Swiss Almond Vanilla Muffins #MuffinMonday

Fluffy rich vanilla muffins are studded with chocolate covered almonds in these Swiss almond vanilla muffins which I created to match the flavors of my husband’s favorite Häagen-Dazs ice cream.

From as far back as I can remember, my husband’s favorite ice cream has been Swiss Almond Vanilla, made by Häagen-Dazs, sold in the pint-sized containers. He doesn’t eat a lot of ice cream so the occasional pint was a rare treat. Then it started getting harder and harder to find.

When we moved to Dubai, there was a small Häagen-Dazs outlet in our neighborhood so I stopped in to inquire about his favorite flavor. The guy had never heard of it. He checked online and then delivered the bad news. It was now called “vanilla Swiss almond” and apparently flavors vary by region.  Sadly, vanilla Swiss almond isn’t made in the Middle East.

Not being a person who gives up easily, I figured I had two choices. I could make my own or I could fudge it. I bought a pint of Häagen-Dazs vanilla bean ice cream. I let it soften slightly then I mixed in a package of good quality chocolate-covered almonds. I scooped my newly created Swiss Almond Vanilla back into the Häagen-Dazs tub, perched the lid on top (since it didn’t quite all fit in now) and popped it in the freezer.

As we sat around last week brainstorming muffin ideas, my husband reminded me of that story and said he’d like some Swiss Almond Vanilla Muffins. Which sounded like a splendid idea to me!

Swiss Almond Vanilla Muffins

Ingredients
2 cups or 250g flour
3/4 cup or 150g sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup or 240ml sour cream
1/4 cup or 60ml milk
1/4 cup or 60ml vegetable oil
1 egg
1 tablespoon vanilla bean paste (or sub vanilla extract)
1 cup or about 180g chocolate covered almonds, divided

Method
Preheat oven to 375°F or 190°C. Lightly grease 12 muffin cups or line the pan with paper baking cups.

Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large mixing bowl.

In a smaller bowl, whisk together the sour cream, milk, oil, egg and vanilla paste.

Fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until just moistened. Set aside 12 of the chocolate-covered almonds for decoration and fold the rest into the batter.

Use a scoop or tablespoon to divide the batter between the 12 muffin cups. Top each with a reserved chocolate-covered almond, pressing the candy gently into the batter.

Bake 17-22 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center of muffins comes out clean.

Enjoy!

Can you find Vanilla Swiss Almond Häagen-Dazs ice cream in your neck of the woods? Do let me know. And make sure you check out all the creative muffins my Muffin Monday group have for you today!

• Ackee and Saltfish Muffins from Passion Kneaded
• Apple Cinnamon Muffins from Farm Fresh Feasts
• Bacon Gruyere Muffins from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Butternut Squash Raisin Mini Muffins from Sew You Think You Can Cook
• Lemony Olive Oil Muffins from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Swiss Almond Vanilla Muffins from Food Lust People Love
• Zucchini Walnut Muffin from Palatable Pastime

#MuffinMonday is a group of muffin loving bakers who get together once a month to bake muffins. You can see all our of lovely muffins by following our Pinterest board.

Updated links for all of our past events and more information about Muffin Monday, can be found on our home page.

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Homemade Vanilla Custard

So easy to make and much more delicious than the box, homemade vanilla custard is a great dessert itself, or heap it in a baked pie crust with bananas and top with whipped cream for something really special.

Last March I shared a story with you about a lovely man and his love of banana cream pie. But it occurred to me that the vanilla custard itself deserved its own post so folks can find it with a quick search. It's simple to make and you can use it in a trifle or as filling between layers in a special cake or even just eat it with a spoon.

Sure you can use custard powders but they have negligible nutritional value and some odd sounding ingredients, as well as sugar. This custard, on the other hand, has fresh egg yolks, so it would helpful if you are trying to boost the protein in someone's diet. But MOST importantly, it tastes delicious!

The following amounts make a little more than 1 3/4 cups or 425ml of custard. Just so you know.

Homemade Vanilla Custard

The eggs you use make all the difference to the color of the custard. For the photo at the top of this post, I made the custard with the wonderful, almost orange yolked eggs I could buy in Dubai. If your egg yolks aren't so spectacular, and color matters to you (It doesn't to me!) you can always add a little yellow food coloring.

Ingredients
1⁄2 cup or 110g sugar
1⁄3 cup or 42g all-purpose flour
1⁄4 teaspoon salt
2 1⁄4 cups or 530ml milk
4 egg yolks
1 tablespoon or 15g butter
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Method
In 2-quart saucepan (no heat!) mix sugar, flour and salt. Stir in milk until smooth.





Make sure you get ALL the lumps out before turning on the heat.

Over medium heat, cook mixture, stirring constantly, until mixture is thickened and begins to boil (about 10 minutes). Boil one minute. Remove immediately from heat and set aside.





See the tiny bubbles? It's gently boiling.

Separate your egg yolks from your whites, by gently transferring the yolk from one half of the shell to the other, putting the whites directly into a sealable plastic container for the refrigerator. (Later, you can make something lovely with these!) Put the yolks in a bowl with enough room to whisk.





Beat egg yolks quickly with a whisk, while drizzling in about a 1/4 cup of the hot milk mixture. Quick beating and slow drizzling are essential so that you don’t end up with cooked eggs.

Slowly pour egg mixture into the saucepan, stirring rapidly to prevent lumping.

I know it doesn't look like I was quickly stirring but that is just because I fake poured for the camera and then really poured and stirred like crazy after. 

Occasionally, scrape the saucepan with a rubber spatula. 

Over low heat, cook, stirring constantly, until very thick (do not boil) and mixture mounds when dropped from spoon.

Remove from heat; stir in butter and vanilla. 

Congratulations, you have made homemade vanilla custard. Once the butter has melted, pour the custard into a metal bowl. Cover its surface with plastic wrap to prevent skin forming. Refrigerate until set, about four hours. This delicious homemade custard can be used in a variety of desserts when fully set or simply eaten with a spoon when soft set, after it cools.

Enjoy! 

Golden Vanilla Bean Caramels

This is the chocolate that started me off.   

Almost two months ago I had the good fortune to be invited to Geneva to take part in a meeting of company spouses.  We were also treated to some lovely meals and excursions, one of which was the Cailler chocolate factory in Gruyère.    I’ve traveled all over the world, but somehow I had never come across chocolate with caramel and SALT. Ordinarily not a sweet lover, I ate the whole bar, square by square, nibble by nibble until it was completely gone. Then I mourned. Just as well, you say, and you are correct, but that new taste sensation has stayed at the back of my mind now for weeks.

Yesterday, I came across a recipe online, originally from Pure Dessert by Alice Medrich and I knew I had to try it.

Golden Vanilla Bean Caramels
from Pure Dessert by Alice Medrich (And if you, too, love Alice Medrich, check out her blog.) 

Ingredients
1 cup Lyle’s Golden Syrup
2 cups sugar (I used only 1 3/4 cups)
3/8 teaspoon fine sea salt (I used a 1/2 teaspoon since I was trying to approximate my Swiss experience, which was definitely salty.)
2 cups heavy cream
1 1/2 teaspoons pure ground vanilla beans, purchased or ground in a coffee or spice grinders, or 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract (I scraped the seeds out of one fresh bean then threw the whole pod in while heating the cream, taking it out before adding the cream to the sugar mixture as required.)
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into chunks, softened

Equipment
A 9-inch square baking pan
Candy thermometer

Line the bottom and sides of the baking pan with aluminum foil and grease the foil. (Really grease it well or even the foil will stick to this caramel! Mine did in places so clearly my greasing wasn’t thick enough everywhere.) Combine the golden syrup, sugar, and salt in a heavy 3-quart saucepan and cook over medium heat, stirring with a silicone spatula or wooden spoon, until the mixture begins to simmer around the edges. Wash the sugar and syrup from the sides of the pan with a pastry brush dipped in water. Cover and cook for about 3 minutes. (Meanwhile, rinse the spatula or spoon before using it again later.) Uncover the pan and wash down the sides once more. Attach the candy thermometer to the pan, without letting it touch the bottom of the pan, and cook, uncovered (without stirring) until the mixture reaches 305°F. 

Meanwhile, combine the cream and ground vanilla beans (not the extract) in a small saucepan and heat until tiny bubbles form around the edges of the pan. Turn off the heat and cover the pan to keep the cream hot.

When the sugar mixture reaches 305°F, turn off the heat and stir in the butter chunks. Gradually stir in the hot cream; it will bubble up and steam dramatically, so be careful. 

Turn the burner back on and adjust it so that the mixture boils energetically but not violently  Stir until any thickened syrup at the bottom of the pan is dissolved and the mixture is smooth. Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, to about 245°F. (This part seemed to take forever. I had my fire rather low because I didn’t want the mixture to burn but it didn’t seem to go above 225 °F for the LONGEST time, so I raised the flame and the temperature finally began to climb.) Then cook, stirring constantly, to 260°F for soft, chewy caramels or 265°F; for firmer chewy caramels. (Took mine out at 260°F and they are soft and chewy and are a danger to dental fillings for sure!)

Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the vanilla extract, if using it. (I skipped this step since the whole pot was filled with little bitty vanilla seeds and that seemed like enough vanilla.) Pour the caramel into the lined pan. Let set for four to five hours, or overnight until firm.

Lift the pan liner from the pan and invert the sheet of caramel onto a sheet of parchment paper. Peel off the liner. Cut the caramels with an oiled knife. (This DID NOT work very well for me. My well-oiled knife still stuck to the caramels. My kitchen scissors were much more effective in cutting the caramel into squares.) 

Wrap each caramel individually in wax paper or cellophane.  (I used cling film, cutting off a wide strip and lining the squares up in the middle with an inch or two in between each one. I folded the cling film over from the top and then the bottom, pressing a finger down between each caramel. Then I cut the cling film where I had pressed my finger, to separate them.)

  

These caramels are delicious. If I would do anything different next time, it would be to add even more salt flakes to the top. I mashed a lot of them off as I was trying to separate the caramels into squares.

Enjoy!