Camel Milk Caramel Basbousa #CreativeCookieExchange

Basbousa are little squares or diamonds made with semolina dough that are traditionally topped with almonds and then soaked with rose flavored syrup when hot. For a twist to the typical recipe, I’ve soaked mine in caramel syrup made out of camel milk. 

Sometimes for these Creative Cookie Exchange posts I have a recipe in mind – sometimes even baked - weeks ahead of time because our organizer, Laura from The Spiced Life reveals the theme several months in advance, to help us plan. But this month, with the delicious theme of caramel, I just wasn’t finding inspiration anywhere. Until my fellow CCE member, co-creator of Bread Bakers and friend, Renee from Magnolia Days asked the following question in the group: “Does dulce de leche count as caramel or is it strictly caramel for the May event?” This set off a flurry of comments where several of us defended dulce as absolutely a caramel and got me thinking about the camel milk cajeta or dulce de leche sitting in my refrigerator. It does keep for months, but why not use some of it in a cookie? So the wheels started turning.

Camel milk caramel can certainly be put in any cookie. But wouldn’t it be fun to find an Arabic one to use it in? Hence, the basbousa. With their traditional sugar syrup, I’ve always found basbousa too sweet – and I’m not a fan of rose water and rose essence, which taste like eating soap to me – but with the addition of the sweet and slightly salty camel milk caramel, they are perfect. Another treat entirely.

So, with my apologies to the Arabic world in general, and Egypt in particular, I've adapted from this recipe from SBS.com.au.  Do watch the video if you are making the original, because the instructions differ from the written recipe. I’ve written mine to include the half hour rest, for instance.

Ingredients
1 1/8 cups or 215g coarse semolina
3/4 cup or 50g freshly grated coconut
1/2 cup or 100g sugar
1/4 cup or 30g flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup or 100g thick yogurt or crème fraîche
7 tablespoons or 100g unsalted butter, melted and cooled
16-30 whole almonds, depending on how small you cut your basbousa.

For the caramel syrup:
1/2 cup or 120ml dulce de leche, cajeta or thick caramel. I used a camel milk version, instructions here.
1-2 teaspoons milk

Method
Grease an 8x8 in or 20x20cm baking pan and set it aside.

Mix the semolina, coconut, sugar, flour, baking powder and salt together in a large bowl.

Add in the yogurt and melted, cooled butter and mix well.

Your dough should be fairly stiff but pliable.

Spread the mixture with your hands into your greased baking pan. Make sure to get it right up to the sides and nice and even.

Cover with a towel and let rest for half an hour. When the time is almost up, preheat the oven to 350°F or 180°C.

Cut the dough into diamond shapes then press an almond into each one. I chose to cut mine pretty small, but you can certainly cut yours larger. You just won’t need as many almonds then.

Bake in your preheated oven for 20–25 minutes or until golden brown. While it's baking make the caramel syrup.

Put the stiff caramel in the microwave in a microwave safe bowl and warm it slightly, just to loosen it. Add a little milk to make it even more runny and stir well till the milk is completely incorporated. You are looking for the consistency of maple or chocolate syrup.

Right when the hot cake comes out of the oven, pour the caramel syrup over it.

It sits there for a few short minutes.

Then it sinks in, leaving the almonds with a lovely shine.

Cool to serve and use a sharp knife to cut through again and lift them out.

Enjoy! Basbousa is a term of endearment in Arabic meaning something like "little sweet," so make these for your basbousa.

Are you looking for more caramel cookie goodness? Here you go!

• Basement Brownies from Sidewalk Shoes
• Camel Milk Caramel Basbousa from Food Lust People Love
• Caramel Cashew Cookies from Our Good Life
• Caramel Coconut Cookies from Basic N Delicious
• Caramel Shortbread Cookie Strips from Magnolia Days
• Caramel Thumbprint Cookies from Cookie Dough and Oven Mitt
• Caramelized White Chocolate and Cranberry Cookies from Baking Yummies
• Chocolate Caramel Shortbread Bars from The Spiced Life
• Chocolate Caramel Rocks from Karen’s Kitchen Stories
• Chocolate Walnut Caramel Stuffed Cookies from Noshing with the Nolands
• Eggless Vanilla-Caramel Biscotti from What Smells So Good?
• Millionaire Shortbread Bars from Spice Roots
• Salted Caramel Butter Cookies from Simply Veggies
• Salted Caramel Macarons from A Baker’s House
• Take 5 Caramel Oatmeal Cookies from 2 Cookin’ Mamas

If you are a blogger and want to join in the fun, contact Laura at thespicedlife AT gmail DOT com and she will get you added to our Facebook group, where we discuss our cookies and share links.

You can also use us as a great resource for cookie recipes - be sure to check out our Pinterest Board and our monthly posts. You can find all of them on our home page at The Spiced Life. We post all together on the first Tuesday after the 15th of each month!

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Classic Crème Caramel #BundtBakers

Rich, flavorful caramel? Check. Soft, spoonable custard? Check. Sticky sweet baked sides? Check. This classic crème caramel ticks all the boxes and, since it’s baked in a Bundt pan, it’s pretty too. Perfect for a party.

Many years ago, I somehow got the impression that crème caramel, aka flan, was my younger daughter’s favorite dessert. It must have been a weird conversation because she got the impression that it was mine.

It took us years, years I tell you, to figure out that we both misunderstood. Truth is, we both like it but it is not our favorite dessert. That may have changed for me with this recipe. I’m not a huge sweet lover but this crème caramel is just the perfect amount of sweet. It’s the creamiest, the softest, the very best crème caramel I’ve ever tasted. Seriously.

Classic Crème Caramel

This recipe is adapted from one shared a couple of years ago by my fellow Bundt Baker, Felice from All That’s Left Are the Crumbs. It couldn’t be easier to make since the custard ingredients are blitzed together in a blender. The caramelized sugar is a little bit tricky but very manageable. I promise you the effort is worth it.

Ingredients
6 large eggs
1 can (weight - 14 oz or 396g) sweetened condensed milk
1 1/2 cups or 354ml evaporated milk
1 1/2 cups or 354ml whole milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups or 250g sugar

Method
Preheat oven to 350℉ or 180℃.
Place your eggs in the blender and blend on medium high for about 15 seconds. I suggest you crack each egg into a small bowl before adding them to the blender. If you add a bad egg to the mix, you'll have to throw them all out and start again. Better safe than sorry.

Add the sweetened condensed milk, evaporated milk and whole milk to the blender, along with the vanilla. Blend on medium high for 30 seconds; set aside.

Place sugar in a dry saucepan and cook over medium high heat for about 5 minutes, until it starts to melt and turn golden in a few spots. If it should start to form clumps, break them up with a spoon and cook until the sugar liquefies again and turns completely golden. Be careful to take the syrup off the heat promptly because it can burn easily at this point.

Meanwhile, put a full kettle on to boil. You are going to need enough hot water to fill a roasting pan to at least two inches or 5cm up the side of a 12-cup Bundt pan.

Warm your Bundt pan by sitting it in a bowl with hot tap water. Use a silicone pastry brush to coat the Bundt pan with the golden caramel halfway up the sides of the pan, including the tube in the middle. If you live somewhere really warm, perhaps warming the pan wouldn’t be necessary but my kitchen was chilly and as I brushed the caramel on the cold pan, it solidified immediately. Warming the pan helped.

Place the Bundt pan into a deep roasting pan and carefully fill it with the vanilla custard.

Put the roasting pan with Bundt pan into your preheated oven, then pour hot water into the roasting pan, about 2 in or 5cm up the side of the Bundt pan.

Bake the crème caramel for 55-60 minutes or until an inserted knife comes out clean.

After removing it from the oven, leave it to cool for a few minutes on a wire rack, then use a rounded knife to ease the crème caramel away from the Bundt pan, around the edges and around the center tube.

After the crème caramel has cooled, tilt the Bundt pan back and forth gently, until you can see the caramel oozing up the sides of the pan.

Cover with cling film and refrigerate for at least 6 hours or overnight.

Tilt the Bundt pan again to see how thick your caramel is. Mine was still thin enough to seep up the sides. If yours is very thick, you might want to warm the Bundt pan briefly by setting it in a bowl of warm water to loosen the caramel before turning the crème caramel out.

To turn the crème caramel out of the Bundt pan, invert a rimmed platter on top of the Bundt pan. Note: The rim is very important because we don’t want to have the caramel roll off a flat platter!

Hold the platter tight against the Bundt pan and quickly flip the pan over, being careful not to lose the liquid caramel. I did this over the sink, just in case, but I am pleased to say I didn’t spill a drop. If you have someone nearby who can help you in the kitchen, have them take the platter from you when you flip it over.

Keep the crème caramel chilled until you are ready to cut and serve.

Enjoy!

This month my Bundt Bakers are sharing puddings baked in Bundt pans. Many thanks to our host, Sneha of Sneha’s Recipe, for the great theme and her behind the scenes work. Check out all of the great pudding Bundt recipes:

• Baked Bread Pudding Bundt from Sneha's Recipe
• Banana Pudding Bundt Cake from Making Miracles
• Brioche Chocolate Chip Bread Pudding Bundlets from Sweet Sensations
• Classic Crème Caramel from Food Lust People Love
• Leftover Chocolate Donut Pudding from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Sticky Toffee Pudding Bundt Cake from Patyco Candybar

#BundtBakers is a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme. You can see all of our lovely Bundts by following our Pinterest board. We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient. Updated links for all of our past events and more information about BundtBakers, can be found on our home page.

Pin this Classic Crème Caramel! 

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Caramel Stuffed Brownie Bites #FoodieExtravaganza

These caramel stuffed brownie bites combine the chewiest fudgy brownies with a big square of chewy caramel in the middle. 

I’m one of those kind of people: The kind that buys ingredients with no plan in mind, you know, just in case someday I might need them. A perfect example is the bag of Kraft caramel squares that I’ve been storing in the door of my freezer for going on three years now.

Sure of course they are expired by now, but they’ve been frozen all this time! And I’m pleased to tell you that frozen caramel doesn’t change texture or flavor. You are welcome. 

Caramel Stuffed Brownie Bites

Be sure to liberally oil the mini muffin pan inside the cups and on the tope between them as well. The brownie bites expand over the top and you do not want them to stick. 

Ingredients

2 cups or 400g granulated sugar

1 cup or 125g flour

1 cup or 120g Dutch process cocoa powder

3/4 cup or 94g icing sugar, sifted if lumpy

3/4 cup or 75g semi-sweet chocolate chips

1 teaspoon fine sea salt

3 large eggs

3/4 cup or 180ml canola oil or other light oil, plus extra for pan

3 tablespoons full fat plain Greek style yogurt

3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

24 caramel squares (I used the individually wrapped Kraft ones)

Method

Preheat the oven to 325°F or 163°C. Prepare your 24-cup mini muffin pan by brushing it with oil. 

In a large bowl, whisk together the sugar, flour, cocoa powder, powdered sugar and salt. Now add in the chocolate chips and stir to distribute them well. 

In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, oil, yogurt and vanilla.

Fold the wet ingredients into the dry until barely combined. Fold in the chocolate chips. Don’t over mix.

Spoon half of the thick batter into the muffin pan then poke one (unwrapped!) caramel in each muffin hole.

Cover with the second half of the brownie batter. 

Bake for 25-30 minutes or until the tops are slightly cracked and shiny.

Remove from the oven and set aside to cool on a wire rack for about 25-30 minutes.

Use a heat resistant silicone spatula to carefully release the brownies from the muffin pan.

You may end up deforming them slightly but you can press them back into shape. 

Place them on the wire rack to cool completely. 

Enjoy!

This month my Foodie Extravaganza friends are sharing recipes featuring caramel. Many thanks to our host, Kelley of Simply Inspired Meals. 

• Caramel & Orange Cake Pudding Trifle by Sneha's Recipe
• Caramel Apple Cinnamon Rolls by Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Caramel Butter Bars by Making Miracles
• Caramel Stuffed Brownie Bites by Food Lust People Love
• Disney's Caramel Shortbread by Simply Inspired Meals
• Easy Caramel Modjestkas by Palatable Pastime
• Galaxy Cake by Culinary Adventures with Camilla
• Hopjesvla (Dutch Coffee Custard) by Tara's Multicultural Table
• Salted Caramel Mudslide by A Day in the Life on the Farm

Foodie Extravaganza is where we celebrate obscure food holidays by cooking and baking together with the same ingredient or theme each month. Posting day is always the first Wednesday of each month. If you are a blogger and would like to join our group and blog along with us, come join our Facebook page Foodie Extravaganza. We would love to have you! If you're a spectator looking for delicious tid-bits check out our Foodie Extravaganza Pinterest Board.

Pin these Caramel Stuffed Brownie Bites!

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English Toffee Bundt with Drunken Dulce Drizzle #BundtBakers

Fold bits of toffee candy into a batter rich with cream and deep brown sugar for a tender Bundt replete with caramel and love. Drizzle it lavishly with rum-spiked dulce de leche and you’ve got a full-blown love affair on a cake plate. 

Caramelicious deliciousness
I’m on deadline here, folks, because they are getting ready to turn my power off in a couple of hours – something about upgrading the system – and I’ve got to share this Bundt with you! So, no long story or introduction except to say that it’s BundtBaker time again and our host this month, the talented Lauren of Sew You Think You Can Cook has proclaimed Caramel as our theme.

Caramel comes in many forms but one of my favorites is caramelized condensed milk, otherwise known as dulce de leche. One of my others is toffee, which is basically sugar that’s been caramelized to which butter and/or cream is added. I love to make this candy for holiday gifts. I make it and wrap it and get it out of the house pronto, or I will eat it all, one shard at a time until it’s gone, gone, gone. So buttery, sweet, salty, nutty, in a word, fabulous. It’s kind of a homemade Almond Roca, but with bigger pieces of almond.


It’s not quite holiday gift giving season so I saved myself the calories and bought a box of Almond Roca to use in the cake, every gram of which went in or on the cake. Feel free to use homemade toffee, if you have some.

Ingredients
For the batter:
3 cups or 375g flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 tablespoon cocoa
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups or 300g dark brown sugar

1 1/2 cups  or 355ml whipping cream

3 eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla

1 cup toffee candy, chopped, or 140g

For the drizzle:
3/4 cup or 240g dulce de leche
1 tablespoon dark rum
Good pinch salt

Method
Preheat your oven to 350°F or 180°C and prepare your Bundt pan by greasing it generously with butter or non-stick spray. I’m not even kidding a little bit here. The toffee bits in the batter will melt and stick to your pan if you don’t. I coated mine once with the spray and put it in the refrigerator. Then, when I was ready to fill it, I took it out and gave it another coating of spray. Even so, one piece of toffee tried to stick up near the top, until I loosened it gently with a wooden skewer. You have been warned!

Sift your flour, baking powder, cocoa, baking soda and salt into a large bowl.

Use electric beaters or your stand mixer to beat the cream and brown sugar together for several minutes until the brown sugar is dissolved.

Add in the eggs, one at a time, and beat after each until well combined.

First egg going in. The brown sugar and cream mixture looks good enough to drink!

A few serving spoons at a time, add the flour mixture to the batter, beating well as you go along. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula as well. When it’s all in, beat on high for two minutes.

Fold in about three-quarters of your toffee pieces, reserving one-quarter to decorate the Bundt after the glaze is added.

Pour into your prepared Bundt pan and bake for about one hour or until a wooden skewer comes out clean. If the top starts to darken too much before the center is done, cover it with a piece of foil.

It wasn't that full but, boy, howdy, did it rise while baking!

Allow the Bundt to cool in the pan for about 10 minutes before turning over and out onto a cooling rack. Don’t leave it longer than this because you don’t want the toffee pieces inside to harden and stick to your pan.

Cool completely before attempting to drizzle on the glaze.

To make the glaze, add your one tablespoon of dark rum and the good pinch of salt to the dulce de leche. Stir with a fork or small whisk until the rum is completely incorporated. At first it looks like it’s not going to mix in but persevere.

When the Bundt is completely cool, drizzle on the spiked dulce. You will not use it all and that's okay. I have a plan for the balance.

Now stick on your reserved pieces of toffee.

Serve extra dulce de leche on the side in a shot glass. :)

Enjoy!

Check out all the fabulous caramel Bundts everyone has been baking this month!

• Apple Butter Bundt Cake with Cider Caramel Glaze by Cassie of Cassie's Kitchen
• Apple Pecan Bundt Cake with Caramel Glaze by Aisha of La Cocina de Aisha
• Belle Helene Bundt Cake by Jelena from A Kingdom for a Cake
• Brown Butter Praline Bundt Cake with Salted Caramel Drizzle by Tux of Brooklyn Homemaker
• Caramel Apple Bundt Cake by Kaylin of Keep it Simple, Sweetie
• Caramel Banana Bundt Cake by Kathya of Basic N Delicious
• Caramel Cake with Caramel Cream Cheese Icing by Rebekah of Making Miracles
• Caramel Chocolate Bundt Cake from Natalia of Principiando en la Cocina
• Chocolate Caramel Apple Bundt Cake by Lauren of Sew You Think You Can Cook
• Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake with Peanut Butter Caramel Sauce by Laura of Baking in Pyjamas
• Cornmeal Bundt Cake with Caramel Popcorn by Patricia of Patty's Cake
• English Toffee Bundt with Drunken Dulce Drizzle by Stacy of Food Lust People Love
• Fall Classic Caramel Bundt Cake by Maleka of La Luna en Dulce
• Fair Toffee Apple Bundt by Jane of Jane's Adventures in Dinner
• Milky Way Bundt Cake by Wendy of A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Salted Caramelized White Chocolate Glazed Butterscotch Pecan Bundt Cake by Laura of The Spiced Life
• Snickers Bundt Cake with Caramel Glaze by Bea and Mara of I Love Bundt Cakes
• Spiced Apple Bundt Cake with a Caramel Brickle Drizzle by Teri of The Freshman Cook
• Spiced Caramel and Pear Bundt Cake by Rocío of Kids&Chic
• Three Flavor Zebra Bundt Cake - Vanilla, Caramel and Chocolate by Caro of En la Cocina de Caro

What is BundtBakers? 
#BundtBakers is a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme.  Follow our Pinterest board right here. Links are also updated each month on the BundtBakers home page.

We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient.

Would you like to join us? 
If you are a food blogger and would like to join us, just send an email with your blog URL to foodlustpeoplelove@gmail.com.