Monday, December 22, 2014

Fresh Cranberry Muffins #MuffinMonday

A delicious muffin made with fresh cranberries in a vanilla batter which lets the cranberry flavor shine through. These babies would be perfect for Christmas morning or for bringing along to a Christmas brunch. 

T'is the season for fresh cranberries in the United States, and from the looks of the refrigerated supermarket shelves here in Dubai, the trend has spread. Last year I had a comment on muffins I had made with dried cranberries, asking if they could be made with fresh as well. So this recipe is for my friend, Marilyn, who lives in cranberry country, that is to say, the US northeast. I have been a regular reader of her blog, Communicating Across Boundaries,  since I connected with her through a post about Egypt, where I was living at the time and she had lived for many years. I knew I’d met a kindred expat spirit as I read about her struggles to fit in and at the same time maintain traditions while living overseas and raising children. And with the challenges of moving back to the US after a life abroad. Every word she publishes enlightens me and makes me think. If you are a third culture kid or are raising some, I am sure you will love her too.

Along with fresh cranberry muffins, may each of you enjoy the wonderful Christmas I wish also for Marilyn and her family!

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups or 170g fresh cranberries
1 cup or 200g sugar, plus two tablespoons
2 cups or 250g flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup or 120ml milk
2 eggs
1/4 cup or 60g butter, melted and cooled
1 teaspoon vanilla

Method
Preheat your oven to 350°F or 180°C and prepare your 12-cup muffin pan by greasing it or by lining it with paper muffins cups.

Chop the cranberries roughly and put them in a bowl. Separate 12 little pieces of cranberry to top the muffins with before baking, if desired. Sprinkle the rest with the 2 tablespoons extra sugar and toss to combine.



In a large mixing bowl, combine the rest of the sugar and the flour, along with the baking powder and salt.



In a smaller mixing bowl, whisk together the milk, eggs, melted butter and vanilla.



Add your sugared cranberries in the dry ingredient bowl and toss them lightly with a spoon to coat them.

Fold your wet ingredients into your dry ones until just combined. You may still see a little flour showing and that’s okay.



Divide the batter between the muffins cups. Top with reserved pieces of cranberry, if you kept some back.



Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden and a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool for a few minutes and then remove the muffins to a wire rack to cool completely.




Enjoy!


Friday, December 19, 2014

Holiday Mint M&M Chocolate Fudge

This quick and easy Holiday Mint M&M Fudge recipe has two layers of both chocolate fudginess and holiday mint M&Ms. Change it up to add the chips or M&Ms of your choice. It's easy to make but hard to give away. You'll want to eat it all yourself.

Food Lust People Love: This quick and easy Holiday Mint M&M Fudge recipe has two layers of both chocolate fudginess and holiday mint M&Ms. Change it up to add the chips or M&Ms of your choice. It's easy to make but hard to give away. You'll want to eat it all yourself.


So, Christmas Week comes to a close with this fifth and final day. Now the actual holiday baking of pecan pies and roast turkeys begins! I told a friend jokingly today that our Christmas dinner was already cooked. All organized! And she took me seriously. Truth is, I don’t have one thing done. Oh, sure! I’ve been making candy and baking cakes and muffins but those are just welcome extras. At our house, there’s got to be turkey and stuffing. Or baked Christmas ham with pineapple, brown-sugar-mustard glaze and those weird cherries that look so cool but that no one eats. Does anybody anywhere eat those?!

The first year I started this blog, I wrote about my grandmother who always made a variety of fudges for presents at Christmas time. It was kind of a competition between her and her sisters to see who made the best.  The two I remember best were a snow white divinity fudge and a chocolate pecan fudge, both of which I’ve tried to replicate.

I think my grandmother would have been thrilled at the ease of the fudge I've made for you today. No thermometers or tricks. Just boil, simmer, mix and pour.

Make sure you scroll on down to see all the Day 5 treats my fellow Christmas Week bloggers have made for you.

Ingredients
3 cups or 600g granulated sugar
2/3 cup or 150ml evaporated milk
3/4 cup or 170g butter
7 oz or 200g marshmallow creme
12 oz or 340g semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cup or 9.9oz or 280g Holiday Mint M&Ms, divided in half

Method
Line a 9x13 in or 23x33cm pan with parchment paper and spray with non-stick spray, below to help it stay in place and on top to help the fudge turn loose later.

In a large pot, combine your sugar, evaporated milk and butter over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil, stirring often.



Reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. It’s still going to bubble gently the whole time since that is the nature of sugary candy.

Remove the pot from the heat; add the marshmallow creme and chocolate chips, stirring until the mixture is smooth. Then stir in the vanilla and salt.






Pour half of the mixture into your prepared pan and spread it around.

Scatter half of the M&Ms over the fudge.

Food Lust People Love: This quick and easy Holiday Mint M&M Fudge recipe has two layers of both chocolate fudginess and holiday mint M&Ms. Change it up to add the chips or M&Ms of your choice. It's easy to make but hard to give away. You'll want to eat it all yourself.


Spread the remaining fudge over the top. Shake the pan to help the fudge spread out in the pan.

Sprinkle the remaining M&Ms into the fudge. Shake the pan gently again. The hot fudge will continue to spread. Tap the M&Ms gently to make sure they are stuck into the fudge.

Food Lust People Love: This quick and easy Holiday Mint M&M Fudge recipe has two layers of both chocolate fudginess and holiday mint M&Ms. Change it up to add the chips or M&Ms of your choice. It's easy to make but hard to give away. You'll want to eat it all yourself.


Allow the fudge to cool until firm. Cut into squares.

Food Lust People Love: This quick and easy Holiday Mint M&M Fudge recipe has two layers of both chocolate fudginess and holiday mint M&Ms. Change it up to add the chips or M&Ms of your choice. It's easy to make but hard to give away. You'll want to eat it all yourself.


Store in an airtight container. This stuff makes excellent gifts if you can bear to give it away.

Still looking for Christmas inspiration? We’ve got you covered!

Pin this Holiday Mint M&M Fudge!

Food Lust People Love: This quick and easy Holiday Mint M&M Fudge recipe has two layers of both chocolate fudginess and holiday mint M&Ms. Change it up to add the chips or M&Ms of your choice. It's easy to make but hard to give away. You'll want to eat it all yourself.

.

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Dark Chocolate Mint Truffle Mini Bundts #BundtBakers

Homemade dark chocolate mint truffles make these darling little Bundts special. Start at least one day ahead to make sure the truffles have time to set and freeze before baking your little cakes. 

Technically this is not part of the official Christmas Week posts but, seriously, what is more Christmassy than mint? I'm thinking candy canes, After Eights, York Peppermint Patties and all manner of candy bark with crushed mints. I submit to you, nothing is! That is why I was delighted when this month’s Bundt Baker host, Laura from The Spiced Life chose mint as our theme. And since my younger daughter is now home for the holidays, I went with one of her favorites, mint and chocolate. From the time she was tiny, her favorite candy has been those York peppermint patties. It’s a classic combination.

Make sure you scroll on down to the bottom of my recipe to see the mint delights that all the other Bundt Bakers have created for you today.

Ingredients
For the truffles:
1/3 cup + 5 teaspoons or 100ml whipping cream
7 oz or 200g dark chocolate, broken into pieces (I used one bar of plain dark and one bar of dark with mint to add more minty goodness.)
1 1/2 teaspoons mint extract
Cocoa and/or powdered sugar, for rolling

For the cake:
1 1/2 cups or 190g plain flour
1 cup or 200g sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup or 27g best-quality cocoa powder
3/4 cup or 170g unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2/3 cup or 150ml sour cream

For the mint glaze:
1 cup or 125g confectioner’s or icing sugar
1/2 teaspoon mint extract
1-2 tablespoons milk

Method
First we need to make the truffles. They are super easy but the chocolate/cream mixture needs time to set before rolling into balls. And then you want to freeze them before adding them to the batter to bake. So, as mentioned in the headnote, start a day early.

The Truffles
Bring the cream just to the boil in a pan or in a microwaveable bowl in the microwave oven. Remove from the stove or microwave and stir in the mint extract and chocolate.

You could eat this with a spoon. Try not to. 

Stir until melted. Cool, then chill in the refrigerator until the mixture is solid, about 2-3 hrs.

Scoop out teaspoons of the mixture and roll into tiny balls with your hands, then roll the balls in cocoa or powdered sugar.

You want at least 24 balls (two per mini Bundt) but will probably get many more since they have to be small to fit in and on the little Bundts. Not to worry. They are delicious and any extras will get eaten. Freeze the truffles till you are ready to bake.

I did half cocoa and half powdered sugar. And yes, there are three big ones. I got tired of rolling when I had enough little ones. 


Okay, so it’s the next day now, right? And your tiny truffles are frozen. On to the cake!

This recipe is from Nigella’s Feast and could not be easier. She chucks everything straight in the food processor but I like to sift my dry ingredients (except the sugar) since sometimes they have lumps. Feel free to follow her method. Original recipe can be found online here.

The Cake Batter
Preheat oven to 350°F or 180°C. Grease and flour your mini Bundt pan or use that baking spray that has flour in it.

Measure your flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a bowl and mix well.

Put the rest of the cake ingredients - sugar, butter, eggs, vanilla and sour cream - into a food processor. Sift the dry ingredients into the processor.



Process until you have a smooth, thick batter.

You could also eat this with a spoon. Try not to.


Put one scoop of batter into each cup. Press one mint truffle into the batter then top with the remaining batter. I put the powdered sugar ones in the cakes and saved the cocoa ones for on top.



Bake in your preheated oven for about 18-20 minutes or until the tops are springy to the touch. Clearly the toothpick-in-the-middle test won’t work here.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes then turn the Bundts out to cool on a wire rack. I trimmed the overhanging edges off of my mini Bundts to neaten them up but you can leave yours on if you want.



While the Bundts cool, mix up your glaze.

The Glaze
Put the powdered sugar into a small mixing bowl with the mint extract and one tablespoon of milk. Stir well.



Keep adding milk a 1/2 teaspoon at a time until you get the pouring consistency you desire. I like a thick glaze but some people prefer thinner so you have to be the judge.

When the little Bundts are cooled completely, pour or drizzle on the glaze. I like to use a piping bag because it’s less messy than actual drizzling and I have more control.



Top each mini Bundt with a little chocolate mint truffle.



Enjoy!

The truffle inside makes a nice minty,chocolate rich bite near the top of the mini Bundt.






Bundt Bakers Logo


Your Bundts with mint! We've got 'em!

What is Bundt Bakers? It's a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme. Follow our Bundt Bakers Pinterest board for incredible Bundt cake recipes and inspiration.  You can find information and links to the recipes for each month in our  #BundtBakers page.

How is the monthly theme determined? We take turns hosting each month and the host gets to choose the theme/ingredient.

Would you like to join in the fun? If you are a food blogger, send an email with your blog name and url to foodlustpeoplelove@gmail.com.

.