Black Forest Cake For Valentines Day

Wishing you all a Happy Valentines Day! 

And what's a valentines day without some chocolate cake? It just has to be, right?

And when it just has to be, why not add some cherries as well?

This is another simple black forest cake recipe- source is from a favorite recipe app on my ipad. The Myrecipes.com daily indulgence app. If you have an ipad and love to bake, just buy the app. Even if you don't bake all the recipes on there, it sure brings a smile and a drool every single day.

Here's the ingredient list. I modified the original recipe very little - reduced the cocoa and used butter instead of shortening. 

1 can sweetened condensed milk

1/2 cup butter (1 stick)

2 Large Eggs

All Purpose Flour - 1 3/4 cup

2/3 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup cocoa powder

2 tsps baking powder

2 tsps baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup hot water

1 cup dark or semi sweet chocolate morsels

1 can cherry pie filling

Mix all the dry ingredients together - flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and mix well.

Combine condensed milk, brown sugar, butter and eggs and mix well until combined.

When that's done, add the dry ingredients and mix well.

When the batter is almost done, add the 1/4 cup of hot water to the batter and mix once well.

Keep your pans ready. Since it is indeed valentines day, I used the two heart pans I had. I loved the cute little bundt pan...but it sure is little, so added my big heart pan as well. Grease and flour them.

Here's the batter ready. It looks chocolatey enough but wait..

...just go ahead and add the chocolate morsels. Trust me, this bite is beautiful while eating the cake!

Pour in pans and bake at 350F for about 25-30 mins or until it passes the toothpick test.

Here are the cakes ready to go..

This is pretty. Yes.

This is also good. Yes.

But this way, its pretty good indeed! YES!

                                           

Drizzle the cherry pie filling on top of the cake. And drool just like the cherry syrup.

I love you so much that I gave you more than one of my hearts!

Someone else here is also drooling at the cake.

Introducing to all you - my little girl Aadhya! Can't believe she's already three months. This is the reason you all don't see me often on here now. I can't believe how someone so little takes over the lives of multiple people! However all that is pure joy and I'm loving every moment of it.

Can I jump inside the cake daddy?

 Make this luscious cake and impress your loved ones.

Happy Valentines Day to all of you!!

Enjoy. Peace Out!

Red White and Blue - A colorful dessert with Pound Cake

The timing to bake a cake for the Sweet Punch Series could not have been better. It was the 4th of July weekend and like every other year, we attend a neighborhood potluck to get together, chit chat and get to know our neighbors. And of course, all the getting to know happens in the middle of a lot of food. And I did not have to think twice on what to take. I just had the pound cake recipe ready and knew exactly what to do with it.

This is a really easy and basic recipe but gives you the the perfect pound cake. However, this recipe yields a  smaller cake - perfect for one loaf pan. So, if you need more quantity, either double or bake it twice. I've made many pound cakes before because the pound cake is probably the only cake that my hubby actually eats. He calls it his tea cake and loves to bite into it with a cup of hot tea or coffee. Simple pleasures! Here another pound cake I baked for his birthday!

Pound cakes can be used as a base for many desserts or of coruse can be eaten as is. One of the best ways to use them is to make a trifle with some pound cake, whipped cream and fresh berries or cherries. That is a combination from dessert heaven! This time though, I wanted the same combination but wanted to change the presentation a little bit and make it all red, white and blue to celebrate the special day. So, I baked the pound cake, chopped it up into little biteable pieces, added some fresh strawberries for the red and blueberries for the blue and of course topped it off with some whipped cream. What's not to like in this!

Here's the recipe from Rose's The Cake Bible for a perfect pound cake. I actually made two cakes. Used one for the potluck and the other was just for the family to munch on and shared a little with friends from work too. Like I always say - good things are meant to be shared!

3 tbsp Milk
3 large Eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1 1/2 cup sifted cake flour
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
13 tbsp Unsalted butter , softened

Let's get started.

Sift together all the dry ingredients and keep in a small mixing bowl.

In another small bowl, add the milk, vanilla essence and 3 eggs. Whisk together well and set aside.

In the mixer bowl, add all the dry ingredients, softened butter and sugar and mix together, starting at low speed and moving up to medium speed. Add 1/3 of the egg mixture and mix till the moist batter starts to form. Then, while the mixer is still on, add the rest of the egg mixture in two batches. Scrap down the sides if needed. Mix just until you see no more dry ingredients. The batter is ready.

Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan or a square pan. Since I was anyways going to cut them into small bits, I did not mind that this could be a flat cake. If you need tall slices, use a loaf pan or a small bundt pan.

Bake in a 350F preheated oven for about 25-30 mins or until the toothpick test passes.

Cool down the cake and serve it any way you like.

If you are making dessert for a small party at home for a few friends, this makes a wonderful individual trifle dessert. Mix it up with whipped cream or even condensed milk and add some fresh fruits in here. Can you imagine a condensed milk soaked pound cake topped off with mangoes?? How awesome would that be? If I made that, I doubt there will be any left over for the friends!

For a bigger party or a potluck, get your creative hat on and present it in a way to suit the occasion. You have one of the most versatile ingredients at hand - so go as crazy as you can and pep up the party.

Here's my red, white and blue platter lined with whipped cream and topped with some festive 4th of July confetti.

Thank you Sweet Punch team for making my potluck planning easy and also for a wonderful pound cake recipe!

Enjoy. Peace Out!

Pineapple Upside Down Cake

A traditional classic. Juicy, sweet and soft Pineapple Upside cake.

Yesterday was the hubby's bday and his favorite cake of all time is a simple pound cake. And I make it religiously every year for him for our own little family celebration. He is a guy who does not eat any other type of cake. The chocolatey cakes, the black forests, the german chocolates, the carrots cakes, the strawberry cakes etc do not impress him at all. So, its almost by default that he gets his favorite pound cake every year.

But this year, just to dress it up a bit and also since one of his favorite fruits is pineapple, I wanted to bake this for him. And yes, he was happy with it and loved it and ate a couple of slices immediately after cutting it - that's like winning the lottery given his track record!

I looked for a good recipe in multiple places but finally settled with this one from Joy of Baking. Thank you Stephanie Jaworski for a wonderful recipe. I love how moist the inside of the cake was. The outside crust it to die for. maybe not. coz if I'm dead I can't eat the outside crust. Let's just say its worth living for! I wish there was more just just one circle of crust. Not fair.

So here is the ingredient list. This is taken from the Joy of Baking site - Pineapple Upside Down cake. Please refer to the link for a printable and detailed recipe too.

Topping:

4 tablespoons (1/4 cup) (55 grams) unsalted butter

3/4 cup (160 grams) light brown sugar

1 medium pineapple (peeled, quartered, cored, and sliced 1/4 inch thick)

Maraschino cherries or candied cherries (optional)

Cake Batter:

1 1/2 cups (195 grams) all purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature

1 cup (200 grams) granulated white sugar

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

2 large eggs, separated

1/2 cup (120 ml) milk

1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

I've explained the steps with pictures here.

First, let's get ready with the flour mix. Measure out 1 1/2 cups of all purpose flour. I used cake flour. Sift it along with 2 tsps baking powder and 1.4 tsp salt. Sift and set aside.

Now to make the topping that actually goes under the cake.

Before you make this, make sure your cake pan is greased and ready to go. I uses a 9 inch round pan. And I absolutely love the Pillsbury baking spray for pans - just a few sprays and you are ready to go. If you don't have the spray, you can just butter and flour the pan well on the base and the sides.

Take 1 stick of butter (1/4 cup) and melt it in a small pan. As the butter melts, add 3/4 cup of brown sugar and keep stirring. In a few mins, you'll see that the sugar will begin to caramelize. As soon as you see the frothiness come up and the sugar starts forming a ball - just pour it into the pan immediately and swirl the pan around so that it reaches all sides. The caramel will start to thicken immediately and that's totally fine.

 Now add pineapple rings all around on top of the caramel base. I had fresh pineapple at home but chose to use the canned pineapple rings. For one, they are even sized and perfectly ripe pieces and somehow they look a lot more pretty and the much I read, this seems to work better for this type of cake. But make sure you buy the one where the pieces are stored in 100% juice and not just a preservative syrup. Fill the centers with maraschino cherries. If you have pecans, you can fill the open spaces with whole pecans which also tastes great in a PUDC.  I actually filled a few more holes here with more cherries.

Pre heat the oven to 350F.

Separate 2 eggs in and save the yolks and whites in two different bowls.

Move the egg whites to an electric mixer or use a hand held mixer to whip up. Add 1/4 tsps of cream of tartar to the egg whites and whip them together for a few mins until you see soft white peaks. Move this out of the bowl and save aside.

Wash the bowl one time, paper dry and then add the butter and sugar in here and mix until you get a nice fluffy mix. That will be 1/2 cup butter and 1 cup white sugar.

Add 1 tsp of good quality vanilla extract and mix again with the butter and sugar.

Now add the 2 saved egg yolks one at a time and mix well along with the rest of the ingredients.

Once the eggs are incorporated well, add the flour mixture and 1/2 cup of milk alternately starting and ending with the flour mix. Scrape down the sides and make sure all the flour is incorporated well. The batter will feel really thick at this point but the next step will take care of that.

Finally, remove the bowl from the mixer and gently fold in the egg whites to the cake batter.

Gently move all the batter on top of the pineapple slices in the cake pan. And smooth down the batter on top.

Pop it in the oven for about 45 mins or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let the cake cool down for about 10 mins.

Using a thin spatula or a knife, run around the edges once to ease the cake out.

Place your cake stand on top and invert it all together.

Tada. Big smile. Wide Smile. Warm feeling. Bliss!

I should have waited a few more mins. The center of my cake split a little bit but you can't really see it unless you look for it. So, don't be in a hurry - just let it rest for 10 mins before you flip it around.

The best part of the cake was the caramel oozing out! Ooohh I loved it!

As you can see the texture inside was perfect. The cake was supremely soft to eat. I think the milk and the egg whites do the trick!

You can serve with whipped cream if you like. Here is a little mango whipped cream that I made for a mango cake last week. The pineapple and the mango flavors mix beautifully and it was just a total pleasure to eat.

So, what are you waiting for? Go make some fancy schmancy pineapple upside down cake for yourself!

Like I said, Bliss.

Enjoy! Peace Out!