Recipe #15: "At Home" Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting

I know how much I’ve talked about loving desserts on here (and I know you are wondering if I am seriously huge by now, and the answer is actually no…..thanks to weight watchers J), but I think one of my favorite sweet treats is peanut butter & chocolate ice cream from Baskin Robbins.  Second to that would be peanut butter cups.  This duo is simply the best, so combining them in cupcake form sounded heavenly!

Somehow I thought this recipe would act differently than all of Ina’s other cake recipes at altitude…..even though it is still a cake recipe, something about it being in tiny, individual portions might make it work?  Mmmm, no such luck.

The cupcakes were a cinch to make, but unfortunately, they didn’t rise (see pic below).  I was expecting them to be an eggy mess like the other cakes I’ve made, but they weren’t!  The cake itself still tasted good, so I decided to make the frosting anyway and treat the sunken cake centers as a of tasty trough for extra frosting :)  I think you have to eat them with a fork because the batter somehow is stuck to the cupcake liners.  Oh well!

A note to all of my fellow contessas: A small carton of buttermilk or whipping cream is the EXACT equivalent of 1 cup.  Just a tip so that you don’t buy a larger carton and end up having it go to waste like I’ve done a dozen times. 

I am excited that our Denver farmer’s markets opened for the season this past weekend!  Berry contessa recipes, here I come!!!

Recipe #1 Ressurected: Cheesecake Perfection!

I think that if achieving dessert contessa status was like the girl scouts, I think I just got a new badge J  This week, I wanted to do a throw back to my first recipe by trying to tweak it!  Perfect place to test my creation?  Easter dinner with the fam J

This time, I used less lemon zest, a different cream cheese mixturee, more fruit (which I changed to strawberries because they were out of raspberries at the market), and made the crust more evenly pressed in the pan. 

I was SO excited to hear literally no complaints or even suggestions (not that I don't love them, but their absence was due to the fact that my family and coworkers were mmmm-ing too much to critique!).  I am normally so critical of my creations, and even I was super satisfied. 

Note for anyone making a fruit topping with a jelly syrup: don’t worry if it seems too saucy!  Cheesecake seems to be thick enough that the topping doesn’t seep in….thank goodness!  I was semi-freaking out that the cake was going to be ruined by getting soggy in the car on the way over to my mom's). 

Ps: I missed last week’s blog as I was in Vegas (woohoo!), so I will need to make up a recipe at some point.   I guess that’s what summers are for J

Recipe #14: "At Home" Black & White Angel Food Cake

Making this recipe was super extra special because one of my best friends came to visit and we got to make it together!!  It was fantastic being able to make something together while laughing, bonding, and relaxing the weekend away!

The recipe itself was the exact same as the lemon angel food cake recipe, and even though I love lemon stuff, this angel food cake was to die for.  Between us and our husbands, we finished the whole thing off in 2 days. 

Lauren was such a trooper….she did most of the manual labor!  She ended up sifting the flour/sugar mixture (and exactly like me in the lemon angel food cake recipe, was like “really Ina?!”).  Between the sifting and the chocolate grating, she was joking that she definitely got her arm workout for the day.  By itself, the cake was awesome, but the melted chocolate on top made it a definite repeat. 

Comforting friends, comforting food….what more can you ask for J

Recipe #13: "At Home" Lemon Yogurt Cake

I love lemon stuff.  It is the perfect spring/summer flavor!  Ina definitely has great citrus desserts…..partly because I think she is a little heavy-handed with citrus zest.

This one is absolutely wonderful.  This is a lot like the Family Style Orange Pound Cake recipe.  While it is a little more work, the sugar & citrus juice she has you pour over the cooling cake definitely makes it even more moist and flavorful.  With the orange pound cake, the consensus was that I should top it with more glaze, so that’s exactly what I did with this one, and I think it is absolutely perfect.  Totally bringing this to a summer bbq!

By the way, my friend Andra bought and left me a handheld citrus juicer in my box the other week!  It definitely came in handy for the freshly squeezed lemon juice needed in this recipe (thanks Andra!).  I will now be deleting that off of my wish list and adding a glass cake pedestal with a dome top J I think it will be the perfect holder for most of the sweet treats I am making. 

Recipe #12: "At Home" Betty's Chocolate Cake

New book!!!  I think Ina’s Family Style is my favorite recipe book, but Barefoot Contessa At Home is a VERY close second.

I was so excited about this first recipe because as I have been working hard to shed a few pounds (already back to pre-baby weight!), Sunday is my day to have a little cheat, and chocolate cake was right up my alley this week!  More importantly though, I wanted to make a sweet treat for my dear sister who could have used a pick-me-up.  Unfortunantly, things didn’t go as planned….

I hate hate hate saying this because goodness knows, I love ya Ina, but your cakes DO NOT work at altitude!  After following every step exactly as intended (now sifting when called for, eggs at room temp, etc.), the result was a chocolate version of the Family Style flag cake.  Excitement squashed. 

A fellow teacher who is a baking-at-altitude veteran actually looked at the Flag Cake recipe to see if anything was amiss.  Perhaps I will have her do the same with this one....

Recipe #11: "Family Style" Tiramisu

I definitely think THE best tiramisu you can find is at an Italian restaurant called Maggiano’s.  It is SOOOO good there….perfection in fact, and it is the main reason why I wanted to have our rehearsal dinner there J I would love to make something comparable to that, so I was excited and nervous to take on this recipe.

This is a no-bake, so it goes without saying that it was pretty easy.  The hardest part was actually finding lady fingers!  I didn’t really know what these things were, so looking in the right area was sort of a challenge….by the way, who came up with this name anyway?  When I actually found them (at the 3^rd grocery store I visited mind you), I was surprised to find that they looked more like fat-sausage fingers than the “lady-like” ones I was envisioning. 

I took the finished product over to a dear friend who is tiramisu –aficionado.  I warned her that it was a bit rummy for my taste.  She gave me some great suggestions (thanks Carolyn!), at and the end of her tiramisu taster, we were both sure that she was a little toasty J  Next time, I think I will use more espresso, less rum, and soak the lady fingers more for a perfect little concoction!

Recipe #10: "Family Style" Chocolate Mousse

Oh.  My.  Goodness. 

Heaven (or something close to it) is how I would describe this recipe.

This recipe is SO good, I barely have the words to express how insanely rich and scrumptious it is.  Ina actually calls for Grand Marnier as well as Cognac, but I selfishly did not want to purchase a $33 bottle when I only needed a minimal amount of each alcohol.  I took a risk and decided to leave out the alcohol, and it paid off because no one could tell the difference!  Chocolate, coffee, vanilla, sugar, etc…..mmmmmm!!! The texture was moussy-smooth and the flavor was so decadent.  Bill definitely liked it (always a plus), and my sister said this is her new favorite recipe that I have made (and she is very discerning). 

Woohoo!  I am on a roll J