Recipe: Carrot Cake with Maple Cream Cheese frosting

This is The Best Carrot Cake of All Time. I shit you not. I got the original from Bon Appétit, but I’ve modified it to it’s current excellence.

The original was super oily, so I cut the oil and subbed in some yogurt, so it’s still super moist.

Ingredients

Cake:

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (or a mix of nutmeg, ginger, and allspice)
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup yogurt
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 4 large eggs
• 3 cups grated peeled carrots (about 10 average sized carrots)
• (optional) 2 tablespoons crystallized ginger Read more

Recipe: Muffnuts aka Muffin Donuts

A while back I was pondering one of nature’s biggest mysteries… the doughnut. I thought to myself that there must be a way to recreate the donut at home, in a somewhat healthier manner. I.E. Not fried.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a classic fried doughnut, but they’re really only worth all that evil fattiness if they’re fresh. And I’m not in the habit of getting up at the crack of dawn, which makes getting fresh ‘nuts from the local donut shop hit or miss. Usually miss.

It didn’t take long to find a recipe for a donut-muffin hybrid. A doffin, a duffin, a monut, a muffnut. Call it what you will, I was intrigued.

Last night, having a hankering for something sweet, I decided to test drive the muffnut, and I am pleased to tell you, it passed with flying colors.

 

 

Here’s the recipe, originally from Baking Bites.

(I love the explanations in the recipe. I’m a habitual fiddler when it comes to recipes, so I appreciate someone telling me why I should not fiddle with certain aspects beforehand.)

NOTE: After a lot of comments from other muffnut testers, I thought I should point out that these muffnuts are most similar to cake donuts. If you’re expecting a Krispy Kreme style yeast donut, you’ll likely be disappointed.

 

Cinnamon Sugar Muffnuts

• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour (I used 1 cup white and 1/2 cup white whole wheat with excellent results)
• 2 tsp baking power
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg (fresh! oh yeah!)
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

(for rolling)

• 1 TB butter, melted
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon (optional… you can mix it up and try different spice combos, too!)

 

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Lightly grease a muffin tin with cooking spray or vegetable oil.
2. In a large bowl, beat together sugar and egg until light in color, about 1 minute.
3. Mix in the oil, milk, and vanilla.
4. In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Pour into egg mixture and stir to combine. A few lumps are okay.
5. Divide batter evenly into 12 muffin cups, filling each about 3/4 full.
6. Bake for 14-18 minutes, until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean.
7. While muffins are baking, melt butter and pour remaining 1/2 cup of sugar into a small bowl. Mix in the cinnamon.
8. When muffins are done, lightly brush the top of each with some melted butter, remove from the pan and roll in sugar.
9. Cool on a sheet of parchment paper. (I cooled mine on a wire rack like the original recipe stated, and they kind of stuck. Boo.)

 

Fresh out of the oven, they are nice and crispy on the outside, very much like a donut.

The next day, they’re softer… and somehow they taste even more like a donut, to me.

I can’t wait until fall, because I’ll be experimenting with apple and pumpkin muffnuts, and replacing the coffee with my favorite donut companion, apple cider.

Recipe: Chicken + Spinach Enchiladas

These are not your traditional slathered-in-red-sauce enchiladas. They’re better.

When I first found this recipe and decided to try it, I thought the sauce sounded too simple. Milk, chicken broth, peppers, and spinach? Isn’t that going to be bland? Do I even like corn tortillas? As it turns out, this is one of my all time favorite recipes. I have been known to make it twice in a month because it’s so damn good.

I’ve tweaked the original recipe a little. If you want to see the untweaked version by Rick Bayless, it’s here: http://www.rickbayless.com/recipe/view?recipeID=167

Read more

Recipe: Wonton Soup

I made the full recipe shown below and between the two of us, Mr. Smarmy ate all of it in one day. That’s how awesome it is.

Making the wontons is a little time consuming, but it isn’t difficult. Plus, you’re making a TON.

I used an Emeril recipe as a guide, but put my own spin on it.

Makes 6-8 servings

Ingredients!

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons minced ginger
• 9 scallions, chopped
• 10 cups chicken broth (homemade is always better, trust me)
• 1/2 pound ground chicken
• 1 egg
• 2 teaspoons soy sauce
• 1 1/2 teaspoons rice wine vinegar
• 1/2 teaspoon sesame oil
• 1/4 teaspoon sambal oelek (or crushed red pepper)
• about 30-40 wonton wrappers
• 1 1/2 cups baby spinach
• 4 oz sliced shiitake mushrooms
• 1 small can or package sliced bamboo shoots
• salt and pepper to taste Read more

Avocado Contest + Extreme Avocado Grilled Cheese Recipe

This post brought to you by Hass Avocado Board featuring Hass Avocados. All opinions are 100% mine.

Two of my favorite things in the world are avocado and grilled cheese, so I don’t hesitate to combine the two whenever possible. So when I saw the Kick Off with Hass Avocados Recipe Contest, I new I had to share my concoction with the world.

So I know I’m not the only avocado fiend around… what recipe are you going to enter? Make sure you don’t forget to take a tasty looking photo!

Mr. Smarmy is going to flip if we win!

Tutorial: Moss Graffiti

This tutorial from Popular Mechanics (which is actually an excerpt from More Show Me How) is one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. PAINT WITH MOSS!

The possibilities are endless. I like the idea of writing some sort of message in moss for the neighbors or passers-by to see.

See the full tutorial here.

Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar?

Last night I was watching an episode of Cold Case Files about a serial arsonist that was setting fires in various fabric and craft stores. It was like my own personal nightmare come to life.

Seriously though… the arsonist was a 50 year old man. I’d be very curious to know what a craft store ever did to him. He denies it, of course, so we will never know.

Also last night… I got the bizarre notion of making homemade Oreos in my head. I don’t usually buy stuff like that because I figure if I’m going to eat something wildly unhealthy, I might as well eat the most quality version I can find. And that usually means fresh/homemade.

So I googled and found a recipe.

I did the less sweet version of the cookie, and I halved the recipe.

I also used coconut oil instead of shortening because I realized half way through making them that I didn’t have any shortening… the coconut oil worked perfectly.

My cookies turned out moist and not at all crunchy like the real ones. I like the crunch, but the moist is still damned tasty. And I think they even have a squishy version now, don’t they?

I don’t know if I should have baked them longer, or if it’s just so freaking humid right now that I have no hope for anything crunchy.

However, the moistness was a blessing in disguise, because Mr. Smarmy said they reminded him of Oatmeal Creme Pies. A light bulb went off simultaneously in each of our heads, so today we got supplies to make homemade Oatmeal Creme Pies. Just so you don’t think we’re total baked good fatties, we’re planning on taking some to his family this weekend since they’re camping nearby.

More in food news: for lunch today, I made these homemade renditions of Taco Bell’s mexican pizza from On Cupcake Moon. Genius! I can’t believe I’ve never considered trying to copy this at home, because the mexican pizza (minus the beef – makes me burp) and 7-layer burrito (minus the guac – TB’s guac tastes like vomit) are my go-to TB items.

I used enchilada sauce on top instead of salsa and served it with a blob of sour cream and a few slices of avocado. Oh yeah, my other secret is Chihuahua cheese. It is tasty tasty stuff.

I think next time I might try using shredded chicken or omitting the meat completely because I’m just not into taco meat, burp inducing or not.

Featured Indie Designer – Twinkie Chan

Ladies and gents, prepare to be assaulted by cuteness… Our newest Featured Indie Designer comes from a land of junk food and yarn. I present to you: TwinkieChan!

Name: Twinkie Chan
Age: 31
Hometown: Bay Area, California
Current Location: San Francisco

How did your interest in DiY fashion and design begin? My mom and my best friend’s mom always told us to “Go home and make it,” so I think that philosophy has stuck with us as we’ve grown up (my bff sews). I also went to a very creative grade school where we weren’t even allowed to wear store-bought Halloween costumes, so you can imagine my mom helping me make a paper mache grape costume or a foam rubber lock-and-key costume! As for DiY fashion, I think we are always looking for those rare or one of a kind items, and I wanted a type of scarf that I’d never seen before, so, I went home and made it! Read more

Halloween Treats!

When I saw this post by craftster chuck_t, I knew I had to share it here! Believe it or not, the severed witch’s finger cookies are the most appetizing of his 3 Halloween gross-out foods.

Check out his post at craftster.org for a link to the recipe for the finger cookies, as well as his 2 other offerings- “Birdsh*t Brownies” and “Big Kid Jell-o”.

Smoothie 101

Good morning, class. Today we will discuss the proper elements to crafting the perfect smoothie. For today’s lecture, you will need:

a blender
an array of fresh and frozen fruit
fruit nectar or juice
banana (optional)
yogurt (optional)
honey (optional)
lemon (optional)

Step 1. Place your array of fruit in the blender. (1 cup of fruit per person)
Read more

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