Orange Sugar-Dark Chocolate Pound Cake: For Winter Nights and Baker's Withdrawal

Wintry clouds kiss small towns; 
Sprinkles of glitter catch on evergreen trees. 

 

It's December.

The coats are longer, the mornings are colder, and the desserts are richer.

This fall, I didn't get much chance to whirl around my kitchen, measure spoonfuls of vanilla extract, and sift flour-sugar mixtures, so extravagant autumn desserts with crisp apples, warm cinnamon or
sweet pumpkin unfortunately never found their ways from recipe stacks to oven racks. And after weeks of not baking, I found myself daydreaming about creaming together butter and sugar or crumbling streusel topping for a crumb cake. I was experiencing baker's withdrawal. 

So when I found myself with free time and an open kitchen, the first thing I did was run to the pantry and take out flour, sugar, eggs, and vanilla. The staples. I wanted to bake something simple, yet sophisticated. Something I was sure would turn out golden and beautiful and rich. Something called a pound cake.

Pound cakes are fancy (I'll definitely argue that) but I wanted this to be fancier. And nothing is fancier than citrus dark chocolate, especially on smoky winter nights.

When I was younger, my sister and I would stand on our tiptoes and rest our chins on the kitchen counter. My grandmother stood behind the counter, her weathered hands reaching into supermarket plastic bags. She'd hand over oranges and tangerines, always presenting them as if they were from an orchard in heaven, not the produce section of a Persian market. My sister and I would dash to the sofa (because PBS commercial breaks were always so short) and peel the orbs with tender care. And when the peels curled off, a spray of citrus sparkled the air, a firework opening for the edible wedges. As I sat criss-cross applesauce on that blue corduroy couch in that tiny apartment, I remember thinking that my grandmother was right. That oranges, at least the ones we had, were other worldly.

So it figures that a kiss of sweet orange is a marvelous pound cake flavor. Orange zest is scrubbed into the sugar and it adds a delicate citrus note to the cake. I added a teaspoon of orange extract into the batter as well (not noted in the original recipe). The extract gives the thick cake a beautiful scent.

This golden cracked-top pound cake is fluffy and soft because of cream cheese is creamed with the butter. Also, this cake doesn't have an eggy smell (which actually is a big issue for a lot of pound cake recipes because pound cake uses around 4 eggs).

Enjoy with a cup of tea or coffee or hot beverage of choice.

So for those days when you need the company of flour, butter and sugar, or for when you want a piece of heaven on a cake plate: this is the perfect recipe.

Also: a quick note on my blog: the recipes I've posted here have been variations of other recipes but starting next post, I'll be posting my recipes and original culinary creations.

Recipe link: http://joythebaker.com/2012/03/chocolate-orange-cream-cheese-pound-cake/
         {Add 1/2 teaspoon of orange extract when you add the vanilla extract. Bake time took me about     90 min. I covered the loaf with aluminum foil from 45 min to 75 min. Not entirely sure why it took my oven so long…}

Thanks for reading. :)

Oh Fudge. Oh Fudge-y, Fudge, Fudge.

The evenings are chilly again so I can enjoy a cup of tea without having to park myself right in front of the air conditioning vent.

It's a blessing, really.

I can open my bedroom window, cuddle under the covers because what's that I feel? a chill in the air?, and read Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King. (A phenomenal book which you must read the first chance you get! Just make sure it's not too dark outside when you read...). Which is actually where I am now. No, not outside in the dark. I'm just in my room, the curtains waltzing in the September breeze, admiring the sunset, and dreaming of fudge brownies.

Last week, I made fudge brownies.

After too many weeks of not even picking up a spatula or pouring vanilla extract in a sugar mixture, I leapt out of bed and power walked my way into the kitchen. I was itchin' bake.

But bake what?

Biscotti? No. It's too hot to be dipping anything in coffee.

Chocolate chip cookies? No, already have a blog post about it. (You see readers, I thought of you.)

Bagels? Eh. Nah.

I knew what I wanted to make.

Something rich and chewy and chocolate-y. And boy, oh boy, did I find it.

Fudge Brownies.

I'm talking the kind of fudge brownies you need a plate and a fork for. The ooey-gooey kind.

The kind that crunches when you take a bite of the edge of a corner piece. The kind with the flaky, smooth top.

These are those kind of brownies.

Cocoa powder and butter melt and mingle over a simmering pot of water. White and brown sugar specks find their way together.

In the end, everything comes together so beautifully it's like the ingredients have a special Sisterhood-of-the-Traveling-Pants friendship.

Cocoa powder and butter while on stove. The butter looks like marshmallows.

They will have you dreaming about 'em for days to come. I guarantee it. No money back.


And they're a blast to make! My sister and grandma even sat in the kitchen while I melted cocoa powder and butter together. My sister was a good audience member because she asks a lot of questions so I felt like I was a contestant on the Next Food Network Star. Except, I wasn't trying to make a gourmet dish using only salmon, picaya, Cornflakes, and pickled beets.

I digress...

These brownies really are wonderful. It's a rich sweet treat, perfect for get-togethers or parties because one pan makes a lot.

Fudge is great, fudge is awesome! Embrace the fudge life!

I didn't choose the fudge life. Fudge life chose me.

And can we please take a moment to squeal at the cute stationary I wrote my recipe on? The cute but hard-to-read stationary. Flowers are pretty and all, but it sure made me squint my eyes.

Itchin' to bake? But it sure made me? Why am I talking like Harvey Kinkle from Sabrina the Teenage Witch? Probably because I have been watching too much of it lately. (It's ok...a little magic never hurt anybody)



Oh but these are beauteous! Beauteous deserts! A delicacy even Merlin dreamed of!

Ok. Done with my weird descriptions.

SO. Many. Brownie. Pictures.

Recipe from Joy the Baker: 

http://joythebaker.com/2008/04/old-school-fudge-brownies-with-walnuts/

Enjoy!

-Susan

The Baking Block

When last summer flutters through my mind, I see rosewater sunsets, sidewalk chalk, and dusty patio chairs.

Glittered tennis shoes, traffic lights, and wrinkled library books.

Breakfast at Tiffany's, black cherry tea, and flower dresses.

Cake flour, pumpkin pie spice, and parchment paper.

Last August, I combined oats and nutmeg while the sun played peek-a-boo. Because doesn't everybody make oatmeal cookies at six-thirty in the morning?

I sliced peaches and snuggled them inside freshly baked scones.

Huge culinary projects tied up my hours.

I happily boiled dough for homemade bagels or grated lemon zest for blueberry crumble bars.

I made graham crackers from organic clover honey and treated each little spice-swirled square as a newborn infant.

I had a baking schedule. Cream puffs on Monday, peanut butter blondies on Wednesday, and pull apart bread Friday because it's the weekend and everyone rings in the weekend with bread. 

Then the school year arrived and my days were filled with physics assignments and English reading.

I graduated in June with ample time for all of the fantastical pastries and treats and entrees I didn't get the chance to create last summer.

But there was something off this year.

My choux pastry cream wasn't finger-licking good. Buttery shortbread cookies I cut made my stomach queasy. Anything with chocolate was glossy and unappetizing.

So reasonably, I was frustrated. I wasn't even cracking eggs perfectly anymore; the white shell crumbled to microscopic jagged triangles. And I would stand over the mixing bowl, my hands covered in egg whites, and blame the egg. It was just a bad egg. Just a bad egg. So I would sigh and get to half-heartedly mixing.

And the eggs weren't the only things frustrating me.

I didn't know what to make. For the first time, I lost my eagerness for cuisine. Even sitting in a kitchen proved too draining for my psyche.

Strange, really. The girl who kneads cinnamon rolls from scratch every Friday night before Say Yes to the Dress couldn't find a reason to slice up some sugar cookies.

And one night, when I went to go slide in a batch of horrendously terrible chocolate chip cookies (embarrassing, really, because I truly do consider my chocolate chip cookies to be wonderful), I noticed something strange.

There was something in my old, creaky oven.

A coarse block.

A baking block.

(Was that cheesy? If no, then I am happy. If yes, then I am still happy. Happiness is good.)

So I was faced with a problem. A block of a problem.

There's writers block, everybody knows what writing block is, but have you ever heard of baking block?

You have? Splendid!

Because it's actually not all that uncommon. Baking is a creative process and sometimes, well....sometimes, you just get stuck.

That's what I was. Stuck, stuck, stuck in the middle of a summer, out of luck.

Oh, how it pains me that I didn't bake as much this summer, but that's quite alright.
Sometimes, in life, we have to stumble on bricks, sit on the ground and look our scabby knee, but then get up, wipe the gravel off our palms, and keep dancing forward.

You're probably thinking why you are subjected to this post. You're probably thinking why I'm even bothering posting it instead of saving it as a page in a diary.

But there is a method to my madness.

You see, when I was starting out baking and messing up (which I did. big time. once, eggs accidentally scrambled when I was making lemon bars...it turned out more like nasty scrambled egg bars...ew.), I would just get frustrated with the product which only led to a racing heartbeat and agitation.

Until somebody gave me a really valuable piece of advice.

Baking is a process. It's not an outcome. It's a process. So scoop flour like you're scooping jewels. Melt butter like you're waltzing on Venus. Fold in berries like you're braiding in diamonds. And enjoy the process. It doesn't matter how the product turns out (well, okay, yeah it does) BUT for the sake of your well being, it doesn't.

Burning a cake or scrambling eggs on lemon bars are no big deal. Give yourself a pat on the back, then throw it out and try again tomorrow.

The important thing is that you feel at peace while you are baking. That is the number one secret ingredient.

Cheesy again. I'm a cheeseball today.

Deal with it, please. :)

That's it for this post. Thanks for reading! Also, thanks to my friend Stephanie for eating one of the chocolate chip cookies that day, turning to me and saying they weren't too bad. :)

Enjoy the outskirts of summer. :)

-Susan

The Panini Genie

Magic, magic, magic.

Do you believe in magic?

Do you believe in magic of the melty, crispy, pressed, fresh, Italian sort?

Do you believe in paninis?

Say yes. Just say yes.

The most exciting moment of July was buying a panini maker.

Well, persuading my mother to buy a panini maker.

This is what happened a couple weekends ago:

I stumbled out of bed at 11am and slapped the sleep out of my head. I slept for twelve hours. Not good. Head-achey and delirious, I blindly looked over my agenda for the day. (Because really, what else does one do when they've wasted precious hours sleeping?)

The index card read: write, send a card to G, bake pumpkin muffins, leg workouts, watch Parks & Rec.

Naturally, I didn't do any of that. Eh, I thought, it'll just be a spontaneous type of day.

My stomach growled and I walked to the kitchen.

My mom was at the table, eating her breakfast, when she said she'd be going to Macy's later on in the day. She asked if I wanted to come along. 

My first instinct was HECK TO THE NO. Macy's is my mom's drug. She'll say she'll only be an hour but she'll walk out seven hours later carrying slow cookers, Lenox plates, business pants, polos, handbags for presents, Estee Lauder perfume, and clearance pajamas.

It's a Persian mom thing.

When she used to take me as a kid, I'd scavenge the area one of those spinning clothing racks and plop down inside and pray to God that Macy's just randomly decided to close early for the day so I could go home and watch Phil of the Future. 

Back to the present, now.

I found myself blurting, "Sure. I'll come." when mom mentioned she needed a skillet.

There's one part of Macy's that I do like. Heck, one part of all stores I like.

And that is the cookware/bakeware section.

Those places are treasures.

Anyway, flash forward to us standing in the cookware section. Macy's, level 3.

Bright spatulas and non-stick cookie pans.

Kitchen Aid mixers in any hue imaginable (mint green, lime green, sea foam green, aqua green, forest green). (And they were on sale! For $350. Which is still extremely expensive, but a girl can dream.) (PS: I'd pick the Kitchen Aid mixer over a pair of Louboutins any day.) 

On a blindingly white, immaculate table was the skillet my mother needed. It was marked down and as she calculated which of her coupons she should use to get the best deal, I made my way to the other side of the table.

Sure enough, Jesus had been resurrected next to a Pyrex measuring cup.

Well it wasn't actually him.

It was a panini maker. But close enough.

Quick fact about me: I totes magotes heart paninis. If I go somewhere that has a panini on the menu, I order it. (Check out my post about sandwiches! :)

They say when you fall in love, you just know, y'know. 

I'd never really believed that. Until: The Panini Genie.

That's the name I gave it. Cute, huh?

I am just rambling on and on like a blabbermouth. Or like a Panini Genie owner. You decide.

ANYHOO: My mom gave the green light to buy the panini maker. I swear I ain't ever smiled so big.

The second I got home, I made a panini. 

French bread, crusty and toasty. Basil and walnut pesto that smelled like Italy. Smoked deli turkey folded gently. Fresh tomatoes sliced thinly. Vibrant spinach leaves and all their antioxidant glory. Cheddar cheese shredded finely.

I had so much fun making the panini. I channeled Giada and pretended I had my own Food Network show. It was cool till my grandma walked in the kitchen and said she'd ask God to give me a brain.

The final product was restaurant worthy. And I don't mean that lightly.

And I think it's because I was okay with it turning into a big floppy mess. It was my first time making a panini. Perfection was not expected.

Oh but perfection I got.

I've made them for my family and they've been a hit! :) So far, I've tried two different types of french bread but I want to experiment with more!

 Thanks for reading and I hope you liked all 57 pictures of the paninis. Have a wonderful day. :) 

Pumpkin Pancakes in July

You know when it feels like Halloween but it's not Halloween?

Yeah. That's been happening to me.

Lately, I've been sitting in my backyard watching the sunset. For some reason, the way the sky turns orange reminds me of Halloween.

Halloween is my favorite holiday.

Costumes and face paint and fake tombstones?

Lugging a pillowcase around door to door, hoping the next house will have Heath Bars?

Watching Halloweentown and Hocus Pocus at 8pm on school nights on the Disney Channel?

Yes. Yes. and Yes.

(P.S: My favorite candy is Heath Bars. The houses that have  them always get extra cool points in my book! :)

There is nothing more magical than Party City at Halloween time. If you don't like Halloween stores, what is wrong witchu foo?

 Just kidding. I still love ya.

Kinda.

No but seriously. I have a deep seeded obsession with horrific creatures.

-My first (...and only...ahem...) boyfriend was a Dracula doll that talked. Before you think I'm complete psycho, know that I was five years old. And might I just say all these new Hollywood movies/tv shows that center around vampires can just fade away. Original Dracula was where it was at. :)

-For Valentine's Day, I bought a pack of monster Valentine cards. They were pics of the original Mummy, Frankenstein, Dracula, WereWolf, Chucky, etc. etc. I liked to pretend the cards were given to me by the monsters themselves. I was four.

-I had a crush on Chucky the Doll. Is that normal?! Probably not.

Halloween is my favorite holiday. Autumn is my favorite season.

Surprise, surprise, summer is my least favorite season (even though my birthday's in July) so last week, when it got a little chilly and the sky turned amber and the air smelled like cinnamon, I jumped aboard the autumn train.

Ed Sheeran played on the stereo. Spice candles decorated the coffee table. Pumpkin cooked on the stove top.

I hoard canned pumpkin. It's a problem most fall loving bakers share. I think pumpkin bread is the best thing that's ever happened to humanity. Truth.

I had the sudden urge to bake something with pumpkin. So I did.

Pumpkin pancakes.

Boom shaka laka boom.

Buttermilk pancakes are awesome. Pumpkin pancakes are awesome-r.

I had just gone out to breakfast with my mom, aunt, and grandma and ordered a pumpkin waffle. For the first time! It's so hard to find pumpkin foods in the off seasons.

These pumpkin pancakes are light and full of cinnamon-nutmeg-cloves-ginger-goodness! Be warned though: one bite, and you'll really wish it was autumn. And it was delish! My dad even gave them a thumbs up!

Recipe is from Food.com.

http://www.food.com/recipe/light-and-fluffy-pumpkin-pancakes-187362

So bake these while wearing a Halloween costume for an extra sprinkling of autumn fun. (I did. :)

Enjoy and let me know how it goes and what season you feel like you've been living in lately.

Now excuse me while I go decorate the house in orange foliage, light candles, and watch Halloweentown. :)

The Magic of Story Telling

Years ago, on a rainy Saturday morning, my dad drove my sisters and I to the library.

Standing in front of shelves of wrinkled paperbacks and glossy hardcovers, I ran my fingers over the spines of the books.

Outside, thunder streaked the darkish sky. Rain kissed the pavement.

Six years old, I sat on the library's wooden chair, my feet dangling far above the floor. Knobby elbows on the beige table, I ventured into the world of words.

The Rainbow Fish smudged oceanic watercolors before my eyes.

Chapter books based off the sitcom Full House made me giggle.

Nancy Drew picked me up in her blue convertible and took me on all her exciting mystery hunts. I included myself in her group of friends. Nancy and her tawny gold hair. Handsomely charming Ned Nickerson. Tomboyish George and adorably plump Bess.

In case you couldn't tell, I was a huge Nancy Drew fan. :)

A bookstore is a treasure. It's a place of tranquility, inspiration, and motivation. Shelves of art books, business manuals, and heart wrenching novels are mountains of gold. There's something earth-shatteringly miraculous about storytelling.

I've been reading since I was four. The first chapter book I read on my own was The Little Vampire. And if I knew you when I was reading it, chances are I probably bragged about it to you back then because I thought I was just so sophisticated and grown up.

There's a quote that says, "A reader lives a thousand lives before they die. The man who never reads lives only one."

And I believe that's true.

I've learned from every book I've had the pleasure of coming across, even the poorly written ones.

I've wept at the misfortunes of the lonely old man.

My heart broke when the teenage protagonist was called a freak.

I've cheered, clapped, loved, hated, lost, and appreciated.

I travelled to France with Julia Child. Italy with Liz Gilbert.

And you know what?

I want everyone to know.

I want them to know about the enchanting qualities of a clever tale. 

I want you to smile at page 242 because things are looking up for the son and his estranged parents. 

I want everyone to have a love affair with literature. 

A cherished pastime among many is reading a good book, cuddled up on the couch after a long day of work or school. It's an escape. 

Welcome to the Circus of Scripts! Step right up! Pick a world, any world. Choose through characters, conflicts. We got hypnotic sci-fi, heartwarming romance, side splitting humor memoirs! Anything ya want! Name it we got it. 

For some reason, seeing a child reading makes me really happy. A tiny person, with glasses or a Spongebob shirt or velcro sneakers, criss cross applesauce on a bench reading. 

Lately, I've felt myself growing up. That sounds bizarre, but the gears in my head are turning (as they have been for the past 18 years) and I'm figuring life out. The little tricks and steps of days.

And I could tell you all about how the paperclips are connecting but I'd probably just be going around in circles because if I start to think about everything too much, I just don't make sense anymore. Like now.

A couple weeks ago, I started to write a novel. It's not the first I've started, but it's the most I've ever typed for a concept. And?

And I'm proud of it and hopeful for its future.

Why?

Because I'm appreciating the process and the art. I want people to read it hungrily at 2 am -turning the pages as the lessons turn in their own heads.

It's 1:36 in the morning. Everybody's asleep except for the crickets, and I don't know if this post turned out like I wanted it to. There's a lot of "I's" and it seems to be more about me than about stories, but I needed to type this. This is all over the place, but I'm sure in the future I'll write about this again because hey, I'm a writer.

So pick up a collection of poems, a fantasy novel, a historical recollection, anything really.

Take it in your hands, open it, and read. :)

(PS: Pics are not mine. :)