GourmAndrea

Cream Cheese Brownies

I got this recipe from the Joy of Baking site the recipe can be found here. *WARNING: This site is highly addictive and you may come back one day later with an empty pan and 5 pounds on your hips! It is truly my fave baking site hands down all the recipes I have tried have worked beautifully. These are decadent,very fudgy,tangy and oh so rich! Cakey lovers should look elsewhere.

The idea of these are three layers, a brownie base,a cheesecake middle and then a bit of reserved brownie batter for the swirl. The recipe calls for a 9 x 9 pan and I all I have are 8 x 8 so if this is what you have too it takes about an extra 12 min of baking time due to it being a thicker brownie. I would also not recommend cutting these without letting them chill for at least 10 hours they have to fully set and the flavors meld, mine actually started to fall apart when I tried to cut them after about 4 hours.

How could anything that starts this way go wrong??I used Lindt %70.
My advice for the swirl use smaller dollops than me I had to swirl too much to mix and lost some contrast because of it. Also I would have cream cheese ready and set aside before you do the brownie batter because as the brownie batter sits it thickens and makes it harder to move your knife through it. If you go to the site you can see how it should really look a little less "swirly" than mine.

Before the oven and then..... after

On a side note these freeze beautifully and I used light cream cheese as I always do and they were intensely rich so there really is no need to full fat. I personally find full fat cream cheese way too overpowering. Anyways brownie verdict: they taste as good as they look! If you want to check out a "linky party" check Sweet as Sugar Cookies here

 

Saskatoon Buckle

In my organic box this week I got two containers of gorgeous local/organic saskatoon berries. I decided to bake a classic blueberry buckle but swap it with saskatoons. With Saskatoon being prime prairie land the name of this dessert reminds me of cowboys big ol' belt buckles. This is such a good recipe a nice moist cake with a crunchy streusel topping it begs for smooth ice cream on top.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saskatoon Buckle

1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened

3/4 cup sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups flour, sifted

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup milk

2 cups fresh saskatoons (or blueberries)

1.) Cream together butter and sugar (about 5 min)

2.) Beat in the egg and vanilla extract

3.) In another bowl whisk together flour,baking powder and salt

4.) Add flour mixture to butter/sugar/egg mixture alternating with the milk. When just about combined gently fold in berries.

5.) Pour into a greased 8" x 8" baking pan and sprinkle with streusel topping (below).

Streusel Topping

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup flour

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 cup unsalted butter cut into small squares

1.) In a small bowl mix sugar,flour and cinnamon with a pastry cutter or two knives cut in butter until it resembles coarse meal.

2.) Sprinkle on top of cake mixture and bake at 375F for 40-45 min. Put baking pan on cooling rack to cool.

 

Baklava

 Erica of Erica’s Edibles was our host for the Daring Baker’s June challenge. Erica challenged us to be truly DARING by making homemade phyllo dough and then to use that homemade dough to make Baklava.

 
 Home made phyllo dough was a first for me and it was not nearly as intimidating and scary as it sounds.

 

 
 

 
 
 This stuff, while so tasty, is crazy sweet. I was really excited about this challenge something I love but have never made before. I think I may use this recipe in the future to make Spanakopita. You can find the entire recipe here. I do have some recommendations if you plan to tackle this baklava. 

*Double the Phyllo for a 9 x 9 pan but keep the syrup and nut portion as is. 

*Instead of rolling and stacking phyllo (mine stuck like mad doing this) have your nut mixture and butter ready and then roll each sheet of phyllo then butter, then roll another piece until you have 5 layers then do your 1/3 nut mix then continue with rolling and buttering ect. The butter will keep them moist and it eliminates the need to stack them together.

* Use 00 flour for the phyllo and give it an overnight rest in the fridge it will be so easy to work with.

* The recipe also states to wrap the dough around your pin and flatten this way I had no problem just rolling it out continuously turning,rolling,flipping and then putting on your fist and gently stretching like pizza dough ect it became really thin that way.

Finally! If you use allspice berries I would chop them really fine with a knife or spice grind them they just broke into chunks trying to process them with the nuts, not the greatest idea to chip a tooth on an allspice berry.

Anyways give it shot it is more scared of you than you are of it :)

Almond Roca

I recommend this to anyone with a "roca" tooth, it is so easy and simple to make. I made some to give away for Christmas treats. This recipe is by John Scharffenberger and Robert Steinberg and is from the book The Essense of Chocolate, I got the recipe from a post on another blog.

 
Almond Roca

Makes 1 3/4 pounds (I have cut original recipe in half)

1/2 pound unsalted butter 227 grams (2 sticks)

1 1/2 cups sugar

3 tbsp water

1/4 tsp freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 tbsp light corn syrup

1 3/4 cups toasted slivered or flaked almonds, coarsely chopped

4.5 oz chocolate (original recipe says 41% but I used close to 80% dark)

1.) Lightly butter a 1/4 sheet pan with approx 12"x9.5"x 1" then line bottom and sides with parchment, the butter will make it stick.

2.) Melt the butter in a medium sized saucepan over medium high heat, add the sugar, water, lemon juice and corn syrup and bring the mixture to a gentle boil stirring to dissolve the sugar. Once the mixture boils stop stirring. Brush down any sugar crystals clinging to the sides of the pot with a pastry brush dipped in water. 

3.) Clip a candy thermometer to the side of the pot and cook for 15 min or until it reaches 300F. If the mixture threatens to boil over lower the heat as nessesary. When it reaches tempurature it will look like this.

 
4.) Remove the pot from the heat and stir in 3/4 cup of the almonds and quicky pour and spread into the prepared sheet smoothing the top, with an offset spatula. It will then look like this.

 
5.) Let the toffee cool at room tempurature or in the fridge I let mine cool at room temp for 2 hrs before doing the chocolate. When cool add the melted chocolate and then smooth it with a spatula or by gently shaking the pan side to side.

 
6.) Then press in the remaining almonds into the warm chocolate and put in the fridge for about an hour to set the chocolate. When cooled pull it out of the pan by the parchment and break into pieces.

7.) Enjoy!

 
 
 

Smores N Camping

We recently went on a camping trip in our new (used) motorhome to Vancouver Island. Before the trip my husband came home one day with a smore kit for me. I was wondering where he picked it up from??? Canadian Tire, they sell everything!!!

 

That is my dog Onyx and she was not prompted in any way for the picture she is just snoopy like that!

 

This smore pack came with "recipes" inside you could make:

 Hawaiian Smore

1 roasted marshmallow

2 graham cracker halves

1 piece of white chocolate

1 thin slice of pineapple

The Peanut Butter Dream Smore

1 roasted marshmallow

2 graham cracker halves

1 peanut butter cup

The Frosty Smore

1 roasted marshmallow

2 graham cracker halves

1 junior peppermint patty

Anyone have any favourite smore creations? I am liking that peanut butter cup one I think I may try it.

Smoken Bones is a restaurant I am in love with in Langford, it is close to Victoria and they make the most amazing smoked meats. They cook southern style food and their beef brisket is to die for I go there every time I am in the area. The pinnacle of the Smoken Bones experience is the Mocha truffle, heaven,I am a truffleholic *just* because of them. I made a truffle smore and I was too excited to take a pic it was the best smore I have ever had.

I wanted to share a few camping pics because if you are ever camping on or around the island these places are well worth the visit.

 

 

These two pics are from Porteau Cove it is by Vancouver it is an amazing place and they ever have a really nice area if you are just coming for a day trip. The first pic is site 32 and it the "nicest of the nice" that is what the lady said when we were checking in. The second pic is me just about going down Onnie looks all innocent in the pic but she had just about pulled me down. 

 

 

These two pics are from Goldstream which is a prov park just outside Victoria these falls are just some stairs away from the campground. This deer was just strolling through our campsite and the following morning a mom and baby deer came past when I was eating breakfast. I used to think I hated camping but now that we have a motorhome I realized that I just hate the tent/outhouse part. I cant wait to try out my oven it was too hot for this trip so maybe I can try it out in the fall.