Tag Archives: chocolate

Kitchemprovise: Mini Blueberry Cheesecakes

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Ugh Ugh Ugh.

I really wanted to create a spectacular dessert to emulate the film “Inside Out” and I thought creating a chocolate bomb would have been the perfect solution.

If you don’t know what a “chocolate bomb” is, I highly recommend watching this video and then come back to the site…

Have you watched it yet?

Good.

So in a perfect world I would have created the mini-blueberry cheesecake to be inside the chocolate bomb, and then with hot chocolate syrup people could pour onto the chocolate sphere, melt it to gain the treat inside. Ideally by creating a “chocolate bomb” dessert to emulate “Inside Out” there would be multiple ways to break into the chocolate sphere:
– Anger: Using an eating utensil and cracking the sphere open
– Joy: Using the hot chocolate syrup and pouring over the top of the sphere
– Disgust: Simple removing the sphere rather than melting / destroying it
– Fear: Not eating the sphere at all and just grab one of the extra mini-cheesecakes

Perfect right?

Nope. Not. At. All.

Could not find (granted this was rather last minute) a sphere mold that I could use that was large enough for what I wanted to do.

So what did I do?

I decided that I was going to move forward in creating the mini-blueberry cheesecakes and instead of the “chocolate bomb” idea, I would dip the cheesecakes in various colors of candy melt and have sphere-ish globs instead…
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Recipe: Vanilla Ice Cream with Chocolate Chunks and Candy Canes

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Just in time for the holidays too. After borrowing my friend’s ice cream machine I decided that the first batch of ice cream I would make would include a classic “Chocolate Chip Ice Cream” kind of feel but with the added twist of ground up candy canes for the season.

Needless to say it was full of the awesome.

Now the ice cream maker came with its own book of recipes to use… so for starters I figured good old fashioned vanilla would work…
vanillaicecream
Sweet and simple.

Right “good old fashioned vanilla”… I added a few mix-ins in the form of ground up candy canes and broken down chocolate truffles…
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Recipe: (Gluten Free) Molten Lava Cake Variations

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20121218-195252.jpgIn a previous post I talked about my attempt of turning the molten lava cake recipe into something more cupcake-y… and then how I tried to adapt the same recipe for friends of mine that is gluten-free.

But why should I stop at the traditional molten lava cake? I mean there are other bags of “chips” that I had readily accessible that are outside of the semi-sweet chocolate vein… including but not limited to butterscotch (which I have used for the Butterbeer Cupcake recipe), cinnamon (in hopes of creating a chocolate / cinnamon cupcake adaptation), white chocolate… and others.

So that is why in this post I decided to really take it another step and create other variations of the molten lava cake recipe by using first the white chocolate chips and the later the butterscotch chips.
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Recipe: (Gluten Free) Molten Lava Cakes with Candy Canes

Many months (over a year) ago, my mother and I concocted the idea of baking our own version of the “molten lava cake” that we loved eating at restaurants so much. So, we searched online for various recipes and came across one that we decided that we liked from Savory Sweet Life.

The recipe seemed simple enough, and had the addition of Kahlua, which was a plus for the both of us since there was a bottle of kahlua that has been untouched for years (if not decades).

We used custard dishes for the formations and created the molten lava cakes that we absolutely loved.

Over time, a coworker asked if I would be willing to bake a batch of such treats but in a smaller form. I agreed as long as he paid for the ingredients. Unfortunately that agreement never materialized so I never had a reason to try out the recipe in a different medium.

Recently as I was walking through my local Meijer I came across a shelf of Peppermint Mocha Kahlua and instantly a new idea came to mind: What if I took the molten lava cake recipe, added ground up candy canes and exchanged the traditional Kahlua with the Peppermint Mocha Kahlua? I mean, it couldn’t be all that bad could it?
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Recipe UPDATE: Butterbeer Cupcakes

So around a month ago one of my friends read my recipe post about the Butterbeer Cupcakes and decided to give them a short herself with some good results.

Here is her blog post about her attempt with the Butterbeer Cupcake recipe and her impressions. She even includes pictures which was something I neglected to do.

She goes so far as to say what part of the recipe she followed – because if you remember I strayed from the path a bit – and cuts off the recipe portion from there and just continues with what she did.

Her impressions?

Following the recipe directly using one standard cake box mix, it made 21 cupcakes for me, with plenty of frosting to cover them all. It might be a tiny too little if you manage 24 cupcakes. The cupcakes are some of the lightest and fluffiest cupcakes that I have ever had. One of mine even turned onto the side in the oven. It was undamaged but quite funny to me. The cupcakes are so good that you can honestly eat them without the frosting. They’re good with them, but the average cupcake is nothing without its frosting.

I would definitely agree with that assessment… but what about her verdict?
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Recipe: Butterbeer Cupcakes

Once upon a time, I really wanted to try my hand at cupcake baking. I came across this new fangled idea when I was surfing Mugglenet.com and came across a recipe for Butterbeer Cupcakes by the Collegiate Baker. When reading up on what the Collegiate Baker did I realized that she actually adapted her recipe from that of another blog from Confessions of a Cookbook Queen.

When perusing the recipe I realized that I am not exactly a fan of butterscotch to begin with, but Butterbeer is a popular beverage that is described by JK Rowling as

a little bit like less-sickly butterscotch

Ok, so now I’m tempted… I am really really tempted, especially since the homemade frosting became a major draw for me.

INGREDIENTS
For the Cake:
1 box yellow cake mix
1 cup cream soda
3 eggs
1 stick of butter, melted
1/2 cup melted butterscotch chips 		For the FROSTING:
1 stick of butter, softened
3 tablespoons of cream soda
3 cups of powdered sugar
2 tablespoons of butterscotch ice cream topping
butterscotch chips for topping

DIRECTIONS:
Step 1: (Starting with the cake portion): Mix the yellow cake mix, cream soda, eggs, melted butter, and melted butterscotch chips (in that order) in a medium/large mixing bowl.

Step 2: Mix on medium speed for two minutes.

Step 3: Follow the temperature and time directions as instructed on the yellow cake mix box.

Step 4: (Now for the frosting): cream the butter and cream soda by mixing on medium speed for approximately two minutes.

Step 5: Mix in powdered sugar, one cup at a time for easy mixing.

Step 6: Then mix in butterscotch topping.

Step 7: When cupcakes are cooled, cover each with frosting and top with butterscotch chips.

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