Twisted sister pastries take two

I made these dinishy pastry things once before, it's one of the best doughs I've ever worked with.  This time I decided to change the filling because the plain cinnamon vanilla butter filling that I did the first time was a little boring.  I had to drown them in danish glaze to make them interesting.  I also subbed some whole wheat flour this time because I ran out of white.  I thought that was going to be the kiss of death and the dough would come out weird, but I think this second try was a winner.

For the fillings I did a raspberry jam one and a chocolate one, both had brown sugar, butter, and almonds too.  And then I made a very thin danish glaze with skim milk and powdered sugar and drizzled it over the top.  Rather than hardening on top like a drizzle it acted more like a glaze that soaked in and made the pastry moist and sweet.

Twisted Sister Pastry with Chocolate and Raspberry Fillings
Adapted from Ask Chef Dennis

Ingredients:

(dough)

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 2 eggs at room temperature
• 1/4 cup honey
• 3/4 cup plus 2 Tablespoons lukewarm water
• 3/4 Tbsp. granulated yeast
• 3/4 Tbsp. kosher salt
• 1 cup ap flour
• 2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour

(raspberry filling)

• 3 Tbsp. raspberry jam
• 1/2 stick melted butter
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• handful of pulverized raw almonds

(chocolate filling)

• 1/2 stick melted butter

• 2 Tbsp. cocoa powder
• 1/4 cup pulverized semisweet chocolate chips
• 4 Tbsp. brown sugar
• 1 tsp. cinnamon

Method:

(dough)

Melt the butter and set aside to cool slightly.
Lightly beat the eggs in a small bowl.
Add honey and melted butter to beaten eggs. Gently and briefly mix together then set aside.
Combine lukewarm water, yeast and salt together in your stand mixer and mix a little. Add eggs, butter, honey mixture. Mix together briefly.
Add ap flour and mix to combine. Add whole wheat flour and mix until dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl. The dough will be damp and sticky. This is a no knead dough so just get all the flour mixed in and you’re done.
Place dough in a warm spot, covered but not closed (you want air flow) for three hours. The dough will rise and be full of air pockets. Perfect!

**Once the dough has risen you can assemble your twisted sisters, I suggest looking at the original recipe for pictures on how to twist the dough etc.  It's not hard but you really need to look at the pictures to get the idea.  

(raspberry filling)

Melt the butter, pulverize some almonds in the cuisinart, and mix with the brown sugar and raspberry jam.  

Spread a fre tablespoons of the filling on the dough before you roll them up to make the pastry.  

(chocolate filling)

Melt the butter and set aside.  

Pulverize the almonds and chocolate chips in the cuisinart, then mix in the other ingredients.  

For this filling, leave the butter separate and brush it directly onto the dough, then sprinkle the nut and chocolate mixture over top before you roll up the pastry.  

After you have assembled your pastries bake them in a 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes or until they get a little brown on top and are hard on the outside.  With the pastries still warm I spooned a mixture of powdered sugar and skim milk on top.  I used about 1/2 cup of powdered sugar and added skim milk a little at a time until the glaze was as thin as I wanted.

Mini- muffin madness

Let the mini-muffin baking begin!! My mom's school is having a breakfast tomorrow and I am in charge of baking the muffins. Four kinds in two hours, the only thing that held me up was that I only have two mini-muffin pans and I was making the batter way faster than I could bake and cool the previous batch. So I got a little backed up, but they came out great! I also ran out of muffin papers so I had to start spraying the pans with Pam and you know how that goes when blueberries are involved.

Honey Orange Corn Muffin with Raspberry Jam
Adapted from Eat Good For Life

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup canola oil
• 4 egg yolks
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/8 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• Zest 1 orange
• 1 tsp vanilla

• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 3/4 cup yellow cornmeal
• 2 teaspoons baking powder

• raspberry jam

Method:

Preheat oven to 450 and paper 2 mini-muffin tins.
Mix all wet ingredients in one bowl and all dry in another.
Pour dry into wet and combine, don't over-mix.
Fill 32 of the muffin cups half way full with batter, then spoon a dollop (about 1/2 tsp) of jam on top of the batter and then spoon more batter on top of the jam.
Don't use too much jam or it will just spill out all over the pan and burn.
Bake at 450 for 3 minutes, then turn down to 400 and bake another 6 minutes or so, until they bounce bak to the touch.

Chocolate Chip Muffins
Adapted from Crumbs and Cookies

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups ap flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt

• 2 egg yolks
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup oil
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1 cup chocolate chips

Method:

Preheat oven to 450 and paper mini muffin tins.
Mix all dry ingredients in one bowl and all wet in another, then pour dry into wet and stir until just combined.
Stir in chocolate chips.
Fill as many cups as you can to the top, or a little over.
Put them in the oven at 450 for 3 mins, then turn down the oven to 400 and bake for another 6 mins or so.

Carrot Cinnamon Muffins
Adapted from My Fudo

Ingredients:

• 2 cups ap flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

• 2 1/2 cups grated carrots (one bag of baby carrots buzzed up in cuisinart)
• 4 large eggs
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 cup canola oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Method:

Preheat oven to 450 and paper mini muffin pan.
Buzz up the carrots in your cuisinart or grate them, one bag of baby carrots yields about 2 1/2 cups.
Mix the carrots with the rest of the wet ingredients and set aside.
Mix all dry ingredients and add to wet, stir to combine.
Pour batter into prepared pan and bake on 450 for 3 mins.
Turn down oven to 400 and bake for another 6 mins or so.

Blueberry Lemon Muffins
Adapted from Kitchen Lane

Ingredients:

• 2 cups ap flour
• 2 ½ teaspoons baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup canola oil
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• zest of one lemon

• 2 cups blueberries

Method:

Preheat oven to 450 and paper your mini-muffin pans.
Mix all dry ingredients in one bowl and all wet in another, add dry to wet and combine.
Mix in blueberries, don't over-mix batter.
Pour into prepared pan and bake at 450 for 3 mins.
Turn oven down to 400 and bake another 7 mins or so, until muffins bounce back to the touch.

Notes:

*Some of the batters came out a little bit wetter or dryer than I like, if it was too wet I added a little bit of ap flour, and if too dry I added a little extra milk.

**I have been baking my muffins starting out really hot for a few mins and then turning them down to finish because it makes them get big and crusty on top and nice and high.

Peanut Butter Banana Muffins with Raspberry Jam

It's peanut buller jelly time!! So my friend's boyfriend takes peanut butter and jelly to work every day for lunch (yeah I know) and that was my inspiration for this muffin. If Joe was going to eat a muffin this would be it. I'm thinking about peanut butter jelly cupcakes for his birthday.

This recipe comes from lovefoodeat. It's pretty healthy. I didn't add any sugar because I put in extra banana and I backed off on the peanut butter a bit. It's all whole wheat flour and it's actually vegan because of the flax meal instead of eggs.

I experimented with a new baking technique on this recipe. I am now preheating the oven to 425 and baking the muffins for a few minutes to get a nice crust and a puffy muffin, then I turn it down to 400 or so and bake them the rest of the way. So far good results!! Really nice crusty top. Which I loooooove. This might be my new thing.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup oats
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda

2 tbsp vegetable oil
2 tbsp ground flax seed + 4 tbsp water
3 mashed bananas
2 tbsp peanut butter
1 cup water

jelly of your choosing- I used raspberry

flax seeds (for sprinkling on top)

Method:

Preheat oven to 425
Mix flaxseed powder and water, keep it aside. Combine all the dry ingredients and mix well (1st paragraph). In a separate bowl, mash bananas and add all other wet ingredients (2nd paragraph) and mix well. Pour the dry ingredients into wet ingredients and mix till everything is combined. Do not over mix. Grease your 12 cup muffin tin and pour about 2 tbsp of batter into each cup. Then spoon in 1 tsp of jelly into each cup. Then with your remaining batter cover the jelly taking care to spread the batter evenly between each cup- don't run out. If you want bigger puffier muffins only use 9 cups. Sprinkle some whole flax seeds on top for looks. Bake the muffins for 3 minutes at 425 and then turn the temp town to 400 and bake for another 12 minutes or until they bounce back to the touch. Let them cool and enjoy!!

Lauren's Birthday Cake

This cake is a standard at our house. When you just feel like making something easy and delish this is the cake for you. It's always a big hit and it has so many possibilities. Sometimes we do layers of ganache, this time I did ganache and raspberry jam. You can definitely do lemon curd layers, whipped cream and fruit, a mousse, yadda yadda...

Here's the recipe for the cake and ganache, and here is the lemon curd recipe should you choose to go that route.