Banana Cream Trifle....

Amy of Sing for Your Supper chose this week's recipe: Banana Cream Pie. I have been under the weather for the last week, so my lovely sister (who is visiting from Oregon) helped me prepare this recipe for our family.

I had previously read that some people found the custard too thick, and I agree. To remedy this, we folded in extra whipped cream after the custard had cooled completely. (Yum!) We also decided to mix things up a bit by changing it from a pie to a trifle--alternating layers of fluffy custard with chunks of Trader Joe's Vanilla Bean cake, sliced bananas, and more whipped cream. A certain family member (I am not mentioning names) even added some Brandy to give it an extra kick!

Thanks, Amy, for the wonderful choice! I would like to try this again with a graham cracker crust. Now what do I do with the 6 egg whites in the fridge...

French Yogurt Cake for TWD

Liliana of My Cookbook Addiction chose this weeks recipe for the French Yogurt Cake with Marmalade Glaze. This is a great recipe and requires one bowl! I had trouble finding Lemon Marmalade so I made my own version of it with lemons and tangerines. I poured it over the warm cake and let it all soak in. WOW! I couldn't believe how tasty this was and how simple as well. My Baking cookbook is starting to "show" that I have been using it. I have never made so many recipes out of one cookbook before. It is really fun to try recipes that I would normally pass over. It is even better when we enjoy them. Thanks Liliana for the simple cake! I would like to try this again warm out of the oven.

Cookies with Tuesdays with Dorie

Grace of Piggy’s Cooking Journal chose the Rugelach this week! I have been wanting to try this type of recipe forever. I had a friend give me plate of them last year for Christmas. They always seemed too complicated or hard to make. The dough was lovely to work with. I made the filling ahead of time and let it all sit until I had time today to roll them out. I love this cookie. I am hoping to make some for a cookie exchange this year. It will be my first time hosting. My friend Ellyn started it in Mt many years ago! I am looking forward to trying lots of great Thanksgiving and Holiday Recipes in the next couple of months. I am going to continue to run and hope that helps balance the holidays out. I have been working on Thanksgiving cards all morning. We are having warm weather for November it really doesn't feel like winter is anywhere close.

TWD Creme Brulee Disaster

I am a little late in posting my recipe for Creme Brulee. Mari of Mevrouw Cupcake chose this recipe for last week. I was so excited to make this. I love this dessert! It is so simple to make and tastes incredible. It started off fine. I followed the simple directions and stuck it in the oven to bake. I was in a little bit of a time crunch with the baking time. After the 50 minutes it wasn't even close to done. I decided to crank up the oven a little and hurry up the process. It made the pudding curdle into huge chunks. I didn't know if it was savable at this time but decided to use the immersion blender to make it smooth again. It worked but in the meantime I sprayed hot creme brulee over the entire stove and counters... Now I was late for the kids school so I left it and hoped it would be OK when I got home. It set up nicely in the fridge. I thought the my disaster was going to work out. After the kids soccer game, I put the sugar on the top to finish these only to find out my torch was empty. I decided to broil them instead. After burning all around the top of each dish so black that it starting stinking up the house, finally the sugar caramelized. These were so bad I dumped them all in the trash. No pictures because I have never made such a disaster or mess up of a recipe before... Esp. when it was such a simple and straightforward recipe!

Dimply Plum Cake

This week for TWD we made Dimply Plum cake chosen by Michelle of Bake-en. I wasn't sure about the texture of the cake. I thought it would turn out like a Kuchen but instead it was a denser crumb almost like a coffee cake and sugar cookie combined. I made it in 3 individual pans. I cut up plums for the first two and peaches for the third. I had to reduce the baking time by 15 minutes.

We had friends over for dinner and they helped us eat it. I made maple whipped cream to serve on the top of each one. We were all so full from dinner that I quartered each piece. 3 out of 4 of us loved it but my husband didn't like the orange zest. I thought that it added a little extra something to the batter. I would make this again but serve it warm instead of room temp. This is a recipe I would normally skip. I have never been a huge plum tart fan but it was good. And change is always good! If you want to try something a little different then....maybe it is the recipe for you. I agree that it doesn't do well the next day. I threw the rest away this morning. It doesn't keep at all.

Thanks Michelle for choosing a unique recipe. When is anyone going to choose the Perfect Party Cake recipe? I am dying to make it! It looks so good with the layers of butter cream and raspberry jam.
P.S. I baked the cookies from last weeks recipe on Saturday night. They were so good! I loved them best warm out of the oven with a tall glass of cold milk. I can see why people were RAVING about these cookies. It was like eating melted chocolate with a tiny bit of flour to hold it together.

First TWD Post

This is the first post for a baking group I joined called Tuesdays with Dorie. We are cooking our was through "Baking" by Dorie Greenspan. Amanda from http://likesprinkes.wordpress.com/ chose the recipe this week. This week we are making Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler. I love crisps and cobblers. I have never tried this combination together so am excited to see how it turns out. I found fresh Rhubarb at the commissary and used frozen cherries. I did add 2 more TBS spoons of sugar to the fruit mixture. I had read other people didn't feel that it was sweet enough. I like my cobblers and crisps sweet! I also added 1 ts vanilla since I had forgotten to buy ginger. The dough was easy to work with. I found it interesting that we rolled the dough into balls before placing it on the cobbler. I have never done that before. I haven't got my food processor yet but used a my fingers like I do with biscuits. I didn't have the right size 8X 8 pan so used what I had. I sprinkled the top with some raw sugar and am looking forward to tasting next. It looked lovely before going into the oven. It came out perfectly browned and bubbly. I cooked it for 35 minutes. We will be enjoying this tonight with ice-cream. P.S I couldn't wait and tasted it now. It was so good right out of the oven. I do prefer a crisp topping more then the biscuit but this was a great summer-time dessert.