HOLIDAY BAKING: PEPPERMINT CUPCAKES

I wanted to re-create the exact same cupcakes I made last year but since I a) ran out of candy canes and b) did not have time to scour the town looking for more candy canes, I made a few adjustments on last year's candy cane cupcakes.

Vanilla peppermint mini cupcakes just out of the oven:
Chocolate ganache laced with peppermint extract and a shot of chocolate liquor:
Cupcakes filled with chocolate ganache:
Frosted with peppermint frosting and topped with bittersweet chocolate shavings:
Close up:
Profiles:
Yummy:
Aerial:
Four standard-size cupcakes ready to be given away:
Profile:
Cross section:
I just ate half of the last regular-sized cupcake left and wow, totally awesome! But you most definitely must be a lover of mint in order to love these cupcakes. There's peppermint extract in all layer of these cupcakes: the cupcake itself, the chocolate ganache and the icing

HOLIDAY BAKING: COOOOOOOKIES!

Tuesday night meant a cookie fiasco. It came about mainly because I was in a grumpy mood. Even though I usually bake to get myself out of a funk, baking and an unhappy Dom do not mix. Oh yeah, that and Bejewelled Blitz. Now, now, don't laugh!! It's just too addicting to stop playing. So yeah, my original dark chocolate candy cane crackle cookies ended up burning because I spent too much time playing Bejewelled Blitz. Sigh.

After the BB baking debaucle, I didn't want the entire baking night to go to waste so I quickly whipped up a batch of these, which I knew would be a hit:They're basically butter cookies rolled in sugar and then baked in the oven. I added a little bit of red food colouring this time so they took on a bit of a pink hue along with the white granulated and pink sanding sugar. These cookies turn out soft...just the way I like them. They're incredibly buttery though so I kept these really small this time. In the past I've made these using instant coffee granuales instead of the sanding sugar. I also baked a batch and topped them with Hersey's Hugs (the Kisses that are white chocolate with milk chocolate stripes) and gave them to my co-workers with their Christmas cards, but I kept this batch for my mom who doensn't like chocolate. These are all that remained once it was photography time.

Lastly, I made a batch of raspberry oat bars for who else, Sean's parents. I kind of miffed the measurements and made the crumble bit way out of proportion this time. I was also lacking in free time (baking on Christmas Eve is NOT a good idea) and rushed the toasted coconut process so these were a little crispier than I would have liked. I'm really going to have to go back and follow the original recipe to a tee one day to find out what they're really supposed to be like. It's been years since I followed the original one. Sean's parents were presented with a bounty of my Christmas baking. They received the four peppermint cupcakes, along with the raspberry oat bars, individually-wrapped fudge and random Hershey's Kisses (mint truffle version). I can't believe I forgot to take a pic of their holiday treats tin! Oh well!

It was a good holiday baking time but unfortunately no time was left for cherry almond biscotti---boo! As for the rest of my baking list:
- dark chocolate candy cane crackles (done but burned)
- toffee crackle cookies (store had no Skor bars, no time to run to Bulk Barn)
- vanilla peppermint cupcakes with chocolate ganache and peppermint frosting (done and a success)
- raspberry oat bars (done!)
- apricot poppyseed thumbprint cookies (no time left)
- snickerdoodles/honeydoodles (no time left)

HOLIDAY BAKING: CANDY CANE FUDGE

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE! (or the two of you that follow this blog)

Chewy wishes you all a Merry Christmas too. This is how he spent the afternoon:
So the holiday baking didn't go exactly as planned but that's usually how things go around the holidays--especially when it involves me, baking and work. First up...Fudge!
Measuring out the candy canes: (This was actually for another recipe but the cookies burned for reasons left-unsaid but I don't want the first few photos to go to waste).Now unwrap all the candy canes and put them into a ziploc bag.
Get out your trusty hammer and get smashing!When you're all done, it should look like this:One-half of the mise-en-place:Second-half of the mise-en-place:
When everything is cooked and your fudge topped with the remaining crushed canes, it looks like this:
Now the pan gets to set in the fridge overnight:And after they're cut and wrapped, this is what they look like:
The second box is what I gave to my co-workers along with the cupcakes which I will feature later on.

TO BE A MASTER BAKER...

You must bake a pie and make French macarons.

Huh? You ask...

Well I have this crazy idea in my head that in order to be a good baker I must learn to master two things: apple pie and macarons. The first seems to be a no-brainer since making a good pie crust seems to be a hard thing to do. The latter is just craziness on my part.

Ah, the French macaron. I had heard about these things for ages but never had the opportunity to eat one until yesterday. There is a little patisserie that opened up on a Queen St. west not too long ago and with two hours to kill, Sean and I decided to venture from Bloor Cinema to Nadege Patisserie. We hopped into a subway and onto a streetcar and not too long after, we were walking into a stark, white pastry shop. It was nothing like how I had imagined. Oh well. Maybe it's the pastries that people come here for.

I kind of expected to see rows upon rows of delicate French macarons but instead was greeting by four rows of macarons in four different flavours: chocolate, cappuccino, chocolate raspberry and poppy. The macarons were $20 for a dozen so I decided to get 3 of each. Even the decor was drab, the packaging was pretty enough--everyone knows I'm a sucker for pretty packaging.

Here's the unveiling: the logo... the box...the inside...the lovelies...Uh, so yeah...there's a few missing. Sean and I had a little nibble while on the streetcar. My favourite was the poppy as was Sean's. The chocolate raspberry (the lilac-coloured one) was also very delicious but extremely sweet and the chocolate filling was quite rich. I haven't tasted the cappuccino one yet. I think the coffee-flavour would counteract the intense sweetness quite nicely. I hope so anyway.

Moving along, here's my first attempt at the French macaron:So yeah, a bit of a failure despite the fact that I tried my best to follow the recipe directions as closely as possible. I had looked up a bunch of different recipes and most of them had the same ingredients. A couple of them called for sifting the ground almonds and powdered sugar while others didn't. I wasn't really sure which one to follow. I then found a recipe and decided not to sift the ground almonds and powdered sugar. I also had run out of pastry bags and ended up piping them through a ziploc bag. Note to self: not a good idea.

I wasn't terribly upset when my first-run macarons didn't turn out as they should have. I had prepared myself for a long battle with the macaron. I was prepared for batches and batches of ground almonds, sugar and egg whites but was a little disappointed that I had not mastered them on the first try. What a feat that would have been!

In the end I called Sean and we decided to give the macarons another shot, but this time at his house. We sifted the ground almonds and powdered sugar separately and then whisked them together and then slowly added them to the soft peaked-egg whites and white sugar. We baked them at 350F for 15 minutes and this was our result:French macarons with vanilla bean filling.

Sean and I completely forgot about the flavouring of the filling and about flavouring the shells with vanilla bean like I had done in the first batch so instead we improved and used the vanilla bean for the filling.

It was good. Ridiculously sweet, but good. I think next time I'd cut down on the amount of sugar or use a bittersweet chocolate ganache to offset the sweetness.

YES! *air punch* French macarons on my second try! (And on Sean's first try!) I guess it really does pay to sift your ingredients.

Oh and just for kicks...