Lemon Pudding Cake

Lemon Pudding Cake - made March 8, 2014 from One Bowl Baking by Yvonne Ruperti

The best way to describe a lemon pudding cake is to think of it like an upside-down lemon bar. The lemon curd or pudding is the bottom layer and what normally would be the shortbread crust on a lemon bar is instead a soft lemon cake on top of the pudding layer. All from one batter. I can't tell you what science makes this phenomenon work (I probably could but I'm too lazy pressed for time to look it up), just that it does. But you have to follow the recipe exactly, beating the eggs in enough in the order given. I did and it really did work.

However, unlike a lemon bar, this is not a bar cookie that cuts into neat little slices. Because the pudding is the bottom layer, this is really more like a spoon dessert. That is, it's literally best eaten with a spoon as it's very hard and messy to eat pudding with your fingers. I like the lemony flavor of this but I can't say I was in love with the cake in general. This is probably because I don't generally like custard-type desserts except for creme brulee and certain pot de cremes but this didn't clear my hurdle to go into the exception pile. It was okay but I wouldn't call it fantastic unless you like anything lemon.

3/4 cup granulated sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
2/3 cup fresh lemon juice from about 4 lemons
1 cup whole milk, room temperature
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 tablespoon lemon zest from 1 lemon
pinch salt
1/3 cup cake flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
confectioners' sugar, for dusting

1. Place an oven rack in upper-middle position.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line an 8" square baking dish with foil and lightly spray with nonstick cooking spray or brush with melted butter. Place the dish in a rimmed sheet pan.
2. In a large bowl, whisk the sugar with one egg until the mixture is very light, about one minute.
3. Whisk in the second egg for 30 seconds.
4. Whisk in the third and fourth eggs for 15 seconds each.
5. Gently whisk in lemon juice, milk, butter, lemon zest and salt.
6. Sift the cake flour and the baking powder over the mixture, then gently whisk until combined.
7. Immediately pour into the pan and set in the oven. Fill the sheet pan with about 1/2-inch of water.
8. Bake until the pudding is just set, about 20 to 25 minutes.
9. Carefully remove the baking dish from the water bath and let it cool on a wire rack until just warm. Dust with confectioners' sugar and serve warm, room temperature or chilled.

Bakery Review: Sift Cupcake and Dessert Bar

Sift Cupcake and Dessert Bar - visited March 3, 2014

Prepare for a post with lots of pictures. Because this is it. After my niece Lauren and I filled up on dim sum, we headed out of Chinatown and made our way down (and up) California to go to Sift Cupcake & Dessert Bar. I'd first heard of Sift by watching Cupcake Wars. A big reason I watch Cupcake Wars is to find out about local small business cupcakeries - more places to try out. Whenever I hear of any in my area, it goes on my list of places to visit someday. For Sift, this was the day.

Last summer, I did the same thing with Frost. Frost Cupcake Factory actually won their episode of Cupcake Wars but if you recall my review of their cupcakes, I was rather disappointed as the textures on most of the cupcakes I bought were dry and their flavors weren't very spectacular in terms of taste. So my expectations for Sift were a lot lower because Sift got knocked out in one of the qualifying rounds and, unlike Frost, couldn't boast being Cupcake War winners.

But before I get to the cupcakes, let's talk about Sift's cute little bakery because it really was a cute little bakery. Sift is located in lower Pacific Heights; Lauren and I were so busy talking when we were walking there that we actually passed it because we were on the other side of the street. We had to double back to find it.

The bakery storefront itself isn't very big but for a cupcakery, it's still a decent size, similar to Sprinkles and Kara's Cupcakes. It's very cheery and filled with pastel colors. One look at their display cases and I was predisposed to like them anyway. They also were smart in their display and storage space by having shelves house their cupcake boxes (above). The cupcake boxes have cute sayings on them and double as decorations until they're needed.

Sift has a selection of not just cupcakes but also "soda pop" (not to be confused with the likes of Diet Coke and their ilk because they didn't have any but actual old-fashioned soda pop) as well as layer cakes, macarons, Krispy cakes (amped up Rice Krispie treats), and whoopie pies. I have a one-track mind and I came for cupcakes so cupcakes are what we bought.

When faced with such mouthwatering choices, it's always hard to narrow down my selections. I highly recommend you check out Sift's flavor menu so you can appreciate my First World struggle. In the end, I bought a Samoa Cupcake and Lauren chose a carrot cupcake. We also bought a red velvet and a chocolate one for Lauren to bring back for Shyla.

Red Velvet and All for the Cookie cupcakes

The carrot cupcake was topped with the traditional cream cheese frosting and decorated with an icing decoration of a carrot. It was my favorite way carrot cake (or cupcake) should be made: with just carrots. The flavor card on the bakery counter that describes each flavor even points out there are no nuts or raisins in their carrot cupcake. Points for Sift. It was also a really good cupcake, cakey, fluffy and moist but not greasy.

The Samoa cupcake was a coconut cake filled with chocolate ganache and topped with vanilla frosting garnished with toasted coconut and ganache drizzle. If that sounded good to you, it's because it was. I loved this cupcake. Let me repeat that: I loved this cupcake. Moist, fluffy, perfect coconut flavor. And here's the shocking thing: I also loved the frosting. If you know me at all, you know I always say I'm not a frosting person, I only like a little frosting to go with my cake and I never profess love for frosting. This is the only cupcakery I've been to where I not only like the frosting but I ate it all. Yup, you read that right. I love Sprinkles red velvet cupcake and I prefer their frosting over most places but I don't ever eat all of the frosting on a Sprinkles cupcake. Not so with Sift's Samoa cupcake. Loved it. The toasted coconut on top was the perfect complement in texture and flavor with the frosting too.

I even liked the ganache filling although if I had to give one piece of feedback to Sift, I'd recommend they switch out the chocolate ganache for a caramel filling instead. The chocolate is already represented in the drizzle on top but I was missing the caramel component of a traditional Samoa. Still, this was a darn good cupcake, chocolate ganache filling included, so I have no complaints. Actually, let me rephrase that: I enjoyed this cupcake so much that I did something else I never do. I bought another one. Buying another cupcake isn't so unusual but typically I would get a different flavor to try. But I liked the Samoa so much that I had to have another one. Not right that moment of course but I bought it for later. And just to really push the outer limits of my waistband, I also chose one of the chocolate cupcakes to try out another time.

Carrot Cupcake on the left, Samoa on the right

I bought the "Sky is Falling" cupcake which was a chocolate cupcake filled with white chocolate mousse and topped with a chocolate buttercream. But I was really greedy for the Samoa again. I had the second one the next day and it was just as good as the first one, even a "day old" and I ate all the frosting again. You've no idea how mind-boggling that is to me.

I didn't get to the Sky is Falling cupcake until the following day - in the interests of moderation, one high-calorie treat a day is all I normally allow myself. This one was more typical of other cupcakes I've had elsewhere. I don't know whether it's because it was two days old by then or it just wasn't as good as the Samoa to hook me in but on this one, I ate the cupcake but left a lot of the frosting. It was good but just not as good as the Samoa. Sorry I don't have a picture other than the bakery case. For once, I forgot to take one before I ate it.

All in all, I thought Sift's cupcakes were delicious and I enjoyed them much more than the ones from Frost. I'll have to hunt up their Cupcake Wars episode again and see where they went wrong in the competition but they win in my cupcake book.

Texas Fudge Cookies

Texas Fudge Cookies - made March 9, 2014 from Cookies and Cups

I've been writing my blog for several years now but it occurred to me only recently that I've never fully explained my scale. Not the kind you step on and it makes you cry but my taste rating scale when I evaluate what I bake. You can probably glean from random posts that, because I bake so much and so often, I have finicky taste buds when it comes to desserts and a pretty high bar on what I consider worth the empty calories. I balance things out (most of the time) with a whole lot of exercise so I always evaluate whether something is worth a session at the gym, a run for X number of miles, walking for umpteenth hours and tackling my 20-lb dumbbells (my dumbbell set goes to 50 lbs but let's not kid ourselves).

But, not everyone exercises to the same extent or understands how I balance my universe of taste buds vs waistband fit so let me tackle it another way. As you know, I give away 90-95% of what I bake. I'll take a taste test piece, evaluate it, photograph it, write it up and give everything else away. Some of the feedback from my recipients I reflect in my evaluation and some just go into my mental files. But their feedback is how I've come up with my taste scale.

Me: These are okay. Meh.
Everyone else: These are really good.
Me: These are good.
Everyone else: OMG, these are fantastic! To die for! Love them!
Me: OMG, these are fantastic! I think I'll have TWO pieces!
Everyone else: Can I have the recipe? I'm SO making these. When are you making them again? Do you take orders?

Now that you've gotten a little primer on my taste rating scale, you'll have the context to understand when I rate these as "OMG, these are fantastic!" My love for Texas Fudge Cake has extended itself to this cookie version from Cookies and Cups. Fudgy cookies are enrobed in Texas Fudge Cake frosting  to the same stupendous results. Little (or not so little) bites of fudgy goodness. The only cautionary note is please don't overbake these. If they puff and crack on top, they're overbaked and can be a little dry (I discovered that with the first batch). They're still salvageable because of the frosting but they're better a little underbaked so they remain moist and fudgy. The cookies aren't too sweet or overly chocolaty; that comes from the frosting. If you have high end baking chocolate (I used Tcho), use that instead of the regular Nestle chocolate chips; they're worth it. And, in keeping with my rating scale, yes, I ate two cookies before giving the rest away to my friend Cindy when we met for dinner and to my coworkers the next day. Cindy asked me for the recipe so my taste rating scale remains intact.

1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/3 cups flour
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips, melted and lukewarm

Icing
1/2 cup butter
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
3 tablespoons milk
2 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Line baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
3. In bowl of stand mixer, beat butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, scraping down sides of mixing bowl frequently.
4. Add in egg and vanilla and mix until incorporated. Mix in baking powder and salt.
5. With mixer on low, slowly add in flour. Mix in melted chocolate chips until evenly incorporated.
6. Drop dough in tablespoon-sized mounds onto baking sheet. Bake for 7-9 minutes until cookies just appear set. Do not overbake. Cool on wire racks.

Icing

1. In a medium saucepan combine butter, cocoa powder, and milk over medium heat, whisking until smooth. Remove from heat and whisk in powdered sugar.
2. Pour icing over cookies and allow to set before serving.

Salted Nutella Butter Bars

Salted Nutella Butter Bars - made March 2, 2014 from Cookies and Cups

This was the third dessert I made for care packages, along with the Texas Sheet Cake and the Gooey Cookies and Cream Cake Bars. Since the first two were primarily chocolate, I wanted something with a different flavor profile so butter bars seemed the way to go.

You'll notice very quickly that there's a pound of butter in these bars. Yes, a pound. For something that only makes a 9 x 13 pan, that's a lot of butter. For context, most similarly-sized desserts might contain half that amount. So these aren't called butter bars for nothing.

With all this butter, as you can expect, this was like eating a very rich shortbread with some nutella. I like nutella but I don't know if I like it with the butter shortbread. I also should've baked this a little longer and let the top become more golden brown. When baked enough, the texture of the top layer is almost crisp like good shortbread should be. Because I didn't bake it long enough, they tended to be soft and you can taste the butter all the more. That's not necessarily a bad thing but I would have preferred more of a texture contrast between the snap of butter shortbread and the creaminess of the nutella. Oh and I would recommend sprinkling the sea salt (I used fleur de sel) on top even though the recipe says it's optional. The salt breaks up the richness of the butter a bit and provides a nice flavor contrast.

1 pound butter, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
2 tablespoons vanilla
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup Nutella, warmed slightly to be of easy spreading consistency
1-2 teaspoons fleur de sel, optional but highly recommend

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
2. Line a 9 x 13 baking pan with foil and lightly spray with nonstick cooking spray.
3. In bowl of mixer, combine butter and sugars. With mixer on medium speed, beat together until smooth and creamy. Add the vanilla and beat until combined. Slowly add the flour into the butter mixture until dough comes together.
4. Press about one-third of the dough evenly into the pan to form a bottom crust. Wrap remaining dough in plastic wrap and chill in the refrigerator.
5. Bake crust until firm and the edges are a pale golden brown, approximately 12-14 minutes. Transfer pan to a wire rack and let cool 10 minutes.
6. Spread softened Nutella evenly over crust, about 1/4" away from the edges.
7. Remove remaining dough from the refrigerator and crumble remaining dough on top. Bake another 20-25 minutes until top is set and lightly golden.
8. Sprinkle immediately with fleur de sel, if desired.
9. Cool and cut into squares.

Restaurant Review: Grand Palace (dim sum)

Grand Palace - lunch on March 3, 2014

This is the restaurant my niece Lauren and I went to for dim sum for our day in San Francisco. We didn't do anything technologically advanced to find it - we didn't check yelp, we didn't do a google search on best dim sum places in Chinatown. Instead, since we were in Chinatown, we just walked around until we found a sit down restaurant for dim sum. Which is not hard to do.

It wasn't fancy or all that cheap considering it was Chinatown and some might even say it was a little rundown but we weren't that picky. The restaurant ran long and narrow so it wasn't conducive to dim sum carts roaming the aisles. Instead we ordered dim sum from the menu along with pan-fried noodles, Hong Kong style. There was a regular menu that spelled Grand Palace correctly and a pictorial dim sum menu that did not. What I liked about the pictorial menu is I could finally see what some of the dim sum items were called. For the most part, my guesswork in the past was fairly correct. My "pork puff pastry thingie" is called "BBQ Pork Puff". Close enough.

Our food came out promptly and it was really good. The siu mai was a notch above the usual dim sum fare and everything else was up to our high dim sum standards. The BBQ Pork Puff was really flaky. It could've used a little more BBQ pork filling but otherwise was tasty. The only things we didn't get that we normally do were the pork buns and egg custards since we'd already bought those at Garden Bakery.

BBQ Pork Puff

Siu Mai

Har Gow (shrimp dumpling)

Lotus Wrapped Pork & Sticky Rice

Pork & Sticky Rice

Pan-fried noodles, Hong Kong style

While the dim sum was good, the prices aren't cheap considering it's Chinatown. For all of the above dishes, including tip, our bill came to $35. That's actually expensive for dim sum. One word of caution: according to the rather abrupt waiter, they only take cash. A fact that is belied by the Visa/Mastercard stickers on their cash registers at the front. Either those stickers are just for show or they do take credit cards and they push for cash unless someone fusses and points out the stickers. I tend to pay cash for most things anyway so it wasn't a big deal to me but it might be to others. Grand Palace also seems more Americanized than what I would've expected in Chinatown and, looking back, the patrons while we were there were mostly non-Chinese folks. I don't think that was because of the food because we thought the food was pretty good so maybe it was due to the prices. No elderly Chinese people here.

Sweet Potato Chips - it's National Potato Chip Day

Sweet Potato Chips - made March 9, 2014 from The Recipe Diva

I was going to put up a different post for today until I saw earlier on facebook that it was National Potato Chip Day. Pi(e) Day I get because it's 3.14 (pi, get it??) but it turns out the potato chip has to share the glory with its more famous counterpart. You know pie, that spotlight hog. I didn't have a pie in the baking rotation (I ate a piece of one but didn't bake it myself - does that count?) but I had made these sweet potato chips last week so I'm throwing them in there just in the nick of time.

I actually don't like potato chips. Not the thin, greasy kind. I'll mow through a bag of Doritos, Cheetos, Fritos and/or Sun Chips whenever I want salt but the straightforward, simple, humble potato chip? I don't think so. However, I saw nothing wrong with switching my allegiance to sweet potato chips. The sweet potato has ousted the white potato in my affections so I figured I would like sweet potato chips just fine.

And so I did. I didn't bake these long enough so they weren't all crunchy, just a few pieces that started to think about burning before I took them out of the oven. But I liked the spices sprinkled over them and they still tasted better than a bag of potato chips. If you want them crunchy like "real" chips, slice them thinly and evenly then leave them in the oven as long as you can stand. You don't even need to sprinkle additional salt on these since the spice mixture already makes them good eating. Move over Ruffles; the homemade sweet potato chip has you beat.

2 medium sweet potatoes, scrubbed clean and sliced into 1/8" slices (I also peeled mine)
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon paprika

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
2. Place sweet potato slices and oil in a re-sealable bag and shake to coat.
3. In a small dish, combine the seasonings and add to the sweet potatoes. Shake again to evenly coat.
4. Lay potato slices on a foil-lined baking sheet and bake for 12-14 minutes. Remove the potatoes from the oven and flip. Cook for an additional 10 minutes until crisp.
5. Place potatoes on a wire cooling rack to cool - they crisp up more as they cool.

Gooey Cookies and Cream Double Chocolate Cake Bars

Gooey Cookies and Cream Double Chocolate Cake Bars - made March 1, 2014 from Picky Palate

I was making up care packages and needed a bar cookie to go with the Texas Sheet Cake I made earlier. I saw this on pinterest and had half a package of Oreos to use up so it seemed like a good one to try. You'll notice it has cake mix as an ingredient and you know my prejudice against those. One of the care packages I was sending was to my friend Kendra who, in the past, has unwittingly tormented me by making things from box mixes. It isn't so much that she uses the mixes (I try to tell myself that's none of my business, it's a free country, I don't have to be there to witness it, etc) but that she thinks the box mix product is just fine or "will do" in place of scratch when she wants something as convenient as "ripping open the box". I get it. Sort of. So I decided to try out this recipe and send it along with made-from-scratch baked goods to see if she (or I) will really think the box mix stuff is just as good.

Whenever I use a box mix, I always run it through my sifter first, not only to get rid of the lumps but to keep out the very hard lumpy lumps left after I finish sifting it all (pictured above). I kid you not - this is what's in every mix; particles so hard that they don't break up and can't be sifted through a strainer. They're not chocolate chips either but are rather like little pebbles. Ugh, I draw the line at including them in my baked goods.

Texture-wise, these didn't turn out very gooey but that was my fault. In a rare move, I think I baked these longer than I should have. The sweetened condensed milk was still "raw looking" so I baked it longer but in hindsight, I shouldn't have. The bar cookies weren't necessarily dry but just normal. But you don't want normal for "gooey" cake bars; you want - well - gooey. Did I subconsciously sabotage these bars because of my cake-mix prejudices? Maybe. So mine didn't turn out as good-looking as the ones from Picky Palate. Taste-wise these were okay but I think they would've been better had I not baked them for as long as I did. I liked the crunch from the Oreos but the rest of the bar cookie was just standard.

1 devil's food cake mix
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 large egg
14 Oreo cookies, broken into bite-size pieces
14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9 x 13" baking pan with foil and lightly spray with nonstick cooking spray.
2. Place cake mix, butter and egg into a large bowl, mixing to combine. Press into prepared baking pan, making an even layer. Top with broken pieces of Oreo cookies.
3. Pour sweetened condensed milk evenly over cookie pieces and top with chocolate chips. Bake for 23-25 minutes, until cooked through. Remove from oven and let cool. Lift out of pan using foil ends and cut into squares.

Texas Sheet Cake (another one)

Texas Sheet Cake - made March 2, 2014 from Chocolate, Chocolate, and More

My obsession with Texas Fudge Cake or Texas Sheet Cake continues. Nowadays I find myself searching out a new recipe for it whenever I need a good quantity of something to give away. I used to do that with new brownie recipes but the brownies are getting nudged aside by Texas Sheet Cake. It's probably a phase but I don't see it ending anytime soon.

Even I am surprised at my recent devotion to it though as I didn't think brownies could be toppled off my baking must-have list. But Texas Sheet Cake is just as easy to make as brownies and that whole pouring frosting over it while the cake is warm is luring me in like a siren's song. If sirens were male. While I normally make Texas Sheet Cake in a 9 x 13" pan instead of a sheet pan because I like a thicker cake, this time I did hold back some of the batter and instead baked two thin layers in 6" round cake pans. Not sure why except to experiment with my new 6" cake pans that came in a set of 5. I have grandiose visions that I'm going to make a 5-layer cake someday. But this time around, I only did two layers, just enough to use up the extra frosting I inevitably end up with whenever I bake a sheet cake in a 9 x 13 pan and there's less surface area for the frosting.

It probably goes without saying that this was fantastic. I liked it better than the last version I made and it was more consistent with earlier versions I've made that hooked me on Texas Sheet Cake in the first place. It was cakey and fluffy yet moist, aided by the frosting melting into the top layer. Just the right amount of chocolate tempered with the sweetness of a thin layer of frosting. So much goodness, so much exercise I need to do to offset it. But worth it.

1 cup butter
1 cup water
1/3 cup cocoa powder
2 cups all-purpose flour
dash of salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups granulated sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Icing
1/2 cup butter
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1/3 cup milk
4 1/2 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 15 x 10 x 1" jelly roll pan or a 9 x 13" pan for a thicker cake; set aside.
2. Sift together flour, baking soda and salt.
3. In a medium saucepan, combine butter, water and cocoa. Heat until butter is melted. Remove from heat, add in sugar, eggs, sour cream and vanilla, blending well.
4. Carefully whisk in flour a little at a time, making sure there are no lumps or flour pockets. Pour batter into pan, spreading evenly. Bake for 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs. Remove from oven and frost immediately. Let cool completely before serving.
5. While cake is baking, make the icing: combine butter, cocoa and milk in medium saucepan. Bring to a boil. Remove from heat and add in vanilla and powdered sugar. Mix well; strain if powdered sugar lumps remain. Spread over hot cake.