SMS- Golden Almond Fruitcake

After what seems like a very long wait, it is finally my turn to host Sweet Melissa Sundays! For months now, I have flipped through the book trying to decide which recipe I wanted to choose, and like many others, I always seemed to come back to one recipe- the Golden Almond Fruitcake. Despite the fruitcake's reputation, it holds a very dear place in my heart. My grandmother used to make many fruitcakes every year at Christmas and would give them to all my aunts and uncles. My dad in particular loved it and savored every last slice. He used to slice it up, wrap each slice in plastic wrap, and freeze the slices. I think he could make two bundt cakes last until March! My grams died two years ago this spring and our world has been fruitcakeless ever since. We looked everywhere for her fruitcake recipe after she died, but could not find it. So you see, my purpose for picking this recipe is two fold. First, it is to honor my grandmother who is very near and dear to my heart. The second is so my dad can finally have his fruitcake again.

Despite a long ingredient list, the recipe is relatively simple and straightforward. To start I chose my fruits- apricots, cherries, and golden raisins which the recipe suggests and I had on hand. To soak them, I ended up going with the brandy. After searching high and low for almond flour with no success, I did have to make my own. I'm not sure my almonds were ground quite fine enough because I forgot about having to add a portion of the sugar to the almonds when processing in the food processor. I let my mini prep run for a minute or two and figured it wasn't going to get much better than what I was left with. Though I tried to adhere to the original recipe as much as possible, I did have to make one small change. In true Melissa Murphy fashion, the stars of the recipe are almonds and citrus zest. I only had one lemon left in my refrigerator and it was definitely not zest worthy, so I ended up omitting the zest.



Now I have never been very good at reading directions. I tend to read what I think are the important parts of each step and skip the rest of the wording. Case and point- making the almond flour (without the sugar). So when I came to the last step before baking, I saw fold in prepared fruit and nuts. Done. I mixed in my brandy scented fruit and chopped almonds and poured the batter into the prepared loaf pan. I had about ten more degrees before my oven was preheated so I set the loaf pan on the counter and started to clean up. As I was putting the pan in the oven, the phrase "omitting the marzipan would be a sin" popped into my head. I totally missed the marzipan! I quick pulled it out of the freezer and folded it in as best I could.

I must admit, this recipe is nothing like my grandmother's, but it smelled wonderful baking in the oven. It has a very strong almond flavor (with almond flour, almond extract, and marzipan) whose aroma warmed the entire house. The loaf baked pretty close to the entire time specified in the recipe, though I did reduce the temperature a little early because the edges started to brown around twenty minutes into the first baking cycle. I glazed the cake with orange juice because I ran out of brandy when I soaked the fruit. Though now I won't feel like I have to say no when my three year old asks me if she can try it!



The verdict? Well, its definitely not my grandmother's fruitcake so I will have to do a little more searching before I settle on a recipe to make for my dad (ugh! fruitcake isn't something you want to experiment with considering how hard it is to give away). However, this recipe is definitely a keeper. In the preface to the recipe, Melissa Murphy states they have to give a lot of samples away at the holidays to get people to buy the fruitcakes. I can see why she says once they try it they walk away with more than one. My suggestion is if you are going to make it for someone else, don't tell them its a fruitcake! Without the red and green candied cherries, they will never know the difference!

Be sure to see what all the other SMS bakers thought of my choice for this week's recipe. Hopefully, people were not too scared by the choice and exahusted from their Thanksgiving baking!

Golden Almond Fruitcake (p. 18)

For the Cake

1 cup chopped dried fruit (1/4 to 1/2 inch pieces)
1/4 cup brandy, apple juice, or orange juice
8 T (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 t freshly grated lemon zest
3 large eggs
1/2 t almond extract
1 t pure vanilla extract
1/3 cup almond flour or 1/2 cup sliced blanched almonds
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t cardamom
1/4 t freshly ground nutmeg
1/4 t kosher salt
1/2 cup whole natural almonds coarsely chopped
1/4 cup (2.5 ounces) marzipan, cut into 1/4 to 1/2 inch pieces and frozen

For the Glaze

1/4 cup brandy, apple juice, or orange juice
3 T sugar

Pro Tip: To make your own almond flour for this recipe, in a food processor, pulse 1/2 cup sliced blanched almonds with 1/4 cup of the granulated sugar called for in the recipe until it becomes a coarse texture. The remaining 1/4 cup sugar should be added to the butter for creaming.

Before you Start:

Position a rack in the center of your oven. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter and flour a 1 1/2 quart loaf pan.

1. In a medium saucepan over very low heat, heat the dried fruit and brandy, stirring occasionally. When the mixture comes to a simmer, remove from the heat and cover (allowing the fruit to absorb the brandy), stirring occasionally.

2. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitten with the paddle attachment, cream the butter, sugars, and zest until light and fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add the almond extract and vanilla. Mix until combined (At this stage, the mixture will appear slightly broken).

3. If using the sliced blanched almonds, in a food processor fittes with the metal blade, pulse grind the almonds until a very fine flour (as fine as you can get). In a medium bowl, whisk together the almond flour, all purpose flour, baking soda, cardamom, nutmeg, and salt.

4. On low speed, add the flour mixture to the butter mixture in two batches, mixing until just combined after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Using a rubber spatula, fold in the dried fruits along with their soaking liquid. Fold in two thirds of the chopped almonds and the frozen marzipan (it's easy to forget this because its in the freezer).

5. Pour the batter into the prepared load pan and sprinkle the remaining chopped almonds on top. Bake for 25 minutes, then rotate the pan and reduce the oven temperature to 325 degrees F. Bake for an additional 25-35 minutes, or until a wooden skewer inserted into the center comes out clean (Be careful when testing with the wooden skewer. You could poke into a piece of marzipan which will look like raw cake batter on the skewer, so test the loaf in a few different spots). Remove to a wire rack to cool for 20 minutes before unmolding the cake onto the rack for glazing.

6. For the glaze, warm the brandy with the sugar until the sugar dissolves (its easiest to do this in the microwave, 30 seconds at a time).

7. Using a patry brush, brush the glaze over the fruitcake while it is still warm. You will not need all of the glaze, but use as much as you like. Glaze the cake at least once, but if you want more, simply wait for each layer to soak in before you glaze again. The more you glaze, the boozier your fruitcake will be. Let cool to room temperature.

This cake keeps very well tightly wrapped in plastic wrap at room temperature for 2 days. For longer storage, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 5 days. Or freeze well wrapped in plastic wrap and then aluminum fool for up to 3 weeks. Defrost still wrapped at room temperature.

SMS- Pear Cranberry Muffins with Gingersnap Crumble

This week's recipe for Sweet Melissa Sundays is pear cranberry muffins with gingersnap crumble by Jennifer of Maple and Cornbread. What a great pick! I absolutely love pears and gingersnaps together! A couple years ago I had a pear cheesecake with a gingersnap crust and it was incredible. Ever since then, I have been in love with the flavor combination so I was really looking forward to this one.

The muffins are super easy to make- we have made two other varieties already- but I wince every time I read the recipe and see that it calls for a stick of butter, cream, and whole milk. On several occasions, I have subbed buttermilk for the cream with great success. This time, I had some half and half to use up in the fridge so I ended up using that instead of the cream and subbed the buttermilk for the whole milk. Even though I always have whole milk on hand for my daughter, I thought the buttermilk may help lighten up the density of the muffins. And after much deliberation, I decided to make the gingersnaps for the cumble. Since I was going to be baking for Joy's Operation Baking Gals team this month, I figured an extra batch of cookies couldn't hurt!

The muffins puffed up beautifully in the oven and the smell of the gingersnap crumble was wonderful. I brought them to my in-laws for dinner last night and everyone loved them. The combination of the sweet pears, tart cranberries, and spicy crumble was delicious! I would highly recommend using buttermilk instead of the whole milk since it seemed to lighten the density tremendously. I ended up bringing the leftovers to work today. We'll see how long they last!
I will post my "pictures" of the muffins a little later. As luck would have it, BOTH of my cameras had dead batteries. I thought I could take pictures with our video camera but couldn't figure out how to do it. Out of desperation and frustration I just decided to take a video. I just have to find the cables and figure out how to get the video on to my computer! Hopefully, its not too complicated- it says YouTube compatible right on the camera so I'm keeping my fingers crossed!!

Jennifer- what a great pick for this week! I think the pear is often an overlooked fruit for the fall that PAIRS quite nicely with our favorite fall spices (sorry for the bad pun). Be sure to head over to Jennifer's blog for the recipe and check out what all the other Sweet Melissa Bakers thought.

SMS Sweet Almond Bread Pudding with Raspberry Sauce

This week's recipe was chosen by Candace of Candy Girl- Sweet Almond Bread Pudding with Raspberry Sauce. I was super excited about this recipe because I love bread pudding! No one else in my house is, so I planned to make about half of the recipe and freeze some of it. I picked up a half loaf of brioche on my way to work on Friday hoping it would be stale by Sunday when I planned to make it.

After reading through the whole recipe earlier in the week, I became less and less excited about the raspberry sauce. It just didn't scream fall to me. And I only had whole raw almonds on hand so I knew I was going to have to make some alterations to the recipe this week. I also had a hard time with the thought of using an entire quart (or half quart in my case) of heavy cream, so I opted for half and half instead. So lets just say I used the recipe as a guide and kind of did my own thing.

The basic recipe is super easy to follow. Heat the cream and sugar, temper the eggs, and soak the bread in the custard mixture. My only snafu was I had just opened a new bottle of vanilla that had a flip cap on it. Not even looking, I squeezed the bottle assuming it had a squeeze top not realizing it had a pour spout on it. I think I ended up with three times the amount of vanilla I should have used! I just crossed my fingers and moved on. Instead of using the almonds, I ended up topping the mixture with sugar and pecans because pecans have become my favorite nut to bake with. I baked the whole mixture for about 45 minutes since it was only a half recipe and it came out perfect.


I tasted a tiny sliver of the bread pudding after it cooled slightly, and oh my goodness was it good. Flavorful (with triple the amount of vanilla) and creamy. It would have been perfect with a nice scoop of vanilla ice cream! I did end up skipping the raspberry sauce and settled on a butter rum sauce instead. My aunt used to make something similar with her apple cake and it was delicious! There were a ton of recipes online, so I picked the most fattening and sugary one and went with it (only because I skimped on calories with the pudding). Knowing no one else would want a piece, I waited until my girls went to bed, sliced a piece of the pudding, topped with a nice helping of rum sauce, and enjoyed! Just one word- awesome! I didn't feel like struggling with lighting and my camera so I will post pics tomorrow.

I know bread pudding is probably one of those desserts most people either love or hate, so if you're one of the lovers, definitely give this recipe a go. You can find the original recipe on Candace's blog. And be sure to see what all the other SMS bakers thought of this week's recipe!

Here are my alterations to the original recipe...

-Used half and half instead of heavy cream
-Used pecans in place of almonds
-Omitted the almond extract and doubled the vanilla

And here is the recipe I used for the rum sauce which I found on Cooks.com

1/2 Cup Heavy Cream
1/2 Cup Sugar
1/4 Cup Butter
2 T Rum (I used Capt. Morgan Spiced Rum)

Combine all ingredients but rum in a saucepan and bring to boil over medium heat. Continue to boil for another five minutes. Add the rum and combine.

Devil's Food Cake with Peanut Butter Frosting

This week's recipe for Sweet Melissa Sundays was chosen by Holly of Phe/mom/enon- devil's food cake with peanut butter frosting. What an appropriate Halloween recipe! Any other week and I would be jumping up and down to try this recipe because I love me some peanut butter, but I threw a baby shower for my sister-in-law on Friday evening, went to a surprise birthday party Saturday night, and to a 1st birthday party this afternoon. I am CAKED-OUT!

I whipped up the batter this morning. Very easy except I am not a coffee drinker. Don't laugh at me, but I wouldn't even know how to make a pot of it. So I subbed in hot water for coffee and added a tablespoon of espresso powder. I also decided to make cupcakes instead of a layer cake because I knew we wouldn't be eating any of them. Cupcakes are much easier to give away! And a word about the icing... the recipe calls for a LOT of butter. One of our fellow bakes suggested cutting back on the butter and increasing the peanut butter. I ended up using six tablespoons of butter (its what I had left of a stick), a half cup of peanut butter, and about two cups powdered sugar. It was a little stiff so I ended up thinning it a little with some milk. The resulting icing was perfect, IF you like peanut butter.

I have to be honest, I'm not really sure how the cupcakes turned out. The batter was delicious, but I haven't had a chance to taste the finished product. I am not a big cake person to start with and after the three parties, I couldn't really stomach another bite of cake. But my cupcake carrier is loaded up and ready to go so my husband can take them in to work tomorrow. I'll take them into my work if he forgets! I'll keep you updated and let you know what they think.

Thanks Holly for picking such a yummy sounding recipe! Maybe I'll hold one of the cupcakes back so I can try them tomorrow. Be sure to see what Holly and all of the other Sweet Melissa Bakers thought of this recipe.

Spiced Pumpkin Cookie Cakes

So I have to admit I was kind of lukewarm about the recipe this week. Debbie of Everyday Blessings of the Five Dees chose Pumpkin Spiced Cookie Cakes for this week's Sweet Melissa Sundays. Now I love, love, love pumpkin desserts but am not a big fan of cake like cookies. I like chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal raisin cookies, peanut butter cookies. Cookies that have a slight crunch when you bite into them with a soft chewy center. I knew these cookies would not fall into that category. They seemed more like tea cakes to me, of which I am not a big fan. But Melissa Murphy gave them such an amazing write-up in the preface to the recipe, I had to try them anyway.

I was a little concerned when I checked the P&Q section of the SMS blog and saw that some people were having a hard time getting their hands on pumpkin. Rumor had it there was a pumpkin shortage this year. I thought this a little coincedental because I was buying mums last weekend and the woman at the nursery said almost everyone she talked to about pumpkins said they had a failed crop this year (my dad included). I wasted no time getting to the grocery store to see if I could stock up for the holidays- I think I would break down in tears if there was no pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving- and sure enough, a sign below the pumpkin said there would be a limited supply due to a crop shortage this year. I felt kind of selfish doing this, but I bought ten cans. Yes, ten cans. I spent twenty dollars on pumpkin. My excuse is, I will be the pumpkin fairy come the holidays when they run out and my mom, sister, and aunts all need it. Can't you see me in a pumpkin costume with glittery wings and a sparkling wand? Probably not because you most likely have no idea what I look like, but its a nice thought, right (can you tell we like fairies and princesses in our house?)!

In any case, on to the recipe... The cookie batter comes together very easily. The recipe calls to pipe the batter onto the cookie sheet using a pastry bag, which I did do, but I think you could drop by teaspoonfuls just as easily. After piping out the first sheet of cookies I popped them in the oven. Boy did these smell wonderful baking in the oven! Exactly what I think a cool fall day should smell like. While the cookies were finishing baking, I mixed up the icing. At first I considered leaving the orange zest out because I wasn't sure how it would taste with the pumpkin, but decided to leave it in. When we were growing up my mom used to simmer fresh orange peel with cinnamon sticks and whole cloves on the stove to make the house smell good and thought if the orange worked well with those spices, it would probably taste great with these cookies. And boy am I glad I did! The flavor combination was incredible!

After I finished assembling the cookies, I plated about 3/4 of them and brought them to the fire house in town where my husband was volunteering at an open house. Everbody loved them. When I came home, I gave one to my mom and sister who came for a visit and they loved them. I brought a couple to my in-laws for dessert and everybody loved them. Do you notice a trend here? These cookies are awesome! They are just like pumpkin whoopie pies and who doesn't like whoopie pies? I would highly recommed this recipe. Even though it is a little time consuming due to the assembly process, they are well worth the effort!

Thank you Debbie for picking such a wonderful recipe! It has been very cold and rainy here on the east coast, and this was a great recipe to warm up the weekend a little. Be sure to check out Debbie's blog and to see what all the other Sweet Melissa Sunday bakers thought.

Sticky Buns with Toasted Almonds

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays' recipe was chosen by Jen of Not Microwave Safe, Sticky Buns with Toasted Almonds. Now let me first begin by saying that sticky buns are HUGE in my husband's family and my mother-in-law makes awesome sticky buns. Over the past several years, she has been gracious enough to bestow her sticky bun making skills on me and I have always used her recipe. So I was a little nervous about this one... the recipe has a lot to live up to in our house.

I was hoping to make this for breakfast on Saturday morning, so I threw the dough together on Friday after I came home from work. My first and only issue with the recipe came with kneading the dough. It seemed very sticky to me, but I didn't want to add too much flour otherwise the buns can turn out super tough. Luckily, I remembered the group ran into the same issue when they made Bee Stings a couple months ago and I believe it was Wendy of Pink Stripes who suggested continuing to knead the dough to release the gluten in the flour. So I decided to let the mixer do its magic and walked away. About fifteen minutes later I came back to perfect dough. Yeah!


The dough rose beautifully. I had just pulled dinner out of the oven as the dough was finishing so I left the door open for a few minutes and then popped the dough in to rise. About two hours later, it had started to rise above the bowl, so I tightly wrapped it with plastic wrap until I had my girls in bed and I could assemble the buns. When I did get around to putting them together, they assembled very easily. My big alteration to the recipe was I covered the bottom of the casserole dish with chopped pecans and raisins before I put the buns in. I guess this is the more traditional approach to making sticky buns (at least in every bakery around here). I would have loved to try the almonds, but knew my husband would not be a big fan.


I woke up Saturday morning and started the second rise for the buns. After about an hour in the oven with the hot water bath, they were ready to bake. And did they ever smell wonderful in the oven! They baked much faster than the suggested baking time- mine were finished in a little under twenty-five minutes (this is my one criticism of the Sweet Melissa Baking Book- the cooking time always seems to be overstated)- so if you decide to try this recipe, be sure to keep a careful eye on them after the twenty minute mark.

So I know I said I was nervous about this recipe because of how wonderful my mother-in-law's recipe is, but oh were these good! They were different, very tender, but oh so delicious. Full of butter and cinnamon, and I loved the flavor the maple syrup gave to the sauce. I will definitely be making this recipe again! In fact, and don't tell anyone in my husband's family, I think I like this recipe a littler better than the one I had been using.


Great pick Jen- this recipe was a huge hit in our house! If you would like the recipe, be sure to wander on over to Jen's blog. And be sure to check out what all the other Sweet Melissa Sunday bakers thought!

Apple Orchard Pecan Crumble

I always seem to be late these days. I never used to be late! I was the one who was always a half hour early for work in the morning... I would get there just as the doors to the party were opening... I would have to wait ten minutes at the bar for a friend to arrive at a restaurant... And then I had kids. Don't get me wrong, I love my two little girls more than anything in this world, but I am always late now! And very late posting Sweet Melissa Sundays this week.

The recipe for this week was chosen by Christine of Christine Cooks, Apple Orchard Pecan Crumble! There is nothing like a good apple dessert in the fall and I have been looking forward to making this ever since I saw it posted on the Sweet Melissa page. I never got around to making it earlier in the week because I didn't have the apples, and then I was making cupcakes for my daughter's birthday party at school, then the cake for her birthday party with our family, and then we had cake for my niece's birthday party on Sunday... I'm sure you get the idea! But this recipe was not going to escape me! So I stopped at the produce stand on the way to dinner at my parents' house last night and picked up some apples so I could throw it together there.

I would say this recipe is super easy to throw together at the last minute, but it took me about an hour to prep everything before I could get it into the oven. My littlest one was entertained with the tupperware cabinet just long enough for me to peel the apples and then I had to stop what I was doing every couple minutes to chase her away from the steps going upstairs. And then my older one had an accident and I had to give her a bath... And then my niece tripped and took a header into the doorframe...

I only made half the recipe for the filling and used a Stayman Winesap, a Jonagold, and a Macoun apple. Per the suggestion of the other bakers, I made the entire recipe for the crumble. I am so glad I did because the crumb to filling ratio was perfect! I also cut the sugar in half and agree with Sarah of Blue Ridge Baker that you could eliminate the sugar all together if you wanted. I baked the entire thing for a little over an hour or just until the filling started to bubble up around the edges. I didn't want to bake for too long because I like the apples to still be intact after baking.

This crumble was a huge hit in my parents' house. My mom, dad, and I all split a small casserole dish and I sent a medium sized dish into my husband's work. If anyone read my last post, you would know that although my husband loves my cooking, he isn't overly expressive when complementing me. But even he gave it rave reviews last night- twice! This recipe will definitely be a repeat in my house.

Thanks Christine for picking such a wonderful recipe to welcome the fall season! Be sure to check out her page if you would like the recipe. And don't forget to check out what all the other Sweet Melissa Sunday bakers thought.

Orange Scented Scones

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays recipe was chosen by Robin of Lady Craddock's Bakery. I have to admit, I was a bit surprised by her selection this week. You see, she is a personal trainer and this recipe has to be the most fattening one in the entire book. I am not kidding when I say this recipe has no redeeming qualities (unless you add some chopped up fruit to them). These scones are literally fat and flour mixed together to create something called breakfast, or tea depending on where you live.

I absolutely love scones. There used to be this little British tea shop near us that sold scones, and I absolutely loved them. Every couple months, I would stop by and pick up a half dozen of them and a package of fruit pastilles (my roommate in college was from South Africa and she turned me on to them). Delicious! Unfortunately, they have since closed. And talk about timing on their part- I went to buy scones the last weekend they were open only to find a burned out building when I turn into the parking lot. Evidently the restaurant next to them caught fire the night before and it literally burned down to the ground. So they only really lost one day of business and I'm sure there was not that much left in the shop at that point. Lucky for them, not so lucky for me!

Since the tea shop has closed, I have been on a quest to find scones that could match up. There is a little shop in our town called Talula's Table that has pretty decent ones, but they aren't quite as good. Maybe I'm just biased because scones seem to taste a little different when you buy them from someone with a British accent. Then I made this recipe... and I can report with great satisfaction that I think I have finally found something to fill the dark sconeless void I had been previously left with.

I first made the recipe a couple months back when I initially bought the book. I had a brunch after my brother-in-law's wedding and made all these different kinds of scones based on the recipe. I was so anxious the first time I made them, hoping they might possibly hold up to their British counterparts. Thankfully, they did. Everyone at the brunch loved them, including me. Though I felt a little guilty when my mother-in-law's best friend started raving over them as she was telling me how she had just been to the doctor and he told her her cholesterol was too high. But it was a little late at that point!

As for the recipe itself, it is super easy to throw together. I only have one of those mini prep food processors so I had to cut the butter in to half of the flour and then mix in the rest. This time around, I opted to use lemon zest in the first batch instead of orange since lemon scones are my absolute favorite. Some other flavor combinations I have made in the past are lemon-blueberry (my daughter's favorite), orange-cranberry-pistachio (one of my favorites), and apple cinnamon with a cinnamon glaze.

For the second batch, I tried experimenting a little. Remember how I said the recipe is fattening? If you make it as written, there is over a tablespoon of butter in each scone AND it uses cream instead of milk. When I was taking yoga before, someone had told me you can sub-in flax meal for butter at a one to one ratio so I decided to give it a try. I also subbed buttermilk, my wonder ingredient, for the cream. My "healthy" scones rose beautifully in the oven and smelled great, but I was a little dismayed when at first glance, they looked a little dry. I grabbed one off the tray and anxiously broke off a piece to try. I was really hoping they would taste incredibly good, but I am sad to report, I prefer the full fat version much better. However, the flax meal version still passes as a decent weekday breakfast. I had one this morning toasted with honey and enjoyed it. Next time, maybe I will do half butter and half flax meal to see if their turn out any better. I am determined to make them better for me!

Thank you so much Robin for picking this recipe! Hands down, it is one of my favorite recipes from the Sweet Melissa Baking book so far. If you would like to try the recipe for yourself, check our Robin's page or buy the book for yourself. It will not disappoint you.

Fallen Chocolate Souffle Cake

First, my apologies to JoVonn for not baking along last week. I did actually make the muffins but brought them to my sister-in-laws for dinner so I did not get a chance to photograph them. And so so sorry to everyone that I am posting late this week. If its not one thing, its another, right? We went to the beach for the holiday weekend and I did actually make the cake on Monday, but then I could not find my camera cord, and we are having work done on our house... well, you get the idea!

This week's recipe for Sweet Melissa Sundays was chosen by Sarah of Blue Ridge Baker. Sarah has a wonderful blog filled with tasty sweets and creative alternatives for baking with refined sugar. I admire the fact that she does not give her children any refined sugar and would love to do the same with mine, but it would never work in my house. I know my husband would sneak my three year old a doughnut or my mother-in-law would buy her a candy necklace when they were out shopping. Sigh...

Now on to the recipe! I was curious about this week's recipe because I have never had a souffle before and did not know what to expect. I always get nervous baking things like this because you never know how they are going to turn out. The one advantage to this recipe is the souffle is supposed to fall. I had to laugh at myself because I always heard you are supposed to be careful not to stomp around the kitchen when making a souffle so it puffs nicely. I was gingerly walking around the oven with my eleven month old when I suddenly realized the cake was supposed to fall so it didn't really matter! Silly me...

The cake was pretty easy to put together aside from the number of bowls I had to wash after I was done. The cake itself is not labor intensive, but the clean-up certainly was! The only change I made to the recipe was to use raspberry liqueur instead of orange, and I omitted the orange zest. I am not a huge fan of orange and chocolate and I was planning on serving it with raspberries anyway. I popped it in the oven and kept watching it grow higher and higher. I was kind of afraid it may overflow, but luckily it did not. The only thing I found was the cooking time was way off. It said to bake for 65 minutes. I set the timer to 60 and took it out with 13 minutes left on the clock. To my dismay, the one side of the cake had a darkened edge to it and I was really afraid the cake was going to taste burnt. Despite the fact that it was only my family coming over for dinner, I decided to make a cherry pie as well just in case it was overcooked (did anyone read Joy's post this week?). Before you think I am totally crazy, I had leftover pie dough from chicken pot pie I made earlier in the week, so it was not too much extra work.

So what did everyone think? Well, I think the consensus of my family was it was good, but not their favorite recipe (again, did anyone read Joy's post!). Actually, I believe my mom said "the cake is ok, but it's not fair to make a judgement with cherry pie sitting next to it." Interestingly enough, I brought the cake to work the next day and received rave reviews. One woman I work with even went so far as to stop by my office to let me know she thought it was the best dessert I have ever brought in, and that was at ten in the morning! When I tried a smidgen later on, I did find the flavor and texture to be a little better the second day. I am not surprised by this, as in general, I tend to enjoy chocolate desserts more the second day.

While not on my favorites list, I would make the recipe again. And judging from what the other bakers have said, I will stick to the raspberry flavoring instead of orange and maybe even try a hazelnut liqueur. Be sure to check out what the other Sweet Melissa bakers thought, though you probably already have at this point! If you would like the recipe, you can find it on Sarah's blog.

Mom's Banana Apple Bread

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays recipe was chosen by Joy of Hot Oven, Warm Heart. If you haven't already checked out her site, you should definitely make a point of doing so. Not only does she have a wonderful way with words, but she has intersting anecdotes about the history of her various recipes.

Joy chose Mom's Banana Apple Bread and I must start by saying I absolutely love banana bread. Its one of those foods that reminds me of a warm blanket on a cold day, a mother's hug, a good snuggle... comfort food! It was fitting that Joy would pick a recipe like this as she seems to be such a warm and caring person. I have to admit though, I went into this recipe a little biased. My dad makes banana bread all the time and I typically use his recipe. I tried a couple other recipes, but always come back to the one he makes. However, the apples seemed like a nice twist and I was intrigued by the choice of spices. I have had cinnamon in bananas foster and nutmeg in banana smoothies, but never together.

The bread is super easy to throw together. It calls for sauteeing the apples before adding them to the banana bread batter which seemed interesting to me. Anytime I have added apples to baked goods, I just throw them in, but I think you sautee them to carmelize them. When I finished mixing the ingredients, I was a little thrown off by how much batter seemed to be in the bowl. The recipe says to use a 1 1/2 quart loaf pan- I have no concept of how big a loaf pan of this size is supposed to be, but obviously the ones I have are much smaller. I doubled the recipe because I had quite a few bananas to use up and I ended up with two nine inch loaves and a bundt cake. This was fine because we had a baptism to go to on Sunday and I thought I could bring the cake to the party after.

As banana bread, I still like my dad's recipe better. I think I was anticipating more of a banana flavor, but once this bread sits for a bit, the banana and apple flavors morph into something totally but wonderfully new. I would definitely make this recipe again, but not when I am in the mood for good old fashioned banana bread. Everyone at the baptism seemed to enjoy it- it was gone before we left! My only complaint about the recipe is I think the apple slices were a little too large for the recipe. They kind of pulled the bread down if they were near the top of the batter, so my loaves looked a little lumpy. The slices also pulled away from the cake in some places. Next time I will cut the slices again in half or thirds. And again, I felt the flavor was much better the second day when the banana and apple had some time to blend. I would also like to try to make the recipe with applesauce instead of bananas for a nice fall treat when apples are in season.

Thanks for picking such a delicious recipe Joy! Another winner from from the Sweet Melissa Baking book... If you would like the recipe, you can find it on Joy's blog. And be sure to check out what the other Sweet Melissa Sundays bakers thought!

SMS Hazelnut Truffles

This week's Sweet Melissa Sunday's recipe was chosen by Annie of Living Life Foodcariously. Hazelnut Truffles... one of my favorite food combinations! I think the first time I fell in love with chocolate and hazelnuts was when my college roommate and I went to France for Spring Break our senior year (I know- France and not Cancun?!). I bought one of the Ritter Sport bars from the grocery store that was just around the corner from the hotel we were staying in and was completely enamoured by it! How excited was I when I found the bars a couple years later when a Trader Joes opened near my parents' house. It seems like they are available everywhere now- one of the benefits of globalization!

The only reason I gave hesitation to this recipe was working with chocolate in the middle of a heat wave. It has been ninety and humid for the past week on the East Coast- not exactly ideal conditions for rolling truffles! But I could not pass up on the recipe. For once I actually had all the ingredients I needed at one time. A lot of people seemed to have a difficult time finding hazelnuts in the grocery store, so I made a point of stopping at the nut shop at the farmer's market. They have a great selection of nuts at very reasonable prices- I found blanched hazelnuts in two pound bags for around five dollars. A steal from what I have read!

I threw everything together during nap time on Saturday and rolled them out on Sunday morning. They were a breeze to make and the rolling went pretty fast using my cookie dough scoop. Since it was so hot, I decided to roll them using rubber gloves. I am not sure why I thought this would make a difference, but it made clean-up a lot easier if anything else. I would definitely consider it for next time! I really dislike having sticky hands...

I am a little short on taste-testers this week since my husband has the stomach flu and my daughter does not like dark chocolate, but my mom and I absolutely loved the truffles! I dropped off the rest of them to my daughters' day care this morning so we'll see what the teachers thought this afternoon. Overall, I thought it was a great recipe, especially considering how easy they were to make, and I will definitely keep this recipe in mind for the holidays. Truffles make a wonderful hostess gift when you are doing the holiday circuit. The only change I may make is to use milk chocolate instead of dark next time. I had also wanted to dip them in white chocolate after rolling them out, but the white chocolate I had on hand looked a little old so I ended up throing it out.

Thanks Annie for picking such a delicious recipe! I would have kept them all for myself if I weren't trying to recover from having the stomach flu! You can check out the recipe on Annie's blog. And be sure to see what all the other Sweet Melissa Sundays bakers thought.

Snickerdoodles!

Snickerdoodles! I feel like its one of those words you can't write without an exclamation point after it. These tasty little cookies were the recipe of the week for Sweet Melissa Sundays chosen by Spike of Spike Bakes.

I haven't had snikerdoodles in ages so I was kind of excited to try this recipe. I am not sure why, but these were never a popular cookie in my house growing up. I think I have only made them myself once or twice. Maybe because they don't have chocolate in them... or because you are supposed to roll them and I am too lazy to do it!

The recipe was incredibly easy to make which was a huge bonus because we were super busy this week. These days, I rate how easy a recipe is to make based on whether I can make it while holding a baby. My daughter, who is ten months old now, was tired of playing with the spices in the cabinet by the time I was able to make these so I only had one hand free the whole time. But they came together in a breeze and I was able to roll them out with the assistance of my other daughter the next day while the baby was down for her nap.

The cookies turned out a little flatter that what I remembered from the last time I made snickerdoodles, but I am not one hundred percent sure how they are supposed to look. And while I did like the recipe, I would not rank snikerdoodles in general as one of my favorite cookies. My daughter loved them and we both had a blast saying snickerdoodle and coming up with different variations of the name- like snickerpoodle or snickertoodles (does anyone else have kids that watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse??). If anything, a three year old will help you get in touch with your inner silliness!

Thanks Spike for picking a recipe that was fun to make more than anything else! Be sure to check out the recipe on her blog and check in to see what all the other SMS bakers thought.

So I just went to upload my pictures and realized I picked up my mother-in-laws camera last night instead of mine, so I'll have pictures coming soon!

Strawberry Ruby Red Preserves

My apologies to Margo who selected this wonderful recipe as I'm sooooo very late posting... I almost skipped this recipe because we had gone to the beach the weekend we were supposed to make it, but the flavor combination sounded so intriguing I had to give it a go. I've made a lot of jelly/jam/preserves in the past. My dad always made them during the summer and my sister and I loved to help. The best part was eating the foam he skimmed off before canning the jam (if you've made jam or jelly with Sure-Jell or liquid pectin before, you know what I'm talking about). I do normally use the Sure-Jell when making jam, so I was especially interested to see how this recipe would turn out since it uses apples as a source of pectin.

Aside from having all the ingredients on hand at one time, this recipe was really easy to make. I bought strawberries and grapefruit before reading the recipe all the way through and when I went to make it the first time, I realized I had no apples. By the time I was able to get the apples, I had to break down and let my daughter eat the strawberries I bought. You just can't say no to a kid when they ask for fruit as a snack! One more trip to the store did the trick...

I absolutely loved the flavor of the preserves- strawberry preserves can be a little too sweet sometimes, but the grapefruit counteracted the sweetness quite nicely. I really wanted to make lemon scones so I could try the preserves on something, but I have been so busy lately. That is the one nice thing about preserves- they keep for a long time! I did give a small jar to my mom and dad and my mom said she really enjoyed them. I may have to add this to my list of preserves to make every year!

You can check out the recipe on Margo's blog. Be sure to check out the latest pictures of her adorable dog as well!

Chewy Peanut Butter Cookies

This week's SMS recipe was chosen by Stephanie of Ice Cream before dinner. Peanut butter cookies... they hold a special place in my heart. For one, I LOVE peanut butter. I grew up on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches- I literally had one almost every day from kindergatden through high school. And it was a saving grace when I was pregnant with my first daughter- I had gestational diabetes and it was one of the few things I really enjoy that I was able to eat without too much concern (even fruit was a no-no). Peanut butter cookies are a staple Christmas cookie in my house as well, so they always remind me of the holidays.

This recipe is very similar to the one I grew up with except we always rolled them in sugar and topped with Hershey's kisses. Funny enough, I always used to pick off the chocolate kiss and eat the cookie when I was little! I didn't develop an appreciation for chocolate until I was older. They are super easy to make, especially considering you skip the sugar rolling step. The only change I made to the recipe was the kind of flour I used. Believe it or not, I had run out of white flour and I had already run the to the store about three times this week and it was raining all day so I decided I had to make due with what I had on hand. After debating between whole wheat flour, graham flour, and oat flour, I went with the graham flour. I figured I love peanut butter and graham crackers so it couldn't be that bad!

I think the cookies turned out well, except they were a little flatter than what I anticipated and I kind of lost the cross-hatch effect in baking. I wonder if this had to do with the graham flour- the texture was definitely a little heavier than regular flour. But the flavor was great and they had a nice chewy texture. My husband loves soft cookies so I think he really appreciated them! The recipe is a definite do-over. I really liked the flavor of the cookie with the graham flour, but I'm curious to see if they would bake differently using a different flour.

Be sure to check out the recipe on Stephanie's blog and to see what the other SMS bakers thought of this week's recipe.

Whole Orange Poppy Seed Cake

This week's Sweet Melissa Sunday's recipe was chosen by Melissa of Lulu the Baker- a whole orange poppy seed cake. I almost sat this week out- I had a really busy week at work and my littlest one has the start of a chest cold, but I really enjoy Melissa's blog and wanted to bake along in support. When I saw how easy the recipe was, I decided to give it a go.

I have one other recipe in my collection that uses the entire orange- orange flax muffins. My mom found the recipe when we were running a "health week" at work. She came across it on a breast cancer awareness website. It was amazing how the bitterness of the orange peel dissipate d after baking the muffins. This recipe was super easy to throw together. I didn't even have to pull out my stand mixer this week! I decided to bake them in my mini bundt cake pan my sister gave me for Christmas a few years ago. I haven't had much luck using it in the past as it is a really dark nonstick pan and everything has a tendency to come out burnt. But I decreased the baking temperature to 325 degrees and kept a very close eye on it.

I ended up pulling the cakes out after about 25 minutes. The texture of the tops looked a little funny- not smooth like I'm used to with recipes like these. But they weren't burnt so I was happy. But then I went to take them out of the pan and evidently I didn't grease them enough. The first one broke when I took it out and I had to ease the rest of them out with a spoon. You can see from the picture that the cakes definitely stuck to the pan.

So the verdict... I really wanted to like these little cakes and I'm not sure if I was discouraged by yet another disappointing experience with my mini bundt pan, but I have to admit, this isn't amongst my favorites from the book. I found the texture to be a little off which I suspect may be due to lowering the baking temperature. I also did not have time to make the glaze for it as we were out all day so I would like to try the recipe one more time before I make a final decision.

Be sure to check out what the other Sweet Melissa Bakers thought of the recipe. You can find the recipe on Melissa's blog.

And here are some pictures from the gardens we visited this afternoon. They are a little more pleasing to the eye than my cake!

I love this orange lilly- the flower was so interesting!

And some beautiful yellow daisies- my favorite color!

Brown Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream

My family and I went to the beach last weekend so I missed out on the brown sugar vanilla ice cream that was chosen by Karen of Karen's Cookies Cakes & More. I was kind of hoping to fit it in before we left but laundry and packing got in the way... I was kind of bummed I missed out on making it because I rarely use my ice cream maker and I love vanilla ice cream, so I am doing double duty for SMS this week.

The last time I made a custard ice cream, I was not quite sure how thick the custard was supposed to be. I was also using an electronic meat thermometer my husband got for the grill so I wasn't confident in the temperature reading I was getting. I wound up overheating the mixture and ended up with a curdled mess. I tried throwing it in the blender to see if it would come back together, but it just wasn't as creamy as it should have been. So I was much more cautious this time around.

The custard was super easy to make. I love recipes like this because they don't require you to temper the eggs. With my trusty meat thermometer in hand, I successfully heated the custard to 182 degrees (I should really get an instant read thermometer). After chilling overnight, I churned the ice cream Sunday morning and was it ever delicious. Super creamy and a nice vanilla flavor... I even got my three year old to eat a piece of chicken by bribing her with an ice cream cone!

Thanks Karen for picking such a great recipe! I was happy for an excuse to use my ice cream maker. You can check out the recipe on her blog.

Lemon Blueberry Cheesecake with Cornmeal Crumble Crust

This week's recipe for Sweet Melissa Sundays was chosen by Eliana of A Chica Bakes. I have to admit there are several recipes in the book that I am a little wary of, but I always end up loving them. While I love cheesecake, the idea of a cornmeal crust didn't sound very appealing.

Aside from being a little time consuming, the recipe is relatively easy to make. I really like the addition of the lemon zest/juice. I am generally not a huge fan of flavored cheesecakes, but the lemon was very subtle. I knew I was going to at least like the cheesecake part when I tasted the batter- so creamy!

I brought the cheesecake over to my parents' house last night and everyone loved it. Very creamy and not dry or gummy as some recipes can turn out to be. My dad kind of had a funny look on his face when he took the first bite and then he asked what the crust was made of. Oh no... I told him it was cornmeal and he said that was what he thought. But surprise, surprise, he loved it! He thought the traditional graham cracker crust would have overpowered the lemon, which I tend to agree with. My husband on the other hand, said he really liked it, but prefers the traditional crust. The only thing I had an issue with was the blueberry sauce. It was a little runnier than what I expected but still delicious.

Thanks Eliana for picking an awesome recipe this week! If you would like the recipe, you can find it on her blog.

Double Dark Chocolate Cherry Cookies

So I'm a little late posting for Sweet Melissa Sundays this week. We had a very busy weekend and then I had to go out of town for business on Monday and Tuesday. I did actually make the cookies over the weekend, but had to give up the memory card in my camera to my three year old. My husband snagged the memory card in her V-Tech camera my mom gave her for Christmas and she really wanted to use it over the weekend, so I gave her mine. How different things are these days- my three year old has her very own digital camera!

In any case... This week's recipe was chosen by Megan of My Baking Adventures. I was somewhat skeptical about the recipe this week because I don't generally like cookies made from a chocolate dough. But I knew the people at my work would eat them if my family and I did not. I was pleasantly surprised by them. I only had regular cocoa powder, so I am not sure how much that affected the flavor. To me, they seemed to have just the right amount of chocolate flavor (not too bitter) and I loved the chunks of cherry in them. Per the suggestion of other SMS bakers, I did cut the cherries in half and doubled the amount I put in the dough. 1/3 Cup just didn't seem like enough.

They got really good reviews at dinner on Sunday evening. My sister-in-law, who is four months pregnant, seemed really excited by them when I set them out on the table after dinner. But who isn't excited by chocolate when you are hormonal!

One last comment about these cookies and similar recipes in the book. The recipe calls for the dough to be chilled twice. First you chill in the bowl, then scrape out of the bowl, shape into a log, wrap in plastic, and then chill again. I have found it a little easier to just shape into a log immediately and chill. I divide the dough in half, kind of squish it on the plastic into something that resembles a log, roll the plastic wrap around it, and then shape into a uniform log shape with my hands when it is wrapped in the plastic. I found it kind of difficult to get the dough out of the bowl after it was chilled the first time and this method also cuts down on the amount of time it needs to be chilled.

Thanks Megan for picking such a wonderful recipe! You can check out the recipe on her blog.

Butterscotch Cashew Bars

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays recipe was chosen by Pamela of Cookies with Boys. I think I gained about three pounds just reading the recipe let alone eating it- two sticks of butter, a bag of butterscotch chips, 3/4 cup of corn syrup... but are they ever delicious.

The recipe is pretty straightforward and easy to make. Just a shortbread crust made with brown sugar that is topped off with butterscotch caramel and cashews. Of course, when I was making them, I was simultaneously making ice cream and helping my three year old pour the ingredients into the mixer, so my first batch I ended up with 1 1/4 cups of flour in the crust instead of 2 1/2. It was pretty much ice cream topping in a baking dish so off to the trash it went. In hindsight, maybe I should have saved it for the ice cream!

The second batch turned out great. I sprinkled chocolate chips on half of the bars before throwing them into the oven for the last five minutes. I also cut the bars while they were still warm instead of waiting until they had cooled. I think it actually ended up being a little easier that way and I didn't have to struggle to get them out of the pan. My husband loved them and told me they were a definite do over but couldn't decide whether he liked the chocolate or the plain better. Of course my daughter loved them...

Thanks Pamela for picking such an awesome recipe- I haven't seen my husband that excited about something I baked for a while, so I know its something to hold onto! If you would like the recipe, check it out on Pamela's blog.

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Toasted Almonds

This week's recipe for Sweet Melissa Sunday's was actually chosen by the entire group. After a vote, it was decided we were going to make the chocolate chip cookies with toasted almonds. This may sound a little odd, but I was actually kind of glad everyone chose to go with this recipe because I still had chocolate bunnies from Easter I did not know what to do with. I was busy studying for an exam around Easter and my mom was trying to help me out so she went out for me to pick up candy for my daughter. She wasn't quite sure what I wanted to get, so she took the safe route and bought three different chocolate bunnies and a chocolate duck so I could choose which one I wanted. I guess she figured grandmas get to go home at the end of the night so she wouldn't be the one to have to send a three year old on a sugar high to bed! Joking aside, she really helped me out a lot, but I had a ton of leftover chocolate. It was really good homemade candy so off to the chopping block the bunny went...

I have to tell you how much I love this recipe. There is a reason why my sister is the cookie baker and I am the pie baker in my family- for some reason, my cookies just don't turn out right. My perrenial problem with chocolate chip cookies is they are always flat. I have tried experimenting with butter versus margerine, white sugar versus brown sugar, and refrigerating the cookie dough. All I end up with is flat cookies that fall apart. But they came out perfect this time! Finally! It will definitely be my go to recipe in the future.

I really liked the toasted almonds in the cookies as well. I am a huge fan of almonds, but if I were making for a big crowd, I may substitute in walnuts or pecans as they seem to have a more universal appeal. I also worry about almonds being more of a choking hazard for my older daughter.

The recipe does call to chill the dough twice before baking it, so bear that in mind if you want need to make the recipe quickly. The first time, you chill the dough in a bowl and the second time you shape the chilled dough into a log, wrap in plastic, and then chill again. The dough can be a little difficult to scrape out of the bowl when chilled, but Melissa of Lulu the Baker suggested scooping the dough out of the bowl and wrapping in plastic before the first chill which I will definitely be doing next time. I wasn't sure if we were going to eat all two dozen of the cookies this week, and freshly baked cookies definitely taste beter, so I froze one of the "logs" of cookie dough. That way next time we want cookies, all I have to do is defrost it for a few minutes, slice, and bake.

Thanks to all who voted for the chocolate chip cookies! It was getting harder and harder to come up with excuses for my daughter why she couldn't start another chocolate bunny! You can check out the recipe on the Sweet Melissa Sundays page.