Cakespy’s Cranberry Bliss Bars
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this is a riff on the starbucks cranberry bliss bar and I found it on the website of cakespy. I have claimed I cannot bake for a long time. My co-worker Claire says this proves I am lying. That either means it is a great recipe, or I can, in fact, bake.
Ingredients for cake base
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/4 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg (optional)
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups flour
1/4 cup dried cranberries
1/4 cup white chocolate, coarsely chopped (I used Ghiradelli)
1/4 cup candied ginger, finely chopped (I left this out)
Ingredients for frosting
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest (optional)
dash of salt
Ingredients for garnish
1/3 cup white chocolate (either chips, or coarsely chopped bar chocolate)
1/2 cup dried cranberries
Procedure
1. Preheat oven to 350°F and lightly grease a 9×13 pan.
2. Make the cake. Beat butter and sugar together until fluffy; add the vanilla and eggs, one at a time, stirring well after each addition. Sift together flour, ground ginger, nutmeg, and salt and then add to the butter and sugar mixture, beating until fully incorporated. This will be a very thick batter. Fold in the cranberries, chocolate and ginger. Spread the batter in the pan and bake for about 30 minutes or until light golden. Let the cake cool before adding the frosting.
3. Make the frosting. Using the paddle attachment on an electric mixer, beat the butter and cream cheese together until fluffy; add the lemon zest, vanilla, and salt; add the confectioners’ sugar bit by bit until the frosting has reached your desired consistency (you may need less than the suggested amount). Spread the frosting evenly over the cake, and scatter the cranberries on top of the frosting immediately.
4. Make the drizzle. In a double boiler, melt white chocolate; once it is smooth, use a spoon and drizzle across the top of the frosted and cranberry-festooned cake.
5. Slice the bars immediately after applying the white chocolate drizzle. Slice in half lengthwise, and then slice into four equal parts horizontally. Slice each rectangle in half diagonally, and you will end up with 16 triangle-shaped bars.
pesto
there is a crêpe place called crêpes & crêpes in the Cherry Creek neighborhood in Denver that I would urge you to try. I used to go there fairly often with my friends. Their crêpes were just wonderful-tender and filled with lovely things. The owner is a thickly accented Frenchman. They always served two sides of sauce with the savory crêpes (a red and a green, like Christmas.) But the one I truly miss is the pesto which is a beautiful green heavily flavored with garlic. Truly wonderful.
We recently had a nice dinner with a family from Campus Crusade and they served us grilled steak which is sorely missed in our grill-less apartment and sauced it with pesto. I asked Nick for the recipe and I hope he doesn’t mind my passing it along. I finally remembered to prowl Brian’s email for it as I am searching for something to eat this week. It is fresh, unusual and really good.
1/2 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley
1/4 roasted shelled pistachios
1 small clove garlic
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 cup olive oil
finely chop the parsley, pistachios, and garlic. Mix into the oil,
salt and pepper. I found that it worked best if I chopped the garlic
and pistachios in a food processor, then chopped the parsley
separately before mixing it all together.
for Denverites and world travelers
Crepes & Crepes
2816 E 3rd Ave
Denver, CO 80206
cooking class – week three
a long day at work and straight to class. Feels like I could be a bit too old for this. But tonight was actually the most interesting night we’ve had at class, food wise. 8 recipes and Karin and I made 2.
I realized one thing big thing tonight. It is good to have the food taste of someone else once in a while because we made things I would never try – and I liked them.
- puffed salmon hors d’oeuvres with sour cream sauce (puff pastry and salmon, dill – which I thought I dislike but might not)
- Heart of Palm Salad – heart of palm is like tofu but not. weird, but ok.
- ‘unbelievable’ biscuit muffins – is it a muffin? is it a biscuit? no one knows.
- Herb crusted Salmon with sun-dried tomato sauce – excellent salmon with a nice dry rub
- Blue Cheese and Cheddar Potato Gratin (Karin and I made this one – it was super-rich and had great flavor)
- Asparagus with Shittake Mushrooms and Bacon (We also made this and it was, dare I say, almost too bacon-y)
- Hibiscus Mocktail. Funny. No hibiscus. Fuzzy pop.
- Chocolate Velvet Cake with Two Sauces–white chocolate and raspberry – very nice, a nearly flourless densely chocolaty cake with lovely raspberry puddles. Delightful.
I also just want to say. Presentation is everything. The most lovely food on a paper plate with a plastic fork is just not the same.
‘wichcraft roast beef & radish slaw
today I made the first recipe out of Tom Colicchio’s book, ‘wichcraft. We picked it up a while back and for some reason it languished. The recipes are very different flavors than I would normally put together on my own and this sandwich speaks to that. I roasted an eye of round for 45 minutes or so in the oven after browning the sides on the stovetop and sliced it very thin. It topped black pepper mayo and ciabatta rolls and was crowned with a daikon slaw, thin sliced red radishes and sauteed red onion. Daikon was a new one for me and is a mild radish. A really nice sandwich. I am looking forward to working my way through a few more of these.
My Urban Pantry 