Brown Butter Buttermilk Doughnuts

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I mean... doughnuts!

I just don't know any other way to introduce the most exciting of all food groups. In fact, I'm just not even sure what to say about these in general. It's like the nuttiness of the browned butter has taken over my brain and left me with the inability to think anything other than "mmm" and "delicious" and "drool" ... basically I'm having a Homer Simpson moment all over this blog.

I mean... doughnuts!

It shouldn't come as a surprise that I've already started stock piling recipe ideas in my mind to cover each season. I'm already counting down the days until I can make a lemon doughnut with a sweet strawberry glaze, or the inevitable pumpkin spice doughnut with salted caramel drizzle, or winter's ginger and apple spiced doughnut with cinnamon sugar. Seriously. I can't stop.

I mean... doughnuts! Seriously!

I don't think I need to tell you that this is most exciting thing I've made in a long time. Or maybe ever. I was given a doughnut pan for Christmas and it was a supremely exciting moment. Except now I've realized just how accessible I've made doughnuts to my life, and I can already foresee the wardrobe issues I'm going to be having in the near future becauseI already want all of the doughnuts, all of the time.

For this inaugural foray into the ridiculously world of doughnuts I've worked with a recipe from my standby baker extraordinaire, Joy the Baker. There doesn't seem to be much this woman can't do, except maybe eat more doughnuts than me - that has yet to be seen, and her basic brown butter doughnut recipe was a perfect place to start. I altered it only slightly to accommodate my pantry.

I never would have thought that I would consider a doughnut pan a kitchen staple, but there is no way I'm ever turning back now!

I mean... doughnuts!

Vegan Salted Chocolate Covered Caramels

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If a food ever had a trick up its sleeve, it would be these vegan salted chocolate covered caramels. They are so delectably indulgent that you'd never guess the normal butter/sugar combination that makes caramel has been replaced by a blended up date with a touch of coconut oil. Draped in a layer of almond butter before dipped and coated in chocolate and sprinkled with sea salt, these morsels of goodness not only easy (though time consuming) but also slightly less guilt inducing at the same time, which in essence is my kind of caramel. 

These got whipped up on a day of "getting into the Christmas spirit" with my sister as we tried in desperation to find a Christmas movie we hadn't seen 100,000 times but in the end had to settle with the always appreciated National Lampoons Christmas. And a word to the wise, don't even bother turning on the Lady Gaga/Muppets Holiday collaboration ... just trust me on this. Though perhaps you have better judgement than me in the first place. 

Based on this recipe from Minimalist Baker, these caramels have a salty sweet aspect that worked its charm on everyone. These disappeared at record pace and left a caramel sized whole in the hearts of those who enjoyed .... soon to be filled by another treat, I'm sure!

Keep reading for the recipe!

Nutella Chocolate Mug Cake

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I've got some really great news for you today. In case you haven't noticed, it's mid-April (already!?), which means it's practically summer. At this time of year many of us start to think about squeezing into our best beach wear for all the world to see, and simultaneously making a list of all the goals you'll need meet before that can happen. Well, guess what? You're stunning just as you are. To celebrate, eat some cake.

What's that you say? You are really committed to your summer-self goals? Awesome! Good for you! Work hard, play hard! I think concentrating on your healthiest self is really important, in both body and mind. So after sweating it out and really going for gold, don't forget to work on the mental aspect of your health too. One great way to do that is by celebrating small victories. Did you run an extra 5 minutes? Complete your first full body push up? Finish your first 5K/10K/half marathon? Then celebrate with cake! And do it happily knowing that this is a single serving cake, so you won't have 7 pieces of leftovers watching you from the fridge. Win-win!

Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Icing

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The beginning of December marks two thing in my calendar. 1. It's the time when I feel it is officially okay to snow, and 2. Other Half is ringing in another year of life. Snow is not a thing in southern China, but birthdays are and what's a birthday without cake? Not much, if you ask me. Which is why every December I roll up my sleeves, head into the kitchen and do my best to outdo myself from the year before.  And judging by the reviews from Other Half and the party goers that helped us celebrate, this one was a win.

I've spoken about this before, but Other Half is a peanut butter and chocolate fiend. The only combination that makes him happier is chocolate chip cookies and milk (there's definitely a theme to his food choices). And so each year I attempt a new twist on what I've done in the past.  One year it was a ice cream brownie cake concoction.  Last year it was this chocolate peanut butter "pie".  This year, it's a chocolate cake (with chocolate chips) and peanut butter icing. Neither element was too sweet and both were mouth watering-ly good on their own, the combo of the two put it over the edge. Yum!

Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Icing
cake recipe from: 5 second rule 

For the cake:

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted about halfway
6 tablespoons sour cream
1 cup milk
2 eggs, at room temperature
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

For the icing:

1 cup icing sugar (or more to taste)

1 cup peanut butter

1/4 cup greek yogurt

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Grease a 9-inch round cake pan. Line with parchment.
2. Mix the flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into a large bowl. 
3. Add the butter, sour cream, milk, egg, and mini chips. Stir until well combined and scrape into the prepared cake pan. 
4. Bake in the center of the oven for 30 to 35 minutes, until the cake is firm to the touch, a skewer withdraws clean, and the cake is just beginning to pull away from the sides. (NOTE: these are the bake time instructions from the original recipe - if you're like me and you're baking in a tiny oven that seems to be overly hot... check it after 10, it's probably done.)
5. Once out of the oven, allow to cool for approximately 5 minutes and then remove from pan and allow to cool completely on a wire rack.
6. While the cake is baking, whip up the icing by combing all ingredients into a bowl and mixing until well combined.  Taste tests are recommended but caution is necessary - this stuff is addictive!
7. Once the cake is completely cool, place one layer on a plate and ice with approximately 1/3 of the icing. Carefully place the second layer on top and cover with the remaining icing.
8. Over with sprinkles, stick in some candles and enjoy!

Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

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Hey friends! I'm here today to share a recipe that I made up on the fly recently.  The goal was these chocolate peanut butter bars, but as I set out to make them, I quickly realized I was missing a few key ingredients....and so a cookie was born!

I'm mostly excited about this recipe because I can easily say it's the first baking recipe I've ever developed myself.  Cooking dinner rarely sees me with a cookbook because I find it much easier to adapt those foods, and while I grew up in a household with the mantra "baking is not an exact science" I was still aware that it was a science, and so while I'm comfortable adapting recipes and making some fairly grand substitutions/additions, I've never been fully comfortable just throwing the book out and going at it from scratch. But sometimes necessity dictates our actions, and on this day cookies were a necessity.

This cookie comes together quickly, is highly adaptable and bakes up in no time at all.  The combination of oats, peanut butter and chocolate chips creates a substantial chewy gooey goodness cookie that is slightly more addictive than is healthy, but totally worth every bite. It's all I can do to not sit on the couch and eat them all one by one while simultaneously feeding my new found "The Mindy Project" addiction.  It's good times folks.

Let's get to it!

Nutella Stuffed Chocolate Cookies

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As our first school year in China is quickly coming to a close, it's time to announce ... we've signed on for a second year! To be real, it's a bittersweet moment for me. I think I've been fairly honest, if not somewhat limited in the details of my thoughts on life here so far, but I think it's time I broke it down for you. Let's make a list!

Things I love:

1. It's a completely different culture from any I've known before and it forces me to rethink my own biases every single day.
2. I get to travel to really amazing places, a lot.
3. I get to work with really amazing students. These dudes and dudettes are some of the brightest people I've ever met, it's almost scary.  They are going to take over the world one day and they'll probably rock it.
4. It's warm 10 months of the year. The other 2 months it's about 15 degrees Celsius - it makes it hard to complain about the cold days when talking to family and friends back home who are sitting under feet of snow.
5. These cookies. 

Things I don't love:

1. The food. I'm in love with food in general, but in China access to safely fresh food is a very, very big issue. I haven't eaten an apple in 10 months and I stopped eating meat not long after arriving. Local cuisine is far too greasy for my tastes (and tummy), and I just want to be able to make a leafy salad, but can't. Also, I don't want to travel 20 minutes by bus in order to buy cheese. I just don't.
2. Public habits. Loud "hoarking" in the streets is a sound I will never get used to. I will also not get used to, or be okay with, your child defecating in the streets - the public health issues alone are never ending. In general people speak too loudly and stand too close. I sound like an old man, I know, but I find it unnerving. (disclaimer: some of this is cultural, I'm not meaning to offend, I just don't love it and that's okay too)
3. It rains. A lot. It causes flooding in the streets and all of the above mentioned public habits are now in movement.
4. The atmosphere is damp. The environment is tropical. I get that, I just don't love it. It means I can't have bangs and my big hair get's bigger. 
5.  My kitchen for making these cookies. The oven is shared, there are always strangers asking for samples and I don't know how to say "no sorry, these are for a friend who's birthday in Hong Kong just got cancelled".

Next year we will be moving and I'll have my very own (mini, counter-top) oven, it's the most exciting part.  It will mean more cookies and maybe even some muffins - it's the little things. 

Little things like Nutella Stuffed Chocolate Cookies. Chocolate wrapped in chocolate. Crispy outside, soft and chewy inside with a melty core of Nutella. Rich and slightly intense these would be perfect paired with a big glass of fresh milk, or even with a dollop of vanilla ice-cream. 

Click through for the recipe!

It's a blogiversary! Let's have (crepe) cake.

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Is there a song you're supposed to sing when you're blog has a birthday? Is there a specific gift you're supposed to buy (yourself) when you and your blog celebrate your first year together? Is it time for cake?

It's always time for cake.  Silly question.

This past year with the blog has seen a lot of changes. It started because I was moving to China but when the move came, I discovered that the Great (fire)Wall was going do its very best to prevent me from ever posting again. Sometimes it wins. Sometimes I win. It's a give-take relationship.  Never the less it has helped me to chronicle my various food/travel/life adventures so that even though my memory sucks, I can attempt to keep track of things and look back and remember my own life. Thanks blog!

It was actually the blogiversary yesterday but I haven't been able to access the internet for almost a week (joy of joys), so I present you this cake today instead. 

This is actually a bit of a cheater cake. It's too easy to be a real cake. It really shouldn't even be allowed. But living the kitchen-less lifestyle that I do, I need to make compromises here and there. Cut some corners, you know? I don't have the luxury of an oven, or a cake pan, or normal ingredients easily available to me. The milk for this recipe alone was a 20 minute bus-ride. So I'm going to let the ease of this cake slide, it's too good not to.

The components of this "cake" are pretty simple. A lot of crepes and a lot of chocolate. I used Nutella because it's quick, easy, and occasionally available in China. If you have the capacity, and the motivation this would be made even more spectacular by a homemade version.

Double Chocolate Red Wine Cookies

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Do you need to read that again to believe it? Double. Chocolate. Red. Wine. Cookies.

That's what I have for you today and to be sure, this is an adult cookie. This is a sexy adult cookie. This is the Jessica Rabbit of cookies.

These cookies are dark and rich, soft and chewy, indulgent and divine. Not to mention they fit so many occasions. Do you need to impress your mother-in-law? Check. Do you need the perfect treat for a girls night in? Check. Do you need something that touches on the romantic side of things a bit better than your average peanut butter cookie? Check. Basically, check, check, check!

There is no way a double chocolate red wine cookie couldn't be an intense flavour experience. These cookies are graced with a deep chocolatey flavour that ends with a hint of red wine.  They will make you question whether you can get away with adding booze to every cookie you ever make again. Grand Marnier Dark Chocolate Cookies anyone? Yes, please! I think we're on to something here...

Chocolate Peanut Butter "Pie"

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Ever wonder what happens when you move to China, don’t speak the language, and then contract a wicked virus like pneumonia? Yeah, neither did I. 

But I can now tell you, because it happened to Other Half, and it wasn’t fun. At all. What started as an innocent cough, quickly escalated into some wild inflammation in the lungs, which led to weeks of exhaustion, a lot of missed classes and too many trips to a Chinese hospital to receive antibiotics via IV twice daily. Slowly, slowly he’s coming around to the healthy side of life, but with a too heavy work load, an environment that’s more polluted than the body is used to, it hasn’t been easy. What a trooper, he deserves a cake, no? Well lucky for him, not only did he pull through like a champ, he also had a birthday, which means double reason for cake! Yay!

Traditionally when it’s Other Half’s Birthday I would bake him up something gooey and sweet that involved chocolate and peanut butter.  Without access to a proper oven, it was time to get creative.  I still managed to pull off the gooey, the sweet, the peanut butter, and the chocolate with just a little ingenuity and some vague memories of no bake classics. After all, a Birthday isn’t a Birthday without some cake!

Cake is perhaps a bit of an overstatement here, it was really more of a… pie? Ish? It had two layers, that I know for sure, but neither of them were traditional cake, or pie.  Working with what I had on hand and access to (which we know isn’t much) I sort of dreamed up this concoction and hoped for the best.

To start we have a layer of pseudo no-bake chocolate oatmeal cookie, and then we add a layer of whipped peanut butter creaminess. Combined it made a decadent, and rather delicious (if I do say so myself) Birthday treat.

If I were to make this again I would adjust a few amounts of certain things here and there (which is how I’m presenting the recipe below – adjustments made) as I found the bottom chocolate layer a bit too wet, and the top layer could have used a more traditional icing sugar (didn’t have).  

At the very least, China is forcing some creativity out of me, and if the results are like this, then I'm not complaining!

Chocolate Peanut Butter "Pie"

all measurements are approximate as this was a very little-bit-of-this-little-bit-of-that recipe!

For the base:

1 1/2 cups of oats

1/4 cup of whipping cream

1/2 cup of unsweetened cocoa powder

1/3 cup of sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup butter

For the topping:

1 cup smooth peanut butter

 1/2 cup of whipping cream

1/3 cup icing sugar

Directions

1. In a saucepan over medium heat melt the butter and add in cream, sugar and vanilla
2. Stir in cocoa powder, when combined, mix in oats and cook for a couple minutes until softened
3. Pour mixture into a greased pie plate - spread evenly and place in refrigerator while preparing the topping
4. In a medium bowl, using either a stand mixer or hand mixer, whip the cream and icing sugar until you have a light whipped cream texture (will take a few minutes)
5. Fold in the peanut butter to the whipped cream mixture until fully combined
6. Spread evenly over the base layer and refrigerate until both layers have set (about 1 hour)
7. Enjoy!

Browned Butter Brown Sugar Brownies

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Today, I got myself a manicure, and today, I bought Other Half a game he'd been eyeing for a long time. Today I feel like giving. To myself, to others, to the world.

Your gift is a close-your-eyes-chew-slowly-and-sigh-audibly moment. The kind that make you stop and realize that with food like this in the world, it's all going to be okay. Whatever it is.

Your gift comes with a little leg work (or, arm work - you need to stir), but really when all you have to do is melt some butter until it's golden brown and nutty, stir it into sugar, chocolate and love, it makes it seem totally doable, and totally worth it.

This is a total winner of a recipe. To me, these are the epitome of brownie. Dense, fudgy, chewy, not cakey, goodness. Other Half claimed that these were the best brownies he ever had. Ever (and I've made brownies before). On a separate occasion he said "I really hope you're saving this recipe" so I decided to save it to the internet. These are true brownie love.

Now, take this gift, get in the kitchen and have yourself a close-your-eyes-chew-slowly-and-sigh-audibly moment (or two).

Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars

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Zorra knows a good thing when she sniffs it

Welcome, friends! May I introduce you to your next obsession?

Bread and butter. Milk and cookies.  Peanut butter and chocolate.  Some things just belong together.

If I ever ask Other Half what kind of sweet treat he wants, he only ever responds with two things. These cookies or these chocolate peanut butter bars.  Without a doubt, it will be one of these two things.  And really, I can't blame him, both of these recipes are classic combinations.

Like many, my introduction to the glory that is the combination of chocolate and peanut butter was the humble Reese's Peanut Butter Cup.  I used to eat them a different way every time.  Sometimes, I would eat all around the edge and save the middle, other times I would do the opposite. Sometimes I eat it as slowly or as quickly as possible. It was a fun food. 

This recipe may not look like a peanut butter cup (I don't have that kind patience), but it sure tastes like one. And I'm having just as much fun eating them!

Curbing Cravings: Banana Chocolate Peanut Butter Smoothie

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As this blog develops over time you will quickly learn that I have a serious sweet tooth.  Chocolate, Vanilla, Butterscotch, Lemon, Raspberry, Coconut, I don’t discriminate - I love all desserts.  They don’t all love me, but I don’t care, I will gobble them up and force them to love me, it’s just how I roll.  Luckily, I also care just enough about my own health that I understand the meaning of “everything in moderation” and can stick to it as a general rule of thumb.  

This recipe is for those days when i need a sweet treat, but I’ve already had several sweet treats. You know what I’m talking about.  Maybe I went berserk on the dessert buffet of my dreams the day before, or maybe i had french toast with caramelized bananas and pure maple syrup for breakfast. Either way, my body knows.