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My second MSC post! MS Cupcakes Club is another online baking group where, once a month, we bake cupcakes from Martha Stewart's fabulous cupcake book. Last month was pumpkin cupcakes, and in keeping with the holiday theme, this month's selection is Candied Sweet Potato Cupcakes.
Now I wouldn't normally associate sweet potatoes (as much as I love them) with cupcakes. But they made them really soft and moist, and added great flavor. The cupcakes are topped with mini marshmallows that have been "toasted" in the broiler. It was a little tough to get the mounds of marshmallows to stay together long enough to stick the pan in the broiler... and they certainly didn't take long to brown! I was afraid that once cooled the marshmallows would have a funny texture or would harden back up, but they stayed soft and gooey, and were a great addition to the cupcakes.
These would be great for Thanksgiving, or any fall party. Thanks to Karen from Karen's Cookies, Cakes & More for this month's selection!
I've never been much for crisps. If I'm going to eat dessert, I've always steered towards chocolate, peanut butter, and the like. I enjoy an occasional slice of apple pie a la mode, but generally speaking I like my fruit plain, simple, and undoctored. So I wasn't particularly excited about this TWD recipe (chosen by Em of The Repressed Pastry Chef - a super cute blog!) Mr. LITK on the other hand, he like fruit desserts. So I figured if nothing else he was sure to like it. Well I was wrong... he loved it! And I thought it was pretty tasty too! 
I quartered the recipe and split it into two ramekins. As you can probably guess by the name, the recipe calls for diced apples and whole cranberries, as well as dried cranberries or raisins. The crumble is a basic mix of flour, brown sugar, butter and cinnamon... with the addition of coconut and ginger (yum!). I had most of the ingredients, but no cranberries.... so off I went to the grocery store.Now I live in a major metropolitan area. And I go to one of those giant chain grocery stores (Dominicks's if you must know). So one would think that I could find just about anything. Wrong. Remember the marscapone from a few recipes back... no where to be found. I was expecting, what with Thanksgiving right around the corner, that cranberries would be in great abundance. I checked the produce section: no fresh cranberries. Then I checked the freezer section: no frozen cranberries. Then I asked a remarkably friendly clerk: he looked at me like I was crazy and directed me to the jellied cranberry. So I had to improvise. I bought a can of whole cranberry sauce, thinking I could strain off the sauce and have whole cranberries left. What I learned was that whole cranberry sauce is basically jellied cranberry... with a few berries scattered throughout. And its not meant to be strained. But I managed to get a few cranberries out of it, and added in some dried cherries and the raisins. 
Overall it turned out to be a nice mix and the crisps were delicious. We ate them hot out of the over with a big dollop of whipped cream - yum! Definitely a great cold weather treat!
For this week's TWD challenge, I decided on the Chocolate Caramel Chestnut Cake chosen by Kayta of Second Dinner. (Remember, for November we can bake the four recipes in any order we choose!) I was at my parents' house this weekend, and decided it was a good time to bake a cake - and to have three other people to help me eat it!This is not the kind of cake you throw together on a whim. If company shows up unexpectedly, you do NOT whip up the chocolate caramel concoction. It's elaborate. And expensive. And time consuming. There are 20 ounces of chocolate and more than four sticks of butter in this baby! It's definitely a special occasion kind of cake. 
Unfortunately, I wasn't too thrilled with the results. The overall consensus was that it was way too rich and buttery for our liking. Now I did make several substitutions, which probably didn't help matters. And I was also rushed for time. But I'm not sure I'll be making this cake again anytime soon!For starters, I couldn't find chestnut spread and I wasn't about to order it online. So I used peanut butter and peanuts in place of the chesnut spread and chestnuts. In the P&Q some of the other bakers mentioned that chestnut spread has a high fat content (more so than pb?)... which might be why my cake dried out a bit, despite the 2 1/4 sticks of butter! The middle was pretty good, but the edges were a little crispy. I also didn't make the brandy syrup, which probably would have helped. 
My favorite part of the cake was the ganache that went between the layers of cake. It started with a stovetop caramel, then cream, chocolate and (of course) butter. The chocolate-caramel combination was delicious, but it was a little too buttery for me. I don't like to actually taste the butter. It would be fantastic combined with powdered sugar to make a frosting though!The glaze was also pretty tasty on its own... but the whole things together was just too much. I also didn't cool the cake long enough, so when I assembled it the ganache started to melt and it turned into a little bit of a mess. I'm thinking of making the holiday bundt cake for Thanksgiving... so next week will be cranberry-apple crisps. I've never made a crisp before, so wish me luck!
So I am a day late this week... oops! I went to dinner with two girlfriends last night and was just too tired when I got home to post. I need to start posting on Monday nights!This week's recipe was chosen by April of Short + Rose. Until this week I've followed every recipe pretty closely (except for subbing in applesauce for some of the butter/oil in the allspice crumb muffins). This week, however.... I had to make some changes! First of all, I don't keep kirsch on hand (I actually don't even know what kirsch is... though I gather from the P&Q that its some sort of cherry liquor). We actually don't keep any liquor on hand (we're beer and wine people)... and I wasn't about to go out and buy a bottle of rum for a teensy 1/4 cup! I also couldn't find marscapone cheese at the grocery store. I spent 15 minutes scouring the refrigerated section but came up empty handed. So I used all cream cheese instead. I don't own a springform pan so I halved the recipe and made it in a Corningware casserole dish. 
Despite all of this, the torte came out really well! The bottom layer is a rich, fudgy brownie. I was a little concerned about the whole cherries (I think I've mentioned before I have texture issues), but they were hardly noticeable and just made the brownie more moist. The top layer was a creamy mousse - I'm sure the marscapone would have been delicious, but cream cheese worked well (and I even used 1/3 less fat!).
I followed the suggestion in the book and put a few tablespoons of leftover cherry preserves in my mini food chopper to make a glaze. I spooned this into a sandwich bag, cut off the corner, and piped lines on top of the torte. Then I used a butter knife to make the chevron pattern. It turned out nicely - and would be great for a dinner party. Be sure to check the TWD blogroll to see how everyone else did!
For this week's TWD post, Erin of Prudence Pennywise chose Dorie's Sweet Potato Biscuits. Isn't it funny how so many fall foods come in fall colors... like orange? I've made pumpkin cookies, pumpkin cupcakes, pumpkin bread, roasted butternut squash, butternut squash soup.... and now sweet potato biscuits. I opted to use canned sweet potatoes for my biscuits because, frankly, its easier. I spent several hours last weekend peeling/slicing/grating pumpkins and squash and I wasn't too keen on re-visiting that just yet. So canned sweet potatoes it was!
This recipe was super simple and the dough came together pretty easily. It was a little sticky, but I tried not to overwork it (on the advice of many other TWD bakers). The biscuits came out really well. The were a little soft in the middle but they were quite tasty. They'd be great to dunk in soup or maybe for a fall spin on biscuits and gravy. Be sure to check out Erin's blog for the recipe and try them out!
I'm super excited for my first MSC post! As I mentioned, Martha Stewart's Cupcakes Club is an online baking group where members take turns picking cupcakes from Martha's book and we all bake along and blog about it. Martha + cupcakes + blogging = fabulous!For this month's recipe, Kim of What the Whisk picked Pumpkin Patch cupcakes. Kim's blog is super cute - be sure to check out how her cupcakes turned out. The photos are stunning! And what a perfect pick for October. Coincidentally, I caught part of Martha's Halloween special on FLN this weekend - tons of cute ideas for party decorations and all things Halloween. Makes me wish I was throwing a Halloween party!
These cupcakes turned out super moist and rich. The combination of pumpkin, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves never disappoints... but what really made these cupcakes special was the addition of real pumpkin. I have to admit, it took me forever to peel the pumpkin, remove the seeds, chop it up, and grate it in the food processor. But it was worth it in the end. After all that time spent on the pumpkin, I went the simple route for decorating and used those mellowcreme pumpkins that line the shelves this time of year. They looked cute, but the next day the orange sugar had started to melt and create little orange pools around the pumpkins. Luckily my co-workers didn't mind and still gobbled them up! 
The cream cheese frosting was also wonderful - it was fluffy, creamy, and rich. Probably the best cream cheese frosting I've ever had. The recipe made a TON so I had quite a bit left over. I spread it on low fat honey grahams and made sandwiches, then stuck them in the freezer to made pseudo ice cream sandwiches. Although Mr. QC loved the cupcakes, he said the frosting sandwiches were out of this world. Overall my first MSC adventure was a big success... and I'm looking forward to the next one!
