Halloween baking

I had a day off yesterday and now only 2 more left of my clinical training. One could say, I could be happy.

I devoted yesterday to cleaning. Yep, cleaning. That meant: vacuuming, washing the boat load of dishes even though it's not my turn (! why can't we have a dishwasher!?!), picking up, dusting...ya know. (No laundry though!! Ha-ha-ha!)

We also had to clean the aquarium. The shape it was in was shameful. Words cannot describe how much we loathe cleaning it, but if you are going to enjoy the beauty of the creatures in it, it's gotta get done! I always feel so much better about life when the aquarium is clean. Weird.

A few of my friends came over yesterday evening to enjoy what the title of this post is about. Halloween baking. This was the best part of my day. Or well, it was the best part of my morning! By 10:45 a.m. I had everything in the oven...and by the evening completely assembled.

The cake inspiration came from pinterest (of course) but I have only one can of pumpkin left and that is for the Thanksgiving pumpkin pie...

Instead I made a chocolate cake using the black magic chocolate cake recipe from Hershey's.

The buttercream frosting is from here. I just added orange food coloring (ahem, ok - yellow and red)

And the glaze was from here...

And finally my favorite part of this cake! The meringue ghosts! I loooove meringue, we have had a serious relationship ever since my pavlova summer. These were so fun to make, I've never piped meringue before so it was nice to try something new. Cute, doncha think? :)

What a frankenstein of a cake! I didn't realize I needed so many recipes just to make what I had in mind! Lol! It turned out great and was DELICIOUS, too!

Since I had such a halloween baking theme going on, dinner unfolded as a ghost shaped pizza! The dough was made from scratch and we put some ground beef, onion, jalapeno and tomato on it -- and lots of cheese! :) If you hadn't already guessed, I was inspired by pinterest for this pizza, too!

Aah, good food, friends and clean house! A perfect Friday!
Thanks for reading! 

Wishing you a Happy Halloween and fun weekend! :)

Blast from the past chocolate muffins

I have a serious question, what is the difference between muffins and cupcakes? 

Are they muffins until they've been iced/frosted? Is that the difference? Or are muffins "healthy" e.g. blueberry muffins whereas cupcakes are "sugar"?

Either way, I had an excuse to bake, so muffins it was and being that we had chocolate, I wanted to use a recipe that I had almost forgotten about. It used to be my go-to recipe for chocolate cakes. It started as a blueberry muffin recipe but I tweaked it at some point in middle school (big chocolate and baking years) to be a chocolate cake recipe. I used to make it in a bundt pan and it turned out perfect every time. I don't know how it would work as a layer cake. But anywho, I'm assuming everyone knows that almost any cake recipe can be used to make cup-cakes or muffins. (I really need an answer for this question). 

I must say, I am so sorry that I have neglected to respect and honor this recipe over the years. It is so amazing and I am going to have to put it back on the regular baked goods list. It never disappoints.

CHOCOLATE CAKE-MUFFIN-CUPCAKE RECIPE

1 1/2 cups flour (about 3 1/2 dl flour)

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt 

1 egg

1/2 cup sugar (a little over 1 dl sugar)

3/4 cup vegetable milk (about 2 dl milk)

1/4 cup vegetable oil of your choice (about 1/2 dl oil)

7 oz or 200 g baking chocolate (semi-sweet)

(a good chunk of butter or margarine for melting chocolate)

Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl. In another combine egg, sugar, milk and oil.

Mix together dry and wet combos.

Melt the chocolate on a low heat with a chunk of butter. Or if you are into melting over steam, go for it. Let cool for a minute so it doesn't heat the batter too much and then mix it in to the batter. ***

Pour batter into a prepared cake tin/bundt pan or spoon into muffin cups. Bake at 350F or 150C for 40-50 min if you are baking a cake. Cupcakes can be baked at 375F or 200C for about 15 min. Test with a toothpick to see if they are ready, it can be tricky to tell by looking since they're brown. It's also really easy to burn them because of their color, too. 

***I didn't have exactly the 200g of chocolate that gives it the best flavor so I added a bit of cocoa powder. 

I fantasized about making a peanut butter frosting for these, but alas, had no butter or powdered sugar. Life can be oh so cruel sometimes...

Be creative with this recipe! Add a dollop of jam to the cupcakes before baking or come up with something different and exotic. I hate when people say baking is all about leveled cups and exact measurements blah blah blah -- because I've never cared about that and never done anything EXACTLY like a recipe says and everything turns out edible and wonderful and everyone gobbles it up every single time! Recipes are more of a guide in my opinion.

Enjoy the recipe!
 

Thanks for reading and happy baking!!!

Check back tomorrow or Wednesday, I have a slew of pictures from the garden to post!!!

Easter tree admiration

Today is my glorious and well-deserved, if I say so myself, day off from clinical training. It's been a grand one, too. I slept in till 8:50, (so late for us these days) and even Koda-Bear was nice enough to oblige. He is usually a stickler for routines, so at about 6 a.m every morning, he's sniffing my hair and crying to go out. Perhaps he sensed, the primitive need for deep sleep. Maybe he needed some himself. Either way, it was marvelous. 

Once we were up, it was on to a lovely breakfast a la the Breakfast King, my husband. Omelette and coffee, hits the spot every time. Then I left to my parents home, to bake and crochet. Sounds like my kind of day, no? 

Here is what I baked. The cake itself is called a täytekakku. It's a spongy type cake made by beating eggs with sugar, then adding potato flour. It's great for those with gluten issues like my dad. The filling is a banana-vanilla cream type deal and I decorated with whipped cream and canned mandarins. At the end of the post, I'll add my recipe (so keep reading/scrolling) :)

 Then it was on to crocheting. I love this pattern from Attic 24. I have used it before and it's just so easy and pretty. I made some of these for the Easter tree while we watched a movie.

 And here is our Easter tree. Birch branches that my mother cut and in three days, leaves appeared! They are the most vibrant shocking green, especially with the sunlight coming through them. It's great to remind me just exactly why I am so excited about spring...the leaves on the trees! Ah, I can't wait! Most trees at the moment are still at that phase where they don't know if they should bud yet...

Manta being ever so photogenic...

Rainbow of ends from my flowers. I love love the colors! 

 Beautiful and green, adorning the green branches...

And some gorgeous orchids, they were decorations at my wedding and they're still blooming just as beautifully. My mom has the real green thumb when it comes to orchids.

And as promised, the recipe for my cake. I loosely followed this Finnish recipe linked HERE

4 eggs

2 dl sugar (about 3/4 cup)

1/4 tsp salt 

2 dl potato flour/starch (about 3/4 cup)

2 tbs unsweetened cocoa

1 ½ tsp baking powder

Beat the eggs and sugar together until white-ish, thick and fluffy. Mix in a separate bowl the dry ingredients. Sift (I personally never do, but it's the "proper" way for this recipe) the dry ingredients into the egg-sugar mixture, folding carefully. DO NOT OVER MIX! (It'll end up being flat!). You could pour this into a cake tin, but I wanted a flat and rectangular cake so I placed it on a baking sheet covered with parchment paper and baked at 225C for about 8 min. Once slightly cooled I cut it in half. 

The filling is made with "rahka", which is a kind of creme fraiche-yogurt type dairy product here in Finland. I suppose if you don't have that in your home country you could use creme fraiche or a similar product and add sugar to taste. 

2 dl rahka (I used vanilla flavored) or substitute (be creative!)

1-2 bananas mashed

about ½-1 dl of whipped cream (flavored with a bit of sugar and vanilla?)

So your cake should be sticking rather tightly to the parchment paper. Just peel off the paper and place one half on your serving dish of choice. Plop the filling on and place the other cake half on top. Then cover with the rest of the whipped cream and arrange canned mandarins on top. Easy-peasy.

I'm off to get ready for some culture tonight. Well, my husband's friend is in a metal band and they have a show tonight. So if that counts as culture, in my book it does, that is what I'll be up to. :) 

Thanks for reading and in advance to share the spirit, a token from our Easter tree!