Confessions of a Chocoholic

While I try to be an equal opportunity baker, I must confess that my ideal late night indulgence includes some combination of chocolate and coffee and my favorite brownies hit the spot every time.

These brownies are rich and decadent, with a fudgy interior and a cake-like crust. When I really want to be decadent, I brush the top of the brownie with a little bit of Kahlua and top with (my favorite) Starbucks Java Chip ice cream.

Best of all, these brownies are easy to make-you can mix all of the ingredients by hand in the top of a double boiler.

Decadent Brownies

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into large pieces

6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped

1 1/3 cup sugar

3 large eggs

3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 teaspoon instant espresso powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup toasted walnuts

3/4 cups all-purpose flour, unsifted

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line an 8-inch square baking pan with parchment paper, leaving a slight overhang on all side.

2. Melt the butter and chocolate in a double boiler, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat and stir in sugar. Stir in the eggs, one at a time, then add the cocoa powder, vanilla extract, espresso powder, salt, and walnuts. Fold in the flour until well combined.

3. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with a few crumbs, about 35 minutes. Let cool slightly in pan for about 10 minutes. Lift brownies from pan using parchment paper and transfer to wire rack to cool completely before cutting. Brownies can be stored at room temperature in an airtight container for up to three days.

A New Thanksgiving Tradition

If you recall, this was the first year I went to the Half Moon Bay Art and Pumpkin Festival. My best friend and I did our due diligence tasting as much food as possible before concluding that the “World Famous Pumpkin Roll” was our favorite pumpkin treat. 

No need to wait until the 2012 Pumpkin Festival (or sit in hours of traffic) to indulge in these rolls. They were selling the recipe for $1, by far one of the best purchases I made all year! I made a couple of modifications- I cut the ginger in half and replaced it with ground cloves as well as reduced the amount of chopped walnuts.

This roll is so good I think it may replace the traditional pumpkin pie at the Thanksgiving table this year. 

Pumpkin Roll
Cake

3 eggs

1 cup sugar

2/3 cup pumpkin puree

1 teaspoon lemon juice

3/4 cup flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup walnuts, finely chopped

powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 375º. Line a 15 x 10 x 1 jelly roll pan or baking sheet with wax paper. Grease and flour paper.  

Beat eggs on high speed for 5 minutes; gradually beat in granulated sugar. Stir in pumpkin and lemon juice. Sift together flour, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger, clove, nutmeg, and salt. Fold into pumpkin mixture. Spread in prepared pan. Top with finely chopped walnuts.   

While the cake is baking, sprinkle powdered sugar onto a thin, cotton dish cloth (I use a flour sack). Bake for 13-15 minutes or until top of cake springs back when touched. Immediately turn the cake out onto cloth and remove the wax paper. Starting at narrow end, roll towel and cake together into a spiral form. Let roll cool on a wire rack, unroll, and fill.

Filling

1 cup powdered sugar

4 tablespoons butter

6 oz. cream cheese

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Combine powdered sugar, cream cheese, butter, and vanilla.  Beat until smooth.  Carefully unroll cake and remove towel. Spread cream cheese mixture over cake. Re-roll cake, wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least one hour, or you may freeze up to one month. I find that freezing the cake makes cutting it much easier.  

Don’t worry of the cake doesn’t look that pretty when you first put it in the refrigerator or freezer. The cracks in the cake will not be noticeable and the powdered sugar on the outside of the cake will absorb into the cake. 

The Most Expensive Cookie Ever

My niece’s birthday is coming up and I wanted to bake her some cookies to add to the care package I’m sending her.  Taylor, like her aunt, has expensive taste so I thought she might like the $250 Nieman-Marcus cookies. 

If you're not familiar with the story, legend has it that a women had lunch at Nieman-Marcus and loved the cookie so much she asked to buy the recipe. When she received her monthly statement she had been charged a whopping $250 for the recipe. The woman was so upset about the exorbitant cost she decided to send the recipe to everybody she knew. 

The $250 Cookie
Adapted Maida Heatter’s version of this infamous cookie
Yield: About 48 cookies

 2 cups sifted all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 1/2 cups old-fashioned (not instant) oatmeal

4 ounces milk chocolate 

8 ounces (2 sticks) unsalted butter

3/4 packed cup dark brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 large eggs

12 ounces (2 cups) semisweet chocolate chips

6 ounces (1 1/2 cups) walnuts, in medium-pieces

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper and set aside.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.

Chop the milk chocolate into medium-sized pieces and place, along with the oatmeal, into a food processor fitted with a metal blade. Pulse for about 25 seconds, until the oatmeal and chocolate are almost powdered. Set aside.

In a large bowl of a standing mixer, beat the butter until soft. Add both the sugars and the vanilla and beat until mixed. Beat in the eggs. Then add the sifted ingredients and the oatmeal mixture on low speed, scraping the bowl as necessary and beating only until mixed.

Remove the bowl from the mixer and stir in the chocolate chips and walnuts (it will be a stiff mixture.)

Using a medium sized cookie scoop, place dough about 2 inches apart on prepared cookie sheets (the dough will stay together better if you pack it tightly into the scoop).

Bake two sheets at a time for about 14 minutes, reversing the sheets from top to bottom and front to back halfway through baking to ensure even browning.

When the cookies are lightly colored and are just firm to the touch, remove the sheets from oven. Let the cookies stand on sheets about one minute before transferring them to a rack to cool.

And, in case you're wondering, I'm not sure if the recipe was worth $250 but they are pretty darn good. (I managed to eat four of them before I even finished my morning coffee.) If you like oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, you will love these. They aren’t too sweet and are crispy on the outside with a soft, moist center.