Blueberries Again!

What a gorgeous week it has been! 50 degrees in February? Very strange, but I can't say I am missing the bitter cold winter winds. The spring like weather has made me think of all things fruity and delightful. I have recently found the most perfect recipe for a Blueberry Breakfast Cake. I found this on the Alexandra's Kitchen Blog  , just another food blog that I am in love with. This recipe is absolutely perfect for any time of year! It would make the most perfect breakfast for company around the holidays, or even just a brunch with friends. I will definitely be keeping this cake in my repertoire.

I know I always say it, but this really is the most simple recipe ever. I think it only took about 20 minutes to put together.
I started by fluffing my butter and sugar together. One of my most favorite things to do, I love the way the butter and sugar start out, and then what they become in the end! Nothing goes together better then butter and sugar. Along with the butter and sugar you throw in the zest of one lemon, which I love because it gives it a little tangy taste.

After the butter and sugar are nice and fluffy, I added one egg and a little vanilla and let that continue to mix. In the meantime I mixed my blueberries with 1/4 cup of flour. Mixing the blueberries with flour before adding them to the batter allows them to stick into the batter a little better.

Then in a separate bowl I mixed together my flour, baking powder and salt.

The treat in this recipe is the buttermilk. It makes the batter really thick, but in the end it makes the cake so fluffy. Buttermilk really is a gem. I added my flour mixture, and buttermilk alternating back and fourth between the two until it was all mixed together. The batter was extremely thick, much thicker then your normal cake batter. Lastly I folded in my scrumptious blueberries and spread the batter out into a greased 9' pan.

I baked the cake for about 40 minutes. You can only imagine how delicious this made the house smell! We live in a tiny house, which when cooking or baking can be a blessing or a curse. Cakes and delights such as this makes the house smell yummy, opposed to Jake's fajitas that make the house smell like burnt meat, YIKES! Anyways! 40 minutes later this gorgeous, blueberry sweet came out of the oven.

It was almost impossible to allow it to cool before cutting into it. I was dying to see how it came out. About an hour later when it was finally time, I most definitely was not disappointed with the outcome. It was so moist and the blueberries just burst in your mouth, and there was a simple hint of lemon. YUM. I would most definitely recommend this recipe for any occasion. Make this for family and friends, they will thank you for ever and want the recipe! Thank you Alexandra's Kitchen for this sweet treat. 

Buttermilk-Blueberry Breakfast Cake

Serves 6-8
½ cup unsalted butter, room temperature
2 tsp. lemon zest or more — zest from 1 large lemon
7/8 cup* + 1 tablespoon sugar**
1 egg, room temperature
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. kosher salt
2 cups fresh blueberries
½ cup buttermilk
* 7/8 cup = 3/4 cup + 2 tablespoons
** This 1 tablespoon is for sprinkling on top
1. Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Cream butter with lemon zest and 7/8 cup of the sugar until light and fluffy.
2. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until combined. Meanwhile, toss the blueberries with ¼ cup of flour, then whisk together the remaining flour, baking powder and salt.
3. Add the flour mixture to the batter a little at a time, alternating with the buttermilk. Fold in the blueberries.
4. Grease a 9-inch square baking pan (or something similar) with butter or coat with non-stick spray. Spread batter into pan. Sprinkle batter with remaining tablespoon of sugar. Bake for 35 minutes. Check with a toothpick for doneness. If necessary, return pan to oven for a couple of more minutes. (Note: Baking for as long as 10 minutes more might be necessary.) Let cool at least 15 minutes before serving.

PB&J

I have recently returned from a trip to Florida, where I was visiting two of my very best friends, my sister and brother in law. It was a wonderful visit, and I miss them already!

 

Living in Florida you get spoiled my so many delightful restaurants and bakeries that you just can't find in Maine. While I was living in Florida one of my most favorite places to stop and get a treat was a little cupcake bakery called Sweet by Good Golly Miss Holly. Its an adorable shop with the most delicious cupcakes you've ever tasted in your life. Upon my arrival my sister and her husband surprised me with one dozen mini cupcakes from Sweet! 

Every single one of them was just as delicious as the last, but there was cupcake in particular that intrigued me, it was a Peanut Butter & Jelly Cupcake. It tasted exactly just like a sandwich and I was in love. When I got home I decided to try and recreate a version of this cupcake. I found a recipe on the Food Network that seemed easy enough. It was a regular yellow cupcake with strawberry jelly shot into the middle. 

The ingredients for the cupcakes were pretty simple. Flour, Sugar, Baking Powder, Sour Cream, Eggs, Butter, Vanilla, and Jelly. My adorable cupcake papers were a valentines gift from my sweet friend Meagan! They were perfect for valentines day! 

I started the process by creaming together the butter and the sugar. While that was being mixed I whisked together my flour and baking powder, and set it aside. After the butter and sugar was nice and fluffy I added the sour cream 

After that was well mixed I added my eggs, and vanilla, then slowly started to add my flour mixture and milk. Mixed it all together then they were ready to be scooped into the pan! 

 

And into the oven they went for about 20 minutes! 

Once they came out of the oven, I transferred them to a cooling rack and began on my peanut butter cream cheese frosting. The frosting was also very easy. In the kitchenaid I creamed my butter and cream cheese together and added the vanilla and peanut butter. Once it was all mixed together I threw in a little confectioners sugar for sweetness!

Now the fun part! Once they were cooled I filled a pastry bag with the delicious strawberry jelly. I filled each one until jelly was almost flowing out of the top.

Once the jelly was inserted in the middle, I frosted them with the peanut butter frosting. A little peanut butter and jelly treat!

I have to be honest, these were not my most favorite sweet I have ever made. The peanut butter frosting was a little much for me. If you are a hardcore peanut butter fan then these are for you! This is what this blog is all about, experimenting and learning!

We'll see what comes next!

Ingredients

• 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon table salt
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 large egg yolk, room temperature
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup strawberry jelly
• Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting, recipe follows
• Confetti pastel sprinkles, for garnish

Directions

Put an oven rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 350 degrees F. Line a standard 12 cup muffin tin with cupcake liners.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, add the butter and sugar and beat until light and fluffy, about 3 to 4 minutes.
Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
Add the sour cream to the butter and sugar mixture and continue to beat until incorporated. Add the eggs and yolk, 1 at a time, beating until thoroughly mixed into the batter. Add in the vanilla and continue to mix. Slowly add the dry ingredients, in increments, and mix until combined.
Scoop the batter into the cupcake liners to fill 3/4 of the way. Put in the oven and bake until the cupcakes are a pale gold color and a cake tester comes out clean, about for 18 to 20 minutes. Remove the cupcakes from the oven and let cool in the tins for 5 minutes. Remove to a wire rack to cool completely before frosting and filling.
Meanwhile, fit a plain pastry tip to the bottom of a gallon-sized resealable plastic bag and fill with strawberry jelly. Once the cupcakes are cool, insert the tip far into the cupcake and slowly squeeze in about 1 tablespoon or so of jam. Be careful not to overfill the cupcakes or they will crumble and explode. Repeat with the remaining cupcakes. Frost the cupcakes with the Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting using a pastry bag and a star tip. Sprinkle lightly with the confetti sprinkles and serve.

Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting:

• 1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, room temperature
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar

In a large bowl, add the cream cheese and butter. Beat until well combined, then add the vanilla and peanut butter and beat until well mixed. Slowly add the confectioners' sugar and beat until well incorporated.

Sweet, Sweet Pastry Construction!

I am so excited and thrilled to write this post because I am extremely proud of myself and the sweets that came out of my kitchen (and are already gone I might add) yesterday! For Christmas my dear friend Meagan and her adorable family gave me a fabulous cookbook (among other amazing gifts like my new Hunter boots I cant ever take off!) called The Big Book of Baking. Its one of the best baking cookbooks I own. It has recipes for all difficulty levels.

Yesterday I was feeling adventurous. I wanted to spend the day baking something that I had never made before and would challenge me. Flipping through the book I stumbled across a recipe for Eclair's. Sweet, flaky, Custard filled Eclair's are something that I can rarely walk past in a bakery and not purchase. I read over the recipe several times that morning make sure I had every ingredient I needed and was in full understanding of how to put this recipe together.

I started of by cutting up my butter and placing it into a saucepan with a small amount of water, stirring constantly until it formed a buttery mixture.  This was the base for my dough.

Next was to sift my flour, which as you know from previous posts is not my most favorite thing. I still have not purchased a sifter!

After the butter was melted and the flour was sifted with no lumps, I added it to my butter mixture beating it together until the batter came way from the sides of the pan and formed a ball.

After it was a nice firm ball I allowed it to cool slightly before transferring it into the Kitchenaid and whisking in the eggs and vanilla.

Once my eggs and vanilla were added I started to spoon the batter into a pastry bag. I did not have the correct size tip, so I ended up not using a tip at all and just cutting the end of the pastry bag a little bit bigger.

I piped out 8 of these little babies onto my greased and lightly water down cookie sheet! No, they are not perfect but I sure was excited to get them in the oven to see how they would come out! They were in the oven at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes. I watched them very closely so they would not burn or fall in.

Just look at them!!!! They are not the most perfect looking pastry in the world, but the fact that they even came out at all amazed me! I immediately cut slits into the sides of each of them to let the steam out and get some air into the insides. I set them on a wire rack to cool.

In the mean time I started on my custard, another nerve racking task. I started by whisking together the eggs and the sugar until it formed a nice thick base. I then added my cornstarch and whisked it together. While my egg mixture was being mixed I brought the milk to a slow boil. Once it was just about to boil I added it to my egg mixture mixing together over low heat. I stirred it constantly until it was starting to thicken.

After the custard was nice and think I took it off the heat and placed a piece of parchment paper over the top of the pan and allowed it to cool completely.
While the custard and pastries were cooling I started on my chocolate frosting.

The frosting was very easy, over medium heat I mixed the confectioners sugar, cocoa powder and butter until it was nice and creamy and delicious.

Once everything had cooled I cut each pastry in half and started to pipe in the custard. I did this with a pastry bag as well that way it went in nice and neat. I placed the tops on them and frosted only a little bit with chocolate. I did not want the chocolate to be overpowering.

I have to say they were absolutely fabulous! They were literally gone within 24 hours of coming out of the oven! The pastry was buttery, crisp and perfectly flaky. The custard was so sweet, light and fluffy. They were deeeelish! The next time I make them I hope to get the construction of the pastries down to be a little fancier and Eclair looking, but for my first time this will do!

Eclairs

Ingredients

• 6 tablespoons butter, divided into 4 and 2 tablespoons
• 2/3 cups water
• 3/4 cups all purpose flour
• 4 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract, divided into 1 and 1/2 teaspooons
• 2 eggs
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1 cup milk, plus 2 tablespoons
• 3/4 cup confectioners’ sugar
• 1 tablespoon cocoa powder

Instructions

1. Begin to make the pastry by melting 4 tablespoons of the butter in a saucepan over low heat.
2. Add water and bring to a boil.
3. Remove from heat and the add flour, whisking furiously until the dough leaves the sides of the pan and forms a ball.
4. Cool slightly, then whisk in two of the eggs and 1 teaspoon of the vanilla.
5. Place the dough in a pastry bag or plastic baggie with the corner cut to form a hole.
6. Pipe the dough onto a greased cookie sheet misted with water.
7. Bake at 400 degrees until light golden brown in color, approximately 30 minutes.
8. While the pastry bakes, make the pastry cream. Whisk together the remaining two eggs, sugar, vanilla, and cornstarch in a medium bowl and set aside.
9. Place one cup of the milk in a saucepan over low to medium heat and bring to a simmer.
10. Pour the hot milk over the egg mixture in bowl and whisk until combined.
11. Return the combined mixture to the saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until thick.
12. When the pastry cream thickens, remove from heat, cover and allow to cool.
13. To make the icing, beat the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, confectioners’ sugar, and cocoa powder together on medium speed.
14. Increase speed to high and add the remaining 2 tablespoons of milk until combined.
15. Remove the pastry from the oven, and cut a small slit in the slide of the pastries to allow the steam to escape.
16. To assemble, cut the pastries lengthwise like a hotdog bun.
17. Spoon the cream along the length of the pastries and lightly press to close the cut sides together.
18. Spread the chocolate icing along the tops of the pastries.

(Recipe adapted from The Big Book of Baking)