Lots of new and interesting bakes in this roundup! I made some classics as well as a movie-inspired cake and some fun jam cookies. I was most excited about the latest bake - a vanilla bean pound cake - because I was using actual vanilla beans! WOO! Can't wait to they them in another recipe, just have to find the perfect one.
Vanilla Bean Pound Cake
Native Vanilla sent me some of their Organic Madacascar Vanilla Beans and I thought this pound cake by Zoë François would be the perfect way to highlight the vanilla-ey goodness! I've been a fan of Zoë since first watching her show on Magnolia Network, so talented! I was a little late to the game as she's been blogging for quite a while. The recipe was pretty easy, with a fun added step of whipping up eggs, I could definitely tell they helped the cake to rise with all that added air! The vanilla flavor was really highlighted with this simple cake, the perfect showcase! This was my first time using full vanilla beans and it was fun to finally be able to cut them open and scrape out the seeds like all the fancy bakers.
Matilda-Inspired Chocolate Cake
Christian wanted a chocolate cake for his birthday so I took the opportunity to make Jenna of Butternut Bakery's Matilda-inspired chocolate cake. 90s kids will know what I'm talking about, but for the uninitiated, there's a famous scene in Matilda where a student gets accused of stealing the principal's cake and she makes him eat an entire (kind of disgusting) chocolate cake in front of the whole school. Obviously this cake has no "sweat and blood" in it. Soooo airy and delicious!
Strawberry Jam Sugar Cookies
When I made my strawberry galette in July I had to buy a little bit of strawberry jam to glaze it. I knew I wouldn't need much of the jam but decided to get some fancy Bonne Maman preserves so I could make these strawberry jam cookies with the leftover! I only did a half batch because I wanted to make sure we liked them before "wasting" another stick of butter and more jam. I knew I didn't need to worry, but you never know, haha! However, I did go against my better judgement and baked too many at once so they all spread and touched each other, bye bye pretty photo!
Double Chocolate Zucchini Bread
If you can believe it, this was my first time baking with zucchini. I've eaten stuff but never made it myself. For this first time I used a huge zucchini we grew in the garden and made double chocolate zucchini bread. I almost made chocolate chip zucchini bread but we didn't have sour cream. We also were low on honey, which this recipe calls for, so I just used 1 cup of brown sugar instead, it worked perfectly and was a hit at our weekend gathering.
King Arthur Baking - Favorite Sandwich Bread (part Whole Wheat)
This is our usual sandwich bread but this time I used half whole wheat instead of fully all purpose. It did affect the rise a little bit with the loaf flattening out instead of puffing up at the top, but it still tasted great and toasted up wonderfully. It's such an easy recipe and takes no time at all to make (unless you could the two hours of rising.)
Peanut Butter Cookies
Another Handle the Heat Monthly Challenge recipe! I always forget how much I enjoy peanut butter cookies until I make them. They're just so soft and tasty! Tessa's recipe doesn't disappoint, as with all her other's I've tried.
We've got a very fruity theme going on in this roundup! And mostly strawberries, which isn't surprising because they're my favorite fruit. I tried a few recipes that were experiments and a couple I've made before. The other two were new but things I've had on my list to make for a while! I have a few more fruity recipes on my list to make, one that I'll probably make this week after we finish eating the beignets.
Strawberry Cinnamon Dutch Baby Pancake
Dutch Baby pancakes are so fun. I'm never a huge fan of how flat they get after they deflate but the flavor is still delicious, especially this one made with cinnamon and served with strawberries. The batter comes together in minutes and bakes in 15 - after pre-heating a cast iron skillet in the oven. It's definitely a showstopping piece if you want to impress someone with your skills.
Lemon Poppy Seed Scones
I've had this recipe saved for quite a while and finally made it when I realized we had leftover heavy cream AND a leftover lemon! They were super easy to make and really delicious. The texture was more like a biscuit than a scone, but that didn't bother me.
Blueberry Crescent Rolls
This was an experiment with some extra blueberries we had. I was originally going to try mini blueberry buckles (we only had a cup of blueberries left) but there were too many ingredients I didn't have. Lack of ingredients is the mother of invention so I decided to open up some Pilsbury crescent rolls. I kept two triangles together to form a rectangle and plopped on some blueberries, powdered sugar and cinnamon. Next II kind of folded them up to make a packet and baked for 13 minutes. When they cooled a bit I drizzled on an icing made from leftover lemon juice and powdered sugar. Tadaaa!!!
Brownies with Freeze-Dried Strawberries
I've had some freeze dried strawberries lying around for a bit and decided I wanted to try and use them for brownies. Didn't feel like trying a brand new recipe so I went with Butternut Bakery's "Better than Boxed" brownies and added some of the strawberries to the batter and sprinkled some on top. The ones on the top were a mistake, they burned, haha! Luckily I only had a few up there. I think I needed a little more of the dried berries to get a really good berry flavor, but I just wanted a hint this time. Overall, they were good. But next time I'll try to get more strawberry flavor packed in. I will also just turn it all into strawberry powder because the bigger chunks were a bit too gummy inside the brownie for our taste.
Strawberry Chocolate Galette
Another Handle the Heat monthly baking challenge! July was Galettes; strawberry chocolate, apple or peach! I chose the strawberry since it felt most summery and brought it to a family barbecue.The crust came out amazing but I did slightly burn some of the bottom because I cooked it on a baking steel (she recommended a stone to avoid a soggy bottom.) Next time I'll move it off the stone halfway through. I also needed to add a little more sugar to the strawberries. But overall it was a hit!
Mickey Beignets
One of the first scary things I made during the height of the pandemic. I kept telling myself I needed to make them again - only took three years, haha! This time I used butter instead of shortening because I never use shortening. I bought it for that first time I made beignets in 2020 and then never used it again, ha ha. I like to get Christian involved when I make anything fried because he likes the challenge of getting it to come out the perfect color.
Here we are with another baking roundup! We've got a mix of fruity and chocolatey recipes this time around. Now that Summer is here I may try out more light recipes that I usually gravitate toward. My two favorite bakes of this roundup are the strawberry bundt cake and m&m brownies. YUMMM.
Glazed Lemon Cookies
These glazed lemon cookies were Handle the Heat's May baking challenge. I had bought some lemons to make her lemon pound cake for my niece's graduation party and this recipe was perfect for using the rest of the lemons. I made them at my in-laws house so I didn't have all my usual tools, always funny baking in someone else's home, nothing ever comes out how you're used to. So while they aren't the prettiest/most round, they were delicious. I will definitely make these again for my lemon loving husband.
Coconut Brownies
We have a bunch of shredded coconut and rather than make coconut chocolate chip blondies again I decided to search for a coconut brownie recipe. I want to make homemade mounds next but we didn't have sweetened condensed milk. I wanted something fast with what we had on hand. I trusted the google gods and used the first recipe that popped up from a blog I had never read. Luckily, they came out great! Anyone else have a fun coconut recipe they like? Nothing super tropical (hence my issue with using up what we have, there's only a few recipes so far that have been easy/with ingredients I have already.) I might try lamington at some point too, they're always so tasty when I have them at EPCOT food festivals!
Chewy M&M Brownies
These have been on my list to make for a while but it took me forever to buy the M&Ms because they are just so darn expensive now! I couldn't stop thinking about them so I finally bought some after our trip to Missouri. They are definitely the most expensive brownies I've ever made, the MINIs cost almost as much as the big bag of regular M&Ms because I didn't want to spend $7 on a big bag of the minis, haha. But they came out of the oven and I actually gasped because they looked and smelled so good!
Mounds
Mounds are one of my favorite candies so I finally made some homemade. I deviated a bit from this recipe and did it by feel for when I thought there was enough coconut to sweetened condensed milk ratio. I was in a bit of a rush coating them so they are NOT the prettiest, but they tasted good! I used Bob's Red Mill coconut and Ghiradelli dark chocolate wafers for coating.
Strawberry Bundt Cake
My sister invited my siblings and I over for a last minute Memorial Day BBQ so I decided to finally make this cake I've had saved for a while. It was very easy to make, but a lot of dishes to clean since you have to puree strawberries for the cake AND freeze dried strawberries for the icing. But for a special occasion it's definitely worth all the cleaning. The cake was a hit at our get together with multiple people having more than one slice.
Brown Butter Blueberry Muffins
This is my second time making these and I did it slightly different from the first time. To begin with, I used frozen wild blueberries instead of normal sized because I prefer them small. The first time I made these I followed the tip to chill the batter for 8 hours before baking and added the blueberries after. It was really hard for me to add in the blueberries because the batter was a little too firm so I decided to just add them in before the rest this time. I don't mind that it turned the batter blue, I actually think they're more fun that way! I also doubled the crumble on top because Christian and I love the crispy texture.
