no knead wheat bread and spinach-salmon dip

made for a potluck. no knead wheat bread and dip. sour cream, nonfat greek yogurt, fresh spinach, diced fennel and some flaked canned salmon. nothin fancy. tasted good though!

yogurt custard with mixed berries

a recipe i found in food and wine. mixed berries baked in a vanilla/cinnamon yogurt based custard. tried unsuccessfully to make a sugar crust on top; my broiler just wasn't able to get close enough to the surface. i need to buy a brulee torch. i heart kitchen gadgets.

whole wheat apple pancakes with homemade syrup

parents came to visit during mothers day, so for breakfast I made us some healthy whole wheat apple pancakes! they were really fluffy and yummy. i used fuji apples because thats what i had in my fridge, but they were too sweet i think and the apple flavor was lost in the pancake. so i recommend choosing a more tart apple, maybe a jonah or honeycrisp when they come back in season.... mmmmm i cant wait for honeycrisp season!

since i didnt have any syrup, i looked up an online recipe to make my own, which turned out surprisingly tasty. I did tweak a bit by adding some cinnamon and didn't have maple flavoring so i used vanilla extract. it continually amazes me the things that i always thought i had to buy in the store, that you can make from everyday items in your pantry.

adam perry lang

bbq tips from adam perry lang. excuse me while i wipe the drool off my keyboard.

also here's his website.

blackberry whole wheat ricotta pancakes

had some random ingredients left from cake making, so i decided to cook myself up some ricotta pancakes! i halved this recipe from eating well, subbed blackberries instead of blueberries, and of course, tossed in the obligatory handful of minichocolate chips and sprinkle of flax seed. had no buttermilk on hand, so i used the standard sub of milk and a squeeze of lemon juice.

the whole wheat flour made these pancakes extremely filling, but they were still nice and fluffy and browned well. the recipe needed a touch more sugar, i thought, but maybe that was just because i didnt have maple syrup to douse it with.

to make up for my syruplessness, i threw in a half can of mandarin oranges with juice, a squeeze of honey and some dried cranberries into a small saucepan and reduced it until it until it turned syrupy. next time i would maybe throw in some ginger to give it more dimension.

devils food cupcakes with cannoli cream and chocolate ganache frosting

photo courtesy of dan chiang

so for a k's bday, he specifically requested devils food cake with chocolate cannoli cream filling. since i had no round cake pans, and cupcakes are all the rage, i adapted the recipes i found to cupcake form.

devils food cake and chocolate ganache recipe from david guas. i halved the recipe and it made 11 cupcakes and more than enough ganache frosting. reduced baking time to 25 minutes to adapt to cupcake form, which seemed right. the cake turned out an extremely tender crumb, was just sweet enough, and the ganache frosting was out of this world!

cannoli cream filling recipe from giada. i just omitted the fruit part. had no whipping cream, so i used milk, which i think was the reason the filling wasnt fluffy or smooth enough. it still had the grainy quality from the ricotta, and was slightly runny so i had to firm it up in the fridge before stuffing the cupcake. i also threw in some mini chocolate chips into the final cream mixture.

to fill the cupcakes, i waited for them to cool, used a small sharp knife to cut a conical section out of each cupcake top, spooned in some cream filling and replaced the cut out piece of cake. then i frosted. the ganache set up nicely, but i recommend putting it in the fridge for at least an hour before frosting just so its easier to spread.