Vessy's day » frosting

Chocolate chestnut whoopie pies

Vessy — Wed, 19 Oct 2016 09:01:44 +0000

Chocolate chestnut whoopie pies with white chocolate frosting….how does this sound for an Autumn chestnut delight? These cookies are soft, chocolaty and amazingly delicious. Oh, boy, I wish I had a batch right now…I would probably eat a dozen. They taste like brownies, yup, real brownies only in the shape of cookies. And the chestnuts…. they bring this awesome nutty flavor to the cookies.
You all probably know that I love chestnuts, so much that every year I cook a little extra and put in the freezer for cravings throughout the year. Here in Bulgaria, canned chestnuts and commercial chestnut puree are very expensive, plus you can never be sure what’s in the package, right? So, my way to have budget friendly chestnut meals and desserts at home is to overload the freezer when they are in season. Not many things you can find in my freezer, but chestnuts are the sure thing.
I have another few chestnut recipes here, including a post on how to cook chestnuts and make a homemade chestnut puree. Check them out, I am sure you will find your next recipe in there.
Now, I am leaving you with this simple and delicious recipe. Happy cooking!

Ingredients (makes about 15 large double cookies):
180 grams (6 oz) all purpose flour
40 grams (1,5 oz) cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
A pinch of salt
180 grams (6 oz) butter, softened
220 grams (8 oz) sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
200 grams (7 oz) plain chestnut puree
Ingredients for the white chocolate frosting:
80 grams (3 oz) white chocolate (preferable for cooking)
80 ml. (3 fl. oz) heavy whipping creamTo make the cookies: Preheat your oven to 180 C (350 F). Line two baking sheets with baking paper.
In a large bowl, add flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and stir to combine.
In another large bowl, beat together sugar and butter until fluffy and well combined. Add egg, vanilla extract and chestnut puree and beat until combined.
Add flour mixture to the chestnut mixture and stir with a rubber spatula until nice and smooth, but don’t over mix the batter. **Batter will be a bit tough to handle and sticky, but don’t worry it’s not that hard.
Using a spoon or an ice-cream scoop form small balls out of the batter and place on the baking sheet as you leave enough room between the cookies, since they will double their size during baking. Gently wet your hands and smooth over the cookie-balls. Place the cookie sheet in the fridge for 10-15 minutes then bake for about 12-14 minutes. While one cookie sheet is the oven, work with the rest of the batter then put the second sheet in the fridge. It’s important to have the batter chilled, this will keep your cookies in good shape while cooking.
Let them cool completely on a wire rack.
***form really small balls of dough cause cookies expand significantly during the baking.

**** I use unsweetened homemade chestnut pure for this recipe but a jar of commercial one will do the job too. It is preferable to use unsweetened but in case you have only sweetened on hands, just reduce the sugar amount in the recipe (in half…more or less, depending on your. taste ) in order to avoid over-sweeten the cookies.
To make the frosting:
Place white chocolate in a large bowl. Heat the cream till hot to the touch but not boiling, then pour over the white chocolate. Let those sit for a minute then stir to combine until smooth and glossy. Put the mixture in the fridge for about 30-45 minutes, then beat with an electric mixer for about a minute or two until white and fluffy. Pour the frosting in a piping bag fitted with a large round tip or other of your choice.
Arrange cookies with the flat side up and pipe the frosting over half of them, then assemble.

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Chocolate mud cake

Vessy — Sat, 28 May 2016 07:10:26 +0000

This is the easiest chocolate cake, I have ever made. It tastes absolutely amazing and it’s chocolate all the way – from the inside to the top of delicious chocolate buttercream. Baileys is a great addition to the chocolate, but if you are not a fan of boused desserts, you can totally skip this part.
As of preparation, I have to say that it is almost as if you are making brownie, but this one requires longer baking on lower temperature.
Preparation takes just about 20 minutes, so it’s actually pretty quick to make, if you don’t count the baking time.
Once baked you can top it with any of your favorite frosting. I love the chocolate buttercream frosting, but it involves having softened butter on hands. Sometimes I just forget to take the butter out of the fridge the day before, which is a bit frustrating. In such situations I usually go for this quick and easy whipped chocolate frosting.
Happy baking!

Ingredients for the cake:
190 grams (6,7 oz) butter
150 grams (5,3 oz) chocolate
20 grams (0,70 oz) cocoa powder
1 teaspoon instant coffee granules
300 grams (10,5 oz) sugar
200 ml. (7 fl oz) milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons baileys
200 grams (7 oz) flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 large eggs, lightly beaten

Chocolate buttercream:
80 grams (3 oz) dark chocolate (60%), melted and cooled to room temperature
2 tablespoons baileys
125 grams (4,5 oz) butter, at room temperature
85 grams (3 oz) powdered sugar

To make the cake:
Preheat your oven to 170C (340F). Grease an 8-inch springform and line with parchment paper.
In a large saucepan add butter, chocolate, cocoa powder, coffee, sugar, milk, baileys and vanilla extract. Cook over medium temperature until chocolate, butter and sugar melt and you have a nice smooth mixture. Set aside to cool off a bit.
In the meantime combine flour and baking powder in another bowl and stir to distribute the baking powder evenly.
Add flour to the chocolate mixture and stir gently with a rubber spatula to combine. Add eggs, one by one, stirring after each egg.
Pour mixture into prepared springform and bake for about 60 minutes. If you see that top of the cake is cracking soon after you put in the oven, just lower the temperature to 160C (320F) and continue baking.
Check if cake is ready by inserting a toothpick in the center. It should come out clean but without crumbs. This cake should be moist on the inside with a nice crust on the outside.
Let cake cool to room temperature.
In the meantime prepare the chocolate buttercream:
Melt chocolate and let cool to room temperature as you stir it occasionally.
In the meantime beat butter and sugar in a large bowl until light and fluffy. Add a pinch of salt, cooled chocolate and baileys, and beat for a minute or so to combine.

Assembling the cake:
Even the top of the cake layer by cutting out the dome. Place the cake on a large platter and spread the buttercream on top. Cover the sides if you like.

Double chocolate banana cake

Vessy — Thu, 14 Apr 2016 10:04:36 +0000

I can’t say that desserts are my passion, but I also can’t deny I love preparing sweets. I guess, of all desserts, cakes are the hardest. Nonetheless, I try and stick to simpler recipes and share with you once that I really love. Even if they look hard and impossible to be done, believe me, they most probably are manageable. If a recipe requires special skills and equipment, or has any tricky moments I would definitely mention that in the post.

So, anyway, this one is pretty straight forward – you have two extra thick banana cake layers, white chocolate frosting, white chocolate ganache and caramelized almonds for decorations.

I always recommend baking cake layers separately. This will lower the chance of breaking up the layers, while cutting them – believe me, it had happened to me many times and it’s not pleasant, especially when you realize you have to do the work twice. So, layers are pretty simple – beat batter in a large bowl then bake.

Meanwhile you can make the frosting (pretty easy too), ganache and lastly the nuts, which are of course optional, but I really love the finishing taste they give.

I prefer the “naked” or “semi-naked” cakes, as this one is, but you can go nuts with the decorations. In case you want to cover the sides of the cake with thick layer of frosting and make some flowers, you will need to double the recipe, cause these amounts are enough only for the naked option.

Continue reading for the detailed recipe and happy baking!

Ingredients for the cake layers (Adapted from Women’s Weekly):
225 grams (8 oz) butter, at room temperature
330 grams (11,5 oz) sugar
3 medium eggs, at room temperature
150 grams (5 oz) chocolate, melted, cooled to room temperature
3 large bananas, finely pureed
250 grams (9 oz) buttercream
450 grams (16 oz) flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
For the chocolate frosting:
150 grams (5 oz) white chocolate
90 ml. (3 fl. oz) sweetened heavy whipping cream (*for the chocolate)
90 ml. (3 fl. oz) sweetened heavy whipping cream
For the chocolate ganache:
50 grams (1,8 oz) white chocolate
30 ml. (1 fl. oz) heavy whipping cream
For the caramelized nuts:
10 grams (0,35 oz) sugar
30 grams (1 oz) crushed almonds

Prepare the cake layers:
Preheat your oven to 150C, fan-forced (300F, fan-forced). Grease and line 2 x 6inch springform pans with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, beat sugar and butter until fluffy and light. Add eggs, one at a time, melted and cooled chocolate, bananas and buttercream, as you beat after each addition.
In another bowl combine flour and baking powder, then add to the wet mixture. Stir with a rubber spatula to combine.
Distribute the mixture between the pans and bake for about 1 hour, or until toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Set aside to cool completely.
In the meantime prepare the white chocolate frosting:
Melt chocolate and 90ml. of heavy whipping cream in a medium bowl. Set aside to cool completely and then beat with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy.
In another bowl beat the rest of the whipping cream until medium stiff peaks form. Add white chocolate mixture to the whipped cream and beat again for a minute or so. Set aside until needed (*Feel free to refrigerate the frosting if it doesn’t look too strong and thick, but keep in mind that you will need to gently stir it once in a while cause white chocolate will harden fast).
Prepare the ganache:
Melt chocolate and cream in a small bowl. Put in the fridge to cool and thicken. Keep an eye on the ganache and remove from fridge once you see it’s thickening a lot. You will need it spreadable, but not too runny. In case it thickens too much, just microwave it for 15 seconds.
To make the caramelized nuts:
In a small skillet add sugar and nuts and heat over medium-high heat. Stay close to the stove, this takes a minute, but once sugar starts to melt, it could burn in a second.
So, stir nuts and sugar until sugar melts and nuts are coated. Immediately remove from stove and pour over a piece of parchment paper. Spread them in one layer and let cool completely.
Assembling the cake:
Place first cake layer on a cake platter.
Pipe or spoon one layer of the white chocolate frosting and then place the second cake layer on top. Spread 2/3rds of the rest of the frosting over the top of the second layer, then use the rest of the frosting to cover and even out the sides.
Pour over the white chocolate ganache and sprinkle some nuts.

Dark beer chocolate cake

Vessy — Mon, 06 Jul 2015 19:17:27 +0000

I bake this cake for my birthday тwo years in a row. It is one of our favorite chocolate cakes, plus there is dark beer among the ingredients, so it’s the perfect celebration cake.

Ingredients (for 2 x thick 8-inch (20 cm.) layers):
225 ml. Guinness
150 grams butter
350 grams brown sugar
135 grams cocoa powder
2 medium eggs
200 grams sour cream
2 tea spoons vanilla extract
275 grams flour
1 tea spoon baking powder

For the Buttercream:
5 large egg whites
350 grams granulated sugar
350 grams butter, softened, cut into cubes
2 tea spoons pure vanilla extract
150 grams milk or dark chocolate, melted and chilled

Preheat your oven to 180C (350 F).
Grease 2 x 8 inch cake tins/springforms.
In a large saucepan pour the beer, butter, sugar and cocoa powder. Heat and stir until the butter melts.
Leave on the side to cool to room temperature.
In a small bowl mix the eggs, sour cream and vanilla extract.
In another bowl mix the flour with the baking powder.
Add the egg mixture to the beer mixture and mix well. Then add the flour to the egg-beer mixture and mix with a rubber spatula until incorporated.
Distribute the cake batter evenly into your springforms.
Bake layers 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake layer comes out clean.
Cool on a wire rack.

*** You can divide the batter in more springforms and bake 3-4 thinner layers.

To make the buttercream: Add the sugar and egg whites in a heatproof bowl over a pot with simmering water.
Cook the mixture until the sugar completely dissolves (or reaches 160F, if you have a candy thermometer).
Then, add the vanilla and mix with a hand or stand mixer until the meringue is fluffy, thick and glossy (about 10 minutes).
Add the butter, piece by piece and continue to mix until well incorporated. If it curdles, keep mixing and it will come back to smooth.
If your cream is not thick enough just add more butter until you reach the desired consistency.
If you want to make the buttercream chocolaty feel free to add the melted chocolate. If buttercream doesn’t seem thick enough, just put in the fridge for half an hour, then beat again with a mixer for a minute.

Assembling the cake:
Prepare 2 cups of freshly brewed coffee (sweetened it if you prefer).
Place the first cake layer on large plate/cake stand. Sprinkle with coffee, then using a spatula spread one layer of the buttercream.
Place the other layer on top and repeat the same steps until you use up your cake layers.
Optional: You can cover the top and sides of the cake with the rest of the buttercream.

Whipped coconut chocolate ganache

Vessy — Mon, 09 Mar 2015 14:44:36 +0000

Ingredients:
100 grams (3,5 oz) milk chocolate
180 grams (6,30 oz) dark chocolate
220 ml. heavy cream
1 large table spoon coconut liquor

In a small saucepan heat the cream and add both types of chocolate chocolate. The cream has to be warm enough to melt the chocolates but not boiling or simmering. Add the coconut and stir constantly until the chocolate melts and the mixture is nice smooth and glossy.
Leave to cool to room temperature for about 2 hours then whip with an electric mixer until paler color and smooth creamy texture.
Store in the fridge for up to 5 days.