Book 104: Luscious Berry Desserts

by: Lori Longbotham

This recipe calls for tiny, wild blueberries - even suggests using the intensely flavored dried blueberries if you don't have access to the wild ones. The dried blueberries I have purchased in the past, were indeed intense in flavor - almost too much - not to mention they have added corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup and sucrose. I prefer my dried fruit to be just that - fruit. Dried.

Well I had just purchased three quarts (last of the season) of fresh (not wild) blueberries from the farmer's market. Being they are larger than the wild berries, I used less than the three cups called for in the recipe. I did not measure, just eye-balled it, so I can't give you the amount I used.

The batter alone had the most heavenly scent from the lime zest and fresh thyme. I purposely did not wipe the bowl clean with the spatula as I normally do. I wanted to make sure there was a little (OK, a fair amount) left in the bowl for a wee little taste. Yum. This was going to be good.

My plan was to make, bake, and take this cake to my sister for her to bring into work the next day. Unfortunately, the cake stuck in the pan. This cake wasn't going to be going anywhere other than the trash. I don't know why it stuck like it did. I buttered and floured the pan as instructed. The same pan turned out this beautiful cake just a short time ago.

Even though I knew that I would be tossing it, I still went ahead and brushed the lime juice mixture over the cake, until it started to basically disintegrate, so I stopped. I was hoping for at least one slice of cake for a photo-op and taste test.

Without the lime juice mixture, the cake is very dry. You would not want to skimp on adding it - all of it. I grabbed a good chunk of this pitiful cake and dipped it in the juice for a taste. I do think this would have been a decent cake had it turned out for me.

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 Thyme infused milk.

 The aroma and flavor of the batter was delightful.

 Can't wait..

 Excitement ensues..

Oh man..

The majority of the berries sunk to the bottom of the pan - which in turn is the top of the cake once unmolded. Doesn't look half bad from this angle - believe me, it was pretty sad looking.

 Yeah, not so pretty..

I almost did not post on this recipe. I thought who would want to read about a failure? Then I thought why not? I believe we should all share our fortunes, as well as our misfortunes. Because we all know that not everything works out like we hope it will. And for me, I like to see that others have issues besides myself; there are others (even the pros), aren't there?

Book Ninety-Nine: Great Coffee Cakes

by Carole Walter

There are so many delectable sounding baked goods in this book (Country Cherry Honey Scones, Apple Walnut Strudel, Pineapple Cheese Braid and Macadamia Fudge Squares), and this would not have been my first choice (more than likely I would not have chosen it at all), except I had a few bananas that desperately needed to be used up.

I was actually looking for a quick banana bread recipe - which I have one that I like a lot, but thought if I could knock out another book from the shelf, I would be a happy camper; enter Banana Chocolate Chip Cake.

I was still in the mind-frame of "quick" as I was pluggin' away with this recipe. This is not quick - not terribly labor intensive - but a bit more than I was hoping for and used up a lot more dishes and equipment.

First you butter and flour your pan, and set aside. Mix your dry ingredients, and set aside. Mix the puréed banana and yogurt (which you use your food processor and a strainer), and set aside. Mix the butter and sugar in the mixing bowl of a stand mixer - yep - a lot of dishes.

I loved this batter from the beginning. First I thought, what a pain to add the sugar a couple of tablespoons at a time, but it turned out so smooth and fluffy. Then after adding the dry and wet ingredients (alternately), it had a soft, light, pillowy texture to it.

The recipe calls for banana extract - I have never seen, let alone hear of banana extract. I omitted this, as well as the vanilla extract (in error). Still I thought the cake had a nice light banana flavor. I think if you use really ripe bananas as I did, you don't need the banana extract, unless you want a strong banana flavor.

In no way is this heavy like your typical banana bread. This has a soft, airy, light texture to it. However, if I was to make it again, I would bake it in the middle of the oven, rather than the bottom third of the oven. The bottom of the cake (which is the top when turned out of the pan) was more browned than I like and was a bit dry. I even took it out ten minutes sooner than the lower suggested cooking time. I would probably have taken it out earlier if I were in the kitchen at the time.

Aside from the top of the cake being a bit dry, which is easily fixed with a shorter cooking time, I really enjoyed this, and I hope my sister's co-workers will too.

Success meter (1-3): 3

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I also have her Great Cookies cookbook which I love. I'll probably be posting on this book closer to the Christmas holiday. 

She has you sift the flour before measuring.

I did not have mace, so I substituted nutmeg. "Mace is a product of the Myristica fragrans tree - mace is the exterior web-like membrane that surrounds the nutmeg. Mace is normally sold in dried, ground form and used in many cuisines including Indian, Asian and Europe." -(source)

You purée the banana with lemon juice then pass it through a medium-gauge strainer to remove the seeds of the banana. (I'm thinking you can skip the straining part - I would next time- how heavy can they be?)

Butter and sugar mixed until lightened and smooth.

The recipe calls for mini chocolate chips. I was going to use walnuts until I found an opened bag of chocolate chips (very rarely do they make it into baked goods...) and a small block of chocolate from another recipe that I was unable to make (could not find dark chocolate liqueur). I tossed them into the food processor to make them more "mini" like - the block chocolate had no problem breaking up, but most of the chips stayed whole - hmmm.

The "bottom" of the cake looks beautifully golden.

The top, a bit more browned then I like.

Because I like it.

Carole instructs you to spoon the glaze over the cake. I opted to place the glaze in a baggie and snip a corner and drizzle the glaze in as much as uniform lines as I could.

The drippings from the glaze is almost as pretty as the cake!

The center of the cake is delicious. With a shorter cooking time, the whole cake will be delicious.