Do not think that this is your normal fruit cake that gets passed around from house to house at Christmas. It is way beyond that. Last year I discovered that I love using fresh ginger in biscotti, cookies and now this fruitcake. You will be proud to have it sitting on your dessert buffet during the holidays. I won’t be waiting for Thanksgiving to make it. It is a great recipe to make to have on hand during the Fall when guests show up unexpectedly. Whip up some homemade whipped cream and put the coffee pot on.
3/4 cup pecan halves, toasted
2 cups flour
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 tables baking powder
1/2 teas salt
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup butter, softened (1 stick)
2 eggs
1 teas vanilla
1 cup dried apples, chopped
2/3 cup dried apricots, chopped (not unsulphured)
2 tables grated fresh ginger
1 recipe Honey Bourbon Butter (recipe follows)
Preheat oven to 350. Grease and lightly flour a 9″ spring form pan; set aside.
Place 1/2 cup of the toasted pecans in a food processor; cover and process until finely ground; set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, combine ground pecans, flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add milk, butter and eggs. Add vanilla.
Beat with an electric mixer on low speed until combined. Beat for 1 min.
Fold in dried fruit and ginger. Transfer to prepared pan.
Arrange remaining pecans (1/4 cup) on top of batter.
Bake about 40 min or until cake tests done. Cool in pan on wire rack 10 min. Remove sides of pan; cool completely on rack. Remove bottom of pan.
To serve, pour Honey Bourbon Butter over fruitcake if desired and whipping cream if this doesn’t have enough calories to make you feel guilty.
*Honey Bourbon Butter*
In small saucepan melt 1/4 cup butter. Add 2 tables bourbon and 1 table honey. Stir until heated through.
If you want to make this ahead of time for the holiday dinner or party* See below.
Use bourbon or orange juice to moisten a large piece of 100% cheesecloth. Wrap cake in cloth and place in a large resealable plastic bag or wrap in plastic wrap. Store in fridge up to 1 week.
Category: Desserts
Eagle Brand Pound Cake
OMGosh, you are kidding me! I cannot believe I just found a recipe using a can of Eagle Brand in a cake!
Eagle Brand, to me, should be in it’s own food group. I would probably even like liver if it was soaked in Eagle Brand. This recipe was in the old cookbook that had the “possum” recipe. I have to have some friends over so I have an excuse to make this wonderful cake.
1 lb (yep, you heard right, a whole pound) softened butter (do not use margarine as I will turn you in to the butter police)
2 cups sugar
8 eggs
1 can Eagle Brand Condensed Milk (there is only the one size)
3 cups flour
1/2 teas salt
2 teas vanilla
1 teas lemon extract (I will probably use butter extract as I like that combo of flavor with the vanilla)
Sift flour and salt and set aside. Grease and flour 10″ tube pan. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Continue beating, adding eggs, 1 at a time. Add flour and Eagle Brand alternately, blending just until well mixed. Add flavorings last.
Pour into pan and bake at 325 preheated oven for 1 hour. Reduce oven to 300 and bake about 25 min more, or until cake tests done.
Sprinkle powdered sugar over cooled cake if desired. Or set out different toppings, such as fudge sauce, fresh strawberries, ice cream or whipped cream when serving.
Glazed Apple-Maple Blondies
That sounds so good that it should become a OPI color. But until then, these blondies will help us slide into the Fall Season with a new appreciation for Apples. Taken from the Sept-Oct issue of TOH, these will certainly get us in the mood for pulling out the boxes in the garage marked “Fall” on them. Oh, I can just heat the excitement in Peter Pumpkin’s voice as he heads upstairs to put on his wife beater shirt to start unloading boxes.
Makes 2 dz
1 1/3 cups packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup butter, melted and cooled
1/2 cup maple syrup
2 teas vanilla
2 eggs
2 cups flour
1/2 teas salt
1/4 teas baking soda
3 cups pealed and chopped apples (about 3 medium sized)
Glaze
1/4 cup butter, cubed
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour a 9×13″ pan.
In a large bowl, beat the first 4 ingredients until blended. Beat in eggs.
In another bowl, whisk flour, salt and baking soda. Gradually beat into brown sugar mixture. Stir in apples. Batter will be thick.
Transfer to prepared pan and bake 25-30 min or until blondies test done when knife inserted in middle comes out with moist crumbs on it.
Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, melt butter and add the brown sugar and syrup. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Cook and stir 2-3 minutes or until slightly thickened. Cool slightly. Pour glaze over warm blondies.
Cool before cutting into bars.
The Amazing Mug Cake
Ok, just when I thought that there were some nights when I was just too tired to get in the kitchen to whip up something sweet at 9 or 10 p.m., which would allow me to actually go a whole day without dessert, comes this Mug Cake. It goes from bowl to mouth in 5 minutes. So now, I don’t ever have to go to bed without a sugar high. The recipe is in the back of the Food Network Mag and gives several different toppings for this cute little “cup” cake. I have to admit that I have never made a cake or any dessert, for that matter, in the microwave. So as soon as I’m off this computer, I am going to go nuke my first dessert.
Lightly butter 4 microwave safe coffee mugs. Place 1/2 cup ea: sugar and buttermilk, 1/4 cup vegetable oil, 1 egg, and 1/2 teas almond extract or vanilla in a large bowl. Mix until smooth, about 2 mins.
Whisk in 1/2 cup flour, 1/8 teas baking soda and a pinch of salt. Combine with oil mixture and mix until smooth.
Pour 1/2 cup batter into each mug. Microwave 1 at a time until puffed and cake test done in middle (about 1 minute.) Bake at 15 sec intervals if needed.
Let it cool slightly and frost as desired. Sprinkle any topping, such as strawberries, chocolate chips, nuts, marshmallows, caramel, etc.
If you want to make the cake chocolate, decrease the flour to 1/3 cup and add 2 tables cocoa to flour mixture.
Top cakes with ice cream if desired.
Apple-Caramel Cheesecake Bars
Years ago (and I do mean years, as in 30-35) we use to go to a cafeteria in Corpus which served the best cinnamon topped apple cheesecake. It was on my tray every time we went. When I saw this on the front of my new Paula Deen Magazine I jumped for joy. Thanks Paula for your amazing great Southern Recipes! (that is in case she should ever happen to run across my blog…do I dream big or what?)
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
2 cups flour
1/2 teas kosher salt
Filling:
4 large Pink Lady (or Gala) apples, peeled, halved, cored and diced (about 8 cups)
1 cup granulated sugar, divided
1 1/2 teas ground cinnamon, divided
1/2 teas ground nutmeg
2 ( 8oz) packages cream cheese, softened
2 large eggs
1 cup flour
3/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup old-fashioned oats
1/2 teas salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup chopped pecans
Caramel Ice Cream topping (like Smuckers, remember if it is Smucker’s, it has to be good)
Preheat oven to 350. Line a 13×9″ baking pan with parchment paper, letting excess extend over the sides of pan.
For crust; in a large bowl, beat butter and brown sugar with mixer until fluffy. Add flour and salt, beating until combined. Press mixture into bottom of prepared pan. (remember if you do not have parchment paper, just spray the bottom of the baking pan with Pam or butter it well)
Bake for 20 min or until golden brown. Let cool completely.
Meanwhile, back on the farm…in a large bowl, stir together apples 1/2 cup granulated sugar, 1 teas cinnamon and nutmeg. Transfer apple mixture to a colander set over a bowl; let stand for at least 30 min.
In another large bowl, beat cream cheese, eggs and remaining 1/2 cup granulated sugar with mixer until smooth. Pour over cooled crust. Spread drained apple mixture over cream cheese mixture.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour & next 3 ingredients and remaining 1/2 teas cinnamon. Using a pastry cutter or fork, stir in butter and pecans until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Sprinkle over apples.
Bake for 35-40 min or until center is set. Let cool in pan to room temperature. Then place in fridge until completely chilled.
Using excess parchment paper as handles, remove from pan and cut into bars. drizzle with caramel right before serving.
If you did not use parchment paper, you can leave in pan and cut into bars right before serving, using a spatula to serve.
The Perfect Chocolate Cake
This recipe comes from a blog, Two Chums, which are ladies that I met while living in California. The story behind this recipe is just so sweet that I encourage you to go to their blog and read about the background to this cake. It is in my oven as I write. I cannot wait to taste it.
1 1/2 cups melted butter
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
Add and mix well:
3 cups sugar
3 cups flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 heaping Tablespoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
Then add and mix again:
1 1/2 cups boiling water
Line 3 round 8″ cake pans with waxed paper and butter the sides of the pan to prevent sticking when cake is done. Pour batter evenly amongst the 3 pans in a preheated 350 degree oven. Bake for about 30 minutes or just until the center of the cake feels firm to the touch and the sides of the cake are beginning to pull away from the pan. Cool thoroughly and remove from pans. (You can wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate at this point if you are making the cake a day ahead or hours ahead of when needed.) Spread icing liberally and smile….perfect chocolate cake is on its way.
Icing
1 cup butter at room temperature
8 oz. package cream cheese, at room temperature
12 oz. package chocolate chips, melted
1/4 cup cocoa
1 1/2 lbs. powered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
Enough heavy cream to soften
Great-Grandma’s Pound Cake
Dianne, a friend of mine brought me a new cook book the other day and it is filled with several old recipes that I had never seen. This recipe says that it won a Blue Ribbon at the Michigan State Fair. Can’t wait to try it. Very different from the usual pound cake.
2 cups butter, softened (Randy has found that it is much quicker and easier to just melt a stick of butter and drink it, rather than having to get in his butter quota of the day through baked goods)
16 Oz package of powdered sugar
6 eggs
1 tables almond extract
3 cups all purpose flour
Beat butter until light and fluffy; add powdered sugar, mixing well. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add extract and flour; mix just until blended. Pour into a greased and floured 10″ tube pan. Bake at 350 for one hour and 15 min or until cake tests done in middle. After 15 minutes, turn cake out onto serving platter allowing to cool.
Sprinkle with powdered sugar if desired after cake has cooled completely.
Whiskey Cake (Or If you are a Bapt, like me, we like to refer to it as a Cake With a Kick)
This summer we have had to adjust to living back in Texas, which means that we stay in the house alot. At our age, dealing with heat just means that you learn where the coolest (and I don’t mean “hip”) stores in town are and where the closest ice cream shop is located. Some of our kids are coming to dinner tonight and they had requested that we have whiskey cake for dessert. Mandy and Cameron have taken me to Whiskey Cake on several occasions for us to have that dessert and I told them that I was determined to find the recipe for it. Wa La, lo and behold, the chef at WC was featured in the Dallas paper with his recipe for this amazing cake, which the restaurant has been named having the best dessert for 4 yrs in a row, according to the article. So tonight is the unveiling of this creation that I hope resembles the “real thing”. It takes some time, but since I “don’t have a life”, as our kids seem to think, what else do I have to do but spend hours in the kitchen making any and all of their request. Oops, I guess that didn’t sound very nice. I just hope they remember this when it comes to them picking out my nursing home.
The recipe does take about an hour, but it truly is so worth it.
And for all you Baptist out there, if you decide to bake it for dessert when you are having the preacher over, it will be our little secret what’s in it.
1 lb of dates, chopped
(I buy the chopped dates in the box that are coated in sugar and it worked great.)
1 tsp baking soda
2 cups boiling water
1 cup softened butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1 3/4 cup self-rising flour
2 jumbo eggs (I had extra large so used two eggs and 1 egg yolk)
1 teas vanilla
Place the dates, baking soda and boiling water in a bowl. Stir and allow to sit 15-20 min to soften the dates.
Place the date mixture in a food processor and pulse until it becomes a paste. Set aside.
Cream butter and eggs, vanilla & sugar until light and fluffy.
Add the flour and mix to combine. Fold in the date mixture and pour into a 9×13″ baking pan which has been sprayed with Pam and then coated with a little sugar on bottom.
Bake at 350 in preheated oven. When cake tests done, cool for 20 min then flip cake out onto paper lined plate or tray.
Leave at room temp to cool completely. Once cool, wrap in plastic and keep stored at room temp or serve immediately.
Whiskey Sauce
1 cup heavy cream
2 tables granulated sugar
1 teas vanilla extract
3 egg yolks
1 teas Whiskey
Bring cream, 2 tables sugar to a simmer in a small saucepan.
In a mixing bowl, whisk the egg yolks with the other 2 tables sugar until foamy.
Temper 1/2 of the heavy cream into the mixing bowl and then return the mixture to the rest of the cream.(I actually drizzled gradually about 1/2 cup of the cream mixture to the egg mixture, stirring constantly before adding it to the rest of the cream)
Continue to cook until thicken. (This did not take but a couple of mins).
Add the vanilla and whiskey.
Remove and cool. Store in fridge until ready to use.
Toffee Sauce
1/4 lb (1 stick) butter
1 lb light brown sugar
2 cups heavy cream
2 tables whiskey
1 tables vanilla
Place butter in a heavy bottom sauce pan and melt. Add the brown sugar and cook over medium heat for 10 min.
Add the heavy cream and allow to cook for an additional 7 min, stirring occasionally.
Stir occasionally with a wooden spoon to ensure it is cooking evenly
Remove from heat and add the whiskey and vanilla. Stir.
Cool. You can store in fridge up to 3 days.
When ready to serve the cake pieces, place the needed amount of cake pieces on a baking sheet. Poke holes in the cake pieces and spoon some of the toffee sauce over each piece.
Place in a 500 degree oven for about 2-3 min or until toffee is bubbling and cake is warmed throughout. After placing each piece on individual plates, spoon a little of the Whiskey Sauce over the pieces. Serve with additional whipped cream if desired.
Peach Praline Cobbler
This recipe is so much like the recipe that my Italian neighbor from NYC gave me years ago that I seemed to have misplaced. It is different from the ordinary cobbler. Such a great way to use fresh peaches.
8 cups of fresh peaches (or frozen)
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
2 tables cornstarch
1 teas ground cinnamon
3/4 cup light packed brown sugar
1/4 cup butter
1 1/2 cups chopped pecans
2 cups self rising flour
2 teas sugar
1/2 cup shortening
3/4 cup buttermilk
in a large pan, combine peaches, 1 cup sugar, water, cornstarch and cinnamon. Cook and stir until thickened and bubbly. Transfer to a 3 qt rectangle baking dish.
For filling:
Stir together brown sugar and melted butter; add pecans. Toss to coat and set aside.
For dough:
IN a large mixing bowl, stir together self rising flour and 2 teas sugar. Cut in the shortening. Make a well in center and add buttermilk. Stir just enough to cling together.
Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead gently for 10-12 strokes. roll to a 12×8″ rectangle. Spread with pecan filling. Roll up from one of the long sides, (like you would do when making cinnamon rolls). Cut into 12 (1″ thick) slices. Place slices cut down, atop hot peaches.
Bake, uncovered in 400 degree oven for 25-30 minutes or until dough cuts are golden. Serve warm with ice cream or 1/2 & 1/2 poured over individual servings.
*(you may substitute regular flour with 2 teas baking powder, 1/2 teas baking soda and 1/2 teas salt in place of the self-rising flour)
Praline Pumpkin Dessert
It is truly summer & with temps going to the 100’s, who wants to have the oven on?
Looking through an old 1987 Sothern Living magazine this no-bake dessert drew my attention.
Not wanting to wait for Fall to experience my love of pumpkin, I immediately tore this one out. It is a keeper.
Crust:
1 cup graham cracker crumbs
1/2 cup finely chopped pecans
1/4 cup light brown sugar
1/3 cup butter, melted
Mix and press into bottom of a 9″ spring form pan.
Filling:
1 can (14 oz) Sweetened Condensed Milk (aka Eagle Brand)
1/4 cup frozen orange juice concentrate
1 can (16 oz) canned pumpkin
1 teas pumpkin pie spice
1 (8 oz) container frozen whipped topping, defrosted
Blend all ingredients and pour over crust. Put into freezer for at least 4 hours, covered. Spread 1 qt of vanilla softened ice cream over the top. Return to freezer, covered. Allow to stand at room temperature 5 min before serving. Serve with Praline Sauce*
*Praline Sauce
1 can Sweetened Condensed Milk
1 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup water
1 table butter
1 teas vanilla
Pour contents of can in deep casserole dish. Cover and cook in microwave 3 minutes. Stir and cook another 2-3 min. Stir in brown sugar, water and butter. Microwave an additional 1-2 min, covered. Add vanilla and stir until smooth. Cool or chill before using over pumpkin dessert.
Chocolate Castles 