Chocolate chocolate-chip pancakes

Yes, sometimes breakfast gets a little extra indulgent and borders on dessert.  I can think of no better excuse (though who needs one) to indulge than Valentine's Day so the weekend beforehand, we did just that as I served up these chocolate pancakes for breakfast.  

These chocolate pancakes are made with buttermilk - tender, fluffy, and light, chock full of chocolate flavor from cocoa powder as well as mini chocolate chips that I folded into the batter.  I substituted some of the all-purpose flour with white whole wheat flour and I think these pancakes can really handle it.  In fact, I think chocolate and whole wheat flour work really well together in general, often giving the finished product a subtle nutty flavor and texture.  

It's a little like eating a light and fluffy chocolate cake.  Think of it as an alternative to chocolate muffins.  I'd like to think I showed some restraint in not topping the pancakes with chocolate sauce like you often see.  As tempting as that may be, some berries and a few extra sprinkles of mini chocolate chips does the trick.

Looking at these pancakes is helping me deal with Valentine's Day withdrawals.  I hope you had a lovely one, filled with love and plenty of chocolate!  Lucky for me, there's Chinese New Year to continue the celebrations and the feasting on sweets.  I can't complain at all!

Peanut butter chocolate chip cookies

I'm going to take these cookies and use them as another ode to the joys and benefits of simple baking...

Sometimes, I need a little baking therapy when I'm stressed and want to relax.  I get into the kitchen, into my "happy place", and in those instances, I go for easy recipes - cookies or muffins, generally - that I can whip up with familiar, routine-like movements that are soothing on their own. The most recent time I really needed a baking "session", I went for a small batch of these peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.  In place of some of the chocolate chips, I chopped up and included some peanut m&m's as well.  I like the touch of variety, color, flavor, and fun it throws in.

You might have recently seen this article on the psychological benefits of baking for others.  It articulates much of what we know and feel if you enjoy baking as much as I've come to.  I don't only bake to de-stress...I bake in all moods and for all different occasions, and I would say I'm usually very happy when I do it, but for times when I do need to decompress, baking is a familiar and happy ritual that does that.  It has been a great outlet and source of joy, and I'm grateful to have discovered it and be able to indulge in it.  

So a couple of weeks ago when I was in need of a little de-stressing, I went into the kitchen to whip up some of these cookies for my family.  We always welcome a fresh batch of cookies!  I knew it would put a smile on my face and on my fellas as we enjoy them together afterwards.

To stretch out the process of making this batch of cookies, I did it the old-fashioned way, by hand.  The mixer and electronic equipment are a great help in general but it's amazing how good it feels to work ingredients together, using your hands, doing basic things like stirring, whisking, and chopping.  You take your time and the process really can be therapeutic...

This recipe from Dessert for Two makes a dozen cookies (or a baker's dozen in my case).  I'm already partial to her small-batch monster cookies, which I've whipped up multiple times but as you know, there can never be too many variations of peanut butter, chocolate chip, or oatmeal cookies to try out and enjoy.  Bring 'em all on!  And if I can whip them up with basic ingredients that I already have at home, all the better!

This was one much-needed happy baking session!  And I'm curious...if you find baking relaxing, what do you like to make when you're looking to decompress and get a little "baking therapy"?

Orange-chocolate chip brioche bread pudding (for two)

Apologies for the long blog post title but I was feeling descriptive...

In all seriousness, I did make bread pudding a few days ago, for the very first time! Are you a fan of bread pudding?  I have to admit that it isn't something that appeals to me in general.  I've never really had it but my husband will order it on occasion when we're eating out.  Naturally, I've been curious and bread pudding's been on my mental list of things to try one day at home.

The time finally came to make it.  When I baked that loaf of brioche recently, I made sure to freeze a few slices so I could have some homemade brioche for my first bread pudding endeavor.  I wanted something simple so I looked up Mark Bittman's recipe, which is a basic one that doesn't involve a long soaking time or a water bath to bake the bread pudding in.  

I scaled down the recipe to make bread pudding for two, essentially, and I added extra flavoring in the form of fresh orange zest and a couple spoonfuls of miniature chocolate chips.  Orange and chocolate is one of my very favorite combinations so I didn't think I could go wrong, and honestly, it gave this simple brioche bread pudding great flavor. 

I'm definitely coming to you as a novice but my husband and I think this inaugural bread pudding turned out really well; and by that, I mean it was tasty!  

When I was putting this together, my initial impression was that I might have too much custard.  It quickly switched to a concern that I didn't have enough when the bread quickly soaked up the liquid.  In the end, the bread pudding turned out soft (not wet), with creamy centers and some slightly crusty edges (thanks to a little time under the broiler).  I've seen bread puddings at different ends of the spectrum - some far more broken down, rather wet in texture.  We like a more intact structure but I think you can adjust according to your preference by how large you slice your bread cubes, how much custard you use, and how much mixing you do.

For me, the burst of flavor from the fresh orange zest totally made the dish.  And the decadent goodness from the chocolate chips would be missed if it was not there.  We thought it was a winner, and I'm very glad I saved some of my brioche bread and made this bread pudding!

Chocolates Andes mint cookies

'Tis the season for chocolate and peppermint, and lots of it!  It is quite possibly my son's favorite holiday flavor combination so it's well represented at my house right now and I'm always on the lookout for more spins to try. 

One of my little one's favorite treats is this peppermint brownie concoction I cobbled together a few years ago.  He just loves it and I usually make a batch for him at Christmastime.  But this year, I swapped it for something different but still very familiar. 

We're having chocolate Andes mint cookies instead.  We are fans of those green foil-wrapped Andes mints, which also play a prominent role in those brownies that my son adores.  These cookies have largely the same flavor - moist chocolate with a big splash of mint.  

I spotted the recipe in the most recent Food Network magazine.  I think I've mentioned before that my son and I like to do the quizzes in the magazine together when there is one.  Well, there was no quiz in this issue but this recipe caught my eye.  As you can see, it's a chocolate base cookie and it's studded with an equal amount of dark chocolate chips as well chopped Andes mints.

These cookies were a big hit at my house and I'm already making a second batch to share with friends.  It's a moist cookie filled with chocolate flavor (from cocoa in the dough as well as the chocolate chips) and mint (from the Andes mints and peppermint extract) - an easy combination to love.  

Since it's Christmastime, I couldn't leave well enough alone so I melted some white chocolate and drizzled it over the top of some of the cookies.  For even more color, I sprinkled some candy cane bits on a few of the cookies using the white chocolate as "glue".  Taste-wise, the cookies don't need the embellishments but I love a little festive decoration on our treats at this time of year.  

Breaking in the baby bundts

I'm not big on shopping when it comes to clothes and things but I could shop for hours when it comes to housewares, kitchen, and food related items.  Leave me at Sur la Table and I could go missing for an hour or two easy.  I actually live minutes away from a mall - no Sur la Table there, unfortunately (or maybe it's fortunate), but I often find myself nipping into Williams-Sonoma or to Crate & Barrel and Anthropologie to check out the home section.

A mini spongy honey bundt cake

Inevitably, I often walk away with a little something - a plate, a mug, some kitchen tool I just realized I should have.  I do try to control myself because I feel like I have all the essentials I need nowadays (and, as importantly, no place to store much else!), but as you know, need and want are two separate things.  And about a week ago, I succumbed to the temptation of the bundt pan.  It's one of the things I don't have and probably don't really need but have always wanted.

Four cakes with toasted walnuts and two (on righthand column) have mini chocolate chips

Well, hey...Williams-Sonoma was running a sale and I was being practical here.  I bought a mini bundt pan - the smaller capacity works better for my small family and with the holidays coming around, I just know I'll have plenty of use for them by being able to make gifts of pretty little cakes.  Right?  Right!

So when you think Fall desserts, maybe you think bundt cakes like I do.  Why is that? I think it might have something to do with the rich, dense pound cake-like texture I often associate with bundt cakes.  They're great spiced with all the flavors of Fall and they conjure up hearty and homey, the kind of things you want when the weather turns cool and the leaves start drifting down.  Well, I know that sounds terrific but I went on a slightly different tangent with my inaugural batch of baby bundts.  

These little cakes are on the lighter side.  They are spongy honey cakes, with toasted walnuts.  I adapted a recipe I saw for Russian Honey Cake on Food52.  I messed with the recipe by scaling it down to make just enough batter for my 6 mini bundts.  That made it easy to then make the batter by hand.  Rather than sour cream, I used whole milk Greek yogurt instead.  I also added some vanilla extract for a little extra flavor. And I couldn't resist switching up the mix-in and making a couple of the little cakes with mini chocolate chips instead of walnuts (plus, I went with a more generous dose of them).  Using two kinds of mix-ins confuses the process a bit but I just couldn't resist.

Spongy honey cake with toasted walnuts

These sponge cakes are lightened by whipping egg whites separately from the yolks. Besides the Greek yogurt and eggs, there's no oil or butter added to them.  Don't expect cakes that are dense and rich like a pound cake though.  What we have here is moist as in spongy, practically bouncy, little cakes that have a sweetness in part from honey.  It was a good place to put the raw honey that I stock up at the farmer's market to good use. 

Spongy honey cake with mini chocolate chips

If you pick the cake with walnuts, you get a punch of nutty flavor from pre-toasting them (a must).  If you go with chocolate chip, well...you pretty much can't go wrong. My son was a big fan of those and they were reserved for him.

To be totally honest here, as dainty as these little cakes look, they're more like snack cakes, the 'pick up with your hands and eat with your fingers' kind of casual cakes.  If I was into sweets for breakfast, these are the types of cakes I'd reach for.

Healthy and easy banana oat "cookies"

Hello, fresh new week!  The past week was a busy one.  Not only did we have Easter and the excitement of the Easter Bunny's visit, the little one was also home on a truncated spring break.  He had only three days off from school because of all those snow days but we managed to sneak off for a quick road trip to Boston before coming home and attending the beautiful wedding of friends over the weekend.  

When we got home from our short trip, I had very little groceries on hand.  I don't know about you but I feel like I go grocery shopping constantly.  In reality, it's more like 2-3 times a week (at least) and I've just come to accept it.  It's really amazing how, one minute, the fridge is stocked and loaded down but then you turn around, and it's practically empty!  

Banana-oat "cookies: Made with just banana and quick oats, then mixed with: mini choc chips, peanut butter and strawberry jam, and just chunky peanut butter

So while I always have things in the freezer and dry goods in the pantry, it was still slim pickings.  I did have one lonely ripe banana sitting on the fruit plate and thought I'd use it to make a handful of breakfast "cookies".

Ripe banana and quick oats bind to make the "cookies"...then add a mix-in or two of your choice

I thought I'd try a recipe I saw from Skinnytaste a few months ago.  When I first saw it, it made me think of one-ingredient banana ice cream because it again highlights the versatility of the banana.  These "cookies" are easy and quick to make - plus, healthy, too!  We're talking 3, maybe 4, ingredients and there's no added sugar, or flour, egg, butter/oil involved at all.  Start with a ripe banana (or two), add quick-cooking oats to bind, then add mix-in(s) of your choice.  I couldn't decide so I tried a few variations. 

Three ingredients: banana, oats, and miniature chocolate chips

This will come as no big surprise but of the variations we tried - ones with mini chocolate chips, chunky peanut butter, and chunky peanut butter with strawberry jam - we liked the chocolates ones best.  They tasted like this banana bread.  The ones with jam came in second and next time, I'd love to try a version with some toasted walnuts.  You could use other nuts, dried fruit, cocoa nibs, coconut, nutella, or whatever you like.  I think the mix-ins add a nice layer of extra flavor and texture.  A little goes a long way with these petite cookies so you can be a little less generous with the chocolate chips than I was.

These healthy cookies are ideally eaten warm from the oven.  Obviously, they're not cookies in the traditional sense (hence, those quotation marks) without all the usual ingredients like sugar and eggs. So don't expect a gooey, sweet cookie.  These are chewy and, ironically, somewhat doughy, despite not having any flour in them.  Adding some extra flavor and texture with a mix-in or two is really nice. I think this is a fun way to use up a ripe banana or two and get a sweet treat out of it without any guilt.  I hate guilt, don't you?

Italian-American butter cookies (aka, the ones kids love)

Walk into an Italian bakery and you're likely to see shelves and shelves of butter cookies in an array of varieties and shapes.  They may be decked out in sprinkles, filled with jam or fudge, or dipped in chocolate. 

Before I started baking so often at home, I'd take my little one to a nearby Italian bakery and aside from the almond cookies, he always wanted these butter cookies.  I think they're generally popular with kids since they're so eye-catching with all the chocolate, colorful sprinkles and jam involved. Moreover, the pure flavor of butter and vanilla just goes down easy.

So this year, with my son in mind, I thought I'd try my hand at making these kid-friendly cookies at home.  In all their varieties, but from one basic dough, they are festive-looking and great for a holiday cookie platter.

I kept things traditional and simple, resisting the urge to add vanilla beans or almond extract, or to try the version that contains almond paste.  Those are projects for another time.  This basic cookie dough is fun to play with in terms of the variety of cookies you can make. You can pipe different shapes using one star tip.  For the embellishments, I tucked some of the centers with mini chocolate chips, candied cherries, and fruit preserves before baking.  I sandwich some together with apricot preserve and dipped a bunch in chocolate ganache.  Sprinkles make everything even better.

These cookies made me smile and baking them really put me in the holiday mood.  Before starting, I thought they might be a bit of a hassle to make but not only does the dough comes together in a flash, it was easy to work with in terms of piping.  That was actually a lot of fun - quick and easy, too.

These also make me think of Danish butter cookies - those blue tins have a special place in my heart. I didn't grow up eating many sweets but we did have those butter cookies.  As a child, I loved opening up the tin, taking a long whiff of that delicious buttery aroma, and looking inside, I'd finger those paper liners, deciding which shape I wanted to eat.  I loved the pretzel shape with the coarse sugar on top the best.  These cookies are similar to Danish butter cookies though it seems the Danish ones are more commonly made with confectioners' sugar (somewhat like these cookies).  Now I realize I'll have yet another project for next Christmas!

I hope these little cookies make you smile the way they did for us.

Peanut butter granola bars

Today, I'm trying out some peanut butter granola bars.  I think they'd be good as part of our rotation of after school (or after the park or some kind of exercise) snack options for the little one.  In a bind, these make a quick breakfast bar. 

Peanut butter is the predominant flavor of these bars (sorry if you are allergic) but its bulk comes from old-fashioned oats.  There are also a bit of slivered almonds and mini chocolate chips - all flavors I personally enjoy.  I adapted this recipe from Giada De Laurentiis, making a couple of changes based on reviewer comments.  I used to wonder who these people are who do reviews and make comments on websites and post up all those youtube videos.  Now I've really come to appreciate and value constructive participation.  You can learn a lot from what others have tried and discovered. 

I think these granola bars were a success in my house.  Bare in mind that my 6-year old son decided somewhere along the way in the last year or so that he doesn't like nuts.  I think he just wants to dislike things that I tell him are good for him and I know he doesn't really dislike nuts as much as he claims.  He eats peanut butter and used to love walnuts, and I know he's ok with almonds.  He also won't eat oatmeal on its own (he doesn't like anything hot) though he's down with an oatmeal crisp or oatmeal cookies.  So I'm happy to report that he does like (I didn't say love) these granola bars and I don't think he'd mind seeing them as part of his snack rotation.  Personally, I think the bars are quite tasty, with a nice chewy texture.  The toasted almonds go well with the peanut butter also.  These are quite filling so a small piece goes a long way.