Cappuccino Squares

As mentioned in a previous post, I made these squares for a New Year's Eve party we attended. Everyone loved them. The butter wasn't melting into the cakes when I was mixing it, so I was a little worried that they weren't going to turn out well. While it was in the oven, it melted in nicely, so they turned out okay.

Cappuccino Squares
adapted from Perfect Chocolate, a collection of over 100 essential recipes

Ingredients:
8 oz butter, softened
generous 1 1/2 cups of self rising flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp unsweetened cocoa, plus extra for dusting
generous 1 cup golden superfine sugar (I just used regular sugar)
4 eggs, beaten
3 tbsp instant coffee powder, dissolved in 2 tbsp hot water (I used regular coffee because I didn't have any instant on hand)

White Chocolate Frosting
4 oz white chocolate, broken into pieces
2 oz butter, softened
3 tbsp milk
1 3/4 cups confectioners' sugar

Directions



Sift the flour, baking powder and cocoa into a bowl and add the butter, sugar, eggs and coffee. Beat well, by hand or with an electric whisk, until smooth, then spoon into a greased and base lined shallow 11 x 7 inch pan and smooth the top.



Bake in a preheated oven, 350 degrees F, for 35-40 minutes, or until risen and firm, then turn out onto a wire rack and peel off the lining paper. Let cool completely.



To make the frosting, place the chocolate, butter and milk in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water and stir until chocolate is melted.

Remove the bowl from the pan and sift in the confectioners' sugar. Beat until smooth, then spread over the cake. Dust the top of the cake with sifted cocoa, then cut into squares. (NOTE: I cut the cake into squares before icing it. I thought it would be less messy that way)

Servings: about 15 squares



Review:
These went over really well. The cake was very moist and the icing was a perfect compliment. I was skeptic as to whether they would actually taste like cappuccino, but they sort of did.

Need help on Your Cooking Techniques??

A blog I frequent, The Hungry Mouse, has just announced a new feature which will focus on illustrated methods of cooking techniques. Check out the announcement here.

I've never had any formal training, so I'm really looking forward to this!

New Year's Eve

One of our close friends purchased a house this year, and after a couple months of fixing it up, it was finally ready for its debut on New Year's Eve. The party was a pot luck of sorts, and I was volunteered by the hostess to bring the following items:

Black Bean Hummus
Asparagus Roll Ups
A Dessert of my choosing - I chose Cappuccino Cakes out of my new Chocolate cookbook.

You can view the hummus recipe in an earlier post here. Check out my next post for the Cappuccino Cakes.

Asparagus Roll Ups

A couple months ago, I was looking for a really simple appetizer recipe that I could whip up in a couple minutes to take to a bridal shower. The bridesmaids, me included, decided we could cut costs a little bit if we all made one appetizer and one dessert. Since it was for about 60 people, you might understand why I wanted something relatively easy. These roll ups fit the bill perfectly.

Ingredients

One can of Pillsbury breadsticks
24 asparagus stalks
ground black pepper
Parmesan cheese, shredded

Directions



Open the can of breadsticks and cut each in half (so you end up with 24 pieces of dough, instead of 12).



Snap the white part of the asparagus off of the stalks and twist a piece of dough around each of the 24.

Sprinkle with black pepper and Parmesan cheese.

Bake at 375 F for about 12 minutes, or until breadsticks start to turn golden brown.

Thick Pork Chops with Spiced Apples and Raisins

I received a bunch of cookbooks for Christmas. Feeling overloaded on sweets, I decided this meal would be a great way to get back into eating better. As it says in the cookbook, the key to this recipe seems to be brining the pork chops before cooking them - it makes the meat very tender. When preparing the brining liquid, please remember to add the gallon of water last. Like an idiot, I filled the bag with water first, and it ended up all over the kitchen (and my new cookbook!). Luckily, there wasn't anything sticky in the solution yet, like the brown sugar, and it was pretty easy to clean up.

Thick Pork Chops with Spiced Apples and Raisins
adapted from Tyler Florence's Real Kitchen

Ingredients

Pork Chops:



1 gallon water
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup sea salt
1 cup frozen apple juice concentrate, thawed (I used regular apple juice, since we had it on hand)
1 1/2 teaspoons whole black peppercorns
2 fresh thyme sprigs (I used dried thyme)
4 double-cut bone-in loin pork chops, 1 pound each (the only meat I could find totaled to about 3 lbs, so mine were slightly smaller than suggested)
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Extra-virgin olive oil

Spiced Apples and Raisins:



2 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, and sliced in 1/2-inch-thick wedges
Leaves from 2 fresh thyme sprigs (see above re: thyme)
1/4 cup raisins
3/4 cup frozen apple juice concentrate, thawed (see above re: apple juice)
3 tablespoons brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
Pinch of cardamom
Pinch dry mustard
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Juice of 1/2 lemon (I used store bought lemon juice)

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a mixing bowl combine the water, brown sugar, sea salt, apple juice concentrate, peppercorns, and thyme. Give it a good stir to dissolve the sugar and salt. Transfer the mixture to an extra-large re-sealable plastic bag. Submerge the pork chops in the brine, seal up the bag, and put it in the refrigerator for 2 hours to tenderize the meat. Do not brine longer than that or the meat will break down too much and get mushy.

Remove the pork chops from the brine and pat them dry with paper towels. Sprinkle both sides of the meat with salt and pepper. Put a heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Add a 3-count drizzle of olive oil and get it hot. Lay 2 pork chops in the pan (most likely only 2 of these massive pork chops will fit comfortably) and brown 4 minutes per side. Remove the pork chops to a large baking pan; brown the remaining 2 chops and add them to the others in the pan. Put the baking pan in the oven and roast the chops for 30 minutes. The pork is done when the center is still rosy and the internal temperature reads 140 to 145 degrees F when tested with an instant-read thermometer.

While the chops cook, melt the butter in a clean skillet over medium-low heat. Add the apples and thyme and coat in the butter; cook and stir for 8 minutes to give them some color. Toss in the raisins and add the apple juice, stirring to scrape up the brown bits. Stir in the brown sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and dry mustard; season with salt and pepper. Squeeze in the juice from the lemon to wake up the flavor and simmer for 10 minutes or until the apples break down and soften. Spoon the spiced apples over the pork chops.

Servings: 4

Review:
This recipe was really good. Although it says to bake the meat for 30 minutes, my pork chops were a little more done than I would like. I think it was because the meat I bought wasn't super thick like the picture in the book shows. I was planning on checking them at 20 minutes to see how they were cooking, but I got distracted making the spiced apples. The next time I can get my hands on some affordable spices, I'd like to try this recipe out using all the ingredients. I didn't have cardamom, cloves or dry mustard on hand, and each spice would have run me about $10 at the store. I thought that was a little much, so I opted not to use them - especially since I don't have many recipes that call for those spices.

I served this with Vanilla-Honey Glazed Carrots, but the book suggests to serve it with Tyler's corn pudding. (NOTE: this isn't the recipe in his book, but it's the closest I could find online.)

Menu Sunday

In keeping with the spirit of new year resolutions, my husband and I have made a commitment to eat out less in 2009. To kick it off, we will not be eating out at all in January*

To keep ourselves honest, I've decided to make a menu we can stick to each week. This also made grocery shopping much easier since we knew exactly what we needed. Usually I decide on our meals while we're shopping. We spent a total of $110 grocery shopping and that should cover all meals below, plus lunch and breakfast every day. I'll report back next Sunday on what type of leftovers we had.

Sunday - Panko Crusted Chicken Parm, with Chicken flavor Rice a Roni and Corn (inspired by the blog Erica's Kitchen Adventures)
Monday - Black Bean and Corn Soup (crockpot recipe)
Tuesday - Leftovers for Melissa (Jim will be in the city for his CFA class)
Wednesday - Leftovers for Jim (My boss is taking the group out as an end of year thank you)
Thursday - Cavatappi Al Sugo
Friday - Asian Style Turkey Burgers
Saturday - Baked Whole Wheat Penne with Roasted Vegetables

*We received some gift certificates for Christmas, so we might use those, and my husband will be eating his lunch out Tuesdays to keep up with his networking at work.