BitterSweet

The Great Pumpkin Cake

In a pumpkin patch most sincere, on Halloween night, there was more to see than just the usual vines and gourds, slumbering under the cover of darkness. Rising from the earth like a giant glowing orb, brighter and larger than a full moon, it was none other than the Great Pumpkin, here to reward all the good little children at long last!

However, I have a feeling that this may have been a different Great Pumpkin than the original orange squash, because his reward was not in the form of toys or trinkets as fabled, but in the form of cake.

Yes, the Great Pumpkin is in fact made of cake… And practically effortless to assemble, too. Little more than chocolate chip pumpkin cake baked in an oven-safe metal bowl (greased well!) and slathered with pumpkin frosting, it’s easy enough to throw together for any last-minute Halloween event. Just bear in mind that the cake will rise when filling your bowl with batter, so fill it about 1/2 way full to prevent spill-over, and it wouldn’t hurt to park a baking sheet beneath it just in case. While baking the cake, just be sure to keep a close eye on the oven, since it will take much longer to bake in such an unusual and relatively dense form. Times will vary depending on the size of your bowl.

Applying the frosting is a very fast process, since you don’t actually want the coating to be entirely smooth. Leave vertical lines to mimic the striations of a real pumpkin, and you’ll save yourself a headache and create a more “realistic” Great Pumpkin. For the features, simply roll out a small portion of modeling chocolate very thin, and use a knife to carve out the eyes and mouth you want. Roll out a small log for the stem, and taper it out at the top, curving it slightly just so it doesn’t stick straight up. Gently press the chocolate eyes, mouth, and stem into the frosted cake as desired. Voila! Now the Great Pumpkin isn’t such an elusive character after all.

As for that glowing orange frosting, you could use any flavor you desire and color it accordingly with a drop of beet juice and a pinch of turmeric, but wanting to match the theme more closely, I went with an all-pumpkin frosting instead.

Pumpkin Frosting

3/4 Cup Non-Dairy Margarine
1 Cup Solid-Pack Pumpkin Puree (Canned; not homemade due to the water content)
1/4 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
Pinch Nutmeg
Pinch Salt
1 Package Vegan Butterscotch Pudding Mix
3 1/2 Cups Confectioner’s Sugar
1/4 – 3/4 Cup Soy or Rice Milk Powder

Place the margarine in your stand mixer first, and beat briefly with the whisk attachment until creamy. Add in the pumpkin, and whip the two together until mostly smooth, pausing to scrape down the sides of the bowl to ensure that everything is becoming incorporated. Add in the spices, salt, pudding mix, sugar, and 1/4 cup of the “milk” powder. Start the mixer on the lowest speed to prevent the dry goods from flying out of the bowl, and once the sugar is mostly mixed in, turn up the speed to high.

Continue to scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed, and whip the frosting for a solid 4 minutes. If it seems too loose and/or somewhat grainy/separated, add in another 1/4 cup of “milk” powder. Beat for another 3 minutes, assess the texture, and repeat if needed. Once smooth and stiff enough to spread, apply to your completely cooled cake as desired. Happy Halloween!

Printable Recipe

Purple Potato Eater

Bubbling cauldrons are no where to be seen, but there’s definitely something strange brewing in this busy little kitchen. Between standard ingredients that behave contrary to common knowledge, mysteriously disappearing treats, downright impossible recipes that actually work (and quite well, I might add!), it’s hard to deny the unlikely alchemy going on every day. It’s easy to ignore the small, everyday signs that the kitchen could perhaps be enchanted by an otherworldly force, but when I pulled this last batch of cupcakes, you would have to be blind to deny the witchcraft of this working space.

Blue cupcakes. Bright purple frosting. No food coloring, naturally, so even I could hardly believe what I had baked. Truly, what sort of malicious curse would turn innocent confections into visions of the dark arts?

Believe it or not, the powerful wizardry here comes from a very unlikely source; A potato. Though it looks just like any other tuber from the outside, slice open a beni-imo and the magic will become clear. Bright violet through and through, these humble spuds don’t lose their color once boiled or exposed to air, making them a prime coloring candidate. Better yet, their mild, sweet flavor is somewhat akin to a pumpkin or sweet potato, making it easy to substitute an equal amount of purple potato puree in your favorite pumpkin cake recipe for a frightening new hue.

However, even more unusual is that once baked, my beni-imo cupcakes turned not only blue, but strangely swirled with emerald green! This is some sort of witchcraft that’s beyond me, since the batter was thoroughly mixed before hitting the oven… My best guess is that it’s due to a reaction with the baking soda or powder, but further experimentation is clearly necessary. While the results may look quite creepy indeed, they’re far less scary than the average consumer cupcake pumped up with Red Dye #40 and Blue Lake #1- That’s for sure!

World Bread Day

No matter how crazy life has been lately, and how poorly I’ve been staying on top of making regular posts, there is nothing that could make me miss out on celebrating World Bread Day.  What could be more glorious than a whole event created simply to celebrate all that is baked and doughy?  This occasion calls for something special, and I have just the thing…

Chocolate brioche, anyone? Inspired by my initial success with basic brioche some time ago now, I couldn’t help but push the envelope just a little bit further, and delve deeper into this decadent bread that tastes like cake. There’s no mistaking this loaf for a hearty breakfast bread, much in contrast to my most recent offering, but the lure of that voluptuous ribbon of pure chocolate swirled within is almost too much to resist; it may very well end up on the breakfast table all the same!

Even if you don’t drop everything and bake this beauty today, take some time to celebrate your “daily bread.” Happy World Bread Day, everyone!

Chocolate Brioche

Sponge:

1/4 Cup Chocolate Soymilk
1 1/4-Ounce Packet Active Dry Yeast
1/2 Cup Bread Flour
1/4 Cup Granulated Sugar

Dough:

3 Cups Bread Flour
1/2 Cup Dutch Processed Cocoa Powder
1 1/2 Teaspoons Salt
1/4 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1 1-Pound Package Chocolate Silken Creations Tofu*
1/4 Cup Margarine, at Room Temperature

Chocolate Swirl:

6 Ounces Semi-Sweet Chocolate, Chopped
2 Tablespoons Granulated Sugar

*This is a recipe I made for Nasoya using their Silken Creations tofu, but if you can’t get your hands on this specialty item, you can also substitute an equal amount of regular silken tofu, plus about 1/4 cup of additional cocoa powder.

To begin the sponge, briefly warm the soymilk for just 30 – 60 seconds in the microwave, and then sprinkle in the yeast. Let the mixture stand for about 5 minutes, and then mix in the sugar and flour. Cover with plastic wrap, and allow the sponge to rest for 30 – 45 minutes until it appears bubbly.

When the sponge is ready, move it into the bowl of your stand mixer, and add the flour, cocoa, salt, and cinnamon. Mix on low speed with the paddle attachment for a minute, and add in the chocolate silken creations. Continue to stir slowly until the dry goods seem to be mostly incorporated, and then increase to medium speed, beating the dough for 5 minutes.

Switch to the dough hook attachment, and continue mixing on a low speed. Slowly begin to incorporate the margarine, one tablespoon at a time, until no pieces are visible throughout the dough. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and dough hook as needed to make sure that the dough is completely homogeneous.

Let rest for 10 minutes before turning the dough out onto a well-floured surface. Kneed by hand for approximately 10 minutes, adding flour as needed, until smooth and elastic. Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover with plastic, and let rise in a warm place for 2 – 3 hours, until doubled in volume.

Once risen, punch the dough down, scrape it out of the bowl and onto a lightly floured surface. Press it out gently but firmly with your knuckles into a rectangle, about 15 x 7 inches. For the chocolate swirl, place the chocolate and sugar in a food processor, and pulse until you achieve a coarse but fine meal. Sprinkle this mixture evenly over the rectangle of dough, leaving an inch of one of the short sides clear. Press the chocolate in lightly, and roll the dough up, ending at the clear strip to seal the roll. Pinch the edge together, and place the loaf, seam-side down, in a lightly greased 8 x 4 inch loaf pan. Place in a warm area, and let rise once more for 45 – 60 minutes.

As the loaf nears the end of its second rise, preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Bake for 25 – 30 minutes, until well-browned and has an internal temperature of 200 degrees.

Let cool completely before slicing.

Makes 1 Loaf

Printable Recipe

For the Sake of Dessert

It’s a crime that all bakers have committed at least once in their modest or illustrious baking career, and one that I can not deny being guilty of as well. Always well-intentioned, who could blame us mad pastry chefs for occasionally dropping some sort of dessert bomb… And not the kind smothered in chocolate. No, far from it. After the shock of a particularly indulgent recipe beings to wear off, we seek some sort of half-baked way to repent for our sins, perhaps switching out chocolate chips for fruit, upping the whole wheat flour, and really, is all that oil absolutely necessary? The attempts at “health-ifying” desserts are valiant indeed, but there comes a time to draw a line. No, I do not want sugar-free, fat-free, taste-free cardboard cake, thanks.

One sweet treat most commonly burdened with this misplaced desire is by far the oatmeal cookie. Depressingly few vegan recipes exist that don’t attempt to make them into breakfast-friendly bricks of portable oatmeal, or bona fide granola bars. Don’t get me wrong, those cookies are plenty tasty and I would have a hard time turning one down regardless, but sometimes, as the weather grows colder and the need for comfort foods becomes more pressing, I just want a damn cookie. Like the oatmeal cookies I grew up with, before being vegan, before caring what on earth was making those morsels so irresistibly sweet and chewy, before everyone started fearing eating a full-fledged dessert for dessert’s sake.

If you really wanted, you could still spin these as the smarter choice, being vegan and cholesterol-free of course, but really, they’re just good cookies. The best thing they can offer your health is perhaps a temporary elevation in mood, which is still more than I can say for a plain old granola bar.

Bakery-Style Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

2 Cups Old-Fashioned Rolled Oats
2 Cups All Purpose Flour
2 Teaspoons Baking Soda
1/2 Teaspoon Salt
1 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1/2 Cup Chopped, Toasted Walnuts
1 Cup Raisins
1/2 Cup Dark Brown Sugar, Firmly Packed
2/3 Cup Date Syrup/Molasses
1/2 Cup Non-Dairy Margarine, Melted
2 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees, and line two or three baking sheets with silpats or parchment paper. Set aside.

First things first, place the oats in your food processor, and pulse until they’re mostly broken down and look like “instant” oats, but still have slightly more texture and some whole oats remaining. If you were short on time, you could substitute half rolled oats and half instant, but the texture isn’t quite the same. Transfer the lightly ground oats to the bowl of your stand mixer or just a large bowl, and add in the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, walnuts, and raisins. Stir to distribute all of the dry goods evenly and coat the raisins with flour so that they don’t all clump together, and set aside.

In a separate bowl, thoroughly mix the brown sugar, date syrup, melted margarine, and vanilla until smooth. Pour these wet ingredients into the bowl of dry, and mix until you achieve a thick batter, and no dry patches of flour remain. Be sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl every now and then as you stir to make sure you don’t miss any big clumps hiding out there.

Scoop out a scant 1/4 cup of dough for each cookie (I find that an ice cream scoop is an indispensable tool for even cookies here) onto your prepared baking sheets, and very lightly press down the tops so that they’re not mounded up in the center. Bake for just 10- 12, and err on the side of less time to ensure soft, chewy cookies. Slide the silpats or parchment papers off the hot sheets immediately after pulling the cookies from the oven, and let cool completely before storing in an air-tight container, or serving up with a tall glass of non-dairy milk.

Makes 2 – 3 Dozen Cookies

Printable Recipe