Chocolate Molasses Bat Cookies

 

I've been wanting to make these bat cookies for a while-- they're cute and sounded really tasty, although I had to make a few modifications to accommodate my ingredients.  I didn't want to buy the specialty dark cocoa, so I just used regular, forgetting that you have to watch your leavening agent if you switch around your cocoa powder.  (However, natural cocoa is more chocolaty, so that also affected the flavor a bit.)  I used salted butter and reduced the added salt.  Then I decorated the bats using sanding sugar because it's more sparkly than regular granulated.  I also modified the directions slightly (I didn't note my changes).  Using a 5-inch cutter, I baked the cookies 10 minutes, rotating halfway through, but my oven did not maintain a consistent temperature.  (With the first batch, it was 300 at the 5-minute mark and 350 when I removed them.  Presumably it averaged out.)  Baking 10 cookies at a time, I chilled the sheet outside in the cool night air between batches.  As my dough circles got smaller, I switched to a 4-inch cutter and baked those for 8 minutes.

For 22 large cookies and 9 medium cookies, here's what I used:

2½ cups flour
1/2 cup dark chocolate powder cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1½ sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter
1 large egg
1/2 cup unsulphured molasses
Silver edible sugar pearls
granulated sanding sugar

In a large bowl whisk together first 7 ingredients until well combined; set aside. Cream together sugar and butter in a large mixing bowl. Add egg and beat until pale and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add molasses, and mix to combine. Add flour mixture and beat until just combined, about 1 minute. Divide dough in half. Place each between two pieces of parchment paper, and roll to a 3/8-inch-thick disk. Refrigerate 1 hour.

Heat oven to 325 degrees F. Dust countertop with cocoa powder. Transfer dough to countertop and cut cookies with a 6-inch bat-shaped cutter or desired size (adjust baking time accordingly). Place 1 inch apart on ungreased baking sheets.  Bake about 12 minutes, rotating baking sheets halfway through baking, until cookies are firm around the edges. Using tweezers and working quickly, press 2 sugar pearls into each cookie for eyes. (As the cookies start to cool and dry, the surface will crack when you press the pearls in if you take too long.)  Transfer to wire rack to cool completely. Use a new paintbrush to lightly coat the tops of the bat wings with water. Sprinkle with sugar and allow to set.

My dough was very soft, more like batter-- I had to let it chill for a bit outside before I could even divide it.  (It might have been because my butter got too soft and my kitchen was warm.)  Since I was making smaller cookies, I rolled the dough thinner as well.  Being a heavy butter cookie, I knew the dough would spread.  I question the use of baking soda-- it started to react before I'd even gotten the dough rolled out, creating little air holes and making the dough fluffy.  That might have been because I used natural cocoa powder instead of dark cocoa powder, which is less acidic and wouldn't have reacted as much.

It's not necessary to cover your surface with cocoa powder before laying your dough out-- you can use plain flour.  It will soak in during baking and disappear.  Dipping the cutter in flour might leave a small amount of residue around the edge of the cookie, but it's easily wiped away.

It's a little tricky getting the sugar pearls placed-- it's a little like that children's toy with the box you have to tilt from side to side to try to get the little balls into their holes.  I'd place them with the tweezers then try to press them in with my finger, but too often the pearl stuck to my finger just long enough to be pulled loose and then I was chasing it around the pan.  Pressing too hard with my finger would smoosh the cookie.  Once in place, you have to tap the pearl down so it's flush with the cookie surface, otherwise it just falls out.  In the last batch, I tried a few pearls in the raw cutouts to see if that would work, as they were much easier to place. It worked beautifully.  In fact, even better, because it pushed the pearls forward so they were slightly above the cookie surface but still secure.

You also have to think about the logistics of making these.  They're definitely not a cookie to be made on a hot day-- the dough was so soft, and remained firm only a few minutes outside of the refrigerator.  (Probably why we're directed to make them thick.)  To keep the dough firm and usable, you have to refrigerate it completely flat-- for me, that's a challenge.  I divided my dough into thirds and, using a narrow, 5-inch cutter, got 5 cookies initially from each portion.  In the time it took me to cut out those 5 cookies and press the remnants together, the dough around the edges had already softened back to a batter state.  (Another reason to divide it into smaller portions.)  Just some things to think about before getting started.

Conclusion:  I had assumed these would be rich and chocolaty.  It wasn't until I was actually making them that I realized how very much molasses they contained.  It's the dominant flavor; I'm definitely not picking up the spices.  (I didn't really expect to with those small amounts.)  The cocoa (especially if using dark) just adds a bit of roastiness to the flavor.  Even though there's no ginger in this recipe, the spices that are there and the molasses made my brain taste gingerbread.  I was expecting a chocolaty cookie and instead it registered more as gingerbread, which isn't a flavor associated with this time of year.  An excellent dunking cookie for coffee, these were surprisingly crisp even when soft baked; careful timing would allow you to adjust the crispness to your liking (although they'd never be a soft cookie.  It's all that butter!)  If you could manage to cut out the pieces quickly and keep it cold, this dough would be great for a haunted house, as it's very firm.  If I made these again, it would be in a different shape for a different occasion.

Recipe:  Spiced Chocolate Bat Cookies via Country Living

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

I don't know why these little cakes are called whoopie pies.  Maybe for the same reason cow patt---   Never mind.  Anyway, whatever they're called, I love them.  Perfect little individual cakes for when you want a treat.

I made these for a Halloween party and they were a big hit.  The only real change I made was to substitute a little whole wheat flour in for the white and an adjustment for salted butter.  For 12 cakes, here's what I used:

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled to room temperature

1 cup packed light brown sugar

2 large eggs room temperature, lightly beaten

1 cup canned pure pumpkin puree

2 teaspoons cinnamon

2 teaspoons ground ginger

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 1/4 teaspoon salt

1⅔ 1⅓ cups flour

⅓ cup white whole wheat flour

 

Filling

4 ounces cream cheese, chilled

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, softened

3 tablespoons maple syrup

1 cup powdered sugar

A few pinches salt

Heat oven to 350.° Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. In a standing mixer with whisk attachment, mix together butter and brown sugar until smooth. Add eggs, pumpkin puree, spices, vanilla, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Using a spatula, fold in the flour. Using an ice cream-style batter scoop, drop batter by heaping tablespoons, 12 to a sheet and evenly spaced. Bake until springy to the touch, about 10 minutes. Transfer to a rack to cool completely. 

 

For the filling, cream together the cream cheese and butter. Add syrup, sugar, salt, and vanilla (see discussion below); mix on low speed until blended, then beat on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Spread the flat side of 12 cakes with the cream cheese frosting. Top each with another cake.

  

I was irritated to find there were some errors in the recipe.  For one, the ingredients called for maple syrup in the filling, but the directions mention vanilla.  So then you have to wonder whether they'd swapped maple syrup in place of vanilla in a standard recipe and forgot to remove it from the directions, or if they'd simply forgotten to include the vanilla in the ingredient list.  It's really up to you whether you want to include it or not; I did not.  

The bigger irritation was that the directions called for using an ice cream scoop with "generous" scoops-- that would give you about four giant cakes.  I initially followed their directions, but of course ran out of batter immediately and then had to start redistributing the batter to get the right number of cakes.  But because the batter contains baking soda, it had started to rise immediately and I deflated some of those air bubbles while I was redistributing the batter.  I don't know what they were thinking. I modified the directions to use the appropriate amount of batter per placement.

Conclusion:  These were delicious!  Very rich and perhaps a bit sweet.  I would be inclined to slightly reduce the sugar in the cake part.  They don't keep too well as the filling soaks into the cake, but that also made them easier to eat-- the cake doesn't squish the filling out with each bite.  And they probably freeze okay. 

Recipe:  Pumpkin Whoopie Pies via PBS Food

Happy Halloween! Chocolate Red Wine Cake

 This isn't my first foray into the chocolate/booze experience.  The first was this chocolate rum cake-- good, but I didn't rave about it.  I tried these red wine brownies and had a mixed reaction.  I even tried a red wine chocolate cake once before, but was unimpressed.  So why try again?  Because I'm convinced this is a delicious combination-- I just have to find the right mix.  Is it the recipe that makes the difference?  Maybe.  Food & Wine, the source for today's recipe, has a well-deserved reputation.  Review comments on this recipe, however, seem to put great stock in the wine used.  Seems Bordeaux is the prime choice, while Cabernet Sauvignon did not work well.  Not very helpful, since Bordeaux reds are a blend of grapes, one of which is Cabernet Sauvignon.

Not willing to invest a quality wine to what might end up a mediocre bake, I bought a bottle of Charles Shaw Cabernet Sauvignon, otherwise known as 2-buck Chuck (now $3.99 Chuck).  Despite its low cost, Charles Shaw wines regularly receive surprisingly good reviews, probably because it's actually drinkable, while other wines at that price point are better reserved for salad dressing.  That said, the wine in the final result was completely undetectable, even in the ganache.  I didn't point out it was a red wine cake when I served it, and no one asked about any subtle flavoring.  It was, however, an amazing chocolate cake!

I was bringing this cake to a Halloween party, so I baked it in my Wilton skull pan, but kept it simple.  (I've used this pan previously here and here.)  No fancy decorations this time.  The original recipe is for a 12-cup Bundt; I halved the recipe and baked it in just the face half of the skull pan.  It would probably work fine in an 8" x 4" loaf pan, or a single 9" round cake pan.  Here's what I used:

1 cup all-purpose flour 

3/8 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch process)

5/8 teaspoons baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

7/8 cup sugar

1 large egg 

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

5/8 cup dry red wine 

Confectioner's sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 325°. Butter and flour a 6-cup pan. In a bowl, whisk the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.  In a large bowl, using a handheld electric mixer, beat the butter with the sugar at medium-high speed until fluffy, 4 minutes. Add the egg and beat until incorporated. Add the vanilla and beat for 2 minutes longer. Working in two batches, alternately fold in the dry ingredients and the wine, until just incorporated.

 

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 45 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let the cake cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then turn it out onto a rack; let cool completely. Drizzle or streak the ganache around the sides of the plate and just a little in the center (to help hold the cake in place.) Dust the cake with confectioner's sugar, then place on the plate. Serve with whipped mascarpone cream.

 

Ganache:
2 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons red wine

pinch of salt

Heat the chocolate and butter in a double boiler until melted; stir together.  Add the wine and salt and stir until smooth.

 

Topping
1/2 cup mascarpone cheese
1/2 cup (118 grams) chilled heavy or whipping cream
2 tablespoons (25 grams) granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Whip together until soft peaks form -- don't over whip. 

 

I over baked this cake, and it still turned out great, but I'm frustrated with Wilton-- they included a recipe with the cake pan for a pumpkin cake that requires a long bake time.  I think it must be the moisture in that particular batter requiring that lengthy bake, because I keep over baking the cakes when I use another recipe.  It was nice of Wilton to include the recipe, but guidance for a standard cake recipe would have been more helpful.  I used a thermal cake strip around the pan, which is supposed to help the cake rise more evenly.  I baked it for 65 minutes, and even though it was overdone, it sank in the middle.  The edges were a bit crusty, but the whole thing was delicious.  The pan probably needs only a normal bake time.

 

Conclusion: This was amazing! Semi-sweet, and so good! Rich and moist and chocolatey, made even more so with just a little bit of the ganache -- you don't need a lot.

Recipe:  Chocolate Red Wine Cake via Kristin Donnelly at Food & Wine

Trick or treat! Scottish tablet

I've wanted to try this for a long time.  I wasn't sure what it was, but had an idea -- it's basically caramel that's been agitated to create tiny crystals, turning it into a semi-firm block.  It's extremely sweet, like eating frosting, with a buttery, penuche-like flavor.  Thing is, I'm not a fan of overly sweet things, so it wasn't something I was going to be eating.  I don't know how people feel about kids getting homemade products at Halloween, but I did it anyway and will be handing these out to the kids.  I was concerned about the small quantity this made, but it's so sweet that it really has to be served in small pieces.  

I looked at several recipes; they were all pretty similar, so I cobbled together my own list of ingredients then followed instructions from a couple of others.  This made about 100 pieces (about the size of a Mary Jane candy).  Here's what I used:

1/2 cup salted butter
3/4 cup whole milk
1/4 cup heavy cream
4½ cups granulated sugar
2 pinches of salt
pinch of cream of tartar
1 can (397g/14 oz) condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Grease a 13 x 9" baking pan, line with foil, then lightly grease again.  In a large, heavy saucepan, combine the butter, milk, cream, sugar, and salt over medium-low heat. Stir constantly, removing any sugar crystals or splatters from the sides of your pan with the wet pastry brush (do this throughout the entire process) and slowly bring to a boil.  Once the mixture is boiling and the sugar has completely dissolved, stir in the cream of tartar, then the condensed milk.  Bring the mixture back to a boil over medium-low heat, still stirring continuously.  Once boiling, stop stirring.  Allow the mixture to cook, wiping down the pan sides as necessary with the wet pastry brush to remove any crystals.  Once it reaches 240F, remove from heat and beat with a whisk for about 5-10 minutes; this will encourage proper crystallization.  (I used an electric hand mixer wit the whisk attachment on the lowest speed.)  Continue to mix until the mixture has thickened and cooled slightly but is still pourable.  Quickly pour the mixture into your prepared pan and smooth the surface; remove any air bubbles by tapping the pan on the counter top a few times.  Allow to cool for several hours before cutting (or scoring so you can break it later).  To make cutting easier, lift the entire slab by the foil out of the pan and set on the counter.  Store in an airtight container.

This was pretty easy to make.  I had a slight issue of a spot in the bottom of my pan that cooked hotter, creating browning that pulled up and resulted in a few hard, dark pieces of candy mixed in, but I picked those out and used caution scraping the bottom of the pan.  (One recipe recommends stirring occasionally while it's cooking in order to keep this from occurring.  An undamaged pan shouldn't have this problem.)  The only tricky part was knowing when to stop whisking after it's cooked.  I whisked too long, I think, so that the mixture was cooler than it should have been when I poured it out.  It was firming up quickly while I was trying to scrape the last out of the pot.  Then when I tried to smooth the top, it just dragged the mixture around.  On top of that, I found my counter is not level, so one side of the pan was substantially thicker than the other.  Also, some areas of the candy were softer and creamier than others, which I can only assume had something to do with the cooling process since it all came from the same place.  I used a slender, sharp knife to cut pieces about 1.5" x 1" x 1/4" and wrapped them in waxed paper.

Conclusion:  Delicious!  Tooth-achingly sweet, but nice to nibble on in tiny bits, and good with strong coffee.  For an adult version, I would add rum or bourbon instead of vanilla.  Coconut or nuts would be good too, as long as they don't burn.  (Maybe have them in the pan already and pour the candy on top.)  One could also try dipping an edge in dark chocolate.

Original recipes:  Scottish tablet via Not So Humble Pie and Old English Butterscotch 1934 via The Vintage Kitchen

October ABC challenge: Cafe Pasqual's Pumpkin Pie (and cocktail!)

The ABC challenge this month was custard.  My first thought went to Portuguese egg tarts, then Mexican chamucos, but ultimately, considering the season, pumpkin pie was the obvious choice, and another opportunity to capture the elusive Cafe Pasqual pumpkin pie.  This is my second attempt to recreate it (my first attempt was here), this time using the recipe from their cookbook, although the recipe might not be fully forthcoming with exactly what they use and I made some minor adjustments.

As much as I love pumpkin pie, this recipe is richer than what I normally make, so I decided to scale it down to a half recipe.  (Actually one quarter, since the recipe in the book is for two pies.)  The real trick was finding an appropriate pan.  I calculated the volume of the original recipe and the volume of several pans I thought might work and finally settled on a pan from a Marie Callender's take-home pie, which measured 8¼" x 1¼".  This ended up being slightly too large and produced a thinner pie, but it still worked fine. Fortunately I started checking the pie early, because it also reduced the baking time.

Here's what I used:

1 pre-baked whole wheat pie crust, fitted into an 8-inch* pie dish (recipe below)

1 cup (1/2 of a 15-ounce can) pumpkin puree

2 large eggs

1/4 cup sour cream

1/4 cup + 3 tablespoons maple syrup

2 tablespoons dark, unsulphured blackstrap molasses

1/2 tablespoon ground ginger

1/8  teaspoon ground cloves

1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/8 teaspoon ground allspice

1/16 teaspoon cayenne pepper

pinch sea salt

3/8 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 ounces evaporated milk or heavy cream

Preheat the oven to 400F.  In a bowl, beat the pumpkin and the eggs with a wire whisk.  Add the sour cream and whisk again.  Blend in the remaining ingredients, mixing with a whisk until thoroughly combined. Pour mixture into baked pie shell crust and bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 350 and bake for an additional 30 minutes (45 minutes for the full recipe), until center is almost set and a toothpick or knife inserted into the center comes out clean.  If the crust edges are browning too quickly, fit a ring of foil around the rim. Let pie cool completely on a rack before serving.

Whole Wheat Pie Crust (for 1 crust pie)

1¼ cup whole wheat pastry flour

1 pinch sea salt

1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 cup pecans, finely chopped

1/2 cup cold, unsalted butter

2 tablespoons ice water

1/2 large egg beaten with 1 tablespoon of water

In large bowl, mix dry ingredients.  Add butter and, with a pastry blender or your hands, incorporate until mixture resembles coarse cornmeal.  Add ice water and toss lightly with a fork.  Form the dough into a disk, wrap in plastic wrap, and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour. 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Roll the dough into a 12-inch circle about 1/8-inch thick.  Fit dough into the bottom of the pie dish, cutting off the excess, and decoratively crimp edges.  Brush the egg and water mixture thoroughly all over the crust, then bake for 12 minutes. Cool completely on a wire rack before filling.

 

 

I was misled by the high amount of butter in the dough and added only 1 tablespoon of the water.  It felt perfectly moist and held together easily, or seemed to anyway, but when I rolled it out, the dough was very firm and crumbly, made even more fragile by the pecans.  Fortunately, because of all the butter, it patches easily.  

I like the crust a little on the salty side, so I used half salted butter and half unsalted.  After tasting it, I added 1/8 teaspoon of additional salt.  In the future, I'll probably just use salted butter (although that might be too much in this case because it's such a high butter content.)

I followed the original directions for the filling, which mixed the eggs with the syrup, and then added the sour cream, but quickly realized they are not in good order.  The egg and syrup mixture was far too liquid to try to mix the sour cream into, resulting in little bits of cream floating around.  (I wonder if the restaurant uses Mexican sour cream, which is much more liquid and would blend into the egg/syrup mixture easily.  If so, this would be a case in which the cookbook deviates slightly from the restaurant.  That's understandable, since Mexican sour cream isn't widely available.)  Another change I made was to use blackstrap molasses.  In my first attempt, the results were too sweet.  Blackstrap molasses is much less sweet and has a much deeper flavor.  I also used half heavy cream and half full-fat evaporated milk.

I knew my oven had a temperature difference from front to back, but apparently the regions are so distinct they're evident across the width of an 8-inch pie.  Half of the crust is darker than the other, and that side of the filling also baked differently.  I know all about rotating cookie sheets midway through baking -- apparently I'll have to do it even for pies as well.

Conclusion:  Very tasty, with an intense, spicy flavor that deepened over the next couple days.  This pie was not super sweet, but the sweetness at first was sort of cloying; there seemed to be too much molasses and too much maple syrup.  Two days later, however, the flavors had mingled and become richer, the same way a good spaghetti sauce improves over time in the refrigerator.  The pie had a surprising earthiness that I couldn't quite pin down, but I suspect it was the molasses.  I'm not usually a fan of whipped cream on pumpkin pie, but the intense flavors in this pie benefit from a good dollop (as recommended in the original recipe.)  I don't know that the pecans in the crust added anything, but the buttery crust was a delicious accompaniment to the filling.

Original Recipe:  David's Perfect Pumpkin Pie via Cooking with Cafe Pasqual's:  Recipes from Santa Fe's Renowned Corner Cafe

So what does one do with half a can of pumpkin puree?  You make these:

Pumpkin Pie Cocktail (serves one)

1 tablespoon canned pure pumpkin puree

2 tablespoons half & half

1 tablespoon maple syrup

3 tablespoons brandy

1/8 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves)

1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Combine all the ingredients in a martini shaker filled with ice. Shake vigorously, then strain into a glass.

The original recipe calls for vodka, but I used brandy and it was delicious. I also omitted the sugared and
spiced rim because it made the drink too sweet. This mixture also makes a good addition to coffee for a
homemade pumpkin spice latte (with or without the booze.)

Original Recipe: Pumpkin Martini via Real Simple