Recipes Discovered

Blueberry Buckle Recipe

Blueberry Buckle is fantastic cake made with fresh blueberries and a crumb topping. The name supposedly refers to the cake engulfing the blueberries and then buckling on top to make a dimpled appearance. Although my cake has a dimply top, the blueberries weren’t engulfed by the cake, but they did make a rather yummy blueberry goo on top. To me though, the cake was a tad dry, so I will definitely fold the blueberries into the cake batter next time to spread them out more and to give the cake some moisture. The cake also burnt on the bottom, and I’m not quite sure if that was because of my cake pan or the oven temperature. The cake does bake quite awhile (at least 45 minutes), so I will probably lower the baking temperature to 350 next time. And there will be a next time – this cake, even with it’s problems, is delicious. It may not be Blueberry Delight, but it definitely ranks up there.

Once summer comes around, all Seth wants to eat is peach pie and strawberry shortcake. I still haven’t figured out how to make a perfect peach pie, but I can make strawberry shortcake. Or at least I thought I could, until last night when he told me it tasted funny. Did I use a different recipe? Did I change something? Probably. So tonight we set out to set the record straight and to find the recipe for the best shortcake. Paula Deen’s recipe uses a little more butter than Dorie Greenspan’s. My mom uses an egg in her recipe. Alton Brown uses butter and shortening. There is also the debate of milk or cream. I made each of the recipes, plus a chocolate shortcake (I had to try it), and divided them up using cream in half and milk in half. Seth did a blind taste test, having no idea what the differences were between the shortcakes, and I was really surprised by his comments. >> Read more

Lemon Cream Cheese Pound Cake Recipe

I was searching for a pound cake recipe and most of the ones I came across were for a cream cheese pound cake. The reviews said the cream cheese gave the pound cake a rich taste and also kept the cake moist. I’ve never made a pound cake, but rich and moist both seem important to cake, so I went with the cream cheese pound cake recipe. I added vanilla extract and lemon zest for flavor, and topped the cake with a lemon glaze. The cake looked beautiful, and tasted quite good as well – very rich and moist. Definitely a keeper.

Banana Crunch Muffins

Since Seth loves banana, and I had a few very ripe bananas that needed to be used up, I decided to make banana muffins. The batter is very similar to a banana cake batter, with the addition of walnuts, coconut, and granola. The granola seems a little odd, but it gives the muffins a nice crunch. The muffins are really moist and wonderful on their own, no need for frosting. And I had much better luck getting the paper off these muffins than with the apple crumb muffins.

Apple Crumb Muffins Recipe

Seth wanted an apple cake and I wanted a coffee cake, so somehow we compromised on these Apple Crumb Muffins. The muffins are simple to make, since they are made from a standard crumb cake batter (with chopped apples), just baked in muffins tins. The topping is butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, and pecans. One of the recipes I read called for melting the butter in the topping, which I thought kind of made sense since it would be easier to mix together. Do not do it! Because the butter was already melted. the topping just ran off the muffins instead of making a crunchy top, and it made some kind of glue that fused the muffins to the paper liners making it nearly impossible to get the paper off without destroying the muffins. On the upside, the muffins taste really good. They are very moist, and aren’t overly sweet. Just watch out for the paper while you are eating them.