Tag Archives: baking

BA’s Gingerbread cake

I have had this Bon Appetit ginger cake recipe tucked in my recipe inspiration folder for almost two years. Every time I came across it, I grew very excited and determined to finally make it. And then, clutching the magazine tear-out on my way to the kitchen, I would realize that I don’t have one crucial ingredient - molasses. This happened on several occasions, yet every time it did, I was surprised. Like, shouldn’t I have realized that I don’t have any freakin’ molasses and bought some already? Ah, woe is me.

The thing is, sweets like this (and this) are my weakness. I care little for cupcakes or other overly sweet, super-frosted cakes. It’s the dense, somber desserts that really get to me. Perhaps my Soviet upbringing is to blame.

Bon Appetit Gingerbread cake

Alas, I found myself at the supermarket on a humid Saturday morning and finally remembered to buy the stuff.

Bon Appetit Gingerbread cake

Like a child coming home with a new toy to play with, I excitedly arrived at the kitchen counter and laid out all the ingredients necessary for the cake, finally completed by the molasses. The batter came together in no time, and - with the exception for my being surprised by the dissolving-the-butter-in-boiling-water step - without a hitch. The recipe calls for a whipped cream-lemon curd topping, but again, due to my dislike of frosting, I decided to slather it with some plain old cream cheese instead. (Can’t blame Soviet Russia for this one. We didn’t have cream cheese in the motherland.)

Bon Appetit Gingerbread cake

This ginger cake turned out absolutely perfect. Dense, rich and a tad spicy from the ginger and cinnamon. I only wish I hadn’t waited so long to make it.

Bon Appetit Gingerbread cake

So, ah… what else can I use this molasses for?

How I learned to bake, and the best brown sugar cookies you’ll ever have

When I was a kid, my mom baked all the time. There were layered cakes, crispy cookies, sweet breads to accompany our tea, and so much more. But when I watched her bake, I never once saw her measure a single ingredient - we didn’t even own measuring cups or a scale. She would just scoop ingredients into a bowl with a little ceramic teacup, stir them while balancing the bowl between her hip and forearm, put whatever it was into the oven and soon, the smell emanating from the oven alone would leave us speechless and drooling. I don’t remember her ever messing up a dessert so I assumed she was some sort of magician with a sixth sense.

Brown sugar cookies

So, when I started baking, I didn’t take measuring seriously, especially since I’ve been cooking for a while already and had gotten used to eyeballing ingredients. I understood recipes and directions like, “butter at room temperature” and “gradually add flour” to be guidelines. I guess I thought I could outsmart the recipe and if my intentions were good, the dessert would somehow just work out. But unsurprisingly, it didn’t. I couldn’t make a single edible cookie. I remember how my mom would stand next to me, scraping the burnt bottoms of cookies with a butter knife after yet another failed attempt, comforting me and saying that next time, I would certainly do better.

Brown sugar cookies

It wasn’t until I started reading and re-reading the recipe before baking and following measurements and directions exactly that anything worked out. I learned that if a lemon bars were advised to be cooled before being cut, I should do just that, and that if a recipe calls for brown sugar, substituting with white just won’t do. It is now that I realize that despite how amazing my mother is, she is no magician. She’s just made so many cakes and cookies by the time she had me, that baking became second nature to her - she, as they say, just felt it.

Brown sugar cookie

Whereas cooking is about intuition, instinct and pleasure, it is careful attention, precision and patience that matter in baking. I’ve still a long way to go til I can flawlessly frost a cake, but these cookies (and these!) are proof that I have finally mastered at least one type of dessert.

Brown sugar cookies

This recipe from Epicurious (click HERE for the recipe) is incredible. The cookies are quick to prepare and bake, and they don’t dry out, even days after baking. They’re soft, chewy, fragrant and ideal for minimalist dessert lovers like me. I strongly advise you to make them!

Brown sugar cookies

What is your experience with baking like?

Lemon Bars from The Brown Betty Cookbook

Remember this post where I told you about the incredible Brown Betty Cookbook? Well, when I was looking to bake something in celebration of Women’s Day (I’m Ukrainian and this day is not taken lightly in Eastern European cultures), I returned to its pages in search of another great recipe. I didn’t have to look hard as I’d placed a flag on the page with this lemon bars recipe before and here they are.

Brown Betty Lemon bars

Although the bars are, in my opinion, quite festive, they require no fancy ingredients and are relatively simple to make. First a buttery crust is mixed and parbaked. Then a simple custard-like filling is prepared and poured over the crust. And then (the hardest part) they bake for half an hour and you pace back and forth in your kitchen in anticipation.

I scaled the recipe down to two-thirds of its original. I think I should’ve baked the crust at a higher temp but I didn’t. As a result, the crust didn’t completely solidify after its proposed 25-minute bake time and in the end turned out more crispy and less buttery and delicate as was intended by the recipe. They were still incredibly yummy with a super lemony, clean taste, and my mom, sister and I inhaled them nonetheless ;) Below is the original printed recipe. Also, the book suggests using a stand mixer for these - I used a food processor and it worked just as well.

Brown Betty Lemon bars

Recipe from The Brown Betty Cookbook (Wiley, 2012)

(Yield: 21 bars)

Crust

1 tbsp plus 2 sticks butter, at room temp

1 1/2 c all-purpose flour

1/2 c white sugar

1/2 c packed light brown sugar

Filling

8 oz cream cheese, at room temp

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 c sugar

2 tbsp all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

2 eggs, beaten

3 tbsp fresh lemon juice

2 tsp lemon zest

Procedure: Preheat oven to 350F. Coat 9x13x2″ baking pan with 1 tbsp butter. For the crust, in a medium bowl, whisk together the flour and sugars. Add butter and mix until dough forms. Pat dough into pan and bake until golden brown, about 25 min. Set aside. For the filling, beat together cream cheese and salt until smooth. Gradually add sugar, flour and baking powder and beat until blended. Add eggs, lemon juice and zest and beat until blended. Do not overmix. Pour the filling over crust and bake until a wooden pick inserted into a corner comes out clean, 30 to 35 min. Transfer the pan to wire rack to cool completely. When cool, cut into bars.

Brown Betty Lemon bars