Tag: Dessert

Pretzel Chocolate Chip Cookies with a Caramel Surprise

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Who doesn’t love a surprise?  Especially around the holidays.

Okay so the surprise is caramel.  I gave it away.  I’m terrible at keeping secrets.  And let’s be honest sometimes it’s not even a surprise but a gooey caramel mess.  You can’t really go wrong.  Either way, I’ll keep calling them a surprise cookie.  I sounds more enticing that way.

Caramel in a sweet and salty cookie.  I know, it’s exciting. Definitely surprise-worthy.

You’re probably going to want to make these for your next Holiday gathering and/or potluck.  They work for Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa; clearly, they’re really equal opportunity cookies.

Did I mention they’re fun to make? And more importantly fun to eat.

Pretzel Chocolate Chip Cookies with a Caramel Surprise

1/2 cup white sugar
2 tbsp butter, softened
2 tbsp heavy cream, room temperature
pinch of salt
3/4 cup butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
2 eggs
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips
1 1/2 cups pretzel pieces

First make the caramel filling.  Put 1/2 cup sugar in a saucepan.  Turn heat on to medium and wait til the sugar starts to melt.  Carefully keep stirring until all the sugar is melted.  If you get clumps, smash them with your wooden spoon.  Push them to edges, they’ll melt faster.  Once your sugar is a light brown color, remove from the heat and quickly stir in the butter.  Once the butter is incorporated, add the pinch of salt and stream in the cream and you stir.  Keep whisking/stirring until it’s one thick, uniform texture.  Set aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 350F.  Cream together 3/4 cup butter, 1 cup brown sugar and 1/4 cup white sugar.  Beat in eggs, one at a time.  Next add try ingredients  (including chocolate chips and pretzels).  The key is to work the dough as little as possible.  It’ll be a little sticky but that’s okay.

By now, your caramel should be pretty cool.  If it’s not then hang out for a few minutes until it’s cool enough to put in a ziploc bag.  Once you can, put it in a ziploc bag and cut off a bottom corner so you have a make-shift piping bag.

Prepare a baking sheet by lining it with parchment paper and get ready to assemble your cookies (note: the dough will be pretty sticky!  This is sort of a messy cookie making extravaganza, but get into it!  It’s fun!).

Grab a small amount of dough and sort of flatten it into a disk shape.  Using your finger, make a small well.  Pipe about a tsp of caramel into the well. Then fold the edges around to cover the caramel.  Put some more dough on top to make sure the caramel is completely coated with cookie (you might have to use bits of dough to patch up holes).  Repeat until you have 36 dough balls (depending on how big you make them) or you run out of dough.

Bake for 12 minutes or until golden around the edges.

Then surprise your fella, co-workers, siblings with these cookies.  They’ll appreciate them.  Mine did.  I can almost guarantee yours will too.

Who doesn’t love surprises?  Especially ones that involve chocolate, pretzels and caramel.

That’s what I thought.  Get to the kitchen!

Caramel Pretzel Brownies

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I have a tendency to under-cook things.  It’s a bad habit, but to me, over-cooked anything is disgusting.

Who likes a soggy vegetable? (Other than Italians who seem to overcook ALL their vegetables… or maybe that was just FAO)  I like mine to have a bit of a crunch still.

Overcook your Thanksgiving turkey… Not delicious.

Steak well-done.  My dad likes to say it’s like the sole of a shoe.

Brownies are really no different.

I am of the firm belief that all brownies should always be a little undercooked.  If you’re in the brownie’s fully cooked camp.  We can’t be friends.  Sorry.

I really would like to find a middle ground, but no.  I can’t.  Slightly undercooked brownies are amazing.

Want to know what’s even better?

Slightly undercooked brownies with caramel in the middle and pretzels on top.


No words.


Caramel Pretzel Brownies

For Brownies:
4 Squares Bakers Unsweetend Chocolate
1 1/2 sticks of butter
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
1 cup flour
handful of pretzel sticks

For Caramel:

1 cup sugar
4 tbsp butter
1/4 cup heavy cream
pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 350F.

While the oven heats, make the caramel.  Heat the sugar in a saucepan until the sugar melts and turns golden.  Remove from heat, stir in butter and add pinch of salt, once butter is incorporated, stream in cream while stirring.  Once well combined, set aside to cool slightly.

In the meantime, make the brownie batter.  In a pan, melt together butter and chocolate.  In a mixing bowl, combine sugar and eggs.  Once the butter and chocolate have melted together, stream into sugar/egg combo while stirring.  Stir in flour until just combined.

Pour half the batter into a greased 9×13 baking dish (or line with parchment paper, which is what I did, and I used 2 9×9-inch pans).  Then drizzle caramel over first half of the batter.  If your caramel cooled too much and got sorta firm, you can reheat it a tiny bit.  Then pour the rest of the batter over the caramel.  Arrange pretzels on top.  Bake approximately 30 minutes or until it no longer jiggles in the center (it might take a little longer, but not sure).  But remember, the goal is a slightly undercooked center.

This will yield, amazingly fudgy, dense, delicious brownies.  They’re not super thick, but trust me, they more than make up for it in flavor.

So actually when I made these, I made two kinds.  Caramel and Peanut Butter.


So if you’d like, you can use peanut butter instead of caramel.

Both are delicious, the caramel was just extra delicious.

See the caramel in there? (hint: look to the left!)

Divine.

They’re gooey, sweet, salty,  and most importantly slightly undercooked all in one perfect little square.

I’m pretty sure that means they’ll make the perfect treat any time.

Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Filling and Raspberry Frosting

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We all have oh-shit moments.

You know what I’m talking about.

Oh shit, I just cut an extra inch off my bangs.

You’re on a date, wearing a dress.  All of a sudden you realize… oh shit, I totally didn’t shave my left leg.

Sitting alone in your room with your computer, a spoon and a jar of peanut butter… Oh shit, I totally just ate half a jar of peanut butter.  Don’t say it’s never happened to you.  You probably felt a little ill afterward.  Oh shit, I did.

But there are also good oh-shit moments.

Oh shit, I can’t believe a boy left me soup on my doorstep.

or at 6:45am… oh shit, I can’t believe I just ran 4 miles.

and oh shit, these cupcakes are delicious.

It might be my obsession with lemon, but I thought these were great!  Others agreed.  Lemon curd makes everything better.  So imagine a delicious lemon cupcake, filled with lemon curd and then topped with raspberry cream cheese frosting.

I know.  It makes you want to say oh shit, right? I totally get it.  We don’t have to talk about the bad language.  Focus on the cupcakes.

Lemon Cupcakes with Raspberry Cream Cheese Frosting

For cupcakes:

1 cup butter
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
zest and juice of three lemons
3 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup sour cream
1 cup milk
Lemon Curd filling

For Frosting
8 oz cream cheese, room temp
1 stick butter, room temp
1 lb powdered sugar
4 tbsp raspberry preserve

Pre-heat oven to 350F.

Cream together butter and sugar.  Beat in eggs one at a time.  Add lemon zest and lemon juice and sour cream.  In a bowl, combine dry ingredients.  Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet.  Alternate between adding the flour mixture and the milk.  Mix until just combined.

Pour batter into lined cupcake pan.  Bake 17-20 minutes (depending on your oven).  Mine took 17 minutes.  Also accidentally wayyyy over baked the first 12 and had to throw them away.  Beware!  These might not look done on top but poke them with a toothpick after 16ish minutes to see when they’re ready!

Allow the cupcakes to cool completely, then cut holes in the top using a knife and scoop some out.  Then put some lemon curd in a ziploc bag, cut off an end and pipe some lemon curd into each cupcake.

Next make the frosting, throw all the ingredients in a bowl and let your hand/stand mixer do the work.  If it’s too stiff, add some liquid (or more raspberry preserve), if it’s too runny, add more powdered sugar.  Adjust accordingly.

Frost your cupcakes and serve them up.  They don’t have to be perfect or uniform.  They’ll be delicious either way.

Then, wait for your audience to say oh shit.  Listen carefully, they might say it quietly if they’re trying to be polite.

The final oh shit moment of the night… I made a Facebook page for Foodologie.

Oh shit.

Please “like” me.

Double Ginger Chocolate Chip Cookies

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It’s a pretty well-known fact that I’m a nerd, and I totally okay with it.

I like to think I’m at least a cool nerd, but realistically, I’m just a nerd, especially when it comes to food.  I read recipes for fun.  I talk about things I want to try to make (why yes, I do want to make a turducken and roast an entire goat.  No, I don’t usually eat meat.  That totally makes sense.).  I go on solo dates to grocery stores where I walk around looking at random ingredients and imagining what I can make with them.

That happened a few weeks ago when I was walking around my newest favorite grocery store, Sprouts.  (Sorry, Wegmans I couldn’t handle the distance.)

I came across crystallized ginger, and my eyes lit up like Christmas.  I’m almost embarrassed to admit that ginger is exciting, but honesty is the best policy so I’ll go with it.

I spend a lot of time thinking about ginger.

There’s something about crystallized ginger that makes me want to curl into my bed with a blanket, a cup of tea and a cookie.  Specifically this cookie:

These cookies feel like fall.  That seems to be a theme for me, recently.  But it’s November, and my body seems to have forgotten what less than 60F feels like, so let’s embrace the ginger.

Throw it in everything.  Start with these cookies.

Double Ginger Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup molasses
1/4 cup crystallized ginger, chopped
2 cups flour
1 tbsp ground ginger
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup chocolate chips

Pre-heat over to 350F.

Cream together butter, sugar, egg and molasses.  Stir in crystallized ginger.  Add in dry ingredients except chocolate chips.  Mix until just combined.  Fold in chocolate chips.

The dough will be sorta dry, but will come together when you form it into balls.  So don’t be discouraged or tempted to add more wet ingredients!

Place golf ball sized balls on parchment paper-lined baking sheet.  Bake 10-14 minutes or until just golden around the edges.  Allow to cool a few minutes before removing from baking sheet.

Once they’ve cooled enough, put some on a plate, make a cup of tea, get into bed and watch something totally nerdy, like Star Trek… or Twilight… At least this way nerdy is tasty.

 

Pumpkin-Chocolate Chip Cookies

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Today was one of the worst days ever.  I’m not going to talk about.  Instead I’m going to talk about cookies.

Fact: Cookies make life better.

There’s something I really love about a plate of cookies.   No it doesn’t matter what kind of cookies.  I just sorta find them pretty.

I gave these away.  The next day I received a few texts telling me they were popular with co-workers.  I won’t lie, I was sorta kicking myself for giving them away.  As I wrote this post, all I wanted was one of these cookies.  That’s what happens when you have a stressful day: you want cookies.

From what I recall, they were a little bit cakey (but less so than your average pumpkin cookie, which always seems more like a muffin top to me) and chewy.  I’m pretty sure that means they’re good.  Cakey but chewy?  Done.  I want it again.

Pumpkin-Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1 cup white sugar
1/2 brown sugar
1 egg yolk
1 cup chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate)

Preheat oven to 350F.

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl.  Set aside.  Cream together butter, pumpkin puree, sugars and egg yolk.  Mix in dry ingredients until just combined.  Fold in Chocolate chips.

Form dough into golf ball-sized balls and arrange on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

Bake 12-15 minutes or until golden on the edges.  Allow to cool for a few minutes before removing from baking sheet.

Put on a plate and make someone’s day that much better.

Fall Cupcakes: Gingerbread Cupcakes with Caramel Filling and Pumpkin-Cream Cheese Frosting

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You all remember the Fall Cake, right?

Inspired by my time spent working at a bakery… One layer of pumpkin cheesecake, another layer of gingerbread cake, caramel pecans in between and on top, then covered in vanilla buttercream.

That was it a little too intense for me to make that often.  So if you’re looking for the perfect fall dessert, that isn’t super complicated but will likely impress people, this is it.

Okay so it requires a lot of steps, but I promise it’s not that complicated and super delicious in the end.

Fall Cupcakes

for Gingerbread Cupcakes (adapted from Food Network’s Gingerbread cake)

1 cup canola oil
1 cup sugar
1 cup molasses
1/4-1/3 cup crystallized ginger, finely chopped (plus more for garnish)
2 eggs
3 cups flour
1 tbsp ground ginger
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 cup boiling water

For Caramel Filling:

1 cup sugar
4 tbsp butter
1/4 cup heavy cream
pinch of salt

For Pumpkin-Cream Cheese Icing

8 oz cream cheese, softened
4 tbsp butter, softened
4 tbsp pumpkin puree
1 lb powdered sugar (note you might need more depending on how sweet you like it)
dash of cinnamon
dash of ground ginger (or just use pumpkin pie spice)

Start my making the cupcakes.  Preheat oven to 350F.  Combine the sugar, oil, molasses and eggs in a large bowl.  Stir in crystallized ginger.  Add dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, spices), mix until almost combined.  Stir in boiling water.  Pour into cupcake pan lined with baking cups.  Fill only a little past half way.  This is sort of crucial.  If you over fill the pan, you get this:

Sad sunken in cupcake.  Not cute.

So fill them a little more than half way and bake them for about 15 minutes (mine took 14 mins) or until they pass the toothpick test.

Next make your caramel filling.  Heat sugar in a deep saucepan, until the sugar melts.  Once the sugar is a deep golden brown, take it off the heat and quickly stir in butter.  Once the butter is melted in there, add a pinch of salt and stream in the cream as you stir.  Keep stirring until smooth.  Set aside to cool.

At this point, your cupcakes and caramel need to cool completely.  In the meantime, go for a walk, rake some leaves (this really doesn’t apply to you if, like me, live in California…), call a friend, paint your nails, go to the gym, listen to Beyonce and dance a little bit, you get the idea…

Then come back and make the pumpkin-cream cheese icing.  It’s super easy, all you need is a hand or stand mixer.  Throw all the ingredients together and let the machine do the work.  Truth be told this frosting is delicious but not super stiff (that’s what she said).  You can add more powdered sugar if you’d like but I can only take so much sugar, it definitely hardens in the fridge but your piping might not be as beautiful as you’d like.  Oh well, it’s delicious.  Stick it in the fridge while you prep your cupcakes.

Now you can assemble!  Filling a cupcake with caramel is easy.  There are two ways to do it, but both ways involve putting your cooled caramel in a ziploc bag and cutting off the corner to create a make-shift piping bag.  Then you can either:

1. Take a knife and hole in the top and scoop some of the cupcake out.  Then take the “piping bag” and pipe some caramel into it.

2. Shove your finger into the top of each cupcake while they’re still warm.  Same effect.  It creates a hole.  I sorta like this method… some people might have an issue with it.  Obviously, please wash your hands before doing this 🙂 Then pipe in the caramel.

Once you’ve filled all your cupcakes with caramel.

Frost them as you’d like, either with a piping bag and tip or just a knife.  Both look lovely.  Either way garnish with some slices of crystallized ginger.

I swear these taste better the next day.  I don’t know what it is, but true story.  Would I lie to you?  Either way, we’re well into October and speeding into November.

That probably means you should give these cupcakes a try.

Almond-Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

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Did you hear that chocolate may reduce women’s risk of stroke?  In case you really needed a reason to eat more chocolate, now you have one.

I’m only looking out for you, and because I love you so much and I don’t want you to have a stroke, I’m going to share some ways you can eat more chocolate.

Like this

Champagne Brownies

Spicy Chocolate Cupcakes

Double Chocolate Coconut Cookies

Chocolate Wine Cake

Oh and don’t forget these

Chocolate Cupcakes with Caramel Filling, Cream Cheese Frosting and Sea Salt Candied Walnuts

And most recently this:

Almond-Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup almond butter (I used maple almond butter)
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar, heaping
1 egg
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup oats
3/4 cup chocolate chips (or more, if you’d like)

Preheat oven to 350F.

Cream together butter, almond butter, and sugars.  Beat in egg.  Add dry ingredients (except oats) and blend together.  Fold in oats and chocolate chips.

Place balls of dough on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet.  Bake for 10-15 minutes depending on your oven, or until golden on the edges.  The center will be slightly undercooked but don’t forget they keep cooking even after you take them out of the oven, not to mention a slightly undercooked center is delicious.

I’ll be honest, these were amazing because of the texture.  Although I sort of wish I had used PB instead of almond butter, or maybe added some almond extract in there, and coconut.  Yes, coconut would have been divine. 

But really, the chocolate will suffice, after all that’s all that really matters right now.

So be healthy and go make some Almond-Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies and eat a few handfuls of chocolate chips while you’re at it.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Caramel Filling, Cream Cheese Frosting and Sea Salt Candied Walnuts

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Did you see that title?  Yeah, it’s intense.

I have a little bit of a confession though.  I wasn’t going to blog about these.  Not because they aren’t good.  No, no.  They are the most amazing things ever.  But because I wasn’t happy with the photos.  You see, prior to my full time employment, I had time to bake in the morning and take photos in daylight.  Now that I work all day, baking happens at night (unless it’s the weekend of course).

In case you’re not really into taking pictures… pictures look better when taken in natural light.  Truth. I was even tempted to make these again this morning just so I could take pretty pictures in the sunlight! But in the end, laziness (or health consciousness?) prevailed.

That said, nothing is going to change the fact that these are amazing.

Not even a mediocre pictures.

Next time you have a gathering or just really need something sweet, please make these.  They’re wonderful.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Caramel Filling, Cheese Cheese Frosting and Sea Salt Candied Walnuts

1 recipe for your favorite chocolate cupcakes (I like Hershey’s Perfectly Chocolate Cake)
1 cup sugar
4 tbsp butter
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 (8 oz) packages cream cheese, softened
2 sticks of butter, softened
Few cups of powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 sugar
1 tsp coarse sea salt

Bake cupcakes and allow to cool completely.  While they are baking, you can make the caramel filling.  Place sugar in a deep saucepan on medium heat.  Allow the sugar to melt (about 10 minutes), stir occasionally until the sugar is a golden brown color.  Remove from heat and immediately stir in butter.  Once butter is mixed in, stream in cream while you stir.  Stir until all combined and smooth.  Set aside to cool.  You can make this a day in advance if you like. Once the caramel is completely cooled, place into a ziploc bag (or a piping bag, if you’re fancy) and cut off one corner so you can pipe caramel.

Next, make the cream cheese frosting.  Using a stand or hand mixer, blend together cream cheese, butter, sugar and vanilla.  I say a few cups of powdered sugar because 1. I never measure and 2. you should use as much as is necessary to get the consistency and amount of sweetness you like.  I’m guessing I used about 6 cups?  Once your cream cheese frosting is ready, put it in the fridge to keep firm until you’re ready to use it.

Next prep the cupcakes.  Scoop out some of the cupcakes to make room for the caramel.  I use a small knife just to make a small hole on top then pull out some of the filling.  Pipe some caramel into the hole.  It doesn’t need to be a ton, but let’s be honest a lot is always delicious.

Now you can make the candied nuts.  First, lay out some wax paper so you’ll have somewhere to place the candied nuts.  This really is an essential first step.  Next in a pan, over medium heat, combine the walnuts and sugar, stir occasionally.  After a few minutes, the sugar will start to melt.  Stir to coat all the nuts.  Once they look golden and candy coated, remove from heat, sprinkle with salt, stir again and then spread them on the wax paper.  Be careful.  At this point they will be very hot.  Give them some time to cool, then go through and separate any pieces and stuck together.

Lastly, now you can finish assembling the cupcakes.  Frost them however you like.  My sister and I went through a different types of frosting styles with different tips, but in the end it doesn’t really matter, since it’ll be covered in delicious candied nuts.  So once you’ve frosted them, lay some salted, candied nuts on there.  Refrigerate so everything gets firmed up together.  Then serve!

(Note: This picture will be infinitely funnier if you’ve read this)

You might be wondering why I decided to bake in the middle of the week.  Well, I suppose it’s not that out of character for me, but I had a reason. It’s my favorite brother-in-law’s birthday.

Happy Birthday, Tim!!  I think he liked them 🙂

In fact, I think everyone that’s eaten them has liked them.  I’m pretty sure that means I might have to make these again.

There has to be another birthday coming up soon, not that I really need a reason to bake.

Have a great weekend!

Quick and Easy Pear Crisp

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This pear crisp saved my dad’s life.

True story.

That cookies and cream ice cream from Thrifty sitting next to it…  That did nothing for him.

But the pear crisp? Bonafide hero.

Let me tell you why.

Last Sunday, I saw my dad about to serve himself some of this peachy, puddingy-looking dessert a family friend brought over.  I had seen it sitting in the fridge for a loooong time, uncovered, not looking too hot.  I get closer, I see that it’s gray.

Now, I’m all for consuming everything and not letting anything go to waste, but your peach dessert should not be gray, nor should it be fuzzy.   I made him throw it away.  I’m sure we can imagine what the results would have been if he consumed that…

But LUCKILY, this guy saved the day, and you can too.

Quick and Easy Pear Crisp

6-7 pears, sliced (you can leave the peel on)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 flour (or corn starch), for the filling
1 cup flour (for the topping)
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup oats
1/2 cup butter, softened

Pre-heat oven to 400F.

Combine sliced pears with sugar, cinnamon and 1/4 cup flour.  Put in a greased baking dish.

Make crumble topping by combining 1 cup flour, brown sugar, oats and butter.  Use your fingers break up the butter and combine it with the dry ingredients to make small clumps.

Sprinkle with crumble topping.  Bake 30-45 minutes or until the topping is golden brown and the pears are bubbling.

Serve warm with ice cream and thank goodness you won’t be calling the diarrhea hotline.

Chocolate-Wine Cake

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Learning is a funny thing.  I have no idea how it happens. The question I probably get asked the most is: how did you learn to cook?

I have no idea. There are very few things that I remember anyone actually teaching me to make (among them: handmade tortillas, Rellenitos, and most other Guatemalan dishes I know how to make).  Most of my cooking knowledge comes from observation and experiment.  That’s right.  Experiment.

Try recipes.  Make changes.  Sometimes it works.  Sometimes it doesn’t.

When I worked at a French bakery, I watched the chef make cakes, tarts and galettes full of envy, because I wanted to make things as beautiful and delicious as she did.

Then I went home and tried it.  The result:

Pear Almond Galette.

The Fall Cake.

All because I watched the chef make it, then I wanted to try it myself.  But inspiration doesn’t only come from watching the pros.

Here’s the most recent example of my constant experimentation.

Chocolate-Wine Cake.

An experiment inspired by an experience.  In Italy, I had a chocolate-wine gelato.  I had never had chocolate and wine together.  It seemed like such an unlikely combination, but I was completely intrigued.  I figured it was worth a try in cake form too.

Chocolate-Wine Cake

adapted from Hershey’s “Perfectly Chocolate” Chocolate Cake

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups sweet red wine (such as Port or other sweet red wine)
1/2 cup boiling water

Pre-heat oven to 350F.  Sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt into a bowl.  Set aside.

In another bowl, beat together sugar and oil.  Beat in one egg at a time until just combined.  Alternate mixing in dry ingredients and red wine.  Lastly, stir in boiling water.

Pour batter into a greased and floured bundt pan.  Bake 40-50 minutes (this will vary depending on your oven).

Allow to cool completely, turn onto a plate, top with chocolate ganache (optional) and serve!

I thought the chocolate and wine combination was interesting.  The chocolate flavor dominates but the wine is not far behind.  Most definitely a nice break from traditional chocolate cake.    For some, it might seem blasphemous.  Straying from a recipe is a recipe for disaster.  But I like to think of recipes more as guidelines.

From there you learn what works and what doesn’t.

Replacing milk with wine in chocolate cake.  Success.

Using less butter in Italian Buttercream Icing.  Failure.

How else are you supposed to discover the next best thing?