TWD: Chocolate-Crunched Caramel Tart

DELICIOUS!!!

That could pretty much sum up this divine rich desert. Similar to many of Dorie's recipes this delightful dish was a very detailed treat to make. Luckily I had an extra baker this time to help and a much more adept baker at that. Thanks Lizzie (sister and TWD baker as well) for helping out and thanks Mike for studying ALL night so I could borrow your wife!

For the first time I did not change a thing...I think.
Here is the run down:

The crust was a short bread crust. It was very buttery and delicious. It was slightly time consuming so next time I may use a faster recipe...Liz has a no roll nut crust that is similar. Maybe she will post it sometime.


I turned the caramel responsibilities over to Liz. She is the family caramel expert (at least that is what I think). This caramel used a very unique technique done in a skillet with heating just the sugar first. She did a fabulous job. After the caramel has cooled the recipe called for honey roasted peanuts, which I thought were super fun in the desert.


The ganache. Wow!!! This stuff was rich. This wasn't too hard to make. I think this is the best ganache I have ever made. I used ghiradeli bittersweet chocolate and it was crazy rich. If I were serving it to guest I may tone it down a little and use at least semisweet or maybe milk. Although the caramel is so sweet you have to be careful with the balance. It was good!


The finished product. Oh so good. When we sat down to eat (at 11pm) my husband said he didn't think he could eat the whole thing because it was so rich. Oh he totally finished it. It is too good pass up. All of the flavors worked well together without one over powering the other. If you are interested in giving it a try you can hop on over to Chocolate Moosey for the recipe.

TWD: Cottage Cheese Pufflets

Hello Bakers.....happy fall as it is the first day of fall. I love fall treats. It is the best time of year to bake. I hope you are enjoying it as much as I am. The TWD this week is yummy, but not neccesaryily fallish. Don't you worry though we still had some fun with it.

These were a fun little change in pace. These pufflets were more like tiny little pastries that I think would be good served as appetizers. My husband's family has a Cottage Cheese Pancake recipe that is delicious so I thought these cookies could be similar. I am not sure what the cottage cheese adds to something like this, but they were tastey. The original recipe calls for a dot of fruit preserves in the middle, but I am not a fan of preserves in my desserts so I changed it up a bit. I did three variations.

The dough is refridgerated for a while before rolling out.

My filling variations were as such:
1. cinnamon, brown sugar, a little butter, and chopped pecans
2. sweetened cream cheese and chocolate chips
3. sweetened cream cheese and frozen raspberries

It seems like the favorite by my taste testers was the cinnamon version. It was delicious, but didn't turn out as pretty as the others. I preferred the raspberry version, but may have sweetened the raspberries a little next time. The chocolate was a fun variation as well. Next time I think I will make the pufflets bigger and more like puffs so I can add more filling. While these were yummy they may not be a regular in our house. Perhaps an occasional fun treat.

If you are interested in the recipe you can visit Daisy Lane Cakes.

TWD: Flaky Apple Turnovers

This weeks TWD recipe was a fun one! I enjoyed making Dorie's sour cream dough, although it was a bit difficult to work with when it softened. It made the flakiest, butteriest turnover I can imagine. The filling was a simple apple pie filling that complimented the dough perfectly.

I only made up 3 turnovers, and I saved the rest of the dough and filling in the fridge. I think I'll bake these up as a warm "welcome home after school treat" for the kids. -And maybe one for me too! ;)

If you would like to see how others fared with this recipe, you can go to Tuesdays with Dorie and if you want to try your hand at homemade apple turnovers, you can visit Julie at Someone's in the kitchen.

TWD - Chocolate Souffle

I was so excited for this weeks recipe! Although I knew it would be a challenge, I was up for it and was ready to face it head on. I had all my ingredients out and got everything ready to make the Chocolate Souffle. I pre-heated my oven and headed out to the garden to pick the late-summer bounty. When I came in a half-hour later, my oven was only at 190 degrees. Right then I knew things were not going my way. I called my neighbor to see if I could use her oven but no one was home. At that point everything was ready to go in a hot oven so I opted to use my new, shiny convection counter oven (a fancy toaster oven) I got for my birthday.

I had my doubts as to whether it could handle something as delicate as a souffle. I watched with great anticipation and saw it rise. Those hopes were dashed when minutes later it fell. I finished the cooking time and decided it was worth at least tasting. I even plated it and took a few pics. Alas, the pictures didn't do the dessert justice so I decided not to post any. I did taste it though and thought the taste was nice. It wasn't eggy, as I feared it might be having possibly been cooked too long. I put a dollop of sweetened whipped cream on top of a scoop of warm souffle and took a few bites. I'm sure the texture was completely off but the taste was nice and chocolaty.

So, if you are brave and want to try Dorie's Chocolate Souffle, head on over to She's Becoming DoughMesstic for beautiful pictures and the full recipe. Maybe when my oven is fixed I'll attempt it again. I guess every week can't be a smashing success.

TWD Espresso Cheesecake Brownies

I have been so excited to make these brownies! While they were cooling, I could hardly contain myself. I've been wanting a rich chocolaty treat. I read the P&Q's and saw that many people had dry brownie. I was tempted to use my own brownie recipe, but was true to Dorie and used hers. I decreased the temperature to 325, yet I still had dry brownies! I was bummed!
I also chose to fore go the topping, as my sour cream was expired. I thought it was fine to bake with, but was hesitant to put it on top (and I'd already thrown up once for the day! I'm loving this 3rd pregnancy!).

The cheesecake was delicious and creamy, but my brownie was a let down. I would love to make this recipe again using my no fail brownie recipe. I hope others had better luck! To check out the recipe see Life in a Peanut Shell.