Chocolate Chunk Coffee Cake

Remember how you used to find great recipes on the back of the sugar box or bag? You'd cut it off after you finished the bag, and you'd save those paper recipes for years. Well sugar boxes and bags still have them, but your limited to the two or three that fit on the package. Most sugar companies now have great websites and blogs with those recipes and more. Domino Sugar is one of those sites. I found this fabulous recipe for Chocolate Chunk Coffee there, and it's a must bake for a holiday breakfast. Serve it with a great cup of Hot Cocoa. Perfect for guests, too.

Chocolate Chunk Coffee Cake

Topping:

10 oz - semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

3/4 cup - chopped walnuts

2/3 cup - Domino® Granulated Sugar

Cake:

3/4 cup - butter, softened

1 1/4 cups - Domino® Granulated Sugar

3 - eggs

1 1/2 cups - sour cream

2 teaspoons - vanilla

2 1/2 cups - all-purpose flour

2 1/2 teaspoons - baking powder

1 teaspoon - baking soda

1/2 teaspoon - salt

For better mixing results, have all your ingredients at room temperature. Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease 10-inch tube pan.

In small bowl, combine topping ingredients; set aside.

Beat butter and sugar in large bowl until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, sour cream and vanilla until well mixed. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in bowl. On low speed, add flour mixture to batter, beating until smooth.

Spoon 1/3 (about 2 cups) of the batter into prepared pan, spreading evenly. Sprinkle with 1/3 of the topping (scant 1 cup). Repeat layering 2 more times. Bake 55 to 65 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan on wire rack for 20 minutes. Remove from pan.

Makes 12 servings.

Chocolate Biscotti with Cranberries

The other day I went to my friend Sue Trowbridge's home for a wonderful afternoon. She had bid on an auction item: a reading by a well known San Francisco Bay Area actor, and she was finally collecting. Sue provided various sweets, tea and champagne. My kind of repast. On her tea menu were Chocolate Biscotti. I had two chocolate biscotti recipes on DyingforChocolate awhile ago, one based on Dorie Greenspan's double chocolate biscotti, but this recipe had the added texture and tanginess of dried cranberries. I asked her about the recipe. 

Sue commented,"I might try it sometime with dried cherries instead of cranberries. Also, it was a LOT of work to blend the dry ingredients into the egg/sugar mixture... I had to get Joe to help because my arm was getting tired! I bet it would be easier if one has a stand mixer that could handle stiff doughs. I just have a little hand mixer that is fine for cake batters & whipped cream, but not so good for anything thicker."

A word to the wise then, there's nothing like a KitchenAid mixer! I love my dark blue KitchenAid. It matches my dark blue O'Keefe Merritt stove that has a small but powerful gas oven. My other two ovens are electric: one convection and one conventional. There's nothing like gas for baking cakes and biscotti!

Chocolate Biscotti

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

3/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

6 Tbsp (3 oz) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup sugar

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

3/4 cup dried cranberries

3/4 cup mini chocolate chips

1. Sift together dry ingredients. Beat butter and sugar together until very smooth, then beat in the eggs. Mix in dry ingredients until blended. Fold in cranberries and chips.

2. Divide dough; put pieces on opposite sides of a parchment-lined baking sheet. Shape each into a 12-inch-long, 1/2-inch-thick log. Bake at 350°F for 25 minutes; cool 20 minutes.

3. Slice into 1/2-inch-thick cookies. Stand them up on the baking sheet; bake for 15 minutes. Cool to room temperature.

Godiva Star Chocolate

Like the green layer! These are really, really good.

Now let's check out the outrageously priced Godiva offerings:

The red one is Aztec Hot Chocolate - a chocolate ganache with a hint of habanaro oil in dark chocolate:

There's a very slight hint of habanaro. I think a hint of cinnamon too would have made this better. The ganache is smooth and creamy, but it needs a little more ole'.

Green is Twilight Mint - chocolate mint ganache in dark chocolate:

A nice, sophisticated mint taste - like a real mint sprig. But as I said in the last post, mint doesn't rock my world, so this is only okay to me. Pretty though, very pretty.

Gold is Holiday Spice - chocolate ganache with cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and ginger in milk chocolate. Sounds awesome!!!

Hmmm......apparently my eyes see the world differently than the eyes of the Godiva people. That sure don't look like chocolate ganache to me! This is an interesting flavor - I think it would have been better if that were chocolate ganache. It's really sweet and the spices are there, but they need to be stronger or this mystery ganache needs to be a little less cloying.

And the one I have the highest hopes for - Almond Shortbread - almond shortbread cookies combined with creamy ganache in dark chocolate:

Okay - Dark chocolate? I don't think so! Godiva must have changed these after they printed their Chocolate Menu. The closest thing these taste like is sugar cookie dough. I don't taste almond at all. And there is kind of a slight aftertaste. Boo! What a let down!

Let's see if their holiday truffles are any better:

Next is Egg Nog:

Now I'm excited about the gingerbread truffle - I love gingerbread!

This was my favorite of the truffles. It was very good, but I'd rather have gingerbread. But it was a great attempt and I would recommend it. I wouldn't go to the mall with a recently replaced hip for it, but if you are in the mall anyway, really like ginger bread, and are craving a bit of chocolate - get it, baby!!

Cake Roll Chocolate

You know, when you have Wikipedia, why go anywhere else for information? I found this baby in World Market and I've always wanted to try one:

Yeah, yeah - fancy, schmancy - started as a pagan tradition and my love of sweets is fairly pagan, but I think we can all agree that burning a log in a winter fire and/or eating a delicious cake is a good thing, so kumbaya!!

Now it does look like a log when unwrapped (kind of creepy):

But, it gets better:

Oh yeah, baby!!! This is like the world's biggest Swiss Cake Roll. And it is really, really good. The cake is not too rich, it's just right. The outer icing could be a little bit thicker, but overall - YUMMY!!!

It's made by DAN CAKE, the largest producer of family size Sponge Cakes and Swiss Rolls in Scandinavia. No wonder it's good! It's from the land of Swiss Rolls!

I also found these:

These are little cake balls covered with chocolate sprinkles. I thought they would be great! But - glaack! There was some kind of liquor involved. Yucko! Give me the huge Swiss Cake Roll any day! That Christmas Log is a beautiful thing.

Now these aren't Christmas things but I just found them, so let's look at them now:

I thought they were going to be candy bars, but they are cakes:

It's a Pirate's Life for Me!

Hotel Chocolat http://www.hotelchocolat.com/ is a British chocolate company that just opened its first US location in Boston.

But when I looked a little closer, I saw that several of the confections had booze in them, so I guess it makes sense. Now here's the downside, I'm not such of a drinker, so I don't really love the alcohol/chocolate combo. So this was a bit of a bummer for me. But hey, most people would probably really like it.

I loved all of these - great designs, great chocolate. I loved the mistletoe - a smooth caramel milk chocolate. Wonderfully sweet and creamy and a very cool design. The ornament is an equally delicious milk chocolate with a hint of hazelnut. YUM!!! Dark chocolate fans will love the penguin - a 72% dark chocolate in a lovely design. These were all terrific.

The one with the red top has some strawberry liqueur in it. I didn't like it. The other milk chocolate one is better - it has milk chocolate and caramel and those round things are mini shortbread cookies. It was good, but not as good as it sounds. It was maybe a seven, but really should have been a ten. And the white chocolate one? Finely milled macadamia nuts in creamy white chocolate with a hint of coconut. Hmmm....I found the white chocolate overpowered everything else with its sweetness. Macadamia nuts are sweet too and I couldn't really catch the hint of coconut.....maybe if you bit off the penguin's head first, it would give a better blend of flavors. Nothing like a little holiday violence!

The yellow star was my worst nightmare - lemon and ginger - glacck! Now many of you might really like that creative combo, but not me. The ginger was too strong for me and with the lemon - eek!

The one at the top is a rum and raisin star - no rum for me - too strong. I'm not a pirate for God's sake! I just like chocolate!

And the pink star has raspberry and prosecco (I didn't even know what that was! It's a sparkling wine). Again, I didn't like it. These guys are killing me with all the alcohol. To me the alcohol overpowers the subtle flavors of the chocolate.

The little round guys are mini whisky truffles. Eew. Sorry, I'm just doomed with these.

Now I liked the other two - the white chocolate one is the smoothest and creamiest hazelnut and milk chocolate praline ever enrobed in white chocolate and topped with a Christmassy cranberry. Yum, yum, yum!!!

And the square is a pecan nut praline blended with crushed feuilletine pieces (I had to look that one up too: Usually only seen in the professional kitchen, feuilletine (foo-ye-teen, more-or-less, from the French "feuille," meaning "leaves") tastes like crispy, thin little shards of sugar cone. You can mix it in to mousses to add some crunch.) Great - some leaves are in here. Anyway, those sugar leaves are pretty damn good!

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

 I love the look of snow - so pretty!! And I love the idea of chocolate snow!! So here's our chocolate winter wonderland:

Look at these adorable chocolate snowmen from Lindt!

Not sure why he has a broom. If there were two brooms they could be arms. But one broom? I dunno - maybe it's a Swiss yuletide story. I don't even care enough to Google it. I prefer to think it's random and weird. There's just not enough random weirdness in the world.

These are good - Lindt chocolate is always good. They are hollow, so there's not much to them. Cute, though. Would be great decorations/party favors.

Check these out from Cadbury:

These are, quite frankly, addictive. They are like really, really good M & M's (good because there is more and better chocolate) coated in powdered sugar. Or maybe it's cocaine.

I got them at World Market and they are fantastic.

More snowballs:

These are malted milk balls covered with chocolate, then white chocolate, then white powdered sugar. They are good, but not as good as the Cadbury Snow Bites. Not enough chocolate.

There's a problem with all of this powdered sugar, however:

This was just after taking the pictures! Give these messy things to children at your own risk. Good God! At least real snow melts.

A less messier snowball:

Whoppers Sno-Balls! I reviewed these last year. They're good (they ain't no Snow Bites, mind you) but they are a helluva lot less messy - candy coating, no powdered sugar. The red and green dots get a little out of control sometimes (see the green blob sn0-ball) but overall they are pretty good. It's a malt-ball thing

But look at these:

After the way cool tin, this is a bit of a let down, but it gets better:

These are "a truffle-like fudge center, enrobed in a creamy white coating, and a snowfall of coconut on top" according to Harry & David. My description - "Holy smokes! Get me a glass of milk!" These are VERY rich. Fudge-like? I don't think so - I think they ARE fudge. And you know how rich fudge is! And I don't know what the "creamy white coating" actually is, but it's pretty rich too. These are very good and it would be great to have one. Only one. Ever.

Snow is an amazing thing, isn't it? Every flake different. And I have to admit, I like my people like that - yep - a little flaky and different. The kind of people who might read a candy blog. The kind of people who laugh out loud and don't care who hears them. The kind of people who are real - and everyone of you I've come to know is real - authentic - a gift. So I say again, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!!!!

Chocolate Shopping

You know how I feel about the attempt to trick us by only changing the packaging. But this is pretty cute packaging and these would make a great stocking stuffer.

Where I really missed the sleigh was with peppermint. I don't really love peppermint and chocolate, but I can't escape it this time of year. First there's a new Bliss (at least new to me) and not specifically Christmas, but what the hell:

These were not my fav. In fact, I'm going to go so far as to say that I don't like these at all. There's some funky aftertaste. Toothpaste? Lighter fluid? Poison?

Tracy spotted these at Target, and they are pretty festive. Look how gorgeous:

They are really thin:

Wow! This is my favorite peppermint bark - love the thinness - making it not too chocolately and not too rich. Love the crunchy peppermint chunks on top and LOVE, LOVE, LOVE how pretty it is! Also like the dark and white chocolate with the peppermint (rather than milk and white like Ghirardelli). And I almost didn't try it! Thanks, Tracy, for spotting it! Thanks, Dove, for making it! And thanks, Martha, for not ruining it with your lame advice.

And now I have some pics of my favorite peppermint/chocolate combo (other than the Dove bark -it's moved to the top spot for me!):

The Lindor truffle is just so amazingly smooth and creamy it's hard to beat. It has the best chocolate, but I really like those festive peppermint chunks on the Dove bark. I like the mix of textures and the Dove bark is just so damn pretty! If you see the Dove bark - get it - it's fantastic!!!

We also spotted these and I had to get them for my tree:

How great are those?? I love them! $1 at Target and they have candy in them. Now, don't get excited about the candy, this is all that in there:

That's pretty weak, huh? How about the TWO Tootsie Rolls? I mean, why even bother? But I really do like the ornaments - look for them in the stocking stuffer section of Target if you like them too.

Consider taking endless hours to make gifts by hand. Your time isn't worth nearly as much as mine, so you might as well waste it.

If you are allergic to any foods, don't eat them.

Happy Shopping!!!!