Hey everyone, so here is a follow up to my last post on Christmas. But instead of all the Christmas decor and crafts I want to show you all the Christmas baking I've done this past season. Now I will admit I was pretty ambitious this season, considering all things. I somehow made time while working practically everyday to make a bunch of goodies that I was able to share with most my friends.
So I was browsing Pinterest and saw this amazingly really easy recipe for a chocolate truffle, that I had all the ingredients for stocked in my pantry. This was the first time I had made truffles, and as simple as it was to make it, I found it there was a lot of waiting time- particularly waiting for the chocolate to settle before scooping them into chunks, then letting them settle again before rolling them into balls. I then coated them with simple confectionary sugar or a cocoa/sugar mixture.
Now I made these truffles on Monday mid November (right when I started my second season job) and while I was making them, an idea came to me; why not turn this week in to a week long bake-a-thon that would welcome the holiday season. So Tuesday came and I made a toffee/caramel crunch bar sprinkled with walnuts. This I never had a recipe for but I just tried to make it on the whim, and I personally think it turned out well. Wednesday I resorted to something a little more simple; sugar cookies coated with m&ms that was very popular among my family. As the days went on I found I needed to really stock up my pantry once more because I clearly was draining my ingredients.
Thursday came around and I really wanted to be as ambitious as possible. So I used previous knowledge I had learned from class about certain flavours pairing well and I ended up using white chocolate and cardamom (which I found surprisingly really hard to find fully ground- I ended up using while cardamom and grinding it myself) along with espresso beans to add a smoky flavours crunch. I combined those 3 very strong flavours and blended them into a cheese cake mixture which I then superheated into tarts. I baked them for a bit and cooled them off and they resulted into what I call a Spiced White chocolate espresso cheesecake tarts. Sounds fancy huh? Well to take it to the next level, I had always wanted to learn how to do chocolate piping, so after some self taught videos on YouTube, I made my valiant effort which turned out to be not as bad as it could have. After an exciting and very creative Thursday, I rounded off the week with a very Christmas Classic; chewy chocolate chip cookies that I knew would be perfect for Santa!
A friend of mine was seeing all this baking I was doing and recommend me to make this oddly different twist on a loaf cake. What makes this different from other loaves, is that it only has 3 ingredients and it super easy to make! All you need is flour, sugar and....ice cream! That right, I said ice cream. When I tell my coworkers this, trust me not only did they not believe me, but some couldn't comprehend baking with ice cream. Too be honest, I was a little skeptical too, but believe me, it works. Somehow I found the flour held the ice cream together real well when baked and the ice cream, gave the loaf a moistness and fluffiness that you get ice cream. I used chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream in particular but you can use any flavour of ice cream as long as it's full fat and none of this sorbet, sherbet stuff.
All season, I have been looking for a real simple but delicious gingerbread recipe to make gingerbread men, but for weeks and weeks I had no luck. I just couldn't find one that's liked enough to make. So for the first time, I went to my friends and asked if they had known of any recipes that they used every year to make gingerbread and long and behold one of my coworkers gave me her mothers recipe that she swore by. It was a tried and tested recipe so I couldn't argue against that right? It seemed simple enough so the next time I found time, I went to work and started making them. Earlier that season I had purchased a set of holiday themed cookie cutters that came real handy in my baking- particularly this one when I needed a gingerbread man shape. I thought the recipe was only big enough for a small batch of men but I ended up with a lot of cookies all ready to be decorated. So I stored them in an airtight container until the time was ready.
A few days later I had a couple of good friends come over to watch 'Rise for the Guardians' which I wholeheartedly recommend, but after that and a couple of board games, I decided it would be the perfect time to start decorating the cookies! After some difficulty using the icing we managed to turn out a couple of really great looking cookies. And boy was it a blast decorating them!
Those were my 3 gingerbread men I decorated and I am very proud of the work I did.
So now Christmas is officially over, and the season is now winding down, the holiday baking was a lot of fun, but now the. New Year is coming and it's time to focus on some healthier cooking/baking. I may have the biggest sweet tooth I know, but even I know when I need a little break from all the sweets! That is until Valentines day comes along! I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and a happy New Year too.
Follow me!
Youtube: youtube.com/mglalvarez13
Twitter: twitter.com/mglalvarez
Instagram: instagram.com/mglalvarez
So I was browsing Pinterest and saw this amazingly really easy recipe for a chocolate truffle, that I had all the ingredients for stocked in my pantry. This was the first time I had made truffles, and as simple as it was to make it, I found it there was a lot of waiting time- particularly waiting for the chocolate to settle before scooping them into chunks, then letting them settle again before rolling them into balls. I then coated them with simple confectionary sugar or a cocoa/sugar mixture.
Now I made these truffles on Monday mid November (right when I started my second season job) and while I was making them, an idea came to me; why not turn this week in to a week long bake-a-thon that would welcome the holiday season. So Tuesday came and I made a toffee/caramel crunch bar sprinkled with walnuts. This I never had a recipe for but I just tried to make it on the whim, and I personally think it turned out well. Wednesday I resorted to something a little more simple; sugar cookies coated with m&ms that was very popular among my family. As the days went on I found I needed to really stock up my pantry once more because I clearly was draining my ingredients.
Thursday came around and I really wanted to be as ambitious as possible. So I used previous knowledge I had learned from class about certain flavours pairing well and I ended up using white chocolate and cardamom (which I found surprisingly really hard to find fully ground- I ended up using while cardamom and grinding it myself) along with espresso beans to add a smoky flavours crunch. I combined those 3 very strong flavours and blended them into a cheese cake mixture which I then superheated into tarts. I baked them for a bit and cooled them off and they resulted into what I call a Spiced White chocolate espresso cheesecake tarts. Sounds fancy huh? Well to take it to the next level, I had always wanted to learn how to do chocolate piping, so after some self taught videos on YouTube, I made my valiant effort which turned out to be not as bad as it could have. After an exciting and very creative Thursday, I rounded off the week with a very Christmas Classic; chewy chocolate chip cookies that I knew would be perfect for Santa!
A friend of mine was seeing all this baking I was doing and recommend me to make this oddly different twist on a loaf cake. What makes this different from other loaves, is that it only has 3 ingredients and it super easy to make! All you need is flour, sugar and....ice cream! That right, I said ice cream. When I tell my coworkers this, trust me not only did they not believe me, but some couldn't comprehend baking with ice cream. Too be honest, I was a little skeptical too, but believe me, it works. Somehow I found the flour held the ice cream together real well when baked and the ice cream, gave the loaf a moistness and fluffiness that you get ice cream. I used chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream in particular but you can use any flavour of ice cream as long as it's full fat and none of this sorbet, sherbet stuff.
All season, I have been looking for a real simple but delicious gingerbread recipe to make gingerbread men, but for weeks and weeks I had no luck. I just couldn't find one that's liked enough to make. So for the first time, I went to my friends and asked if they had known of any recipes that they used every year to make gingerbread and long and behold one of my coworkers gave me her mothers recipe that she swore by. It was a tried and tested recipe so I couldn't argue against that right? It seemed simple enough so the next time I found time, I went to work and started making them. Earlier that season I had purchased a set of holiday themed cookie cutters that came real handy in my baking- particularly this one when I needed a gingerbread man shape. I thought the recipe was only big enough for a small batch of men but I ended up with a lot of cookies all ready to be decorated. So I stored them in an airtight container until the time was ready.
A few days later I had a couple of good friends come over to watch 'Rise for the Guardians' which I wholeheartedly recommend, but after that and a couple of board games, I decided it would be the perfect time to start decorating the cookies! After some difficulty using the icing we managed to turn out a couple of really great looking cookies. And boy was it a blast decorating them!
So now Christmas is officially over, and the season is now winding down, the holiday baking was a lot of fun, but now the. New Year is coming and it's time to focus on some healthier cooking/baking. I may have the biggest sweet tooth I know, but even I know when I need a little break from all the sweets! That is until Valentines day comes along! I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and a happy New Year too.
Follow me!
Youtube: youtube.com/mglalvarez13
Twitter: twitter.com/mglalvarez
Instagram: instagram.com/mglalvarez
Cheers,
-Miguel
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