Baking recipes
Scroll through our posts below to try all sorts of delicious baking recipes from our instagram baking videos. New baking videos are posted the first week of each month on Instagram and Facebook.
To easily find one of our recipes type below:
Lemon Raspberry Roll Cake!
YeeHAW! Stampede is back and so are my cooking demos at the kitchen theatre! This year we made a lemon raspberry roll cake with a light lemon sponge and smooth raspberry cream cheese filling. It’s delightful!
Ingredients:
Cake:
5 egg yolks
2 Tablespoons Oil
3 Tablespoons Milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon lemon extract, or zest of 1 lemon
2 drops yellow dye (optional)
1 cup of sugar (divide into 2 parts)
4 egg whites
3/4 cup flour
2 Tablespoons Cornstarch
1 teaspoon Baking Powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
Filling:
454g Cream cheese (2 x 8oz logs)
1 cup sugar
pinch salt
3 Tablespoons Raspberry Jam
1 1/2 cups Whipping Cream
Cake:
Preheat oven to 350*F and grease and line a half sheet pan with parchment. Grease parchment as well.
With electric mixer, whisk yolks, oil, milk, vanilla, lemon extract, yellow dye and half of the sugar. Whip until light and fluffy.
In a separate bowl, whisk egg whites and remaining sugar until stiff peaks form.
Combine remaining dry ingredients in a bowl.
Sift dry ingredients into yolk mixture and gently fold in.
Fold approximately 1/3 of egg whites into the yolk mixture.
Fold in remaining egg whites gently.
Spread into the greased half sheet pan and bake for 15-20 minutes until golden brown and firm feeling.
When cake comes out of the oven, run a knife around the edges to loosen, and flip onto a clean tea towel that is sprinkled heavily with icing sugar.
Peel off parchment paper carefully.
Using tea towel roll the cake up into a log and let cool.
Filling
With a whisk on your mixer, mix together softened cream cheese, sugar, salt and raspberry jam.
Scrape down bowl and continue mixing until smooth.
Slowly pour in cream and combine.
Turn up speed and whip until thick and fluffy.
Unroll cake and spread a tick layer of the filling over the entire cake, leaving about 1” on the far end free of any filling.
Using the tea towel to help, roll the cake back up into a log.
Place onto your serving dish and then spread remaining filling all over the entire cake.
Place in the fridge to chill for at least 30 minutes and serve cold.
Hey! Nice (Cinnamon) Buns!
Cinnamon buns…can you think of a GREATER bun?! The answer is no! Sweet, soft and oh so gooey! They are the perfect breakfast, lunch or dinner! This recipe has a delicious layer of “goo” aka caramel on top (some might call it a sticky bun!), but if you are more of a cinnamon bun with icing type of person, omit the goo and top with your favourite icing instead.
Yield: 12 buns (or you can make 8 ginormous buns)
Ideally use a 9”x13” pan but you can probably use 2 pie pans if you don’t have one
Dough:
3 cups All purpose flour
1/4 cup milk powder
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons or 1 packet Instant Yeast
2 Tablespoons Sugar
1 1/4 cup milk, warm to the touch but not boiling
1 egg
1/4 cup butter, melted
In the bowl of an electric mixer, place the milk, egg and melted butter.
In another bowl toss together the flour, milk powder, salt, yeast and sugar just to combine.
Pour the dry ingredients on top of the liquid ingredients in the mixer bowl and then mix using the dough hook attachment for 5-10 minutes, or until the dough forms a smooth ball. The dough will still be a little sticky.
Place the dough into a greased bowl and cover. Let rest at room temperature for about 1 hour or until doubled.
Goo:
1/3 cup butter
1/2 cup Brown Sugar
1/2 cup Corn syrup, honey OR maple syrup
1/4 cup heavy cream (if you don’t have cream, omit this and increase your butter to 1/2 cup)
pinch of salt
Combine all the ingredients: butter, brown sugar, syrup, cream and salt in a small pot.
Bring to a boil while stirring, basically we are melting the butter and sugar together, so you don’t need to cook it very much. You can also do this in the microwave if you prefer.
Pour the goo into a greased 9”x13” pan and set it to the side until your dough is ready.
Filling/Assembly:
1/3 cup - 1/2 cup Butter, very soft basically you want it to be the texture of mayonnaise, so almost melted
3/4 cup - 1 cup Brown sugar
1-2 Tablespoons Cinnamon
1/2 cup Add-in (optional): toasted pecans, toasted walnuts, raisins, chocolate chips, OR dried fruits
Once your dough has doubled in size place it onto a lightly floured surface and shape it into a rough rectangle shape. Then roll out into a large rectangle using a rolling pin or wine bottle, whatever you’ve got on hand! Since we are making 12 buns, make sure your rectangle is at least 12” wide, but if it gets a bit longer that is no problem. Mine probably was about 15”x9” in the end.
Smear your super soft butter all over your rectangle but leave a strip about 1” wide across the top edge without any butter. This strip is going to be the end edge of our roll which we will use to stick the dough to itself and seal the log.
On top of the butter sprinkle a nice even layer of brown sugar all over, depending on the size of your rectangle you might need a little more sugar, or a little less, but as long as it’s nicely covered you are set, the measurements for the filling are more by feel, so if you have leftover don’t worry!
Next, sprinkle the cinnamon all over the sugar to your liking. If you are putting any add-ins into your cinnamon buns, you can sprinkle them all over the cinnamon sugar layer now as well.
Now time to roll! Starting at the edge closest to you, move from one side to the other, rolling the dough on top of itself, tucking in the dough into the layer of cinnamon sugar, until you reach the top edge that doesn’t have any butter on it. Your dough should look like a big wormie and be lying on top of the un-buttered strip of dough.
For ease, I like to roll my wormie over so the edge of the dough is on top, then you want to seal the dough together by pinching it all the way from one side to the other so it won’t unravel when we cut it.
Now using your sharpest knife cut the wormie into 12 even-ish pieces. The easiest way for me to do this is to cut the wormie in half, then you will have 2 pieces. Now, take each of those pieces and cut them in half, so now you should have 4 even-ish pieces. Then cut each of those 4 pieces into thirds. Viola! 12 even-ish pieces!
Now grab your pan that has the goo at the bottom (or if you don’t want goo, just make sure your pan is very well greased, or lined with greased parchment). Place your buns cut side down in the goo into the pan, in a 4 across and 3 down pattern.
Cover the pan and let sit at room temperature until doubled and starting to reach the top edge of the pan, about 1 hour. If you want to serve these for breakfast, make your buns the day before, then cover them and place into the fridge overnight. In the morning, take your buns out about 2 hours before baking so they can come up to room temperature and then continue to proof so they are doubled and reaching the top edge of the pan.
While your buns are rising, pre-heat your oven to 350*F.
When your buns have doubled, pop the pan onto a cookie tray (this is purely to catch caramel drips from falling into your oven which would be the worst to clean…speaking from personal experience) and then place the pan with cookie tray into the middle of the oven and bake for 20-30 minutes or until golden brown and sounding hollow when you tap on the dough.
Let the pan sit for about 5 minutes at room temperature so it’s not boiling and then using oven mitts and being EXTREMELY careful, place a baking tray or a large platter (something that is larger than your cinnamon bun pan so it can catch the caramel) on top of the cinnamon buns, and flip them over and remove the baking pan. All your buns and delicious caramel should pour out onto the baking tray/platter, but if there are a few stragglers, just grab a spatula and scrape them out.
Now time to devour these delicious babies! Best served warm!
Peanut Butter and Jelly Panna Cotta!
YeeHAW! It’s stampede time, which means I get to don the Britney Spear’s microphone headset and hit the stage at the “Calgary Stampede”. This year I made a peanut butter panna cotta which is a peanut custard topped with strawberry compote and peanut brittle! Fancy!
Yield: 8-10 ramekins
Ingredients:
Peanut Panna Cotta
Gelatin 7g
Water 60mL
Whipping Cream 750mL
Sugar 170g
Salt pinch
Peanut butter 50g
Milk 180mL
Strawberry Compote:
Fresh strawberries, chopped 1 cup
Sugar 2 Tbsp or to taste
Peanut Brittle:
Sugar 200g
Water 85g
Corn Syrup 140g
Peanuts 230g
Salt 1/4 tsp
Butter 15g
Vanilla 1 tsp
Baking Soda 1/2 tsp
Panna Cotta:
Bloom your gelatin in the water, set to the side
In a pot combine your cream, sugar, salt and peanut butter and cook until the sugar is dissolved and the peanut butter is combined, it will only need to simmer, not boiling necessary.
Melt your bloomed gelatin and then stir into the hot cream mixture and stir to combine.
Add your milk and stir until combined.
Pour into ramekins or whatever molds you are using and pop in the fridge overnight.
Strawberry Compote:
Combine chopped strawberries and sugar until you reach a sweetness you like, then set to the side. If you are making ahead of time, store in the fridge.
Peanut Brittle:
In a pot heat the sugar, water and corn syrup until it reaches 115*C on a candy thermometer.
Add your peanuts and cook while stirring constantly until the mixture reaches 155*C
Remove from heat and add butter, salt and vanilla, stir to combine.
Add baking soda and stir, this is going to start foaming, so be cautious!
Pour immediately onto a greased and parchment lined baking tray, or onto a silicone mat.
Let cool completely, then store in an airtight container.
Serving:
Your panna cotta can be served in it’s mold or unmolded. To unmold, dip your ramekin into a bowl of hot water to warm up the container, this is going to melt the edges of your panna cotta, then place your serving plate on top of the ramekin and flip it over. It should pop out of the ramekin and be ready to serve!
Spoon some of your strawberry compote onto your panna cotta.
Break up some of your peanut brittle and you are ready to serve!
Tres Leches Cake!
This delicious vanilla cake gets soaked in three types of milk and then topped with whipped cream! The milk soak softens the cake so it’s a bit like a pudding and it’s SO delicious!
Tres Leches Cake
Yield: 9”x13” pan
Preheat your oven to 350*F
1/2 cup Butter, soft
1 cup Sugar
1 teaspoon Vanilla
1/4 teaspoon Cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 teaspoon Baking Powder
5 Eggs, separated
1 1/2 cups Flour
1 1/2 cups Milk
1 can Sweetened Condensed Milk
1 can Evaporated Milk
1 1/2 cups Whipping Cream
2 Tablespoons Sugar
1 teaspoon Rum (optional)
In the bowl of your mixer whip together your butter, sugar, salt, cinnamon, vanilla, baking power until light and fluffy.
Separate your eggs and add the egg yolks to the butter mixture and continue whipping until light and fluffy.
Add your flour and stir until combined.
In a separate bowl whip up your egg whites until medium firm peaks.
Fold the egg whites into the butter mixture in 2 additions. Folding gently so they don’t deflate too much!
Pour your batter into a greased 9”x13” pan, you don’t need to worry about lining the pan with parchment paper just a little baking spray is great!
Bake your cake in a preheated 350*F oven for about 25 minutes or until lightly golden and a toothpick comes out clean when poked into the middle.
While your cake is baking stir together your milk, sweetened condensed milk, and evaporated milk .
When your cake comes out of the oven, pos it ALL over with a fork so the milk has somewhere to soak into.
While the cake is still hot, pour ALL of the milk mixture on top of your cake as evenly as possible. It’s going to look like too much, but it’s going to soak in.
Let the cake cool at room temperature for about 30-60 minutes, then place into the fridge for at least an hour or ideally overnight.
Whip up your cream to soft peaks with the sugar and rum (if using).
Spread your cream on top of the cake and eat!
Cream Puffs with a Lemon Cheesecake Filling!
Cream puffs are made with ‘Choux Paste” which is a dough that is used for ALL sorts of things - eclairs, churros, cruellers, profiteroles, gorgieres and more! It’s a dough you cook on the stove, then add eggs to before piping and baking. I filled my cream puffs with a lemon cheesecake filling, but you can fill them with lightly sweetened whipped cream or a scoop of ice cream for a simple and delicious dessert!
A mountain of Cream Puffs!
Cream Puffs with Lemon Cheesecake Filling
Yield: 24-30 cream puffs
Preheat your oven to 400*F
Choux Paste aka Cream Puff Dough:
1/2 cup Milk
1/4 cup Water
1/3 cup Butter
1/4 teaspoon Salt
1/2 teaspoon Sugar
3/4 cup Flour
~3 Eggs
icing sugar for dusting on top
Lemon Cheesecake Filling:
1 cup (8oz.) Cream Cheese, softened
1/4 cup Icing Sugar
1/4 teaspoon Salt
zest of 1 lemon
In a small pot, bring your milk, water, butter, salt and sugar to a boil.
Once the milk mixture is boiling, add your flour and stir over a medium heat until the mixture become a dough ball and leaves a film on the base of your pot. Transfer to a bowl and cool for a minute or two.
Add your eggs one at a time, stirring to combine after each egg. Depending on how much moisture is in your dough, and how large your eggs are, you might not need all three. You want your finished dough to be soft and when you run your finger though it, it should slowly fill in the gap, but still leave a visible line where your finger had been.
Place your dough into a piping bag and pipe about 1.5” diameter rounds onto a parchment lined baking tray.
If there are little “kisses” poking up from where you stopped piping, wet your finger and lightly press them down so the tops of your cream puffs are flat.
Bake in a preheated 400*F oven for 20-30 minutes, or until golden brown. Try not to open the oven at all (no peeking!) for the first 20 minutes, the cream puffs are creating steam that will help them bake, and we don’t want that to escape!
To make the lemon cheesecake filling, whip together the cream cheese, icing sugar, salt and lemon zest until light and fluffy. If you plan on piping it into your cream puffs, you can place it into a piping bag or a ziplock bag with the corner cut off.
Once your cream puffs are baked, let them cool and fill with your choice of filling! You can use a knife to poke a hole in the base of your cream puff, large enough to fit the tip of a piping bag full of filling, then squeeze it into your cream puff, or you can cut the top of your cream puff off with a serrated knife, scoop some filling into it and then place the top back on once filled, both look cute!
Sprinkle the tops with icing sugar and devour!
Bread Pudding with the EASIEST Caramel Sauce!
I never had bread pudding growing up, but once I went to pastry school I was like “omg what have I been missing!” Bread pudding is basically like french toast, but instead of slices of bread, you cube up all your old dry bread and soak it in the custard, then place it into a baking pan and bake until custardy! Delicious! To top it off I make the easiest caramel sauce, just pop everything in a pan and bring to a boil. Easy and impressive dessert, what more could you want!
For the type of bread, you can use anything, I had some leftover sourdough bread, but I’ve used white bread, banana bread, even croissants! They are all yummy!
ALL the caramel sauce on my bread pudding!
Bread Pudding with Caramel Sauce
Yield: 4 Ramekins
Preheat your oven to 350*F
Bread Pudding:
3 Eggs
1/3 cup Sugar
pinch of Salt
1 teaspoon Vanilla (optional)
1/2 teaspoon Cinnamon
1 cup Milk
1/2 cup Cream (or milk if you don’t have cream)
4-5 cups of cubed dry bread (if it’s not stale, pop it in the oven for a few minutes to dry them out for maximum custard absorption!)
Caramel sauce:
2/3 cup Brown Sugar
1/2 cup Whipping Cream
1/4 cup Butter
1 teaspoon liqueur like dark rum or whiskey (optional)
In a bowl combine your eggs, sugar, salt, vanilla, cinnamon, milk and cream. Whisk until combined.
Toss in your cubed bread and stir until coated. Let sit at least 20 minutes to absorb the custard.
Scoop your bread mixture into 4 greased ramekins (or whatever baking vessel you are using). Pour over any excess custard left in the bowl to fill up the ramekins.
Place the ramekins into a larger pan where they can sit flat without touching (I used a 9”x13” cake pan).
Place the pan with ramekins into the preheated 350*F oven and then fill the pan with hot water until it reaches about halfway up the side of the ramekins. This is called a water bath.
Bake for about 35-45 minutes, or until lightly golden and the custard is set in the middle. If you push down on the middle of a ramekin it shouldn’t look super liquidy.
Remove from water bath and let cool or eat straight away!
To make caramel sauce, place your brown sugar, cream and butter in a pot and bring to a boil.
Remove from heat and stir in the liqueur if you are using it.
Pour over your delicious baked bread puddings and eat warm.
Butter Tarts! Classic Canadian!
What’s the most Canadian dessert? I would say it’s a tie between butter tarts and Nanaimo bars, but butter tarts are definitely MY favourite! These little tarts are basically a buttery vanilla sugar pie, I love butter, I love sugar, what more do you need…RAISINS! Ok some people hate raisins in their butter tarts, I believe they are crucial, but do what you love, that’s the fun of baking, you can make them exactly how you want! The way I make my butter tarts is by adding the raisins before the filling, instead of mixing them together, so you can even make some with raisins and some without and then judge how you prefer them. So many options!
Look at those gooey edges!
Butter Tarts
Yield: 12 tarts (made in a muffin tin)
Preheat your oven to 375*F
Pie Dough:
Alternatively, you can skip the pie dough step and buy the frozen tart shells from your grocery store, just fill and bake them straight from the freezer, no thawing required!
2 cups Flour
1/2 cup COLD butter, cut into small pieces
1/4 cup shortening (you can replace this with butter if you prefer, I just like the texture it brings)
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 teaspoon Sugar
1/4-1/2 cup COLD water
Filling:
1/2 cup Raisins (optional)
1 teaspoon Dark Rum (optional)
1/2 cup Brown Sugar
1/2 cup Corn Syrup
1/4 cup Butter, melted
1 Egg
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1/4 teaspoon Salt
In a large bowl combine your flour, salt and sugar for the dough.
Toss in your cold butter and shortening and using your fingers pinch and rub the butter into the flour until it looks crumbly like sand, but still has some large pea sized chunks of butter - this is going to make things flaky!
Add your cold water, start with about 1/4 cup, and see how it feels, depending on your flour and how the butter has been incorporated, you might not need the full amount, You want the dough to stay together when pressed in your hand, I used about 1/3 cup in my dough.
Your bowl should still have some drier bits at the bottom, that is perfect, then dump the bowl of pastry out onto your counter and give it a few kneads until it comes into a nice ball, then press into a flat disk or rectangle and wrap in saran wrap. Chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
Once your dough is chilled, roll it out on a flat surface to about 1/8-1/4” thickness and cut into about 4” diameter circles, you want a circle that will fit into the cavity of a muffin tin, so see what fits best in yours. Or maybe you have actual tart tins, you can definitely use those too!
If you run out of dough, just lightly press the scraps together and continue cutting out the rounds.
Take each circle and press it into each cavity of your muffin tin, making sure to press in the corners so they are filled with dough.
Once all your muffin cavities are lined with dough, poke the bases a few times with a fork, this is called “docking” and helps any trapped air release during baking.
Pop your muffin tin into the freezer to firm up, at least 20 minutes.
Now for the filling, you can skip this step but it makes things more decadent, take your raisins and cover them with boiling water to soak. Just enough water to cover them, the amount doesn’t matter as we will be draining it all off. Soak 10+ minutes.
Once your raisins have soaked, drain them off, and squeeze out any excess moisture. Then toss with the 1 teaspoon of Rum! Set to the side.
In a large bowl combine all the rest of the ingredients for the filling - brown sugar, corn syrup, melted butter, egg, salt and vanilla. Stir to combine.
Now to put everything together! In your chilled tart shells, evenly distribute the raisins into the bottom of each tart (or however many you want raisins in!)
Scoop your filling mixture on top of the raisins in each tart shell, then pop into a preheated 375*F oven for about 15-25 minutes until gold and bubbly! The longer you bake them, the thicker your filling, if you like them gooier, bake them a little less.
Let cool and devour!
Lemon Lime Citrus Pie...and by Pie I mean Mason Jar!
What’s better than a pie, a cute little individual mason jar full of pie just for you! This is similar to a key lime pie, but I don’t have key limes, and unfortunately I am not in Florida so walking out into my backyard citrus farm just isn’t an option. These little beauties are perfect for making yourself feel fancy and like you are at a restaurant serving the most delicious desserts!
Perfect size for snacking!
Lemon Lime Citrus Pie Mason Jars
Yield: 6 x 1/2 cup mason jars (a Ramekin would also be great for this!)
Preheat your oven to 350*F
Base:
1/3 cup Graham Cracker Crumbs
1 Tablespoon Sugar
1/4 teaspoon Cinnamon
1.5 Tablespoon Butter, melted
Filling:
1 can Sweetened Condensed Milk
1/2 cup Citrus Juice - I used 1/2 lemon and 1/2 lime
Zest of 1 lemon or lime or whatever you got!
3 Egg Yolks
pinch of Salt
Topping:
1/2 cup Whipped Cream
1-2 Tablespoons Sugar
In a bowl combine all your base ingredients - graham cracker crumbs, sugar, cinnamon and melted butter. Mix to combine, then evenly portion into the 6 mason jars.
Using your fingers press the graham crackers down to compact them into a firm base and set to the side.
In a new bowl mix together all of your filling ingredients - condensed milk, citrus juice, zest, yolks and salt. Once combined evenly pour into your mason jars.
Place filled mason jars onto a clean baking tray and bake in a preheated 350*F oven for 8-10 minutes or until they have a firm jiggle.
Remove from the oven and let cool at room temperature for about 30 minutes, then transfer to the fridge and chill for at least 2 hours or overnight.
While your mason jars are chilling, whip up your whipping cream and sugar until firm peaks.
Dollop a nice pile of whipped cream on top of your chilled mason jar pie and devour!
Crepes Suzette! It's FLAMBE time!
This dessert was popular in the days of white gloved waiters, but no white gloves necessary! First you make crepes which are already delicious, then you make an orange caramel sauce which you FLAMBE! So fun and exciting! Both the crepes and orange caramel sauce are delicious for other uses, like crepes filled with nutella and bananas, or ice cream with orange caramel sauce on top! Yum!
These crepes are saucy!
Crepes Suzette
Yield: 6-8 large crepes (I used a 10” skillet)
Crepes:
1/2 cup Milk
2 Eggs
1 Tablespoon Butter, melted
2 teaspoon Sugar
1/4 teaspoon Salt
1/2 cup Flour
Orange Caramel Sauce:
1/2 cup Sugar
1/4 cup Butter
Juice of 1 Orange (about 1/4-1/2 cup)
2 ounces (1/4 cup) Grand Marnier (optional)
To make crepes, whisk together all the crepe ingredients until smooth and combined. If it is lumpy just pour it through a strainer. Let this sit in the fridge at least 30 minutes or overnight.
To cook the crepes, heat a non-stick skillet to medium high heat (or a crepe pan if you have one of those!). Grease the pan with a little butter or oil then pour a few tablespoons of batter into the pan and swirl the pan around to coat the base. You don’t want your crepes to be thick, so depending on the size of your pan probably 2-4 tablespoons.
Continue heating the crepe until it looks matte on top and not liquidy, then it’s all cooked! Peel it off the pan and place onto a clean baking tray. Then continue until all your batter is used up, placing each crepe onto the baking tray, the crepes can overlap a bit and they shouldn’t stick together.
Now for the sauce! Make sure you have ALL the sauce ingredients ready to go, you can’t walk away from this once you start.
Heat up a large pan over medium-high heat. Place a few teaspoons of sugar onto it and stir until it is melted, then add a few more teaspoons of sugar and continue stirring until it’s melted, then continue until all your sugar is used. This is called a dry caramel. Once all your sugar is melted, continue cooking until it is a nice golden brown colour.
Turn off the heat and carefully add your butter, stirring it gently until it is all melted and combined. Watch out this is going to be super hot and bubbly!
Now slowly pour in your orange juice, and stir to combine. Even though this is off the heat it is still going to bubble up and steam so be careful! If the sugar clumps up don’t worry!
Now put your caramel sauce onto a medium-low heat and cook until all the sugar clumps have melted and the sauce looks nice and smooth.
Now turn off the heat and pour in your grand mariner (if using), DO NOT POUR FROM THE BOTTLE! This can carry a flame back into your bottle and explode which would not be good! Just use a measuring cup or small container. Carefully using a BBQ lighter ignite your sauce, it might take a second and then it will be on fire! Carefully shake your pan until the fire burns itself out. If you get scared or the fire gets out of control, keep a lid nearby to cover the pan, this will put out the fire if you need. IF YOU HAVE A GAS STOVE your burner will ignite the pan, you might have to tilt it towards the flame, but it will catch on fire that way. If you are not comfortable with this, turn off your gas stove, move your sauce off the heat and ignite with the BBQ lighter as I had. Now your delicious sauce is all ready to go!
To serve, fold each crepe in half and then fold that in half, so it looks like a triangle shape. Then you can place the crepes directly into the sauce, or you can place the crepes onto a plate and pour the sauce on top! Yum!
Pavlova!
Pavlova is the fluffiest of cakes! It’s a GIANT meringue with a marshmallowy centre that you fill with whipped cream and top with fresh fruit! It’s our favourite dessert for any bakery staff party! Named after a ballerina’s fluffy tutu this cake is as light as air!
it’s a mountain of deliciousness!
Pavlova
Yield: 1 approximately 8” round pavlova
Preheat oven to 300F, then reduce to 250*F when you place the pavlova into the oven.
Pavlova:
5 Egg Whites, room temperature
pinch Salt
1 teaspoon Vanilla extract (optional)
1 cup Sugar
1 teaspoon Vinegar
1 Tablespoon Cornstarch
Filling:
1/2 cup Whipped cream
1-2 Tablespoons Sugar
1 cup Fresh Fruit
1 Tablespoon Sugar
In the bowl of your mixer place your egg whites and the pinch of salt.
Using the whisk attachment, whip the egg whites until they start to turn white and foamy.
While the machine is running on a low speed, slowly pour in the sugar until it is fully incorporated, then increase the mixer speed to medium high speed and whip until super thick and fluffy, at least 10 minutes. The meringue should not feel grainy when you rub it between your fingers.
Add the vinegar and cornstarch to the mixer and mix on a medium speed for 20-30 seconds until combined.
Using a bowl or plate, trace an approximately 8” diameter circle onto a piece of parchment paper, then flip oven the parchment so the outline is on the bottom of the paper, and place the parchment onto your baking tray. You can use a little baking spray on the pan to stick down your parchment so it won’t slide.
Load your meringue mixture onto your drawn circle on the parchment. Then gently spread it into the circle shape. You can use the back of a spoon or a spatula to create decorative lines on the side of your pavlova, or just leave it with a rustic look.
Place pavlova into a preheated 300F oven, then as soon as the pavlova is in, REDUCE the heat to 250*F and bake for 1.25-1.5 hours. The pavlova should be crispy feeling on the outside.
Turn off the oven, but leave your pavlova in the oven to cool - about 2 hours (or just leave overnight.)
Once your pavlova has cooled, whip your cream to soft peak and sweeten to taste with sugar (1-2 Tablespoons if usually good for me), place the whipped cream on top of the pavlova.
Chop up your fresh fruits and toss with a little sugar to taste - if your fruit is sweet enough don’t worry about adding any sugar. Place fruit on top of the whipped cream.
Serve right away! So delicious!
Homemade DOUGHNUTS!
Doughnuts are AMAZING! I love doughnuts! That is my birthday treat of choice. Home made doughnuts are truly the ultimate version of doughnuts because you can’t beat a warm doughnut straight out of the fryer! It’s sooooo yummy! The dough isn’t too tricky, but you do need to deep fry them, because lets be honest, a baked doughnut should just be called a bun and we don’t want none, if you’re just a bun! Ok I would still eat a bun, but fried is the WAY TO GO! I don’t have a deep fryer, you just need a sturdy pot and ideally a thermometer.
Freshly baked doughnuts are the love of my life!
Doughnuts
Yield: 6-8 regular sized hole-y doughnuts
Dough:
2/3 cup milk, warm
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 egg
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract (optional)
3/4 teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoons Sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons Instant yeast
2 cups Flour
In the bowl of your mixer combine the dry ingredients - flour, salt, sugar, yeast. Toss together to combine.
Pour in your liquid ingredients - milk, melted butter, egg and vanilla.
Knead the dough in your mixer until it creates a ball around your dough hook, and isn’t sticking to the sides of your bowl, about 10 minutes.
Place your dough ball into a grease bowl, cover and let rise at room temperature for about 1 hour, or until doubled.
Once double, press down your dough and take it out of the bowl. Wrap in saran wrap and place in the fridge until chilled, at least 30 minutes. You can even leave these overnight if you want to fry them off for breakfast in the morning!
Next, roll out your dough to about 1/2” thick and cut out your doughnuts, ideally use a 3-4” round cutter with a 1” cutter for the middle, but use what you got! Wine glasses work great!
Place your doughnuts onto a lined and lightly floured baking tray, then cover with a clean tea towel and let rise at room temperature for 30 minutes-1 hour, or until almost doubled.
Get your glaze and/or cinnamon sugar ready at this point, so they are ready to go once your doughnuts are fried!
While your doughnuts are rising, heat up a deep fryer or a large pot with at least 1” of canola oil or shortening at the bottom, you want an oil with a high smoke point. We want our oil at 350F-365F. Ideally use a thermometer to keep an eye on your oil, otherwise you can toss scraps of dough in to see how the sizzle and gauge the temperature that way.
Once your dough is ready place a 2-3 doughnuts in at a time and fry for 1-2 minutes flipping halfway. Mine took about 1.5 minutes for the larger doughnuts.
Once your doughnut is golden, remove it from the oil and place onto a wire rack that is sitting on top of a baking tray to catch anything that drips.
If you want cinnamon sugar doughnuts, roll them in the cinnamon sugar while they are hot out of the fryer. If you would like to glaze them, finish frying all your doughnuts and then toss them into your glaze and place back on to the wire rack to dry for a minute before serving.
Now eat them while warm, it is the GREATEST!
Cinnamon Sugar:
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Toss together!
Vanilla Glaze:
1 cup Icing Sugar
2 Tablespoons Milk
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
Stir ingredients together until smooth, if you want it thicker, add more icing sugar to get the consistency you like.
Giant Lemon Cheesecake Mousse Cream Egg!
Easter is almost here and that means Cream Eggs! So lets make a GIANT cream egg!!! You can definitely make this mousse in a glass or serving dish, but I am making it in a giant egg so I can crack it open! Yay! dessert and a show!
pre-smashing!
Lemon Curd
Yield: about 2 cups
1/2 cup Lemon Juice
1/2 cup Sugar
3 Eggs
1/2 cup Butter, cubed
In a pot bring your lemon juice to a boil on the stove.
which together your eggs and sugar in a bowl, set to the side.
Slowly pour the hot lemon juice into the eggs while constantly whisking until about 75% of your lemon juice has been whisked in.
Pour the egg mixture back into the pot and over a low-med heat on the stove, constantly stirring until the mixture begins to thicken.
Take off heat and then stir in the butter until melted.
Pour your lemon curd into a bowl and let chill in the fridge.
Lemon Cheesecake Mousse
Yield: about 4-5 cups
1 cup Lemon Curd
8 oz. Cream Cheese (1 cup), softened
1/4 teaspoon Salt
1 cup Whipped Cream
2/3 cup Icing Sugar
Whip your cream to medium peaks, set aside in the fridge.
in a mixer whip up your cream cheese and salt until soft.
Add your lemon curd to the cream cheese and using a whisk in the mixer, whip up until fluffy.
Add your icing sugar to the cream cheese mix, and whip until fluffy.
Using a spatula, fold your whipped cream into the cream cheese mix in 2-3 additions, folding as gently as possible to not deflate your mousse.
Pour into moulds or glasses!
Giant Egg Method
Yield: 1 giant egg!
You will need a giant easter egg that opens up to use as a mould
1 package of Candy Melts (I used white, but you can use any colour
Lemon Curd (just the leftovers from your mousse is perfect)
Lemon Cheesecake Mousse
Sprinkles and candies to decorate your egg
Line your easter egg with saran wrap on the inside of the egg, pressed as smoothly as possible against the sides and letting the excess go over the edge so you have something to grab onto when you want to pop out the egg shell from the mould.
Melt your candy melts in the microwave doing just 10 second intervals so you don’t burn the candy, you can also do this on a double boiler.
Once you candy melts are completely melted, using a small spatula or a spoon, brush the candy melts onto the saran wrap, it’s easiest to do a few layers, so brush your layer on, pop it in the fridge or freezer, once it’s hardened add another layer until your “shell” is thick enough that you can pop it out of the mould and it will stand on it’s own. I did 2 thick layers.
Fill your egg shells with the lemon cheesecake mousse, smoothing out the top so it is not higher than the edges.
In the centre of the mousse, scoop out an egg sized hole on both sides of the egg, as a yolk would be on a real egg.
Fill the hole with lemon curd.
Freeze your eggs until firm, I let them freeze overnight.
Once frozen, pop your eggs out of the moulds and remove the saran wrap.
Using a sharp knife, trim the edges until they are flat and the two halves will fit together.
Heat up your remaining candy melts and place them into a piping bag if you have one.
Pipe the candy melts around the edges and glue the two halves together, then smooth any candy melts that squished out with your finger.
Now using your candy melts as glue, decorate your egg using sprinkles and candies.
Your beautiful egg is not ready to go! Let it sit in the fridge for at least 4 hours so the mousse thaws and isn’t frozen!
Happy Easter!
Mini Egg Nanaimo Bars!!!!! Yes, you read that correctly!
Mini eggs - they’re my addiction! Normally I would be in the midst of making a zillion mini egg cakes and bunny shaped sugar cookies, but alas it’s quarantine! Now I have a ridiculous amount of mini eggs and all I want to do is eat them by the handful…which I do, but we should bake some too! Genius idea - MINI EGG NANAIMO BARS! It came to me as I was eating mini eggs out of a bowl like they were cereal and they are HEAVENLY!
Mini Egg Nanaimo Bars before slicing!
Mini Egg Nanaimo Bars
Yield: 8”x8” pan
Preheat your oven to 350*F
Base:
1 cup Graham Cracker Crumbs
3/4 cup Sweetened Coconut (or unsweetened)
1/2 cup Toasted Almonds, chopped up (can substitute another nut, or replace with graham cracker crumbs)
1/4 cup Cocoa Powder
1/4 cup Sugar
1/4 teaspoon Salt
1/3 cup Butter, melted
1 Egg
Icing Filling:
1/2 cup Butter, soft
2 Tablespoons Hot Chocolate Powder (or 1 Tablespoon Cocoa powder)
2 Tablespoons Milk
1 teaspoon Vanilla
2 cups Icing Sugar
1/4 cup Crushed Mini Eggs (I crushed them in a food processor)
Chocolate Topping:
3/4 cup Dark Chocolate (semi-sweet Chocolate chips will work great!)
1.5 Tablespoons Butter
2 Tablespoons Crushed Mini eggs
Roughly chopped mini eggs for top decor ~ 1/4 cup
In a bowl combine the base dry ingredients - graham cracker crumbs, coconut, almonds, cocoa, sugar, and salt. Stir to combine.
Add your melted butter and egg, and stir until combined.
Pour your base mixture into a parchment lined 8”x8” baking pan, and using your hands press it evenly over the base of the pan until its evenly covered and compacted.
Bake your base for about 10-15 minutes until it feels firm and you can’t see any liquid bits. Let cool.
Once your base is cool, in the bowl of a mixer combine your icing filling ingredients. Start with the milk and hot chocolate powder, stir them together to moisten the powder, then add all the other ingredients - butter, icing sugar, mini eggs, and vanilla extract. Mix on medium high speed until light and fluffy looking 4-6 minutes.
Smear the icing filling on top of your cooled base and evenly spread it out, trying to make the top as smooth as possible. Chill until firm, at least 30 minutes.
In a microwaveable bowl, or a double boiler (if you want to use a stove), melt together your chocolate and butter until fully melted.
Stir in the crushed mini eggs to the chocolate and quickly spread on top of the firm icing layer.
Sprinkle with more chopped mini eggs!
Chill until set, ideally 4 hours.
Cut and eat! These also freeze great!
Tiramisu! It's like we're at a fancy Italian Restaurant... when actually we can't leave the house!
Tiramisu! It just sounds delicious! This Italian dessert has layers of coffee soaked ladyfingers (which we made yesterday!), sandwiched with sweet fluffy mascarpone cheese filling, then topped with a sprinkle of cocoa powder! No Italian restaurant required!
This photo does not capture the deliciousness of this Tiramisu!
Tiramisu
Yield: 1 large serving dish, I believe my glass dish is about 2 litres, but use whatever pan you’ve got, the taller the container, the more layers you will get. You could also make this in a 9”x13” pan
Mascarpone Filling:
1 1/4 cup Whipping cream
4 Egg Yolks
1/2 cup Sugar
2 Tablespoons Frangelico - Traditionally this is made with Marsala wine, but I don’t have any, so use whatever liqueur you got!
pinch of Salt
1 1/4 cup Mascarpone Cheese, softened at room temperature
Ladyfinger Soaking Syrup :
2 cups of coffee
1/4 cup sugar
2 Tablespoons Frangelico (optional)
Approximately 24 ladyfingers (or one batch of the recipe we made yesterday)
Cocoa Powder - for dusting
In a shallow baking dish stir together your ladyfinger soaking syrup ingredients - coffee, sugar, Frangelico. Set this to the side.
In the bowl of your mixer (or by hand) whip the cream to soft peaks. Then leave in fridge until we are ready for it.
Get a pot with water simmering on the stove, we are going to do a water bath! Just an inch or two of water in the bottom of a large pot will be perfect.
Grab a metal bowl the will fit on top of your pot of water and in it place the egg yolks, sugar, Frangelico, and salt. Then stir them together and place it on top of the simmering water pot on the stove. The bowl should not be touching the water, we are just trying to steam the bottom of our bowl and cook the eggs so they are safe to eat.
Constantly stir your egg mixture while it is sitting on the waterbath until the eggs feel warm/hot and when you rub it between your fingers you cannot feel any grains of sugar. Then pour this mixture into the bowl of your mixer and whip on high until cool - it should be super fluffy and marshmallowy looking.
In a large bowl place your softened mascarpone cheese.
With a spatula fold in all of your egg mixture, being as gentle as you can so you don’t knock out too much air.
Now fold in about 1/3 of your whipped cream, again, being gentle!
Then fold in the rest of your cream. Now your filling is complete!
To layer your tiramisu you will start with a layer of ladyfingers. Grab one ladyfinger, dunk it into your coffee syrup on both sides and then place it into the bottom of your serving dish. Continue until you have fully covered the bottom of the pan (mine fit 8 cookies).
Now pour a layer of your mascarpone filling - my container would fit 3 layers of ladyfinger cookies, so I planned to do 3 layers of mascarpone filling, so I poured about 1/3 of the filling on top. but count up your ladyfingers in the base layer and see how many cookies you have for your baking dish and divide the filling evenly.
Continue to layer the soaked ladyfinger cookies, then the mascarpone filling until you use them all up.
Then lightly dust the top of your tiramisu with cocoa powder!
This baby is all finished now, it just needs to sit in the fridge for about 8 hours or overnight to let everything soak into each other.
Yum!