HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Whether you’re hosting a Halloween party, attending a potluck, or simply craving something sweet, Halloween rice krispie treats are a classic choice. Loved for their crispy texture, chewy marshmallow consistency, and endless decorating possibilities.
Rice Krispie treats have been around for about 85 years. Snap, crackle, pop! These three words have become synonymous with Rice Krispies, the breakfast cereal made from pieces of crisped rice that, when combined with milk, emit a noise that you can probably imagine while reading this. Regardless of the last time you enjoyed a bowl of Rice Krispies in the morning, it’s clear that the beloved brand exudes childhood nostalgia. The iconic mascot trio, memory-stimulating sound, shape, and aroma are embedded into many memories.
Rice Krispies Treats are a legendary confection with an undemanding recipe that has graced several generations. Not only are the possibilities endless with these delicious treats that kids and grown-ups can enjoy but they can bring a challenging cake shape to life while making the process so much more manageable. Intricately sculpted cakes often have a surprise inside: rice cereal treats. Swapping traditional batter for these crispy treats provides structure and strength to modeled cakes that you just can’t get with fondant and modeling chocolate alone. And the best part is, the method you use to sculpt the cake afterward isn’t that different than when you sculpt a traditional batter-filled cake.
For some tasty little Halloween treats this year, I’m making some cinnamon bun rice krispie rolls with a cream cheese frosting. I can think of a few kids & adults who will enjoy these!
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Cinnamon Bun Rice Krispie Rolls w/ Cream Cheese Frosting
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Instructions
Rice Krispies
Line a 10 x 15-inch jelly roll pan with parchment paper. Spray well with cooking spray. Set aside
In a large pot, melt marshmallows, butter, vanilla & cinnamon over low heat. Stir until melted & smooth. Remove from heat & stir in rice krispies. Scrape rice krispie mixture onto prepared pan. Using well buttered hands, press out evenly into pan. Let cool to room temperature.
Filling
In a small bowl, stir together brown sugar, butter, cinnamon & flour until creamy.
Assembly
Carefully spread filling onto the rice krispies. Sprinkle with pepita seeds. Roll up from the long side like a jelly roll while rice krispies are still flexible. Press firmly as you roll.
Place in fridge for 15-20 minutes. When it feels FIRM, cut into 1/2-inch slices using a serrated blade & sawing motion. You should get approximately 24 slices.
Frosting
Beat together cream cheese, vanilla & powdered sugar until smooth. Place in a piping bag & pipe a swirl onto each slice. Sprinkle with extra cinnamon if you wish. Keep in refrigerator.
Nothing tastes more like fall than fresh baked pumpkin goods. I love just about anything with pumpkin in it. It definitely wasn’t always that way but it’s amazing how your taste buds change as time passes.
My original thoughts were to make some German pumpkin plachinda. It was one of those wonderful things my mother used to make that got pushed into the back of my memory.
It seems most recipes you find on the internet make plachinda as individual pastry turnovers with a pumpkin filling. I think I recall my mother making it in a rectangle casserole dish with the pastry on the bottom and up the sides and the filling showing.
I decided to do some ‘recipe development’ and try making some German streuseltaler and top it with a sweet pumpkin (plachinda) filling.
Streuseltaler was inspired by the round shape of the taler, a silver coin used throughout Europe for almost four hundred years. Its name lives on in the currency called dollar.
Taler is a German word for coin, so the name of the dessert literally translates to streusel coin. Basically, a free form tart made with a yeast dough topped with a huge amount of streusel, sometimes filled with custard and often with a sugar glaze.
A traditional German streusel (streusel meaning something ‘strewn or scattered’ in German) bakes up into shortbread balls. It makes a crunchy, cookie-like top but is soft on the bottom where it meets the bread or fruit compote.
Streusel was first popularized in Germany. In its simplest form, it consists of flour, sugar and butter but gets even better with the addition of oatmeal, cinnamon and nuts …. just my opinion of course!
In the history of cooking, one could find recipes that have constantly changed and could be seen as a connecting link between modern times and our past. I guess this is my contribution to the evolution of plachinda.
For all of you who love pumpkin, here’s a treat you don’t want to miss!
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Pumpkin Streuseltaler
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Instructions
Dough
In a small bowl, add yeast, lukewarm water & 1 tsp sugar. Allow to sit about 10 minutes until frothy.
In a large bowl, combine yeast mixture, butter, salt, cinnamon, eggs & pumpkin puree. Mix well. Add flour, one cup at a time, until well combined. Knead dough for about 8-10 minutes or until smooth & soft. Place dough in a greased bowl, cover with a tea towel & allow to rise for about 1 hour or until double in size.
Filling
In a small dish, combine the filling ingredients, set aside.
Streusel Topping
In a small bowl, combine flour, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon & salt. With a pastry blender, cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Set aside.
Assembly & Baking
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Place dough on a lightly floured work surface & divide into 12 pieces. Form each piece into a ball & allow it to rest for about 5 minutes.
Space out the balls on parchment lined baking sheet. With fingertips or the back of a Tbsp., press out center of each ball to about 4-inch diameter. Add about a Tbsp of pumpkin filling to each dough piece & spread leaving a border around the outside.
Divide streusel topping evenly between the pastries. Allow to rise for about 15-20 minutes.
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Bake for about 10-12 minutes. Allow to cool completely on a wire rack. In the meantime, you can prepare the glaze.
Glaze
In a small dish, whisk powdered sugar & lemon juice to a thick glaze. When streuseltaler are cooled, drizzle with glaze.
Recipe Notes
- The picture at the bottom of the recipe is MY version of my mother's plachinda. I had posted it on a blog in October 2016. She used to serve this wonderful pastry when she made a white bean soup. At the time I thought it was an odd combination but it works! Another one of those 'taste of a memory' kind of comfort foods.
It’s the fall season, so bring on the chai flavored recipes! Fall can encompass many different flavors including apple, pumpkin, maple, cranberry and ginger just to name a few. To me, baked goods and chai spices are a no-brainer. Traditionally, chai is made into a tea which consists of milk, spices, sweetener, and black tea. Chai spices can be used for so much more than just tea. Once you make your basic chai spice recipe, there are so many ways to utilize it.
Chai can include several different spices. Cardamom is the most common ingredient, followed by a mixture of cinnamon, ginger, star anise and cloves. Pepper and coriander, nutmeg and fennel are also used but they are slightly less common.
In the winter of 2011, Brion and I traveled Turkey for a month. We were meeting with the Trafalgar tour group in Istanbul. Arriving a day early gave us time to ‘snoop’ around a bit. Next to our hotel was a ‘Starbucks’, so we went in. When Brion ordered my coffee, they gave me a ‘Pumpkin Spice Chai Latte’ by mistake. That (pumpkin) chai flavor was just incredible. I have been addicted to it ever since.
A stay in Istanbul would not be complete without a traditional and unforgettable boat excursion up the Bosphorus, that winding strait that separates Europe and Asia. Its shores are a mixture of past and present, grand splendor and simple beauty. Modern hotels stand next to shore-front wooden villas, marble palaces in contrast to rustic stone fortresses and elegant compounds neighboring small fishing villages. Since Turkey actually straddles two separate continents, its culture features strong elements and traditions from both east and west. At that point in time, we found Turkey a relaxed country to travel in which made our time there very enjoyable.
These crescent rolls are a shortcut to making the classic cinnamon rolls using cream cheese pastry and that incredible flavor of the chai spice. Yum!
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Chai Cinnamon Crescents
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Instructions
Chai Spice Filling
Whisk together all chai spices with brown sugar. Set aside.
Crescents
Preheat oven to 350 F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder & salt. With a pastry blender, cut in cream cheese & shortening until mixture resembles coarse peas. Stir in milk. On a lightly floured work surface, knead dough gently about 20 times.
Form dough in a ball then roll out into a 14-inch circumference. Spread butter over the surface of dough then spread spice/sugar combo (all but 1 tsp needed for drizzle) evenly over the butter.
Cut circle into 12-14 equal wedges. Roll each wedge from the outside edge to form a crescent shape. Slightly curve each one & place on baking sheet.
Bake for about 20 minutes or until pastry is baked. Remove from oven & place on wire cooling rack.
Drizzle
In a small bowl, beat together cream cheese & butter until smooth. Add 1/2 tsp chai spice mix, powdered sugar, salt & vanilla. Beat until well combined then add enough milk to make a drizzle consistency. When crescents are cool, drizzle & serve.
While I’ll never grow tired of the classic pairing of strawberries and rhubarb, I love rhubarb too much to let it simply be a sidekick to those sweet berries. Not only can it hold its own, but it also begs to be matched up with many other flavors that give it new life.
Eating seasonally doesn’t have to be difficult when it tastes so delicious. Finding inventive ways to incorporate locally grown, seasonal fruits and vegetables into breakfast, lunch, and dinner dishes is actually a very easy task.
When making desserts, chocolate and rhubarb bring very different flavors to the table. The result makes a perfect balance. High-cacao chocolate is rich, subtly sweet, and creamy. Fresh rhubarb, meanwhile, is tart and comes into its own when offset by a dash of sweetness.
Celebrate rhubarb season with a stellar dessert like fudgy rhubarb brownies.
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Chocolate Rhubarb Brownies
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Instructions
Preheat oven to 375 F. Line an 8 x 8-inch baking pan with parchment paper.
In a medium-sized bowl, whisk sugar, butter, eggs & vanilla.
In a large bowl, whisk flour, cocoa powder, baking powder & sea salt.
Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients & mix until they are just incorporated. Add the rhubarb, chocolate chips & nuts. Mix only until they are combined. The batter will be quite thick. Pour batter into baking pan & spread it out so that it is even.
Bake for 20-25 minutes or just until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean. DO NOT OVERBAKE.
Remove brownies from the oven & allow to cool for at least 10 minutes. Slice into squares.
Since stone fruit is so gorgeous when in season, why not make a fruit tart? Not just an ordinary fruit tart, but one bursting with an array of colorful fruit and roasted to bring out all the natural sweetness.
I like this tart in the fall made with apples, but since we can enjoy the seasons stone fruit bounty right now, let’s take advantage of it. When we were shopping for fruit, we came across some apricots called raspberry apricots. Their flavor is absolutely incredible. Of course the plum/apricot cross (pluots) is pretty special as well. I decided on a nice cinnamon-y pastry to highlight all these wonderful fruit flavors!
Roasting stone fruits concentrates their sweetness and flavor, creating a depth of taste unrivaled by a regular fruit salad. The cornstarch in the filling acts as a thickener to prevent the fruit juices from making the base soggy while it bakes. And the open-faced top exposes the fruit to the oven’s heat, allowing it to caramelize and concentrate its flavor. What’s not to love!
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Roasted Fruit Tart w/ Cinnamon Crust
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Instructions
Crust
In a bowl, combine flour, sugar, cinnamon & salt. Cut in butter with a fork or finger tips to form a crumbly mixture. Drizzle in beaten egg & combine until mixture just begins to come together. Lightly press mixture into the bottom & up the sides of a 14 x 4 x 1-inch tart pan. Chill until firm while you prepare the filling.
Filling
Toss prepared fruit with sugar, cornstarch, lemon zest & juice, vanilla & salt.
Assembly
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Arrange fruit mixture over pastry in pan. Press down slightly into pan.
Bake until the fruit is soft & cooked through, the fruit juices are bubbling & the crust is a golden brown about 40-50 minutes. Remove from oven & allow to cool for about 20-30 minutes.
Pumpkin angel food?! That’s probably not what you’d expect when you think of angel food cake or pumpkin, but this recipe is actually a very tasty combo.
Of course, pumpkin-based desserts are a traditional fall dessert, so I am sure that you will be surprised that I am posting this pumpkin angel food cake recipe in April. It seems I have some pumpkin puree that’s in the freezer just waiting to be used before we get too far into the spring and summer season.
Brion has always loved angel food, so I thought why not add the pumpkin puree to kick it up a notch. Pairing it with the right fruits can also enhance its flavors. Instead of frosting or a whipped topping I am making some caramelized apples and raisins spiced with anise and cardamom.
- Anise has a distinct licorice-like flavor. It adds depth and enhances the overall aromatic profile of the compote.
- Cardamom is a fragrant spice with citrusy and herbal notes. It adds warmth and sophistication and complements pumpkin beautifully.
For a cake that’s quite sweet, some salted pepita seeds sprinkled on top are a bit of necessary and delicious balance.
Simply put, it’s an easy cake mix recipe dressed up with warm spices and pumpkin purée served with caramelized apples, raisins and salted pepita seeds. Yum!
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Pumpkin Angel Food Mini Bundt Cakes
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Ingredients
Pumpkin Angel Food Mini Bundt Cakes
Caramelized Apples & Raisins
Ingredients
Pumpkin Angel Food Mini Bundt Cakes
Caramelized Apples & Raisins
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Instructions
Cake
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In a large mixing bowl combine everything except the Angel Food Cake mix and ingredients to prepare cake. Mix until combined. Set aside.
In a different bowl combine the Angel Food Cake mix and ingredients required to make the cake. Carefully fold in 1/4 of the batter into the pumpkin mixture. Then gently fold in the rest of the batter.
Carefully pour or spoon into an 24 ungreased mini bunt cake pans. Place pans in oven on the middle rack.
Bake for 15 -20 minutes or until cake is golden brown and springs back. Immediately invert pans onto a wire rack.
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Serve with caramelized apples & raisins & a dollop of whipped topping. Sprinkle with salted pepita seeds.
Apples & Raisin Compote
In a medium saucepan, melt butter then add water & sugar. When the caramel is golden brown, add the raisins, swirling them into the caramel.
When raisins begin to plump, add apples & orange zest, then sprinkle with spices. Lower heat & simmer 5-10 minutes to thicken.
Do not overcook compote as it will thicken when cooled.
