Salted Caramel Pretzel Brownies

I became inspired to make something like these brownies once I successfully made this salted caramel recipe from Averie Cooks. If you think you want to take a crack at making your own caramel sauce, if you like caramel (I've said it before, but for the record--and you can write this down--I thought I didn't until I made some), you should give it a go. You just lay out all your ingredients before starting (because you can't be measuring out ingredients while you've got sugar boiling), and then it's mostly just watching it to make sure it doesn't burn. I've made it three times now, and my sugar starts to become caramel around 12-13 minutes of boiling.

But I digress. Go for it if you want (I have faith in you, dear reader). I've laid out some photos of what the process might look like below. Or, you can use jarred caramel sauce. That's part of the beauty of this recipe. Although multilayered, this recipe can be as easy as you want. These brownies are ridiculous and unnecessary. They are over the top and stupid indulgent. People love them. The pretzel crust (adapted from the crust in this recipe) is pretty thick and crunchy, and the brownie base I used is cocoa brownies (sans sea salt)--the now standard in our house. I've made them a few times, and each time I varied the recipe slightly to a different end.

In the first run through, I added the caramel about 10 minutes before the end of the brownies' cooking time. Once finished, you couldn't see the caramel at all, as it had baked into the brownie itself. Ultimately, I was needlessly disappointed--they still had a great salted caramel taste, but I disliked that the caramel's presence wasn't visually apparent. The second time through, I added the caramel just a minute or two before pulling them out of the oven, so there was a layer of melty caramel on top that would slide around as you tilted the pan. While nice to look at initially, it made cutting them very difficult (i.e., they looked like a nightmare when I was done) and would make packaging them next to impossible.

What I ended up doing in this final run through was to add the caramel about 5-7 minutes before taking them out of the oven, settling on the fact that they would be a little messy to cut but that there would still be a little caramel pooled at the top. An alternative way of doing it would be to use the first method (baking it into the top), cutting the brownies, and then drizzling a thin ribbon of caramel over them in a nice pattern. Something to consider. Onto the goods.

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread Squares with Coconut Streusel

I'd been meaning to make use of some old bananas hanging out on my counter for a while now, and I decided to try to adapt this pumpkin bar recipe from Kelly at Meals for Miles (if you are into reading about evidenced-based nutrition and high-volume running, give her blog a read). I've made her recipe several times, and I love it because it's flavorful, pumpkin, dense, and it comes together super easily. Anything I can make in the evening without waking the baby up is a plus. I figured I could easily swap the pumpkin for banana and change some of the spices around and such, and I'd have a similar recipe going on. Except that it wasn't, not really. What I ended up with instead of a dense bar was a soft bread-like baked good, which, in retrospect, shouldn't have been surprising. What I wanted was banana bar, and what I ended up with was banana bread in an 8 x 8 bar pan. 

I was disappointed as I went to taste my first bite, thinking to myself that I'd do better in the next run-through . However, although the texture was not what I'd anticipated, both it and the flavor were excellent. I had a second huge piece just to be extra sure that I wasn't disappointed any longer... The base was almost fluffy and quite moist, and because I liked the addition of the streusel topping so much, it's going to be difficult to stop myself from putting it on everything.Also, although the streusel contains dairy, the bread itself is vegan. I'm going to toy with a streusel topping made with coconut oil in future recipes, so check back if that's something you're interested in. 

I let a friend take some of the bread home (because I'm trying to save myself from myself), and she reported back that it was the best banana bread she's ever had. In short, it may not be a great bar, it is some hella good banana bread. Happy accidents, y'all. Give those old bananas some new life. 

Grapefruit Shortbread Bars

I've relayed to you my penchant for apple cinnamony things. You know what's also up there? Citrus. You know what's also in season pretty much year-round? That's right--pucker up, y'all. I started thinking about doing something with citrus when I was running around our local farmer's market a few weeks ago. Although I really long for the summery days when the stalls are overflowing with zucchini, tomato, and corn, I still go in the winter because I gotta get outta the house every once in a while with this baby, and because the eggs are absolutely ridiculous. Yard eggs, farmed eggs, whatever they are. They're amazing and beautiful, and I love them over easy (whites cooked all the way through fortheloveofallthatisholy!) on some avocado toast. Or some sauteed spinach and mushrooms. Or on, like, just a plate. In any case, if you have the opportunity to support your local farmers and get some delicious eggs that were probably laid yesterday, I highly suggest you do.

Anyway, in addition to the eggs, I also got some citrus--grapefruit. I feel as though grapefruit don't get as much love as the lemon in baking. Or as much as the blood orange, which I see everywhere in blog recipes, but I have yet to find a blood orange in my local area (although if you do happen upon them, lemme know, because I've got plans laid out...). The grapefruit is like the citrus people eat while they're dieting, and it doesn't have to be! Just as it has a place next to the dieter's fat-free cottage cheese and hard-boiled egg breakfast, it has a place in delicious baked goods. Case in point--these grapefruit bars. They're a play on the classic lemon bar, which I love.

 Like lemon bars, these have a basic shortbread crust that comes together easily. The filling is tart, sweet, and rich. When I first tested this recipe and brought it out along with the salted caramel pretzel brownie and king cupcakes, I honestly thought it would be overlooked. I was pleasantly surprised to find that people seemed more eager to try the grapefruit bar than either of the other two. Perhaps they shared my love of citrus, or perhaps they were simply curious--either way, those who tried it definitely seemed to enjoy it. I know I did.

I juiced the grapefruit with this helpful guy I bought at Publix. 

Mardi Gras King Cupcakes

Welcome back! It shouldn't be a secret that I don't know what I'm doing. That is to say I have no formal training in cooking, let alone baking. I actually used to shun baking because it required too much precision and felt a little too much like college-level introductory chemistry lab (which, if I'm being honest, I did not pass the first go-around). I liked stove top cooking where I could just throw mostly whatever I wanted in all willy nilly--amounts, temperature, time--and I was good to go as long as I didn't burn the garlic. Slowly, I began to embrace aspects of baking. The cookie. The quick bread. The crisp. The cupcake. You know what I wasn't prepared for?

A yeast bread. A baking feat that involves caring for a living thing--an organism that requires a particular temperature in its environment and, like, food. Last year, I probably would've shied away from this task, but now that I've got four months of baby-rearing under my belt, I figure I can feed some yeasties. So, after that pep talk, I decided to dive in and make some sort of king cake treat--cupcakes seemed like the way to go. 

After some thorough scouring of the Internet for instructions on how to deal with this dough without a KitchenAid stand mixer, I think I figured it out. So, if you're like me, and you're new enough to this game that you don't yet have a need for such an expensive piece of baking equipment, bust out your hands. According to the folks who know, it's good to start familiarizing yourself with these doughs by hand and then moving to a mixer. #Winning? 

The most important things I took away from this experience were that I needed a kitchen thermometer, I had to be careful not to add too much flour to the dough, and that working with the dough was like trying to put hosiery on an octopus. I'm just not accustomed to it quite yet, but I'll get there. The nice thing about this recipe is that even if you mangle the dough as you're trying to roll it up before slicing it, it doesn't really matter. You end up putting the slices/pieces/jaggedy chunks of dough into muffin tins (I highly recommend silicon liners if you have them), and they come out of the oven golden brown, twisty, cinnamony, and beautiful. 

These festive little cupcakes have a light base that's flavorful yet not too sweet, finished up with a lemon cream cheese frosting and colored sugar. If you're looking to bake a Mardi Gras treat, and you too have been looking to step outside of your cookie-quickbread baking comfort zone, I highly suggest that you give these goodies a go. I've tried to lay out the recipe in such a way that the you can easily see the steps (super photo heavy)--it's definitely one worth attempting. 

Let the Good Times Roll, y'all!

Call for Testers: 12th Avenue Flea V-Day Extravaganza!

This post will not be as photo-laden as previous ones because it's mostly to say that I've got some recipes that I'm testing, and I'm looking for some folks to both take them off of my hands and give me some constructive feedback before I finalize the recipes and throw them into the Internet ether.

Where will I be?
I'll be out at the 12th Avenue Flea, located out in front of the old Sacred Heart building (1010 N. 12th Ave, Pensacola, Florida 32501) this Saturday, February 14, from 11 a.m. - 2 p.m. I'll be sharing a table with my mad-crafter sister of Felt Up Good fame.

I'm not selling the baked goods. I'm just giving them away. There may be a tip jar if eaters feel compelled to contribute to the Sugar-Butter-Flour fund, but that's about it. At this point, that's not my goal--I just want to make treats that people like, and it's easier to do that if both the goods and I leave my kitchen from time to time.

What are the Goods?
Here's the tentative plan:
Salted Caramel Pretzel-Crusted Brownies
Grapefruit Shortbread Bars
Mardi Gras King Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

The brownies will make use of the salted caramel I figured out how to make earlier this week.

I've never been a huge fan of caramel, but I think it might just be that I'd never had anything but store-bought or pre-made caramel. To me, this stuff tastes... rounder? I have a hard time describing it. It seems to have more depth than what I'd remembered caramel-flavored things having. It's sweet (because it's sugar), salty (salt), rich (cream), and it has layers of flavor, probably from the caramelization and the vanilla... I don't actually know anything about candy making. This project was all totally new to me, and I can certainly write about it more coherently after taking several more cracks at it. I thought it would be far more difficult than it was, which is how I feel about a lot of aspects of baking. Thus, this blog. 

The grapefruit bars will be similar to a traditional lemon bar. I have always been a huge grapefruit fan, and I've been seeing them all over at the farmer's market, so I thought I'd make use of them. Although I've never actually seen or tasted a grapefruit bar before, I've been reassured by Pinterest that others have thought of them before. As such, this will just be my take on it. 

The cupcakes are the most ambitious good I'm attempting, as they utilize a yeast dough, something not in my repertoire, not even a little bit. And I don't have a fancy stand mixer. Don't worry. Even if it all goes south, and I end up breaking my hands trying to knead dough, you'll at least have brownies and citrus bars. 

Come on down. Try some treats. Check out some softies. Say hello. 

Curious about the 12th Avenue Flea?

Check them out on Facebook .

Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cookies

I know I made those sweet (& salty) brownies last time, but I’m decidedly not a chocolate fan. This is not to say that when given the option of choconilla swirl, I go strict vanilla—I don’t. I’m not a maniac. I’m just not as into chocolate as the rest of you people. I understand I’m in the minority, and I’m cool with it. The way I see it, I’m doing you a favor—more chocolate for the general population. So what’s my “chocolate,” then? Although the question is a difficult one, the general answer is fruity such and suches, but not “fruit-flavored”—cherries and grapes do not taste like that.

A fruit-and-flavor (not to be confused with “fruit-flavored”) combo that I’m super into, especially when it’s a might chilly, is apple and cinnamon. To me, it’s the perfect blend of crispness, tart, sweet, and warmth. There’s that pop of fruit sugar and tang, and the spice of the cinnamon to really round it out. These buttery oatmeal cookies came out pretty much exactly how I wanted them to, and I barely had a fully formed plan beyond “apple and cinnamon is happening.” 

After looking at several oatmeal cookie recipes, I pulled bits and pieces from quite a few. I’m pleased with the blends—butter and coconut oil; whole wheat and all-purpose flour; cinnamon and cinnamon chips. A note on the cinnamon chips—they aren’t always easy to find, and, really, although they add to the cookie, but they don’t make or break it, in my opinion. Without them, I would just double the amount of cinnamon (that’s right! DOUBLE IT!).  If you wanted to try a vegan adaptation of this recipe, I would suggest replacing the butter with coconut oil and replacing the egg with flax eggs (1 tbsp. of ground flax + 3 tbsp. of water per egg; let sit about 5 minutes before using) or your favorite vegan egg replacement (e.g., Ener-G, Bob's Red Mill, etc.).  

Sweetheart Edition: Cocoa Brownies with Sea Salt

"Artist" Rendition of the Love of My Life

The Love of My Life doesn't really smile for a lot of photos. As such, this doodle I drew of him about a year ago will serve--it's pretty accurate. Big huge beard. Broad shoulders. Dimples. Cleft chin. Lifts big. Trust me. It's all there; you just can't tell because of the huge beard. He's super picky, but he'll tell you that he's just a man who loves good, simple food. I love to cook (obvs), and I do it fairly often. He'll eat what I cook because he loves me and because he's a good man, but being a man of incredibly discerning palate (i.e., he so picky, you guys), there are but a handful of dishes about which he's gotten truly excited. Those dishes, and ones that are inspired by his tastes, will be highlighted in this and other "Sweetheart Editions."And in the interest of the coming romantic-times holiday, I thought I'd bake something for the Love of My Life.

I found this recipe last year when Buzzfeed had posted this article on sexy brownies.  Keeping in mind his penchant for simplicity, I opted to bake my love the most straightforward of the recipes--Cocoa Brownies with Sea Salt. They come together quite easily: I happened to already have all the necessary ingredients just hanging around. AND since the first step involves melting the butter down in a double-boiler-type setup, you don't have to worry about softening it first. I must admit that I'm kind of the worst about remembering to set up my butter beforehand. Easy come, easy go--you make these one night, and they are gone the next morning!

Enough jibber jabber--here's how I made them.

Dreamy Loaded Pumpkin Loaf

Gather ‘round for a treat, people! I know that pumpkin season is dwindling (or has been over for months…), but I was either grossly pregnant or in the midst of newborn chaos during OMGPumpkinMania ’14. As such, I’m giving you the blog recipe equivalent of the latergram.  This hearty bread is not only relatively healthy—its base is white wheat, and its fat content is reduced by the addition of pumpkin and Greek yogurt—but it also contains enough goodies that you won’t feel like you’re missing out. What I’m getting at is although 2015 is still fresh, January’s over, y’all. Put some dark chocolate in dat bread.

The inspiration for this recipe was this cookie recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction—I made them for coworkers back when pumpkin was holiday-appropriate, and I highly recommend them. Weeks later, when I was in labor (hour 12 or thereabouts) and was taking an epidural-nap, I could only dream about food because I hadn’t eaten in forever. Thus, the concept for this bread was born. There was also a baby in there somewhere, but this isn’t that type of blog.

Many aspects of this loaf are flexible. The recipe uses white wheat flour, so you get the nutritional benefit of whole wheat without some of the denseness that often accompanies it; however, if you don’t have that on hand, a blend of whole wheat and all purpose will also get the job done. The add-ins can also be adapted to what you’re into—some variations we at Kitchen Elise have considered are cinnamon chips, walnuts, cranberries, white chocolate chips. I don’t want to say that the pepitas make this bread, but they did speak to me in my dream.

Loaded Pumpkin Loaf

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 60 - 70 minutes

Total Time: ~ 1 hour, 30 minutes

Yields: 1 loaf

Serving Size: I'm not gonna tell you how to live your life. 

Ingredients

1 ½ c. white wheat flour (or you can use a combination of whole-wheat and all-purpose)

1 tsp. baking soda

¼ tsp. ground cinnamon

½ tsp. pumpkin pie spice

¼ tsp. kosher salt

1/3 c. granulated sugar

½ c. light brown sugar

2 large eggs

2 tbsp. vegetable oil (or canola or melted coconut oil)

1 ½ c. pumpkin puree

½ c. Greek yogurt (I used non-fat plain)

1 tsp. vanilla extract

¼  c. chopped pecans

1/3 c. dark chocolate chips

¼ c. pepitas

1/2 c. sweetened coconut flakes, toasted

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x5 loaf pan with butter or cooking spray (I used Pam for baking because how else am I supposed to use that stuff up?). Set aside.

In a medium bowl, add the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, spice, and salt. Whisk it up, and set it aside.

Spread coconut flakes onto a baking sheet, and toast in the oven for 4-7 minutes. Be sure to check on them frequently, as they will burn quickly. Once done, set aside to cool.

In a large bowl, beat together (I used a hand mixer) both sugars and eggs until thick and pale tan. Stir in the oil, pumpkin, yogurt, and vanilla. Then, slowly fold in the flour mixture, followed by the add-ins. Stir until just combined—do not over mix.

Pour into loaf pan, and bake for 60-70 minutes (minute was done in 62), or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let cool on wire rack and serve. Pat yourself on the back.

Ta Daaa! 

Have any suggestions for other mix-ins or variations? 

Anything you'd like to see me attempt to bake?
Did you try to make this and find my recipe incomprehensible? 

I wanna hear about it. Leave me a comment. 

What Is This?

WELCOME!

Hullo! Thanks for dropping in. I’m Elise, and the kitchen is my jam. I’m a self-teaching cooking enthusiast constantly learning through cooking trial and error, triumphs and fails. Although I enjoy the freedom and empowerment that came with initially gaining the knowledge and skills to cook seriously satisfying (and often nutritious) meals for myself, I’ve more recently found more fulfillment in cooking for others. For one, it’s just not the same when I tell myself that I did a bang up job and all the flour in my hair or beet juice staining my hands was worth it. Really, there’s something special about knowing that others enjoy the fruits of my kitchen labor—it fuels my cooking mania.

Baking up scones with a bun in the oven.

The purpose of this blog is to document my experiences in creating delectibles to share with others and in honing a craft to which I’m still relatively new—baking. Baking is pretty fickle and unforgiving, but its end products seem to bring people great gustatory satisfaction. I’m aiming to develop, test, and post mostly original recipes that I’ve come up with on my own or adapted from a variety of other recipes. I will also, from time to time, share recipes from other sources that I’ve just particularly enjoyed and that others have requested time and again. Having others hang out with me across the counter as I bop around making goodies is one of my favorite ways to spend time—this blog is a manifestation of that. My goal is to post around 3-4 times a week, so be sure to check back often.

Blueberry Peach Cobbler

TLDR: I’m Elise. Kitchen jammin. Mostly baked goods. Mostly my own. Sometimes other foods that were big hits. Bop around the cyber kitchen with me.   

P. S. Have a question? Want to see me attempt something? Interested in being a taste tester? Leave a comment.