Dirt Cake

I found this unfinished post from nearly a year ago that I apparently started and never finished. Oops! Oh, well, it doesn't lessen the awesomeness of this dessert, one of my all time favorites!

Dirt Cake

I'm in the middle of my summer vacation here at my mom's house in Maine and having a fabulous time.  I love it here.  The weather has been (mostly) beautiful and we've had an enjoyable time relaxing by the pool and just enjoying what Maine has to offer (which is lots, by the way.)

But, being away from my own home isn't going to keep me out of the kitchen!  But turning on the oven on a hot day? No, thank you.  So, when we had a beautiful day earlier this week and had company in the form of one of my favorite people in the world, I wanted a cool and easy dessert.  Dirt cake totally fit the bill.  Normal dirt cake is made with classic Oreos and vanilla pudding, but I like to shake things up a bit. Sometimes, I use lemon cookies and pudding and call it sand cake!

Ingredients:

1 lb Orea cookies (I'm cheap and used generic Oreos, chocolate ones and yellow ones)

8 oz cream cheese (I prefer the lower fat neufchâtel)

1/2 cup softened margarine

1 cup powdered sugar

12 oz Cool Whip

2 small boxes instant vanilla pudding

3 cups milk

1 tsp vanilla

In a large bowl, mix the sugar, margarine and cream cheese until well blended and smooth (make sure there are no lumps!) Fold in the Cool Whip.

Either in a food processor or in a large ziploc bag with a rolling, crush the cookies (but not too fine, a little bit chunky is okay). 

For one large dessert, layer half the cookies at the bottom on a 13x9 pan, spread all of the filling on top and then top with the remaining cookies. Chill for at least a few hours.

For individual desserts, layer in small bowls. Clear dessert bowls work best :) Enjoy!

Whoopie Pies!

Did you know that whoopie pies originated in Maine?  Pennsylvanians will try to tell you that they invented them, but don't believe them.  They are definitely from Maine.  I LOVE whoopie pies.  Two cakey cookies, with frosting in the middle?  What could be better?  And they are so adaptable. You can make different sizes, different flavors for the filling and the cake, there are tons of possibilities.  I've made traditional ones (dark chocolate cake, vanilla filling) and pumpkin cakes with cream cheese filling.  And I've had apple ones and I got a HUGE maple one at the Fryeburg Fair in Maine last year (THAT one was amazing.)  I want to make red velvet ones.  I love red velvet.  And I think banana would be yummy, too.  With cream cheese filling.

My munchkin had his last day of preschool and to celebrate, they had a party for the kids.  So of course, I brought dessert.  I had in my mind an idea of a cake that I wanted to make, but it didn't work out because I didn't have time the night before.  I had finals for grad school that I really had to work on and so I couldn't devote HOURS to baking.  I wanted to make whoopie pies for the kids, because it needed to be something kid friendly and little sandwiches are easy for little hands.  So, I decided on mini whoopie pies for the kiddos and one large cake size whoopie pie for the adults.

Little people like simple, so I went with classic chocolate cakes and vanilla filling.  This recipe is  from one in a magazine called Fresh that is published by the grocery store Hannaford.  Here's a link to the original, but I left out the instant coffee.  Preschoolers don't need coffee, even in minuscule amounts.



Whoopie Pies
3/4 cups unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cups packed brown sugar
2 eggs
3 cups flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350F.  As always, I use my baking stones which are well seasoned and do not need to be sprayed or lined.  Regular baking sheets should be lined with parchment or sprayed with cooking spray.
In a medium mixing bowl, stir together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.  Set aside.  Measure out buttermilk and add vanilla and set aside.
With an electric mixer on medium speed, mix butter and brown sugar until well blended.  Add eggs one at a time and continue mixing until smooth.
Add half of the flour mixture to the butter and sugar mixture and mix on medium until smooth.  Add half the buttermilk mixture and continue to mix on medium speed, scraping the sides when necessary.  Add the remaining flour and then the remaining buttermilk, mixing until smooth after each addition and continuing to scrape the sides of the bowl.

For my large, cake size whoopie pie, I scooped several spoonfuls of batter on to the baking stone and smoothed it out into a large circle, about 8-9 inches across and baked them for 14 minutes.  For my mini whoopie pies, I used small spoonfuls (about a tablespoon) and baked them for about 10 minutes.  But for normal sized pies, about 2-3 tablespoons should be sufficient.  Cakes should be puffy, but still soft to the touch.  Let cool for about 3 minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.

Vanilla Filling
3/4 cups unsalted butter
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 3/4 cups sifted confectionary sugar
3 cups marshmallow creme  (Fluff is best, but not available everywhere)



With an electric mixer on medium speed, mix butter and vanilla until well mixed and creamy.  Add half of the confectionary sugar and mix on low to combine then on high.  Add the rest and mix again, scraping sides as necessary.
Add marshmallow creme and mix until filling is fluffy and smooth.

For the big whoopie pie, I slathered on several large dollops of filling, smoothed it out and added the top.

The little ones took about a teaspoon of filling.

The fickle preschoolers seemed to like them, although, some licked out the filling and others just ate the cakes.  And the big one came out great, too.


 I think next time, red velvet.  Or maybe gingerbread ones around Christmastime...

Chocolate-Cherry Lattice Squares

Sometimes, I need a dessert.  Quick.  So I look in my pantry and see what I have and what I can come up with.

I needed something the other night and I had this recipe for these peanut butter squares, made with peanut butter chips.  My husband informed me that he doesn't do peanut butter in desserts (who knew?) so I modified the recipe somewhat and this is what I came up with.  I can't give credit for the original recipe where I got my inspiration, though.  It was written in my beloved recipe book, so maybe it was my grandmother's?

Chocolate-Cherry Squares, with whipped cream and with rocky road ice cream
Served in my pretty new (to me) 1930s Depression glass dessert bowls

Chocolate-Cherry Lattice Squares
2 cups chocolate chips
1 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 can cherry pie filling (I had this in the pantry, I have no idea WHY)

Heat oven to 375.  Microwave chocolate chips 1 minute, stir and heat an additional 30 seconds at a time until melted and smooth. It took only a minute and a half for these to melt.

Yum, a bowl full of chocolate!

Beat butter and sugar until creamy and fluffy.  Add in eggs and vanilla.   Blend in melted chocolate.  Add dry ingredients.
Divide the dough in half.  Place half in refrigerator.  In a 9x13" pan, press the other half of the dough into the bottom of the pan.  This part is tricky, because the dough is a little sticky and it tries to pull up as you are pressing it down.  Once it is as smooth as you can get it, bake for 10 minutes.

Press the dough into the bottom of the pan.  Don't bake the spatula.

Once cooled, pour the pie filling over the baked layer.  Roll chilled dough between two pieces of waxed paper.  Cut into strips and place over pie filling in a lattice fashion.  Bake for an additional 20-25 minutes.

Just out of the oven, the cherry is all bubbly

We had company over and these got great reviews.  I believe the quote was "We get the greatest treats whenever we come over here!"  And then tonight, after having them again for dessert, my husband told me they were fabulous, just like me.  He's a keeper.

I would make these again, but I think I'd try doing a half batch and using a 9x9" pan.  This made a lot.  I'd also like to try making them with a homemade filling.  I like to do homemade whenever possible, but I was in a time crunch the other night and I had the pie filling available.  

Easter Cupcakes and an "Egg Hunt" Cake

No sooner did I finish the great birthday cake experiment, and Easter was upon us.  My 4 year old is now in preschool (!) and they had a little Easter party.  Of course, I signed up for a dessert.  But what do you make for twenty 3-4 year olds?  Cupcakes, of course!

I hauled my cupcake pan back out (which really does require some hauling, since it is a stoneware pan and weighs about 10 lbs) and make my trusty chocolate cake recipe again, this time in cupcake form.  It's the same recipe I used for the birthday cake and you can find it here.  This time I baked the cupcakes for about 30 minutes.

I decided to make Easter Basket cupcakes, minus the handles.  I skipped the handles (to have been made with Twizzlers) mostly because I ran out of time that morning.  Oh, well.  Now I have a bag of Twizzlers.  Handles or no, these were INCREDIBLY easy to make.  And yummy.  Twenty preschoolers will agree.

I started off icing the cupcakes with green tinted buttercream icing, the same as I used on the birthday cake.  I thinned it out slightly with about a tablespoon of milk.  Then I added the "grass."  I used green food coloring to tint shredded coconut and then I rolled each cupcake in the coconut.

And to finish them off, I added three Easter M&Ms to each cupcake to look like Easter eggs.  You might notice that there is ONE cupcake, on the lower right, that has no coconut.  A certain 4 year old decided at the last minute that he does not like coconut (who knew?) so I had to scrape it off and re-ice it for him.

Voila!  Easter cupcakes!

So, for the "Egg Hunt" cake, I needed another quick dessert for ANOTHER party on the same day.  I had leftover green icing and green coconut (what else was I going to do with them?) and leftover M&Ms.  So I made a half recipe of chocolate cake, iced the whole thing in pan after it cooled, sprinkled on the coconut and added the "eggs" and that was it.  I didn't have to show up at the party empty handed.

And now that Easter is over, my sweet tooth is ACHING!  Too much candy, too many sweets.  I think I'll bake something more fruity and less sugary next.

A Birthday Cake of Epic Proportions

My little boy just turned four years old and we had his birthday party over the weekend.  I gave him his choice of party themes and, surprise, he chose Buzz Lightyear.  So, I love to make a decorate his birthday cake every year and I wanted this year's to just be amazing.  I searched online for inspiration and, not finding what I was looking for, ended up just kind of winging it.

What I didn't wing, was the cake recipe itself. Like many other things that I cook and/or bake, I have go-to cake recipes.  I am a self professed chocolate fiend.  My son (weirdo) prefers yellow cake.  So this one had a little of both.  My go-to chocolate cake is actually part of another recipe .  I have been making it for years.  It is the BEST chocolate cake and whenever I make it, I always get requests for the recipe.  The birthday party was no exception.

Rich Cocoa Squares
2/3 plus 1/4 cup oil
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
2 eggs
2 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups cold water

Combine all ingredients and mix thoroughly.  Pour into a 9"x13" pan.  On top of raw batter, sprinkle 1 cup of chocolate bits and 1 cup chopped walnuts.

Bake 30 minutes at 350.

So, that's the whole recipe.  But I use the basic cake recipe whenever I want to make chocolate cake for anything else.  I use it for cupcakes and two layer cakes.  It is moist and chocolatey and like I said, it always gets compliments.  It's also a "dump all the ingredients in the bowl and mix" cake.  For this cake, I used a 9 inch contoured Wilton pan because I wanted the top rounded and I didn't want to have to carve a two layer cake down.

Then I made a topper for the cake and a dozen cupcakes with a yellow cake recipe.  I'm not a huge fan of yellow cake, but this is the one I use when I have a cake to make.  And my son loves yellow cake and requested it.  It is moist and has a nice vanilla flavor to it.

Basic Yellow Cake from Better Homes and Gardens ( I love this cookbook!)
3/4 cup butter
3 eggs
2 1/2 cups flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups milk

Preheat oven to 375.  Grease and flour pans.  Allow butter and eggs to come to room temperature.  In a bowl, stir together flour, baking powder and salt and set aside.  Beat butter with an electric mixer on high for 30 seconds.  Gradually add sugar, beating until well combined, then beat two minutes more.  Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Beat in vanilla.  Alternately add flour mixture and milk, beating on low speed until just combined.  Spread batter into prepared pans.

For two 9 inch pans, bake 20-25 minutes.  I baked 12 cupcakes and put about 1/2 of the batter in my small Pampered Chef glass mixing bowl.  The cupcakes baked for about 18 minutes.  The bowl cake took much longer, over 30 minutes.  I used a melon baller to make some craters in the bowl cake, since it would become a moon later on.

So, then it was on to the icing.  I always use the basic buttercream icing recipe from Wilton.  

Wilton Buttercream Icing

1/2 cup solid vegetable shortening

1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened

1 tsp vanilla extract (use clear if you will need white icing)

4 cups confectioner's sugar (ideally, it should be sifted, but I hardly ever do it)

2 Tbsp milk

Thick icing

In large bowl, cream shortening and butter with electric mixer. Add vanilla. Add sugar, one cup at a time, beating well on medium speed. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl often.  Add milk and beat at medium speed until light and fluffy. Keep bowl covered with a damp cloth until ready to use.

For best results, keep icing bowl in refrigerator when not in use. Refrigerated in an airtight container, this icing can be stored 2 weeks. 

For thin (spreading) consistency icing, add 2 Tbsp water or milk; for medium, add 1 Tbsp.  Thick icing is used for decorations like leaves, thin is used for icing the cake.  I use medium for everything else.  I used 1 recipe for this entire cake and had a little left over.

First I iced the chocolate cake blue and the yellow cake gray, to look like the moon:

Then I added green, purple and orange to the borders:

Buzz hanging out on top

Next, I did the yellow cupcakes.  I blended the different colors with white and added blue sprinkles.  And on top of each one I put a yellow chocolate star that I made with yellow chocolate melts and a star shaped mold:

And finally, the finished cake (minus Buzz, because he kept falling off):

It was a great hit and everyone loved it, most of all my son, whose opinion is the only one that really mattered, anyway.