Dessert

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

November 10, 2012 by The Partial Ingredients

Sadly my favorite month of the year has been over ten days but I am still celebrating Fall with new pumpkin recipes! These muffins would like to pretend they are for breakfast, but they are so delicious they seem more like a dessert. The inside is light and fluffy with gooey bits of chocolate chips all over. The flavor of the pumpkin is mild, but definitely present. I added some yogurt into the batter which gave the muffins a fluffier, creamier texture. This recipe has lots of possibilities for variation–adding nuts or raisins would work well as a substitute for the chocolate. If you wanted to replace the yogurt with apple sauce that would work fine too.

…

Golden Delicious Apple Crisp

October 27, 2012 by The Partial Ingredients

October has gone by so fast it’s hard to believe. Just a few weeks ago I spent some time in a local apple orchard and picked up 8 pounds of Golden Delicious apples. Golden Delicious are suitable for both baking and eating, which makes them special as most apple varieties are good for just one or the other. I was excited to try these out using my mom’s classic rhubarb crisp recipe and just reducing the sugar to compensate for the apples’ sweetness. These apples had a honey-like sweetness with just the right amount of crunch and tartness to keep things interesting.

The crisp is a simple combination of oats, flour, sugar and spices, baked in the oven, and topped with whipped cream or ice cream. It was really good with the golden delicious apples. It will be hard to go back to store bought apples when the season ends!

…

Apple Rhubarb Crisp

August 28, 2012 by The Partial Ingredients

What better way to make a slow transition into fall than with an apple rhubarb crisp? I am a little reluctant to acknowledge the fact that fall is coming so it’s nice to bring the two seasons together in a dessert! I saw a lot of recipes for apple rhubarb crisp that called for green apples but I thought sweet red apples would be a good choice since rhubarb is so tart. To compensate on the apples’ sweetness I just cut the sugar a bit and it turned out great! The recipe is similar to the other rhubarb crisp recipe and just as delicious! I liked the combination of the sweet apples, tart rhubarb and crunchy crust. Whipped cream and vanilla ice cream are the perfect accompaniment for this dessert!

…

Rhubarb Crisp

May 13, 2012 by The Partial Ingredients

For Mother’s Day I wanted to post my mom’s rhubarb crisp recipe I enjoyed every summer as a kid. In the backyard there was a big rhubarb plant and once the stalks were ripe she would cut some off and make rhubarb crisp! Her recipe is easy and not including the rhubarb you probably already have the ingredients at home. Oats, butter, brown sugar and cinnamon cover a layer of chopped rhubarb. Then it’s baked in the oven and the result is soft and melty on the bottom with crispy oats on the top. I topped the crisp with fresh whipped cream. Mom’s recipe is a winner!

…

Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies

March 17, 2012 by The Partial Ingredients

One of my favorite combinations is mint and chocolate. For St. Patrick’s Day, I decided to make some green chocolate chip cookies and to give the recipe a little kick I added mint extract to the batter. The chocolate and the mint were great together and it was even tastier dipping the cookies into milk. For whatever reason dipping the cookies in milk caused the mint flavor to be more pronounced. This was an easy and tasty recipe for St. Patty’s day!

…

Cherry Chocolate Chip Cookies

January 1, 2012 by The Partial Ingredients

Cherries and chocolate are a perfect food combination. The tanginess and sweetness of the cherries combined with dark chocolate is one of my favorite desserts. I had never tried making a cherry and chocolate cookie before and when I came across a recipe for this cookie I knew I had to try it. I used semi-sweet chocolate chips, but the chips can easily be substituted for chocolate chunks from a good chocolate bar. The recipe begins as a standard chocolate chip cookie recipe which is very easy to throw together. The steps that deviate from that recipe comes from adding the cocoa powder and the dried cherries. I like chocolate chip cookies to be crispy on the outside and chewy/soft on the inside and these were pretty much the perfect texture in every way. The tangy cherries and chocolate were perfectly balanced. I’m sure you could exchange the dried cherries for some other dried fruit that pairs well with chocolate so I can’t wait to play around more with this recipe!
…

Nutella Pumpkin Bread

November 12, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

If you like pumpkin and chocolate you just might like this recipe which combines two great flavors into one delicious bread. The bread is also seasoned with nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, and ginger which produces amazing aromas in the kitchen as the bread bakes. The chocolate hazelnut flavor from the nutella and the pumpkin puree mixes well together, creating an excellent fall bread recipe. I mixed the batter well, resulting in a dark brown batter. Another option is to fold in the nutella at the end, creating a swirl of chocolate in the middle.

…

Pomegranate and White Chocolate Chip Cookies

October 16, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

I was excited to try this recipe because I had never tried baking with pomegranates before. Pomegranates are so tasty on their own but it was even better with butter, sugar, and chocolate. The pomegranate arils were a nice pop of color in the white cookie, and the flavor of the pomegranate could still be tasted when the arils burst in your mouth. My cookies were a little bit crumbly and soft so next time I will chill the dough before baking. This recipe will be great for the upcoming holidays and I could see this becoming a regular, annual cookie recipe!

…

Pumpkin Bread with Dried Cranberries and White Chocolate

September 23, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

Since September has arrived I have been searching for a more fall inspired bread recipe. This recipe is a perfect fall bread and has so many good flavors. The pumpkin flavor and spices can clearly be tasted along with the delicious addition of cranberries and white chocolate chips. The white chocolate chips melted into the bread during baking so I might try a larger, white chocolate chunk next time. The bread was nice and moist and the pumpkin spice highlighted the flavors of the pumpkin puree. The aroma during baking was amazing and I can’t wait to have this for breakfast the next coming week!

…

Kuro-Goma Purin (Black Sesame Pudding)

May 17, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

I first heard about black sesame pudding through John who raved about it. I went to the asian market recently and saw bags of black sesame seeds. Curiousity got the best of me so I picked one up. Black sesame pudding is a popular dessert in Japan and Korea. The consistency is similar to a thick custard and the flavor is hard to describe. It has a mild, slightly bitter, nutty taste that mixes well with the flavors of the coconut milk. I used my grinder to grind up the sesame and the rice. It worked better than a blender and resulted in a nice, smooth pudding. Even though the pudding was pretty thick, I might try using gelatin to get a more custard-like consistency.

…