chocolate cake muffins, take 2

Last time I made chocolate cake muffins, that was the intentention of the recipe, and the recipe was sort of a yogurt snack cake. This time, I used SK's everyday chocolate cake recipe that I had made before as a loaf cake and cooked it in muffin cups so that I could serve them individually more easily. I had my first boys movie night with my students (and a male teacher came too), third movie night total (and last one tomorrow), so I wanted to make it easy for them to grab. I think it turned out well, but next time I will not fill the cups as full as I did. Instead of making a half recipe, I think I will just cook it in two batches because making them individually vs. the loaf also cut the cooking time in half.

The recipe:

1/2 cup (1 stick or 4 ounces) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup (6 7/8 ounces) firmly packed light brown sugar - I used dark brown because that's what's available
1/2 cup (4 ounces) granulated sugar
1 large egg
1 cup buttermilk - I used regular whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract - I only have powdered available
1 1/2 cups (6 3/4 ounces) all-purpose flour
3/4 cup (2 5/8 ounces) Dutch cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Preheat the oven to 325°F.
In a large bowl, on the medium speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugars and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the egg and beat well, then the milk and vanilla.
Sift the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt together right into your wet ingredients. Stir together with a spoon until well-blended but do not overmix (I actually just used the mixer again because I am lazy, and it seemed fine). Scrape down the batter in the bowl, making sure the ingredients are well blended.
I put my little muffin paper cups into my muffin tin (these were an exciting buy at the American table at the International Women's Bazaar the other weekend) and poured the batter into 12 cups. As mentioned above, mine overflowed a bit, so I think using 2/3 or 1/2 of the batter in each would work out a little better. If you make it all in one pan, it should cook for 60 - 70 minutes. I think it took mine about 35 minutes to cook in the muffin tins. Either way, just stick a toothpick in to test, and when it comes out clean, they're ready. I dusted mine with confectioner's sugar before serving.

The boys loved them and so did my roommates, and 20 minutes after they were out of the oven, all 12 were gone and I didn't eat one.

chocolate cake muffins

Second movie night with my girls tonight, and, in addition to carrots, apples, chips, pretzels, and popcorn, I again made the thick chewy oatmeal cookies by SK (in my other move night snacks entry) and tried out another SK chocolate cake recipe for little cake muffins. The girls watched Penelope and I baked, and I think they had a good time. They are just too precious - they brought me chocolates and a traditional Bulgarian juice drink (er, not too delicious).

Chocolate Cake Muffins:

As far as the recipe, I had a few different ingredients, but I think it turned out pretty much as expected. I also accidentally added all the oil with the chocolate and then later realized it only was supposed to be half, but it didn't seem to be a major crisis. I made 12 little mini muffins and 12 regular muffins.


7 ounces (200 grams) bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup (125 ml) vegetable oil
1/2 cup (125 ml) plain, whole-milk yogurt (I didn't have whole milk yogurt, it seemed fine)
1 cup (200 grams) sugar
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (I used a vanilla sugar because we don't have extract here)
1/2 teaspoon almond extract (we don't have this so I didn't use any)
1 1/2 cups (200 grams) flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt (I used regular salt)

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a 12-cup muffin tin with paper cupcake liners or lightly butter the pan (um, I rubbed it in oil and it sort of worked).

2. In a heatproof bowl set over simmering water, melt the chocolate with 1/4 cup of the oil. Once melted and smooth, remove from the heat (I did this in the microwave on high for a few seconds on and off, and stirred in between).

3. In another bowl, mix the remaining 1/4 cup oil with yogurt, sugar, eggs and vanilla and almond extracts.

4. In a large bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, and salt. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour in the yogurt mixture. Stir lightly a couple times, then add the melted chocolate and stir until just smooth.

5. Divide the batter among the muffin or springform cups and bake for 20 to 25 minutes (less for mini-springforms, more for muffins, though your oven may vary) or until they feel barely set in the middle and a tester or toothpick comes out clean.

6. Remove from the oven and cool. I dusted mine with powdered sugar before serving.

chocolate cake, oatmeal raisin cookies

Nothing like having grading to do to make me catch up on blog posts... So I decided to have my students over to my house for movie nights over the course of 4 sessions so that my 36 students were broken down into reasonably sized groups (and by sex, no hanky-panky in my house thank you). I realized afterward that this is actually a quasi educational event since the movies are in English, with the bonus challenge of no subtitles because we can't find the remote for our dvd player. Anyway, I just thought it would be a nice thing to do, especially for the handful of students who are away from home (and can you imagine, at the age of 13/14?!), to make them feel special and liked. I also wanted an excuse to make them some treats. So I had the first group of girls over a couple weeks ago, and I had chips, popcorn, carrots, apples, pretzels from the store and made SK's thick chewy oatmeal cookies and SK's everyday chocolate cake. The girls really enjoyed it and were really cute about it. My roommates were impressed, I think, at how adorable and quiet they are. The girls in my class are all just incredibly sweet. I love the boys too, but they are a bit of a different animal. I am slightly nervous about those nights, but I asked Rob, one of the other ESL teachers, to chaperone it with me, and having an adult male influence is definitely easing my mind a bit about handling them. Anyway, all my students are wonderful and I really enjoy them.

Speaking of the cookies and cake, I made a couple mistakes. First, I was talking to my stepdad on skype while making the cookies and miscalculated the conversion from English to metric for grams for butter and so they had half the butter that the recipe called for. I noticed that they were a bit off but I couldn't figure out what I did wrong until well after the first batch was in the oven. They weren't as delicious as they had been in the past, but I was still pleased with them. The cake is sort of a long process, largely because of the baking time (compared to movie length) of 45-60 minutes, and so I didn't really let it cool because I wanted to serve it right when the movie ended and then get the girls home (it was only 6 pm but I didn't want it to be a long event). It sort of fell apart, which led to me dumping piles of chocolately crumbs on my girls' napkins. At the end of the day, it worked out because it got them all laughing at me and I think they enjoyed seeing me being silly in my domestic environment (vs. frequently seeing me being silly at work). I am having another movie night tomorrow with the second girls group, and I picked out a different recipe to use to make little chocolate cake muffins. My fingers are crossed and my camera is ready.

Chocolate Cake:

1/2 cup (1 stick or 4 ounces) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup (6 7/8 ounces) firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup (4 ounces) granulated sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups (6 3/4 ounces) all-purpose flour
3/4 cup (2 5/8 ounces) Dutch cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Preheat the oven to 325°F. Butter and lightly flour a 9×5x3-inch loaf pan, or spray it with a butter-flour spray. In a large bowl, on the medium speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugars and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the egg and beat well, then the buttermilk and vanilla. Don’t worry if the batter looks a little uneven. Sift the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt together right into your wet ingredients. Stir together with a spoon until well-blended but do not overmix. Scrape down the batter in the bowl, making sure the ingredients are well blended.

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Bake for 60 to 70 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. Cool in pan on a rack for about 10 to 15 minutes, at which point you can cool it the rest of the way out of the pan.

Oatmeal Raisin Cookies:

1/2 cup (1 stick or 4 ounces) butter, softened
2/3 cup light brown sugar, packed
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt (I often use a half teaspoon, but I like more salt in my baked goods)
1 1/2 cups rolled oats
3/4 cup raisins
1/2 cup walnuts, chopped (optional)

Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

In a large bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar, egg and vanilla until smooth. In a separate bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt together. Stir this into the butter/sugar mixture. Stir in the oats, raisins and walnuts, if using them.

At this point you can either chill the dough for a bit in the fridge and then scoop it, or scoop the cookies onto a sheet and then chill the whole tray before baking them. You could also bake them right away, if you’re impatient, but I do find that they end up slighly less thick.

The cookies should be two inches apart on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake them for 10 to 12 minutes (your baking time will vary, depending on your oven and how cold the cookies were going in), taking them out when golden at the edges but still a little undercooked-looking on top. Let them sit on the hot baking sheet for five minutes before transferring them to a rack to cool.

Pictures of my not-quite-right recipe :)

I have made the recipe quite a few times, so some pictures from more successful and correctly done experiences.

lemon ricotta pancakes

A few Mondays ago for my weekly dinner, I made SK's lemon ricotta pancakes with sauteed apples along with scrambled eggs and cyrene cheese. My roommates liked the pancakes; I found them too different of a texture from normal pancakes to really wrap my brain around them. They are light and fluffy from the whipped egg whites, and the resulting texture is a foamy batter. The taste is also a little different, unsurprisingly, due to the ricotta cheese and lemon zest. All in all, they were good, but I think I will stick to more traditional pancakes. What can I say, my dad made great breakfast food and it's hard for me to break my strong associations with his dishes. The sauteed apples were delicious, though, and I would definitely make them again to go with ice cream or other pancakes or anything you might want to eat sauteed apples with. We kept leftover apples in the fridge and continued to eat them for a couple days.

For the sauteed apples
4 large Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, and sliced - this is a surprising amount of apples, use a large pan
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon - I added more because I really like a solid cinnamon flavor to my apples
fresh lemon juice to taste

For the pancakes
4 large eggs, separated
1 1/3 cups ricotta
1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons freshly grated lemon zest
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
Melted butter for brushing the griddle

Maple syrup, as an accompaniment - I didn't have any because it isn't available here, but I think it would have been quite delicious, so I recommend it.

Prepare the sauteed apples:
In a large heavy skillet, saute the apples in the butter over moderately high heat, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes, or until they are softened, sprinkle them with the sugar and the cinnamon, and cook them over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, for 5 to 10 minutes, or until they are tender. My apples took significantly longer to cook, so I alternated having a lid over the middle and stirring them around to get them more moist and tender. Stir in the lemon juice and keep the mixture warm.

Make the pancakes:
In a bowl whisk together the egg yolks, the ricotta, the sugar, and the zest, add the flour, and stir the mixture until it is just combined. In a bowl with an electric mixer, beat the egg whites with a pinch of salt until they hold stiff peaks, whisk about one fourth of them into the ricotta mixture, and fold in the remaining whites gently but thoroughly. Heat a griddle over moderately high heat (Deb firmly believes that pancakes should be cooked medium-low) until it is hot enough to make drops of water scatter over its surface and brush it with some of the melted butter. Working in batches, pour the batter onto the griddle by 1/4-cup measures and cook the pancakes for 1 to 2 minutes on each side, or until they are golden, brushing the griddle with some of the melted butter as necessary. Keep them warm in a preheated oven.