Nutella Truffles

It's been a long time since my last post, I know. I hope you'll all forgive me. I have been rather short on time lately, and most of all short on camera. This picture, in fact was taken on my cell phone, if you couldn't tell.

Ingredients:

• 9 oz dark chocolate
• 4 oz heavy cream
• 1 oz corn syrup
• 2 tbsp butter
• 2 tbsp Nutella
• 1.5 cups puffed rice cereal
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• Chocolate for dipping

Combine the cream and the corn syrup in a saucepan and bring to a boil. In a food processor, pulse until the chocolate is in small chunks. With the processor running, stream in the cream. Then add the butter and Nutella. Add in the cereal and sugar. Use your hands or a scoop to portion into bite sized pieces. Precoat by rolling in chocolate. Once hardened, dip again in tempered chocolate, letting the excess chocolate drain off.

Not so hard, and (in my very chocolate-biased opinion) fun. Thanks for sticking with me while the blog undergoes some changes. :)

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Dark and white chocolate Cake

I've been doing a lot with chocolate lately. And loving it. It really is an awesome and delicious media, and what better way to decorate a cake when you're tired of piping?

Ingredients:

• 2 ounces cocoa powder
• 8 ounces flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 10 ounces butter, softened
• 4 ounces granulated sugar
• 3 ounces brown sugar
• 3 eggs
• 6 ounces milk
• 1 ounce creme de cacao
• 6 ounces butter, softened
• 2 ounces white chocolate, melted
• 4-5 cups powdered sugar
• 2 tablespoons water
• 4 ounces white chocolate, melted

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 360 degrees F. Whisk together the flour, cocoa, salt, and baking powder.
2. Beat together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy.
3. Beat in eggs, one at a time.
4. Alternately add in the dry ingredients and wet ingredients (milk and liqueur) until just combined.
5. Pour into prepared pans and bake for approximately 15 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.
6. Once cooled, beat together the 6 ounces of butter, the 2 ounces of white chocolate, and the powdered sugar until light and fluffy.
7. Add the water and beat for approximately 4 more minutes, or until light and fluffy again.
8. Frost the cakes.
9. Pour the rest of the melted white chocolate into molds, or onto parchment paper. If pouring onto parchment paper, freeze the chocolate and break it into small piece before piecing it onto the cake.

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Homemade Flavor Extracts

This post is a shout-out for all of you out there who always seem to have some over-ripe fruit hanging around. You know who you are.

You have a few options.

1. Make puree's. They keep fairly well in the freezer and can be added to smoothies, ice creams, etc.
2. Dehydrate them. This only works if you have a dehydrator, and one can only take so much dehydrated fruit, but this is a good option every once and a while.
3. Make flavor extracts. This is my favorite. Why? Because an extract can be used to make delicious candies, chocolates, and way more without having to mess much with an existing recipe. 

I apologize for the bad picture.

The process is super simple, and you only need two ingredients.

1. Ripe fruit
2. Vodka

When selecting a vodka, shoot for the middle of the road. You don't need a great vodka (it's not worth it), but you don't want the cheapest vodka you can find, either, because some off flavors can get in.

All you need to do is cut some of the fruit up nice and small, add it to a small bottle (to 1/4 full or so, less for citrus), and pour in some vodka. It takes a few weeks to get good flavors, but you can shove them into the back of your pantry and forget about it. For citrus fruits, use the zest. For others, try to figure out what the most flavorful part of the fruit is. For apples, the peel makes a great extract, but for mangoes, the flesh is best.

Eventually these extracts will lose their alcohol smell and taste, and will blossom into delicious flavors. I will warn you, however, that this can get a bit addicting. A bit.

What do you usually do with fruit that's nearing its end?

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