Black Forest Cookies

Black Forest Cookies

1 cup margarine
1 box chocolate instant pudding mix
1 egg
2 cups flour

1/4 cup white sugar

approx 66 maraschino cherries

1/2 cup chocolate chips
3 tbsp margarine

Preheat oven to 325 F. Beat softened margarine and pudding powder together. Add egg and beat well. Add flour slowly, beating between additions. Beat until no dry flour remains. Roll into 1 inch balls. Roll each ball in a sugar. Place each on a cookie sheet and dent. Bake for 5 minutes, remove from oven and press the dent in again. Bake
for another 10 minutes. When they have cooled slightly put a cherry in the center of each dent. Heat chocolate chips with margarine, until melted. I like to do this in the microwave. Drizzle melted chocolate on the top of each cookie. If you want to do this to look really fancy, put the chocolate in a icing piping bag with a small circular tip attached.

Cherry Nut Muffins

I made these last week for my early morning prayer group. Just the thing to get you awake in the mornings, Cherry Nut Muffins!

2 eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
6 tbsp butter, softened
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup milk
1 1/2 cups cherries (The original recipe calls for canned sweet cherries, but I used some that I froze last year, or you could use fresh ones, also I used close to 2 cups)
1 1/2 cups nuts (I used pecans, you could also use walnuts or something else if you liked)

Preheat oven to 350. Prepare 24 muffin cups. Mix together eggs and sugar. Add in butter. In a separate bowl mix flour, baking powder and salt. Add flour mixture to egg mixture slowly, alternating with milk until all the ingredients are well combined. Stir in cherries and nuts. Spoon batter into muffin cups. Bake at 350 for about 20 minutes.

How NOT to make Cherry Tarts

Step 1: Make your favourite cherry pie filling using this recipe.

Step 2: Make your favourite pie crust dough using this recipe.

Step 3: Attempt to make star shaped cherry pies:
Step 4: Fail miserably

Step 5: Attempt to make apple shaped cherry pies:
Step 6: Fail miserably.

Step 7: Give up, decide to make Cherry Tarts the way your Grandmother used to make them...

With a coffee mug...
And a simple cookie cutter...
And a muffin tray...

Bake at 400 for 10 minutes and then at 350 for another 10 minutes or until pastry is brown-ish...

And now you have some tasty cherry tarts!
Step 8: Eat your tasty new creations and forget all about the fact that the day started with a much different pie-related project!

Black Forest Cake - Take 2

I made another Black Forest Cake for my mom for Mother's Day a few weeks ago. And it looked A LOT better than the first one.

It looks almost professional doesn't it?
If only I could figure out how to get the chocolate shavings on the sides without getting them EVERYWHERE else!
OH! And when I was in the States this past weekend I found cans of Sour Cherries that don't cost $6 a piece! So I can make this cake more often! (I bought enough cans for two more cakes, or a pie)

Mom (and Dad)'s Birthday Cakes

This Wednesday was my Mom's birthday and since we weren't able to celebrate my Dad's birthday in the summer we decided to celebrate both birthdays at once. So that required two cakes!

Mom asked for the same Turtle Cheesecake I had for my birthday so I was happy to oblige.

And for Dad I made his favourite cake, Black Forest.

Black Forest Cake

Cake
2 cups + 2 tbsp flour
2 cups sugar
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
3 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup oil
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350, grease and flour two 9-inch pans. Combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Mix well. Add in eggs, milk oil and vanilla. Mix well. Pour into prepared pans. Bake 30-35 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Cool in pans for 10 minutes, then turn out onto wire racks and cool completely.

Filling
2 (20 oz) cans Sour Pitted Cherries in juice(I could only find 14 oz jars but it worked just fine)
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup corn starch
1 tsp vanilla (I think I forgot this but it didn't really matter)

Drain cherries. Reserve 1/2 cup of juice. Mix cherries, juice, sugar and corn starch in saucepan. Cook over low heat until thick, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. COOL COMPLETELY! (I definitely did not do this, results described below)

Topping
3 cups whipping cream (unwhipped)
1/3 cup icing sugar
Combine cream and sugar in a chilled GLASS (Ceramic) or METAL bowl. With an electric mixer beat on high speed until stiff peaks form.

Construction

How the instructions said to do it:
Cut each of the two layers in half with a serrated knife or specialty cake layer cutter. Crumble one of the layers and set aside. Set first layer on cake tray. Spoon on some whipping cream. Spoon on cooled cherry goo. Top with second layer, repeat. Top with third layer. Cover the whole cake with the remaining whipped cream. Top cake with more cherry goo. Cover sides of cake with crumbled cake.

How I did it:
Make chocolate shavings: Take a bar of chocolate and a carrot peeler, "peel"(or shave) the chocolate as you would a carrot. Set the chocolate shavings aside. Place the bottom layer on the cake tray. Top with whipped cream. Cover with cherry goo. (Which was still warm because I was running out of time) The cherry goo will melt the whipped cream and goo will go everywhere. Top with second layer. Cover the rest of the cake in whipped cream. Cover the sides and top in chocolate shavings.

What I would recommend for next time:
Make chocolate shavings, as described above. Place bottom layer on cake tray. Top with (warm) cherry goo. Place second layer on top of the cherry goo. Cover the entire cake in whipped cream. Cool the rest of the cherry goo. Place more cherry goo on the top. Cover the sides in chocolate shavings. Serve with excess whipped cream or cherry goo.

Buttermilk Pancakes with Cherry Sauce

Yesterday for breakfast my family made buttermilk pancakes with cherry sauce. Don't they look delicious, all that's missing is the whipped cream.

Buttermilk Pancakes

2 1/4 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tbsp sugar
3/4 tsp salt

3 eggs
3 cups buttermilk
3 tbps oil or melted butter

Preheat pancake grill. Combine dry ingredients. Combine wet ingredients. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients, whisk until well combined. Drop spoonfuls of batter onto pancake grill, cook one side until it begins to bubble then flip it over and cook until the other side is golden. Serve with syrup of cherry sauce.

Cherry Sauce

1/4 cup sugar
2 tsp corn starch
1/8 tsp cinnamon
2 cups sweet cherries, pitted and halved
1/2 cup orange juice
1 tsp grated orange zest

In a saucepan combine sugar, corn starch and cinnamon. Then add the rest of the ingredients. Bring to a boil over medium heat and boil until thickened.

This was pretty good but the orange flavour overpowered the cherry. I think next time I make it I will omit the orange zest and cut down on the orange juice. It is pretty good though.

Cherry Ice Cream

My family has owned an ice cream maker since before I was born but I can't remember ever actually using it. So, when someone suggested that I make cherry ice cream as one of the uses for the 30 cups of cherries I had, I decided to go for it.

For this recipe an Ice Cream maker is required.


1 egg
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
1 cup cream
1 cup chopped cherries

Beat egg and sugar until thick and cream coloured. Add vanilla, cream and cherries. Mix well. Chill and then follow the instructions for the ice cream maker.

Mmmmm.... home made ice cream. This was very very tasty. It didn't make a lot but enough for 3-4 people to have dessert. And it was so good.

Bing Cherry Pie

Bing Cherry Pie

Pastry
2 cups flour
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup lard
1/3 cup cold water
1 egg yolk
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp vinegar

Mix together flour, sugar, baking powder and slat. Cut in lard until mixture resembles coarse meal. In a separate bowl combine the rest of the ingredients. Stir into flour mixture. Chill and allow to rest for 15 minutes before rolling out. Makes enough for a double crusted pie.

Bing Cherry Filling
4 cups bing (or other sweet) cherries, pitted
2 tbsp orange juice (fresh squeezed)
2 tbsp lemon juice (fresh squeezed)
2 tbsp corn starch
1 - 1 1/2 cups sugar (depending on how sweet you want it)
1/4 tsp cinnamon
Pinch of salt
1/4 tsp almond extract
1 1/2 tbsp cold butter, cut into small pieces

Preheat oven to 450. Place cherries in a large bowl. Mix orange and lemon juices with corn starch, then combine with sugar cinnamon and salt. Toss with cherries. Let rest for 15 minutes (I didn't do this) Add the almond extract, toss well. Prick the bottom pie crust. Spoon in filling. Dot all over with butter pieces. Put on the top and cut holes in it for air to escape. Bake for 10 minutes at 450, then reduce heat to 350 and bake for another 45-55 minutes.

Okay, well I messed this one up and forgot to reduce the heat. So it kind of boiled over and the crust was a bit crispier than expected. But it was still an amazing pie. I will make this again for sure. The pastry was very tasty (even when burnt) and the filling was amazingly cherry-y. Soooo good.