DOUBLE DESSERTS

We have two Desserts Of the Month to feature today. The first is Molly Schnick's whose month was a while back but I misplaced it. Luckily it resurfaced!!
For those of you who don't know Molly's Snickerdoodles, which I prefer to call Schnickerdoodles, are the best version I have ever tasted. In other words DON'T SLEEP.





















The next DOTM, is APRIL and comes to us from Jodi, our Vegan Queen! I love love love a good quick cake recipe! This one looks moist and flavorful and I plan on making it for sure. It looks like the kind of cake you can build a tea party around!
Thanks Ladies!!!!

KING CARROT CAKE

For Easter Feaster (thanks to Kat for the moniker) this year I made the Ginger Carrot Cake that was featured in MSL's April 1999 issue. It was a long time candying those carrots but it looked spectacular and tasted even better. I moistened the layers with the carrot infused syrup. I felt very proud of this cake and I took many photos of it, it sort of hypnotized me.

A TALE TWO PEEPS

Last year I made Peeps out of meringue. They did not work out as I had planned because I am get impatient in the kitchen sometimes. This year I followed a recipe from MSL. It only called for gelatin and sugar! I busted out my kosher and veegs gelatin and got to work. After like 15 minutes in the mixer, nothing was happening. Bummsville! I hastily added some egg white (as the gelatin had not congealed at all and was still a viscous liquid, it was safe to do so) and ta da! Marshmallow started to happen. I think what happened is I treated the kosher gelatin like regular gelatin. I did not boil it for instance. My question is, had I boiled it and added just the sugar, where is the volume (imagine fluffy clouds of marshmallow) supposed to come from? I am asking you Martha! Without the egg whites, I don't see how that is gonna go down. But I am not Alton Brown so maybe there is a good reason. If you know please tel me. So anyway, my peeps though not a complete failure are VERY delicate. they still look cute tho!

I MADE A CHOCOLATE PEANUT BUTTER PIE

That is half veegs...check it out over here.

BIBINGKA

My co-worker Joey has a major sweet tooth. We often score cookies from the kitchen and sneak in bites of chocolate during the work day. The other day she made a Filipino dessert, Bibingka and brought a piece in for me. Creamy coconutty and not too sweet, with a toothy bite, it was delish and I of course asked her to please jot down the recipe so I could share it here!!


Herrrrrrrre's Joey:

Bibingka (bingka, for short) is a really popular dessert in the Philippines. There are generally two kinds, one made with rice (or rice flour) and one made with cassava (also known as yuca). There are lots of variations and personal spins on both. Like apple pie, there are so many ways to make it. I'm sure there are different versions of it in other countries in the Pacific too. This is the recipe for the Filipino cassava bibingka.
I couldn't believe how easy it was to make.

My mom always used the frozen cassava, being a working mom it was just more convenient. It can be found any Philippine-American grocery and at some larger Asian grocery stores. One day I want to grate my own cassava but for now I don't trust myself to cook it properly since it can be toxic if not cooked long enough. All I have to say about macapuno is for the longest time I thought I hated coconut and then I had this. I can eat this stuff right out of the jar.

Here is my mom's recipe:

2 - one-pound packages of frozen grated cassava, defrost overnight in the fridge and leave out until room temperature before preparing
1 jar of coconut sport string (macapuno), drained
1 can of coconut milk
1/2 can of sweetened condensed milk
4 tbsp butter, cut in small pieces, plus some for greasing the baking dish

Preheat oven to 350. In a large mixing bowl, mix the room temperature cassava with the butter, then combine the coconut sport string, coconut milk and sweetened condensed milk. Place in middle rack until lightly golden, approximately 1 hr, 30 min. depending on your oven. (My old oven at my last place took 2 hours but my fancy stove now took only 1 hr, 25 min.)

Tastes best warm or room temperature, refrigerate leftovers, reheat in microwave. Enjoy!