So, here’s a thing I make at work a couple of times a week as a petit four. Consider them Rice Krispie Treats, perfected. They started out as these. Then they evolved.

That's as good as the photos get these days, folks.

Dirty Rice Krispie Treats

1. 2.75 oz. unsalted butter
2. Large pinch Kosher salt
3. 15 oz. marshmallows
4. 9 oz. Rice Krispies (or generic puffed rice cereal)
5. 4.5 oz. cocoa nibs

Place the butter and salt in a large-ish pot, something with a wide bottom. Heat over medium until butter melts and begins to brown, stirring occasionally. Cook the butter to a dark brown (not black).

While the butter browns, spread the marshmallows in a single layer in a large mixing bowl or on a clean baking sheet. Torch the heck out of ‘em. You could also put them under a broiler if you have no torch, but a torch is really the way to go here. You want a burnt, black, crispy shell on at least 2 sides of those marshmallows. With gooey insides. Once the butter and marshmallows are done, turn the heat down to medium-low and add the marshmallows. Stir occasionally with a buttered heat-proof spatula until completely melted.

SUPER DANGEROUS ACTION SHOT

Combine the cereal and cocoa nibs in a large mixing bowl and mix well. Butter a medium rectangular baking dish (or a half sheet pan, if you’re in a professional kitchen…I cut them 1×1.5″ for petit fours so they don’t need to be that thick, but they’d be too thick to fit a quarter sheet) and line it with parchment. Liberally butter the parchment. Butter, butter, butter. Once the awesomely burnt goo in the pot is totally melted, add the cereal and nibs and stir to combine as evenly as possible. Scrape into your buttered vessel and smooth evenly. At work I use a liberally buttered large offset spatula. If you’re into cake decorating you’ll have one. If not…use whatever a home cook would use to spread and smoosh Rice Krispie Treats. I don’t know. After this, I butter another sheet of parchment and lay it on top, then wrap and let it set up for a few hours. Then I turn that sucker out and cut it up with a buttered knife.

Not sure what the next post will be. Banana jam? Toasted almond milk? How to make lame-ass cultivated blueberries taste like wild ones? Perhaps the infamous ANIMAL CRACKERS, the recipe for which I’ve only shared with one very special person?

I know I don’t talk about myself all that much here. I’m more interested in telling you about food. But as this is food related, I figured I should mention it here.

I left my job.

I know. I really liked my job. And I still really like the restaurant. But sometimes, you have to move on to something else. So I decided to go in search of that something else. And I considered all sorts of things in my search…switching over to bakery work, learning a totally new cuisine, even raw desserts. Then I got lucky.

I’m not going to say too much now since it’s not open yet. Let’s just say I’m getting my very own pastry station. Dessert concepts have been submitted and approved. I can get in there and start testing in a matter of days. There’s a lot of work ahead of me, but it’s incredible that I’ve come this far, this fast.

Watch this space for more details (including, you know, name and address and opening date).

That’s enough of that for now. Let’s move on to the cupcakes I made for this month’s Mystery Box Challenge.

Is it really spring?

This month’s theme, luckily for me, was to make a pretty pretty birthday cupcake for someone special. My mom has a March birthday and what could be more special than that?

It blooms!

When I think of my mom, I think of plants and flowers and growing up in a house with a yard full of wild strawberries. So I made Spring Lawn Cupcakes with Strawberry Marshmallow Blossoms, Fresh Mint Custard and Chocolate Ganache Frosting.

Roots? Roots!

Since I’m generally all about flavors over really fancy presentation, I had to think hard to come up with something clever to make these as pretty as possible, so I filled the cupcakes with the pretty green custard to give the cross-section an illusion of roots growing from the soil.

Wishing for real flowers...

A few notes, if you make these. The recipe as I’ve written it only make 8 cupcakes, but you can’t very well just make a few small flowers’ worth of marshmallow, so you’ll have a lot of strawberry marshmallows left over. However, I’m not really minding…

Spring Lawn Cupcakes

First, Make the Cupcakes (adapted from Martha Stewart):

1. 3 Tbsp cocoa powder
2. 3 Tbsp hot water
3. 1 cup AP flour
4. 1/4 tsp baking soda
5. 1/4 tsp baking powder
6. 1/2 tsp salt
7. 3 oz. butter
8. 1/2 cup +1 Tbsp sugar
9. 1 egg
10. 1 tsp vanilla
11. 1/4 cup sour cream

Preheat the oven to 350F. Whisk together the cocoa powder and hot water, set aside. Sift or whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt, set aside. In a small saucepan, melt the butter and sugar, then transfer to the bowl of a stand mixer and whisk on medium-high speed until cool (4-5 minutes). Beat in the eggs one at a time, thoroughly scraping down the bowl in between additions, then beat in the vanilla. Thoroughly incorporate the cocoa mixture, then alternately add the dry mixture and the sour cream in three additions each. Mix the batter until homogenous but don’t overwork it. Scoop into lined muffin tins, bake 10 minutes, rotate the pans and bake for another 10 minutes. Test the cakes with a toothpick to make sure they’re not wet on the inside before removing from the oven and cooling in the pans for 15 minutes. Remove to racks to finish cooling, then chill overnight, loosely wrapped in plastic.

Fresh Mint Custard:

1. 1 cup milk
2. About 30 medium-large fresh mint leaves, washed, dried and roughly torn
3. 1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp sugar
4. 2 egg yolks
5. 2 Tbsp cornstarch
6. Green gel food coloring

Place the milk and mint in a small saucepan and bring to a low boil, then remove from heat and cover. Steep at least an hour, until the milk tastes “leafy” but not too minty. Once you’re happy with the flavor, return it to the heat. While you wait for it to get hot again, whisk together the sugar, yolks and cornstarch (beat them really hard and don’t let them get too gloppy) and continue whisking until the milk steams. Pour the milk into the yolk mixture through a strainer, whisking constantly. Whisk in the food coloring a little at a time, until it’s a light yellowish spring green color. Once it’s all mixed together return it to the saucepan and cook over medium heat, whisking constantly. Once it becomes thick, taste it, but continue whisking. If it tastes at all starchy, keep cooking it, repeating the process until it no longer tastes like starch. Force through a chinois or strainer into a bowl, then press plastic wrap onto the surface of the custard and cut a few thin slits in it to let steam escape. Let cool in the refrigerator overnight.

Strawberry Marshmallows:

1. 1/4 oz. powdered gelatin (1 packet Knox)
2. 6 Tbsp cold water
3. 1 cup sugar
4. 1/3 cup corn syrup
5. Pinch salt
6. 1-2 Tbsp strawberry juice
7. Red gel food coloring
8. Powdered sugar

Pour 1/4 cup of the cold water into the bowl of a stand mixer and sprinkle with the gelatin. Bloom for about 10 minutes. Meanwhile, combine the remaining 2Tbsp water with the sugar and corn syrup in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil and pour into the bloomed gelatin, then beat on the highest speed with the whip attachment for about 8 minutes, until the marshmallow is airy and fluffy. While it’s whipping, prepare a rectangular pan (a loaf pan would be fine, or a small sheet pan) with a generous amount of nonstick spray, then a piece of parchment paper and another layer of spray. Also apply the spray to a rubber spatula. Once the marshmallow is fluffy, beat in the strawberry juice and just enough food coloring to make it light pink. Once fully incorporated, quickly scrape the marshmallow into the prepared pan, spreading it flat if necessary. Top with another piece of greased parchment and let set for at least 3 hours.

Once set, cut out flowers with a small oiled cutter. If the pan you used for the marshmallows is small and your marshmallows are very thick, just cut thin slices and stamp out the flowers from there. Toss cut marshmallows in powdered sugar and store in an airtight container.

Ganache Frosting:

1. 6 oz. heavy cream
2. 6 oz. dark/bittersweet chocolate, chopped small

Heat the cream to a low boil and pour over the chocolate. Let it sit for a couple of minutes, then mix with a rubber spatula, stirring in small circles as you go around the bowl. If there are still chunks of chocolate after you’ve fully incorporated the mixture, heat over simmering water, stirring frequently until smooth. Chill, stirring occasionally, until it is thick and spreadable.

Assembly:

1. Chilled cupcakes
2. Fresh mint custard
3. Ganache frosting
4. Strawberry marshmallow flowers
5. Small fresh mint leaves, washed and dried

Using a small circle cutter, remove the center of each cupcake. Reserve the “stumps.” Beat the custard with a spatula or a handheld or stand mixer until it is smooth and pipeable and load into a pastry bag fitted with a very small round tip. Fill the cupcakes with the custard, reserving the leftover custard in the piping bag for a later stage of decoration.

Put the ganache into a piping bag fitted with a very large round tip and pipe blobs of frosting onto the cupcakes, fully covering the “root” of the cupcake. Crumble up the reserved bits of removed cake and press the crumbs into the frosting. Pipe a small circle of custard onto the top of the cupcake and arrange two or three mint leaves on it, then press in a marshmallow flower.

Makes 8

The winner of March’s Mystery Box Cupcake Challenge will receive prizes from:

• Angela’s Images; a selection of handmade crafts
• Bake It Pretty; a $5 online gift card
• Beanilla; a $7 online gift card
• Miss Kitty Creations; a handmade cupcake charm of your choice
• Simply Caked; 600 brown greaseproof cupcake liners
• Sweet Cuppin Cakes; a $5 online gift card
• Tundra Books; a selection of 3 very sweet children’s books

Thank you to all our prize sponsors!

You remake them.

What do you do if you’re REALLY busy with school and life in general and don’t have the time to remake them for another couple of weeks?

You remake them when you finally have some time and send them out as “screw your New Year’s diet” treats! (For all intents and purposes, you readers are encouraged to also think of these as Ideas for Next Year.)

I got little wax paper bags for them and everything!

First up: the one thing that did turn out right, one of the only truly foolproof things that comes out of my kitchen. Marshmallows!

Spicy and delicious!

From the shape you can probably guess what flavor they are. Yeah, gingerbread!!

I actually ended up making these, realized they were thinner than I originally planned on so they would NOT work as giant fluffy cubes, and had to go all the way to NY Cake & Bake like three days later for their tiniest gingerbread man cutter. Somehow I restrained myself from buying anything else while I was there.

Oh noooooo!

I was originally just going to put a pinch of this spice, an eighth of a teaspoon of that spice…but then I decided that I also wanted to be able to roll the marshmallows in a blend of spices and powdered sugar instead of just straight up sugar, to maximize their spicy taste, so I made my own gingerbread spice blend. I have plenty left over for anytime I want gingerbread flavor – it would make a great addition to hot cocoa, cookies, coffee even. It would also make a nifty gift for anyone who is interested in baking but doesn’t really have a giant collection of odd spices and such like I do.

Pretty presentation.

Gingerbread Marshmallows

1. 1/2 oz. powdered gelatin
2. 1/2 cup cold water
3. 2 cups sugar
4. 1/3 cup + 2 Tbsp light corn syrup
5. 1 Tbsp + 1 tsp molasses
6. 1/4 cup water
7. 1/4 tsp salt
8. 2 tsp gingerbread spice blend (formula to follow), plus more for coating
9. Powdered sugar

In the bowl of a stand mixer, bloom the gelatin in the cold water for 5 minutes. Place the sugar, corn syrup, molasses and water in a saucepan and cook over high heat until it comes to a rolling boil. Pour over the gelatin and beat with the paddle attachment on high (you can start at a lower speed if it’s really splattery at first but once it starts to fluff up turn it way up) for 8-10 minutes, until white and fluffy but not too stiff. While it beats, line a rectangular casserole dish or a smallish sheet pan with greased plastic wrap. Also grease a spatula. Beat in the salt and spice blend. Use the greased spatula to move the marshmallow blob to the chosen greased, lined receptacle and smooth out the top as much as you can. Cover with another piece of greased plastic wrap and let set for at least 3 hours. Once completely set, prepare a shallow bowl or pan of powdered sugar/gingerbread spice mixture (about 1/2 Tbsp spice for every cup of powdered sugar). Coat whatever tool you are using to cut the marshmallows (knife, scissors, cookie cutter) in the sugar mixture and toss every cut piece thoroughly in the spiced sugar. Keeps well in an airtight container or bag for 1-2 months.

Gingerbread Spice Blend

1. 2 parts ground cinnamon
2. 2 parts ground ginger
3. 1 part ground nutmeg (I used freshly grated)
4. 1 part ground cloves
5. 1 part ground allspice (I crushed whole berries in a mortar & pestle)

In my case, I just had a “part” equal a Tablespoon. You could increase this as much as you wanted, but I wouldn’t decrease it by more than half, just so you have enough to coat the marshmallows.

These are adorable and spicy-delicious. I wish everything else had come out so effortlessly adorable but that’s what this weekend is for (well, this weekend is REALLY for finishing a big school project, but it’s also for re-making things I’m still pissed about screwing up in the first place).

Walk up the chocolatey front walk...

I chose a gingerbread house for the challenge because, well, it hasn’t been done yet and I haven’t made one since I was a kid. I know they’re not necessarily the tastiest treats but they’re a lot of fun to make and allow for an almost endless range of creativity.

Oh look! Pumpkin pals!

You may be curious as to why my house appears a little spooky for December. Well, when you host a challenge, you have to make it somewhat in advance to work out any kinks in the recipe and get all organized and stuff, so I made mine back in the beginning of November. And I bought candy in October. Which meant that I bought Halloween candy. But it’s ok because I like Halloween better than Christmas, and I hope it reinforces my interpretation that a gingerbread house can be any kind of structure, not necessarily a house decked out for Christmas.

What's in the coffin?

There was originally supposed to be a little gingerbread Dracula in the coffin but he fell over on himself in the oven. I should have made him more like a tuile but didn’t think of it. He tasted pretty good though.

I don't know why I put sanding sugar on the cross. I just never find an excuse to use it I guess.

I decided to fill the coffin with one of my favorite basic candies, gummi worms. Creepy and delicious!

Wormy-snakey-gummy things! Yum!

I sure do love my chewy, fruity candythings.

That coffin was kind of a pain to build. I should have actually measured the dimensions or something but the sides kept falling off. I probably held it together for an hour. But, in the end, it held together and you can tell what it is, and that’s all it takes to make me happy.

I very specifically wanted the little Hershey bars.

I made a smoked salt-cacao nib streusel to use as dirt, which was cute and tasty. I also used royal icing to glue little fun-sized Hershey bars down as a path, which came to me when I first envisioned this little house.

Note the "dirt"...the delicious, chocolatey, salty dirt.

I’m no decorative piping master but I can pipe a straight line (sometimes). I would have liked to have piped something a little fancier but my royal icing came out really thick. Like, so thick you might want to decrease the amount listed in the recipe. Oops.

Spooky wreath?

I think the star of this particular house, though, is the spooky candy and not the fancy piping.

More pumpkins, this time of the marshmallowy variety.

If I had more time I’d gladly have thrown together a smaller, fancier house too but time is not a thing I’ve had for a while now.

I had them shingled at first but it was toooo heavy (or so I feared).

I would have also liked to have had the time to test out more than one recipe, but luckily for me I somehow managed to convince the totally awesome Y of Lemonpi to co-host with me, so there were two recipes for our fellow bakers to choose from. (And apologies to the gluten-free/vegan factions, we would have LOVED to have had enough time to test specifically for you guys but we are both mega-busy little bakers these days and it just didn’t happen…we knew you guys would handle things awesomely on your own though.)

So that's who lives here!

I’m off to go look at the (hopefully) hundreds of other houses floating around the merry internet now. Unseasonal or not I am pretty happy with mine – I would definitely actually measure my sides next time so they don’t overlap in weird places, but it was easy enough that I would, in fact, consider a next time. After all, it’s easier than building a chocolate Kitchenaid or a sugar fireplace!

Well hi there!

The December 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi. They chose to challenge Daring Bakers’ everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes.

Anna’s Notes: If you don’t have an awful lot of time, the doughs can easily be frozen and then thawed when you are ready to roll it. The baked pieces can also be tightly wrapped in plastic and frozen for assembly later.

Y’s Notes: I found this slideshow very helpful: http://www.bonappetit.com/tipstools/slideshows/2008/12/gingerbread_house…

Variations: You are welcome to use either recipe we tested, depending on your taste or what is available where you are.

Obviously, you are also allowed to use any sort of candy or sugar decorations you wish. You can even make your own candy to decorate the house! You may give your house any theme you’d like – you don’t have to stick to the traditional Christmas house. We are providing a rough template but feel free to find or make your own (there are a lot of great books out there with tons of fun blueprints and ideas). Some books you may want to check out:

Gingerbread: Things to Make and Bake by Teresa Layman http://www.amazon.com/Gingerbread-Things-Make-Teresa-Layman/dp/081093367…

How to Build a Gingerbread House: A Step-by-Step Guide to Sweet Results by Christina Banner http://www.amazon.com/Build-Gingerbread-House-Step-Step/dp/0981580610/re…

Gingerbread Houses by Christa Currie http://www.amazon.com/Gingerbread-Houses-Christa-Currie/dp/0385472676/re…

The Gingerbread Architect: Recipes and Blueprints for Twelve Classic American Homes by Susan Matheson and Lauren Chattman http://www.amazon.com/Gingerbread-Architect-Recipes-Blueprints-American/…

Gingerbread Houses: Baking and Building Memories by Nonnie Cargas http://www.amazon.com/Gingerbread-Houses-Baking-Building-Memories/dp/087…

Your house can be as big or as small as you’d like, but it MUST meet these requirements:

1. Everything needs to be edible – no glue or inner non-food supports allowed.

2. You must bake the gingerbread yourself, whichever recipe you choose. No graham cracker houses please!

3. You must use some sort of template. If you don’t use ours, take a picture or link to what you do use in your final post. It doesn’t have to be super technical – Anna didn’t even measure hers, she just cut out shapes from parchment and made sure the edges matched up.

See?

4. Your house must be able to stand on its own. If you want to go adding balconies with candy stick buttresses or whatever go right ahead, but the main house itself must be free-standing.

We feel that by having these simple ground rules in place but giving you the freedom to run with the challenge otherwise, anyone with a few hours of free time this month can tackle this. And if you have a bigger chunk of time, you can REALLY tackle it.

Preparation Time for Anna’s Recipe: 10 minutes to mix the dough, 4-8 hours at least to chill it, then 5 minutes to roll, 10 to rest, and 10 to cut. Another 30 minutes to rest, if necessary. 25-30 minutes to bake, depending on the size of the pieces. I would estimate 2-4 hours to decorate, depending on how ornate you want to make everything. It could certainly take longer if you are doing a lot of intricate royal icing designs or making your own candies. Altogether, this will take 7-13 hours, including chilling time. But, as noted above, you can break this up over several days or even a couple weeks if the freezer is utilized.

Equipment Needed:

1. Stand or handheld electric mixer (not required but it will make mixing the dough a lot easier and faster)
2. Plastic wrap
3. Rolling pin
4. Parchment paper
5. Baking sheets
6. Cardboard cake board or sheet of thick cardboard
7. Foil, if desired
8. Small saucepan
9. Small pastry brush (optional)
10. Piping bag with small round tip, or paper cornets if you’re comfortable with them

Anna’s Recipe:
Spicy Gingerbread Dough (from Good Housekeeping) http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/recipefinder/spicy-gingerbread-dough-157…

1. 2 1/2 cups (500g) packed dark brown sugar
2. 1 1/2 cups (360mL) heavy cream or whipping cream
3. 1 1/4 cups (425g) molasses
4. 9 1/2 cups (1663g) all-purpose flour
5. 2 tablespoon(s) baking soda
6. 1 tablespoon(s) ground ginger

Directions

1. In very large bowl, with wire whisk (or with an electric mixer), beat brown sugar, cream, and molasses until sugar lumps dissolve and mixture is smooth. In medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and ginger. With spoon, stir flour mixture into cream mixture in 3 additions until dough is too stiff to stir, then knead with hands until flour is incorporated and dough is smooth.

2. Divide dough into 4 equal portions; flatten each into a disk to speed chilling. Wrap each disk well with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight, until dough is firm enough to roll.

3. Grease and flour large cookie sheets (17-inch by 14-inch/43x36cm)

4. Roll out dough, 1 disk at a time on each cookie sheet to about 3/16-inch thickness. (Placing 3/16-inch dowels or rulers on either side of dough to use as a guide will help roll dough to uniform thickness.)

5. Trim excess dough from cookie sheet; wrap and reserve in refrigerator. Chill rolled dough on cookie sheet in refrigerator or freezer at least 10 minutes or until firm enough to cut easily.

6. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (149C)

7. Use chilled rolled dough, floured poster board patterns, and sharp paring knife to cut all house pieces on cookie sheet, making sure to leave at least 1 1/4 inches between pieces because dough will expand slightly during baking. Wrap and reserve trimmings in refrigerator. Combine and use trimmings as necessary to complete house and other decorative pieces. Cut and bake large pieces and small pieces separately.

8. Chill for 10 minutes before baking if the dough seems really soft after you cut it. This will discourage too much spreading/warping of the shapes you cut.

9. Bake 25 to 30 minutes, until pieces are firm to the touch. Do not overbake; pieces will be too crisp to trim to proper size.

10. Remove cookie sheet from oven. While house pieces are still warm, place poster-board patterns on top and use them as guides to trim shapes to match if necessary. Cool pieces completely before attempting to assemble the house.

Royal Icing:

1. 1 large egg white
2. 3 cups (330g) powdered sugar
3. 1 teaspoon white vinegar
4. 1 teaspoon almond extract

Beat all ingredients until smooth, adding the powdered sugar gradually to get the desired consistency. Pipe on pieces and allow to dry before assembling. If you aren’t using it all at once you can keep it in a small bowl, loosely covered with a damp towel for a few hours until ready to use. You may have to beat it slightly to get it an even consistency if the top sets up a bit. Piped on the house, this will set up hard over time.

Simple Syrup:

1. 2 cups (400g) sugar

Place in a small saucepan and heat until just boiling and the sugar dissolves. Dredge or brush the edges of the pieces to glue them together. If the syrup crystallizes, remake it.

Guess what flavor I made?

If you follow me (or any other Daring Baker) on Twitter, you’ll already know that many of us did not care for this recipe. It flat out did not work for most of us (including myself). I tried it. It didn’t work. I could see many reasons it wold not work as I was making it but went ahead anyway. And then I wished I had just saved the time and ingredients.

The marshmallows may be a little thick, but, then again, there's really no such thing as too thick a marshmallow.

So why are there pictures of somewhat-successful macarons here? After tossing the completely failed macarons into the trash, I started over. With my school’s recipe (which I will not be sharing, since I’m not really supposed to do that I think…it is VERY close to the one I’ve used in the past though). I still didn’t have complete success but they came out MUCH better and I was able to put a few together – and some even came out well enough to take pictures!

How'd I get them to stick in there? GANACHE!

Of course this was all after I’d already thrown a fit about wasting my entire Sunday on something that was only barely successful. If I were the type of person to get embarrassed, I would be. Horribly. But I don’t really do embarrassed. I move on and set up a few shots anyway.

It's imposing.

If you still can’t tell what flavor they are, they’re hot chocolate macarons with vanilla bean marshmallows in the middle. I put hot chocolate mix in the shells (substituting it for 10 grams each of almond flour and powdered sugar), spread ganache on the insides to up the chocolate flavor and anchor the marshmallows in place, and dusted them with a little extra mix right before serving. I also served them WITH hot chocolate and marshmallows.

Extra marshmallows means more hot chocolatey times for me!

If they’re not chocolatey enough for ya, just dunk them in the hot chocolate. It worked for me!