Tagged: ‘vanilla extract’

Chocolate Velvet: Chocolate Cake of the Month

If you love cheesecake and also love chocolate, this recipe is for you. This is one of the finest cheesecakes I have ever made and the name says it all…chocolate velvet..smooth and creamy all the way down from your lips to your tummy. It sits in a yummy pecan-enhanced graham cracker crust.
If you love cheesecake and also love chocolate, this recipe is for you. This is one of the finest cheesecakes I have ever made and the name says it all…chocolate velvet..smooth and creamy all the way down from your lips to your tummy. It sits in a yummy pecan-enhanced graham cracker crust.

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My Mother’s Classic New York Cheesecake


Up until the early 1900s, cheesecakes were made with cottage cheese, which made a cakey cheesecake with its own unique texture. To get the height of a traditional New York-style cheesecake, bake this in a springforn pan with high (3-inch)…

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My Favorite Devil’s Food Layer Cake


Another winner out of the old McCall’s Cookbook I have been making since about 1980 that I learned from my mother. It is so perfect a cake, I have never had to make another recipe for devil’s food. Devil’s food…

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Marbled Chesnut Sour Cream Coffee Cake



Vanilla- and chestnut-flavored batters are baked together to form a quintessential coffee cake that is excitingly different, yet exceptionally simple to mix and bake.  Be certain to obtain sweetened créme de marron purée, often available in the jam or specialty food…

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Fresh Fruit Cobbler

This fruit cobbler is certainly one of the simplest coffee cakes to make.  The cobbler is low in sugar, baking up into an appealing fruit-laden cake that is as flavorful as it is tender.  Based on traditional German everyday coffee-time…

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Pineapple Cheese Crumb Cake


Popular in all the cuisines of the hot regions of the world, the juicy, tart-sweet pineapple fruit is really showcased when used in sweet breads.  Most coffee cake recipes call for canned pineapple, but here the colorful fruit layer is…

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Poppy Pomfrey’s X-traordinary Restorative Hot Cocoa with Marshmallows

Plain ol’ hunks of pure chocolate, one of children’s most requested pleasure foods, is given the medicinal power to nourish and revive bodies exposed to debilitating toxic vapors and high altitude broomstick falls. Served in the Hogwarts school hospital wing,…

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Chocolate Melt-in-Your-Mouth Cake with Vanilla Sauce

This is a fudge-like little chocolate cake, adapted from my old chocolate truffle cake I made during my restaurant days. It is for intense chocolate lovers and because of its unique texture, tastes best within an hour of baking, while…

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Chocolate Chip Cookie-Cake Heart

This chocolate chip cookie-cake heart is the handiwork of my friend and incredibly versatile cook Jacquie McMahan. Jacquie’s daughter-in-law fell in love with a cookie-cake with her name written on it available by mail order from a bakery in San…

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Sweet Tangerine Popovers



Citrus is a perfect ingredient in making a sweet breakfast or dessert popover during the winter.  I think tangerines are too underused in baking, their tart-sweet flavor a bit more assertive than regular oranges.  Placing them in a cold oven…

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