Recipe: Jalapeño Hush Puppies

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From Denny: Making these becomes an art like making perfect biscuits. It takes a little practice. It also depends upon your climate and humidity level as to how the batter will come together and behave so you will have to rely upon your judgment.

After the batter is mixed try a small test ball to see how the batter behaves. From the recipe author: "The object of this recipe is to have light, fluffy hush puppies. If heavy and do not rise enough, use more baking powder. If hush puppies are greasy and break apart, add more flour."

And hey! When you go to chopping those jalapenos, make sure you use gloves, and, if not, make sure you wash your hands well before any bright ideas of thinking you can wipe your eyes or touch your mouth or you will be letting out one (maybe more) loud yelp from the pain!

Jalapeño Hush Puppies

From: The Cotton Country Collection


Ingredients:

2 cups cornmeal

1 cup flour

2 eggs, beaten

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 ½ teaspoons salt

1 small can cream style corn

3 jalapeño peppers, chopped

¼ bell pepper, chopped

1 small onion, minced

Buttermilk

Pinch of baking soda (about ½ teaspoon)


Directions: Mix all ingredients. Use enough buttermilk to make this the consistency of cornbread batter. Test batter by scooping up a portion on a spoon and with your thumb push portion into medium hot grease. The object of this recipe is to have light, fluffy hush puppies. If heavy and do not rise enough, use more baking powder. If hush puppies are greasy and break apart, add more flour. If you want more tang, add some jalapeno pepper juice.

Chocolate and Zucchini Cake

From Denny: From the almost 6-year-old blog Chocolate and Zucchini, written by a French woman and offered in American-style very good English as well as French.

It is also in the top 100,000 traffic ranking, an admirable feat for any blog other than an IT one. Congrats to Clotilde Dusoulier for getting recognized as a fabulous blog! For more interesting recipes and reading just click on the title link.

For recipe conversions there is a link for your convenience to that page just below my posting area if you are unsure about any of her measurements.

Chocolate & Zucchini Cake

Yield: Serves 10


Ingredients:

1 1/2 C (180 g) all-purpose flour

1/2 C (60 g) whole wheat flour (of course, you can just use 2 C / 240 g all-purpose flour, I was just trying to be good)

1/2 C (40 g) unsweetened cocoa powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 C (110 g) butter, softened

1 C (160 g) light brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp instant coffee granules (the Nescafé type, the stronger the better)

3 eggs, at room temperature

2 C zucchini, unpeeled, grated (about 280 g, two medium)

1 C (170 g) chocolate chips

Topping :

40 g (1/2 cup) light brown sugar

1/2 C (70 g) hazelnuts, toasted and chopped


Directions:

Preheat the oven to 180°C (360°F). Grease a 3 quart (3 L) springform cake pan, and flour it or sprinkle with cocoa powder : this is to help the cake unmold easily, especially if you're not using a magic non-stick pan.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

In your food processor, combine the sugar and butter, and mix until fluffy. Add in the vanilla extract and espresso powder, then the eggs, one at a time, mixing thoroughly between each addition.

Spoon in the flour mixture, reserving the last half-cup of it. Mix thoroughly, the batter will be thick.

Add the grated zucchini and the chocolate chips to the reserved flour mixture, and toss to coat. Fold in the batter, and blend thoroughly, it's fun. Pour into the prepared cake pan, and flatten the surface with a spatula.

In a small bowl, combine the topping ingredients, and sprinkle all over the batter. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes, until a cake tester comes out clean. Turn out on a rack to cool for half an hour, then unmold.

Recipe: Sweet Potato Pancakes

From Denny: Ready for a cool idea for a brunch or weekend breakfast like we often do in Louisiana? Here's one of my all time favorite recipes I've developed over the years. You can find many variations of this pancake recipe throughout Louisiana. This is a great way to use up mashed or baked sweet potato leftovers from a previous meal!

Sweet Potato Pancakes

From: Denny Lyon

Yield: about 20 pancakes


Ingredients:

1 ½ cups flour

½ teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 eggs, beaten

1 ½ cups lowfat organic milk

1 ¼ cups melted clarified butter or canola oil (clarified butter tastes better! Once it’s clarified it’s as healthy as canola oil cholesterol wise.)

1 ¼ cups mashed, cooked fresh sweet potatoes (or canned)


Directions: In one larger bowl combine the dry ingredients of flour, baking powder, nutmeg, cinnamon and salt. I like to use a wire whisk to combine so it is well distributed.

In a smaller bowl, combine the wet ingredients of the eggs, milk, butter, and sweet potatoes.

Now add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients. Just mix it only until blended. Drop batter by spoonfuls (I like to use a gravy ladle as it pours onto the ladle easier.) Try a small test pancake to check the heat of your burner. Depending upon whether you are using gas or electric will determine if you require medium or medium low heat.

You can cook these pancakes like regular pancakes except you do need to watch them a bit more since the sweet potato has a lot of sugar in it and can burn easier than a regular plain pancake. Fry on about medium heat until browned on one side well and then turn over to brown the other side for not quite as long.

Serve with clarified butter (you tend to use less as the taste is wonderful!) and we like heated (melted) orange marmalade into which we dip each perfect bite of pancake.

Makes about 20 sweet potato pancakes.

Photo by foodistablog @ flickr

Books and Chocolate

Books and Chocolate: "Give me a stash of books and a sack of melt-in-the-mouth chocolate and you can lock me up in a room and throw away the key. That comes pretty near my idea of heaven, never mind that I might resemble something really not divine by the time you let me out of there! But what are a few extra pounds around the waist in the pursuit of knowledge? I'm kidding!

Pursuit of knowledge? I didn't say anywhere that those books had to be edifying works of literature. In fact while I'm making suggestions I may as well add that crime fiction would do very well, and some gooey nut encased dark chocolate. And do add a box of tissues so that I don't ruin the pages of those books with messy fingerprints.

It happened to me today and I could have wept. Engrossed in the misadventures of a harassed young woman trying hard to find a man (well sometimes you need a break from hardened gumshoes blowing smoke rings in your face) I was also working my way through a decadent block of almond-orange chocolate and as I absentmindedly turned the pages I left an ugly smudge on one of them. Horrors! I hadn't licked my fingers completely clean and the evidence was right there on the pristine pages of a brand new book."

By Feline Prophet @ HubPages

Recipe: Flourless Chocolate Cake with Coffee Liqueur

Photo by Svadilfari @ flickr

Flourless Chocolate Cake with Coffee Liqueur

From Denny: OK, have any of you actually ever met a flourless chocolate cake you didn't like? Come on, now, we all LOVE this stuff - and shamelessly! :) This chef makes an awesome version AND it's lighter too. Take a look.


Flourless Chocolate Cake with Coffee Liqueur

From: Chef Ray Johnson of Café Mundo, San Jose, Costa Rica

Yield: 12 servings

Serve this with coffee ice cream or whipped cream, if desired. Beaten eggs make this cake lighter in texture than most other flourless chocolate cakes.


Ingredients:


1 pound semisweet chocolate, chopped

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter

¼ cup coffee liqueur

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

7 large eggs, room temperature

1 cup sugar

Powdered sugar


Directions: Preheat oven to 350° F. Butter 9-inch diameter springform pan with 2 3/4 –inch-high sides. Line bottom of pan with parchment paper. Stir chocolate, butter, coffee liqueur and vanilla in heavy large saucepan over low heat until melted and smooth. Cool to lukewarm.

Using electric mixer, beat eggs and 1 cup sugar in large bowl until thick and pale, and slowly dissolving ribbon forms when beaters are lifted, about 6 minutes. Fold 1/3 of egg mixture into lukewarm chocolate mixture. Fold remaining egg mixture into chocolate mixture.

Place prepared pan on baking sheet. Transfer batter to prepared pan. Bake until tester inserted into center comes out with moist crumbs attached, about 55 minutes. Cool 5 minutes. Gently press down edges of cake. Cool completely in pan. (Cake can be prepared up to 1 day ahead. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate. Let stand at room temperature 1 hour before continuing.)

Run knife around pan sides to loosen cake. Remove sides of pan; transfer cake to platter. Remove parchment paper. Sprinkle cake with powdered sugar and serve.