Butter "Scotch" Brownies: Butterscotch Brownie Day!

Today is Butterscotch Brownie Day! Butterscotch Brownies, as good as they are, do not include chocolate (well sometimes chocolate chips). So I've changed it up a bit, while still keeping with the spirit of the day. Here's my take on Butterscotch Brownie Day: Butter "Scotch" Brownies. Add Scotch to the batter, and you're good to go.  

I've posted Bourbon Brownies, and I've posted recipes for St. Patrick's Day Irish Whiskey brownies, so it's only natural to make these brownies with Scotch for Butterscotch Brownie Day. Hey, there's butter in the recipe, too! 

The following recipe is adapted from DrinkoftheWeek's recipe for Whiskey Brownies. So get out your kilt and do a highland fling!

This recipe, of course, can be made without the Scotch.

BUTTER 'SCOTCH' BROWNIES!

Ingredients
3/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup unsalted butter
2 Tbsp water
2 eggs
6 ounces dark fair-trade 65-70% chocolate, chopped
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup Scotch (yeah, they're pretty boozy!)

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 and grease 9-inch pan. Sift together flour, baking soda, and salt in bowl and set aside. In saucepan, combine sugar, butter, and water. Cook on low heat until boiling gently. Stir in chopped chocolate, vanilla. Then beat in eggs, one at a time. Now add flour mixture and stir well. Pour mix into pan and bake for 30 minutes. After brownies have cooled, sprinkle Scotch on top and let it soak in.

The recipe at DrinkoftheWeek has an excellent chocolate icing, but for today's holiday, I thought I'd go all the way with the "Scotch" Brownie theme, so here's a recipe for a Scotch infused icing. 

Scotch infused Icing
 
Ingredients
1-1/2 ounces unsweetened or very dark chocolate 

1/4 cup unsalted butter
2 cups powdered sugar
3 Tbsp half-and-half
1 Tbsp good Scotch
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

In top of double boiler (or saucepan on top of saucepan with simmering water), melt chocolate with butter. Combine rest of ingredients in bowl and with electric mixer, beat in melted chocolate and butter. Beat until smooth. Mixture will be runny, but stiffens as it cools. Frost cooled brownies.

How's that for Butter "Scotch" Brownies?

MOTHER'S DAY SUNBEAM MIXMASTER Retro Ad & Recipe for CHOCOLATE CAKE!

I adore Retro Advertisements, and this one is particularly close to my heart. My mother had a Sunbeam Mixmaster. So many cookies, cakes and brownies were made with that Mixmaster. I don't have my mother's Sunbeam Mixmaster, but I have my Mother-in-Law's -- the same model with all the attachments. Although I use my own Kitchenaid Mixer, I love the functionality of that old Mixmaster work horse. It still works, and I'll bet my mother-in-law got it in the early 1950s.

So, for Mother's Day, here's a Sunbeam Mixmaster Mother's Day Advertisement from Life Magazine, May 1, 1950, complete with Chocolate Cake recipe. What are you making for Mother's Day?

CHOCOLATE APPLE PIE: Mom & Apple Pie - Mother's Day!

Chocolate Apple Pie is perfect for Mother's Day! You know the expression -- as American as Mom and Apple Pie, and here's where it originated:

From Wikipedia: 
Although apple pies have been eaten since long before the European colonization of the Americas, "as American as apple pie" is a saying in the United States, meaning "typically American". In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, apple pie became a symbol of American prosperity and national pride. A newspaper article published in 1902 declared that “No pie-eating people can be permanently vanquished.” The dish was also commemorated in the phrase "for Mom and apple pie" - supposedly the stock answer of American soldiers in World War II, whenever journalists asked why they were going to war.

My grandmother made an awesome Apple Pie. I've written about it before. It did not contain chocolate, and she made it in a huge rectangular pan that was big enough to feed a crowd since there were always lots of family members at our house. My Bubbe lived with us, and all of her children and their children lived within walking distance. She made Apple Pie because it was American, and when she came to these shores, she became an American! My Bubbe was born in Ukraine, married in London, and settled in Philadelphia, the cradle of liberty. She took her new citizenship to heart, and she baked her special apple pie for every Friday night dinner. She did it because she saw herself as a true American. So Celebrate Mom (and Grandmom) and Apple Pie with this easy Chocolate Apple Pie Recipe!

CHOCOLATE APPLE PIE

Ingredients
Pastry for a double-crust 9-inch pie, unbaked
8-10 tart apples (peeled, cored and sliced thinly--number of apples depends on their size)--Gravensteins aren't available this time of year, but they're my favorite, especially for pies!
1/3 cup sugar
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 cup 65-75% dark chocolate fair-trade organic, chopped into smallish pieces

Directions
Apples: peel, core, and slice thinly.
Combine cinnamon & sugar = cinnamon sugar. (you may need a tiny bit more). I've also used the chocolate cinnamon sugar from Trader Joe's
Place 1 layer apple slices on bottom crust. Sprinkle with 2 tablespoons cinnamon sugar. Repeat twice.
Spread chopped chocolate pieces over top.
Using remaining apples, make 3 more apple/cinnamon sugar layers.
Top with 2nd crust and seal edges. Make cut on the top--or prick with fork in a few places.
Bake in preheated 450 F oven for 15 minutes (until golden).
Lower heat to 350F and continue baking for another 25-30 minutes, or until apples are tender.

CHOCOLATE CREPES SUZETTE: History & Recipe for Crepes Suzette Day!

Today is National Crepes Suzette Day. To add a chocolate element to your crepes, add chocolate sauce to your traditional crepes suzette or make Chocolate Crepes!

History of Crepes Suzette from What's Cooking America?

Probably the most famous crepe dish in the world. In a restaurant, a crepe suzette is often prepared in a chafing dish in full view of the guests. They are served hot with a sauce of sugar, orange juice, and liqueur (usually Grand Marnier). Brandy is poured over the crepes and then lit. The dish was created out of a mistake made by a fourteen year-old assistant waiter Henri Carpentier (1880-1961) in 1895 at the Maitre at Monte Carlo's Café de Paris. He was preparing a dessert for the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII (1841-1910) of England. 

According to Henri Charpentier, in own words from Life A La Henri – Being The Memories of Henri Charpentier:

“It was quite by accident as I worked in front of a chafing dish that the cordials caught fire. I thought I was ruined. The Prince and his friends were waiting. How could I begin all over? I tasted it. It was, I thought, the most delicious melody of sweet flavors I had every tasted. I still think so. That accident of the flame was precisely what was needed to bring all those various instruments into one harmony of taste . . . He ate the pancakes with a fork; but he used a spoon to capture the remaining syrup. He asked me the name of that which he had eaten with so much relish. I told him it was to be called Crepes Princesse. He recognized that the pancake controlled the gender and that this was a compliment designed for him; but he protested with mock ferocity that there was a lady present. She was alert and rose to her feet and holding her little shirt wide with her hands she made him a curtsey. ‘Will you,’ said His Majesty, ‘change Crepes Princesse to Crepes Suzette?’ Thus was born and baptized this confection, one taste of which, I really believe, would reform a cannibal into a civilized gentleman. The next day I received a present from the Prince, a jeweled ring, a panama hat and a cane.”

CHOCOLATE CREPES SUZETTE

For the Crepes: 

Ingredients
2 cups milk
2 eggs
2 1/2 Tbsp melted unsalted butter
2 ounces dark chocolate, melted
1-1/2 cups flour
1/3 cup DARK cocoa
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions
Melt butter and chocolate together, mixing to combine and smooth out  chocolate. 
In large bowl, combine milk and eggs. 
In separate, smaller bowl, combine dry ingredients.
Whisk together milk and eggs with dry ingredients, continue whisking as you incorporate butter and chocolate mixture.
Cover and refrigerate at least an hour, or overnight. Be sure to re-whisk batter before you cook  crepes.

To Cook Crepes:
Butter hot skillet (small or medium, not large) or crepe pan, then wipe out excess butter with paper towel so it's dry-ish. Pour in small amount of crepe batter and tilt pan as needed so batter spreads and covers bottom of pan. As edges begin to turn up, flip crepe with a spatula for few seconds to cook other side.

SAUCE & FINAL PREPARATION

Ingredients
4 Tbsp unsalted butter
1/4 cup sugar
Juice of 6 oranges (with zest from one)
3 Tbsp Cointreau
3 Tbsp Cognac
12 dark chocolate crepes
Grated chocolate for garnish

Directions
Melt butter in large skillet over medium heat. Stir in sugar, zest, juice, and liqueur. Stirring constantly, reduce sauce to 2/3 cup. Carefully add each cooked crepe to  pan—one at a time—and coat with sauce.
Fold each crepe into quarters, and arrange on plate (3 per plate if you're serving four)
Sprinkle crepes with orange zest and grated chocolate chocolate.

Only if you're really careful: Flambé sauce: reserve two tablespoons and add three more tablespoons of Cognac. Stir together and remove the pan from heat. Ignite with match and pour flaming sauce over crepes.