Apple Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake: Fall Equinox

Happy Fall Equinox! I love Autumn with its infinite variety of apples.  Here's a great way to make the most of the apple harvest. This fabulous Chocolate Chip Apple Bundt Cake (recipe originally from Sunset Magazine) is a great way to celebrate the Fall Equinox. I use tart apples in this recipe because I like the combination of tart and sweet. Try different apple varieties. You can use your favorite dark chocolate, chopped, instead of chocolate chips.
Apple Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake

Ingredients 
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups white sugar
3 eggs
1/2 cup water
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
2 cups apples - peeled, cored and diced
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips (or chocolate chunks)

Directions
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
Grease and flour one 9 or 10 inch Bundt Pan.
In large bowl, cream butter with sugar. Beat in eggs. Add water and vanilla.
Stir flour, cocoa, baking soda, ground cinnamon, and ground nutmeg together. Beat this mixture into creamed mixture.
Fold in chopped apples and semisweet chocolate chips (or chocolate chocolate chunks).
Pour batter into prepared pan.
Bake at 325 degrees F for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until cake tests done when toothpick is inserted near center. Do not overbake. Start checking at one hour.
Transfer to a rack to cool.

DOUBLE CHOCOLATE PECAN COOKIES: Go nuts on Pecan Cookie Day!

Pecans and chocolate are a marriage made in heaven! I've posted recipes for Chocolate Pecan Sandies, definitely a pecan cookie, but this recipe for Double Chocolate Pecan Cookies is one of my favorites and the perfect way to celebrate National Pecan Cookie Day!

This recipe is adapted from Woman's Day, April 1, 2006. As always, I suggest you use the very best ingredients. I use chopped pecan toffee in the recipe, and I use 15 ounces of 70% chocolate in place of the original 2 10-oz milk chocolate bars. I also use DARK cocoa. And, FYI, there are over 1000 varieties of pecans. Whichever you choose, you'll go nuts for this recipe!

DOUBLE CHOCOLATE PECAN COOKIES

Ingredients
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
2⁄3 cup packed light brown sugar
2⁄3 cup granulated sugar
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 large eggs
3⁄4 tsp baking soda
3⁄4 tsp salt
2 1⁄3 cups all-purpose flour
2⁄3 cup unsweetened DARK cocoa powder
10 oz chopped pecan toffee 
1-1⁄2 cups coarsely chopped pecans
15-oz dark chocolate (70% cacao), chopped coarsely (or dark chocolate chips)

Coarse Kosher salt (optional)

Directions
Heat oven to 375°F. Have baking sheets ready.
Beat butter, sugars, and vanilla in large bowl with mixer on medium speed 1 to 2 minutes until fluffy. Beat in eggs, baking soda, and salt until combined. Add flour and beat on low speed until blended.
Stir in cocoa powder, chopped toffee, pecans, and chocolate.
Drop rounded tablespoons dough about 1 1⁄2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets.

Optional: sprinkle lightly with coarse Kosher salt.
Bake 8 to 9 minutes until edges are golden brown.
Cool on sheet 1 to 2 minutes before removing to wire rack to cool completely.

Chocolate Chip Noodle Kugel: Breaking the Fast

The Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, starts tonight. This is a fasting holiday. The day, and the fast, is over at Sundown tomorrow night. This is a great dessert to make in advance for the Breaking the Fast at the end of the day.  Note: If you're taking this to a kosher household for the Break Fast, check with your host if they are having a dairy meal. I love this Chocolate Chip Noodle Kugel (aka Noodle Pudding). FYI: It's great any time!

A bit of  history about Kugel. Kugel is a traditional Ashkenazic Jewish dessert or side dish. Kugel is Yiddish for ball, but it is sometimes translated as pudding or casserole, and related to the German Gugelhupf. The first Kugel were plain -- made from bread and flour, and salty rather than sweet. About 800 years ago, the flavor and popularity changed when cooks in Germany replaced bread mixtures with noodles or farfel. Eventually eggs were incorporated. The addition of cottage cheese and milk created a custard-like consistency which is common for today's dishes. In the 17th century, sugar was introduced, which gave the option of serving kugel as a side dish or dessert. In Poland, Jewish women sprinkled raisins and cinnamon into recipes. Hungarians took the dessert concept further with a hefty helping of sugar and sour cream.

Today many people add corn flakes, graham cracker crumbs, ground gingersnaps, or caramelized sugar on top. Some people layer the dish with sliced pineapples or apricot jam, but since this is a chocolate blog, here's a recipe that includes chocolate chips! Enjoy this for the Break Fast or any time!

Chocolate Chip Noodle Kugel

Ingredients:
12 oz pkg medium wide egg noodles, boiled & drained (I use Manischewitz)
4 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted
8 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1 pint (16 oz) cottage cheese (large curd)
2 cups sour cream
1 tsp pure vanilla
3/4 cup chocolate chips

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350.
Butter sides and bottom of 9 x 13 Pyrex or another Pan.
Beat together eggs and sugar. Add cottage cheese, sour cream, melted butter, and vanilla, and mix with wooden spoon.
Fold in cooked noodles and chocolate chips.
Pour mixture into buttered pan.
Bake at 350°F for 40-60 minutes until just set.

CHOCOLATE MARBLE COFFEE CAKE: Breaking of the Fast- Yom Kippur

Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, is the most important holiday in the Jewish calendar. It starts Sunday night and concludes Monday evening. This holiday involves fasting, but at the end of the holiday there's a Breaking of the Fast that usually involves a big feast. Chocolate Marble Coffee Cake is perfect for the Breaking of the Fast. You can make it ahead and have it ready when the group assembles at the end of the day. The following recipe includes butter and sour cream, so if you're bringing something for the Breaking of the Fast, check to see if your hosts are Kosher and whether or not they're planning a meat or dairy meal. Everyone else, this is a fabulous chocolate marble coffee cake for just about any time! It even tastes great sliced and toasted for breakfast!

This recipe is adapted from Carole Walter's recipe for Chocolate Ripple Coffee Cake in Fine Cooking, October 29, 2008. You're going to love it! It's one of my favorite go-to recipes! I'll bet you have most of the ingredients in your pantry and fridge. This coffee cake also freezes well.

CHOCOLATE MARBLE COFFEE CAKE

INGREDIENTS

For the cake:
3 cups sifted cake flour
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1-1/4 cups unsalted butter, slightly softened
1-1/2 cups superfine sugar
4 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups sour cream

For the filling:
1/2 cup toasted pecans
6 oz coarsely chopped dark chocolate (64-75% cacao)
3 Tbsp granulated sugar
3 Tbsp light brown sugar
3 Tbsp Dutch-processed or natural cocoa powder  (Tip: Natural vs Dutch-processed) 

For the streusel topping:
4 Tbsp unsalted butter
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup toasted pecans, coarsely chopped
2 Tbsp granulated sugar
2 Tbsp light brown sugar
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp table salt  

DIRECTIONS

Position rack in center of oven -- 350ºF.

Butter and flour 10-inch tube pan with removable bottom.

Make topping: In 2-quart saucepan, heat butter over medium heat until almost melted. Remove from heat and cool to tepid. In medium bowl, combine flour, pecans, both sugars, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt, and stir with fork. Add flour mixture to butter and stir until evenly moistened and crumbly.

Make filling: In food processor, pulse pecans, chopped chocolate, both sugars, and cocoa until chocolate is finely chopped, 12 to 14 pulses. Set aside 1/2 cup of mixture as additional topping.

Make cake: In medium bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In bowl of stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment, beat butter on medium speed until smooth and creamy, 1 to 2 minutes. Add sugar slowly, beating until combined. Scrape bowl. Beat in eggs one at a time, blending each one completely before adding each. Scrape bowl and blend in vanilla. On low speed, alternate adding dry ingredients and sour cream, adding flour in four parts and sour cream in three parts, beginning and ending with flour, and scraping  bowl as needed.

Layer and marble batter and filling: Spoon 2 cups of batter into prepared pan. Smooth with back of big spoon, spreading batter to side of pan first and then to center. Sprinkle 1/2 cup filling evenly over batter. Cover filling with about 2 cups batter, dropping chunks around pan and smoothing with spoon. Sprinkle another 1/2 cup filling evenly over batter and cover with 2 more cups batter. Layer on another 1/2 cup filling and then remaining batter. (four layers of batter and three layers of filling.) Insert table knife 1 inch from side of pan straight into  batter going almost to bottom. Run knife around pan two times, without lifting up blade, spacing circles about 1 inch apart. Smooth top with the back of spoon.

Top and bake the cake: Take a handful of streusel crumbs and squeeze firmly to form a large mass. Break up mass into smaller clumps, distributing streusel evenly over batter. Repeat with remaining streusel. Clump reserved chocolate filling mixture together with your hands and sprinkle over streusel. Press both toppings lightly into surface of cake. Bake until top of cake is golden brown,  sides are beginning to pull away from pan, and skewer inserted into center of cake comes out clean, 70 to 75 minutes. Transfer to wire rack and let cool for an hour before removing from pan.