COFFEE CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES

Today is National Coffee Day. So many ways to celebrate, especially if you add Chocolate. You can always have a Cafe Mocha, Chocolate Coffee Fudge, Chocolate Clouds in your Coffee, Irish Coffee Chocolate Cake, Irish Coffee Truffles, or pick up some Chocolate Covered Coffee Beans. Chocolate goes great coffee!

In honor of the day, I thought I'd re-post one of my favorite recipes for Coffee Chocolate Chip Cookies. Everyone loves chocolate chip cookies. What I love about Chocolate Chip Cookies are the infinite varieties.

As I've mentioned before, your final product is only as good as your ingredients. Use the very best Chocolate, Espresso (or Coffee) Beans, Vanilla, Flour, Butter and other ingredients! This recipe calls for a baking stone. You can use a pizza stone. If you don't have one, you can make these Coffee Chocolate Chip Cookies the traditional way. The stone helps makes them gooey on the inside and crispy on the outside. I've adapted this recipe from ehow.com.

COFFEE CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES 

Ingredients
1 cup Sweet Butter, softened
2 fresh Large eggs (room temperature)
2 cup Brown Sugar
6 Tbsp Granulated Sugar
5 tsp Pure Madagascar Vanilla Extract
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Sea Salt
3- 1/2 cups flour
4 tsp Ground Espresso Beans (or finely ground coffee beans). Try this recipe with ground chocolate covered Coffee beans. Gives it just a bit more chocolate!
16 oz Dark chocolate (65-85% cacao) chopped (or dark chocolate chips)
Baking Stone

Directions
1. Toss butter in microwave for 20 seconds to SOFTEN not melt the butter. (or leave out in advance, so it's already softened)
2. Cream butter and sugars together until fluffy. Mixture should be well blended but firm.
3. Add 2 eggs. Beat. Add Vanilla. Mix well. Set aside.
4. Sift flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt into another bowl. Add ground coffee or ground espresso beans.
5. Add dry ingredients to wet mixture, beating in a little at a time. Fold in chocolate pieces (or chips). Possible to add walnuts, if you want them. I didn't put them in the ingredients above, but I always like chopped walnuts in my chocolate chip cookies.
6. Put Cookie Dough in refrigerator for 2 hours to firm up. Put wax paper on top to prevent drying.
7. Pre-heat oven to 350. Put hot stone in Oven.
8. Take hot stone out of oven. Drop cookie balls (use a small scoop or form balls) onto stone, smashing with fork after dropping. Put back in oven on stone.
9. Cook for about 8 minutes. Depends on your oven, of course.
10. Transfer with spatula to Wire Rack.
Hint: Check the first one. If the cookies fall apart or aren't cooked all the way, give them another minute.

PAKE OR FUNNY CAKE?

Stacy, Jane's best friend on Drop Dead Diva, gave up acting and started a new business this past season. If you don't watch the show, I'll fill you in.

Stacy is now in the bakery business but with only one product, kind of like the Cupcake only bakeries. Stacy accidentally created the Pake, Part cake/Part pie, when two pages in a cookbook stuck together. If you think that was the end of it, it wasn't. First she had to contend with a business partner played by Kim Kardashian who ran off with her start up money. Then, a patent troll looking for profits from the Pakery, took her to court. Poor Stacy, of course, forgot to send in the papers even though her roommate is a lawyer. But Stacy proved that she invented the Pake in a courtroom bake-off (Episode 12, Season 4). The 'pretender's' Pake imploded. His baking skills were way too deficient--and, of course, he didn't create the Pake.

O.K., so why am I bringing this up? Well in my Retro Research, I came across a recipe for Funny Cake. It's a Swans Down recipe and advertisement from September 21, 1953. "It's a cake and a pie... and it's 'wonderful good'!"  Sorry, Stacy, but Swans Down already offered the world the recipe for this Pennsylvania Dutch treat. How come Jane didn't find this ad in researching your claim?

So here's the Swans Down Ad and Retro Recipe. Watch out, Drop Dead Diva, this Funny Cake is a cake baked in a pie shell. The sauce goes on the top and ends up in a layer right at the very bottom of the cake. And, there are three variations for the sauce--Butterscotch Sauce, Chocolate Sauce, and Orange Sauce. It's a cake in a pie. It's a Pake! Here's the Recipe!

 

National Chocolate Milk Day: Chocolate Milk Cocktails

Today is National Chocolate Milk Day. Everyone knows that chocolate milk is a sweetened, cocoa-flavored milk drink that can be purchased pre-mixed or made at home. Lots of ways to make chocolate milk, and lots of different ingredients can be added to give it a special flavor. And, as always, remember it's the quality of the chocolate that will make a big difference--and the milk: 2 %, whole, etc.

For you Adults out there who want a different kick in your chocolate, scroll down for 2 Chocolate Milk Cocktail recipes.

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Here's an easy chocolate milk recipe. As always, use the very best chocolate. Basically you make a chocolate syrup first, then add the milk.

1. Chocolate Milk

11 ounces milk
1 ounce water
1-1/2 teaspoons cocoa
2 tablespoons sugar

Put sugar, cocoa, and water in microwavable 12 oz glass.
Microwave for 30 seconds or until sugar and cocoa dissolve.
Add cold milk and stir.

Want something a little more unusual? Sunset (1994) had a wonderful Ultimate Chocolate Milk Recipe (Nicaraguan Chocolate Milk). This is not a classic, but it might soon be for you. Preparation takes some time, so you won't be drinking this today.

2. Nicaraguan Chocolate Milk (Orchata de cacao)

1-1/2 cups long-grain white rice
2 cups (about 2/3 lb.) cocoa beans
4 cups water
3 cinnamon sticks (each about 3 in.), broken into 1-inch pieces
8 cups whole, low-fat, or nonfat milk
1 1/2 tablespoons vanilla
1 cup sugar
Ice (optional)

Place rice in bowl, cover with cool water, and let stand to soften somewhat, up to 24 hours; drain.
Place cocoa beans in 9-inch metal baking dish. Bake in 500 degree oven 5 minutes. Shake beans. Continue to bake until beans smoke and some skins have split, 5 to 8 minutes longer.
In blender, place half rice, cocoa beans, water, and cinnamon. Whirl until ingredients are very finely pureed. Place large, fine strainer over a bowl; pour cocoa mixture into strainer and stir to extract liquid. Discard residue. Repeat with remaining rice, cocoa, water, and cinnamon.

Rinse strainer, then line with a double thickness of damp cheesecloth. Pour cocoa liquid through strainer into bowl, stirring to extract all liquid; discard residue.

To cocoa liquid, add milk, vanilla, and sugar; stir until sugar dissolves. Serve plain or over ice. If making ahead, chill, covered, up to 3 days. Stir to serve Makes about 10 1/2 cups, 10 servings.

3. Salted Chocolate Milk

Two years ago, I paid homage to one of my favorite TV sitcoms, Modern Family. I'm so glad they were honored again this year at the Emmys. In the premier episode two years ago, Manny is studying with a girl he has a crush on. She comes to his house where Manny's doting Columbian Mama Gloria (Sofia Vergara) makes the kids chocolate milk. The young girl with whom Manny is smitten says that they always add salt to chocolate milk at her home. Gloria, threatened by another 'woman' in Manny's life,  says she doesn't like it that way.  Of course, when she tries it without the two in the room, she really loves it.

I've posted lots of reviews and recipes that call for salt and chocolate. Salt gives chocolate a certain pop, and I think you'll find it very refreshing in chocolate milk. Just don't add too much. A pinch will do.

The Modern Family Chocolate Milk with Salt Showdown:
Gloria: So how is it going?
Manny: Great, Kelly's moving her stuff into my notebook.
Gloria: This is sudden.
Kelly: It just felt right. Oh, you know what you should do, put a pinch of salt in the chocolate milk, it really brings out the flavor.
Gloria: Salt is for the popcorn.
Manny: Sounds good.
Gloria: You wouldn't like it.
Kelly: Maybe we should let Manny decide.
Gloria: Okay, here's the salt. We'll see what he likes.
Manny tries both:
Manny: Wow! It's great! Try it, Mom.
Gloria: I don't care for it.

Her best line of the episode, defeated and with her accent, she tells the camera and the viewers, "It was delicious."

So moving from the youngsters to the oldsters, here are two very easy cocktail recipes for Adult Chocolate Milk Cocktails!

1. Chocolate Milk Cocktail

Glass of Chocolate Milk
Couple Splashes Kahlua
2 or 3 ice cubes

Add Kahlua to chocolate milk and add ice

2. Chocolate Milk Cocktail

1/2 shot Kahlua
1/2 shot milk
Dash of Amaretto

Put the milk in the bottom, pour the liqueur on top and add dash of amaretto. Do not mix.
Serve in a tumbler. 

 

Chocolate Marble Coffee Cake for Break the Fast

Yom Kippur starts tomorrow night, and although I'd love to bring a Chocolate Babka to the Breaking of the Fast the following evening, I know that's not going to happen. Babka is a yeast bread. If you feel so inclined and are invited to a Breaking of the Yom Kippur Fast, here's a link to a great Babka recipe. So, I'm now into substitute mode. Why not an easy Chocolate Marble Coffee Cake?  The following recipe includes butter and sourcream, so check to see if your hosts are Kosher and whether or not they're planning a meat or dairy meal. And, everyone else, this is a fabulous chocolate marble coffee cake for just about any time! It even tastes great toasted!

I would love to say this is an original recipe, but it's not. Yes, I've tweaked it a bit, but it's almost exactly as it appeared as "Chocolate Ripple Coffee Cake" by Carole Walter 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 on your shelves. I do.

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 sweet butter, slightly softened
1-1/2 cups superfine sugar
4 large eggs
2 tsp. Madagascar vanilla extract
2 cups sourcream

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 sweet 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 tmixture 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  next. Scrape bowl and blend in tvanilla. 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 the 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 tstreusel. Press both toppings lightly into surface of the cake. Bake until top of cake is golden brown, the sides are beginning to pull away from pan, and skewer inserted into center of the cake comes out clean, 70 to 75 minutes. Transfer towire rack and let cool for an hour before removing from pan.