Well folks, this is it. The last week of my year-long baking project. I made this cake on January 10th, I believe, ten days later than I should have. I attempted to make Chocolate Covered Hi Hats for New Year’s Eve, but the cupcakes imploded in the oven and I just didn’t have it in me that night to try again. So I accepted that things happen, and plotted something to make a few days late.

Rob and I were watching America’s Test Kitchen one day, and they made the most incredible looking Triple Chocolate Mousse cake. I started scouting around online to see if I could find the recipe, but those Test Kitchen/Cooks Illustrated fans are an ethical bunch. No one had the recipe listed, but I noticed that someone mentioned it was in the November issue of Cooks Illustrated magazine. Sure enough, I had that issue on my shelf. And there was the recipe.

And so, ten days late, I began my final week of baking for the year.

The recipe started with a flourless chocolate cake base in the bottom of a springform pan. The cake layer baked beautifully, other than the fact that it started pulling away from the side of the pan. I noticed commentors on the America’s Test Kitchen message board had this same problem, but I have no idea how one would fix it. Someone mentioned not greasing the pan before pouring in the batter, but I would be terrified that the cake would stick. I just went with it.

Flourless chocolate cake batter:

Baked:

The next layer that went down was a dark chocolate mousse layer. Heavenly:

The final layer was a white chocolate mousse layer that used gelatin as a stabilizer (I’ve really discovered the power of gelatin this year):

I topped it with some dark chocolate shavings because it looked kind of naked with nothing on top. After I refrigerated the cake for a few hours, we took it out, crossed our fingers and unmolded the cake.

It worked!!!

You’ll note that my layers aren’t as distinct as they should be. That’s because the dark chocolate mousse layer seeped down into the area where the flourless chocolate cake pulled away from the side of the pan. But once we cut some slices, the layers became more distinct:

This cake was pretty fantastic. The only problem was that it was so rich, we couldn’t eat much of it. Tragically, half the cake had to be thrown out after a day or two because we just couldn’t keep eating it. But I hope to make it again in the future and take it to an event or family gathering so it can get the proper respect it deserves!

So that’s it! 52 weeks, a little more than 52 baked goods. A few failures, a few standout favorites and a lot of money spent on ingredients, cookbooks and toys. I can’t even put into words how proud of myself I am that I finished this project. The fact that I learned some new techniques, discovered my love of Christopher Kimball and Co. and made croissants from scratch are just the tip of the iceberg; I finished a project that I started! So so amazing.

Now that we’re a month into 2010, I’ve been thinking about what I want to do now. I’m going to take a break from weekly baking. While I enjoyed almost every minute of it, it can be exhausting. But I’ve already baked a few things this year for birthdays, so I don’t think I can stay away for long. Baking has gotten into me and I don’t think it’ll leave any time soon.

I hope by the end of February to launch a new blog that will feature not only things I’ve baked, but reviews of bakeries and cookery stores in my new city, baking news and baking-related events I’ve attended or wish that I could attend (I’ve managed to attend a book signing by Jen Yates of Cake Wrecks fame and Christopher Kimball and Jack Bishop of Cooks Illustrated/Cooks Country/America’s Test Kitchen fame (eeeeeeeee!) ). I’ve already got a website on hold, but I won’t mention the address yet, as I want everything in place before I unveil it.

I want to thank everyone who supported me during this year, especially my husband, who acted as taste-tester, ingredient-fetcher and shoulder to cry on when things didn’t go so well. I love you.

A bittersweet post. This was the last baked good I made in our Columbus kitchen. The last baked good I would take into my co-workers. And yet, not surprisingly, the first post I will write in New Jersey.

Yes, folks, we made the move. Our house is all packed up and in storage in New Jersey and we’re staying with Rob’s dad for a while so we can scope out neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Queens. We hope to move into a new place by September 1st.

With only two cookbooks and a couple of issues of Cook’s Country left unpacked, my choices are limited until we get our new place and I can unpack the rest of my books. This week I chose an Apple Coffee Cake that used yeast and looked quite pretty on the page.

The recipe started off as a typical yeasted baked good would, only with more sugar in the dough. The dough was kneaded several times and rolled into a ball, which was placed in an oiled bowl and left to rise until doubled in size:

While the dough was rising, two apples were peeled and sliced and then the slices were chopped into small pieces. These were cooked with sugar and butter until the apples were softened. The dough was then spread out onto a cookie sheet:

(Please excuse the disposable cookie sheet – most of my stuff was packed at this point.)

Once the apples had cooled a bit, they were spread out down the middle of the dough, leaving several inches of dough uncovered on either side. I then cut slits one inch apart down the dough and began layering the strips to resemble a braid:

Once the cake was completely layered, it was left to rise again for an hour. Once it was risen, I brushed the cake with egg wash and baked it for 35 minutes. It came out looking pretty good:

I then mixed some powdered sugar and milk together to make a glaze and coated the cake with it:

I didn’t even give this thing a chance to cool down before I cut into it:

Fan-bloody-tastic. This was absolutely amazing. There are several variations on the filling and I want to try a few more of them. My co-workers devoured the rest of the cake pretty quickly. It seemed like a successful way to say goodbye.

This week I’m trying to figure out what to bake. I’m thinking there may be a Lemon Meringue Pie in the future, but I’m still getting used to our new digs and the new kitchen that came with them.

I was casually flipping though cookbooks the other day at work (as I often do), and came across the recipe for a Cannoli Cake in the “Good Housekeeping Illustrated Book of Desserts”. It looked pretty awesome, so I decided I would try it. The recipe didn’t seem too difficult (just time-consuming) and I thought my co-workers would enjoy it. And I haven’t done a cake since Week One, so it won.

The recipe started with an angel-food like cake that was comprised of an egg white mixture:

and an egg yolk mixture:

These two mixtures were folded together and poured into a springform pan:

The cake was baked and came out looking quite nice. The pan was flipped upside down on a rack to cool and finally was released:

While the cake cooled, I mixed up the filling, which consisted of ricotta cheese, cream cheese, confectioner’s sugar, chocolate chips and a couple of other ingredients. I tried to get it as smooth as possible, but ricotta cheese is not the most cooperative stuff:

The cake was cut into two layers and each layer was liberally brushed with fresh-squeezed orange juice:

The filling was then heaped onto one of the layers, with more filling in the middle to create a dome shape:

I then cut a wedge out of the top layer and arranged the pieces on top of the filling. Cutting a wedge was necessary so the top layer wouldn’t crack trying to conform to the domed filling:

The cake was then ‘dirty iced’ (as Buddy from “Cake Boss” would say) with a vanilla cream frosting made of whipped heavy cream and confectioner’s sugar (and it was delicious, by the way):

Finally, the rest of the frosting was dolloped on and I attempted to make a pretty pattern on the top with some melted chocolate:

I took the cake to work the next day and my co-workers descended on it like a pack of wolves, of course:

The cake and frosting were delicious. I wasn’t too crazy about the filling, but then again, I am not the biggest fan of ricotta. My co-workers seemed to enjoy it though!

This week, I plan to bake an apple coffee cake thing. It will be my last Columbus baked good, and the last baked good that my co-workers will get to enjoy. I’m happily passing the torch to my co-worker Danae, who I’m sure will keep our co-workers’ stomachs full.

This week started with a cake and ended with a bonus cupcake. I planned to leisurely bake a Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting on Wednesday morning, but I ended up spending a good hour of prime baking time picking my dog Scout up from the vet. So I was racing around like crazy trying to get the cake together and frosted before I had to hit the road for work.

The recipe started with a batter that combined a heavenly array of spices: Cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. Yummmy!

Five medium sized carrots were then shredded. I hadn’t realized how long it takes to shred a carrot on a box grater. After the second carrot I was ready to take a break:

The batter was spread into two greased and floured spring form pans and baked. When the timer went off, I nervously pulled the cakes from the oven:

Beautiful! And I even managed to extract the layers from the pans without tearing up the bottom, like I usually do:

While the cake layers cooled, I whipped up a Cream Cheese Frosting, which I could have just eaten straight out of the bowl with a spoon:

The cake layers were supposed to cool for two hours before being frosted, but I had only about an hour and fifteen minutes until I had to be out the door for work. I wanted to take the frosted cake with me to work, so I ended up throwing the layers in the fridge and freezer to try to cool them down. They didn’t cool down as much as they should have, but I got them cool enough that the frosting didn’t just slide right off the cake:

I wrapped the cake up in plastic wrap and hauled it off to work with me. It was an incredibly heavy cake! As suspected, my co-workers tore into it like wolves on a baby rabbit:

I quite enjoyed my slice:

This cake was incredibly moist (which may have been because the cake layers were still warm when it was frosted) and very delicious. I’m not the world’s biggest Carrot Cake fan, but I could eat this cake every day. Especially for breakfast. I can only imagine how awesome it will be when I make it in the future and actually let the layers cool down like they should. Yum.

Tomorrow is the Kentucky Derby and my husband and I have been invited to attend a Derby BBQ/Party. The invitation suggested that we could bring side dishes, so how could I not bring a cupcake?

I flip through cookbooks on a regular basis during breaks at my job, and I knew I’d struck gold when I found the Mint Julep Cupcakes with White Chocolate Mint Frosting. Perfect! I set out after work today to acquire the ingredients I would need, including fresh mint leaves, white chocolate chips and Creme de Menthe.

I’ve never worked with, drank or even seen a bottle of Creme de Menthe, so I had no clue where to find it in the grocery store. I checked Google on my iPhone, but it wasn’t really helping me out. I called my husband who suggested that I ask one of the clerks. I knew what the answer would be, but I asked anyway, hoping that maybe someone would be a weird liquor connoisseur. The exchange went a little something like this:

Me: Do you have Creme de Menthe?
Clerk (with blank stare): What’s that?

Just as I had suspected. I drove to a liquor store up the road a bit and asked the guy behind the counter there if they had Creme de Menthe. His response? “What’s that?” Luckily, another employee knew what I was talking about and said that they did not carry it, but another close liquor store might. I called them and they confirmed that they did have it in stock. I made the drive and procured the liquor.

As I was waiting for my credit card to go through, one of the clerks said, “What kind of drink are you making with that?” And I looked at him and said, “Well…it’s actually for a cupcake…”

I’m pretty sure all the old dudes in that store shook their heads sadly at me when they heard that.

The magic liquor:

This recipe started with the White Chocolate Mint Frosting. I started by heating whipping cream and butter until the butter melted. The mixture was removed from the heat and white chocolate chips were added in and melted. Finally, the Creme de Menthe and green food coloring were added, turning this:

into this:

The frosting went into the fridge where, in two hours, it was supposed to set up enough to have reached spreading consistency.

The cupcake batter was a fairly straightforward mixture of flour, baking powder, salt, butter, sugar, eggs, mint leaves and my substitute for bourbon: Old Grandad Whiskey:

I didn’t want to buy a whole bottle of bourbon for a half cup, so Rob suggested I just use the Old Grandad Whiskey still left over from our wedding reception six months ago. It seems to have done the trick:

Once the cupcakes had cooled, I took the frosting from the fridge. It had decidedly not reached spreading consistency. It was way too thin. Luckily, I remembered that I had a can of Betty Crocker white frosting in the cabinet, so I mixed a little of that in. I know it was cheating, but when you’ve got a dynamic cupcake planned for an event, you’ll do what you’ve got to do to make them look good. Once the hybrid frosting was put into a freezer bag, it covered the cupcakes quite nicely. I added some green sugar and a fresh mint leaf:

Mmm mmm! Baked, the whiskey took on a much mellower taste. And the frosting has a nice minty kick. I think these will be a lovely snack for the Derby watchers.

This Sunday is Scout’s sixth birthday, so I’m planning to bake homemade dog biscuits for her! That’s right, a non-human baked good!

Piece of Cake
772 North High Street
Columbus Ohio, 43215
(614)421-0399
Hours: Monday through Saturday 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Closed Sundays

Piece of Cake is a lovely little bakery hidden on a side street in the Short North. In their bakery cases you will find cookies, brownies, creme brulee, as well as a nice assortment of different slices of cake and cheesecake. I was nervous heading in, as some of the Yelp.com reviews had been less than stellar regarding the customer service. The cakes in the case were not labeled, so I sheepishly asked the employee if he could tell me what they were and he did with absolutely no hesitation. He was very helpful. I chose a slice of Red Velvet Cake (how could I not after having baked it as my first project?!) and a cup of coffee:

The cake was very yummy. My only complaint (which isn’t even really a complaint) is that the frosting was a touch too sweet for me. I worked the frosting off the last few bites of cake. I think their cake was definitely better than mine, but I liked my frosting better. The coffee was also excellent. And I got all this cake and coffee for an even $5! I will definitely be coming back to sample some other goodies. They even have ‘real food’ if you want to eat some lunch with your dessert.

Bakery Gingham
189 Thurman Ave
Columbus, Ohio 43206
(614) 449-CAKE
Hours: Monday through Sunday 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.

I was very excited to check out Bakery Gingham. It used to occupy a small space next door to the Brown Bag in German Village and just a week and a half ago the bakery moved into a new location between the Thurman Cafe and the German Village Coffee House, a highly desirable location, especially on the weekends.
Rob and I stopped in on a Saturday in the early afternoon, and the bakery was packed. It’s a very cute store, painted in bright blues and pinks with cupcake paintings on the walls. The customers in line in front of us bought multiple cupcakes, and all the cupcakes on display were quickly snatched up. The employees brought out some more from the back, and from those I selected a ‘birthday cake’ flavor – yellow cake with chocolate buttercream frosting – and Rob chose a chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream frosting. We eagerly bit into them:

They were…okay. Average. We both found our cupcakes slightly too dry, and I thought the frosting was both a little too ‘crunchy’ and sickly sweet. They weren’t terrible, but I feel like I’ve become a bit of a bakery snob and these just weren’t outstanding. For $2.50 a cupcake, I want perfection.
I did, however, find their inclusion of 50-cent peanut butter ‘pupcakes’ to be quite charming, and we bought one for our dog Scout, who loved it.
Bakery Gingham will probably be an amazing neighborhood cupcake shop for German Village, but I wouldn’t recommend making a drive. There are many other shops that are much more exciting.

So I knew I wanted to bake a cake from this book. I settled on the Red Velvet Cake.

The recipe calls for cake flour, which I didn’t have in my pantry. I had All-Purpose and Self Rising, so I went on a search for cake flour. Giant Eagle turned up nothing, so one day after work I hit up Trader Joe’s, thinking they would probably have it. Nada. So I drove 20 miles out of my way to Whole Foods, thinking they would DEFINITELY have it. Nothing! At this point, I was starting to freak out a little, and checking the Web to see if I could substitute something else for cake flour. Finally I decided I would try Kroger’s, just to see.

Lo and behold:

Armed with my ingredients, I set to work. The next problem occurred when I noticed that the recipe called for six tablespoons of red food coloring. This is the food coloring I had on hand:

I quickly realized that one of those little bottles of food coloring is just about one tablespoon. So I would have needed six of those bottles! I used up all the red in that four pack, and then found an extra bottle of red food coloring tucked away in the pantry. But it only had about half a tablespoon in it, so I was four and a half tablespoons short. It would have to do.

I think it worked out fine:

Even after baking, the cakes stayed red:

This was a three layer cake. I only have two springform pans, so I had to bake two of the layers and then let them cool for an hour in the pans before I could bake the third layer. As you can imagine, this was an all-day affair.

I used the Creamy Vanilla Frosting the cookbook suggested, which was very interesting. It required cooking milk and flour for ten minutes, and then mixing up FOUR sticks of butter with sugar and vanilla before mixing in the milk/flour mixture. It made a ton of frosting, which I thought was going to be way too much. I underestimated how much icing it takes to frost a three layer cake.

Finally, it was time to cut into this bad boy.

I plated our slices on our new dinner plates. They tasted fantastic, although in the future, I will know to cut the slices much much thinner. We couldn’t finish our pieces!

Tune in next week when I’ll be making scones!