Showing posts with label grape. Show all posts
Showing posts with label grape. Show all posts
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Grapey Grapey Grape
When you are studying and you would rather not be studying and you have grapes and they are in your freezer and then they are no longer in your freezer and then suddenly they are where your textbook should be, this is when you are truly happy.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The Ugly Grape
A lot of people are scared of baking grapes.
"Won't it just explode?"
"Will it turn into a raisin?"
"That'll just be foul."
It seems kind of fun to me though, like champagne cupcakes with flavor but also a burst of texture. Ooh, considering that, lychee cupcakes could be delicious. Okay, on my to-do list. So,
Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, which was quite a riveting read, but made realize how much of the food that I eat is imported from places far, far away. I need to work on that.
But first the grape cake.
I found this recipe, and thought it would be pretty easy to replicate, but now that I'm back at school I have a more limited number of ingredients at my disposable. Here's my adapted version:
Almond Grape Cake
1 1/2 sticks sweet butter (at room temperature, annoying, but important)
1 c. sugar
5 egg whites (I had a lot leftover from all the yolks used in the custard)
1/4 c. whole milk
1 tsp. vanilla extract (the recipe called for almond, which I would have much preferred, but you work with what you got)
1 c. almond slivers (ground up as much as possible), or almond meal if you have it
1/2 tsp. baking soda (recipe called for 2 tsp. baking powder, but I couldn't find any)
1 c. grapes (however much you want really)
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Spray an 8 by 8 glass baking pan or maybe it could fit in a 9 inch pie pan. I think a rounder shape would be prettier actually if you can finagle that.
2. Cream the butter and sugar until it fluffs. Hopefully you don't have to do this with a hand held mixer where the butter flies in you face.
3. Add the eggs gradually. Make sure they combine fully with the sugary butter. Add the vanilla/almond extract and the milk.
4. In another bowl, mix the flour, almonds, and baking powder/soda. Carefully combine the dry and wet ingredients careful not to overmix.
5. Pour the batter into a pan of your choice and put the grapes on top, pushing them in slightly. In retrospect I should have made a smiley face or some picture instead of just rows, but oh well.
6. Bake for about 40 minutes or so. When I took my pan out there was a little bit of moisture bubbling atop, I'm guessing from the grapes. I just poured it out. Also this might be fun with some sort of syrup poured on top to make it moister--like an amaretto syrup, mmmm.
Oh and someone told me the green grapes looked like olives, so maybe you should use red/purplish grapes instead if you care about that sort of thing.
Oh and Anna should know that I really like the new format, but am curious about who all the taste buds belong to.
-Amanda
"Won't it just explode?"
"Will it turn into a raisin?"
"That'll just be foul."
It seems kind of fun to me though, like champagne cupcakes with flavor but also a burst of texture. Ooh, considering that, lychee cupcakes could be delicious. Okay, on my to-do list. So,
Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, which was quite a riveting read, but made realize how much of the food that I eat is imported from places far, far away. I need to work on that.
But first the grape cake.
I found this recipe, and thought it would be pretty easy to replicate, but now that I'm back at school I have a more limited number of ingredients at my disposable. Here's my adapted version:
Almond Grape Cake
1 1/2 sticks sweet butter (at room temperature, annoying, but important)
1 c. sugar
5 egg whites (I had a lot leftover from all the yolks used in the custard)
1/4 c. whole milk
1 tsp. vanilla extract (the recipe called for almond, which I would have much preferred, but you work with what you got)
1 c. almond slivers (ground up as much as possible), or almond meal if you have it
1/2 tsp. baking soda (recipe called for 2 tsp. baking powder, but I couldn't find any)
1 c. grapes (however much you want really)
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Spray an 8 by 8 glass baking pan or maybe it could fit in a 9 inch pie pan. I think a rounder shape would be prettier actually if you can finagle that.
2. Cream the butter and sugar until it fluffs. Hopefully you don't have to do this with a hand held mixer where the butter flies in you face.
3. Add the eggs gradually. Make sure they combine fully with the sugary butter. Add the vanilla/almond extract and the milk.
4. In another bowl, mix the flour, almonds, and baking powder/soda. Carefully combine the dry and wet ingredients careful not to overmix.
5. Pour the batter into a pan of your choice and put the grapes on top, pushing them in slightly. In retrospect I should have made a smiley face or some picture instead of just rows, but oh well.
6. Bake for about 40 minutes or so. When I took my pan out there was a little bit of moisture bubbling atop, I'm guessing from the grapes. I just poured it out. Also this might be fun with some sort of syrup poured on top to make it moister--like an amaretto syrup, mmmm.
Oh and someone told me the green grapes looked like olives, so maybe you should use red/purplish grapes instead if you care about that sort of thing.
Oh and Anna should know that I really like the new format, but am curious about who all the taste buds belong to.
-Amanda
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
