Cherry Biscotti and Mocha Chocolate Chip Muffins

I have some more enticing to get people at work to come to my 9am meeting I scheduled, so I thought I'd make biscotti. I found an easy Biscotti recipe on vegweb that seemed doable. As I was making them I got scared because it wasn't coming out like I'd hoped, so I found this Mocha Chip Muffin recipe on Post Punk Kitchen, thinking the mocha was perfect for the morning. Strangely, both recipes call for emulsifying, a word I can't recall seeing in a recipe ever.

And I apologize for still not having photos. Food blogging without pictures is like driving the scenic route with no windows. Maybe this weekend someone will buy me a digital camera a few weeks early before my birthday. Jeff, feel free to say something to my dad like, "Hey, Bill, I would love to see pictures in Anne's blog, maybe you could get her a camera while she's in town this weekend. You'd be the greatest dad and colleague of all time." Just a suggestion...

Biscotti

Ingredients
1 3/4 cups of flour (half white, half whole wheat)
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 cup dried cherries
2 tablespoons flax seeds & 1/4-1/2 cup of water
3/4 cup maple syrup
1/3 cup melted vegan soy butter
2 TB macadamia nut liqueuer
1-1/2 teaspoons grated lime rind
soy milk for browning

Preheat oven to 350F. In a large bowl, combine the flour and baking powder; stir in the dried cherries. In a separate bowl, whisk together the wetness of the flax seeds, maple syrup, soy butter, macadamia nut liqueur and orange rind until thoroughly emulsified. Make a well in the dry ingredients. Stir the wet into the dry until soft, sticky dough forms. I needed to add a ton of flour because it was too sticky.

Transfer the dough to a lightly floured work surface; with hands, form into smooth ball. Divide the dough into about 6 uniform balls and make into 8-12 inch long strips. The original recipe calls to make 2 long logs, but the dough was too sticky so I had to make them smaller. Transfer each to its own ungreased baking sheet. The original recipe says to brush the top of each log with a bit of soymilk for aesthetics, BUT I tried this on half of mine and it didn't work. They ended up sticking to the pan and not cooking as much as the others.

Bake at 350F for 20 min. Remove from oven and allow to cool on the baking sheet placed on top of a cooling rack for 5 min. Transfer each log to cutting board. With a sizable and sharp knife, make firm cuts on a diagonal at about every 2cm. The original recipe says "stand the cookies back up (sideways) on the baking sheets," which makes no sense so I just put them back on a pan and return to oven for 20-25 minutes longer, or until golden. Remove to rack and let cool. A little lesson I learned the hard way- don't put on bottom rack, or if you do, watch them very closely. Some of mine ended up a little darker than I'd hoped. So I did what any good chef does- I coated the bottoms in chocolate. I melted 1/2 cup chocolate chips and dipped the underside of each piece into it, placing them on wax paper in the fridge until cool (about 30 minutes).

If I ever make these again, I'll skip trying to brush with soy milk, and I'll make my logs skinnier. I'd also like to play with the flavors more. One of my coworkers doesn't like nuts so I didn't add any, though the chocolate and cherry combination was great. I'd also avoid the bottom shelf :(

Mocha Chocolate Chip Muffins

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (I used 1 cup white, 1/2 cup whole wheat)
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup unprocessed cocoa
2.5 teaspoons instant coffee
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup soy milk
1/2 cup canola oil
1/2 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375 F. Line 12 muffin tins with paper liners. In a large bowl, sift together dry ingredients (flour through salt). In a seperate bowl, wisk together wet ingredients (soy milk through yogurt) until emulsified. Pour wet into dry and combine until dry ingredients are moistened. Fold in chocolate chips. Fill muffin tins almost to the top. Bake 18 - 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

These came out amazing! Very fluffy and moist and chocolatey. Originally I was thinking a vanilla cake with chocolate chips, but you really can't go wrong with chocolate on chocolate. I'd go ahead and call these perfection.

Maple Strawberry Muffins and Flourless Cashew Butter Cookies

I'm giving a lunchtime presentation at work tomorrow on a topic that most colleagues probably don't really care about, so I thought I'd lure them there with baked goods. I didn't want to make more brownies or cupcakes, so I though muffins would be nice. But I wanted a twist and remembered the random fresh strawberries in my fridge. Maple Strawberry Muffins seemed perfect though not healthy by any means. I then caved and thought about a cookie and knew I wanted a nut butter cookie. Thus, the Cashew Butter Cookie was born.

Maple Strawberry Muffins

The recipe I used is very close to this Vegan Blueberry Muffin recipe I found online.

Ingredients

2 cups flour, I used half wheat and half white
1/3 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup soy milk
1/4 cup margarine
Egg replacer for one egg, I used 1 TB ground flax mixed with 3 TB water
1 tsp acidic fruit juice, I used some pineapple juice but lemon/orange/lime will do
2 TB real maple syrup
1 cup fresh or frozen strawberries

Preheat oven to 400 degrees and lightly grease a muffin pan. In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add the soy milk, margarine, egg replacer, maple and pineapple juice and stir until mixed. Add the strawberries.

Spoon the batter in to the muffin pan, filling each cup about 2/3 full. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until muffins are golden brown.

The muffins are a little messy because I cut up the strawberries, but they were pleasant.

Flourless Cashew Butter Cookies

I found this recipe for Flourless Nut Butter and Whatever You Want Cookies on vegweb and decided it seemed intruiging and ridiculously easy.

Ingredients

1 cup of cashew butter
3/4 white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 TB ground flax seed mixed with 3 TB water
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Dark chocolate morsels to top cookies

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Mix everything until well combined.

Cover dough and refrigerate for about 30 minutes.

Form 1 tablespoon dough balls for each cookie. Arrange on an ungreased baking sheet, spacing 2 inches apart. Press down slightly with a fork to make criss cross typical of peanut butter cookies. Top with chocolate.

Bake cookies until puffed, golden on bottom and still soft to touch in center, about 12 minutes. Cool on sheets 5 minutes. Transfer to racks; cool completely.

The cookie dough was amazing! I had no idea how much they were going to spread out, however, so I evidently smushed them too flat :( That or the recipe should have called for baking powder, not soda. I'm debating throwing them out, but I'm sure someone at work will eat them...

Low-Cal Banana Muffins/Banana Bread

Since I have company in town I can actually make a lot of baked goods without fear that I'll eat them all before they have time to even cool. So I busted out an old recipe for Banana Muffins. I have no idea of its origin, but I do know that I changed it significantly from whereever I got it anyway.



Ingredients

• 1c white all purpose flour


• 3/4 c wheat flour


• 2 ¼ tsp baking soda


• 1/2tsp salt


• 2/3c sugar


• 1 TB ground flax mixed with 3 TB water


• 1 TB oil, I used Enola which is allegedly not all absorbed by your body


• 2 TB unsweetened applesauce


• 2 TB vanilla soy milk


• Vanilla extract, I omitted this becuase I have none


• 2 mashed bananas, I used 2 from my freezer that I let thaw on the counter for an hour


• 1/2c chopped nuts (pecans, walnuts, etc)
  

Mix the dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. Mix the wet together in a small bowl. Add the wet to the dry and mix until batter forms. Bake on 350 for 25-30 minutes if making muffins (recipe makes 12) or for 45 minutes if making bread. Each muffin has 140 calories without nuts and 175 with nuts.

The apartment definitely smelled amazing while these baked, and they turned out nicely. They were moist on the inside and had a nice crust on the outside. It seemed, though, like they could have used more salt or maybe a little more banana.