Melt In Your Mouth Blueberry Cake

We spent this weekend in State College, PA celebrating my sister-in-law’s birthday with family members coming in from as far north as Maine and even as far away as Ireland. Saturday night’s meal was a Maine seafood feast with all the ingredients brought down by Katy and her boyfriend Billy.

We enjoyed lobster, Louisiana shrimp, seafood casserole, cole slaw and this delicious Melt-In-Your Mouth Blueberry Cake. The recipe was found in the cookbook, Cooking Down East and originally came from a Maine church cookbook.

Thank you Katy and Billy for a great meal and Happy Birthday Judy.

Melt-In-Your-Mouth Blueberry Cake

Ingredients

2 eggs separated
1 cup sugar
¼ cup shortening
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 ½ cups sifted flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 cup milk
1 ½ cups fresh blueberries

How to Make Homemade Blueberry Cake

Beat the egg whites until stiff. Add about ¼ cup of the sugar to keep them stiff.
Cream shortening (cream as a verb means to beat an ingredient or a couple of ingredients together until soft and smooth) and add the salt and vanilla. Add the remaining sugar slowly.

Add the sifted dry ingredients alternatively with the milk. Fold in the beaten egg whites and then the blueberries. The recipe says to use some of the flour “called for in recipe and gently shake berries in “ so they won’t settle. I’m not sure what this means but I’m guessing by coating the blueberries with some flour they won’t sink to the bottom.

Add the mixture to a greased 8 x 8 inch baking pan. Sprinkle top of batter lightly with granulated sugar. Bake at 350 degrees F. for 50 to 60 minutes.

This recipe serves eight and is absolutely delicious. We served it with ice cream for dessert but my wife had a piece the next morning for breakfast (without the ice cream) and it was fantastic.

How to Make Incredible Molten Chocolate Cake at Home

Sorry for the delay in posts but I’m on vacation with my family at the Jersey shore. I’m trying to find time to write about some of the delicious meals we are having but between the beach, meals and taking the kids to different night entertainment, I’m not finding time to get much writing done.

Here’s the receipe for the Molten Chocolate Cake that I promised to post in my Humbled But What a Great Night of Cooking blog. If you didn’t read it, this recipe came from a cooking class my wife and I attended at a great BYOB restaurant called Blackfish. Not only did we have a fun night of cooking and a great meal, I learned a lot from Chef Jeff Power and Chef Ashley Hess.

Molten Chocolate Cake
Makes 20 cakes

Important Tip –I learned from Chef Jeff while preparing this recipe it is critical to not to get any water in the melted chocolate. He made it clear that even a drop of water would ruin the chocolate.

Ingredients

1 lb. chocolate (we used those chocolate chips you buy for cookies)
1 lb. butter
5 oz sugar
4 oz sifted flour
10 eggs
10 egg yolks
20 aluminum tins (butter & floured)*
Powdered sugar for dusting at the end

(more…)

I wanted to treat you to more of Chef Robert Reynolds. I was reading his web site and came across this paragraph where he was discussing preparing an elegant but simple fish dish. He served it with three garnishes but each garnish added only one flavor.

He said, “The first garnish is a simple sauté of onions, cooked without browning until they are soft and sweet. They are garnished with lemon rind that has been blanched and then cut into threads. The slivers of lemon rind disappear into the onion compote; you don’t see them, but are surprised to discover the little burst of lemon they offer when you bite into them.”

These are the morsels of information I want to learn more about. What a simple technique described so well you can almost taste it. Can you imagine attending his cooking school, Chefs Studio, and getting 8 weeks of this kind of knowledge? I do.

I also wanted to share with you Chef Reynolds’ first cooking video, giving you a glimpse of who he is and how he works. It is berry season at the time and he is making a Genoise Cake covered with strawberries that have been mixed with honey, marmalade, red wine and heavy cream.

Genoise cake is basically a sponge cake except the egg yolks and whites are NOT beaten separately. It’s of Italian decent and gets its name from the city of Genoa. Instead of using any kind of leavening agent, it gets its volume from the air suspended in the batter while mixing.

Here’s Chef Reynolds’ version of Strawberry Shortcake. To view the video, click here or on the image.

Genoise

6 large eggs, room temperature
¾ cup sugar
tiny pinch of salt
1 cup flour, twice sifted
Butter for the cake pan

2 pints of strawberries
2 or 3 tablespoons excellent quality honey or, 2 or 3 tablespoons sugar
1 or 2 tablespoons orange marmalade (optional)
1-1/2 to 2 cups red wine, or real fruit juice
1-cup excellent quality heavy cream, whipped to soft peak, sweetened with sugar if desired

(more…)