Pastry Creme

Creamy, smooth, silky... Pastry creme is good for quite a few things. Today we'll mix it up and fold in some whipped cream to fill our cream puffs.

Creme Patisserie
1 qt. Milk
8 oz. Sugar
2 Eggs
4 Egg Yolks
2.5 oz. Cornstarch
2 oz. Butter

Heat the milk and about half the sugar until it's ~steamy~. Combine the remaining sugar and cornstarch in a small cup to make sure there are no lumps. In separate bowl, whisk whole eggs and egg yolks and add the sugar/cornstarch mix about 1/3 at a time. Whisk for a few minutes (one teacher says just get it good and mixed, one says mix till it holds some air and when it drops off the whisk and keeps it's shape, like a ribbon, it's ready). Both work, why whisk your arm off?

When the milk is steaming, temper it into the egg mixture. If you don't know what that means,

no problem. 

Add about half of the milk into the egg, and whisk really well, until it's combined. Add the hot, milky, egg mixture back into the pot. Stir ccoonnssttaannttllyy on med-high heat for 1-3 minutes. The mixture gets very thick, very fast. Keep stirring. It will boil. Keep stirring. This cooks the eggs, and kicks out the starchy flavor.

After a minute or so, remove from heat and place in a clean container. Now stir in the butter, and a drop or three of vanilla if you want. Cover with plastic wrap directly on the surface of the creme, and cool until use.

Cream Puff filling -
Once cooled, it will be thick. Whisk by hand or machine until loose. Fold in 14-16 oz whipped cream. Keep refrigerated until needed.

If you like, you can dip your eclairs or puff in ganache. I would recommend dark chocolate. 2 parts chocolate to 1 part heavy cream.

5 Minute Mousse!

: ) So I know I said I'd post Healthy recipes for the next 90 days or so but I've been wanting to put this one up for a while now.
I first had this mousse dessert at a Fancy Nancy Tea Party with my two cousins, ages 7 and 4 at the time. We planned a great party with pocket pizzas and fancy cups, frilly dresses, and grandma's jewelry. My aunt Toni made this mousse for dessert. It was delicious.

I have made this quite a few times, and with experience comes stories. You were warned in my very first post that you would get a whipped creamed wall story - I needed to make a quadruple (or something) batch of this for a dessert one day, and thus needed to whip up A LOT of Heavy Whipping Cream in my dad's Kitchen Aid mixer. 8 cups of whipping cream is a lot for my little mixer and my bowl of cream became a corner of cream. I was whipping it up the cups and it got a little out of hand - out of mixer. Before I could turn the mixer down I managed to spray quite a few drops on the fridge, cupboards, walls, counter...
Well, I figured since there was already a mess I was beyond the point of no return. So I held my hands up around the top of the bowl and turned up the speed.

-Note: Everyone in the world needs a splatter guard for their stand mixer. Or a good cleaning product-

It turned out great. Messy things taste better; like tacos, Red Robin's Teriyaki Chicken Burger, ice cream cones.

Without further ado, 

5 Minute Mousse

2 cups Heavy Whipping Cream

7 oz. Hershey's Symphony Bar (Plain, Creamy Milk Chocolate)

Whip the cream into stiff peaks. Melt candy bar until it stirs smooth. Fold melted chocolate into whipped cream. Serve. 

That's it. You can top it with chocolate covered pretzels or chocolate curls if you like.

Oh, and for some reason every time I've made it the chocolate cools to fast in the whipped cream so it's not a smooth texture. But I love eating the mousse and getting little chunks of chocolate. I did hear that you can whip the chocolate into the whipped cream in the mixer, but you have to be careful not to turn it into chocolate butter. (Though that would be delicious on pancakes...)

Heavy Whipping Cream

Aunt Sue's Pumpkin Bread

It's December!!!! That means cold weather and Christmas! Well, here is a Christmas tradition recipe for you.

Every year, Aunt Sue makes/gifts all the family a homemade calendar filled with pictures of her latest adventures abroad, and a loaf or two of Pumpkin Bread. A couple years ago I decided that since I love this stuff so darn much I should probably learn how to make it, so we made the Christmas loaves together. Now, every Christmas season I make it all the time, and often bring it to work. I recently brought it to a Kent FHE (Family Home Evening) and it was a huge hit, with a few recipe requests.

Let's get cooking!!

First, depending on what you are making this for, pick a pan.

Standard Loaf Pan -- 4-6 Loaves -- Bake 55 mins to 1:05 

Mini Loaf Pan -- 6-9 Loaves -- Bake 40 mins

Standard Muffin Pan -- 3+ dozen Cupcakes -- Bake 25-30 mins

Mini Muffin Pan -- ~6 dozen Cupcakes -- Bake 15-20 mins

Ok, are you ready for this? It's SOOO difficult... not. 

Aunt Sue's Pumpkin Bread

3 c. Sugar

4 Eggs

1 c. Vegetable or Canola Oil

1 1/2 t. Salt

2 t. Baking Soda

1 t. Cinnamon

1 t. Nutmeg

1/3 c. Water

2 c. canned Pumpkin (NOT pumpkin pie filling)

3 1/3 c. Flour

12 oz/2 c. Chocolate Chips (optional, but really? Who wouldn't want this?)

1 - 1 1/2 c. chopped Walnuts (optional)

Mix all ingredients together, ending with flour, then stir in Chocolate Chips and/or Walnuts.

Put in sprayed/greased pans and Bake at 350 according to time/pan chart above.

Standard Loaves are good for keeping at home, slicing for events, or gifting to larger families.

Mini Loaves are good for slicing for events, or gifting to smaller families or individuals.

Standard Muffins are good for potluck events, or munching on at home.

Mini Muffins are good for parties, or goodie bags.

Also, one time I made a checker board cake using this recipe and my mom's Wacky Chocolate Cake recipe and it bakes up like a cake just a tad bit more dense, but the WCC batter is thicker than normal cakes, too. If you want me to post further instruction on that, ask me.

This is how it turned out.