The Wolf Eel BaKes

I have baked about once a month since starting a new job - and the whole thing seems quite novel to the people with whom I work. It also seems that each time I bring all these baked goods to the office, they reach (and possibly even excite) a whole new group of people. This company is considerably larger than my last company, so each time I bake, new/different people from different departments discover the array of baking on offer. Also, it seems that every time I bake, some big meetings are taking place, meaning that people from our local markets in different parts of the world are also here to take part.

I used to be a bit more methodical about following up my baking with recipe and photo posting - but have been quite lazy.

Speaking of lazy, I actually bought one of those little gadgets that might be an "as-seen-on-tv" kind of things... one of those little tools that has a dedicated purpose with debatable use (you know, one of those things that sounds handy but makes you question, as you buy it, whether you will ever actually use it). But for me, even as I questioned myself as I bought it, it was a revelation. It's a little gadget that hollows out the middle of cupcakes in order to fill them. I cannot describe what a time saver this has been - and has also provided the much-needed uniformity between cupcakes. Good investment.

Eventually I will follow up again, but for now, the list of what I offered this time is:

Cherry pine nut biscotti
Daim cookies
M&M cookies
Dark chocolate and hazelnut mini tarts
Carrot cake
Dulce de leche cake (the link explains how to make your own dulce de leche; failed to put the recipe for the actual cake up yet)
Kahlua cupcakes (I adjusted this recipe since last time I made it so this will be slightly different)
Vanilla cupcakes filled with lemon curd (I will supply the lemon curd recipe later; the cake recipe referred to is good for any kind of filled cupcake)
Brown sugar cupcakes with maple frosting and candied bacon
Aloha cookies
Nanaimo bars
Brownie cupcakes stuffed with peanut-butter-slathered Oreos and peanut butter frosting, topped with a peanut butter cup (probably a full day's worth of calories in one cupcake)

Even people who claim not to like peanut butter can sometimes get behind a cake like this. The peanut butter's intensity is softened by its being whipped with cream cheese and vanilla, and it takes on a soft cake-like texture once baked inside a very moist, dense and dark chocolate exterior.

Last week I made three of these cakes to take to the office and followed up with one more for one of my Thanksgiving guests. I finally managed to take some new pictures to supersede the ones I took years ago when I first attempted this cake - find the chocolate peanut butter bundt cake recipe by clicking the link.

Oslo folks, so deprived all summer, will welcome the return of my obsession with baking. Probably.

I did not get as far as I wanted with my baking plans. It amazes me, though, that I got as far as I did. I really did not have that much time but still managed some of the plan. The final list is below with my wishful-thinking plans crossed out (undoubtedly to be baked sometime soon).

My ambitious baking plan included:

Shortbread
Carrot-sandwich cookies
Anzac biscuits
Dark chocolate hazelnut mini tarts
Cranberry-pistachio biscotti (altered: Cranberry-blueberry-cashew biscotti)
Tart cherry, blueberry and toasted pine nut biscotti
Oreo-stuffed chocolate chip cookies (altered: Oreo-stuffed peanut butter cookies, recipe provided in another post)
Smil-filled chocolate cookies (Rolos really would be better! But it is yet another thing unavailable to me in Sweden! How can I do my biggest, best bakes without Rolos? Without endless waterfalls of chocolate chips?)
Samoa cookies
Nanaimo bars
Mini cheesecakes with Oreo crust
Oatmeal lemon cream bars*
Caramel apple crumble bars*
Kahlua coffee cupcakes*
Malted milk chocolate cupcakes*
Brown sugar cupcakes with maple frosting and candied bacon*
Carrot pineapple spice cupcakes*

Added after the fact: Peanut butter cup-stuffed M&M cookies! (I used the linked recipe but used M&Ms instead of chocolate chips since I can't easily get chocolate chips here in Sweden; used Reese's peanut butter cups instead of brownies as the stuffing.)

*recipe, photos and taste-test verdicts to follow

Oh and how Canadian of me to have both Nanaimo bars and maple frosting!

Watching Al Jazeera English program Witness: Truth on Trial about an international war crimes tribunal, prosecuting a Rwandan priest for allegedly perpetrating acts of genocide.

Sometimes when I watch things like this or think about things like what happened in Rwanda - and things that happen all over the world all the time, I wonder how it is I can bother with baking or care about some of the petty things I bother with.

Still trying to decide if my heart is stuffed with love, hence the stuffed cookies... or whether I am more of the type who thinks Valentine's Day (and even love) is something people can stuff up their asses, still making stuffed cookies appropriate. Now I just hope I have time to do it all. Time is not on my side right now.


Pumpkin cheesecake stuffed snickerdoodle cookies
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup powdered sugar
2 large eggs
4 1/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar + 1 tablespoon cinnamon (for rolling)

Pumpkin cheesecake filling:
2 cups white chocolate chips (about 10 ounces)
1 cup pumpkin puree
1 1/2 cups finely ground gingersnap cookies
1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
4 tablespoons powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened

Directions:
Make the pumpkin cheesecake filling. Melt the white chocolate chips in the microwave or in a double boiler. Set this aside to cool. Make crumbs from the gingersnaps and graham crackers. Mix the pumpkin, gingersnap and graham cracker crumbs, powdered sugar, cinnamon, and cream cheese together. Add the white chocolate and mix well until thoroughly combined. Put the mixture to the refrigerator to chill. Make the snickerdoodle dough.

Mix together the butter, vegetable oil, granulated sugar, powdered sugar, and eggs in a large bowl. In a separate large bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients. Add the flour mixture into the butter mixture in 3-4 additions, mixing until just combined between each. Place the finished dough in the refrigerator to chill. While the cookie dough chills, roll pumpkin cheesecake into balls and place on a wax-paper or parchment-lined baking sheet. Cover, and freeze (1 hour or so).

In a small bowl, mix 1/2 cup granulated sugar and cinnamon. Preheat oven to 375F/190C. Take a few pumpkin balls out of the freezer at a time to work in small batches (so they stay firm). Scoop out about a tablespoon of chilled cookie dough. Press a frozen pumpkin cheesecake ball into the center, then cover with another bit of dough, working the dough around the whole ball. Roll in cinnamon-sugar and place on a lined baking sheet. Repeat the process, placing cookies 3-4 inches apart. If cookie dough gets too soft, re-chill it.

Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until edges are slightly browned. Let the cookies cool on the pan for a few minutes before removing them to a cooling rack to cool.

Oreo-stuffed chocolate chip cookies
1 cup softened butter
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla
3 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
10 oz bag chocolate chips
1 package Oreo cookies (I have two small packages of 12 each)

Preheat oven to 350F/180C.
Cream butter and sugars until well combined. Add in eggs and vanilla until well combined. In a separate bowl mix the dry ingredients. Slowly add to wet ingredients and then chocolate chips.

Take a scoop of cookie dough and place on top of an Oreo. Use another scoop of dough for the bottom of the Oreo. Work the dough around the edges of the Oreo and press together, enclosing the Oreo with dough. Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet and bake cookies 9-13 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes before transferring to cooling rack.

Oatmeal cookies with cheesecake filling
Filling
8 ounces room-temperature cream cheese
4 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla

Cookies
1 cup butter
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon
3 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups finely ground graham crackers
1 1/2 cups flour
2 1/2 cups oatmeal
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon

Add the filling ingredients to a medium bowl and mix well. Let the mixture solidify in the fridge.
Preheat oven to 350F/175C.
Cream butter and sugars. Mix in other wet ingredients. Whisk dry ingredients in separate bowl. Add dry ingredients to wet. Fold together until evenly combined.
Shape dough into balls. Remove filling from the fridge and make balls to stuff into the cookie dough balls. Once stuffed, place the balls in the freezer for several minutes to make firm. Place balls on a parchment-lined cookie sheet.
Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until golden brown.

Peanut butter Nutella stuffed cookies
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 1/2 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
Cream the butter and sugars together, and then add the egg and mix. Stir in vanilla and peanut butter, when incorporated, add flour and salt. Refrigerate for an hour or so while you make the filling and topping.

Filling:
1/4 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup Nutella
1/2 tsp salt
1 Tbsp cocoa
3 Tbsp sugar
3 Tbsp powdered sugar
Mix all ingredients until creamy. You should be able to roll little balls of the filling in your hands. If it’s too sticky, add some more powdered sugar.

Topping:
1/4 cup peanuts (run through the food processor)
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
Grind the topping ingredients together and place in a shallow bowl.

Preheat oven to 375F. When the cookie dough is chilled, take 1 tablespoon of dough and roll into a flat disc. If the dough is too sticky, add a bit of flour. Place a ball of filling in the middle, and another 1 Tbsp disc of dough on top. Roll between hands to form one big ball. Roll this in the topping, then place onto a parchment-lined cookie sheet. Press with your fingers to flatten slightly. Bake at 375 for 8-12 minutes.

There are a few other kinds of cookies and cupcakes I will probably make, but no sense writing them here. For now.

In honor of a colleague's birthday (admittedly, it's belated on my part), I made some cupcakes known as "better than sex cake". I have written about them before (recipe can be found there, too). (I imagine that they taste better than they look. Reliable taste-testers have confirmed this. It's basic yellow cake topped with pineapple, banana slices, vanilla custard and coconut - pecans if desired.)

























I also made some of the old favorites - white chocolate macadamia cookies, M&M cookies and tea cakes (I used pecans rather than walnuts or almonds, as I had been doing). I also made an experimental batch of peanut butter chocolate chip Butterfinger cookies, which turned out fine but spread too much. I am not sure whether the presence of crushed Butterfinger candy bars in the recipe made the dough too gooey or what, but it was definitely not the right consistency, even though I thought as I was rolling them that they would be fine. (If you like peanut butter, chocolate and/or Butterfinger bars, then you will still love this cookie even if its form did not turn out to be exactly what I had envisioned).