Cakes

Oh My! Applesauce Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Oh My! Applesauce Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

You’ll want to treat yourself to this one! It’s decadently delicious. While applesauce cake has been around in America since colonial times, it became especially popular during WWI. In fact, it was considered downright patriotic to eat applesauce cake during the war. By foregoing the…

Small Sorrows and Chocolate-Hazelnut Banana Bread

Small Sorrows and Chocolate-Hazelnut Banana Bread

OK. It’s no polar vortex, but it is cold, dark and rainy here in SoCal—window-rattling thunder, too. My nerves are noticeably jangled. Sweet Juliet, with plaintive break-your-heart “Mom: Make it stop” eyes,  is hiding among the folds of her favorite blanket. No question. We’re quite…

Double Chocolate Banana Cakes

Double Chocolate Banana Cakes

  These sweet little cakes are perfect. They are single-portion size. They pair beautifully with homemade vanilla ice cream (See ice cream recipe here.) They are beautiful. And then, there is the combination of quality chocolate (Barry Callebaut chocolate)  and ripe bananas–a sure-fire winner on…

Sticky Cranberry Gingerbread

Sticky Cranberry Gingerbread

  Santa’s in the house (or, at least, in the neighborhood). It’s time to get your gingerbread on. This recipe is a riff on traditional gingerbread. It has generous dollops of fresh cranberry sauce stirred through the batter. What you get is a taste of traditional…

Let’s Party With Chocolate  Bourbon Pecan Torte! Blue Cayenne is three!!!

Let’s Party With Chocolate Bourbon Pecan Torte! Blue Cayenne is three!!!

  It’s Blue Cayenne’s Birthday! This improbable journey started on a blustery October day three years ago.  I desperately wanted to be a better writer, a better cook, and a better photographer, but I needed a nudge–a structured project to bring all those elements together…

Lemon-Almond Butter Cake

Lemon-Almond Butter Cake

  Raise your hands if you are fans of lemon curd in all its piquant wonderfulness. Good. I thought so. Read on. This delicious lemon-almond butter cake is a crumbly cake made with regular flour, almond flour and a generous amount of home-made lemon curd.…

Yes! Another Banana Cake

Yes! Another Banana Cake

  Banana cake. Cream cheese frosting. Chopped pecans. This is a great banana cake. You may even want to eat the frosting by the spoonful. I did.   OK. That’s a fair criticism. I have posted a number of banana cake and bread recipes on…

Dear Meghan. It shoulda been banana cake.

Dear Meghan. It shoulda been banana cake.

  Dear Meghan. You are one lucky girl. Movie star good looks. Handsome prince. Loaded grandmother-in-law. But why didn’t you put that elegant little foot down and insist on a real cake for your wedding? What was it with that frou-frou elderflower cake anyhow? I know.,…

Tortuga Rum Cake

Tortuga Rum Cake

  Your friends and neighbors who arrive home from idylls in the Caribbean usually bring back tans, lame pirate jokes, and rum cakes. Rum, of course, is ubiquitous in the Caribbean and entrepreneurs long ago learned to add rum to cakes to expand rum’s culinary…

Pomegranate Molasses Butter Cake

Pomegranate Molasses Butter Cake

First, pomegranate molasses is readily available. You can do this. Second, this butter cake is absolutely delicious. I don’t have the words… I discovered pomegranate molasses some time ago. I shop at a local Jons International Marketplace and they have not one but several brands…