Browned Butter Cheesecake Truffles for #foodbloggerlove

The imaginative minds behind The Pintertest Kitchen have created an occasion called #foodbloggerlove as a virtual coffee klatche to meet & greet bloggers and exchange recipes. The blogger drawn out of the hat for me is Colleen from

(the "whiskered accomplice" being none other than her beautiful Bengal cat!) If you want to check out more of Colleen's creative genius, you can follow her facebook, pinterest, instagram or twitter accounts.

Well, as luck (or otherwise...) would have it, while we were snooping stalking browsing Colleen's social media, Duncan became intrigued with the esteemed Lady Brenna of Fairfax's picture.

He's taking quite a personal interest in this blog post. (Usually he's content to sleep by the keyboard & occasionally rest his head on the "esc" key...) Dunc joined me for recipe testing today.

We thought we'd make chocolate truffles to celebrate Valentine's Day with Colleen.

I was experimenting with browned butter and cream cheese the other day and was struck by the thought that their flavors would make a mighty fine cheesecake! But it's (supposedly) naughty to eat an entire cheesecake by yourself -- however, if crafted into mini "cakes" like truffles (with added benefit of being slathered in chocolate!) one can get by with selfishly eating them all... And then we decided our little cheesecake ball needed a red heart inside, so we tucked in a dried tart cherry.

So here's how you make them:

Brown 1/4 cup of butter. Let it cool until it's almost solid again, then blend it with 8 oz. softened cream cheese. When that is all smooth, add 1 T. pure maple syrup. Chill mixture.

For the crust you'll need to use 1 cup roasted almonds (they should be unsalted, so if you need to, you can toast your own in a 350° oven for about 10 minutes.) Process the cooled nuts with 1/4 t. sea salt and 2 T. butter until it makes a nice almond butter. Continue processing with 1 c, almond flour, 2 T. pure maple syrup, and 1 T. water. Don't over blend it, just let it come nicely together. Do not chill.

Using about a teaspoon of the cheesecake mixture, form a ball around a dried cherry. (You'll need to work fast, it softens quickly. I had to re-chill it a couple times before I was through.) Freeze balls for at least two hours.

Flatten about a tablespoon of the crust mixture in your hand, then cover the cheesecake ball, rounding as best as possible. Return the crusted balls to the freezer for a couple hours.

Melt your favorite chocolate (I used dark chips today) using your favorite method (I prefer double-boiler.) Since the 53% was sweeter than I wanted, I added a couple ounces of Trader Joe's 72% cacao dark chocolate...

I slathered ensconced dipped those baby cheesecakes and let them harden. Duncan suggested a little decoration, so we melted vanilla chips and thus adorned the truffles.

So, happy Valentine's Day, Colleen & Lady Brenna. We hope we added a little sweetness to your celebration!

We had fun making & tasting (well, Duncan didn't get a taste...) your truffles.

(Dunc wanted to leave you with his photo test: >"< )

*maple syrup from here*

An InLinkz Link-up

German Chocolate Cake Pops, gluten-free

 

(adapted from gluten-free girl)

On this fourth recipe for #Choctoberfest I decided I would try something along the lines of my grandma’s favorite cake, which was German Chocolate. But one slice was always a little bit too much sticky sweetness for me; so I decided I would turn it into a cute little round “cakelet” one can pop into one’s mouth.

GERMAN CHOCOLATE CAKE POPS  (gluten free)

for the cake:

Whisk together in mixing bowl:

• 2½ c. gf flour blend
• 1½ t. unflavored gelatin
• 2 c. sugar
• ½ c. baking cocoa
• 1 t. kosher salt
• 2 t. baking soda

In separate bowl combine:

• ²/₃ c. coconut oil
• 2 t. vinegar
• 1 t. vanilla
• 2 c. cold water

Pour this liquid into the flour mixture and beat for about a minute. Scrape the batter into greased pan(s) and bake in a pre-heated 350° oven for 35-40 minutes, or until tester comes out clean. Let cake cool completely.

to make the pops:

Add 1 c. brown sugar to 1 c. cream, heating only to dissolve sugar. Let cool. Crumble cake into mixing bowl. Add 1 cup dried coconut flakes, 1 small box (instant) chocolate pudding and the sugar/cream mixture. Stir on low until well combined. Roll into balls and chill to firm. (makes about 5 dozen)

Melt 12 oz. milk chocolate with 1½ t. coconut oil in double boiler. In a separate dish combine 1 c. chopped pecans with 1 c. dried coconut flakes.

Dip tip of candy stick into chocolate and insert in cake balls. Chill until set.Dip balls into chocolate and then in the coconut/pecan mixture. Chill until set.

Make sure you check out all those delicious #Choctoberfest recipes below:

An InLinkz Link-up

Fresh Peach Caramels

July’s ingredients for the Improv Cooking Challenge are PEACHES & CREAM. Initially, I was quite excited for this challenge because I have a lovely white peach tree in my garden. Sadly, however, the fruit never set on after it blossomed early Spring, & now it looks like this:
Never fear… a #10 of Del Monte canned diced peaches is available at Costco any time of year… So that’s what I used for the Peach Caramel Rum Sauce.Darn heat/humidity! The “caramels” refused to set up overnight… But it did make a lovely sauce to spoon over vanilla bean ice cream!

Determined to fix caramels with fresh peaches, I bought a few pounds at Sprouts. After peeling/pitting four of them, the halves were tossed into the blender to make the purée. The (nearly 2 1/2 cups) purée was slowly cooked down to 1/2 cup (took almost 2 hours over medium-low heat on a humid day…)This is the recipe I used, and the following pics will illustrate the steps:
Stir the sugar & corn syrup into the peach reduction. Cook over medium-low heat until thermometer reaches 234°.Without breaking the boil, stir in 1/2 cup of cream. Return to 234°.Again, stir in the last 1/2 cup of cream, but this time let the thermometer reach 244°. Pour into buttered 8x8 pan.Allow to cool & slice into caramels.
As you can see, these caramels remained a little soft in our desert heat, but they tasted soooooooo good!
…and now, here are some more PEACHES & CREAM recipes from my fellow bloggers:

An InLinkz Link-up

Holy Ground

In our Kindergarten Sunday School class we’ve been discussing Moses’ life. Last week we talked about how God used the burning bush to get his attention after he’d run away to tend sheep in the desert.I wanted to make their snack something that would remind the students of that miraculous encounter with God.These “burning bush” treats were quite simple:Just two ingredients!All I did was nuke microwave the candy melts until I could pour it over the chow mein noodles. Just a gentle stir until everything was coated. And then used a soup spoon to divide it into the baking cups.The most difficult part was deciding whether these were cookies or candies…

(Not really – it was pretty tough explaining to the people at the Asian market what a bagged and fried chow mein noodle was. One lady even said, “Wow! Does that even taste good?” hahaha! Americanized cuisine!)