Recipes

Raspberry Cupcakes
This is a modified version of Emeril Legasse’s recipe for Blueberry-Raspberry Muffins with Streusel Topping minus the blueberries and the streusel. The lemon zest and the hint of cinnamon make this a great recipe.
Ingredients
2 cups cake flour
2/3 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 large eggs
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
1 cup buttermilk
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
1 1/2 cup fresh raspberries (or less)

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Place 24 mini-cupcake metal cups with paper liners intact on a cookie sheet or else line a standard 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners. If you use ramekins, grease the inside of the ramekins with butter and dust them with flour.

In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.

Beat the softened butter and sugar in a large bowl until creamy and light. Beat in the eggs 1 at a time. Add the buttermilk and lemon zest and mix to combine. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and stir just to combine. (Batter will still be somewhat lumpy; do not overmix.) Gently fold in the raspberries so the berries do not break open and pour into the prepared muffin tins. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 15 minutes for mini cupcakes or 20 minutes for standard cupcakes.

Let cool in the tins for 10 minutes, then remove and cool on wire racks.

Lemon Frosting

Ingredients
3/4 cup (6 ounces) cream cheese, chilled
2 tablespoons butter, softened
2 teaspoons grated lemon rind
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Dash of salt
2 1/2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
Approximately 1/4 cup Raspberry Drizzle (optional)

To prepare the frosting, combine cream cheese, 2 tablespoons butter, lemon rind, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla, and dash of salt in a large bowl. Beat with a mixer at high speed until fluffy. Gradually add powdered sugar; beat at low speed just until blended (do not overbeat).

To turn the Lemon Frosting into Pink Lemonade Frosting, beat in a small amount of Raspberry Drizzle until you get the colour you want.

Raspberry Drizzle

Ingredients
1/2 cup of Lemon Frosting
1/2 cup of fresh raspberries

To prepare the drizzle, place the raspberries in a wire sieve over a mixing bowl. Using a spatula, press the raspberries through a wire sieve with spaces wide enough that you can press the berry juice through leaving the seeds behind. Stir small amounts of Lemon Frosting bit by bit until you get the consistency you want.

When the cupcakes have cooled, frost the tops with the Pink Lemonade Frosting. Use a small spoon to drizzle on the Raspberry Drizzle. Top with one perfect raspberry.

Notes

You need about 2 of the 12 oz. baskets of raspberries for the muffins, frosting, and the garnish.

It was tricky getting the cupcake batter in the mini muffin tins. Normally, you fill the muffin cups about 3/4 full, but I filled them nearly to the top because the raspberries take up so much of the space. You could cut the amount of raspberries in half if you’d like more cake with just a bit of raspberry.

One of my reasons for feeding this dish to kids is that it is mostly made up of things they like. There are a few chopped veggies as garnish, but by my theory of veggies by approximation—the veggies might accidentally end up on the fork, or kids might be tempted to eat them through frequent, but benign exposure.

Ingredients

Potato

• 2.2 lb (1 kg ) potatoes (yellow or Yukon gold, if available)
• ¼ cup olive oil
• juice of 2 lemons
• 2 Tbsp. of aji amarillo
• salt to taste

Filling

• 2-3 cups of cooked, chicken (white meat), chopped small
• ¼ cup of celery, chopped small
• 4 green onions, chopped finely
• fresh cilantro, chopped or snipped, to taste
• ½ cup of mayonnaise
• salt to taste

Garnish

• 2 boiled eggs cut into quarters
• fresh cilantro, chopped or snipped, to taste
• red pepper slices
• green tops of the green onions, chopped or snipped, to taste

Preparation

Mash the potatoes, and mix in the olive oil, lemon juice, aji amarillo, and salt. If you get the proportions of salt, lemon, and aji amarillo balanced, you can taste each flavour and none of the flavours overpowers the others.

Chop the chicken and mix in the mayonnaise, celery, white part of the green onion—reserving the green tops for the garnish—and salt. I’ve noticed that the green onion is great for seasoning mayonnaise if you don’t like the taste of mayonnaise.

Causa in a dish:
Place half the potato mixture on the bottom of a rectangular platter. Put the chicken mixture in the middle, and place the other half of the potato mixture on top.

Causa on a platter:
Spread potato in one long rectangular layer on top of some plastic wrap. Spread chicken on one third of the potato layer; then use the plastic to roll it like a jelly roll. Transfer to a platter.

Cover with plastic wrap and chill until cold. Garnish with cilantro, green onion, red pepper slices, and hard-boiled eggs.

Serve cold, cut into squares about 2-3 inches wide.

Notes
Aji amarillo: this is the Spanish name for a paste made from a medium-hot chili with a beautiful golden colour.
Salt: Maldon sea salt is great with in the potato with the lemon and the aji amarillo.

It is with that in mind that I write what I consider to be wonderfully improbable, but true. My daughter likes my chicken curry.

My daughter asks for eggs, orange juice, and toast at just about every meal. Recently, I’d decided it was time to take on a new mantra: I will not live my life in fear—at least not in the kitchen. In a fit of rebellion, I decided to make chicken curry for dinner.

I made a recipe I thought would work with the ingredients I had in the house—but it was much too spicy for a toddler. Then I remembered a lesson I learned from a Mexican chef. If your tongue is burning from spicy food, it helps to have something sweet. So I added carrots and raisins for sweetness and yoghurt to make it creamier. It worked perfectly. It was exactly the comfort food sort of curry I wanted and more surprisingly, my daughter really liked it. I have to say I approve. Anyway you look at it, it’s a healthy dish. First there’s the meat which she will eat eventually after eating some raisins and sauce first. Then there are the vegetables which accidentally get eaten along with the sauce. Then there is the sauce which is mostly chicken broth with some tomato, yoghurt, and spices. Even if she only eats the sauce, I’m happy.

I’ve tried this recipe twice already, both times with equal success. The recipe takes about an hour to make, but only about 30 minutes to prepare, and it reheats wonderfully.

I have to credit the basis of the recipe to this recipe for Red Chicken Curry by Emeril Lagasse which I found on the Food Network website. However, I took a lot of spiciness out of the recipe by adding yoghurt, carrots, and raisins, and I save time by using a curry spice I like rather than making my own Garam Masala.

Prep time: 30 minutes
Cook time: 30 minutes
Yield: 6 servings

Ingredients
2 tablespoons of your favourite red curry spice—mine is for making Tikka Masala
2 teaspoons turmeric
1 large chicken fryer, about 4 pounds, cut into 10 pieces (or 3 pounds of chicken breasts and/or chicken thighs on the bone)
1/4 cup vegetable oil
2 chopped onions
Salt
2 teaspoons chopped garlic
1 cup chopped fresh or canned tomatoes
2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger
3 cups chicken stock
1 cup plain yoghurt
1 cup sultana raisins
1 cup sliced carrots (optional)
1 chopped red pepper (optional)

Season the chicken with the curry powder and turmeric. Set aside. Heat the oil in a large saute pan, over medium heat. Brown the chicken for about 3 to 4 minutes on each side. Remove and set aside.

Saute the onions in the pan until soft—about 4 minutes. Add the garlic, tomatoes and ginger. Continue to saute for 1 minute. Add the chicken stock. Stir in the yoghurt. Add the carrots or red pepper and reserved chicken pieces. Bring to a boil. Cover, reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for about 25 to 30 minutes or until the chicken is tender.

Note: the second time I made this recipe, my daughter looked at it like she wasn’t going to try it, so I squeezed a bit of honey on top of hers where she could see. She started eating the honey, and soon enough she was fishing around for the raisins, then eating bits of the thigh meat (I’d removed the skin and taken it off the bone) and then drinking the broth with her spoon just like before.

Since I like providing a choice and my cupcake stand has 3 tiers, I altered my theme a bit to something that works for 2 year olds and adults—Devil or Angel cupcakes.

The top tier has chocolate cupcakes with chocolate mousse and cherry filling, and lots of pink and lavender buttercream frosting.

The middle tier has white cupcakes with lemon curd filling and lemon buttercream frosting.

The bottom tier has chocolate cupcakes—I got the devil’s food cake recipe from the Joy of Cooking—with chocolate mouse filling—from Nigella Lawson’s Chocolate Cherry Trifle recipe, which I love, but have gained too many pounds eating—and dried cherries soaked in Grand Marnier. I like tart, sour cherries.

All three layers were topped with sugar cookies frosted with butter cream and sprinkled with sparkling sugar. Next time I am making fairy wands, I will use a smaller cookie cutter for the stars. But I do think the large stars would be perfect for Le Petit Prince cupcakes.

I made these cupcakes to go with my fairy cupcakes, but I thought they could be really nice for a Le Petit Prince party theme.

These are white cupcakes with lemon curd filling, lemon buttercream frosting, and large sugar-cookie stars with buttercream frosting and yellow sparkling sugar sprinkled on top.

I got a copy of Cooks Illustrated The New Best Recipe, and tried their Best Cupcake Recipe which makes a golden cupcake. I liked it, but the cupcakes were both dry and a little too eggy.

Then I tried a modification of a recipe that I found online, and I’m perfectly satisfied. The cake is snowy white, and moist and crumbly, and the flavour is delicious. The cupcakes tasted just as good the next day, and although there weren’t any more after that, I bet they would have been good the day after too.

My Favourite White Cupcake Recipe
- adapted from Aliece Well’s Lemon Cheese Layer Cake Recipe

Makes 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups cake flour, not self-rising, preferably Swan’s Down
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cups granulated sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup whole milk, room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line regular-size muffin tins with 12 paper cups (fill empty cups partially with water).

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt; set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter on medium speed until softened, 1 to 2 minutes. Gradually add the sugar, beating on medium speed until lightened, 3 to 4 minutes; scrape down sides once or twice. Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition.

On low speed, alternately add flour mixture and milk, a little of each at a time, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Beat in the vanilla and lemon juice.

Follow the cake recipe preparation; pour batter into the cups, filling each 3/4 full. Transfer to oven and bake until golden brown, about 20 minutes. Remove to a rack to cool.

I used this recipe for my Very Lemony Cupcakes, and I was very pleased with it.

I saw the recipe for these Salmon Starfish Cakes in First Meals by Annabel Karmel. Unfortunately, although the shape is irresistible, my daughter wouldn’t actually eat them. Well, they have a lot of mashed potato in them, and the only time she ever ate mashed potato was when it had some turkey and gravy on top of it. Maybe there’s a way to make them without potato.

Another birthday is coming up, and I thought it would be nice to make cupcakes for the party.

Last year I made Lemon Meringue cupcakes. They were very cute. Although my meringue decorating could use some practise, the meringue covered the cupcake in unruly peaks which I thought was perfect for my one year old. Unfortunately, the cakes were sweeter than I like and a bit dry.

So for her birthday this year, I’ve decided to try out a few different recipes beforehand to see which ones I liked the best.

I started out with a recipe from Cook’s Illustrated for a golden cupcake mix called their Best Cupcake Recipe. Although their thoroughness of their testing sounded promising, and the cakes were fairly tasty, but not what I was looking for. They were a bit dry, and a bit eggy, and they didn’t have the longevity I was looking for—they were best the same day.

Lemon Sponge Cupcakes
Then I decided to try Joy of Cooking which I consider to be a stand by. I decided to experiment with their recipe for Lemon Sponge which they said could be baked in a square tin or in custard cups. I figured if I used the metal lined cupcake liners inside a cupcake tin, that would be good enough. It might have been a good idea, unfortunately, I decided to try mixing it in the food processor to save time. This was a disaster. They came out flat and rubbery instead of spongey. The tops were light and airy though. I might give this another go. The recipe said to serve them with whipped cream and maybe a bit of raspberry sauce or just dusted with powdered sugar. Either way ought to be pretty good.

At this point I got lucky and found a recipe for “Aliece Wells Lemon Cheese Layer Cake”. I’d already made lemon curd which I adapted from a recipe in Feast: Food to Celebrate Life by Nigella Lawson and I’d been thinking of making Royal Icing, but I was nervous about using raw eggs, so the Seven-Minute Frosting sounded perfect. I have to say that the cakes came out exactly how I wanted. OK, they would have been better if I’d not used all the batter - the recipe is for 27 cupcakes which I halved, but I couldn’t resist using the extra batter in my 12 cupcakes. But the taste was moist and delicious, and they tasted just as good the next day.

The Seven-Minute Frosting was a disaster. The frosting is supposed to rise when you beat it like normal egg whites, but it didn’t rise at all. It was a humid day, so that may be it. But maybe I should have left the icing on the stove instead of taking it off after it had reached 170°. It tasted nice, but I ended up using whipped cream to ice the cupcakes instead.

So my next quest is for the perfect icing for lemony cupcakes.

Recipes

Lemon Curd
Ingredients
1 cup lemon juice from fresh squeezed lemons
2 large eggs
2 large egg yolks
3/4 cup sugar
6 Tbsp unsalted butter

Melt the butter in a double boiler. Beat the eggs, egg yolks and sugar together. When the butter has melted stir in the sugar-egg mixture and the lemon juice. Keep cooking, stirring constantly, until the mixture has thickened. Then take it off the heat.

This makes a very tangy—but in a good way—lemon curd. It’s also a bit runnier than Nigella’s which gets it’s stiffness from using a full stick of butter.

Best Cupcake Recipe
I adapted a wonderful recipe that I found online called Aliece Well’s Lemon Cheese Layer Cake Recipe for the cupcakes. I wanted them more lemony and I didn’t need so many. But I was very happy with the results. See my version of this recipe.

Very Lemony Cupcakes with Whipped Cream Frosting
When cupcakes and lemon curd have cooled, use a pastry bag fitted with a medium round tip to push a hole in the top of each cupcake and fill with the lemon curd letting some of the curd flow on the top of the cupcake in a small circle. Use another pastry bag to pipe some whipped cream in a curly, daisy-like border.

Lemon Cupcakes with Whipped Cream on the left and with runny Seven-Minute Frosting on the right

I love salmon. If it weren’t for the fear of mercury poisoning, I’d eat it several times a week. So I was thrilled when I found an easy recipe for salmon that my daughter and I both love. Honey & Soy Salmon Skewers from The Picky Eater section of First Meals by Annabel Karmel.

My only problem with the recipe is that when I want to make something quickly, it doesn’t always work out because you have to cut the salmon into cubes, prep the skewers by soaking them in cold water (and they still burn in the oven), and let it marinade for an hour. The cooking time is only 6 minutes, but the preparation can be a bit much if you’re short on time.

So, I modified the recipe a little bit to make the preparation time negligible.

Ingredients
1/2 lb salmon fillet

Marinade
1 Tbsp honey
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp sake

Mix together the ingredients for the marinade in a bowl. Put the salmon fillet in bowl making sure it is well coated. Put the bowl in the fridge and leave to marinade for about an hour.

Preheat the broiler—sometimes, I use a toaster oven—to high. Line a broiler pan with foil, and place the salmon fillet on the pan and cook for 6 minutes or more. You want the salmon to be moist on the inside. When it’s done, it will flake easily with a fork.

Take the salmon out of the oven out to rest for a minute while you prepare the teriyaki sauce. It will continue to cook a bit while it’s cooling.

Put the remaining marinade in a pan and simmer for a minute or so until reduced.

Divide the fillet into two portions. Serve the salmon with rice (or without) and spoon the reduced marinade over the salmon. You can put some rice in a child’s bowl and flake the salmon over the rice then spoon some of the marinade over the salmon.

Note:
At going on 2 years old, my daughter is starting to like more types of food, but it has always been difficult to find meat dishes that she likes. When she was a year old, I discovered that she liked finely chopped chicken disguised with mashed avocado and a drop of orange juice. After making the teriyaki salmon recipe, I realized that she also liked teriyaki chicken, and chicken from my salad that has a bit of vinaigrette on it. So, my next step is to try more recipes with marinades.