Showing posts with label caramel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label caramel. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Eat Your Heart Out Starbucks

Anyone ever been to Starbucks and had their delicious caramel macchiato biscotti?  Well, so have I many, many times.  After consuming about a billion of those little guys, I finally cracked the secret to the illusive caramel macchiato biscotti recipe and I'm willing to share.


Remember this post where I talked about entering two recipes and one of them winning and then never gave you the second recipe?  Well, the day is here to share the second.  Here's a hint.  It's the caramel macchiato biscotti.


These cookies are easy to combine, but beware, they make a lot and they take a while to complete.  That being said, they are well worth all the work!  I gave some of these to my supervisor at the law library and she called them crack biscotti because she thought they were that good!  *No crack is actually contained in the biscotti, don't worry.*

So, after much adieu, here is the recipe for the first place Caramel Macchiato Biscotti


Caramel Macchiato Biscotti
Inspired by Starbucks


Coffee Biscotti:
2 tpsp of instant coffee 

1/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

3/4 cup sugar

1 egg

2 cups flour

2 tsp baking powder
1 bag Caramel baking chips

Vanilla Biscotti:
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup white granulated sugar
6 tablespoons unsalted butter at room temperature
2 extra large eggs at room temperature
1 long vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped using the back of a knife

Caramel Icing:
6 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 cups confectioners' sugar
2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup packed brown sugar


Directions:
For the Coffee Biscotti:
Preheat the oven to 300ยบ F. Beat the butter, sugar, and egg together until fairly smooth. Add coffee and caramel chips. Mix flour and baking powder together in a separate bowl, then add to the other mixture. Mix everything just until dough begins to form. Cover and set aside in the fridge while you prepare the vanilla dough.
For Vanilla Bean dough:
 In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, and baking powder.  In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment or with an electric mixer, cream the butter, sugar, and vanilla bean seeds until light in color and fluffy.  Scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the egg, beating well.  Add the second egg and beat again.  Scrape down the sides.  Mix in the dry ingredients.

Take out the coffee dough and divide the dough in fourths; shape each quarter into a 12-inch long, 1 1/2-inch wide log. Dough quarters should be thin.  Divide vanilla dough into quarters placing on top of coffee dough. Lightly press the vanilla dough into the coffee dough so that it adheres together.  Transfer two of the logs to the baking sheet. (Unless you have large pans or two ovens, these will have to be baked two at a time, or two can be frozen for further use)  Bake until golden brown, about 50 minutes.  The dough will be slightly soft to the touch.  Allow the dough to cool on the baking sheets for 10 minutes.  

After logs have cooled, cut the logs into 3/4 -inch wide diagonal slices using a sharp or serrated knife.  Place the biscotti cut side down on the baking sheets.  Return to the oven and bake for another 30 minutes, turning the biscotti over halfway through. Cool on the baking sheets.  

While biscotti are cooling, make caramel icing. In a medium saucepan, combine butter, cream, and brown sugar over medium heat.  Cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture just begins to boil; remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Cool then stir in confectioner's sugar. Icing should be thin.  If it is too thick, thin down with milk.  If too thin, add additional powdered sugar until desired consistency is achieved.  You’ll want to dip all the biscotti while the frosting is still warm.

When biscotti are cooled, drizzle or dip each biscotti into icing.  Allow to harden and enjoy.

Store in an airtight container for up to two weeks.  

Sunday, October 9, 2011

Working Title.

After the last blog's success failure, I said that I would not do this again.  Well, once again here I am telling that world that I'm eating my words.  I hope you can all see past the gigantic foot sticking out of my mouth and enjoy the blog.  Here's to me actually sticking it out this time!


You may be wondering about the blog title.  Well so am I.  I'm not great at thinking up cutsie phrases or titles so I stuck with what I know best: stress and baking.   More often than not, those two events are coupled together in my world.  They're symbiotic if you will and as a new law student, I have a lot of stress, which is usually followed by a lot of baking - go figure.  So I hope that you can enjoy a bonus side effect of my stress without the actual, well, stress. Let the straking? bressing? Stress baking begin!


Just a little about myself for those of you who are new to me.  I'm a first year law student in Missouri.  I am married to my best friend Mike who is the biggest blessing in my life (no we don't have kids yet, give it time).  My husband and I are both originally from Oklahoma where we met and graduated undergrad.  We've been married almost a year and a half and lived in Missouri for as long.  We have an eight month old puppy named Kora who thinks she's our child - we haven't told her she's a dog yet, only that she's adopted so if you see her, please don't break the news to her.  She just can't handle the truth yet.  


My husband is a youth minister by trade which is a blessing and also a great dose of birth control all at once.  We are very luck to have such a wonderful church family as our first home congregation as a married couple.  


There's a little about me, but before I leave you with a cookie recipe, I would love to hear a little about you all as well.  Happy baking! (Or stressing, if that's your thing!)




Pumpkin Cookies with Caramel Frosting
(Husband approved)


These cookies are the quintessential fall cookie.  What makes them unable to put down is the caramel frosting.  Once you begin making the frosting, you won't be able to put the spoon down. The cookies are plump and moist and the frosting just makes them that much better.  Definitely an easy cookie to make and enjoy immediately. 



Ingredients

Cookies
1 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup fresh pumpkin puree
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ginger
2 cups all-purpose flour

Frosting
5 tablespoons butter
1/3 cup heavy cream
1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup packed brown sugar

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugars. Add eggs and vanilla and mix well. Stir in pumpkin. In a medium bowl, sift together the baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger, and flour. Add to pumpkin mixture and mix well.  Drop by heaping tablespoons onto a lightly greased cookie sheet. Bake for 10-12 minutes.
 
To make frosting: In a medium saucepan, combine butter, cream, and brown sugar over medium heat.  Cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture just begins to boil; remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Cool then stir in confectioner's sugar.  Spread a generous amount of frosting over cooled cookies. Consume immediately for maximum enjoyment.