Friday, November 20, 2015

Kugelhopf


November is always a exciting time for the "Cake Slice Bakers". November is when we start baking from a new book. Maida Heatter's Cakes was the new selection for this season. 


For my first bake I decided to go with Kugelhopf. A raisin-nut coffee cake, made with a yeast dough. In the last six years with the Cake Slice, I've only encountered two Cake recipes calling for yeast. Kugelhopf was one of our four selections this month, and I could not pass up the opportunity to bake with yeast.
I used a bundt pan to bake my cake, although I wished I would have had the lovely Kugelhopf cake pan.


This cake is a pretty simple recipe. I do recommend you purchase the proper pan. I had overflowed batter drip all over my CLEAN oven, not very happy about it, but my lesson learned. 
The recipe suggest the cake be eaten the next day, but do I listen? No. Not very impressed with the warm slice I had. I could not taste anything but the rum infused raisins. Not very pleasant. The next morning I decided to try another slice before I gave this cake a unfair review. The cake was ten times better, I could no longer taste the alcohol of the rum, and the cake sliced nicely. I liked it so much better. The cake is a slightly dry cake, it does get drier with time. The next time around I would definitely double the raisins and almonds in the recipe, I felt it lacked flavor. Nevertheless the cake was not wasted, my husband was never more delighted he had almost entire cake to himself to eat all week long.


Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Polvorones: #CreativeCookieExchange



I just joined a baking group called "Creative Cookie Exchange". A group of dedicated cookie bakers. Every month this group is given a theme for our monthly cookie bake, we post on Tuesday following the 15th of each month. 
This months theme is Cinnamon! Awhile back ago I came across this recipe while I was searching for the Ultimate Polvoron recipe. I have made these in the past and while pleased with previous recipes it wasn't exactly what I was searching for. I wanted a more authentic cookie recipe. 


Thank goodness I came across "Mexico in my Kitchen"! Her recipe was a great success! My quest is over, I can rest assure no other recipe can beat the authenticity of this one. 
Keeping in mind our theme for the month I tweaked the recipe by adding 2 teaspoons of cinnamon and decreasing the vanilla to 1 teaspoon, and omitting the zest. I gave them a dusting of powdered sugar after they were completely cooled. 
For the recipe please visit "Mexico in my Kitchen". 

Are we the only ones who start craving cinnamon when the weather gets colder? We can’t be! And we are talking anything sold under the word cinnamon--cassia, “true Cinnamon”, Ceylon Cinnamon, Vietnamese Cinnamon--if it is sold as cinnamon it is what we want! Check out all of our cinnamon cookies below! Hint: A lot of them could be used for your holiday cookie table! You can also use us as a great resource for cookie recipes. Be sure to check out our Pinterest Board and our monthly posts (you can find all of them here at The Spiced Life). You will be able to find them the first Tuesday after the 15th of each month! Also, if you are looking for inspiration to get in the kitchen and start baking, check out what all of the hosting bloggers have made: