Tuesday, February 02, 2010

TWD—Milk Chocolate Mini Bundt Cakes

Whoa, this week flew by!  At about 2:00 Monday afternoon it dawned on me that I hadn’t even thought about TWD for this week!  We’ve been super busy as we’re dejunking our house and doing everything we can to get it ready to sell.  (I’ve mentioned this to a few already, but can I just say, there’s a new love in my life—Mr. Clean!  Bahhh, I love him, well, I love the Magic Eraser, that thing is awesome.  I’ve scrubbed off a lot of stickers, markers, ink, crayons, scuff marks and gunk with these things.  They work so well!

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Okay, I think the chocolate ganache looks like spider legs.  I need a lesson or two in drizzling down the sides of a bundt better.  Part of the issue is probably that I use a piping bag to make it easier, but it makes it look too stringy or leggy.  I’ll work on that. 

Anyway, I decided to hurry up and make the bundt cakes.  They were pretty simple.  Just made a quick cake batter, with milk chocolate, butter, sugar, egg, milk, the usual cake ingredients.  Dorie suggested  a swirl in the middle of the cakes made of walnuts or pecans, cocoa powder and sugar.  This is where you must know I veered from the recipe.  Hey, Dorie suggested we play around.  I played.  And I kind of had to hurry.  And I ended up taking some not-so-great pictures.  But the point is that I made this week’s recipe.  The cake was okay.  I hate to say it, but the ganache I made was the best part.  The cake was a little dry and I only baked these for 15 minutes.  This recipe made 11 mini bundts for me, so I must have some really tiny bundts.  Dorie didn’t suggest a size, just that the recipe would make six.  Hey, biggest trick ever, I put the batter in a plastic, zip top baggie and snipped off a little corner so I could easily get the batter in the pans.  Totally rocked rather than trying to spoon it in around the center of each bundt!  (I smoothed out the top of each.)

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I chopped up a couple Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and put those in the middle of two cakes.  Then I chopped up some pecans and toffee bits (gotta get those in there!) and I put those in two cakes.  I did a couple cakes with chopped up Rolo candies for the caramel effect and I did a few with just some mini chocolate chips sprinkle in and a few plain ones.  The ones I was most excited to try were the pecan/toffee ones and guess what, those two stuck to the pan.  Sigh.  Oh well.  The rest of them popped right out after a good spray with cooking spray so they’d release after baking.

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We ate these Monday night for a Family Home Evening treat.  The boys certainly seemed to love them.  I tried to get pictures of each, but of course, Scott and Taylor wouldn’t play along.  Never fear, Parker hammed it up for the camera!

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Here’s Parker with his bummed look because he wanted one of the cakes with the Reese cups and I gave him the wrong one.  He ate the one with Rolo Caramels, then got to have the peanut butter one.  He decided he wanted more peanut butter, so he put “a little” on top.  Scott ate two also.

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It’s pretty hard to get Parker to just make a normal face.  He FINALLY lost one of his front teeth this past weekend (he’s 8!).  The dentist told him six months ago that if those two teeth don’t come out by his next check up (Feb. 17!), she’ll pull them for him.  He DOES not want that to happen!  The other one is just slightly loose.

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Hey, while we’re on the subject of Parker, he had his Pinewood Derby for Cub Scouts this weekend.

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Parker loves Scouts.  He always puts his shirt on at least an hour before Scouts every week.  He was excited for the Pinewood Derby.

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Car number 28, dubbed by me as The Crayola Car, took 2nd place!  Go Parker, Go Crayola!  (Keep in mind, we do Scouts with our church group, so while it is still part of the Boy Scouts of America, it’s a much smaller group.  So Parker won against 9 cars and the race on a really old, rickety wooden track.  Still, he’s pretty happy about 2nd place.)

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Ok, back to the bundt cakes!  Here’s Sam with his cake.

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So there you have it.  I tried taking pictures of Scott’s choice, the Rolo cake, then Taylor’s cake, “the plain” one, but the batteries in the camera were dying and apparently the pictures didn’t take.  Sigh.  Already put in new batteries.  Who cares, I know.

You can find the recipe for these milk chocolate mini bundt cakes at Kristin’s blog, I'm Right About Everything.  She chose our recipe this week.  You can also check out the other blogger’s cakes at the Tuesday's With Dorie blog  as well.  Toodles, gotta get back to Mr. Clean and scrub, scrub, scrub!

38 comments:

Mary said...

Nice additions to the cake--makes choosing just one difficult! I didn't put anything in mine, so found them a bit plain, unsurprisingly. I like the pan, and I may just have to get one!

vibi said...

I can't believe your boys still find a way to be unhappy even with all the chocolate you serve 'em! LOL LOL LOL I would have looooooved my mom for baking me so many desserts!

But anywho... your bundts look amazing, I love how you drizzled the glaze on top! Perfect!

Lisa Ernst said...

Well, they look good, anyway. I have to ask, though, whether Dorrie's stellar reputation is fully deserved. It seems so many of her recipes are not that great in one way or another -- not enough flavor, dry, etc. I am surprised at how often this is true. Just wondering....

Kayte said...

They look great, and you can drizzle, I cannot drizzle (or knot breads) for the life of me. I need to just spend a day drizzling I think. Yours all look great, and love the photos of the kids...Pinewood Derby days, oh, how I remember those and the year that it was a race off between Matt and Alex, OMW, not good, one HAD to lose, and it turned out to be the one who loses the worst...LOL. Fun times, though, thanks for bringing back the memories.

chocolatechic said...

I bow at your reese contribution.

Brilliant!

Fallon said...

The little bundt cakes are SO CUTE! That actually a perfect serving for the huge cake cravings. Where did you pick up your pan? I should get one. ;)

I think your chocolate ganache looks so delicious! I'm not a piping nor decorating "expert" but I've seen people pipe the frosting by going down once, then lifting the tip and going to the next section and piping down a layer, lift tip, next section, pipe down a layer, lift tip etc. Instead of just going up and down up and down and never lifting the tip to stop from frosting. This breaks up your so called "spider" leg effect, which I didn't even think of because all I thought about was.. OOO CHOCOLATE! =P

Jessica of My Baking Heart said...

I love your glaze - spider legs or no! :) Glad you got a chance to make these! Good luck with the cleaning!!

Hindy said...

Adorable! Both bundts and boys. Isn't every child's answer to add peanut butter on top? Good luck with the house!

Cathy said...

Oh my, so much to comment on! First, I'm laughing out loud about the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser. That thing has save me more times than I care to count. My hubs said last weekend "what IS that thing?" And I said "Why, it's the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser!" and he said "No, I mean what's in it? It works way too good to be safe." I see his point, but still, that thing is a godsend if you have kids who like to write on walls and stuff. The pinewood Derby: so cute! Your cub scout is adorable, and great job with taking second place! Our son did not get a trophy last week and was kind of sad (he won one last year). Oh well, gotta learn those lessons sometime! Your cakes look FABULOUS! The peanut butter is a brilliant addition - wish I did that!

Soy*Baby said...

Your changes sound fantastic. Like usual. Every time I read your blog I come away with a craving for rolos. I need to get me some rolos. Your boys are too cute. I remember going to the Pinewood derby when my older brother was in Cub Scouts. Years ago.

Bella Baker said...

I think you did a great job on the drizzle!! Yours boys are so adorable!!!!

Anonymous said...

Your mini-bundts look wonderful! I need to go back and make them again one day. Love the pictures of the boys.

Anonymous said...

The Reeses sound really good. We are dejunking our house for a possible move as well. I discovered the magic eraser this weekend and went through EIGHT of them! Good job, Parker!

Mimi said...

Your mini's are cute and your additions sound tasty. Gott'a love your taste testers they are adorable, of course boys don't want to be adorable, they want to be cool. Oh well.
Mimi

Leslie said...

I love your glazing, it looks so creative! And your tip of using the ziploc back to fill the mini bundts is inspired.

Personally, I'm in love with the bleach pen. Wipes out little spots of mold in the grout in the shower. It's like magic.

Leslie said...

ohhh I can not live without the magic eraser!
I cant believe your son didnt loose his front tooth till 8!!!!!

AmyRuth said...

Way to rally, Katrina! Great job and happy faces too. I think your cakes look really cute. So smart of you to used a ziploc like a pastry bag for the glaze. A great idea to incorporate the candy flavoring. Thank you for your kind encouraging words and visit.
AmyRuth

Jenni Hinckley said...

That cake looks soooo good!

CindyD said...

You're selling the house? I must have missed something!

noble pig said...

This reminded me to get that cake pan out, I always forget I have it. And yeah for the derby, we miss scouts.

Paula said...

Thinking your drizzles look pretty good.

Good luck with Mr. Clean and selling your house. What a job!

Liz said...

Hey, I didn't realize you were LDS! (Me too. You'd think my spidey sense would have told me.) The consensus seems to be that these cakes were skippable, so I guess I'm not too sad that I passed. Seems a shame to have used perfectly good Reese's and Rolos in them, though. :)

mike said...

Katrina.... those look great! Even with the sour puss look on his face! Those boys are lucky to have you around (all that great stuff to eat)! I agree - great additions - creative as usual! And it looks drizzled... not like spider legs! :)

Clumbsy Cookie said...

Parker looks so cute with the teeths like that! I love your mini bundt cake pan, so adorable!!! I'll get the one with rolo ok? And maybe one with ob also...

Jennifer said...

silly boys! I think they look great!!

Welcome to our crazy blessed life said...

I <3 Magic Erasers! They took sharpie off of our pumpkins that we were trying to carve. :) Glad these turned out so well with your playing around! I need to get a little more creative!

Peabody said...

Mmm, I like the addition of the peanut butter cups!

Suzanne said...

your bundt cakes looks delish! Can I have one?

Megan said...

Yum yum! All those flavor combinations - but the pb would have definitely been my favorite.

Love the cub scout photos - and congrats to Parker for his 2nd place win!

And it's nice to see you have a love affair going on in your house - with Mr. Clean, that is.

Jacque said...

Mmmm, great additions... wish I'd have thought to try toffee bits, the ultimate add-in.

Congrats on 2nd place... we've been doing pinewood derby for what, 5 years now? The boys are always excited about it too.

Unknown said...

I actually thought your drizzle looked really good then I read you didn't like it! Love the variety of things you used in the swirl. I went with mint chips and peanut butter chips and loved the flavor, but mine were a little dry too.

Good luck with selling your house!

Megan said...

I love the variations of your cakes and I enjoyed the boys pictures and the derby photos. Thanks for sharing a slice of your life!

Susan said...

Your boys are too cute! Way to go with the #28 car!! Congrats! Your cakes look and sound delicious!

Deborah said...

Great idea on filling the mini bundts! And I think your glaze looks wonderful. :)

Chats the Comfy Cook said...

Love you addition of candy. That had to make them even better.

Jaime said...

i'll take a reese's cake please :) i usu. just use a butter knife to spread my glaze, nothing fancy :)

The Queen of Quite a Lot said...

Chopped Rolos sound really good! Thanks for baking with me this week!

s said...

such a fun blog..loved reading it..and gorgeous pics...the food and ur boys!