Posts made in September, 2019

Bready or Not: Fudgy Chocolate Gluten-Free Cake

Posted by Beth on Sep 25, 2019 in Blog, Bready or Not, brownies, cake, chocolate, gluten-free | Comments Off on Bready or Not: Fudgy Chocolate Gluten-Free Cake

This incredible Fudgy Chocolate Cake is like a great big grown-up brownie.

While this can’t be said to be healthy, it IS gluten free, so makes for a wonderful treat for people with that dietary restriction.

It also keeps very well. I sliced it up and kept pieces stored in the fridge for over a week. They never dried out or lost flavor.

Even better, this cake can be frozen to last longer. Freeze slices on waxed paper and keep stored in a plastic container or freezer bag. Defrost in fridge when you want to indulge!

This cake is delicious by itself, but you could easily dress it up with fresh strawberries, cherries, or raspberries, and/or a scoop of vanilla ice cream–all of which are gluten-free as well, of course.

Modified from Allrecipes Magazine February/March 2015.

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Bready or Not: Fudgy Chocolate Gluten-Free Cake

This gluten-free chocolate cake includes basic ingredients and is fast to make, to delicious results. The cake keeps well in the fridge and can be frozen as well.

Course: Dessert, Snack

Keyword: cake, chocolate, gluten free

Author: Beth Cato

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup cocoa powder sifted, plus more to dust pan
• 4 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 3 eggs beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• confectioners' sugar for top, optional

Instructions

• Preheat oven at 300-degrees. Cut parchment to fit in the bottom of an 8-inch cake pan. Grease pan. Set parchment inside. Grease again. Dust paper and sides of pan with cocoa.
• In a large microwave-safe bowl, heat chocolate and butter in short bursts, stirring well between each pass, until smooth. Stir in cocoa powder followed by sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Pour into prepared pan.
• Bake about 40 minutes, until cake begins to pull away from the sides of the pan; a toothpick inserted in the center should come out just slightly wet. Cool in pan for 20 minutes, then invert onto a rack. Remove the parchment, then invert again onto a plate to cool for at least an hour before cutting. Sprinkle with confectioners' sugar, if desired.
• Keep cake covered by plastic wrap in fridge; keeps well as long as a week. Cake can be sliced and frozen for later enjoyment.
• OM NOM NOM!

Bready or Not Original: Easy Blueberry Pie Bars

Posted by Beth on Sep 18, 2019 in Blog, blondies, blueberry, Bready or Not, breakfast, cookies | Comments Off on Bready or Not Original: Easy Blueberry Pie Bars

These Easy Blueberry Pie Bars taste like blueberry cobbler in a tidier, more compact form. They are DELICIOUS.

Yeah, yeah, I share a lot of good recipes on here, but these are seriously amazing.

The recipe is pretty straightforward, too. Make the shortbread crust. Press it down. Bake. Mix up the middle ingredients, folding in the blueberries last. Sprinkle reserved crust on top. Bake. Enjoy.

I like that this recipe only requires a pint of blueberries, too. During the summer, I can often find a little 12 ounce clamshell container on sale for under a buck!

These bars keep well for as long as three days, maybe longer, in a sealed container in the fridge. They make for a great dessert, but they’d be great for breakfast, too.

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Bready or Not Original: Easy Blueberry Pie Bars

A Bready or Not Original. These delicious treats taste like a blueberry cobbler in convenient bar form!

Course: Breakfast, Dessert, Snack

Keyword: bars, blueberries, pie

Author: Beth Cato

Ingredients

Crust

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup unsalted butter 2 sticks

Filling

• 2 eggs room temperature
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup sour cream or plain or vanilla Greek yogurt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 pint fresh blueberries 12 ounces

Instructions

• Preheat oven at 350-degrees.Line a 9x13 pan with foil and apply nonstick spray.
• Place flour, sugar, and salt in a large bowl. Add the butter, and use a knife and fork to chop it into crumbles. Measure out 1 cup of this crumb mixture; set aside.
• Place the rest of the crust mix into the baking dish. Distribute evenly, then compress into a thin layer; a piece of wax paper and a heavy glass work well for this.
• Bake for 15 minutes. In the meantime, make the filling.
• Beat eggs, then add in the sugar, flour, salt, sour cream/yogurt, and vanilla. Gently fold in the blueberries.
• Pour the filling over the prebaked crust. Spread out evenly. Sprinkle the reserved crust mixture over the top.
• Bake 55 to 60 minutes, until top is golden brown and passes the toothpick test.
• Cool at room temperature, then chill in fridge to set more firmly. Use foil to lift onto a cutting board to slice into bars. Store in sealed container in fridge with waxed paper or parchment paper between layers. Keeps for at least 3 days.
• OM NOM NOM!

It’s fruitcake-making time!

Posted by Beth on Sep 16, 2019 in alcohol, Blog, boozy, Bready or Not, cake | Comments Off on It’s fruitcake-making time!

Yes, the subject line is serious, because YES, fruitcake can be delicious–especially if you make it yourself and control the whole process! Follow my Mini Fruitcake Loaves recipe and you’ll see what I mean. Bake these babies now and you’ll have plenty of time to ripen them (that means brushing them down with a simple sugar mix once a week to soak in flavor) in time for holiday festivities.

Book Blog: A Song for a New Day by Sarah Pinsker

Posted by Beth on Sep 13, 2019 in Blog, book blog | Comments Off on Book Blog: A Song for a New Day by Sarah Pinsker

I review everything I read and post reviews on Goodreads and LibraryThing. That’s not enough. Good books are meant to be shared. Therefore, I’m spotlighting some of my favorite reads here on my site.

A Song for a New Day by Sarah Pinsker
out now; Indiebound, B&N, and Amazon

I received an advance copy of this book via NetGalley.

I’m a big fan of Sarah Pinsker’s work. I adored her collection Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea [reviewed here] and have been genuinely excited that her first novel would be inspired by her fantastic novelette “Our Lady of the Open Road.” The book absolutely lived up to my high expectations.

Pinsker’s science fiction is eerily plausible: a near-future world where a series of terrorist attacks and illness with high mortality have led to laws against congregations of people. Society fully embraces the digital and insular, relying on drone delivery for most all goods and on virtual experiences for dating, sports events, and–most notably for this book–concerts, with StageHoloLive being the major purveyor of much entertainment.

Enter the two protagonists: Luce, a gifted musician on the cusp of going big when the world fell apart, and Rosemary, a young woman rendered agoraphobic by her parents and culture, but who perkily heads out to find undercover musical acts as part of her new job for StageHoloLive. All of the characters in the book are nuanced and realistic, and Pinsker’s own background in bands completely grounds the world. This develops into a book with some shades of Charles de Lint’s works, yet with an original, fresh approach to a timeless theme: a celebration of music, of EXPERIENCING music, of how much more is involved than merely listening.

This book is beautiful, and its deep message will linger with me for a long while.

Bready or Not: Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars [cake mix]

Posted by Beth on Sep 11, 2019 in Blog, Bready or Not, brownies, cake mix, chocolate | Comments Off on Bready or Not: Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars [cake mix]

These Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars are so good that people won’t even guess that it uses cake mix.

I, personally, don’t see any shame in using cake mix. It’s a convenient base ingredient to doctor up.

Chocolate and peanut butter is such a classic pairing. You can use any number of chocolate cake mixes for this (it was tested with a 15.25 ounce box), but I recommend devil’s food cake. It has a nice depth to it.

If you’re in America, you might find a premade bag of peanut butter and chocolate chips at stores like Walmart. If you can’t find that, just use separate bags of those kinds of chips and measure out a cup of each.

At my husband’s work, some of his co-workers considered this among their all-time favorite recipes. That is high praise indeed.

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Bready or Not: Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars [cake mix]

This easy-to-make recipe is so good that people won't even know it uses cake mix!

Course: Dessert, Snack

Keyword: bars, cake mix, chocolate

Author: Beth Cato

Ingredients

• 1 box chocolate cake mix 15.25 oz
• 3/4 cup unsalted butter melted
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1 bag peanut butter and chocolate chips or 1 cup of each kind of chips
• 1/2 cup chopped peanuts

Instructions

• Preheat oven at 350-degrees. Line a 9x13 pan with foil and apply nonstick spray.
• In a big bowl, combine the cake mix, melted butter, and milk. Spread half of batter on bottom of the pan. Bake for 15 minutes.
• Place peanut butter in a microwave safe bowl and warm to be spreadable. Pour over the baked bottom crust and spread to edges. Sprinkle the peanut butter and chocolate chips on top, followed by dollops of the reserved cake batter. Finish with the chopped peanuts.
• Bake for another 20 minutes, until the visible portions of the peanut butter layer look set. Cool completely, refrigerating if desired.
• Use foil to lift onto cutting board to slice into bars. Store in a sealed container at room temperature.
• OM NOM NOM!