Pão de Queijo aka Cheese Bread

Today I present to you a recipe for a treat I absolutely adore. Being born in Brazil (not Brazil, IN but THE Brasil!) I grew up with these little jewels. If you ask any Brazilian, they will know what pao de queijo is! If this is your first time hearing about pao de queijo, it is roughly translated to "cheese bread", although it is not your typical baguette cut in half and smothered with butter, garlic and Parmesan cheese (although that is yummy too!). Instead, they are little bite-sized (or at least I make them bite-sized, you could make them any size you want!) balls of cheese and starch heaven! 

But through my 28 years of life, I had NEVER attempted to make these breads from scratch! I have always bought a pre-mixed box that you just add the wet ingredients, not knowing exactly how to go about the dry ingredients. One day, one of my mom's friends who also happens to be Brazilian, came for lunch and brought these for everyone. Oh man did these disappear fast! My non-Brazilian hubby (he is an all-American boy!) absolutely loves this bread too and prodded me to ask for the recipe. When she told me the recipe, I could not believe how simple these are to make! The secret is the "polvilho", which is tapioca flour (aka mandioca). There are two types of tapioca flour available at international food stores (look in the Brazilian section, or even other Latin-American country sections): sweet (doce) or sour (azedo). I used sweet since that is what I had available, but if I find the sour I want to use it and compare the two.

So what are you waiting for? Go try this recipe NOW!!! And then let me know how it turned out ;) 

Added note 4/11/2013: This is Gluten-free!!! :D I know, I should have realized it in the beginning, but it didn't dawn on me until recently... double bonus!

Pão de Queijo (Cheese Bread)

Makes ~30-40 mini breads

Ingredients:

2 cups polvilho (sweet or sour, I used sweet)

1 egg

1 cup milk

1/2 cup canola (or vegetable) oil

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350F. In a blender, add the egg and milk along with one cup of polvilho. Blend for 2-3 pulses. Add the canola oil, salt and the other cup of polvilho, and blend for 5 pulses. Add the grated cheese and blend for 10 seconds.

Grease 2 mini-muffin pans (24 count each) with non-stick spray and fill each 2/3 of the way full. Bake for 15-20 minutes, watching for doneness. It is done when the bread holds its shape and the sides are just golden-brown. Serve immediately.

Recipe courtesy of friend Ana.

Matcha (Green Tea) Cupcakes

So long no see to everyone! It has been one busy month, and hope things are finally settling down for me. Hope to be able to continue posting more yummy recipes here for all to see!

This weekend was a very special one: my baby sister came home this weekend for her spring break! She is going to school in NC and since that is a ways away from good ol’ Indiana, we don’t get to see her very often. However, this will be the last time we see her until August! Boo! That means we would not be able to celebrate her birthday in March with her. So, what do we do? We bump up her birthday celebration a little early to this weekend! Yay to that! Before she arrived, I asked her what her birthday cupcake request would be. She reply: “Make me something naturally green.” Green?? Green?!!?!?! That was my immediate reaction. BUT! Then I remembered seeing Japanese green tea (matcha) cupcakes, and thought this would be a perfect fit! I first looked through my recipe books for a match, but did not find any. I turned to the internet and found this lovely recipe at Food Mayhem and gave it a try. I followed the cake recipe directly, but modified the frosting recipe (I used the whole 8oz of cream cheese instead of leaving 2oz behind, and I only used 2 tsp of green tea).

Now just a little tid-bit about Matcha green tea: Matcha is a specific green tea used in Asian countries, especially in Japan. When I lived in Japan I participated in a Japanese Tea Ceremony and I was served Matcha tea with small sweet cakes. Matcha has a long history behind it, and if you want to read a little about it, I suggest this Wiki page.

So now onto the recipe! Hope you enjoy it, as my sister certainly did!

*Note: No, we did not eat the cupcake with chopsticks :P

Matcha Green Tea Cupcakes

Makes ~18 cupcakes

Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup cake flour

4 teaspoons matcha powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 1/4 cups white sugar

1 cup vegetable oil

3 eggs

1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup sour cream

Frosting:

2 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar

2 teaspoons matcha powder

8 ounces cream cheese, softened

4 tablespoons butter, softened

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Place muffin liners in regular muffin tin for 18-24 cupcakes.
2. In a medium-sized bowl, sift together all purpose flour, cake flour, matcha powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, beat together sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla.
4. Alternating between dry mix and sour cream, stir into the wet mixture until just combined. 

5. Fill muffin cups so that the tin looks about 2/3 full.

6. Bake muffins for 15 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean. Remove and let it cool for ten minutes before removing to a cooling rack. Cool cupcakes completely before frosting.
7. To make frosting, sift together confectioner’s sugar and matcha powder. Set aside. Using a heavy duty mixer with the whisk attachment, beat together cream cheese, butter, and vanilla on medium speed for 5 minutes. Reduce the speed to low and add sugar/matcha gradually. Once all of the sugar/matcha is mixed in, increase speed to medium and beat for 5 minutes more. Frost with piping bag.

Adapted from Food Mayhem

Join me in Frosting for the Cause!

Hello everyone! As you may notice the lack of recipe that follows, today I am guest posting over at Frosting For The Cause (first time ever participating as a guest post! So nervous!!!).
Paula from Vanilla Bean Baker is the driving force behind this amazing project that is bringing together 365 different bakers to blog and share their personal encounters with cancer. With this project, we are all "baking" a difference one recipe at a time. If you are unfamiliar with this project, I recommend that you hop on over to this site and read the many stories shared by the registered bakers. Also, if you are interested in participating in this wonderful project, click here.





PS: if you are wondering what I made for this wonderful cause: it is Oatmeal Fudge Bars!!!

Tiramisu

Hello everyone! Today I am sharing a recipe I have had for quite a while and have even become somewhat famous among my family and friends for making for special occasions. I have always been a huge fan of Tiramisu, but never thought of making it (sounds too complicated to make right?). Well, then when I was still dating my husband, I had heard my "future" father-in-law LOVES Tiramisu. So what do I do? Of course, I wanted to score brownie points with his family, so I decided to try my hand at it. By the way, I found this recipe online, although I can't find it anymore and I had not saved the source of the original. It was labeled as a William-Sonoma recipe.

Anyways, back to my first attempt at Tiramisu: it went well for a first time, except that I made the mistake of using egg whites instead of egg yolks! Oh man... but you know what though? My father-in-law still ate it! LOL That is family love right there. Since then I've had many more opportunities to... uh-hum, "fine-tune" my skills (and learn the difference from egg yolks and whites). 

So a little background info on Tiramisu. If you don't already know, Tiramisu means "pick me up". This Italian dessert is made of sweet biscuits dipped in coffee (hence the pick me up part) and layered with an Italian custard made of Mascarpone cheese. But aside from the fancy name, it is not hard to make. I'll add comments throughout the recipe directions so that I can hopefully lend my years of "experiences" (or the what-not-to-do's). I hope you enjoy this recipe!

Ingredients

• 6 EGG YOLKS
• 3/4 cup SUGAR
• 1 lb MASCARPONE CHEESE, softened
• 2 cups HEAVY CREAM, chilled
• 2 Tbsp RUM or RUM EXTRACT
• 1 tsp VANILLA EXTRACT
• 2 Tbsp + 2-3 cups brewed (and cooled) ESPRESSO or COFFEE
• 5 EGG WHITES
• 40-50 LADYFINGERS
• COCOA POWDER, for garnish

Directions

1. In a mixing bowl set over but not touching a pan of simmering water, beat the egg yolks and sugar until the mixture is pale yellow and thick ribbons fall from the whisk (4 to 5 minutes).
2. Transfer the mixture to the bowl of an electric mixer.
3. Add the mascarpone cheese and beat until smooth and creamy (2 to 3 minutes). Set aside.
4. In a chilled large mixing bowl, beat the heavy cream to stiff peaks.
5. Add the rum, vanilla and the 2 tablespoons of espresso (or coffee) and beat until smooth.
6. With a rubber spatula, gently fold the mascarpone mixture into the cream until blended and smooth.
7. While blending the mascarpone mixture and the heavy cream mixture, in a clean mixing bowl, beat the egg whites to stiff peaks (when the whisk is lifted straight out of the bowl and inverted, the whites should hold their shape).
8. Add about 1 cup of the beaten egg whites and fold gently until blended.
9. Add the remaining egg whites and fold gently until the mixture is smooth and blended.
10. One at a time, submerge each ladyfinger into the remaining espresso, then lay it on the bottom of a 6-quart glass or ceramic baking or serving dish (about 2 inches deep).
11. Continue to form a complete layer.
12. Spread half of the mascarpone mixture over the soaked ladyfingers until evenly covered.
13. Arrange another layer of soaked ladyfingers over the mascarpone cream, then spread the remaining mascarpone cream evenly over the top.
14. Dust the Tiramisù with cocoa powder to create a rich, dark topping.
15. Refrigerate at least 4 hours or up to 1 day before serving.

Butter Cookies

Happy New Year greetings to everyone! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season J Looking back at this last year, I sure have many MANY things to be thankful for. One of the things I am super thankful for are the people who surround me. I absolutely love my family and friends, coworkers, even my neighbors! I wanted to share my gratitude with everyone, and so I chose to try my hand at cookies (yup, not cupcakes) and share them with my loved ones. I saw this wonderful recipe for Danish Butter Cookies at Day Dreamer Desserts, and couldn’t wait to give it a try. I was a little nervous not knowing how they would turn out as I had never used a cookie press. Also, I had not checked the original recipe from All Recipes, and didn’t know that one recipe makes seven dozen cookies! Ha! Well, on the upside, I had enough cookies to share with LOTS of people, so I guess it was win win!

So these cookies turned out wonderfully! I had lots of fun trying out the different cookies shapes, some of which I had no idea what they did before I pressed the dough through it. This cookie is very buttery with just enough sweetness to it. In the end, it wasn’t hard to get rid of these cookies, as you can see from my last picture.

To share these babies with my loved ones, I placed 3-4 cookies in a cupcake liner (mine were Santa Claus themed) and placed these liners in a cookie tin. If I may say so myself, I think it turned out pretty cute.

I will be posting next another edible gift idea I made for my neighbors. Meanwhile, enjoy this recipe!

Danish Butter Cookies

Makes ~7 dozen

Ingredients:

3 cups unsalted butter (6 sticks)
2 1/4 cups granulated sugar
7 egg yolks
6 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/4 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon baking powder

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In a large bowl (fitted with the paddle attachment), cream the butter and sugar until fluffy. Beat in the yolks one at a time, then stir in the vanilla. In a separate bowl, sift and whisk the flour, salt, and baking powder. Slowly add dry ingredients to the wet in a few batches. Using a cookie press, press cookies onto an ungreased cookie sheet spacing them 2 inches apart. Bake for 7-8 minutes and remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

Oh, and this is what was left BEFORE Santa arrived!

Recipe originally from Day Dreamer Desserts, adapted from All Recipes