Month: February 2022

Oatmeal Cake with Broiled Frosting

~ nancyruth ~ 2 Comments

I was thinking that I could make one dessert for the week and that should satisfy my sweet tooth and love of baking. Well, that might be the case for reasonable people who don’t eat half a pan of brownies in one sitting or cut nibble size pieces from cake as one walks through the kitchen. I am not necessarily one of those reasonable people all the time. But here I am hoping that will work this time.

I have selected this recipe from a clipping in my Mom’s recipe notebook. this one appears to have been from a newspaper. It sounded interesting and relatively healthy, if cake can be healthy? And oatmeal is good for one, so here goes!

  • 1 1/2 cups boiling water
  • 1 cup quick-cooking oats
  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1 cup sugar (Oops! I accidentally omitted this!)
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon nutmeg (I added a shake of allspice as well as I was not sure if I grated enough nutmeg to equal one teaspoon.)
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt

Pour boiling water over oats and mix well. Cream butter and sugar and then beat in eggs. I timed this for 3 minutes. Stir in soaked oatmeal. Sift or whisk the other dry ingredients together and add to batter. Pour this into a greased or buttered 13×9-inch pan and bake in 350 degrees F oven for 30-35 minutes. Cool in pan.

Make broiled topping.

  • 1/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 cup flaked coconut
  • 1 cup chopped nuts; I used walnuts but pecans would work here too.
  • 6 Tablespoons butter
  • 1/4 cup light cream
  • 1/4 teaspoon vanilla

Heat all the ingredients in sauce pan until bubbly. Pour over cake. Broil in oven for about 5 minutes. Technically one should stir in the vanilla after the concoction comes to bubbly.

When this came out of the oven, my first thought was “this didn’t rise like a cake.” Then I thought that maybe it is more like a bar cookie. After letting the very hot topping cool slightly we tasted this. It is good and not too sweet. It is more of a spice bar than cake in texture. I have “hidden” this pan in the bread box to prevent “drive by nibbling”!

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Boston Cream Pie

~ nancyruth ~ 4 Comments

This is really cake. This one is from a recipe clipping in Mom’s recipe notebook and looks like it came from a magazine. There is no reference on the clipping. Did Mom make this? I’m not sure. I know she used to make a poppy seed cake with pudding filling and chocolate glaze, so maybe she did.

I read and re-read this recipe before proceeding. As I was making the cake I realized this is a hot milk sponge cake. I proceed hoping for the best and reasonably confident that the past two hot milk sponge cakes I baked were successful but not this recipe. Re-reading helped me see that this called for two 8 inch round cake pans. I recently bought nice 9-in pans. The amounts of the ingredients also seemed scant for two pans, so I doubled the recipe and am very glad I did. The recipe is almost exactly like the one from my previous blog entitled Hot Milk Sponge Cake so I will not reprint it.

I made the filling and the chocolate glaze from the recipe clipping. Making a pudding or cream-custard can by a little tricky and, I admit, mine had a bit of scrambled egg to it, but not much so you noticed.

  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • 2 Tablespoons flour
  • 1 Tablespoon cornstarch
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 1/2 cups milk
  • 2 eggs (okay so the original called for 1 egg and 1 egg yolk but why?)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla

Stir dry ingredients together in medium saucepan and slowly add the milk and cook over moderate heat until boiling, stir and cook 2-3 minutes longer. Meanwhile have your eggs slightly beaten in a bowl or measuring cup. Pour some of the hot milk mixture into the eggs and then pour it all into the saucepan and cook and stir until returns to boiling. Add vanilla and let cool.

When cool and set beat until smooth and layer over one cake layer. Top with the other.

Make the glaze by heating one ounce unsweetened chocolate with 1 Tablespoon butter until melted and add one cup powdered sugar and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. I did this in a microwave safe measuring cup and not on the stove. Blend in 1-2 Tablespoons boiling water until drizzling consistency. Pour over top of cake.

“This elegant company dessert combines three American favorites–cake, cream-custard, and chocolate.”

Peanut Butter Hearts

~ nancyruth ~ 3 Comments

I wanted to use this heart pan and thought a moldable fudge would be just the thing. There are several no-cook fudge recipes in my Mom’s recipe notebook. This one is from a booklet from the Woman’s Day magazine from December 1959. The magazine would have a The Collector’s Cook Book series of different categories that one could cut out of the magazine each month. This is #35 on candy.

There are handy hints printed throughout and the one that caught my attention was “For best results, don’t double any of the recipes or make substitutions of ingredients.” LOL might be the modern phrase to utter here!

I chose a Peanut Butter Fudge recipe and made only half the recipe. Halfway trough it occurred to me there is no chocolate so I added cocoa. When making half of a recipe it is important to do a mise en place otherwise one might put in the original amount of salt instead of half. These turned out a bit salty.

  • 1/2 cup peanut butter; the recipe calls for smooth but I used chunky.
  • 1/4 cup softened butter
  • 1/4 cup light corn syrup
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla (should have used 1/2 teas.)
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt; I accidently put in 1/2 teas. (To be fair, I was interrupted in my candy making by having to go spot the Hubby who was out on the roof fixing shingles and flashing that had come loose.)
  • 1/4 cup cocoa (my addition to substitute cocoa for some of the powdered sugar)
  • 1 3/4 cups powdered sugar

Mix the first five ingredients well. Then beat in the cocoa and powdered sugar. Knead until smooth. I then stuffed my fudge into the heart pan and set it in the refrigerator to chill and set before unmolding.

The hearts only used half the half recipe so I rolled the rest up in a log and stuck it in the freezer for later use and nibbling.

No food, just thoughts

~ nancyruth ~ 2 Comments

I am retired. I sit in my kitchen and at 8:30 AM I announce to no-one in particular “I am not at work!”

Structuring my day will be the challenge. A few years ago I went through my multiple cookbooks, there were 50+, and now I may just do so again. I love cookbooks. I enjoy flipping through the pages. There is something very satisfying that is not matched by finding recipes on-line.

Today I need to use up 4 apples and will bake them into a small apple pie or tarts. I have planned supper and will start on my 30 minutes of housecleaning a day soon. And perhaps if it warms up a bit I’ll have a walk around the block.

The next chapter of my life begins! Stay tuned and thanks for reading.