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Misty Minty Peppermint Patties

Happy almost mid-November! Are you feeling festive yet? Like clockwork, when I wake up on November 1st, my enthusiasm and excitement for the holidays kicks in, while any traces of the Halloween spirit completely disappear. Along with my festive spirit comes an almost immediate urge for minty treats. It’s likely not a coincidence that this is right around that time that Starbucks brings out the holiday cups, Peppermint Hot Chocolate, and Peppermint Mocha. It seems there are two kinds of people in the world: those who live for mint-chocolate and those who don’t like it at all. It seems there’s no in between. What is it about mint confections that just make us mint-lovers so giddy, especially around the holidays?

This year, though, my need for minty treats is at an all-time high. As a little girl, around the holidays, I used to sneak up onto the counter to reach up above our “harvest gold” refrigerator into the highly-secretive cupboard that my mom and dad thought I didn’t know anything about. Strangely, in between bottles of fancy liqueurs and the like, I could always find a few boxes of Allan’s Misty Mints. I used to sneak as many as I could, then rearrange the remaining mints in the box to hide the evidence. This was tricky when there were only a few left! These magically-minty, pastel, cool-and-creamy buttons have got to be the yummiest treats on the planet. At least, they were the yummiest minty treats on the planet, until I made these: Misty Minty Peppermint Patties. I call them this because it’s what happens when the texture, pastel colour palette, and white chocolate confection of Misty Mints meets the delightfully round, sandwich-like, and creamy minty-filled combination of a peppermint patties. Delish!

I was over at one of my favourite sites the other day, Joy of Baking, when I noticed a great recipe for traditional peppermint patties. I was already looking so forward to some minty recipes for the holidays, so I decided to give them a try. I can’t say I’ve spent much time working on candy recipes, but this was so appealing, and I was inspired. Since I have such love and passion for Misty Mints, I thought it would be the ultimate sucess if I could create a sweet, pastel version that tasted just like them. So, that’s what I did, and if I do say so, they are even better than I expected. Dare I say that they are possibly the most delicious confection I have ever made? These Misty Minty Peppermint Patties are everything (and then some) that my old boyfriends never were: rich, cool, and pretty. ;)

The process was really straight-forward, which isn’t always the case with candy-making, and is why I love this recipe so much. After mixing a rich and minty patty filling, I prepared and chilled the patties, then melted my Callebaut White Chocolate Couverture in a double boiler. I feel it’s so important that you use the best white chocolate for this recipe — it’s the gorgeous creaminess of the Callebaut white chocolate combined with the decadent filling that really makes these extraordinary. And what is it about this retro colour combination that makes me so happy? I truly believe that biting into a gorgeous pastel peppermint patty tastes just that much better. You can make them any size you want, really, and serve them or package them up with a pretty ribbon and give them as stocking stuffers or hostess gifts. I have a feeling that I’m not the only one out there with fond holiday Misty Mint memories.

Here’s the recipe:

Misty Minty Peppermint Patties

Ingredients

For the Filling:

4 cups 480 g/16 oz icing sugar (confectioners')
3 tablespoons 45 grams unsalted butter, softened
4 tablespoons 60 ml evaporated milk
1/4 teaspoon 1.25 mL peppermint oil (ideally food grade oil rather than extract)
3/4 tsp 3.75 mL pure vanilla extract

For the Coating:

1 lb 454 g best-quality white chocolate couverture, chopped
soft gel paste colour optional

You will also need:

candy thermometer

Instructions

For the Filling:

Line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil and smooth. Set aside.
In bowl of electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment, combine the icing sugar, butter, evaporated milk, peppermint oil and vanilla.
Once ingredients are incorporated, turn mixer up to med-high, mixing for about 2 minutes, until creamy. Cover and chill filling in bowl for about 30 minutes.
Once chilled enough to roll balls of filling in your hand, roll 1.5" balls and place on foiled cookie sheet. Using the palm of your hand, gently press down on each ball to create a patty. Refrigerate for another 30-60 minutes until firm and remove when you have your coating ready to go.

For the Coating:

In a double boiler (or bowl on top of a pot), bring water to boil. Once boiling, turn the stove off (keeping pot on element) and add your chopped chocolate. Stir with silicone spatula until nice and smooth.
Remove from heat, wipe bottom of bowl, and set aside, stirring continuously while cooling. When almost cool, divide into 3 and tint each lot desired colour (I used very small amounts of gel colours: leaf green, electric pink, and electric orange). Once chocolate reaches 80-84° F on a candy thermometer, you can start dropping patties in, one at a time, coating both sides, and removing carefully with two forks (or chocolate dipping fork).
Place on cookie sheet to set. Once all patties are dipped and coated, set tray aside in a cool, dry place to set. Don't refrigerate while setting.

Sweetapolita's Notes

[filling recipe adapted from Joy of Baking]

Sweetapolita’s Notes

You can use peppermint extract in place of the oil, but you won’t get that intense mintiness that the concentrated oil gives. It’s still very minty!
You can store the set patties in an airtight container in the refrigerator, with parchment or wax paper in between, for up to one month.
Best stored chilled, and eaten at either room temperature or chilled.

Minty delicious!

Good luck & enjoy

Ooey Gooey Taffy Tart Squares

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Hope everyone had a great week!

It’s been a cold and rainy one where I am, but what better time for a sweet and sticky comfort food: Taffy Tart Squares (also known to some as Butter Tart Squares). My husband goes away into the wilderness this time every year with his Dad and a group of men for several days, and I always make these for them. (A crowd favourite, I’m told.)

I’ve also been baking these squares as a classic holiday treat for the past few years, because they are so loved, and because you can make them ahead of time and freeze. You can eat them as they are (delightful), or if you want to make it even more divine and turn it into a full-on dessert, you can cut a nice big square and microwave for about 20 seconds, then place on top of vanilla bean ice cream, breaking it up a bit with a spoon. With every bite you get a bit of everything: warm gooey topping, crunchy pecans, cold and creamy vanilla, and rich cookie.

Not to state the obvious, but it is heaven. They are so super easy, which is almost impossible to believe, considering their insane decadence. They are amazing freshly baked. They are amazing refrigerated. They are amazing frozen. They keep forever, seemingly, and there is quite simply no escaping their deliciousness and, well, addictive-ness. This has been my secret recipe for several years now, but I just can’t possibly keep it from you one more day.

This is another one of the I-feel-so-authentic-when-mixing-with-a-wooden-spoon desserts. Like I’ve said before, I love my KitchenAid mixer, but, to me, desserts seem so homespun when using only a bowl and wooden spoon. These squares taste exactly like Taffy Tarts, but no fussing with flaky pastry. The crust (aside from simple to make) is almost shortbread-like, and the topping is ooey, gooey, sticky, and sweet — just the way it should be. I always add chopped pecans because they seem to hold the topping structure together and just taste so darn good. You could add raisins as well as, or instead of the pecans as it’s really personal preference. I love them without raisins, but that’s just me.

So I made a tray of these this morning and decided to write this post. When I decided to pull these out of the fridge and take photos, I thought I was being inconspicious, but I was found out. I really thought I had my little Neve fooled when I put Elmo on and set her up with an array of toys, all facing the opposite direction to my photoshoot. There was no hiding them from her. She came looking for me, she came looking for them. She found me and, well, she found them . . .

Aww, look at that adorable little face and excited finger-point at her discovery. How could I even think she’d be capable of anything devilish? Come on, wouldn’t you trust this innocent and harmless creature with a tray full of Ooey Gooey Taffy Tart Squares at her arms’ reach?

Me neither. I think she may have inherited her mama’s sweet-tooth . . .

Ooey Gooey Taffy Tart Squares

Ingredients

For the Base:

2 cups 255 g all-purpose flour
1/2 cup 100 g granulated sugar
1 cup 227 g(2 sticks) unsalted butter

For the Topping:

6 tbsp 90 g melted unsalted butter
6 eggs lightly beaten
3 cups 684 g packed brown sugar
6 tbsp 42 g all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp 7 g baking powder
2 tsp 10 mL pure vanilla extract
pinch salt
1-1/2 cups 150 g coarsely chopped pecans

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F. Spray a 9 x 13 baking pan with cooking spray and line with parchment paper. (Make sure there is an overhang of paper to allow for removing from pan after baked.)

For the Base:

In medium bowl, combine flour and granulated sugar, cutting in butter with pastry blender until crumbly. Press into pan and bake for 15 minutes (or until very light golden brown on edges).

For the Topping:

In large bowl, mix melted butter and eggs, blending in brown sugar, flour, baking powder, vanilla, and salt. Stir in pecans and pour over base.
Bake for 20-25 minutes until top springs back when lightly touched. *It should not feel firm--it's really important that you don't over-bake, or they won't be "ooey gooey!"
Let cool on rack, then cover and refrigerate until very firm. Using the parchment overhang, remove from baking pan and place on cutting board. Cut into squares.
Keep refrigerated until about an hour before you need them, if you can (they get really gooey otherwise, which isn't necessarily a bad thing). They can also be frozen (and they really do taste delicious right out of the freezer!).

Good luck & enjoy!

When an Asparagus Cake Just Makes Good Sense

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*May 2011 update: I have just recently recreated this cake in an 8-layer version! You can view it here: For the Love of Fondant Asparagus (and 8-Layer Cakes).

NEW! How to Make a Fondant Asparagus Cake {a Tutorial}

Funny thing happened on the way to designing my sister-in-law, Mary’s cake for her post-figure-competition celebration: my pink and frilly cake idea got hijacked by this sudden idea that I had to create a hyperrealistic vegetable confection. It was an “Aha!” moment, and I knew right then and there that there was no turning back. Thing is, while training for the IDFA competition, she was so disciplined, so regimented, and so ridiculously sick of eating asparagus. The week before her show, during a text conversation we were having, in response to “How are you doing?” she replied, “I’m loathing asparagus!” So, like any self-respecting sister-in-law and friend would do, I decided to to torment her with a green and spear-filled asparagus cake. See, there’s something you should know: Mary is a foodie, and like me, lives for dessert. This makes her pre-show determination and diet that much more torturous remarkable.

Mary and I talked about the post-show celebration for the weeks leading up to it, and what she really wanted to eat–the girl deserved to eat whatever she wanted, and I was determined to make that happen for her. As for dessert, she knew she wanted rich chocolate cake with Swiss Meringue Buttercream and fondant, so that was the starting point. Once I had the cake baked, filled, and coated, I covered it in a nice bright leafy green fondant. I then started on the asparagus. Working from a real bundle of asparagus for reference, I rolled out about 150 full-size green fondant spears, a dozen at a time, snipped them to look as realistic as possible, and then let them dry. I also dyed, rolled out, trimmed, and snipped about 400 asaparagus tips and set them aside to dry. Once they were dry, I dusted them with several shades of green edible dusting powder (that I typically use for dusting sugar flowers and leaves), and small touches of red. Once they were all dusted and looking particularly asparagus-ish, I started to assemble it all. I wasn’t sure how it was all going to come together, but I loved making this cake, and, in the end, I was kind of proud of it!

I’m not sure, but when Mary first saw her cake, I think she may have wondered if they were actually real asparagus. Sure, we were all eager to try (especially my little Reese) a big yummy piece of the cake, but I think, even more so, we were so excited to watch Mary eat hers!

Yay–cake consumption! Reese was so proud to be taking the first bites with Auntie Mary. And, yep, that is a trophy you see–turns out that all of that hard work and discipline pays off! I have to say, Mary’s victory just made the cake that much sweeter, for all of us. Now that she’s competing in the Canadian Natural Physique Championships in April, I think I better kick it up a notch for the next post-show confection…a 3-tier version, perhaps?

Thanks for stopping by! xo

Girly Woodland Dessert Table

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After falling in love with the idea of a pink woodland theme for my youngest cakelet’s birthday, I was inspired to create an entire dessert table to display some neapolitan woodland treats. Since I spend days (sometimes weeks) preparing cakes and confections for a party, why not put as much love and care into displaying them? The inspiration initially came from her favourite blabla doll, Prudence the Owl, and her organic woodland embroidered blanket in her crib. I knew, though, that I had to infuse the brown woodsy feel with some pink “girliness.” I incorporated white to freshen it up and give it a bit of a contemporary feel. The sweets on the table that I created, included a 3-tier woodland cake, neapolitan mini cakes, chocolate fondant “N” monogrammed cupcakes (for birthday girl, Neve), pink woodland sugar cookies, vanilla cupcakes with pink buttercream swirls and fondant flowers, and raspberry cheesecake brownies (from the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook). My gorgeous sister-in-law (and I’m not just being cute–she really is gorgeous) Mary, made the chocolate birds’ nests with eggs (sadly not shown in the above photo–darn lens!), and I bought cookies n’ cream bark and dark chocolate bark to complete the woodsy feel.

Here are the little chocolate fondant-covered cupcakes. Loved making these little cuties. Inside they are chocolate cake covered in Swiss Meringue Buttercream. One of my favourite details on the table was the lovely hello hanna recyled paper individual cupcake stands, shown in this photo. How important does this cupcake feel, perched up there on such a pretty little (and environmentally responsible) pedestal?

Lastly, here’s an adorable (and teeny) neapolitan banner I found, at the last minute, on Esty from Big Day Party Shop. Life is in the details! All in all, I loved every minute of creating this party for my little Neve’s birthday. Now, there are only 198 days until my preschooler, Reese, turns 4–better get planning!

Thanks for stopping by! xo

Chocolate Marshmallow Pie

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Happy Fall, everyone!

Welcome to my brand new blog and my first official blog post. With the cooler air and cozy sweaters comes the urge to bake and indulge in more decadent sweets and treats, or, well, perhaps that’s just me. But hey, as they used to say in the 60s, “If it feels good, do it.” And trust me, this feels good. And I did it. And you should too.

In honour of the year that gave us (and by “us” I mean those who were born by then) “Sugar Town” by Nancy Sinatra, I’m going 1967 retro with a recipe called “Chocolate Marshmallow Pie.” Can you even imagine a more enticing name for a pie? Who knew there was such a delightful array of forgotten treats from this era. I discovered a great website for just such recipes: Retro Food Recipes. Let’s just say this site was the jackpot for yummy retro sweetness (and savoury, if you’re into that kind of thing).

There are several chocolate pie recipes out there, but I find the marshmallow and double cream components in this one really give it a truly decadent texture. Day 1, it was fabulous. Day 2, it was even better. Day 3…come on, you don’t think I would actually eat something this indulgent 3 days in a row, do you? Then perhaps you don’t know me very well–it was killer. Let me point out, though, that this pie filling has uncooked eggs, so not recommended for babies or pregnant women. I can confirm, however, that it has nothing but positive effects on 30-something, under-rested, mothers of 2. Best part about this pie (aside from its obvious awesomeness) is that there are really very few ingredients, and it’s fairly simple to make.

I have modified the recipe to fit a full size pie, because the actual recipe is for a 7″ pie. After running out to my baker’s supply and buying a 7″ pie plate and realizing how teeny it really appeared, I decided I was not about to have to explain why I ate an entire pie!

Here’s the recipe:

Chocolate Marshmallow Pie

Ingredients

1 full size pie crust I use The Pioneer Woman's Perfect Pie Crust
8-10 oz bittersweet chocolate
30 marshmallows
1/4 cup 60 mL water
2 eggs
1/2 pint 300ml Double Cream (higher in fat than heavy cream/whipping cream, usually about 48%, and can be found in larger grocery stores).

Instructions

Use the pastry to line a pie plate and bake blind (I use pie weights over parchment paper). Let cool. Put the chocolate, marshmallows and water into a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water and leave until mixture melts. Cool slightly.
Stir the yolks into the chocolate mixture and leave until cold.
Whisk the double cream until it forms soft peaks.
Whisk the egg whites stiffly and fold carefully into the chocolate mixture together with half the cream. Turn into the pastry and leave to set completely in fridge.
Decorate with icing sugar or whipped cream, when ready to serve.

Sweetapolita's Notes

[Adapted from the Chocolate Marshmallow Pie recipe from Retro Food Recipes]

Originally from
The Book of Sweets & Puddings
by Myrtle Lindlaw (Spectator Publications 1967)

Sweetapolita’s Notes:

I used Devon Double Cream (fancy, I know…I felt so British buying this, and who doesn’t want to feel authentically British from time to time?).

Good luck & enjoy!