I’m a little light on photo and blog content lately. This is because I’m in the midst of a self-imposed baking hiatus. Summer is approaching and I must admit that I indulged in a few too many treats during the long, cold and miserable months of winter. So I’m attempting to undo a little of the damage from all of the cakes, cookies and rolls. Don’t worry too much. The baking hiatus is temporary. It won’t turn into a long sabbatical. I won’t retire. I like baking too much.

On to the cake…

I’m not a big fan of spice cake. Or at least I wasn’t until I was introduced to this cake last fall. The boyfriend’s boss made it for his birthday. Whenever there’s a birthday in his office, someone is in charge of bringing cake (or dessert). Quite often the baking job has fallen on me….despite the fact that I don’t work there.

When the boyfriend’s birthday rolled around last year, his boss was responsible for the cake. Apparently she felt that it had to be great since he gets my desserts at home all the time and she knows how tasty some of them have been. Needless to say she did a great job choosing the cake and baking it!

He brought the leftovers home and I pretty much gorged myself on it for the next couple of days. I even ate this cake for breakfast. Not that there’s anything wrong with eating cake for breakfast. Especially when the cake has nutritious ingredients like apples and walnuts.

The recipe for the cake can be found on the Food Network website. It’s a Gale Gand recipe called Stella’s Stellar Apple Spice Cake. Stellar isn’t nearly a generous enough word for this cake.

It’s an apple spice cake with lots of walnuts and golden raisins. I don’t really like most spice cakes but this one I love. I also don’t adore raisins…but the golden raisins more than okay in this cake. The apple pieces are relatively large and give the cake a nice texture.

The cake itself is kind of like a spice cake brownie. It has a crunchy top and a soft interior like a good brownie should. But no chocolate. That would be weird.

The recipe calls for a glaze over the cake. The boyfriend’s boss didn’t make the glaze and neither did I . The cake doesn’t need it. Other than skipping the glaze, I didn’t make any changes to the recipe.

Just in case you didn’t click one of the other links, the recipe is here.

Tweet This Post 

For Wordless Wednesday information and posts, go here.

Because you’re likely to ask, this cinnnamon-raisin bread is from a recipe in Martha Stewart’s Baking Handbook.

Tweet This Post 

For more Wordless Wednesday posts and information, go here.

Tweet This Post 

I should use Seinfeld quotes more often (this one is from “The Muffin Tops” episode from 1997). Between Seinfeld and The Simpsons quotes, I could have endless title material.

These blueberry muffins, like all of the other blueberry baked goods I’ve showcased this summer, are from the plethora of blueberries I picked in July.

Even when I didn’t particularly care for blueberries as a fruit, I liked blueberry muffins. This might stem from my general love of muffins. My favorite blueberry muffins have a crunchy top…as a child, teenager and young adult, I was a sucker for the Duncan Hines muffin mix with the can of wild blueberries and the crumb topping. Nowadays I’d never consider using a mix…so I made these from scratch from a Martha Stewart recipe found in Martha Stewart’s Baking Handbook. Are you tired of me praising the recipes in this book yet?

These were very good. Way better than average. For the topping, I simply sprinkled turbinado sugar over the batter. The turbinado sugar provided a nice crunch that regular granulated sugar wouldn’t have.

I loved the advice in this recipe to toss the blueberries with a little bit of the dry ingredients in order to prevent the blueberries from sinking to the bottom as the muffins baked.

Blueberry Muffins

Recipe from Martha Stewart’s Baking Handbook

Makes 1 dozen muffins

Ingredients

• 1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups fresh blueberries (I used fresh this time but I’ll probably use frozen next time I make these!)
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1-2 tablespoons turbinado sugar (optional)

Preparation

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with paper muffin cups.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.

In another bowl, toss the blueberries with about 1 tablespoon of the flour mixture.

Set aside both the flour mixture and the blueberries.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and sugar on medium-high speed until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating until combined after the addition of each egg. Mix in the vanilla extract.

With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture. Beat just until combined. Add the milk and beat just until combined. Do not overbeat. Lightly fold in the blueberries using a rubber spatule. Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups. If you’d like a little crunch on the top of the muffins, sprinkle a small amount of turbinado sugar over the batter in each muffin cup.

Bake until the muffins are golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center of one of the muffins comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool for about 10 minutes. Remove muffins from pan and let cool. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Tweet This Post