Devils Food with a little less sin.

I never knew just how much I loved Chocolate cake until recently when I began experimenting with devil’s food cake.  I have been playing with different cake recipes and I have enjoyed every bite of it.  I have yet to be disappointed with these heavenly desserts.  What’s ever better is that I have been working on making them a little less sinful- swapping applesauce for oil, reduced fat sour cream for original, that sort of thing, with wondrous results. 

There are two recipes that are fairly similar, the biggest differences being the sour cream and oil ratios as well as the size of dry pudding mix used.  I have baked them both within the last few weeks and found that I couldn’t really see the difference.  This cake was perhaps the moister of the two however, so I am posting it first. 

The original recipes that I found using Devils Food cake mix called for either boiling water, strong brewed coffee or coffee liquor.  With this cake I went with Irish Cream Liquor.  Why?  Well mainly because I bought a bottle at Christmas for my friends and family to partake in Irish Cream Coffee and then never got around to actually making the hot dessert beverage.  Maybe next year.  But alas, a whole bottle of Irish Cream, I thought it couldn’t hurt.  It didn’t.

When making this cake I did use a lot of reduced fat or less fat options, however those were to suite my preferences.  I have also made this cake using the ingredients in parenthesis with just as amazing results only with a little more fat.

Heavenly Chocolate Cake

Ingredients

1 package Devils Food cake mix

1 (5.9 oz) package Instant Chocolate pudding mix

1 cup reduced fat sour cream

1 cup applesauce (or oil)

1 cup eggbeaters (or 4 large eggs)

1/2 cup Irish cream liquor

2 cups (1 package) mini chocolate chips

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350* degrees.  Spray a 10 inch Bundt pan with cooking spray.
2. In a large bowl (or using your electric stand mixer bowl) mix cake mix, pudding mix, sour cream, applesauce, eggs and liquor with an electric mixer for 30 seconds.  Mix on medium speed for two minutes.
3. Stir in chocolate chips and pour cake mix into prepared pan.  Bake for 60 minutes.
4. Cool on wire rack for 10 minutes.  Remove cake from pan and cool completely on wire rack.

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

I have been buying a lot of bananas lately. Being that we have toddlers in the house and that we are runners we go through bananas before they are ever ripe enough to be truly warranted for a good quick bread or other baked goods. Buying more bananas than I think we need has only increased the number of banana sundae’s the spouse eats or uses for smoothies. So I started buying even more. Finally, I had three black and mushy (read: beautiful) bananas to use for a recipe. At first I was going to make more Banana Bread Cookie’s, but then I decided I wanted to try out something new. Something with a bit of chocolate in it. Chocolate Banana Bread with Chocolate Chips seemed like just the thing.

I was a bit nervous about this bread to be honest. The last few things I have made with cocoa haven’t turned out so hot. They have actually been quite bad. So bad in fact, that I haven’t even posted about the recipes because they were so bad that there was little more that needed to be said. I was so skeptical of this bread and the changes I made in the original recipe, that I kept convincing myself it was a failure before it was cool enough to try.

I had a small bite the night I made it when I snapped this picture. It was fine, not bad. However, the next day when I was whipping up some appetizers for a book group I snuck another piece. It was quite good. So I snuck another. Before I knew it I had snuck four pieces with a sizable amount of the loaf gone, making it seem a lot less sneaky and a lot more noticeable. I couldn’t help it. It’s that good.

Chocolate Chocolate-Chip Banana Bread

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs

3 ripe bananas, mashed

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 tablespoons unsweetened baking cocoa

1/2 cup light sour cream

2/3 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350*. Lightly grease one 9x5 load pan.
2. In large mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar together. Add eggs, bananas, and vanilla; mix well. Sift in flour, baking soda and cocoa. Beat in sour cream. Stir in chocolate chips.
3. Pour into prepared pan and bake 60 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Cool on wire rack. remove from pan and cool completely.

Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins

Seven days just not enough days to try out all of the amazing muffin recipes out there. I ended up baking over eleven muffin recipes but a few were just not fit to post because they only turned out so-so and who really wants to bother with baking something that is only so-so? However, these muffins, with tons of banana and chocolate, were a big hit with toddlers and adults alike and could easily be breakfast or a snack. The recipe makes 18 regular size muffins but I made 24 mini muffins (the kids preferred these) and 6 regular muffins.

Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins

ingredients

1 3/4 cup flour

3/4 cup white sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 egg

1/2 canola oil

1/2 cup plain fat free yogurt

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup mashed bananas (or 3 medium)

3/4 cup mini semi sweet chocolate chips

directions

1. Preheat oven to 350*F. Spray muffin pans.
2. Wisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. In seperate bowl combine egg, oil, yogurt, vanilla and bananas. Stir in dry ingredients until incorporated. Add chocolate chips. Fill muffin pans 2/3 full.
3. Bake 20 minutes in preheated oven. Cool for 5 minutes before removing from pans.

Colt just lost the ‘big game’…again cookies

 

So what do you do when your favorite team makes it to the Superbowl?  Well, if you’re us you make a bet with your nephews involving cookies.  What happens, you might ask, when your favorite team makes it to the big game and plays horrendously?  Well, if you’re me you spend the Monday morning after the big game creating a new recipe that is (hopefully) fit for air mail. 

I was going to make something with peanut butter, oatmeal, and chocolate chips because the various websites I found about mailing cookies recommended these ingredients.  Unfortunately, I had only 1/4 cup of peanut butter in my whole house.  (Note:  We have been snowed in a lot recently.)  So I played around with a cookie that ended up having really just a hint of peanut butter than being a peanut butter cookie.  Hopefully our nephews and niece, who cheered for the Saints, will find them edible.

Colt Just Lost the ‘big game’…again Cookies

Ingredients

6 tbsp shortening

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

1/4 cup peanut butter

1 tsp. vanilla

2 eggs

1 1/2 cup all purpose flour

2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 1/2 cup quick cooking oats

1 bag mini semi sweet chocolate chips

directions

1. Preheat oven to 350*F.
2. In large bowl cream shortening, butter, sugars, and peanut butter until smooth.  Beat in eggs one at a time and add vanilla. Combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Stir into creamed mixture.  Add oats and chips until just combined.
3. Bake on ungreased cookie sheets for 9-10 minutes.

Zucchini Chocolate Chip Muffins

When it comes to baking chocolate chips, nuts and zucchini are three of the things I love to see on a list of ingredients. My favorite quick bread is zucchini and my favorite cookies are chocolate chip and I will take both with nuts, especially walnuts or pecans. This muffin incorporates all three as well and is a wonderful afternoon snack or morning pick me up.

Zucchini Chocolate Chip Muffins

Ingredients

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

3/4 cup white sugar

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

1/2 tsp. salt

1 egg

1/4 cup applesauce

1/4 cup canola oil

1/4 cup buttermilk

1 tsp. vanilla

1 cup shredded zucchini

1/2 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

3/4 cup chopped walnuts

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray muffin tins with cooking spray.
2. Combine dry ingredients (flour through salt). Combine egg, oil, applesauce, buttermilk and vanilla. Combine with flour mixture and fold in zucchini, chips and nuts.
3. Fill greased muffin cups 2/3 full. I like to use a cookie scoop, about two good size scoops fills the tins 2/3 full.
4. Bake for 18-20 minutes in preheated oven. These freeze well.