Mini Raspberry Swirl Cheesecakes [MSCC]

So yes, I've made many mini cheesecakes before, each of which have been super successful. This one, I didn't find as successful, but those people (Scott's coworkers) who have had it think that it's good. Okay, I guess so.

Fruits of the Forest Pie

I know that I had promised to bake more..and now that I'm moving out of my apartment I am! I had 2 frozen pie crusts and I thought that yesterday was perfect for a pie. 

I had tried to just use the other pie crust as the top crust, but it fell apart on me, so I decided to be a little creative instead. I cut out (using cookie cutters) hearts and made the top crust that way. This way, there were vent holes where the pie could do its thing. 

It was so delicious. We couldn't even stop and get a picture of its inside. The many many different berries made it a great combination. I feel like you could still taste all of them even though they were mixed together. It was still warm about 2 hours later when we finally dug into it and it was gone in 2 minutes. 

Fruits of Forest Pie (adapted from here)

Ingredients:

1 double crust pie crust
2 cups strawberries, cut into small pieces
1 cup blueberries
1 cup raspberries
1 cup blackberry
2/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon


Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Ease bottom crust in 9-inch pie pan.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the sugar, flour, and cinnamon. Stir in berries. Gently toss berries until coated. Transfer berry mixture to the pastry-lined pie plate.
Trim bottom pastry to edge of pie plate. Place top crust on filling and fold edge under bottom pastry. Flute edge as desired.  Prick with fork for steam vents. ( I made the top crust by cutting some pie dough into shapes of hearts and decoratively placed them on the pie) 
Bake for 50 minutes, or until top is golden filling is bubbling. Cool on wire rack.

Chocolate Raspberry Truffle Torte [sms]

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays pick, Chocolate Raspberry Truffle Torte, was chosen by Jennifer of The Rookie Baker.

I'm sorry for not posting for the past couple of weeks. To be honest, I haven't felt like baking in a while. My boyfriend, Brent, decided to break up with me 2 weeks ago after being together for almost 3.5 years. It was hard, but it was right decision for both of us. I'm both glad and sad that this happened. I mean it's been coming for a while, and we are just both so busy with our own lives that we haven't seen each other for more than 4 months already.

Back to this pick, I absolutely loved it. I ended up making it on a Thursday when I was off from school. I forgot that I didn't own anymore 9x13 pans anymore after losing them earlier in the year. Instead, I placed 4 ramekins of water next to the springform on a cookie sheet, 2 on each side. It didn't seem to affect the cake very much. I finished it with a frosting from this brownie and topped it with even more raspberries. It was super sweet, but raspberries cut out some of the sugar and was a bit better.

What is hilarious is that my roommate thought that the cake was too sweet and I expected the cake to stay a while in the apartment. I went out to dinner for a friend's 21st and I came back and my roommate and her friend finished about half of the cake. I guess I shouldn't leave too many sweets for her.

Make sure to check out the rest of the SMS bakers on the blogroll.

ps. does anyone have any places in NYC that I have to try? I'm going from the 15th til the 20th so I need places to try/avoid/whatever. It has to be good for college kids and a 12 year old. My brother and I are the only ones doing the vacationing! Preferably near Times Square too because that's where we're staying...I think!

pps. I just started yelping! Add me!

North Fork Peach Raspberry Pie [sms]

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays pick, North Fork Peach Raspberry Pie, was chosen by Rebecca of Beurrista.

It was a pretty quick make, but it was a bit harder to find tapioca pearls, but I just subbed them with flour. I also changed the proportions of raspberry to peach. I didn't have enough peaches, so I just added more raspberries. It was delicious!

I might have kept it in the oven for a bit too long. I'm still trying to get used to the new oven at my new place.

Happy 4th of July everyone!

[BLUE] Raspberry Buttermilk Cupcakes

So like I've been talking about for almost all of my posts, I'm in this club - Circle K. Recently, we were allowed to be Family Heads. It's sort of like in the greek system where you have a big bro and a big sis and what not, but in Circle K, it's like a Mom and a Dad. Dmitriy and I decided to be family heads together. We are known as the Blue Shapangs (Shaprio + Yang = Shapang).

Tuesday was our first meeting, and we were supposed to wear our family colors - blue. EASY! I wanted to bring something extra along with me in the form of cupcakes. I had looked at my recipes, and quite a few of them were blue - as in blueberries, but going to the grocery store, the raspberries were only 99 cents but blueberries were 4.99. Guess which one I bought.

Dont these look like alien creatures wanting food?
Maybe I just try to entertain myself while baking and laughing at random things I think about.

So with these raspberries, I remembered this beautiful recipe made by Smitten Kitchen, but I still needed something blue.

I decided to dye the batter itself blue. Food coloring will be my best friend. I expect that I'll be using it a lot to get that unnatural color of blue. Even blueberries aren't blue. *sigh* I guess I'll have to see how well the blue lasts me. I'll probably give up after a month. As a surprise too, I added one chocolate chip in the little cup that the raspberry created. I wondered how many of the family members actually noticed.

Recipe for the raspberry buttermilk cupcakes
[found here]

Raspberry Chocolate Ice Cream Cupcakes

These were made for the Dmitriy, my "husband." I think the only reason why we're "married" is because we do act like a married couple sometimes. This only happens because we fight and we just know each other pretty well, but of course, I have my own boyfriend, Brent. It's cool haha. ♥

Picture of Dmitriy and I from like March 2009

So yeah, his favorite berry is blueberries, but he likes raspberries too so I decided to make this fancy shmancy cupcake for him. I was inspired from this ice cream cupcake entry that had caught my eye. It was very interesting and I thought I could make something like this, but my version. [Number 10 out of 10! which means I had finished my goal!]

These cupcakes are chocolate cupcakes filled with a raspberry preserve, topped with ice cream shaped in a heart. On top of that, is a bit of chocolate frosting and a raspberry.

Recipe for the chocolate cupcake
(taken from here)
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons butter, softened [I melted mine]
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract [I used 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract instead]
1 cup milk [I used half cup buttermilk, half cup soymilk]

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Line a muffin pan with paper or foil liners.
Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and salt. Set aside.
In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add the eggs one at a time, beating well with each addition, then stir in the vanilla.
Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk; beat well.
Fill the muffin cups 3/4 full. [I filled mine half full and got 24 of them]
Bake for 15 to 17 minutes in the preheated oven, or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.

To make the ice cream topper:
Put melted vanilla ice cream into a pan.
Then, sprinkled some hazelnuts and chocolate hazelnut truffles in small pieces in the melted ice cream.
Drizzled caramel and hot fudge all over in crazy cool designs.
Then place back into the freezer for it all to set.
Later, use a cookie cutter to cut out the shapes desired. I had used a heart.
To easily cut the ice cream, put the cookie cutter in some warm water and then use to cut.

To put the whole thing together,
Cut a cone from the cupcake and place the preserves/jam inside and replace the top.
Refridgerate the cupcakes and make sure to cut out the shapes from the ice cream.
When serving, place the ice cream on top of the cupcake, frost and serve with some fruit.
Enjoy!