Jun 30th, 2010 by Wordcake
I don’t know what sound more Southern than Bourbon Panna Cotta, do you?
Mmmmm, ramekins. 
Therefore, since I can’t seem to keep my hands of off anything from A Yankee in a Southern Kitchen (a delicious little blog by Kim Morgan), here’s a recipe I found there for this delight which came originally from Frank Stitt’s Southern Table:
1 cup plus ½ cup sugar
½ teaspoon fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons water
4 cups heavy cream
½ cup pecans, toasted and chopped
3 tablespoons good bourbon
2 cups whole milk
2 envelops unflavored gelatin
Set aside eight or ten – 8 ounce custard cups or ramekins.
Combine the ½ cup sugar, lemon juice, and water in a small heavy saucepan and bring to a boil over high heat, boiling until the sugar dissolves. Reduce the heat to medium, brushing down the sides with a wet pastry brush to remove any sugar crystals, and cook, shaking the pan to swirl the caramel, until the caramel is a mahogany in color 10-20 minutes. Do not stir the caramel mixture.
For the complete recipe, please click here.
Tags: bourbon, Bourbon Panna Cotta, custard, dessert, southern baking
Posted in Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 28th, 2010 by Wordcake
“A Yankee in a Southern Kitchen” is a sweet, homegrown blog filled with amazing recipes that are easy to follow and produce ridiculously fine results. Let’s hear it for this one:
1 3/4 cups finely grated carrots
1 cup crushed drained pineapple (save liquid)
1 1/2 cups finely chopped walnuts or pecans- optional
4 eggs
2 cups sugar
1 cup corn oil
2 teaspoons cinnamon
Mix above ingredients together till well mixed.
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
Mix above ingredients together till well mixed, then add to carrot mixture mixing well. Divide into 3-8″ cake rounds that have been well greased or 18-24 well greased muffin tins.
Bake cake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or till knife comes out clean. 20 minutes for cupcakes. Cool on rack for 10 minutes then remove from pan.
For the entire post and the butter cream icing for these beauties, click here to go to “A Yankee in a Southern Kitchen”
Tags: carrot cake, cupcakes, Cuttaloosa, dessert, southern baking
Posted in Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 25th, 2010 by Wordcake
Yep, more from the mistress of the delectable Tender Crumb, Linda…
“…Pate a choux, the basis for these profiteroles, cream puffs, eclairs, and gougeres, is a dough that is first cooked on the stove, then piped on baking sheet. Once in the oven, this magical dough tranform into light and airy pastry puffs that are just slightly crisp on the outside and almost hollow in the middle…”
For the complete and totally amazing recipe for making your own profiteroles that will blow everyone you know away and cause them to worship you wholeheartedly and for all eternity, please click here.
(How, you may ask, are profiteroles Southern? Well, let’s just say that they’ve been makin’ them down South since the 1800’s.)
Tags: ice cream, pastries, Pate a choux, profiterole, southern baking, southern food, Tender Crumb
Posted in Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 23rd, 2010 by Wordcake
I can’t keep my surfing fingers off of “A Yankee in a Southern Kitchen” – here’s yet another recipe hot off that delicious spot in the bloggosphere:
I think you may agree that benne wafers with blueberries and cream sounds like the most delicious summer treat ever conceived. Also, benne wafers are extremely Southern!
By Kim Morgan
A “Benne” seed is the old Southern name for “sesame” seeds. They were brought to the Lowcountry in 1769 by African slaves. They are still called Benne seeds to this day in the South, and frankly I would be surprised if that ever changes. It is part of the charm of the South. Southerners hold fast to traditions, refusing to budge, especially when it comes to food and entertaining. This is something we all can be grateful for, especially if you have the chance to try these wonderful buttery morsels.
Legend says that eating Benne seeds will bring you luck and good fortune. I am not one who subscribes to the notion of luck. Instead I prefer to hold to the belief that, “there are no coincidences” and that Benne seeds and the good fortune from eating them, are simply another of God’s great blessings.
There are countless ways to make Benne wafers and you will find that no two recipes are alike…
For the complete article and the recipe, click here to go to Kim Morgan’s excellent site.
Tags: benne wafers, blueberries and cream, Charleston, dessert, sesame seeds, southern baking, southern food
Posted in Breakfast, Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 21st, 2010 by Wordcake
I feel lucky to have randomly found Tender Crumb, a well-named baking blog with recipes and photos so compelling it makes one want to rush to the kitchen to preheat the oven. The mistress of Tender Crumb, Linda, is involved in a wonderful mass-baking-hysteria called The Cake Slice. This month’s installment of The Cake Slice features Southern Coconut Cake.
From Linda/Tender Crumb:
So far, every recipe that I’ve made out of Sky High: Irresistible Triple-Layer Cakes has exceeded my expectations, and I highly recommend that you go out and treat yourself to this cookbook.
Impossibly moist white cake layers are subtly flavored with unsweetened coconut milk, enveloped by a cream cheese buttercream frosting (I gained 5 pounds just typing those words) and covered with sweetened flaked coconut (oops, another 5 pounds).
With all of the cake making happening in my kitchen this month, I cut the recipe in half and baked the cake layers in two 6″ round pans. The instructions for the cake were pretty straightforward, and the layers were baked without a hitch.
For the coconut cake recipe and a whole lot more, please visit Tender Crumb here.
Tags: cake, coconut, cream cheese frosting, dessert, layer cake, southern baking, southern coconut cake, Tender Crumb, The Cake Slice
Posted in Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 18th, 2010 by Wordcake
There’s been a lot of sweet stuff on here lately and so it’s high time for some savory. Kim Morgan writes about food on her blog A Yankee In a Southern Kitchen and here is yet another brilliant Southern delight from her long list:
(Adapted by Kim Morgan from Martha Hall Foose- Screen Doors and Sweet Tea)
Wanting a change of scenery and something savory to smell in the house and only having an hour to do the trick, I opted to make this bread which I have had my eye on for some time. It is a snap to make, the house smelled wonderful all morning, and my daughter adored this bread. It is a light bread in texture and the flavor is very interesting, you don’t expect the blue cheese and pecans inside which are paired with crushed pepper on the top of the bread…
For the recipe (not to be missed!) and many, many excellent southern food articles and recipes, please visit A Yankee In a Southern Kitchen, here.
Tags: A Yankee In a Southern Kitchen, Blue Cheese Pecan Bread, Breads, Foose, Kim Morgan, savory, southern baking, southern food
Posted in Breads | No Comments »
Jun 16th, 2010 by Wordcake
Something about banana pudding tart seems so supremely summery. I think this sort of fruit tart should be eaten in the twilight of evening while sitting on a porch with a tall glass of very cold milk. I can hear the crickets already…
Banana pudding is a classic, homestyle Southern dessert made with layers of vanilla wafer cookies (Nilla Wafers), sliced bananas and pudding or custard. Sometimes the dish is also topped with meringue or whipped cream to finish it off, as well. The dessert has actually been around for quite a while, as cooks around the turn of the 20th century looked for ways to use the then-exotic bananas in desserts and other dishes. Creamy bananas worked well with creamy custards. The Nilla Wafers were added somewhere along the line, probably to contribute a bit of extra texture to the dessert, and the recipe was made even more popular once it was printed as a standard recipe idea on boxes of the cookies…
For the recipe and the complete post from Baking Bites, please click here.
Tags: bananas, fruit tart, homestyle, pudding, southern baking, Southern Banana Pudding Tart, tart
Posted in Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 14th, 2010 by Wordcake
Cobbler and the South are like bread and butter, peas and carrots, hook ‘em and horns, and other natural combination. This is not to say that they don’t have cobbler in the North, but when I think of the many ubiquitous foods in my Southern heritage, cobbler is a stand out. When I was growing up our family would visit Tennessee and South Carolina with stops along the way in Georgia to acquire bushels (or maybe pecks) of peaches that we’d take home to El Paso to peel and freeze. And while those carefully stored peaches would find their way into other dishes, their main reason for finding their way half way across the country was as filling for cobbler. There’s just nothing quite like a peach cobbler overflowing with juicy, ripe peaches, particularly when the preaches are so sweet they don’t even need more than a pinch of sugar. Of course Texas isn’t too shabby in the peach department either…
For the recipe and complete post from Fete & Feast (and for their food blogger’s guide to Austin!) please click here.
Tags: Austin, cobbler, dessert, El Paso, Fete & Feast, Georgia, peach cobbler, peaches, South Carolina, southern baking, southern food, Southern heritage, Tennessee, texas
Posted in Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 11th, 2010 by Wordcake
Knoxville’s first annual International Biscuit Festival recently wrapped up. So, how did it turn out? Let’s see what KnoxNews had to say:
Biscuit Festival has big turnout
By Mike Blackerby
Judging by the turnout, East Tennesseans sure love their biscuits and all of the accoutrements that go with the delectable flour-based discs.
Saturday’s first International Biscuit Festival in downtown Knoxville served up a blitz for taste buds in a celebration of the heritage of Southern cooking whipped up by local restaurants and vendors.
More than 3,000 festival attendees packed Market Square, Market Street, Clinch Avenue and Krutch Park, sampling a hodgepodge of biscuits and the foods that embellish one of the South’s emblematic palate-pleasers…
For the complete article, please click here.
Tags: biscuit, biscuits, Knoxville, Knoxville International Biscuit Festival, southern baking, southern food, Tennessee
Posted in Breads, Breakfast, Desserts | No Comments »
Jun 9th, 2010 by Wordcake
Let’s put aside baking for just a moment (put aside what?, you say) – yes – yes – we simply must switch our focus for just a moment to…
Sweet Tea.
And let’s not fool ourselves, sweet tea is the perfect summer partner for anything else made southern. Is there such thing as too much sweetness? We think not.
On the Plate: Iced Tea in an Instant
By CAROLYN MAYNARD-PARISI
“For those unfamiliar with this supremely Southern invention, sweet tea is a staple of Southern kitchens. And let me tell you, when they say “sweet” down there they do not lie. Some recipes call for enough sugar to make a spoon stand up on its own…Make homemade iced tea instantly with some concentrate, a little simple syrup and lots of lemon.”
Read the rest of this piece on sweet tea from The New York Times, here.
Tags: iced drinks, icesd tea, southern baking, southern food, summer drinks, sweet tea, tea
Posted in Desserts | No Comments »
