Chocolate Raspberry Swiss Roll

I wanted to try making a roulade on a evening when I invited my family over for dinner. I have always wanted to try one but they seemed like they'd be a lot of work for a questionable end result. I went down a rabbit hole and began looking at many different recipes. Some were meringue based, which I was not ready to try on my first attempt. I landed on this one because half of my family loves chocolate desserts, and I assumed that covering the roll with the ganache could help hide any imperfections. It turns out this was true. While you can't really see it, there is a huge crack in my cake that was perfectly disguised by the ganache and whipped cream. This is a time consuming dessert, but it tasted amazing. Between 7 of us there was only 1 slice left at the end of dessert. 

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Tres Leches Cake with Berries

I must have been living under a rock or something, because I'd never had tres leches up until this summer. I'd also only heard about it a few times. This dessert is rich and moist and absolutely perfect for any summer occasion. You can make many different versions of this cake, but I loved the idea of berries covering the cake. The original recipe adds some booze to the whipped cream, but I opted against it since I'm not a gin or tequila fan. One of the recipe reviewers said they added a splash of Grand Marnier to their whipped cream, which is something  I will try in the future. When I was going to make this, I was deciding between a coffee infused version or the berries, but in the end the berries won. Although I cannot be sure, the coffee flavored cake seemed like it would have a tiramisu sort of flavor and I was up for something new.

I made this for the first time at my sister's house. There was no particular reason for me making this cake except that I really wanted to try it, and so did she. My family and I ate about a quarter of the cake and then my sister took the rest to work the following day where it was apparently devoured in minutes. She said she set it down in the break room and by lunch time it was all gone. You might be wondering why I would share such a delicious dessert. For starters, even though it is amazing, it's very rich and you'd be suffering from a serious food coma if you had seconds. And I love sharing things that I bake, assuming they turn out well.

If you are curious about some of the different tres leches cake flavors you can make, check out this link from Fine Cooking Magazine.

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Raspberry Vacherin

If you're looking for a stunning dessert to make for your next dinner party, this one is a winner. It's definitely the most impressive looking dessert that I have under my belt. I had some egg whites in the freezer, and my mom requested a chocolatey dessert, so I began searching for a recipe to combine the two. My mom has a great cookbook filled with all kinds of chocolate dessert recipes. I have read through the book on many occasions, but had never made any of the recipes until now. Although this dessert takes some precision and patience, it is definitely worth your time. I got more compliments on this dessert than any other I have made before. People couldn't believe it was homemade. They might need some convincing to cut into it since it looks so pretty, but once they try it, your guests will be hooked.

I didn't fully read through the recipe before I got to work on the meringues. The one suggestion I have is to bake the meringues in the evening and allow them to cool in your fridge overnight, or make them in the morning. The cooling process took longer than expected and I ended up hogging the oven when other things were in need of baking. Also, do not assemble this more than a couple hours before you serve it. If this desserts sits too long, it will get soggy. I put mine together just before the dinner guests arrived and it was still perfectly crispy when dessert was served. When I snacked on the tiny slice left over the next day, I found that the crunch was gone. This recipe is delicious the way it was written. I left the top of my dessert plain, but you could drizzle some melted chocolate on top if you want.

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Raspberry-Topped Lemon Muffins

In a way, muffins have always confused me. They're considered a breakfast food, but they border on being a dessert. I almost never have pastries for breakfast since I'm usually starving 20 minutes later if I rely solely on breakfast sweets. And when I do go down the sweet breakfast path, it's usually an afterthought to what would have already been a filling meal (and usually provided by somebody else). Don't get me wrong, I love a good muffin or doughnut, but I don't understand how that can keep someone going until lunch time. You non-breakfast eaters out there are a total mystery to me.

For me, muffins serve as an afternoon snack. Or a small dessert after a meal alongside some fruit or berries. For this reason, I especially love mini-muffins. They're the perfect 2 bite treat to satisfy my sweet tooth without making me feel overly stuffed. I've been known to eat myself into a food coma (my friends who traveled with me in Turkey have witnessed this in full force), so sometimes even the thought of a rich, heavy dessert is enough to induce the coma. This is when the mini muffin is a much welcomed end to a meal. And there's no way you can say no to this adorable one.

Not only does this muffin have a refreshing lemon flavor, but it's almost 1/3 berry. The bite of fresh raspberry (which can be a little tart) contrasts really well with the sweet muffin. The addition of a whole raspberry to a mini muffin is a great way to cut the sweetness and make it feel much lighter. This recipe is originally from Bon Appetit magazine, but I followed the directions on Smitten Kitchen since Deb simplified the steps and made this a much easier (and more freezer friendly) variation of the original. According to Smitten Kitchen, you can use fresh or frozen berries, but since I had lots of fresh berries, that's all I have tried these with.

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Linzer Cookies

If you haven't already noticed, I have quite the sweet tooth. Today alone I probably consumed more sugar than some people do in a week. A lunch made of ice cream and cake batter is far from healthy, but so, so good. And I just pretend there is no such thing as salmonella while scraping up every last bit of batter. These cookies are another delicious cure for my sweet tooth.

Make these today. Seriously. They are so good. When it comes to making cookies, I am extremely fussy. I find that most homemade cookies are average, or slightly better than average, but not always worth the time they take. So when I find one that I love, it becomes a keeper and now this cookie is at the top of my list. They're adorable (especially if you are a more delicate baker than I am), but a little time consuming. Don't let that put you off of these. They're just as time consuming as most cookies that get cut into cute shapes, I just tend to get impatient.

The trickiest part about these cookies is rolling out the dough. After several failed attempts, I decided it would be easiest to leave the plastic wrap in which they are chilled laying on top of the dough, then rolling. This was what save me from giving up on these cookies. After that it's just a matter of keeping the surface floured and not rolling the dough too thin. The thinner the dough, the more difficult it is to lift the delicate cookies onto the baking sheet. I also realized I only had a really chunky mixed berry jam, so I threw it in the mini food processor to make it smooth before decorating the cookies. Even without the jam, these were really good cookies. I intentionally left a few of mine incomplete and used them as a "dunking" cookie with a cup of tea.

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