4th of July

#BundtBakers: Stone Fruit

~ lk529 ~ 22 Comments
BundtBakers

With it being July I knew I had to take this month’s #BundtBakers theme in an All American direction. #BundtBakers is a group of bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake bundts with a common ingredient or theme. We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme or ingredient. This month’s theme is stone fruit and our lovely host is Felice of All That’s Left are the Crumbs.

While I can’t get enough of the smell of fresh peaches and nectarines I don’t particularly care for them. And in thinking of something that’d be great for the 4th of July I knew I had to go with cherries.

Chocolate and cherries are a classic combination. So I knew I wanted to do a chocolate cake. But how to incorporate the cherry? IMG_9243-2I decided to try following the method I use on my popular coffee cake and placing cherry pie filling in the middle of the batter. Well, just like my attempted Mimosa Bundt two months ago the fruit didn’t cooperate like I’d hoped. But this time it created a more beautiful result than I could have imagined! And it also eliminated my need to make a frosting. (For the record I planned on putting some cherry pie filling liquid into a chocolate glaze.) The cherry pie filling fell to the bottom of the bundt pan which created a “pre-made” cherry glaze for the cake. The only downfall is that my brand new star bundt pan didn’t get to shine in all its glory. Thankfully a couple of the stars remained filled with cake batter instead of cherries that I can still show it off.

All-American Chocolate Cherry Pie Cake

Ingredients:

  • 2 sticks butter
  • 1 C water
  • 1/3 C cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2 C flour
  • 1 3/4 C sugar
  • 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 container (5.3 oz) cherry flavored Greek yogurt
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 can (21 oz) cherry pie filling

Steps:

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Heavily grease bundt pan.
  2. In a saucepan melt together butter, water, cocoa powder, and salt.
  3. In a large bowl whisk together flour, sugar, and baking soda.
  4. Using a hand mixer add half of the chocolate mixture into the dry ingredients. When incorporated add the remaining chocolate.
  5. Add the eggs one at a time, the yogurt, and the vanilla extract.
  6. Pour half of the batter into the prepared bundt pan. Add cherry pie filling (I did not use all of the can) and top with remaining batter.
  7. Bake 50-55 minutes, or until a knife comes out cleanly. Allow to cool in the bundt pan for at least 10 minutes before turning out.

*This recipe is adapted from Maria & Josh at http://www.twopeasandtheirpod.com/chocolate-sour-cream-bundt-cake/*

All-American Chocolate Cherry Pie Bundt

If you are a food blogger and would like to join us, just send an email with your blog URL to foodlustpeoplelove@gmail.com. All recipes and photographs can be found on our individual blogs, on our Pinterest board, and the #bundtbakers homepage.

And don’t forget to take a peek at what other talented bakers have baked this month:

Cherry Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake by Renee at Magnolia Days

Cherry Carrot & Banana Bundt by Kelly at Passion Kneaded

Peaches n Cream Melba Bundt Cake by Laura at Baking in Pyjamas

Roasted Cherry Kugelhopf with Cherry Bourbon Glaze by Tux at Brooklyn Homemaker

Peachy Bundt by Margaret at Tea and Scones

Plum, Chocolate, and Orange Bundt Cake by Maria at Box of Stolen Socks

Cinnamon Peach Bundt Cake by Beatriz at I Love Bundt Cakes

Cherry Almond Ginger Bundt by Jane at Jane’s Adventures in Dinner

Chocolate Avocado Bundt Cake by Terri at Love and Confections

Black Forest Bundt Cake with Cherry Ganache Topping by Teri at The Freshman Cook

Caramel Mango Bundt Cake by Bea at Secrets from my Apron

Upside-down Apricot Butter Bundt by Stacy at Food Lust People Love

Red, White, and Blue Sangria

~ lk529 ~ 2 Comments

This recipe is a Lauren Everson original!

I was looking for a white wine sangria for the Fourth. I couldn’t find one that matched both my personal taste and didn’t require me to search high and low for some exotic fruit juice. So, I combined the theories and flavor profiles of about four different recipes and created my very own sangria. Red wine lovers even preferred my recipe! I hope you serve this concoction at your next party.

An Original Recipe

Red, White & Blue Sangria

Ingredients

  • 1/2 C pitted fresh cherries
  • 1 C sugar
  • 1 C water
  • 1 bottle white wine
  • 1 diced apple
  • 6 oz raspberries
  • 6 oz blueberries
  • 1 chilled bottle champagne

Steps

  1. Make simple syrup – In a sauce pan, heat first three ingredients until sugar melts, being sure to mash the cherries. Strain and let cool.
  2. Pour white wine into serving pitcher along with the simple syrup and fruits. Let sit 1 hour or over night.
  3. Before serving, pour in the bottle of bubbly!
    Image

A Red, White, and Blue Fourth

~ lk529 ~ 1 Comment

It’s only fitting that the birth of my blog falls alongside the birthday of our country! The Fourth of July is my second favorite holiday (no, not behind Christmas, but behind Thanksgiving!). There is something about Red, White, and Blue that gets me excited!

This year, it was my mission to make everything, and I mean everything, red, white, and blue! I dyed water red and blue for star shaped ice cubes, pasta blue for pasta salad, pizza dough blue for personal pizzas, angel food cake fell victim to my red and blue dye, rice krispie treats were colored and whoopie pies were made red and blue too!Tablescape

Of all of my food coloring adventures, none of them sound all too difficult, except perhaps one of them. How do you dye pasta?! There are two ways you could do this. One option is to make your dough from scratch and dye that blue. That is not the route I took! Instead I dyed the pasta water. But there’s a trick! Strictly blue food coloring will simply make boxed pasta look green, so I added some red to the water.

Pasta Salad

I was nervous that once my pizza dough was cooked it would also turn green, but I was pleasantly surprised.

Cornmeal Sauce Cheese Pizza Toppings Pizza Station Pizza Slice

You might find it strange that of all my successful food coloring experiments, I was most excited about my ice cubes. To achieve koolaid perfect colors, I boiled colored water before freezing it. They are the cutest, most beautiful ice cubes ever!! Keeping the ice in a paper bag also prevented them from sticking together because the paper doesn’t allow any moisture to cling to the bag or its contents.

Ice Stars

Ice