Dishing the Divine » fruit http://www.dishingthedivine.com Recipes for food that is simply divine Sun, 04 Jan 2015 05:38:43 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.8 peach muffins http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/07/10/peach-muffins/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/07/10/peach-muffins/#comments Tue, 10 Jul 2012 17:30:28 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=4786

My friend Maile asked me to make peach muffins like the ones she discovered at her local grocery store’s bakery years ago and hasn’t seen since. That’s all I had to go on. “Can you make me some peach muffins like those? They were sooooo good!” Um, okay? I’ll try?

I have no idea if these muffins are exactly what Maile wanted me to replicate, but I do know that these have passed the “everyone loves them” test. I took them to a party and they vanished. It was like a Harry Potter trick, but in real life and without wands. I made them again today to share the perfected version with Maile. I sent her the above picture and her response was “YES!” so I think maybe we’re onto something.

Here’s to you, Maile. May it be the peach muffin of your dreams!

peach muffins

Prep Time: 40 minutes

Cook Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Yield: 12 muffins

peach muffins

Heavily adapted from The Food Network

Ingredients

for the muffins:
1 1/2 to 1 3/4 cups peaches, unpeeled, cut into 1/2-inch dice
1 cup sugar (you can use 1/2 to 3/4 cup if you prefer a healthier muffin)
8 tbsp butter, at room temperature
1 egg
3/4 cups milk
2 cups flour (I used 1 cup of cake flour and 1 cup of whole wheat pastry flour)
2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tbsp ground flax seed (optional)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cinnamon
for the topping:
scant 3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/3 cup unsalted butter, melted

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Lightly grease a standard muffin pan or line 12 standard muffin cups with paper liners.
  2. Place the peaches in a bowl and cover with 1/4 cup of the sugar. Mix thoroughly. Allow the peaches to sit for at least 30 minutes and up to 1 hour.
  3. Using an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and remaining 3/4 cup of sugar until smooth and pale in color, about three minutes. Add the egg and beat until fluffy, about two minutes.
  4. In a mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, ground flax seed (if using), salt and cinnamon. Remove the bowl from the mixer and alternately fold in one-third of the milk and one-third of the flour mixture. Repeat until the milk and flour mixtures are both incorporated, being careful not to over mix. Fold in the peaches.
  5. Spoon ¼ cup of the filling into each prepared muffin cup. In a small bowl, make the topping. Combine the flour, oats, brown sugar, and salt. Mix well. Add the butter. Using your hands, mix until the mixture resembles coarse crumb like mixture. Divide the crumb mixture between the muffin tops. Place in the oven and bake for about 18 to 20 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with only a few crumbs attached. Serve warm with butter.
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angel food cake http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/06/01/angel-food-cake/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/06/01/angel-food-cake/#comments Fri, 01 Jun 2012 23:29:50 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5678

My husband loves angel food cake and yet I have never made it for him. I think it’s because I have tasted only the Safeway version and the spongy texture creeped me out. How in the world can a cake be sooooo spongy? I found a recipe on Cook’s Illustrated’s website and a quick perusal of the ingredients answered my question: a dozen egg whites. Yowsers. That is a lot of egg whites! Fortunately, one batch of homemade vanilla ice cream uses a half dozen egg yolks, so all I need to do is time one angel food cake and two batches of ice cream and I am left with no waste at all!

This cake is heavenly. It is perfect topped with a mound of lightly sweetened whipped cream and some fresh berries. You can serve it at a formal occasion or for a weeknight dessert. Either way, it’s delicious! Now that I know how easy it is to prepare angel food cake, I will make this cake often throughout the summer to go with all those wonderful strawberries and blueberries at the local farmer’s market!

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blueberry muffin cake http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/03/16/blueberry-muffin-cake/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/03/16/blueberry-muffin-cake/#comments Sat, 17 Mar 2012 02:09:27 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5596

First off, I see a new trend. First, there were mufcakes. Now there’s muffin cake. I promise. I’ll make something that doesn’t include “muf” in it at some point.

Secondly, I don’t want you to make this. Nope. No sirree. Because then you’ll buy more blueberries, which will mean fewer for me. The last time I checked, my Costco had PLENTY of frozen organic blueberries in stock. If I go tomorrow, I will buy some before you catch onto this craze. At the worst, I did plant 9 blueberry plants a couple of years ago. Come June, there is no stopping the blueberry madness in my house!

Third, if you do make this, you’ll want to hide it from yourself. Probably in a high place behind a heavy box. It’s delicious, but with a stick of butter in the ingredients list, it really can’t be considered a health food (although, I think that with two cups of blueberries, I could be convinced otherwise).

Eat this warm out of the oven or reheat it a bit. Either way, slather some salted butter along the middle or the sides (not the top! don’t ruin the perfectly crunchy top!). And enjoy!

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clementine mufcakes (muffins? cupcakes? you decide!) http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/03/08/clementine-mufcakes-muffins-cupcakes-you-decide/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/03/08/clementine-mufcakes-muffins-cupcakes-you-decide/#comments Thu, 08 Mar 2012 23:27:13 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5588

I don’t know how it is where you live, but in my part of the country, people can’t seem to get enough citrus right now. My dwarf orange tree has exploded and my husband and I recently realized that even if we continue to eat an orange a day we may still be eating oranges in July. I see lemon trees literally drooping under the weight of all their fruit. Clementines, tangerines, and other citrus are widely available at our markets too. It’s citrus season!

When I saw this recipe, I had to try it. The original blogger deemed these muffins so that she could justify eating them for breakfast. I don’t blame her. However, I think that while they do have  a hint of muffin texture, they would definitely be appropriate to serve as dessert in cupcake fashion. And so, enter the mufcake. Here at Dishing The Divine, we dish more than just recipes. We also dish up entirely made up food categories for your foodie entertainment. :)

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mini apple pies with super cute crusts (plus an announcement!) http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/01/23/mini-apple-pies-with-super-cute-crusts-plus-an-announcement/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/01/23/mini-apple-pies-with-super-cute-crusts-plus-an-announcement/#comments Mon, 23 Jan 2012 19:10:57 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5517

The reason I have been delinquent in posting for the last 4 months is that I am 4 months pregnant! :) After two miscarriages last year, we are so thrilled to share this news. We cannot wait to meet our little guy (or girl!?!) and have our lives forever changed. In the meantime, all those pregnancy hormones have messed with my love for food. All I seem to eat these days is cereal. Life cereal. Raisin Bran. Cheerios. Frosted mini-wheats. I have a whole arsenal of cereals to eat because so far cereal has been the one thing guaranteed to taste good any time of day or night. Everything else has been hit or miss, and new recipes are *never* exciting these days. It’s challenging to blog about the new foods that I’m eating when those new foods are simply a new brand of cereal!

My appetite still isn’t what it was, but I did manage to eat some fish today, so that’s promising! While things are on the up-and-up, I’m back with a tweak on one of my favorite recipes: apple pie. I love making apple pie, but I love even more the idea of a personalized apple pie. Here I take my favorite apple pie recipe and cook it in small pots for individual servings. The best part? Layer the tops with cute cookie cutter shapes to match the seasons!

mini apple pies with cute cookie cutter crusts

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Yield: 6-8 individual apple pies, depending on the size of your pots or ramekins

Yum, yum, yum! And personalized, too! :)

Ingredients

filling:
12 cups peeled, cored, and sliced apples (I used a mixture of Granny Smiths and Golden Delicious)
1/2 - 3/4 cup sugar (based on how sweet your apples are)
2 tbsp all purpose flour
1/2 tsp grated lemon peel
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
pinch of salt
glaze:
milk
sugar

Instructions

  1. If you haven't already done so, prepare the pastry and refrigerate until firm enough to roll, about 1 hour.
  2. Prepare the apples. In a small bowl, combine the sugar, flour, zest, and spices. Stir into the apples and set aside for 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally to distribute the juices.
  3. On a sheet of lightly floured waxed paper, roll the pastry with a floured rolling pin to 1/4" thickness. Cut out circles slightly larger than the size of the bottom of your pots or ramekins. Tuck pastry into the bottom of the pots. Use cookie cutters to cut shapes out of the remaining pastry. Re-roll any remaining pastry and cut into more shapes.
  4. Preheat the oven to 375.
  5. Divide the apple mixture evenly among your pots. Arrange your cookie cutter pastry cut outs on top of the apples. Using a pastry brush, brush the cutouts lightly with milk, then sprinkle with sugar.
  6. Place the bowls on a baking sheet and place on the center oven rack. Bake for 15 minutes. Rotate the pies front to back and bake for 10-20 more minutes, or until the apples are easily pierced with a knife. Note: If the top crust starts to get too dark, cover with loosely tented aluminum foil for the last 10 minutes.
  7. Transfer to a wire rack and let cool for at least 1 hour before serving.
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lemon bars http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/01/08/lemon-bars/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2012/01/08/lemon-bars/#comments Sun, 08 Jan 2012 18:03:09 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5425

Once in a while, I bake foods that I know that I won’t like. These lemon bars are among them. I just don’t love lemon enough to eat gobs of it in one dessert. A sprinkle of zest here or a dash of juice there is fine, but almost any food that is centered on lemons will not be on my top 10 list. Or even my top 20. That said, baking foods that I don’t like presents an interesting challenge: how do I judge if they are good? I have extremely high standards, so I wanted to know if these bars were worth blogging about. My friend Joy is a lemon-bar lover famous for her own lemon bar recipe. She says these are great, which means that if you like lemon bars, you’ll love these.

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lemon blueberry loaf (secret recipe club) http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/11/28/lemon-blueberry-loaf-secret-recipe-club/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/11/28/lemon-blueberry-loaf-secret-recipe-club/#comments Mon, 28 Nov 2011 13:00:56 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5361

I have a confession to make: I did not make this bread. I had to commission my mom to do it for me. When I was assigned to Kate’s blog I was *super* excited. Kate has tons of amazing looking recipes with beautiful pictures and I immediately selected a few that I wanted to try. My intention was to prepare these recipes for a baby shower that I was hosting this weekend. Then I got *super* sick on Friday morning and ended up in the ER on Saturday for extreme dehydration. The doctors loaded me up on fluids and meds and told me to go home and rest. No baby shower. No cooking. No Food Babbles blog recipe. I was bummed. Not wanting to leave Kate orphaned, I texted my mom and asked her to do the baking honors for me. She agreed and then came over today to drop off this gorgeous Lemon Blueberry Loaf for me to taste and share with you! Three cheers to mom for helping me ensure that my Secret Recipe Club post came together just in time for the big reveal on Monday!

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5 pound apple pie http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/11/01/5-pound-apple-pie/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/11/01/5-pound-apple-pie/#comments Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:23:39 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5236

October slipped away so quickly that I completely forgot to share this pie with you! Oops! Here’s the Pie of the Month for November October!

I found this recipe in Nick Malgieri’s Modern Baker book but Nick got the recipe from Maida Heatter. You know recipes are great when they’ve come through TWO famous bakers before they get to your kitchen! My dad ate a slice two days after I baked it and declared the pie a masterpiece. I can’t imagine what he would have said if he had tasted it warm from the oven!

I only made a few modifications to this recipe. First, I added some cornstarch to the apple mixture because I like a thicker filling. I also reduced the sugar, and when making it again I’d reduce it even more. I really like the apple flavors to pop in my pies, and besides…. there’s plenty of sugar in the vanilla ice cream I load on top! :) I also like my apple pie to have crunchy apples, but I may stand alone in that camp, so while I’d cook the apples less in the future, I won’t include that change in this recipe because I’m sure some of you think I’m strange. :)

By the way, this pie does use 5 pounds of apples. Five pounds of apples takes a heck of a long time to peel unless you have a peeler and corer. If you do, then you’re in luck because you’ll save yourself an hour of peeling and slicing. :) Otherwise, get peeling! You’ve got a lot to do!

Also, note that this recipe calls for two kinds of apples. You want the Granny Smiths because they retain their shape and provide a bit of tartness. You want the Golden Delicious (or a similarly softer apple) because they will break down to form a thick, apply sauce. (Apply is a word by the way. I had no idea until I typed it and auto-correct didn’t yell at me to fix it. Who’da thought? Words with Friends, here I come!!!)

Enough chit chat. Let’s bake!

5 pound apple pie

Prep Time: 1 hour

Cook Time: 40 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour, 40 minutes

Yield: 1 ginormous apple-filled pie (serves 8 people?)

Adapted from Modern Baker

A pie that uses 5 pounds of apples is surely a health food, right? :)

Ingredients

4 tbsp unsalted butter
2 1/2 pounds Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, and cut into 12 wedges
2 1/2 pounds Golden Delicious apples, peeled, cored, and cut into 6 wedges
1/3 - 2/3 cup sugar (I'd use the smaller amount next time, but you decide!)
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
egg wash: 1 large egg beaten well with a pinch of salt
sugar for sprinkling on the pie before baking

Instructions

  1. For the filling, melt the butter in a cast-iron dutch oven or other large pan with a cover. Add the apples and sprinkle with sugars and cinnamon. Cover the pan and cook over medium heat for 5 minutes, until the apples have exuded their juices. Uncover and continue cooking, stirring occasionally, until the apples are tender. About 1/3 will have disintegrated, and the rest of the apples should remain intact. Cool the filling. The filling may be made several days in advanced and stored, covered, in the refrigerator.
  2. Set a rack on the lowest level of the oven and preheat the oven to 375F.
  3. Halve the pie dough and roll into 13-inch circles. Center one circle on the pie plate. Add the filling. Top with the second crust and pinch the edges. Use a paring knife to cut slits into the top of the pie to allow the pie to vent steam. Place the pie on a tray to catch any juices that may fall. Brush the top with egg wash and sprinkle with sugar.
  4. Bake the pie until the dough is golden and the filling is bubbling, about 40 minutes. Cool on a rack.
  5. Serve with delicious homemade ice cream or homemade vanilla whipped cream.
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autumn quinoa salad http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/10/12/autumn-quinoa-salad/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/10/12/autumn-quinoa-salad/#comments Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:58:10 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5091

Back to the quinoa again. I made a huge batch the other night and decided I would test recipe after recipe until I found one I liked. I was shocked when I loved these quinoa cakes and then again when I found out that I also loved this salad. This is not much different from my standard winter salad, except that I also add a hefty handful or two of quinoa for some nutritious protein. It can even turn a side salad into a main dish!

But if you really, really, really want a great tasting salad, fry your quinoa. It probably ruins all the nutritious benefits of this grain, but really, who cares? It’s delicious! And it’s still healthy because you’re still eating salad! I was inspired by this when I was making the quinoa cakes and some of the quinoa fell off the patties and into the oil in the pan. It got super crispy and I thought, “Hmmm… I bet we’d love this as a salad topping!” If you add 1 cup of cooked quinoa to a splash of hot olive oil, the quinoa turns a toasty brown and makes the most amazing crunchy topping. My husband loved this part so much that he literally licked the pan clean. Try it. You’ll like it. :)

autumn quinoa salad

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 10 minutes

Yield: 4-6 servings of salad

Source: Salad recipe is heavily adapted from How Sweet It is . Vinaigrette recipe was featured earlier on Dishing the Divine

This salad is loaded with tasty goodness and protein. It can be served as a main dish or as a side dish.

Ingredients

salad
2 cups spring greens (I used a mixture of lettuce and spinach)
2 cups cooked quinoa
1-2 medium apples, cored and chopped
1 medium pear, cored and chopped
1/2 pomegranate, seeded
1/8 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper
vinaigrette
3 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 1/2 tsp sugar
1 1/2 tsp Dijon mustard
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup olive oil
fresh ground pepper to taste

Instructions

    salad
  1. OPTIONAL: If you're feeling adventurous and don't mind a few more calories, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a pot until smoking. Add 1 cup of the quinoa and fry until golden brown. (Careful - they jump!) Remove from the heat and cool to room temperature.
  2. Layer the greens on a large serving platter or in individual bowls. Top with some un-fried quinoa. Add apples, pears, pomegranate and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Top with fried quinoa, if using. Drizzle with vinaigrette (recipe below).
  3. vinaigrette
  4. Combine the vinegar, sugar, mustard, garlic, and salt in a food processor. With the machine running, slowly add the olive oil until well thickened. Remove from the food processor and add add freshly ground pepper to taste.
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pie of the month: pear and jalapeño jelly pie http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/09/30/pie-of-the-month-pear-and-jalapeno-jelly-pie/ http://www.dishingthedivine.com/2011/09/30/pie-of-the-month-pear-and-jalapeno-jelly-pie/#comments Fri, 30 Sep 2011 17:07:02 +0000 http://www.dishingthedivine.com/?p=5008

First, don’t you dare turn your nose up at this pie yet. You haven’t even tried it.

Second, I did try it. It’s good. And it doesn’t taste like jalapeños or jelly.

Third, I made this pie way back in August (remember that part, where it was summer and all?!) and then September ran away with me and tomorrow is the first day of October so September’s pie of the month almost turned into October’s pie!

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