All posts filed under: Amazing Sweets

Thai Sticky Rice with Mango

Published by Kathy Hunt

I promise that Kitchen Kat isn’t evolving into a Southeast Asian food blog. However, I do have one more tantalizing recipe from this part of the world to share. This time it’s an iconic Thai sweet, sticky rice with mango. One of those rare desserts that is as straightforward as it sounds, here steamed sticky rice or khâo niaw gets paired with cut mango. Sometimes referred to as glutinous rice, sticky rice’s name comes from its texture. When cooked, this short, oval-shaped rice becomes quite gummy. Its color also changes from white to almost translucent, which is the opposite of how white rice looks before and after steaming. Especially popular in Northern Thailand, sticky rice can be eaten by hand. Occasionally sticky rice is consumed on its own. On some rare occasions it is served alongside fresh or dried shrimp, giving diners a sweet-salty-savory experience. Although it usually pairs up with mango, it also goes nicely with such tropical fruits as soursop, pineapple and jackfruit or tart and fruity sorbet. I like it best, though, …

Czech Strawberry Dumplings

Published by Kathy Hunt

With strawberry season right around the corner, it seems like a good time to talk about Czech strawberry dumplings. Until two years ago, whenever I heard the phrase “dessert dumpling,” I imagined a cinnamon- and sugar-dusted apple bundled into a buttery pastry and baked until golden brown. The thought of a whole strawberry boiled inside a casing of cheese-laced dough never occurred to me. Then I made several trips to the Czech Republic and learned how to make jahoda knedlíky or strawberry dumplings. After that I forgot all about those apple pie-like treats. It’s been said that no traditional Czech dinner is complete without the inclusion of a dumpling or two. A staple since the Middle Ages, the plump, round dumpling can be either sweet or savory. The latter tends to use potatoes and potato flour as its base while the former features flour and/or breadcrumbs and a filling of whole, locally grown fruit such as strawberries, plums or cherries. Shaped into balls, both types of dumpling are boiled, drained, sliced in half with a …

Sweet Steamed Banana Cakes

Published by Kathy Hunt

Still enamored with the foods that I made and ate in Southeast Asia, I want to share another recipe from Thailand. This time it is a dessert featuring my favorite fruit, bananas. When I say “dessert,” you might imagine a thick slice of Red Eye Chocolate Cake, a bowl of velvety Pumpkin Ginger Trifle or plate of the elegant, jam-filled cookie hindbærsnitte. In the U.S. we tend to like our desserts bursting with flavor, textures, sugar and fat. However, in terms of dessert, Asia resembles the Mediterranean; both regions end their meals on a lighter note with fruit-based sweets. In Thailand you may cap off the night with pieces of fresh mango or jack fruit, poached custard apples or, as is the case in this post, steamed banana cakes. This dish is a straightforward as its name indicates. To make sweet steamed banana cakes, you mash together bananas, flour, sugar and coconut milk until a smooth batter forms. You then spoon the batter into small bowls, place the bowls in a steamer basket, cover and …

Red Eye Chocolate Cake

Published by Kathy Hunt

Coffee and chocolate. Two things that I love brought together in one cake, the red eye chocolate cake. For those unaccustomed to hearing “red eye” associated with anything other than an overnight flight, this red eye refers to regular coffee with a shot of espresso added to it. As you might expect, espresso boosts the coffee’s flavor. It also increases the amount of caffeine in the drink. It’s a perfect pick-me-up after a late night flight or simply a late night. In keeping with its namesake’s bold reputation, Red Eye Chocolate Cake boasts of four layers of cocoa- and coffee-infused cake slathered with thick, rich chocolate ganache. This is a dessert that is both decadent and delicious. I can’t think of a more fitting way to celebrate a holiday known for an arrow-slinging god, a sainted martyr, love and chocolate than with a slice of this lavish sweet. Because people often balk at the thought of icing a cake, particularly a layer cake, I’ve made a short, instructional video on how to frost a cake. …

The Dessert Table: Cranberry Torte

Published by Kathy Hunt

Growing up outside of Pittsburgh, I assumed that all wedding receptions featured those decadent displays known as cookie tables. Weighted down by platters of cream-filled lady locks, lemon bars, nut horns, Mexican wedding cookies, spritz cookies and anise-laced pizzelles, these linen-covered tables attracted guests in droves. Introduced as a low-cost alternative to an expensive wedding cake, the cookie table eventually became a companion to cake. Custom dictated that family members make the cookies but, if you didn’t have gifted bakers at home, you could do as my mother did and enlist the help of a local bakery and family friends. At parties it was the dessert table around which people clustered. Here the cookies were less ostentatious — think chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, peanut butter blossoms, pecan sandies and butterscotch — but just as plentiful. So too were the brownies, fruit and custard pies, marshmallow-studded ambrosia and heavenly angel food cakes. What didn’t make it to the dessert table? For obvious reasons I never saw ice cream, make-your-own-sundae bars or chocolate fondue pots. Generally, anything …

Fruits of the Forest Tartlets

Published by Kathy Hunt

It’s time, once again, to talk about elderberries. Back in season and growing with a vengeance on an old friend’s farm, they present me with the annual challenge of what to do with quarts and quarts of bold, earthy fruit. Last year I featured these tiny, bluish-black berries in a colorful sweet that I’d dubbed “Elderberries and Cream.” Consisting of stewed elderberries layered between white bands of homemade, vanilla-laced whipped cream, this uncomplicated dish was perfect for elderberry fans. Unfortunately, those preferring a milder last course were better off just skipping dessert for Elderberries and Cream was a heady, strong-flavored confection. This year I’ve opted for a treat that will satisfy a variety of tastes. Rather than only showcase elderberries, I’ve gone for all of summer’s fabulous foraged fruit—or at least all that I can pick at my friends’ farm—and made a dessert with the “fruits of the forest.” Years ago a family friend introduced me to fruits of the forest pie at the Tavern in New Wilmington, Pa. The memory of that deliciously complex …

Danish Raspberry Slice or Hindbærsnitte

Published by Kathy Hunt

Hindbærsnitte is the latest addition to my ever-growing list of international dessert crushes. Some people liken it to homemade Pop Tarts. Others equate it to thumbprint cookies. Neither comparison comes close to the sweet splendor of this lovely Danish cookie. Inspired by Viennese confections, hindbærsnitte was born in Copenhagen in the late 1800s. The legend goes that in 1850 Danish bakers went on a long-term strike over unfair wages. To keep the country in breads and sweets, bakers from Austria were hired to fill the vacancies. Their time in Denmark and the culinary traditions that they shared would influence the creation of many Danish baked goods, including hindbærsnitte. With its flour- and almond-based dough and thick, fruity filling this cookie does remind me of such Austrian specialties as Linzer tortes and augens. The literal translation of hindbærsnitte is raspberry slice. Its name more or less explains the treat — baked cookie dough blanketed by raspberry preserves, topped with another sheet of baked dough and then sliced and iced or iced and sliced. The order of …

Toasted Almond Aquavit

Published by Kathy Hunt

It has become a beloved, albeit unusual, Easter tradition. For the past few years on Easter eve my husband and I have gathered together with friends to nosh on such Scandinavian specialities as gravlax, pickled herring, rye crisps and pickled beets and sample each other’s take on infused vodka or, as we like to call our creations, homemade aquavit. In the past I’ve made sweet concoctions such as raspberry and apple pie aquavits. This time around I decided to take a savory approach and steep bouquets garnis of chopped sun-dried tomatoes, marjoram and crushed red peppercorns. I assumed that the resulting liquor would go well in Bloody Marys or on its own as a Mediterranean-inspired libation. Unfortunately, my pairing resulted in a decent drain cleaner but an atrocious smelling and tasting drink. Luckily, we had a Plan B and Plan C in place. A few weekends before the fete my husband drove to our old neighbors Frank and Jane’s farm and dug up some roots from a sassafras tree. Ever hear of sassafras? It’s the …

Frisian Sugar Bread for Easter & Beyond!

Published by Kathy Hunt

I may have visited the Netherlands twice, roamed around the Dutch-influenced areas of Belgium as many times and even have Dutch friends but, until recently, I’d never tried Dutch Frisian sugar bread. A specialty of the northern Dutch province of Friesland, suikerbrood or sugarbread features spices and a generous amount of the large, coarse, stark white sugar known as pearl sugar. As you might expect from a food with “sugar” in its name, this is a sweet bread. Yet, I wouldn’t call it overly saccharine. Eaten at breakfast in the Netherlands, it has a warm, honeyed flavor on par with Danish pastries and cinnamon rolls. When I compare it to such cloying breakfast staples as syrup-soaked pancakes, waffles and French toast, I find this bread to be mild and pleasantly sweet. Although not part of the pantheon of European Easter breads, Frisian sugar bread would be a fitting addition to any Easter brunch. For those abstaining from sweets or baked goods during Lent, it will be a delicious way to break these fasts. For everyone …

Double Chocolate S’mores Cookies

Published by Kathy Hunt

On the whole I don’t find supermarket baked goods all that enticing. The breads usually seem too airy, the cookies too bland, the cakes too slathered with artificially flavored frosting. However, last week, before the most recent, and hopefully last, snow of the season, I grabbed a cookie from my local market’s bakery section. Rather than satisfy my ever-present craving for sweets, it drove me to dig out my measuring cups, electric mixer, pen and notebook and create my own take on a s’more cookie. What made this particular cookie so special, so inspiring? Sweet without being cloying, chocolaty without being too rich, it struck the perfect flavor balance. Dotted with chunks of graham cracker, chocolate and marshmallow, the cocoa-enriched dough was far more complex and appealing than the usual double chocolate chip cookie. As with its campfire namesake, this cookie was so good that it left me hankering for “some more.” (Yep, that’s how s’mores got their name. You can’t just eat one graham cracker-chocolate bar-toasted marshmallow combo. You always want “s’more.”) As the …