father's day fruit tart with oreo cookie crust

Usually by the time Father's Day comes around, we have had a ton of cake. In between multiple birthdays (including my own) and Mother's Day, we always have cake. So lately I have been making pie for Father's Day!

This time I decided to go with a simple yet refreshing no-bake cheesecake pie, decorated with fresh fruit. So I used this Martha Stewart recipe, except I decided to go with an Oreo cookie crust instead of the graham cracker crust. (This recipe at Crazy for Crust makes the perfect chocolate cookie crust, in my opinion!)

After letting the pie chill in the fridge overnight, I was ready to decorate with fresh raspberries the next morning. I wanted my raspberries to spell out the word "DAD", so I used cookie cutters to make marks in the pie as a guide.

And then I just fit my raspberries inside the outlines!

So simple! And tasty! The creamy pie filling, with chocolatey cookie crust, and fresh tart raspberries - the pefect combination!

Stay tuned to see what I make for Father's Day this year!

Happy Father's Day!

flag tart for fourth of july

Last year we spent our Fourth of July at a friend's place in Truckee, and we had decided we would all bring various foods and have a BBQ there. Among other things, I wanted to bring a dessert that I could make in advance, would survive the four hour drive, and would last in the fridge until the next evening. I remembered a rectangular flag tart that I had made a couple of years back, and I thought something similar would be the perfect dessert to bring!

This time, I decided to make an Oreo cookie crust instead of my regular pie crust, so I found this recipe from Crazy for Crust (the recipe uses whole Oreos, with the cookie filling and all!)

After pulverizing my Oreos in the food processor and adding a bit of melted butter, I pressed the crumb mixture into a 9-inch tart pan, and baked it at 350F for about 10 minutes until set.

While the crust was cooling, I whipped up the no-bake filling, recipe from Martha Stewart. (Note: I only ended up using half of the filling, as the recipe is meant for a 2-inch tall springform pan)

Then I made my "flag" with fresh blueberries ...

... and fresh raspberries for the stripes on the flag. (Note: after washing the fruit, make sure to blot the fruit with paper towels, so that they don't leak water all over your pie!)

The combination of flavors was wonderful! With the chocolate crust, creamy filling, and tangy fresh fruit, it was perfect and refreshing for our Fourth of July celebration!

Hope you have a Happy Fourth! Enjoy!

japanese cheesecake with whipped cream and raspberries

I've been meaning to try making a Japanese cheesecake again, after making this one a few years ago. I remember it being very light and fluffy, yet super flavorful at the same time (think soft fluffy cheesecake instead of a dense rich cheesecake!). So when it was time to make something for my brother's birthday, I thought it would be the perfect cake for him!

What makes this cheesecake so light and fluffy are eggs whites, which are whipped to stiff peaks and then folded in with the rest of the cream cheese batter.

I used this recipe at Diana's Desserts once again, but this time instead of baking it in a 9-inch springform pan I baked it in an 8-inch round cake pan (lined with parchment paper), in a water bath.

Look how tall and fluffy it got!

After letting it cool to room temperature, I let it chill in the fridge overnight. Then the next morning I whipped up some fresh whipped cream, tinted with a bit of vanilla extract and sweetened with a bit of confectioner's sugar, and covered the top and sides of the cake with it.

Then I used a Wilton #104 petal tip to pipe rows of ruffles along the sides of the cake. (My new favorite way to frost a cake, see here and here!)

Then I decorated it with a ring of fresh raspberries (since my brother likes cakes with fresh fruit!)

I loved the color effect - the striking red of the raspberries against the white of the whipped cream. So cute! (Now that I think about it, this combination looks a bit like the Mother's Day cake I made last year ... hmmmm.)

Happy Birthday, Michael! Hope you enjoyed the cake! :)

hello kitty pavlova

My new book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book, came out this week! Hooray! It's been over a year since I first embarked on this project, and I can't believe it's finally being released!

In honor of my new book, I wanted to show you something you can make with the book's recipe for Hello Kitty meringue cookies - you could also use the same recipe to make Hello Kitty pavlovas! Just pipe a large Hello Kitty, and once it's baked you can add freshly whipped cream and fresh fruit! The combination of delicately crumbly meringue with fluffy whipped cream is out of this world! Trust me!

To pipe my large Hello Kitty meringue, I used a disposable piping bag fitted with a large tip. I piped the outline of Hello Kitty, filled it in, and then added another outline on top to act as the border for the whipped cream. Then just for fun, I piped a bow for hello Kitty, to be placed on top at the end. Then I baked it at 225F for about an hour.

Once baked, your meringue should feel light and airy, and will be delicately crumbly.

Then I just topped it with freshly whipped cream, some fresh raspberries, and a sprinkling of powdered sugar. And of course the bow on top!

Or to change it up, you could even make it an espresso flavored meringue. I used espresso powder dissolved with a bit of water, and whipped it with the meringue after it was already whipped to stiff peaks. SO GOOD!

This time I decided to pipe my border with a large star tip, just to make it look more pretty.

Once baked, I again topped it with freshly whipped cream (this time I added a bit of mascarpone and Kahlua, to amp up the coffee meringue).

Then I added fresh raspberries. (You wouldn't think that raspberries and coffee go together, but it is actually really good!)

This time instead of a bow, I added coffee meringue stars that I had piped with my large star tip!

 

And again to finish it off, I dusted it lightly with powdered sugar. So pretty!

With the rest of the coffee meringue stars, I sandwiched them together with the Kahlua mascarpone whipped cream.

SO GOOD!

Make these today! You won't regret it! :)

mother's day coconut cake with surprise inside heart, fresh whipped cream, and raspberries

Last year for Mother's Day, I made this flower suprise-inside cake. So when my friend Helen sent me a link to this super cute typography cake, I got the idea to do a cake with letters "MOM" inside the cake when Mother's Day rolled around this year. I was so excited, I even bought these mini alphabet fondant cutters!

The typography cake used "edible dough", but I didn't know what that was (and it doesn't sound very tasty either), so I decided to make the letters cut out from chocolate cake! So I baked up a homemade 8-inch chocolate cake, let it cool overnight in the fridge, and the next morning I set out to cut my letters out of cake!

Only, it didn't work. The cutters were so small, that I couldn't get the pieces of cake out in one piece! I suppose that's why the typography cake was made from "edible dough" in the first place - doh! I thought about using fondant instead, but who wants fondant baked into the middle of their cake?! So, I had to abandon my surprise-inside letters idea and settle for a simpler (and bigger) shape to cut out of chocolate cake. Hearts it would be!

Once I cut out a bunch of shapes, I made a batch of homemade vanilla cake. Except I've been toying with the idea of making a non-dairy white cake, so I decided to replace the butter with coconut oil, and I replaced the milk with coconut milk. It would be a coconut cake!

I poured a bit of the batter into the bottom of my prepared loaf pan ...

... and then placed my chocolate cake heart cutouts into the batter. (Note that I placed the hearts upside down, so that I could flip the cake upside down and have a flat bottom as the top of the cake, and then the hearts would be right side up. That sounded confusing, but I'm sure you know what I mean!).

The cake came out of the oven and looked rather flat. Darn. I suppose the problem could be either: a) I used coconut oil of butter, b) I used coconut milk instead of milk, or c) the fact that I've never baked my vanilla cake recipe in a loaf pan. (I'll have to experiment with this more!)

Once the cake cooled, I whipped up a batch of fresh whipped cream, and covered the top and the sides of the cake. (Note that if I were to make this a truly non-dairy coconut cake, I would use a meringue frosting instead of whipped cream.) I had just done this ruffled baby shower cake the weekend before, so I used the same piping technique on this cake. It didn't look quite as nice as the baby shower cake though, since my cake wasn't very tall it didn't have quite the same effect.

Before serving the cake the next day, I decorated the top with fresh raspberries. 

I just love the color combination of the cool creamy white with the bright fresh red of the raspberries!

I couldn't wait to cut the cake and show my mom the surprise-inside chocolate heart!

The cake wasn't quite coconut-y enough, but at least the heart came out quite cute, even though the words "MOM" inside the cake would have been way cuter. Guess I'll have to figure out a way and save that for next year. :)

Happy Mother's Day!