I love carrot cake. After being diagnosed with diabetes, it became a mission of mine to find a healthy recipe that also tastes great. This recipe uses whole wheat flour, applesauce to reduce oil, (reduced) honey instead of sugar, and sugar free white chocolate chips. It’s the perfect balance of fluffy muffin texture, fall spice, crunchy nuttiness, with the right amount of sweetness. And I found that cake pop sized balls of carrot cake are perfect to get maximum enjoyment without overindulging. Deniz and Kelin love the recipe and the muffin balls disappear quickly in our house. Despite the reduced sugar, we all find it perfect for dessert.

Ingredients:

Dry Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 c whole wheat flour
•  1 t baking soda
•  1 t ground cinnamon
•  1/4 t ground nutmeg
•  1/4 t ground ginger
•  1/2 t salt

Wet Ingredients:

•  2 T butter, melted, or olive oil
•  1/3 c honey or sugar
•  1 egg, lightly beaten
•  1 t pure vanilla extract
•  1 c unsweetened applesauce, if using sugar instead of honey, add 3 T applesauce

Add-ins:

• 1 c shredded carrots (about 2-3 medium carrots). You can also use shredded zucchini for a less sweet zucchini muffin alternative.
• 1/4 c no-sugar white chocolate chips (we like Lily’s White Chocolate Style Baking Chips that are Stevia sweetened)
• 3 T coconut flakes
• 1/2 c chopped walnuts, toasted

Instructions:

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
• Put the walnuts in a quart-sized ziplock bag and break into 1/5th sized chunks with a rolling pin. Place the crushed walnuts on a cookie tray lined with parchment paper. While the oven is preheating, toast the walnuts, approximately 5 minutes. Watch carefully to ensure the walnuts do not burn.
• Spray cake pop tray cups with cooking spray and brush so that the entire indentation has oil.
• In a large bowl whisk together the Dry Ingredients.
• Beat the egg lightly in a small bowl.
• Make a small well in the center of the Dry Ingredients and add the Wet Ingredients.
• Stir ingredients together until just combined and there are still some spots of flour remaining.
• Fold in the Add-Ins just until combined (don’t overmix or the balls will be dense).
• Distribute the batter evenly among the cake pop tray. I use a melon baller to scoop even amounts of batter and to reduce mess. Bake for 17 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center of a cake pop comes out clean.
• Remove to a wire rack to cool completely. These cake pops can be frozen. They can also keep covered at room temperature for 2-3 days.

The first time I went to Turkey, I had these sekerpare cookies and fell in love.  They’re soaked in a delicious syrup, giving them an incredibly moist crumbly texture that I’ve never had in any other cookie.  We often crave them as there’s nothing comparable available in the US.  We’ve tried making them many times with no success, until we found a recipe on yemek.com.  We reduced the sugar and replaced the vanilla extract with almond extract for an extra delicious flavor.  The result was perfect!  Finally, we can have the cookies we love at home!

Print

Turkish Almond Syrupy Cookies (Şekerpare)

Semolina has multiple uses in Turkish cooking, especially in desserts. This almond flavored syrupy cookie is one of them, and it sure makes you want to eat more after your first bite.

Ingredients

Cookie Dough:

• 1 stick butter 1/2 c, softened to room temperature. Don't melt the butter.
• 2 c all purpose flour
• 2½ t semolina
• 1 egg + 1 egg white see below Topping for the 1 egg yolk that will be remaining
• ¼ c sugar
• 1¼ t baking powder
• 1 t almond extract

Syrup:

• 1¾ c water
• 1½ c sugar

Topping:

• 1 egg yolk for brushing on top of the cookies
• ground pistachio optional

Instructions

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 355° F.
• Prepare the ingredients as described above.
• Combine and mix the Syrup ingredients in a sauce pan.  Cook over medium heat until boiling, turn heat down to simmer, and continue cooking for 10 minutes.  After cooking, turn off the heat, and let the syrup cool to room temperature. The syrup cannot be hot when it is combined with the cookies.
• Combine and mix the Cook Dough ingredients in a large bowl.  Mix the dough until uniform with a fork, and then kneed the mixture until it is like playdough consistency.
• Prepare a cookie sheet with parchment paper.  Spray or brush oil on top.  Using your hands, form walnut-sized balls out of the mixed cookie dough.  Put them on the oiled parchment cookie sheet and press them into a flattened ellipsoid shape.
• Use a fork to press lines on the top of each cookie.
• Mix the egg yolk in a small bowl.  Brush the egg yolk on top of each cookie.
• Bake for 25 minutes.
• After done baking, while the cookies are still hot, put the cookies in a single layer in a tray that is deeper than the cookies.  Pour the cooled syrup on top of the hot cookies.  Allow the cookies to soak for 15 minutes.  Turn the cookies over and allow them to continue to soak for another 15 minutes.
• Enjoy while warm!

Deniz and I were lucky to have my parents visiting this week during Chinese New Year.  Dad made this traditional Taiwanese coconut butter steamed new years cake that I grew up on.  It’s sticky in the center, flaky on top, and has a delicious buttery coconut taste.  Here’s the yummy recipe, given to us by a family friend (Mrs. Helen Shu).

Ingredients:

• 16 oz bag of sweet glutenous rice flour
• 3 eggs
• 1/2 c butter
• 2 c sugar
• 3 c milk
• 3 T coconut flakes
• 2 t baking powder

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350oF.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl well, until they bubble.  Add in all the remaining ingredients to the eggs and mix well until no lumps remain.

Liberally grease a 13″x9″x2″ baking pan.  Pour the mixture into the greased baking pan.  Bake in the oven for one hour.  Cool before removing for the pan and serving.

After Deniz’ 20th weekly purchase of tiramsu from Don Quixote’s, I couldn’t help but challenge myself to make something cheaper, healthier, and just as tasty ourselves.  Challenge accepted.  This whoopie pie look-alike is actually a reverse tiramisu:  chocolate cake dipped in coffee with a tangy cream frosting.  No matter what it’s called, it’s mouthwatering moist and light, with just the right amount of sweet, bitter, and tart.  We couldn’t stop ourselves, gobbled down 12 cupcakes in the first day.  I’ve never been a big chocolate or coffee fan, and even I can’t keep my hands off of these.

Print

Mocha Whoopie Cupcakes

This whoopie pie look-alike is actually a reverse tiramisu:  chocolate cake dipped in coffee with a tangy cream frosting.  No matter what it's called, it's mouthwatering moist and light, with just the right amount of sweet, bitter, and tart.

Ingredients

Cake:

• 1 package dark chocolate cake mix
• 1 plus 1 cup coffee cooled to room temperature
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 3 large eggs
• butter cooking spray

Cream Filling:

• 8- oz plain cream cheese
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 c sugar
• 3 T coffee cooled

Instructions

• Heat the oven to 350°F. Put metallic cupcake liners in two 12-cupcake pans or 24-mini cupcake pans.  Spray with cooking spray.
• Mix the cake ingredients (except for the cooking spray) in a large bowl.  Beat with an electric mixer until almost smooth.
• Scoop the batter into the cupcakes.  Bake according to package directions.  Cool 10 minutes.
• Cut each cupcake in half.  Pour 1 tsp of coffee onto the cut side of both the top and the bottom of the cupcake.
• Mix all of the cream filling together first by and and then with an electric blender until smooth.  Spread the cream filling in the middle of the cupcake.

As someone who was born and raised in Turkey, people always assume I have baklava syrup running in my blood (my cholesterol test results partially confirm this). Moving to the US did not stop me from enjoying this sweet, nutty, crunchy dessert. My cravings were easily satisfied by Baklava King when I was in San Diego (the best baklava hands down).  After we moved to Japan and Hawaii, I had to find a way to make this at home.

Today, we are happy to share our recipe, which takes the most common elements from other recipes. Turkish baklava is unique in that it uses pistachios instead of walnuts used in Greek baklava.

Print

Turkish Baklava

This crunchy, nutty, sweet dessert is a classic Turkish recipe. Unlike its Greek counterpart, it uses pistachios.

Ingredients

• 1 lbs phyllo dough thawed
• 1 c of unsalted butter we used butter substitute or butter flavored spray

Filling

• 1 lbs of shelled pistachios or walnuts, or mixture of two finely chopped.
• 1 t cinnamon

Syrup

• 1 c of honey
• 3/4 c of sugar
• 2 T of lemon juice
• 1/4 t of vanilla extract
• 1 c of water
• 1/2 t cinnamon
• 1 pinch of ground cloves
• 1 pinch of ground cardamom

Instructions

• To make the syrup, combine all the ingredients under "Syrup" above in a sauce pan, and cook over medium heat to melt the sugar.  Set it aside as we will use this the last.
• If you haven't already, finely chop the pistachios/walnuts. You can use a food processor if you like.
• Melt the butter. You will need a brush to apply this melted butter on the dough sheets in a minute.
• If you have a baking pan that is about the same size as the phyllo dough sheets, that's perfect! If not, you will need to cut the dough sheets to fit in the baking pan. Lightly cover your baking pan with butter using brush or butter-flavored cooking spray.
• Preheat your oven to 350F. This will get the preheating going while you lay down the dough layers.
• Lay your phyllo dough sheets on a clean working area, next to your baking pan. Put one dough sheet on the baking pan. Brush the sheet with melted butter or spray with butter-flavored spray. Repeat this until you have 6 sheets in the baking pan. Allow for air pockets between the sheets where possible to help the baklava be fluffy.  After the 7th layer, sprinkle 3/4 cup of finely chopped nuts evenly on the sheets. Put another 6 sheets, brushing/spraying butter on each layer. Then again sprinkle another 3/4 cup of nuts evenly. Repeat this procedure until you are out of dough or nuts - but make sure you at least have 4-5 layers of sheets on top.
• Now you just made one big chunk of baklava! Cut it in diamond shapes (in Turkey, they call this baklava shape If you have a pastry cutter, your life will be easier. First, cut it lengthwise so you have 1.5" deep, long strips. Now cut them diagonally, which will produce diamond-shaped slices.
• Bake the baklava for about 40 minutes on the center rack, or until it's golden. It will puff up a bit.
• Take the baked baklava out, and let it cool for few minutes. Take the syrup you made earlier, and drizzle evenly on the baklava using a big spoon or ladle. The syrup will naturally drip down to the bottom of the baking pan, so make your best effort to keep the top of the baklava slices moist with syrup.
• Wait for at least 30 minutes before you try one. Who am I kidding, you will try one right away. We did. But seriously, it gets better as it cools down in the syrup. Also, if you are not going to consume the rest within a day or two, refrigerate it.