To say that I am overwhelmed is an understatement. As is my mom. In true fashion of my mom though, it was not so much the monetary donations that moved her (though that is nice too), she was so moved by the comments that people left for her through the American Cancer Society.

“People left such wonderful comments to me…they don’t even know me”.

I kindly reminded her that the kind of do since I spill her secrets on here from time to time. Which I am sure she feels is all worth it now. So thank you, thank you, thank you for all of you who donated!!!! You amazing, amazing people have helped her raise $900!!! $900. In my wildest dreams I didn’t think we would raise so much.

As promised, here is this simple yet insanely good Chocolate Hazelnut Financier with Nutella Ganache. Though this looks simple, there are a couple of steps that make it a little time consuming, but they need to be done. Don’t let that stop you from making it, they aren’t hard, they just take a little time. And when you are done, you will have a cake that will help remind you that life truly is worth living!!!

There is still time to donate, so if you want to help you can go read about it HERE!

Chocolate Hazelnut Financier with Nutella Ganache

4 TBSP unsalted butter
10 oz semi-sweet chocolate
1 ¼ cups heavy cream
1/3 cup Nutella
1 ½ cups hazelnut meal
1 cup almond meal
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup powdered sugar
½ tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
7 large egg whites, at room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350F.

Place oven rack in center of oven. Spray a 10×2-inch round cake pan with pan spray, line with a piece of parchment paper, then coat paper lightly with pan spray.

Melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook until solids separate and brown to a dark golden color, 7 to 10 minutes. Remove from heat and cool at room temperature until it reaches 70 degrees F, about 30 minutes. Don’t chill; it needs to remain liquid. Set aside.

Place chopped chocolate and 1/3 cup Nutella in a medium bowl. Bring cream to a boil in a small saucepan over medium heat. Immediately pour hot cream over chocolate.

Using a spatula, slowly stir in a circular motion, starting from center of bowl and working out to sides. Stir until all chocolate is melted, about 2 minutes. Set aside at room temperature to cool to 70 degrees F.

Sift together almond flour, hazelnut flour, all-purpose flour, powdered sugar, baking powder and salt into bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment or use a large bowl and hand mixer. Turn mixer on low speed and mix dry ingredients 30 seconds.

Add egg whites all at once and mix on medium speed 3 minutes.

Add chocolate mixture and vanilla and mix 30 seconds.

Add melted butter all at once. Be sure to scrape in all browned bits from bottom of pan. Mix 30 seconds on medium speed, then turn mixer to high speed and mix 3 minutes more, scraping down sides of bowl well.

Pour batter into prepared pan, spreading evenly. Bake for 15 minutes. Rotate cake for even browning and bake 15 minutes more, or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool in pan on a rack 5 minutes, the invert it onto rack, remove cake pan and parchment and cool completely before decorating and serving.

Nutella Ganache

8 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, finely chopped
1 cup heavy whipping cream
½ cup Nutella

Place chocolate and Nutella in a medium heatproof bowl. Bring cream to a boil in a small saucepan over medium heat.
Immediately pour boiling cream over chopped chocolate and Nutella. Tap bowl on counter to settle chocolate into cream, then let stand 1 minute. Using a rubber spatula, slowly stir in a circular motion, starting from center of bowl and working out to sides.

Stir until all chocolate is melted, about 2 minutes. It may look done after 1 minute of stirring, but keep going to make sure it’s emulsified.

Pour ganache on top of cake and spread to cover.

Recipe adapted from The Secrets of Baking by Sherry Yard

So this is a non-food post. I don’t do them often so this is probably important.

See that crazy woman with the jellyfish on her head that was meant for little kids at the aquarium (no, not me in the yellow, the other crazy one). Well that crazy woman and I have a bet.

See, as many of you know my mom is a breast cancer survivor. Every year she participates in the Relay for Life. Every year she raises money like crazy. Except this year. About 6 weeks ago my mom had her toe removed. Yes, you read that right, her toe removed. Up until a couple of days ago she was in a cast. On June 4th and 5th my stubborn mom is insisting on participating this year and will be wheeling herself in a wheelchair/and or walker for the race. Yes, insanity runs in my family.

My mom’s a little bummed that she hasn’t been able to get out and fundraise (or do anything else for that matter) and so I told her I would ask my readers if they would be willing to help. She laughed. And from that the bet was on. I rarely ask for anything of my readers but I am asking for help with this. So if you are out there and are willing to donate even $1.00 or heck less (*Edit, darn it all, you can’t donate less than $10…sorry, didn’t know that…but reader Robin W. pointed out that there is a form you can print out and mail in any amount you want), we will take it! If you are willing to help, here is the info:

Relay for Life Bonner ID

Click on donate:

It will ask you to search for a particpant and ask for first and last name. Her’s is Jane Gould.

Her team CAL will show up. Click on that. They have large amounts of money to donate. You can ignore that and put how much you want. They also have a section for Name Recognition. You can either put my mom’s, Jane Gould. Or Carol Bair who was my mom’s life long best friend who died of stage four cancer.

If you are nice and donate, I may be willing to give the recipe for this cake.

I have a gift. A gift for attracting strange people. So does my bff. We have come to the conclusion that we are smilers and that is what gets us into trouble. I’m almost always smiling and I have a habit of smiling at people. Which doesn’t sound odd, but if you really pay attention, not that many people do.

I loved in the movie Elf when he says “Smiling’s my favorite”. Not because it is my favorite, hockey is my favorite, but because I could relate.
Usually I get strange looks when I smile at people.
I’ve been asked more time I can count if I’m on drugs. For the record, I am not.
I get the half smile while you can see their mind racing thinking, how do I know this person? You don’t…I’m just being…wait for it…friendly.
And then you get the super crazy people that because you smiled at them they now want to be your bff and tell you all about their life. I find a lot of these. And yet it does not deter me…it just usually gives me good stories.
I also get a lot of offers to convert to random religions.

I know I got this trait from my mom. There have been more than a few occasions when a complete stranger has been at our house for a holiday (my mom loves people over for Thanksgiving…both, Easter, and New Year’s Day). All because my mom smiled and struck up a conversation. Then she found out that they had no where to go for the holiday and the next thing you know, stranger next to me at the dinner table. So apparently it rubbed off. I mean, I haven’t had an strays at my dinner table yet, but I wouldn’t put it past me not to do it.

Baking of course is something that makes me smile as well. I was standing in the kitchen this morning baking these jumbles and I caught myself smiling. No one was around, it was just for me…the smiling fool. And of course the fact that there is caramel in these makes me smile as well.
These are a take on the ever popular jam jumble cookie bar. But they are made better because they have chocolate and caramel. Mmmmm. Pretty simple to make, other that the annoying unwrapping of the caramels. But if you can get passed that, and I’m sure you can, you have yourself a nice little treat.

Oatmeal Turtle Jumbles

For the Base & Topping:
6 ounces unsalted butter, at room temperature
¾  cup granulated sugar
¾  cup light brown sugar, firmly packed
1 egg
1 ¾  cups all-purpose flour
½  tsp baking soda
½  tsp salt
1 ½  cups quick-cooking oats

1 cup purchased caramels halved ( might have added a few more )

For the Filling:

¾ cup milk chocolate chips
2/3 cup sweetened condensed milk
2 TBSP unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 cup pecans (it called for chopped but I left mine whole)
1 tsp vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F; coat an 8 ½  x 12-inch baking sheet with nonstick spray (I used a 9-x-13-inch pan, worked fine),

Cream butter and both sugars in a bowl with a mixer until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.

Add the egg and mix to blend, followed by the flour, baking soda, and salt; mix to incorporate. Add in oats and mix on low speed until incorporated.

Crumble 2 cups of dough over the bottom of the prepared baking sheet. Press to cover base of the pan (don’t push dough up the sides); set aside.

Add halved caramels to remaining dough, working them in with your fingers; set aside for the topping.

Melt chocolate chips, condensed milk, and cocoa powder together for the filling in a saucepan over medium- low heat. Cook until mixture is smooth, stirring constantly to prevent scorching. Off heat, stir in the pecans and vanilla.

Pour the filling over the dough in the pan and spread evenly. The layer will be fairly thin.

Crumble dough with caramel pieces evenly over the top of the chocolate. Bake bars for 30 minutes, or until chocolate is set and topping is firm. Cool bars completely before cutting.

Adapted from Cuisine at Home Magazine

One of the joys of living in Western Washington is the abundance of fresh produce to choose from. Farmers Markets and road side stands are scattered across our areas. Some of us are even lucky enough to belong to a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture). So when the opportunity to receive Seasonal Fruit Desserts (right when lots of fruit will be in season) I was all over the chance.

Seasonal Fruit Desserts by Deborah Madison( I actually own her Vegetarian Cookbook) is a visually beautiful cookbook that really focuses on creating desserts that lets the fruit shine through (imagine that). Some of the desserts are as simple as Strawberries in Red Wine Syrup which consists of strawberries (duh), red wine (again duh), sugar and some peppercorns, which I thought was an interesting addition. The author suggest serving them over orange segments. I, being a glutenous person, would probably go for over ice cream. But that is an example of the many recipes that highlight just the fruit and all it has to offer at it’s seasonal best.

I personally chose to make a tart. Now if you read my blog you will know that I don’t make a lot of pies (at least not traditional ones) as I hate making pie crust. So when I saw the recipe for Cream Tart with Black Raspberries I almost passed it up since it said tart. But while looking at the photo I noticed that the tart dough looked different. And it is. It’s almost cake like, and goes amazingly well with the fruit. If I were to get nothing else more from this book, that Silky Tart Dough recipe is worth the cost of the book (though I must disclaim that I received this book for free). I did deviate for my recipe and use blackberries and blueberries. No black raspberries to be found and those were the closest I could find in color. And it was the color in the photo that made me pick the recipe.

And don’t just think it is all about Summer produce, there are some great recipes for the more hearty months. I can’t wait to try the Quinoa Pudding (I love and obsess over quinoa so it was great to see it in a dessert) using dried cherries and cranberries. And the Native Wild Rice Pudding with Maple Syrup and Wine Soaked Cherries sounds like a winner as well. I love the use of wild rice.

If you love fruit and more importantly desserts that highlight all the lushness that fruit has to offer, than this is the book for you.

To see what others thought about the book, head over to A Blithe Palate for the round up later on this week.