Monthly Archives: August 2011

Girly Bling Rings Cupcakes

These Bling Ring cupcakes - decorated with Ring Pops and Sugar Pearls - would be perfect for a girly tea or princess party.

Just like fashions in sunglasses, automobiles and handbags, there are definite trends in desserts.

The first dessert era I remember was age of tiramisu, followed by the crème brûlée epoque. Next came chocolate lava cakes, which oozed their way onto dessert menus everywhere and took their sweet time leaving.

The latter half of the 2000s has been the Era of the Cupcake, when the homemade treat made by moms everywhere was re-imagined as a designer sweet with a 3-inch beehive of frosting and a $3 price tag. As a dessert trend, I think cupcakes are pretty 2008 (read over), but creative homemade cupcakes will never go out of style. I like borrowing some inspiration from designer cupcakes and adding them to the homemade ones.

I remember being fascinated with Ring Pops as a kid and wanted to find a way to incorporate them in a girly cupcake. I baked white cupcakes in fluted petal baking cups and then frosted them with a lemon glaze. Then while they were still soft, I embedded the shank of a ring pop in each one and finished with a sprinkle of silver and white sugar pearls, plus pink and green sugar sprinkles to match the cups.

I have to admit, the cupcake making part was super-easy, as I used boxed cake mix and frosting mix from Trader Joe’s. I turned their white frosting into lemon glaze by substituting the juice of two lemons for the hot water called for on the box.

These Bling Ring Cupcakes are a bit over the top, but they’d be perfect for a tea or a princess party. And they were appreciated by girls of all ages.

Croque Monsieur With Cheese Bechamel for #letslunch

Open-faced croque monsieur is delicious hot, cold or in-between.

Just like revenge, sometimes dinner is best served cold – or at least at room temperature. It’s pretty comfortable here in California, but for the rest of the country, the idea of heating up the kitchen with the oven sounds pretty unappealing.

So the bloggers in the #letslunch group decided to share our favorite cold dinners this month. Whipping up a salad makes for a cool and easy meal, but I decided that that makes it too easy.

Croque Monsieur, the French grilled ham and cheese sandwich, is one of my favorite meals to eat lukewarm or hot from the oven. It takes a little time to whip up the bechamel, but aside from that, it’s as easy as toasting cheese on bread and so much more satisfying. There are lots of ways to present it, but I like Croque Monsieur open faced and topped with juicy summer tomatoes.

Croque Monsieur

4 slices of crusty levain bread
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 cup cheesy bechamel (recipe follows)
12 slices thin smoked black forest ham
4 slices ripe tomato seasoned with salt and pepper
8 tablespoons shredded melting cheese like fontina or swiss
2 teaspoons hard grating cheese like Pecorino Romano or parmesan
2 teaspoons olive oil
Slice bread about 1/2 inch thick. Drizzle with olive oil and then flip over. Spread top of each with 1/8 cup cheese bechamel sauce, being sure to take sauce to the edges of the bread. Top each piece of bread with 3 thin slices ham and a slice of ripe tomato seasoned with salt and pepper. Crown each slice with 2 tablespoons shredded melting cheese and then 1/2 teaspoon hard grating cheese. Drizzle each with a little olive oil.

Bake at 400 til brown and bubbly on top and crisp on the bottom, about 15 minutes. Let cool to room temperature or just warm, and serve. Makes a great lunch with poached or pickled asparagus or green beans.

Makes 4 servings

Cheese Bechamel Sauce

Makes 1-1/2 cups

4 tablespoons butter
4 T flour
3 cups warmed whole milk
salt to taste
a few grates of nutmeg
1/2 cup to 1 cup shredded cheese swiss or gruyere

Melt the butter in a heavy-bottomed pan over low-medium heat. Whisk in the flour. It will be bubbling. Let the sauce cook for several minutes. Watch it and keep whisking it keep it from browning.

Remove from the heat, pour the milk in all at once and continue to whisk. Now you can add more milk to make it thinner. Let it keep cooking until it doesn’t taste like flour any more. Once it’s nice tasting, add 1/2 cup to 1 cup of Swiss or gruyere and stir until it’s melted in.

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