Fashionably Fit

To state the obvious, Valentine’s Day is really not a holiday for men. Not at all.

But since I am the there-WILL-be-flowers-and-jewelry-and-a-big-deal-made-out-of-this-made-up-holiday kind of girl, I feel like I should get my husband something. But usually, what I come up with is something a girl would want. Framed photos? That’s a chick gift. Lame.

This year, though, I think I actually got it right: A batch of homemade biscotti. My husband loves coffee. He loves sweet things to dunk in his coffee even more. Ah-ha! Espresso-flavored biscotti it was.

I wish I could tell you that I packaged these up in a spiffy new mug with a pretty Valentine ribbon, but I didn’t. I put them in a container he can easily take with him to work. He’s pretty easy to please.

And even though I’ve scheduled this to post late in the afternoon of Feb. 13, you can still make biscotti for your Valentine, too. It’s unbelievably easy and you almost certainly have the ingredients on hand!

Espresso and almond biscotti

From Food Network

• 2 cupsall-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons ground espresso powder
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 3/4 cup sliced almonds (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper, a liner or nonstick spray and flour. (My Silpat has been a game changer, to say the least.)

In the bowl of a stand mixer, whisk together flour, espresso powder, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, sugar and salt.

In another bowl, beat together the eggs and vanilla.

Using the paddle attachment, beat the egg mixture into the dry ingredients until a dough forms. Fold in the almonds.

On a floured work area, form the dough into a ball and then cut it into two logs, about 3 or 4 inches wide and 12 inches long.(Some biscotti recipes say the dough spreads; mine didn’t, and I wish I had spread out more.)

Bake the logs for about 35 to 40 minutes, until browned and firmed. Take them out of the oven and let them cool for a few minutes. Move back to the floured surface and cut them into pieces about a half-inch thick. Bake the biscotti another six to 10 minutes, until crisp.

If you want to impress someone on Valentine’s Day, I have an idea.

I made this cake from Food Network this weekend to celebrate Valentine’s Day with my husband. I had never worked with meringue before, and as you can see, it got a little too toasty, but other than that, I was really pleased with it. I foresee many more meringue experiments in my future.

Honestly, sometimes I feel a little weird posting these fun recipes. This is a blog that was started because I wanted to write about losing weight and be all, like, “Look at me! I lost 100 pounds!” But the truth is that I never thought much about food before I lost weight, and I certainly never would have gone on the hunt for a special recipe to celebrate Valentine’s Day.

I think that if I had to explain it to my former self, I would say, “100 pounds is the difference between a slice or two of this cake on Valentine’s Day versus dozens of those heart-shaped Little Debbies snack cakes that come out as soon as the Christmas tree-shaped brownies disappear.”

Flourless chocolate stout cake with vanilla meringue

From Food Network

For the cake

• 2 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 1 1/4 cups chocolate chips
• 6 large eggs
• 3/4 cup turbinado sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 1/2 cup Guinness or other stout beer
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 325 and spray a springform pan with a nonstick baking spray. I use Wilton’s Bake Easy.

Bring a small sauce pan of water to a simmer. Crack the six eggs, turbinado sugar and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer. Whisk together over the simmering water until the mixture is warm through.

Put the bowl on the mixer, and, using the whisk attachment, beat on medium-high speed for five to seven minutes. While the mixer’s going, bring the beer and vanilla to a low boil; beat into the egg and sugar mixture.

While the beer’s boiling, melt the chocolate in the microwave. (Heat in 30-second increments until melted.)

Beat in the butter pieces and finally, the chocolate.

Pour into prepared springform pan and bake about 40 minutes until set in the center. Don’t be worried if it doesn’t seem entirely done; it will set up quite a bit as it cools.

Meringue

• 4 room temperature egg whites
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

Using a stand mixer, beat egg whites with whisk attachment, slowly streaming in cream of tartar, vanilla and sugar, until stiff glossy peaks form.

Use an offset spatula to arrange the meringue on the cake, making swirls and peaks throughout. You can use a culinary torch to toast the meringue or pop it under the broiler at 500 degrees for a few minutes, but if you do that, be very careful. I sat cross-legged on the kitchen floor staring into my oven and was about 10 seconds too late in removing our cake. Time to buy the lighter fluid for the culinary torch I received at my bridal shower … almost a year ago.

What special sweet treat are you making for Valentine’s Day?

There was a problem at our house earlier tonight.

A self-inflicted problem at that. I saw cinnamon M&Ms on a clearance end cap at Target and could. not. help. myself. I mean, cinnamon M&Ms? What are those? I had never heard of such a thing and had to know more. Plus, they were 90 cents. If they were terrible (unlikely) I could pitch them and little would be lost.

I don’t know about you, but I think Green is pretty chic in the snow bunny look.

The Biscoff spread, well, that’s a whole other story. I saw a jar of cookie butter from Trader Joe’s on Instagram and immediately pleaded on Facebook for someone to send me some. My friend Elin, being as amazing as she is, sent me a delicious care package from TJ’s that included the cookie butter, cocoa almond spread and a chocolate and coffee grinder that will be the perfect topping for the coffee cupcakes I still haven’t made.

My other amazing friend Kim also saw the post and didn’t say anything … but came to visit right before Christmas bearing a horseshoe necklace (“Your version of the Carrie necklace!” she told me, and I totally squealed) and, you guessed it, Biscoff spread.

I didn’t open the Biscoff spread right away, because we still had the cookie butter. We devoured the cookie butter far sooner than I’d care to admit and dove head first into the Biscoff, and when I came home looking forward to a spoonful, I knew things had gone too far. I was also pretty close to tearing into the M&Ms, for the simple reason that they were in my house, so they needed to go, too.

The thing is, if it’s a cookie or a cupcake, I can usually shut myself off. I know when I’ve had just enough and it’s time to call it a night. But with individual ingredients, I’m done for. I will eat small handfuls of chocolate chips until the entire bag is gone. Clearly I should have acted sooner, as I had exactly one-half cup of Biscoff spread left — just enough to make these Biscoff oatmeal cookies from Two Peas and Their Pod that I found via Table For Two.

Biscoff oatmeal cookies with cinnamon M&Ms

• 1 1/2 cups old fashioned oats
• 1/2 cup plus 2 tbsps all purpose flour (I used whole wheat pastry flour in an attempt to get rid of it and it was fine)
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp. salt
• 1/2 cup of unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1/2 cup Biscoff spread
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• As many cinnamon M&Ms as you can fold in into the dough.

Whisk together the dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside.

Using a stand or hand mixer, beat together the butter, Biscoff and sugars until fluffy; add the egg and vanilla and beat until blended.

Gradually beat in (on low) the dry ingredients, mixing just until combined. Carefully fold in those limited edition M&Ms. Refrigerate the dough for about 30 minutes; during this time you can preheat the oven to 350 F and line baking sheets with parchment or wax paper or silicone mats.

Bake for eight to 10 minutes, until they are just firm around the edges. Allow them to continue to firm up on the baking sheet for at least five minutes, then move to a wire rack.

There is more to this cupcake than meets the eye.

It is a cookie-bottomed cupcake! An idea stolen from How Sweet Eats.

I don’t want to get all “the possibilities are endless!!” on you, but they kind of are. How Sweet Eats also features a snicker doodle cookie cupcake.

For the cupcake above I used the chocolate chip cookie recipe from How Sweet Eats. The cupcake portion is from a boxed chocolate cake mix, and the frosting is salted caramel buttercream. I cheated on that, too — I made my basic buttercream by beating together two cups of powdered sugar and two sticks of butter, then adding jarred caramel sauce (the horror!)  until the flavor and consistency were just right. I added a couple pinches of salt, but next time, I’d add more so the salt was more obvious.

I think recipe will be fun to play with for holidays and events — it’s a crowd pleaser for sure, and it’s so straight forward that experimenting is easy.

What kind of cookie bottomed cupcake combo are you dreaming up?

I have a confession to make. 2012 was going to be the year Fashionably Fit ended.

It had been dying a slow death for several months anyway, and I was going to pull the plug. But then my hosting company automatically renewed my account, and I now own this space until some time in 2013. My immediate reaction was just, ugh — talk about wasted money. As if the first year hadn’t been enough of a waste.

But I realized keeping the blog might help me with my goal for 2012: Cook more.

2011 was huge — I got married, ran a half marathon and had my gall bladder removed (sorry, no link). I baked a lot, mostly in the form of birthday cakes and treats for coworkers. But I didn’t cook as much as I should have. There was white chicken chili, of course, and a lot of baked eggs in my cute Le Creuset ramekins, and far too many outings to Taco Tuesday at Tijuana Flats (this will not change).

I was busy, first with the wedding and then with the half and always with work, but a lot of really busy people put dinner on the table more nights per week than I did. In 2012, I’d like to cook dinner three times per week, with at least one of those meals being a bigger meal, possibly from the slow cooker, with leftovers. I’d like to write about some of those meals, too.

We’ll see what happens. But in the mean time, I beg you to check out these champagne cupcakes from one of my new favorite blogs, Dessert for Two. All of the recipes are scaled-down dessert recipes to feed two people — how perfect is that? When I told my husband, who is generally disinterested in most things food blog related, about the concept, he said, “That’s brilliant!” I agree.

I made these cupcakes with a few minor changes for New Year’s Eve, and we had the other two for dessert on New Year’s Day, and now they’re gone. Too perfect.

Admittedly, I got too heavy handed with the champagne in the frosting, and it got runny — next time, I’ll stick to the directions.

Pink champagne cupcakes

Slightly adapted from Dessert for Two

Cupcake ingredients

1/4  canola oil
pinch of salt
1/3 cup sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
2 tablespoons pink champagne (I used Barefoot Bubbly Pink Moscato — judge all you want, it’s delicious and perfect for this recipe)
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1/3 cup + 1 tablespoon flour
1/8 teaspoon baking powder
pinch of baking soda

Preheat oven to 350 and line a muffin tin with four cupcake papers. Beat together the oil, sugar and salt on medium speed for about a minute, or until fluffy. Beat in egg, champagne and vanilla until combined. Mix in the flour, baking powder and baking soda by hand, being careful not to over mix.

Fill each muffin cup 3/4 cup full with batter. Christina’s recipe calls for a baking time of 19 to 21 minutes at 350 F, but mine were ready to go by 17 minutes.

Frosting ingredients

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup powdered sugar
2-3 tablespoons champagne

Beat together the butter and sugar, adding champagne by the tablespoon until you reach the desired consistency. Four tablespoons is definitely too many — I piped my frosting on just to watch it melt into a pile.

Serves four

Our good friends are lucky enough to live about a block from the beach.

And we are lucky enough to be invited over.

I grew up landlocked and did not see the ocean, any ocean, until I was 25. So I don’t think you can have enough buddy shots on the beach.

While our friends finished up dinner, we walked the dogs on the beach. Hector is actually BFF with their dog, Benny, which is lucky because Hector hates almost every other dog he has ever met, with the exceptions of another puggle on the beach last fall and a shih tzu named Muffin who lives in the neighborhood.

In addition to dog-walking services, we also contributed dessert: S’mores Bars.

My mom made a giant pan of these when we visited Pennsylvania last month, and they tasted all the more amazing after an 18-hour drive. I didn’t have time to get her recipe after I decided to make these, so I was relieved when one of the first search results for “s’mores bars recipes” was from Hershey’s, a Pennsylvania staple. (They have pretty much the best back-of-the-package recipes ever, including these fabulous peanut butter paisley brownies.)

I followed the Hershey’s recipe with a minor adaptation.

Preheat oven to 350 and grease an 8-inch by 8-inch pan.

Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy; beat in egg and vanilla. Stir together flour, graham cracker crumbs, baking powder and salt; add to butter mixture, beating until blended. Press half of the dough into the greased pan.

Spread the marshmallow creme on top of the mixture. I had to use more than a cup to get an even layer, so use your own judgment.

Sprinkle the chocolate chips evenly over the marshmallow. Spread the remaining dough on top and press into place – it may not cover evenly, but that’s OK — I don’t think anything s’mores-themed has to be perfect.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until lightly browned.

Behold the giant cookie cake.

I’ve made this twice so far this year, and it’s a hit every time. It’s a Martha Stewart creation, and you can find the original Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake recipe here.

Julia at Dozen Flours  (is that not the best name for a baking blog?) wrote a really helpful post on making the cake, including a sweet recipe for Nutella frosting to sandwich in between the cookies.

Since this wasn’t my first giant-cookie-making rodeo, I had time to document the process. The first thing I did was trace the inside of my springform pan on four separate sheets of parchment paper.

Each cookie takes just more than 1 cup of dough. I scooped it out on to the circle, then put another sheet of parchment paper on top and pressed it to fill out the circle, using a rolling pin and my hands.

None of them will be perfect, so don’t worry!

Then you bake for about 10 to 12 minutes at 350, and pull it out of the oven to re-shape it into a circle. My cookies didn’t spread that much, but they still needed a little coaxing back into a circle. Put it back in the oven for another 8 minutes or so. I’m always careful to catch them at that still gooey stage — there’s nothing worse than a crispy cookie!

For this cake, I made a mocha buttercream frosting from this simple Wilton recipe, but I honestly prefer the cream cheese frosting Martha recommends.

Then I drizzle it with caramel sauce and melted chocolate, using a pastry bag and tip.

I can’t recommend this cake enough, whether it’s for a birthday, a potluck or just because. It’s not that complicated — really! — and it’s a huge crowd pleaser. Plus, the variations are endless. I’d like to try making a dark chocolate/white chocolate chip cookie with vanilla buttercream version!

Still need an excuse? You’ll be the star of your Memorial Day picnic if show you up with the giahugic cookie cake in tow.

How could you not be?

My love for Easter is a recent development.

I know you’d think a 300-pound woman would be all about waking up to a big basket of sugar, but I was just never that into it (and why should I have been — I ate candy whenever I wanted to!) until I started to lose weight. Then, Easter started to mean spring, which meant I could get out and be active. Hooray!

Since I moved South, the coming of spring is slightly less significant (because really, what is more significant than the end of snow and sleet and generally gray misery) but my Easter festivities have continued. All of the sweet Easter decor I scored in my two-plus years as a salesgirl at Pier1 made the move with me, and it’s been out for a month.

I wanted to bring that same spring-y spirit to work on Friday, so I made Easter chick cupcakes.

100 percent of your daily dose of adorable, right? Sadly, these little guys met an untimely demise as I was stomping down the steps of the parking garage.  My heel caught the hem of my pant and I let go of the Cupcake Courier, grabbed the banister and watched in horror as it crashed down the concrete stairs.

I assured all of the confused onlookers that I was OK, picked up the Cupcake Courier and continued onward. The Cupcake Courier is basically a tank for baked goods, so the little chicks were a smeary mess but still edible.

This morning I woke up to the cutest Easter basket and card from the mister-to-be.

And then we came home from church and I made both the puggle and fiance wear rabbit ears.

Oh, and I made Easter dinner, too!

Clockwise from top we have homemade beer bread, lemon-pepper tilapia and tomato-onion casserole from this month’s issue of Martha Stewart Everyday food. We also had a from-scratch red velvet cake and sea salt carmel gelato for dessert, but I didn’t photograph the cake because I tried to build it into a 3-D rabbit and it was a complete and total failure.

What’s your favorite part of Easter festivities? I wish we’d gotten around to egg dyeing!

I’m not big on the change of seasons. When I was getting ready for my move to Florida, I remember a couple of people saying, “Won’t you miss the different seasons?” To which I would always say that I could go the rest of my life without seeing fall foliage or snowflakes. I have zero problem with drinking peppermint tea in July or a daquiri in December.

Which might explain why I’m in love with these pumpkin corn muffins, even though it’s spring.

I had cracked open a can of pumpkin last weekend to make pumpkin scones for a lazy Saturday brunch, and as it sat in the refrigerator, I was obsessed with how to use the rest. Cupcakes? Cookies? Brownies? All of the above?

YES! Well, no. There is a wedding gown in  my very near future. But I was not about to waste pumpkin, by God. Driving home from dinner Saturday night, I randomly thought of the yellow corn meal in the pantry I hadn’t touched in awhile and wondered, “Pumpkin corn muffins? Is that even a thing?”

As it turns out, it is. I adapted this recipe and it’s fabulous. They’re a good pre-exercise snack, they’re good with coffee, and well, they’re just plain good anytime.

Printable recipe

Pumpkin corn muffins

Adapted from JustBento.com

1 cup yellow corn meal

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup minus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

2 tablespoons brown sugar

2 large eggs

3 tablespoons unsweetened applesauce

1 cup pure pumpkin

1/3 cup plain Greek yogurt

Prepare a muffin tin with nonstick spray. Preheat oven to 360 F. Whisk together the dry ingredients; set aside. Beat the wet ingredients together until well blended; fold into dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Drop by tablespoons fulls into mini-muffin tin or use an ice cream scooper for full-size muffins.

After I filled my mini-muffin tin, I had just enough left over to make two full-size muffins, so I put them in the very center of a muffin tin. The mini muffins were done in about 15 minutes; the two full-size muffins took about 20.

This isn’t what it looks like.

I swear. These are fudgy brownies from Cooking Light, with walnuts added in to push down the glycemic index.

For some time, it seemed like brownies were everywhere. It started with these slow cooker triple chocolate brownies in the March issue of Everyday Food, which I thought about for weeks but a) couldn’t find a six-hour chunk of time in which I would be home to attend to the slow cooker and b) couldn’t get over the 400+ calories PER BROWNIE.

It didn’t end there, though. There was the white chocolate coconut brownies and red velvet brownies with white chocolate frosting.

Here’s the thing about baking and me: I love to bake. I love it. For the most part, I am pretty good about having that stuff in the house and not binging on it, which to me, was always kind of the point of losing weight and changing my lifestyle: To be able to eat normally and enjoy everything.

But our wedding is coming up quick, and I don’t want any added temptations around. I have to get my dress fitted soon. I know it will be bigger than when I picked it up in December, and I’d like to continue the (agonizingly sloooow) downward trend. Unless you have also lost more than 100 pounds, I don’t think you can fully comprehend the terror of pre-wedding weight gain.

The Cooking Light brownies come in at 147 calories a pop, though mine had more because of the addition of walnuts (and the scoop of Skinny Cow ice cream, of which I am a major fan). But they were really, really good — better than the boxed stuff! — one of those recipes you’d never guess was “light.”

What’s your favorite “light” recipe?