Adventures in Mika's Kitchen
A year ago, I posted my efforts to make a Chocolate Matcha Marble Cake, inspired by a Bakerella recipe that I read the year before. While the resulting cake was delicious, I wasn’t quite happy with the way it looked visually. I think the problem was that instead of using the Hershey’s Special Dark Cocoa Powder [...]
My favorite cake of all time is the Japanese Strawberry Cake. I have wonderful memories of visiting Little Tokyo in Downtown LA as a child, and getting a slice of this insanely delicious, light, and delicate cake from the Japanese bakery. The year I got my very first real job (2000), I decided to buy [...]
So, I USED to have a ton of lemongrass growing in the backyard. It’s a long story, but basically, I was standing there watering my beloved lemongrass plants when I noticed a snake slithering out of the thicket. Triangular shaped head, rattle on the tail, diamond shaped markings. Yup… a young Western Diamondback Rattlesnake had [...]
The Brown Derby restaurant in Hollywood was famous for a variety of reasons: it was the “it” hangout for celebrities back in the day (Clark Gable, Lucille Ball…), the iconic dome shaped architecture that resembled a man’s Derby hat, the supposed birthplace of the Cobb salad… and last (but not least) the origin of the legendary Brown [...]
Blood oranges are amazing fruits… orange colored peel, with red/orange vesicles within the endocarp. I received a generous gift of some lovely homegrown blood oranges, and immediately thought they would be perfect for an adaptation of Ina Garten’s amazing Lemon Yogurt Cake. This cake did not disappoint, and makes a wonderful gift. You can divide one recipe [...]
So apparently “cake balls” or “cake pops” are a new American dessert trend right now… everyone is making them, and some people (like Bakerella) are making some really extraordinary designs. I decided it was time to jump on the bandwagon, and give cake balls a try. Cake Ball truffles are sooooo good – I can’t [...]
So here’s a spin off of the tried and true, delicious Caribbean Rum Cake… the Banana Rum Banana Cake! When I found banana flavored Malibu Rum at the market, I felt like I hit the jackpot. The cake portion is flavored with the banana rum (banana Malibu) and mashed bananas, and once finished, soaked in [...]
Sometimes I feel like eating a really rich, decadent dark chocolate cake. Butter cream frosting simply does not satisfy when I get in that CHOCOLATE mood. This is one of my most favorite chocolate cakes to make for those times – but consider yourself warned: it is a really rich cake – a little slice [...]
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