In celebration of our April birthdays, staff member and culinary wizard Lori generously baked this gorgeous hummingbird cake which we devoured in a typical five minutes flat. A spring-y twist on carrot cake, hummingbird cake substitutes crushed pineapple for shredded carrot. It is fabulous with coffee or tea. The dried pineapple flowers ore optional, but impressive as heck and really pretty easy (tutorial here).

Recipe:

• 3 Cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 2 cups (about 3 large) mashed ripe banana
• 1 can (8 ounces) crushed pineapple, drained
• 1 cup chopped pecans (more for decorating, if desired)
• 1 cup unsweetened desiccated coconut
• Dried pineapple flowers, optional

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter two 9-by-2-inch round cake pans. Line the bottom of pans with parchment paper. Butter the paper and dust pans with flour, tapping out any excess; set pans aside. Whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt into a medium bowl; set aside.

Place butter, vanilla, and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat until well combined, about 2 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating to combine after each addition. Continue beating until mixture is fluffy and pale yellow.

In a medium bowl, stir together banana, pineapple, nuts, and coconut. Add to egg mixture, stir until well combined. Add flour mixture; blend well.

Divide mixture between prepared pans. Bake until golden brown, and a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean, 30 to 40 minutes, rotating pans halfway through baking.

Transfer pans to a baking rack to cool. Let pans cool 15 minutes before unmolding. Loosen sides with a small metal spatula or a paring knife, and invert onto greased wire racks. To prevent layers form splitting, invert again, so tops are up. Cool completely before assembling cake or wrapping airtight to freeze cake for later.

Using a serrated knife, trim the top of one layer (it is okay if the second layer is a bit rounded, for it becomes the top of the cake).

To assemble, place trimmed layer on serving platter. Spread the top with a 1/4-inch layer of frosting. Top with the untrimmed top layer. Lightly coat the assembled cake with a thin layer of frosting to protect against crumbs in the frosting. Finish with remaining frosting. Decorate with chopped pecans if desired and dried pineapple flowers, if desired. Serve immediately, or keep refrigerated until ready to serve.

Source: Martha Stewart Living, June 2003

We all love to binge on our favorites this time of year; the same movies, songs, and recipes, over and over again until we can’t stand it anymore. I decided to try an update on a very old favorite this year: holiday sugar cookies.  You know the kind — you cut them out and decorate them like Santa or snowmen or dreidels or gelt. I found the simple recipe (below) in my mother’s battered copy of the Joy of Cooking. The vibrant color of our Yame Matcha green tea powder seemed full of festive possibilities, so I decided to throw some in and this happy-looking dough was the result:

Just in case my experiment was a total flop, I made a batch the old-fashioned way. I couldn’t leave that alone either though, and I whipped up a batch of Matcha icing. My “recipe” was basically a cup of confectioner’s sugar, a few tablespoons of milk and Matcha powder until a screaming green color was achieved. I glazed both versions. The green icing on green cookies version was my favorite. The Matcha lends the cookies a delicate, slightly sweet green tea flavor. Next time I would nix or reduce the vanilla extract in the original recipe — the Matcha alone is flavor enough. I’m itching to make some witch fingers out of this stuff, or maybe some shamrocks in a few months. Here’s the recipe:

Cream Together: 1/2 C sugar and 1/2 C butter.

Beat in: 2 1/2 C sifted flour, 2 t baking powder, and 1/2 t salt.

Chill the dough 3-4 hours. Preheat the oven to 375 degree. Roll out and cut the dough, place on a greased cookie sheet and bake 7-12 minutes.

Once the cookies have cooled, add icing, sprinkles, etc.

Fall is official and our seasonal flavors are full of cinnamon, maple, pumpkin, and other things that are wonderful to cook with. My personal favorite is Pumpkin Chai, a beautiful blend of black, green, and herbal teas flavored with chai spices, caramel, and pumpkin. It smells so good I decided to find a way to eat it.

There are many ways to infuse foods with tea flavor, and I would like to try all of them. At the moment I’m too busy for a recipe that requires more than a few steps, so I decided to give a simple syrup recipe a try, inspired by the title. It is stupidly simple, and the end result is delicious and versatile. Here’s what you do:

1. Brew a cup of strong tea. I used three teaspoons of the Pumpkin Chai in one cup of boiling water and let it steep for about five minutes.
2. Strain the leaves and bring the tea to a boil in a small sauce pot.
3. While the tea is boiling, add a cup of sugar and stir constantly for about two minutes.
   
4. Let the mixture cool completely. Store in a container with a tight lid (a canning jar works great).

At room temperature the syrup will last about a week before it begins to crystallize. Refrigeration will extend the shelf life to about a month, probably longer, but chances are it won’t sit uneaten for that long.

What can you do with tea-infused simple syrup? Bake with it, poach with it, add it to an adult beverage, or drizzle it on whatever you want. I’m already planning a million variations on this theme.

Feeling under-challenged by simple syrup, I decided to keep going and make sundae sauce, adapting this recipe for wet walnuts, my favorite. I brought a half-and-half mixture of the simple syrup and maple syrup to a boil, along with the vanilla extract and pinch of salt. Then I stirred in chopped walnuts and let it cook for a few minutes. That’s all. Warm, on vanilla ice cream, it is mind-blowing. Warm, on pancakes, also mind-blowing. Cold, right out of the jar with a spoon, mind-blowing.

Have you tried cooking with tea? We’d love some recipe suggestions!