Cake of childhood, Pineapple Upside Down Cake (or cupcakes)

My friend CC and I are hosting a Mad Men themed Christmas party this year.  So we research and thought one of the desserts needs to be somewhat TV inspired.  PUDS(Pineapple Upside Down Cake) starting making an appearance after Dole started canning its pineapple and recipes flooded in after that.
I thought PUDS would be a simple, easy, tasty dessert.  We did a test dinner last night and yesterday morning I remembered, I don't have a cast iron skillet.  So I did the next best thing.  I made cupcakes.  You can't use pineapple rings obviously because muffin pans are smaller so you have to modify the recipe.  The one I found says you can break up the fruit into pieces and halve the cherries.  It turned out delicious and only took about 30 minutes to make.  Still kicking myself  that I didn't take a picture.  I'll have to remember to do so when we have the party.

Pineapple Upside Down Cake cupcakes recipe:

for the cake:

2 eggs

2/3 cup white sugar

4 TBSP pineapple juice 

2/3 cup all purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

for the brown sugar topping:

2 tablespoons of butter/margarine

1/3 cup brown sugar (packed)

can pineapple rings 

maraschino cherries

Instructions

1.Melt the butter and brown sugar in the microwave – 30 seconds should do it. Once melted, mix it well!

2.Sift the dry ingredients.

3.Mix the wet ingredients thoroughly!

4.And preheat the oven to 350 F.

5.Once the wet ingredients are mixed well and the dry ingredients are sifted, you can mix them together.

6.Pour the dry into the wet, and mix until everything is combined and you can’t see any clumps of dry ingredients.

7.Spray your muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray.

8.Spoon in a little bit of the butter/brown sugar mixture into the bottom of each cup – it ends up being a little less than a tablespoon each. Then place a maraschino cherry in the middle and surround it with bit of pineapple.

9.Now you’ll spoon the batter onto the toppings.

10.Bake in a preheated 350 F oven for 20 minutes. Test their doneness with a toothpick – it should come out of the middle of a cupcake nice and clean!

11.Once they’re done, you need to let them cool for at least 15-20 minutes, preferably on a wire rack.  If you try to take them out of the pan right away, you’ll probably lose your toppings because they’ll be too hot.

12Go around the edge of each cupcake with a butter knife to help loosen them. Then cover the muffin pan with a large plate or a cutting board and flip it over! This should let them come out nice and easy, and in one piece!

Try it!! So good!! 

Key Lime Pie is so Divine!!

Key Lime pie says summer to me.  It has that bit of tart I just love.  I made this pie several times in the past few months and I made it for my friend's 30th birthday party at our office.  I am a bit of a snob when I comes to certain things homemade.  The crust is so important.  Seriously, I hate store bought crust.  If I'm in a hurry and I need to get something quick, it's one of those last resort decisions to use one.  The recipe is so crazy simple but I did have a friend of mine tell me I need to add more key lime because it's just not tart enough.  Now I like tart but apparently she wants to have lemon/lime face.  Here is the recipe:

Key Lime Pie
filling:
1 can (14oz) condensed milk
4 egg yolks (separate the whites out)
3-4 oz of Key Lime juice

crust:
3 oz of toast almond slivers - buy them and use a tiny slice of butter and toast.  Must watch carefully or will burn and taste horrible.  Believe me, it's happened.
4 tbsp butter melted
1-1 1/2 cups of graham cracker
3 tsp white sugar
sprinkle of cinnamon.

Heat oven to 350 degrees and mixed all the crust ingredients and press into pie plate and bake for about 8 minutes.  Take out of oven and let completely cool
Use a mixer and pour in condensed milk, key lime juice and egg yolks.  Mix well and pour into crust.  Bake for about 20 minutes.
Cool and then spoon cool whip topping on pie and chill for at least 4 hours.

This is what was left at party.  And then it was gone after the picture was taken.

Cookie Pie?

The reason I put a question mark on my title is I was iffy about doing it.  Now I love anything Tollhouse usually but the recipe I used called for a crust to make it a "pie".  I've never done that before.  I used the Tollhouse recipe on the bag but I also lined a pie plate with a ready made crust. Baked as usual and let cool for a few minutes because I wanted to taste it warm with the vanilla ice cream I bought.  Yeah, I live dangerously.  So I bite into it.  Moooaaannnnn!! It's good until I bite into the crust. Should it taste like a cookie and a pie?  In theory, it sounds great but the reality is, eh.  And now my whole Tollhouse experience is destroyed. I will try again of course.  Now it's sitting on the counter top and no one else has touched it.  Crust is bad.

Lesson learned.

Mmmm, pie.

I have made something I haven't in quite some time.  A bourbon chocolate chip pecan pie.  Oh yes, it just rolls off the tongue.  Bourbon chocolate chip pecan pie.  Same diabetic friend that asked for the cream cheese pound cake wanted this.  I make sure she has her insulin available at work.  I used a pretty quick and easy recipe this time.

Easy Peasy Bourbon Chocolate Chip Pecan Pie

1   (9-inch) unbaked pie shell
2 cup pecan halves
3   large eggs, beaten
3 tablespoon butter, melted
1/2 cup dark corn syrup (I used light)
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoon good-quality bourbon (Jim Beam)
3 ounce semisweet chocolate, chopped (doesn't have to be finely done, just rough)

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. 

Cover bottom of pie crust with pecans. 

In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs and melted butter. Add the corn syrup, sugar, bourbon and the chopped chocolate. Stir until all ingredients are combined. Pour mixture into the pie shell over the pecans and place on a heavy-duty cookie sheet. 

Bake for 10 minutes. Lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees F and continue to bake for an additional 25 minutes or until pie is set. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack. 

I can't wait for her to taste it.  I'll keep ya posted.