Rosemary Sweet Potato Bread (Vegan)

Without even realizing it while I was making it, this dish is both earthy/Thanksgiving-y and has bananas in it, satisfying both of our most recent Suggestion Friday requests.

This is a vegan rosemary sweet potato bread, completely invented by yours truly. No eggs, no margarine or oil, no sweeteners. I wanted to create something warm and chunky for the cold weather that’s to come, yet healthy and lively. I heavily adapted my own vegan banana bread recipe and replaced most of it with sweet potato and herbs. Like I said, there is absolutely no added sugar—the sweetness of the rosemary potato with the added bananas really take control of this savory bread.

I’m proud of the way this came out and I hope everyone enjoys this as much as I did! Once it cooled, I wrapped it up in tin foil and I’ve been gobbling it up for breakfast with my tea/coffee all week. And if you don’t like sweet potato, I’m sure you can substitute this with pumpkin, or even butternut squash. Yummm.

[Recipe].

This was done before I left to college, as my parting gift to my family. It’s nothing special, just a chocolate cake. What is rather comical about it is I used a donut-shaped mold to make it that a friend gave me for my birthday. This one to be specific.  

Another thing is the frosting. To those of you that don’t know, frosting, when heated, becomes thin but still viscous, like a glaze. I heated vanilla frosting in the microwave (in a microwave safe bowl, of course), and drizzled it over my giant donut. It seeped into the pores of the cake really well, penetrating the chocolate with hints of creamy vanilla. So, if you ever want to fancy up a cake or cupcakes, I would try this neat little technique. 

Remember that photo of an avocado and black beans I posted on Thursday? Believe it or not, this is the product of those two ingredients (with a few more added in).

When I saw Cara’s recipe for black bean and avocado brownies, I knew I had to make them right off the bat. That is exactly what The Baking Duet is all about: experimentation and surprises. It also helped that the main ingredients are very readily available in South Florida…and our posts have been very Cuban-based lately. Did you notice that?

They tasted good, but they weren’t perfect. (Pictured above is the result of trying the recipe three times—the first two came out flat as a pancake).

I want to put my own twist on it and see if I can reduce the amount of white sugar in the recipe while maintaining that chocolate taste. I already have a few ideas up my sleeve. So keep in tune!

Note: Whatever you do, don’t use Cuban style black beans. I made the mistake of using that can in Thursday’s photo, but it’s seasoned with herbs and the taste will come out in the brownies. Sorry! Just use a can of Goya beans.

Ask anyone that knows me personally, and they’ll tell you that my thing is cupcakes. I just like making them, a lot. Well, I mostly like playing with the frosting and dyeing it abnormal colors, but making them is really fun too. Lately, though, I haven’t really had the oppurtunity to bake these little delectable morsels of cake, but thanks to a friends’ birthday last week, the oppurtunity presented itself.

Alas, I didn’t get to play with the frosting. But, I did play with the ingredients.

It’s your normal chocolate cupcake mix, with a few special additions. Instead of the 1 1/3 cup of water that the recipe called for, I replaced it with decaf coffee. Why decaf? Well, I was worried the flavor would overpower the chocolate, so there. The other difference was I added about a teaspoon worth of ground cinnamon. Think mocha latte.

The cupcakes came out light and fluffy, and slight fragrant thanks to the cinnamon. It also left a nice cinnamon aftertaste on the tongue once it was swallowed. It I could do anything different, I’d probbaly replace the decaf coffee with extra bold, or take Nicole’s suggestion and put some coffee ground into the mix to heighten the flavor of the coffee.

Any suggestions for icing? A friend of mine suggested whipped cream straight from the can, but I’m just not sure what would match the mix of flavors.

Natalie came to my house yesterday! We made a gluten free version of this delicious blueberry pull apart bread. We just replaced the all purpose and wheat flour with a gluten free alternative. It came out so much better than we expected.

We also used Splenda for more healthiness (not that it’s that good for you, anyway).

It’s Tea Time Tuesday again!
Today I made coconut macaroons with a chamomile anise tea glaze.

These are pretty tasty, but very sugary. Recommended to those with a sweet tooth. My mom and I gobbled these up in seconds.

[Recipe].

Hey guys!! It’s Tea Time Tuesday! Here’s what I’ve cooked up for today…

I found this recipe which calls for tea bags/leaves, rather than the powdered form. But even when steeping the tea at the longest amount the recipe advises, the flavor was still a little too weak. If you’re going to try this recipe, (and you want a strong green tea flavor) go all out, add more tea bags and steep them longer. If you don’t mind having just a hint of tea flavor, this makes a nice vanilla ice cream with a subtle taste of tea, and would make a great base for a number of toppings (like honey!)

If you try this out, let us know how it turned out! And if you don’t have an ice cream maker, the website has a set of instructions on how to make it by hand.