Streusel Coffee Cake

When I was a little girl, my mother used to bake this treat for Sunday breakfast. My brother and I would beg for multiple pieces to no avail. This week, I heard the same pleas echoed by my children. They had no better luck than I, for this time, I was hording some of the extras all for myself!

Cake:

1 1/2 c. flour

3 tsp. baking powder

3/4 c. sugar

1/4 c. butter flavored Crisco

3/4 c. coconut or rice milk

1/4 c. applesauce

Streusel topping:

2 Tbsp. butter flavored Crisco

1/2 c. brown sugar

2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350. Pour cake batter into greased 8x8 pan and sprinkle streusel topping generously on top. Bake 20-30 mins.

Glaze:

1 c. confectionery sugar

1/2 tsp. vanilla

1/2 tsp. almond

2 Tbsp. vanilla coconut milk

Spoon over warm cake.

Infamous Apple Pie

The woman that first noted, "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach" must certainly have counted apple pie as a crucial part of her arsenal. Tart juicy apples, cinnamon, crisp crumb topping, all cradled in a thin, flaking crust are the very definition "pie".

At this point, you probably are chuckling at me. Most men jab their fork into my apple pie, shovel it into their mouths, and then mumble some sort of shocked marriage proposal. To be fair, only three of them were serious, but none the less, please allow me to share the few essential secrets to the perfect apple pie. Oh, and did I mention, every morsel is vegan!

Everyone has their favorite apple, but when it comes to pie, you MUST use Granny Smith and ONLY Granny Smith. Over the past 15 years I have baked hundreds of pies. Without exception, Granny Smith apples make the best pie. They are a firm, very tart apple. They maintain their shape well, juicy nicely, and have a flavor I have been unable to replicate with another apple. Try them.

The second secret to an exceptional pie is the crust. A perfectly good pie can be completely ruined by a bitter, tough crust. There are two secrets to a perfect crust. The first element is ice water. Before you slice an apple, pull out the flour, or even pre-heat the oven, fill a bowl with ice cubes and cover the ice with refrigerated water. The second key to a tender crust is to handle the dough as little as possible.

Make and set aside your ice water.

Pre-heat the oven to 350.

Thinly core, peel and slice 6 cups of Granny Smith apples.

Toss apples with:

1/2 cup sugar

2 Tbsp. flour

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Set aside to allow apples to juice.

Next prepare the crumb topping.

Combine:

1/2 c. flour

1/2 c. sugar

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

Cut in:

1/4 cup Butter Flavored Crisco

Stir in:

1/3 c oatmeal

Finally, the crust that pulls the ensemble together. If you are afraid to try a crust, you can finish the recipe with out the crust and spray the pie plate with cooking spray and bake. You could also try a store bought crust. Try the crust. It isn't as intimidating as it seems!

Create the crust.

Sift together:

1 1/4 c. flour

1/4 tsp. salt

Cut in:

1/3 c. Butter Flavored Crisco until the pieces are pea sized

Sprinkle:

3-4 Tbsp cold water over the flour mixture.

Gently toss the moistened flour to one side of the bowl until a soft dough forms.

Add additional water a Tbsp. at a time. The dough should not be sticky.

Roll out the dough on a floured surface with a floured rolling pin.

Do not handle the dough!!

Using a very thin metal spatula dipped in flour, work the dough gently up off the counter top.

Fold in half, then quarters.

Transfer to a pie plate, crimp edges with a fork, and cut off excess dough hanging over the edges.

Fill the crust withe the apples and top with crumb topping.

Bake 1 hour and check with a fork. Apples should give easily and topping should be lightly browned and bubbling around the edges.

One final tip....if the crust tears as you are transferring the dough, or the dough doesn't exactly cover the pie plate, do NOT panic! Dip pieces of the excess dough in the ice water and patch any holes or tears, using the water to smooth the seams! Enjoy!

Noel Nutballs

In the Hoch family, Noel Nutballs are a Christmas tradition. When I quizzed my mother on the origins of this delicacy, she began to reminisce about collecting bushels of English Walnuts with her dad each Saturday morning. Apparently their tree was particularly fruitful and my grandmother, a young woman shaped by the Great Depression, was determined to find a use for the bountiful walnut crop. With the yearly debut of autumn, my mother (better known as "Tude") and my grandfather would don in dark cotton gloves to protect their hands from the pungent staining resin that would leak from the cracked hulls of these tasty nuts, and go foraging in the back yard. My great-grandfather Goodwin, who lived with my mother and her family, took on the task of shelling the walnuts and my grandmother created this little recipe to showcase the fruit of his labors.

Sometime after my grandmother died, my mother lost her sacred family recipe. She breathlessly called my aunt who (praise be) had a copy. When I moved south with my little family, I lost my copy during the move and made the same sort of call home to my mother. This Thanksgiving, having traveled home, I was amused to hear a frantic phone message from the very same aunt who had supplied the copy all those years ago. She had lost her copy. Being half Hoch, I knew I was going to have to veganize this lovely cookie; a rich shortbread cookie, chock full of crunchy rich walnuts, and liberally doused in powdered sugar. Enjoy!

1 cup butter flavored Crisco

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon almond

1 teaspoon salt

2 1/2 cups flour

3/4 chopped walnuts

Cream the first five ingredients. Mix in the flour. Stir in the walnuts. The mixture will be very crumbly and slightly moist. If the mixture will not form balls when molded by hand, add another teaspoon of vanilla or almond. Roll into 1 inch balls. Bake at 400. Check at 8 mins. The cookies should be lightly browned on the bottoms but the rest of the cookie appears white. Cool slightly and roll in powdered sugar while still warm until completely covered. Roll in powdered sugar a second time.

Sylvia's Chocolate Chip Cookies

This latest post is dedicated to my baby, Sylvia. For the past several months, Sylvia has struggled with upset stomach, cramping, bloating, and "digestional distress" (insert: mad scrambling for an empty bucket). I have been suspecting for months, that my precocious five year old had perhaps inherited my allergy to all that is dairy and delicious. After weeks of scribbling food consumed in a pocket calendar and a nasty tussle with a lab tech for a blood sample, the verdict is in: allergic. Now I suppose some would say that Sylvia is a lucky little girl to have a mama with the experience to help her navigate her new diet. That is small comfort to a little girl addicted to smoked gouda, donuts, chocolate, and Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. So here is to you, Sylvia. I promise to fill your life with delectable cakes, crusty bread, fluffy pancakes, and chewy cookies. And I promise, you won't know the difference.

So in honor of Sylvia, the chewy goodness of chocolate chip cookies.

1 1/4 cup brown sugar

3/4 cup Crisco Butter Flavor All-Vegetable Shortening

1 tbsp SO Delicious Unsweetened Coconut Milk

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1 tsp almond extract

1/4 cup Nasoya Silken Tofu

1 3/4 cup flour

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

Heat oven to 375

Cream the brown sugar, Crisco, coconut milk, extracts, and tofu.

Add salt and baking soda and mix well with creamed ingredients.

Beat in the flour and stir in the chocolate chips.

Form into balls and bake 8-9 minutes.

Cool slightly before removing from cookie sheets.

Grandpa's Banana Cake

This afternoon, I stumbled upon a pile of overly ripe bananas already beginning to issue a siren song to all fruit flies within a five mile radius. As I pondered the integrity of the banana peels (would they make it to the garbage can intact?), I had a flashback to my grandparents' kitchen. My grandpa had an extreme "liking" for banana cake. My grandma had a taste for overly ripe bananas. The scenario would play out something like this. My grandpa would hide some bananas, hoping against all hopes, that they would last long enough to rot into acceptable banana cake material. Just about the time they were approaching banana cake nirvana, my grandma would find his stash and snatch them back from the brink of certain "cake-hood". And round and round it went; grandpa hiding the bananas and grandma eating them. When we all were fortunate enough to reap the rewards of grandpa's crafty banana stashing, he would bake the most divine banana cake ever.

This afternoon, I decided it was time to remake grandpa's recipe into something I could eat again. With lots of help from my kids (see the bits of mashed banana in my hair), we recreated a family favorite.

1/2 cup Crisco Butter Flavor All-Vegetable Shortening
1 1/2 cups sugar

1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce

1/4 cup SO Delicious Unsweetened Coconut Milk

1 tsp white vinegar

2 cups flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp vanilla

2 mashed bananas

Combine vinegar with coconut milk and set aside.

Cream Crisco, sugar applesauce, and vanilla.

Mix in salt and baking soda, distributing thoroughly.

Add mashed bananas and vinegar/coconut milk mixture and stir.

Stir in the flour until completely combined.

Bake at 350 in a well greased pan; 30 mins for a 9 x 13; 40 mins for a Bundt.

Invert immediately and cool.

This cake is delicious warm from the oven, cooled, with powdered sugar or a glaze. Cream cheese frosting (vegan cream cheese, of course) is also a decadent addition to this dense, moist cake.

Ruth's Cherry Pudding

Ruth was the vivacious mother of three, grandmother of ten, my grandma. She was a teacher, an avid reader, a phenomenal baker. The following recipe is adapted from my childhood memories of summer baking sessions, sans air-conditioning, with grandma.

The term "pudding" is something of a misnomer. This dessert is not a creamy, custard-like concoction, but a light, moist cake laced with luscious fruit. This recipe is incredibly versatile and I will include several variations.

1 cup sugar (DIVIDED)

8 T Crisco Butter Flavor All-Vegetable Shortening (DIVIDED)

1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce

1/2 cup SO Delicious Unsweetened Coconut Milk

2 t baking powder

1 cup flour

1 t vanilla extract

1/2 t almond extract

1 quart (4 cups) cherries

Heat the oven to 375 and grease a large, oven safe bowl.

Cream 1/2 cup sugar with 6 T Crisco in the greased bowl.

Add applesauce, coconut milk, vanilla and almond extracts and mix thoroughly.

Mix in the baking powder and distribute throughout the batter before adding flour.

In a sauce pan heat 1 quart cherries, 2 T Crisco, and 1/2 cup sugar until it reaches a slow boil.

Stir for five minutes and then pour the boiling mixture over the batter.

The cake will bake up through the fruit but remain moist.

Bake for 45-55 mins.

Notes for variations:

If fresh or frozen cherries are used, follow the fruit instruction above.

If the fruit is canned and already in a syrup based juice, omit the sugar and merely heat the fruit and Crisco.

Peaches are perfect for this recipe as well. Fresh peaches are incredible in this dessert, but canned peaches substitute well. With fresh peaches, I slice the fruit, toss it with the 1/2 cup sugar, and allow it to sit for an hour. I then add the melted Crisco in addition to upping the almond extract to 1 t.

Tonight, I used a mixture of frozen blackberries, blueberries, raspberries and cherries (see the picture) and the "pudding" would have made my grandma smile.

Sugar cookies

In our family, sugar cookies are relegated to the Christmas season. It IS July and the heat index has been hovering round about 105 degrees. Now you are probably asking yourself, "what is she doing, baking Christmas cookies in this heat?" My friends, I was celebrating Christmas in July with my two stir crazed offspring. On went the oven. Down plunged the lever on the air conditioning unit. As we watched the Wiggles jiggle through their Yuletide DVD, we rolled, cut, sprinkled, and burned our fingers through several dozen of these tasty little bites. I made the dough the night before to allow for the ingredients to cool properly.

1/4 cup Nasoya Soft Tofu

2 T SO Delicious Unsweetened Coconut Milk

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 t almond extract

1 t vanilla

1/8-1/4 t salt (according to your taste)

1 t baking powder

2/3 cup Crisco Butter Flavor All-Vegetable Shortening

2 cups flour

Whip the tofu, coconut milk, sugar, almond and vanilla extracts together until smooth.

Mix salt and baking powder into the creamed mixture until even distributed.

Cut and stir in the flour until a stiff dough is formed.

Chill for several hours. The more chilled the dough is, the easier it is to handle when rolling it out and cutting it.

Roll out on floured surface and cut into desired shapes.

Bake at 375 for 8 minutes on un-greased cookie sheets.