Blog Posts

Boxless Brownies (GF/DF)

10/21/2018

As if your day didn't just get better.

Hi, Haley here, just wanting to give my cute little site a #smol shoutout for it’s second year of existence. I started this baby two years ago, and while I took a several month hiatus due to the fact that I was busy getting my degree, I’m back and here to appreciate #tinycrumbs for a two year birthday and few week celebration of having an Instagram account.

Anyways.

There you are, it's a Sunday night, you're in your jammies, and you just got a hankering for brownies. But, *PLOT TWIST* your roomie stole your last box, so *big sigh* guess you gotta pull out the big guns for this one.

Enter: Tiny Crumbs.

So. Over the past few months, I’ve figured out that my digestive system appreciates it when I don’t have a ton of gluten….ya girl is a pasta hound and I sleep on a loaf of bread so this is difficult…THAT SAID, I have been on a search for gluten-free alternatives for baking specifically!

Enter: Bob.

Bob created the most beautiful gluten-free flour, perfect for baking. Who the HECK is Bob? Why, it’s Bob of Bob’s Red Mill….notorious for their several varieties of flours and protein powders, made from quinoa, corn, hazelnuts, almonds, coconut, tapioca….etc. They also have regular flour too. In this case, I found his Gluten Free 1-for-1 Baking Flour (made from a perfect blend of rice flours and tapioca starch) worked beautifully for this recipe.

F U R T H E R M O R E, since Ghirardelli has recently started adding dairy into their chocolate chips (*tsk tsk*) as well as in their previously loved brownie mix, we have been searching/seeking all over to find a homemade brownie recipe that truly outshines all others.

Enter: Sally.

My girl Sally from Sally’s Baking Addiction is the #kween of dessert knowledge. She’s a recipe tester and sugar fanatic, so of course I bopped over to her site to see what’s up in the land of brownies. I gathered my data, researched competitors, read articles, skimmed novels….all to come up with this beautiful gluten-free, dairy-free fudgy, chocolatey, dense but chewy brownie recipe just *clap* for *clap* you.

*Note* I tried this using coconut sugar to try and round out the whole GF/DF scenario and make it a refined sugar-free trifecta...but they just didn't come out all that great and maybe I didn't measure the chocolate properly....but. That's why I jumped back to the regular old stuff.

Ingredients

3/4 cup vegan butter — Earth Balance is great for baking
1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chunks, coarsely chopped
2 cups granulated sugar
3 eggs, at room temperature
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free 1-for-1 Baking Flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 bag of semi-sweet chocolate chunks, coarsely chopped

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350°F and line the bottom of a 8x8 inch pan with foil/parchment
In a large glass bowl, combine the butter and 1/4 cup of chocolate chunks. Melt in 30 second increments and mix in between until fully liquified. Add the other 1/4 cup of chocolate.
Whisk in sugar until smooth, then add the eggs and vanilla.
Add the dry ingredients! Cocoa powder, flour, salt all go into the melted chocolate/egg mixture. Fold in the chocolate chips (I told you this would be chocolatey)!
Spread in the pan — it will be #thicc — and bake for around 30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean in the center! (As in, you take the brownies out and stick a toothpick in the middle of the pan to see if there is any wet/raw batter that needs to be cooked for longer; if it's clean, you're good to go!)
Allow to cool before cutting! Munch them up and your digestive system will appreciate you. <3

1 Comment

Pumpkin Layer Cake

10/5/2018

3 Comments

...with an orange, cinnamon dairy-free buttercream.

Do I have your attention yet? Maybe this will help:

There we GO! FOLKS. Hey! HI! Howdy!

I am SO excited that it’s FINALLY October, so I can tell you all about this pumpkin cake I made a few weeks back. There’s a long, emotional backstory to why I made it when I did, but I will save you the details and instead discuss my love for all things pumpkin.

Here’s the deal. I’m not a huge PSL girl (aside from this one product I found at the store), but when the fall air starts tingling, my tastebuds immediately seek out any pumpkin baked goodie. We usually make chocolate chip pumpkin muffins, but this time around, I wanted to make a CAKE. My new-found love for cake baking sparked my interest in making a fall-spiced, autumn-inspired pumpkin cake with a zesty orange, cinnamon buttercream frosting — all dairy-free of course.

I stumbled across Sally’s Baking Addiction about a year ago, and every recipe I try from her, she absolutely NAILS the flavor, texture, and technique. So, of course I adapted her pumpkin cake recipe to be dairy free and then added my own buttercream recipe (here) to take it up a notch.

I appreciate pumpkin goodies that actually taste like pumpkin and are properly spiced accordingly. If you tell me something is pumpkin, I'm going to expect that your claim is TRUE and will surpass my expectations...so that said! ON WITH THE GAMES!

Fam, this is something you will be making throughout the fall season, so get those pantries stocked up with all the pumpkin you got because we are going places with this baby. Also, the cute lil pumpkin guys on top of the cake? Yes. I know you were wondering. No, I didn't make them — I don't have the proper marshmallow techniques HOWEVER, someone at Williams-Sonoma does, and I was able to pick these bad boys up up a few weeks back. Hurry! There's a sale happening and you can get a discount!

Onward.

Ingredients

Recipe adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction | Makes a 3-tiered 6" cake

Cake:

2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 and 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1 cup vegetable oil
4 large eggs
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
1 15oz. can pumpkin puree
1 and 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Orange Cinnamon Buttercream:

2 1/2 sticks Earth Balance vegan butter — my personal favorite for baking
5-6 cups powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
Zest of one orange
Salt to taste

Instructions

Cake:

Preheat oven to 350°F — grease and line three 6" round cake pans OR two 8" round pans.
In a medium bowl, combine your dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice. Whisk or sift to remove any clumps!
In a mixing bowl, combine eggs, sugar and pumpkin puree. While mixing, add in the vegetable oil slowly. Add vanilla.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredient bowl and mix until smooth!
Divide the batter among the three pans, and place in the oven for about 30 minutes or so — you will want to poke the middle with a toothpick to make sure it's done all the way through (if the toothpick comes out clean it's done; make sure to check all the pans!).
Once ready, pull out cake layers to cool individually. You will want them to be completely cool so you can begin frosting!

Frosting:

In an electronic mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, whip softened butter until creamy
and slowly add in powdered sugar. Depending on your desired sweetness you may need more or less.
Let the mixer run for a few minutes until mixture becomes white!
Add vanilla, cinnamon and orange zest (or any other flavors you want to infuse).
Salt to taste for balance (trust me).
Store in airtight container in fridge and remove about 20 minutes before you're ready to frost.

Assembly — Feel free to frost to your heart's content, but here are some helpful tips:

Use an ice cream scoop to evenly measure out how much frosting you use between layers. You want to make sure there is an even distribution of frosting between each layer!
It's much easier to decorate the outside of a cake when it's cold; so if you can stick it in the fridge for a bit before frosting, you will probably be happier with your results.
Crumb coat! LIGHTLY frost the outside of your cake to trap the crumbs that might ruin the final decoration portion. Sometimes leaving it like this is the goal, especially if you're going on the naked cake route.
Use steaming hot water to dip your frosting tool in to get a smooth look to the outside of your cake!
When adding decorations like marshmallows, use a small toothpick to insert them into the cake to allow for maximum support.

3 Comments

Boxless Brownies (GF/DF)

As if your day didn't just get better.

Ingredients

Instructions

Pumpkin Layer Cake

...with an orange, cinnamon dairy-free buttercream.

Ingredients

Instructions

About Haley

Archives

Categories