Boston is one of my favorite American cities. I love Boston's gorgeous architecture, cobblestone roads, the smell of the sea.... Having visited Boston a few times, I've also noticed that people in Boston are really nice. If you pull out a map from your pocket because you are lost, a stranger will probably stop to see if you need help. I am always a little surprised when this happens in a big city because usually city people have no time for tourists. I know this because I am a city person, and I often have no time for tourists who seem to always catch me at the wrong moment (sorry!).

Montreal is a little like Boston in its old world charm, which could be why I love Boston so much. Boston is also home to Flour bakery, with its chalkboard menus, fantastic sandwiches, and comforting baked goods, all "made with love!". Flour bakery reminds me a lot of Montreal's Olive et Gourmando.

The old-fashioned sour cream coffee cake from Flour bakery is unbelievable. I have no idea what makes it so good (besides that it's made with love). It's moist, a little dense, with a fantastic crumb. It's unbelievably good. I'd eat it all day long if I could.

Abby Dodge's baketogether for this month conveniently was a coffee cake, feeding my hunger for a good coffeecake. Abby's coffee cake is much lighter and spongier than the coffee cake at Flour bakery. The cake batter is sweetened with light brown sugar, while the streusel is made with dark brown sugar for a much more pronounced molasses flavor.

The best part of coffee cake is the deliciously crumbly streusel topping. Of course, the problem with coffee cake is also the deliciously crumby streusel topping. One false move and there are crumbs everywhere. I made this coffee cake twice, and the first time, I spilled half the streusel topping on the floor while I was mixing it together. It was tragic, but kind of funny because there was streusel everywhere and I unfortunately had just vacuumed. And when I was eating a square of it the next day, my hunk of cake fell over on my plate, spraying streusel crumbs all over the sofa and carpet, and even down the sleeve of my sweater.  I suggest you make a coffee cake and indulge in a piece with a cup of tea before you vacuum the house, and if you can, consume it before you shower and do your laundry for the week! These are my words of wisdom.

This coffee cake is light, moist and comforting. I made the streusel topping from a graham flour mixture that is a little nutty from the wheat germ and whole wheat flour, so it goes perfectly with the thin layer of sliced tart apples just below it.

Okay, this cake is not quite like the coffee cake at Flour bakery. Guess I'll just have to go visit Boston again sometime soon...

Apple graham coffee cake

    Makes one 9x9-inch coffee cake
Streusel ingredients:

• 50 grams all-purpose flour
• 30 grams whole wheat flour
• 10 grams wheat germ
• 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 130 grams dark brown sugar
• 4 tbsp unsalted butter, melted

Cake ingredients

• 250 grams all-purpose flour
• 1 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 115 grams (8 tbsp) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 250 grams light brown sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 250 mL (1 cup) sour cream (full-fat)
• 1 apple (such as Cortland), peeled, cored and sliced thin

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F.
2. Prepare a 9x9x2-inch pan by greasing and flouring it. Set aside for later.

Streusel

1. With a fork, stir together all the streusel ingredients in a small bowl. Continue mixing until the streusel clumps a little and all the dry ingredients are moistened. Set aside.

Cake

1. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside for later.
2. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and the light brown sugar. Add the vanilla, followed by the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl as needed between each addition.
3. With the mixer on low, add the dry ingredients alternately with the sour cream, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Give the cake batter a couple stirs with your spatula to be sure all the ingredients have been evenly incorporated and the batter is smooth.

Assembly and baking

1. Spread the batter evenly in the prepared cake pan.
2. Top with a layer of the thinly sliced apple. Press them down gently.
3. Sprinkle the prepared streusel topping over the apples. Press the streusel down gently.
4. Bake the coffee cake for 40–50 minutes, checking it with a cake tester to be sure it is done.
5. Let the coffee cake cool completely in the pan on a wire rack before serving.

Whoopie pies. It's about time! For months, I read about people's love for whoopie pies, all the while wondering what could possibly be so special about them. After all, whoopie pies are nothing but frosting sandwiched between two little cakes, right?

That's kind of right because they are really simple to make, but with the right filling and the right little cakes, they are quite special and a lot of fun.

Since fall is here to stay, my first batch of whoopie pies was inspired by a Wilton "Harvest" whoopie pie pan and their easy recipe for pumpkin spice whoopie pies. I added some ground ginger to add a little more zip to the cake batter, and I changed the frosting recipe slightly, adding in a little extra powdered sugar and substituting some brown butter for some of the cream cheese. The nuttiness of the brown butter is great in a cream cheese frosting like this one and the nutty aroma and flavor really come through since the frosting is not too sweet. I am madly in love with this frosting.

For the frosting, be sure to use Philadelphia full-fat cream cheese because the no-name brands just don't compare. In fact, I made two batches of this cream cheese frosting, one with Philly cream cheese and the other with my local grocery store's brand of cream cheese. The Philadelphia cream cheese produced the tastiest filling, but what was most shocking was the texture: the grocery store brand had an almost powdery feel to it and gave the frosting an almost grainy (unpleasant!) texture. The frosting made with Philadelphia cream cheese was much, much creamier, and really quite dreamy! (NB: Kraft did not pay me to write that)

If you're on the fence about whoopie pies, you should give them a try. They are a welcome change in a cupcake-dominated world. But if you don't have a whoopie pie pan, don't let that stop you! Bake small scoop-fulls of the batter on a parchment-lined baking sheet.

Pumpkin spice whoopie pies with brown butter cream cheese frosting

    Makes 18–20 assembled whoopie pies


For the whoopie pies

• 1 1/2 cups (188 grams) all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp ginger
• 1/8 tsp cloves
• 1/4 cup (57 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup (200 grams) granulated sugar
• 2 eggs, room temperature
• 1/2 cup (125 mL) puréed roasted pumpkin
• 1/2 cup (125 mL) buttermilk (I make it from skim milk and a splash of white vinegar)

For the filling

1/4 cup (~50 grams) butter

7/8 cup (200 grams, almost an entire block) full-fat Philadelphia cream cheese, room temperature

1/2 cup–1 cup (60–110 grams) icing sugar, sifted

To make the whoopie pie cakes:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Spray the whoopie pie pan with cooking spray. Set aside for later.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and cloves. Set aside.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and the sugar for about 5 minutes.
4. Add the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed with a spatula.
5. In another small bowl, combine the pumpkin and buttermilk.
6. To the mixer, add the flour mixture and the pumpkin mixture, alternately, beginning and ending with the flour.
7. Fill each whoopie pie mold no more than half full, spreading the mixture into all the nooks and crannies.
8. Bake for 7 to 10 minutes (I baked some longer than others so that the whoopie pies were all different golden browns, just like fall leaves and pumpkins).
9. Let the whoopie pies cool for 5 minutes in the pan, then tap them out onto a rack to cool completely before filling.

To make the filling:

1. Begin by browning the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat until the milk solids turn a nutty brown. Set aside to cool.
2. Beat together the cream cheese and the cooled brown butter (be sure to add all those nutty brown bits!) in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment.
3. With the mixer on low, slowly add the icing sugar. Beat until the desired consistency and level of sweetness is achieved.

To assemble: 

1. Spread the filling on one cake and sandwich with another. Repeat to assemble remaining whoopie pies.

Pistachio, cranberry, and coconut granola with Three Farmers oil

This may be the best granola ever. I'm not just saying this because I made it myself. I'm also not just saying this because I'm on a granola kick.
Granola is incredibly easy to make, but somehow, my granola-making happens in spurts. I go through phases where I make granola on a weekly basis, and then eat it multiple times a day, and then nothing. Weird, eh?

When I received a sample of Three Farmers camelina oil a few weeks ago, its intensely nutty flavor was screaming to be baked into granola, and thus, my love for granola was renewed. The best part about Three Farmers oil (besides the omega 3s and 6s) is that you can enter the product code on the bottle and trace the bottle back to the farmer that grew the camelina seeds used to produce your oil. Traceability is a good thing in my books.

I made two batches of this granola, one using only Three Farmers oil, and the second using half Three Farmers and half coconut oil. Both batches were delicious, but the nutty flavor from the camelina oil was a little too strong in the batch of granola made with just Three Farmers oil. Using two oils is better flavor-wise because the coconut oil cuts down the nuttiness of the camelina oil just a touch. Plus, Three Farmers oils is a little pricey, so using it in combination with another oil is a little more budget-friendly. The texture of the granola was light and crispy, and the nuttiness from the Three Farmers oil was just right when mixed with coconut oil. You can add any nuts and dried fruits to your granola, but I love to make granola with dried cranberries, pistachios and flaked (not shredded) coconut. Obviously, I sweeten my granola with  maple syrup, but you could use honey, agave.... I'm already planning my next batch, which I think will contain some dried apple, pecans, cinnamon, and maple.

Hi, my name is Janice, and I'm addicted to granola. Again.

Pistachio, cranberry, and coconut granola

    Makes about 6 cups of granola

• 3 cups large flake oats
• 1 cup shelled raw pistachios
• 1/2 cup maple syrup
• 1/2 cup oil (I used 1/4 cup melted coconut oil and 1/4 cup Three Farmers oil)
• 1/2 tsp grey salt
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/2 cup dried cranberries
• 1 cup toasted flaked coconut

1. Preheat the oven to 300°F.
2. In a medium bowl with a wooden spoon, stir together the oats, pistachios, maple syrup, oil, salt and nutmeg so that the oats and nuts are evenly coated. Spread the mixture in an even layer on a rimmed baking sheet (~12x17-in). Bake for 30–40 minutes, rotating the pan as needed so the edges don't get too brown, and stirring every 10 minutes (for a loose granola) or once halfway through the baking (for more clustered granola).
3. Remove the pan from the oven when the granola is crisp and golden brown. Pour the cramberries and toasted coconut over top. Let cool completely before crumbling and serving. Store in an airtight container.

When life gives you 20 pounds of apples, make an apple bundt cake and salted caramel sauce

The other night, I slept with a 20-pound bag of Cortland apples. I do mean that literally. My schedule got out of hand, and so did the "order" in my apartment. And so, by Sunday night, I was completely exhausted and just couldn't deal with the giant bag of apples I had picked that day. The only place to put it was my bed. Thus, I slept with a 20-pound bag of apples, for real.

See, there are pros and cons to going apple picking once a year and picking 20 pounds of apples when you live alone (I'm not counting the cat because she doesn't eat apples).

Pros: 

• A day spent in nature, out of the city, where there's fresh air, sunshine, and tress 
• You get to eat the apples while you're picking them; there's nothing like a fresh apple straight off the tree
• You get to climb ladders and trees
• You go home with 20 pounds of apples, yay!

Cons:

• If there's traffic, it could take 3 hours to get to the apple orchard instead of the 30 minutes that google maps told you it would take
• You inevitably get stuck in traffic because you pick the most beautiful day of the year to go apple picking
• Apple picking is hard. You end up tired and sweaty by the end of it
• You go home with 20 pounds of apples, OMG!

I go apple picking every year, and every year I recall the same pro/con list. What always amazes me is how, as I'm picking the apples and filling my 20-pound bag, I think to myself "Gosh, this is not nearly enough apples!" Then, when I unload them into my fridge, I panic because I have to find space for 20 pounds of apples. That's a lot of apples! And finally, as I munch on the last of the 20 pounds of apples, I proclaim that next year, I will bring home 40 pounds of apples! I did that one year. Again, if you think 20 pounds of apples is too much for one person, imagine 40 pounds!

This recipe is originally from Dave Lieberman. The recipe as published on the Food Network site is, shall we say, inedible (and I'll eat almost anything!). I called it "the fat cake" the first time I made it because it contained a ridiculously obscene amount of oil, and I honestly couldn't get through a single slice. So, I tweaked the recipe a lot (removing much of the fat content, and adding in apple sauce). I came up with this recipe in the end. I've made it a few times, and everybody enjoys it. It's kind of like an apple pound cake, dense, full of apples, and delicately spiced.

The salted caramel sauce is to die for. Then again, when is salted caramel sauce not wonderful? It's so good, that I honestly spooned it on every bite of cake. It's not that the cake isn't good on its own, but the cake with a drizzling of caramel is a whole other level of amazing. Real caramel sauce and apples are a winning combination.

Oh, and if you feel the need to drizzle a little caramel sauce on each and every bite like I do, by all means, do it. Just try not to do this every day (your dentist and your nutritionist might get mad)....

Caramel sauce is not hard, and it pretty much stirs itself! Just please prepare and measure out all your ingredients before you get started because when the sugar has caramelized enough, you have to act fast or it will continue to cook and burn. That would be sad. For more caramel sauce instructions try here, here, and especially here for lots of tips and tricks.

Apple bundt cake with salted caramel sauce

    Makes 1 bundt and about 2 cups of caramel sauce

For the bundt cake

• 3–4 (~500–600 grams) baking apples (I use Cortlands), peeled, cored and cut into ~1/2 inch pieces
• 1 lemon, juiced
• 1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated sugar
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
• pinch or 2 ground cloves
• 2 1/2 cups (350 grams) all-purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1/2 cup (114 grams) unsalted butter, melted
• 2 cups (400 grams) granulated sugar
• 1 tbsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 1/2 cup apple sauce
• 4 large eggs

For the salted caramel sauce

• 2 cups (400 grams) granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup water, plus more for brushing sides of pan
• 1/2 cup (8 tbsp) unsalted butter, cubed
• 1 cup whipping cream, heated
• 3/4–1 1/2 tsp gray salt or sea salt

For the bundt cake
1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Prepare a bundt pan by greasing and flouring it. Set it aside for later.
2. In a medium bowl, toss the apples with the lemon juice, 1/4 cup of sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. Stir it well so that all the fruit is evenly coated. Set aside for later, stirring every so often to evenly coat.
3. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking powder. Set aside for later.
4. In another medium bowl, stir together the melted butter, 2 cups of granulated sugar, vanilla, warm water, and apple sauce with a wooden spoon. Add the eggs one at a time, and beat well after each addition.
5. Pour the liquid mixture over the whisked dry ingredients. Stir well to combine, being sure to pull up any flour stuck at the bottom of the bowl. Add the spiced apples and any juices that may have released, and stir to combine.
6. Pour the batter in the prepared bundt pan, and bake for about 1 hour to 1 hour and 10 minutes until a cake tester comes out clean. Let cool completely then invert on your serving plate.

For the salted caramel sauce
1. Set out all your ingredients before beginning. This is very important. Have the cream heating on a back burner so that is is warm, but don't let it boil.
2. In a deep 3 quart saucepan, pour the sugar, and then the water. Don't stir it.
3. Bring the mixture to a boil over medium–high heat. If there's sugar stuck on the sides of the pan, carefully brush it with a heat-resistant silicone brush dipped in a little water.
4. Continue to boil the caramel until it turns amber in color (the temperature will read somewhere between 350°F and 360°F with a candy thermometer). As soon as the caramel has reached the desired color, slide the pan off the heat, and turn the burner off.
5. Slowly and carefully drop in the cubed butter (it will bubble and erupt so be careful!). Pour in the cream, slowly and carefully, a quarter at a time.
6. When the bubbling has calmed down, begin to gently whisk the caramel until it is smooth and homogeneous. Add in the salt and continue whisking a little more to combine.
7. Let it cool slightly before serving (or sampling). The more you let it cool, the thicker it will get.