Day 6: Bombolini

The 12 Days of Christmas Baking On the 6th day of Christmas, my true love gave to me These little puffs of joy!

Do you guys ever do things in life that you know can get you in DEEP trouble for but you still do them anyways because some things are just worth the risk??

Well, for us, bomboloni's we're that guilty pleasure. It all started 4 years ago in Italy. You see, our parents are from a small town in Calabria, Italy called Cerisano. In that town there are a total of 3 cafe\bars located on the same street. Our uncle happens to own one of those bars. Since we were little, we were told to NEVER step a foot in those other 2 bars because that would offend our uncle. And trust us, word spreads FAST in that town!

Anyways, during our nightly "passeggiata" we would see people exiting another one of the bars with these big donuts just oozing with chocolate or cream! This was just torture for us. We had to find a way to get our hands on one of those! BIG MISTAKE!

We were addicted from the first one! We made our cousin pass by on her way home and secretly bring them to us! This became a nightly ritual. Yup, shes an aweome cousin!

We pretty much had to spend our entire month of vacation in fear of getting caught, but it was SO worth it and guess what?? Till this day we never got caught! Well that's for now.....

These are actually miniture size bomboloni's called bombolini. Bombolini are little pieces of fried dough that are rolled in sugar and filled with nutella, cream, or jelly. If you follow our blog, you know which one we filled ours with! ;)

This recipe is very simple to follow! We recommend making the dough the night before and doing all the proofing the next morning!

Recipe courtesy Jacques Torres

Ingredients Scant 1/4 cup loosely packed fresh compressed yeast Scant 1/4 cup cold water 3 1/2 cups bread flour 4 large eggs 1/3 cup granulated sugar, plus extra for coating 1 1/2 teaspoons salt 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cubed Vegetable or canola oil Nutella

Directions Dissolve the yeast in a small bowl with the cold water. Place the flour, eggs, sugar, and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and beat on medium speed until the ingredients are dispersed, about 5 seconds. Add the dissolved yeast and beat for about 2 minutes on medium-high speed, until the dough is well combined and holds together. Add the cubed butter and mix for another 5 to 7 minutes, until the dough no longer sticks to the side of the mixing bowl. If the dough is overly sticky, you may need to add about 1 tablespoon of flour. It is usually necessary to scrape down the side of the bowl with a rubber spatula to encourage the dough to form a ball and come away from the side. Remove the paddle and pat the dough into a ball at the bottom of the bowl. Cover the mixing bowl with plastic wrap and let the dough rest at room temperature for about 20 minutes. The dough will rise slightly.

Remove the dough from the mixing bowl and punch it down to remove the air. Spread it onto a lightly floured baking sheet with your fingers and flatten the dough until it is about 3/4-inch thick. Cover with plastic wrap and let it rest in the refrigerator for a minimum of 2 hours or overnight. It will slightly proof.

Remove the dough from the refrigerator and place on a lightly floured work surface. Flatten it slightly with your hands. Cut the dough into circles with a 1 1/2-inch diameter cutter, keeping the cuts as close together as possible. Pat any leftover dough into a rectangle and cut more circles out of it. (At this stage, the Bombolini can be frozen for up to 1 week if well wrapped in plastic wrap. Allow the Bombolini to defrost in the refrigerator before proofing.)

Place the Bomboloni on a parchment covered baking sheet lightly sprayed with vegetable cooking spray. Space them 2 inches apart. Loosely cover the baking sheet with plastic wrap. Allow the Bomboloni to proof at room temperature for about 2 hours, until they have doubled in size and appear light and full of air.

Heat the oil about 15 minutes in an electric fryer or in a 4-quart heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium-high heat to 320 degrees F. If using a saucepan, check the temperature with a candy thermometer. Fry 5 to 7 Bomboloni at one time, any more than that and the oil temperature will dip down too much and they will not fry evenly. Fry for a total of 3 to 5 minutes, until they are golden brown. Turn to evenly fry each side. As they fry, they will increase in size. Remove the Bomboloni with a large slotted spoon and set on a paper towel to drain the excess oil.

While the Bomboloni are still warm, roll them in a bowl filled with granulated sugar until evenly coated. If desired, fill the Bomboloni with a jam-filled pastry bag fitted with a 1/4-inch plain tip. Use a sharp paring knife to make a small hole on the bottom of each Bomboloni. Place the tip of the pastry bag in the hole and squeeze until the Bomboloni feels heavy. It is best to fill the Bomboloni while they are still warm and the dough soft and pliable. Serve immediately.

Nutella filled Cream Cheese Cookies

Do you guys ever get a recipe that you still get asked for years later? We've found this recipe about 4-5 years ago and we still get asked for the recipe till this day. I guess they are that good! This is kind of a bittersweet story....

It all started about 4 or 5 years ago. We were looking for a cookie recipe that had nutella in them. We came across this recipe on a girl's blog, way before we started our blog. We made these cookies for labor day, or some other summer event, and they were a HUGE hit! Everyone loved them, including us!

How can you not LOVE anything with Nutella in them?!! Although we know someone who isn't a fan of nutella.. yah you read that right! SOMEONE ON THIS PLANET EARTH DOESN"T LIKE NUTELLA!!

Anyways, we lost the recipe... and for a couple years tried to find it... We couldn't find the same one.... we tried multiple times to make these off of our memory and what we thought were the correct measurments. They failed try after try.

Well, this weekend, Lisa found a similar recipe, made some adjustments and discovered that she did it! She recreated the long lost recipe! So here you all go! The ones who have wanted this recipe for years, and the ones who recently have been asking for it!

Nutella Pocket Cookies

Makes 40 cookies

1 cup unsalted butter, softened plus 2 more tablespoons, melted.

1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened

1 cup granulated sugar plus 1\4 cup for sprinkling

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cups Nutella

In a large mixing bowl, cream together the 1 cup of butter, cream cheese, and 1 cup sugar until smooth, light, and fluffy. Add the vanilla extract and mix until well combined. Gradually add the flour to the creamed mixture and mix well. Divide the dough into two portions; cover and refrigerate until the dough is firm and easy to handle. An hour should be good enough.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Remove one portion of dough from the refrigerator. On a floured surface, roll out one portion of dough until it is about 1/4-inch thick. Using a circle cookie cutter that is approximately 3 inches in diameter, cut circles out of the dough and place them on an ungreased cookie sheet. Repeat this with the rest of the dough.

Place approximately 1 1/2 teaspoons of Nutella on the center of each circle.

Fold each circle in half so that the edges meet and lightly press the edges to seal.

With a fork, seal the edges more securely. Lightly brush melted butter on the tops and sprinkle with sugar.

Bake the cookies for 10 – 12 minutes or until the edges are lightly browned. Leave the cookies on the cookie sheet for 2 – 3 minutes before removing them to wire racks to cool.

Enjoy!

Black Magic Chocolate Cake with Nutella Frosting!

This recipe is our FAVORITE cake recipe! Whether you're a chocolate lover or not, you'll love this cake! We came across this recipe when our cousin in Italy made something very similar to it. Over the years we've modified it to our liking and truly created something so good! It consists of a moist chocolate cake with a filling and frosting that is made of only whipping cream and nutella. It's so simple yet so amazing!

The cake recipe is from Ina Garten's beatty's chocolate cake. We discovered this recipe a couple years ago and have loved it ever since. The cake recipe is as follows:

Ingredients

Butter, for greasing the pans 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pans 2 cups sugar 3/4 cups good cocoa powder 2 teaspoons baking soda 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon kosher salt 1 cup buttermilk, shaken 1/2 cup vegetable oil 2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter 2 (8-inch) round cake pans. Line with parchment paper, then butter and flour the pans.

Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and mix on low speed until combined. In another bowl, combine the buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry. With mixer still on low, add the coffee and stir just to combine, scraping the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Pour the batter into the prepared pans and bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool in the pans for 30 minutes, then turn them out onto a cooling rack and cool completely.

Place 1 layer, flat side up, on a flat plate or cake pedestal. With a knife or offset spatula, spread the top with frosting. Place the second layer on top, rounded side up, and spread the frosting evenly on the top and sides of the cake.

The frosting is so simple! The recipe is as follows:

Ingredients

2 cups of heavy whipping cream

1/2 cup nutella

Directions

Whip the heavy cream until thick anf fluffy. Place the nutella in a large bowl and slowy add the whipped cream to it, folding it in. When you have incorporated all the whip cream into the nutella it should be a mocha color. If the cream is too pale or the nutella flavor isn't strong enough, feel free to add more nutella by the tablespoon! I probably added up to 3/4 cup into my frosting!

Nutella Self-Frosted Cake

We've came across this recipe several times for a while now. We never got a chance to making it until now and we wished we wouldn't have waited that long! We don't know many people who don't like nutella. Actually.... we know ONE person...

::cough:: ::sarah:: ::cough::

Nutella is amazing and this cake is just perfect! Its a good dessert to have after dinner and even better to have in the morning with coffee or tea.

You could either make this as a cake, like we did, or also as cupcakes.

Nutella Frosted Cupcakes

1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup, 12 oz) butter, softened

3/4 cup granulated sugar

3 large eggs

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 3/4 cups sifted all purpose flour

1/4 tsp salt

2 tsp baking powder

Nutella, approx. 1/3 cup

Preheat oven to 325F.

Line 12 muffin tins with paper liners or grease the cups with some butter. Alternatively, butter an 8-inch round cake pan. Cream together butter and sugar until light, 2 minutes. Add in eggs one at a time, until fully incorporated. Don’t worry if the batter doesn’t look smooth. Add vanilla. Stir in flour, salt and baking powder until batter is uniform and no flour remains.

Fill each muffin cup about 3/4 full (or pour all the batter into the cake pan). The batter will be thick. Top each cake with a dollop (I used about 2 tsp per cupcake and about 1/3 cup dolloped in tablespoon measures for the cake round) of Nutella. Swirl Nutella in with a toothpick, making sure to fold a bit of batter up over the nutella.

Bake cupcakes for about 20 minutes and the round cake for 25-30.

Remove to a wire rack to cool completely.Makes 12 cupcakes or 1 8-inch round cake.

We did a recipe and a half and used a 9inch cake pan. We think next time we'll just stick to 1 recipe so the cake part will be a little thinner and you'll get more nutella with each bite!

ENJOY! =)