A recipe I've had in the works since 2020!!! Get your ingredients together, this one's a real treat and one of my favorite cookies. There's just something very special about the contrast of ‘birthday’ flavors with a dark chocolate cookie =)
New: Chocolate Birthday Cookies!
Fudgy, brownie-like chocolate cookies studded with white chocolate, sprinkles AND most importantly, bits of birthday crumbs!
and another new one….
Smooth, lush, bright magenta curd with whole eggs. No cooking down the blackberries, we’ll just use a lot of them ;p
And some other things to add to your baking agenda:
Curd Layered Ice Cream (no churn) : On the site we now have raspberry, blueberry, blackberry, lemon, lime and orange curd… All of them taste amazing with ice cream. Some layering with a simple no churn and a chosen curd is just heaven.
Bakery Style Double Chocolate Cookies: Big, chewy & chocolatey with giant puddles of chocolate and some chocolate chips. So. Much chocolate!
Berry Swirled Cheesecake Bars: The blackberries and raspberries are in prime season here on the east coast and I think a cheesecake is due!! Maybe some bars but you can also make a grand one in an 8” round pan.
Weekly Notes
Re: that blackberry curd! If you double the recipe and add a bit of starch (I like tapioca, and per cup of curd I'll use 2 teaspoons starch) then pour it into a pate sucree crust and bake, you'll have the most gorgeous blackberry curd tart a la this raspberry curd tart.
ALSO you can pour curd over a brownie base like in this raspberry brownie pie and bake it… I mean just picture it: purple and tart above a fudgy chocolaty base….ahhh.
While we are on the topic, let us talk about curd color. Every so often I get a comment from a reader upset that their bake didn't turn out as vibrantly colored as what they see on their screen. And I do totally get the disappointment if you were expecting a glorious hue. Something I have learned from years and years of experience: the color depends on the ripeness of your berries. If you use dark raspberries, you'll have a crimson colored curd. If you use light colored berries, the curd will probably lean toward beige. In the blackberry curd recipe you'll see photos of a bright magenta curd because that's what it looked like in one of the first rounds, but when I made it later for the video it was closer to eggplant purple. The color of the yolks can contribute too: vibrant orange yolks help turn curds brown. It's also important to remember that food photographers use photo editing tools to bump up the vibrancy because we are dealing with our work being filtered and displayed on many different screens and we want to ensure that you'll see something close as to what we see in person. So next time you start making something berry based, take a look at your berries and remember the end result is going to be several shades lighter/more dull than the berries you have and it won't always be exactly as pictured (but it'll always taste good!).
Speaking of blackberries, Anita, my scone goddess, just published a ginger and blackberry scone recipe and they look soooo gooood.
Ok I'm done talking about blackberries. But.. but… also you could use them in the muffins below =p
Review from this week for lemon berry muffins: “These muffins have the perfect texture! So tender and moist. They also domed beautifully. I made these with blackberries and King Arthur GF flour. I’m not usually a huge lemon fan but I loved the lemon flavor with the berries. These were also easy to make which I appreciate”