TWD: Cantuccini

Oh no, I forgot to post! No baking for some weeks (lenten season...), and than I forget to document what I made...
Anyways. Cantuccini are really great and I love baking them as much as eating them. They are part of what I call "dry things", I am best at baking. Don't know why. But cookies, shortbread (I know, they are fat, but somehow also dry), bread and so on come easy to me. Not like cream-rich, chocolate loaded sweets. Maybe because I also like them more in taste.

However, I regularily do pistacchio-cranberry cantuccini, but I also liked these. They were more than fast and easy in the making and turned out great. Everybody at the office loved them, even those people who are not very crazy about nuts. I exchange the almonds for pine nuts because I had to get rid of some left-overs. But cantuccini are great with any kind of nuts, I guess.

For the recipe, have a look at pp. 313-314 in the book by Dorie Greenspan! And, as always, don't forget to step by all the other gifted bakers in the group to see what they made of it.

TWD: Date-Nut Loaf

Super!Mary of Popsicles and Sandy Feet chose Date-Nut Loaf for this week's TWD. You can find the recipe on her page or in Dorie's book on page 228. [personal comment: what are popsicles??]

Easy in the making, great in taste!
I used dates as in the basic recipe. When it was time to fold in the nuts I realized I ran out of them - but I had some pinenuts left. And dates and pinenuts - doesn't sound too bad, or?
I had no time to roast them, what would have given them an extra flavour, but it was good like that, too.

Super moisty and tasty cake! If you haven't already: try it out!

P.S.: I always have the problem that my cakes tend to become tents. I had two recommendations. One said: Obviously the dough has problems to raise at the edges, so you should butter the form better. The other one said the complete opposite: Leave some space at the upper end of the mold free from butter. I tried both, and: even if the first tip sounds more logical, in the end the second one did work out! So, no tents anymore, yay!