Pumpkin Apple Bundt Cake

Welcome back to Quince Cottage!
With autumn well underway, you may or may not have had your fill of "pumpkin everything". If you haven't, then this is a recipe you'll want to try. It's a moist, dense, not overly sweet, not screamingly pumpkin, cake - ideal for breakfast, brunch, snack, or dessert.
We found it on Pinterest (of course) and credit goes to JuliasAlbum(dot)com. We made only a few changes in terms of ingredients.

Pumpkin Apple Bundt Cake © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

Ingredients:
2 eggs
3/4 C white granulated sugar
1/2 C brown sugar
2/3 C vegetable oil
1 TBS vanilla extract
1 C pumpkin puree
2 C all-purpose flour, sifted
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
4 C apples, cored, peeled and diced (about 6 small-medium apples)

Caramel sauce (you can make your own, but we bought a jar)
1/3 C chopped pecans

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. In a medium bowl, using an electric mixer, beat eggs, white and brown sugar until light in color and creamy, about 4-5 minutes.
3. Add oil and vanilla extract and beat 1-2 minutes more. Add pumpkin puree and beat 1 more minute.
4. In a separate medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.
5. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and stir just until combined. Fold in apples.
6. Spray bundt pan with baking spray. Pour batter into pan.
7. Bake at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes (toothpick test). Let the cake cool on a wire rack about 40 minutes. Invert the bundt pan onto a serving platter and let cake cool completely.
8. When ready to serve drizzle caramel sauce over the cake (suit your own tastes in terms of how much you use) and then sprinkle pecans over the cake.

This cake is really better after sitting for a day, lightly wrapped, so by all means make it a day ahead of when you actually need it!

Pumpkin Apple Bundt Cake © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

Pumpkin Apple Bundt Cake © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

You could easily substitute pears for the apples, walnuts for the pecans, etc. At Quince Cottage, we like recipes that are flexible as well as delicious. Enjoy!
Unfortunately this was not a treat we shared with our Irish Jack Russell Terriers - except for a few chunks of apple. You can imagine how hard it is to resist spoiling them.

Daisy and Buster © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

Come back soon--we'll be sharing our outdoor Halloween decor!

Quince Cottage Style mixes old and new, rustic and opulent. 

Our goal is to make our new subdivision house look inviting and beautiful, 

and as though it wasn't born yesterday.

Sesame Chicken

Take-out Chinese is a favorite at Quince Cottage, but in the interests of trying new things and saving a little bit of cash, we sometimes do a combo of homemade and restaurant. Case in point, this lovely Sesame Chicken dish below. We got this recipe from a local flyer and changed it up a bit to make the flavor brighter.

Sesame Chicken © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

Like all Quince Cottage tested and approved recipes, this one's easy, customizable (to a degree), and yummy. We ordered shrimp egg rolls and some lo mein to go with it.

RECIPE:

Ingredients
Sauce 
2 TBS reduced sodium soy sauce
2 TBS orange juice (if you use fresh, grate a 1/4 tsp or so of peel and add)
1 1/2 tsp toasted sesame oil (ideal, but canola oil would work)
2 1/2 tsp brown sugar (honey would probably work too)
2  tsp rice vinegar (ideal, but apple cider would also work)
1 (1 inch) piece fresh ginger, peeled and grated (store extra ginger in a baggie in the freezer)
1/2 tsp minced garlic in oil
2 TBS sesame seeds
1 TBS cornstarch
Chicken
1 egg
2 TBS cornstarch
Pinch salt
Pinch pepper
1 lb. boneless skinless chicken (breast or thigh meat)
Garnish with chopped scallions if desired

Directions
1. In a small bowl stir together soy sauce, OJ, oil, brown sugar, vinegar, ginger, garlic, sesame seeds and cornstarch
2. To prepare chicken, whisk together egg, cornstarch, salt and pepper. Cut chicken into 1" pieces. Toss chicken in egg mixture.
3. Heat vegetable oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. When oil is very hot, add chicken. Cook, stirring occasionally, until chicken is golden brown and cooked through (7-10 minutes). Drain off excess oil if desired.
4. Pour sauce over chicken. Toss to coat. Sauce will thicken as it heats. Remove from stove when heated through and sufficiently thickened. Serve to plate and garnish with scallions if desired.

And since no post is complete without a picture of at least one of our cute Irish Jack Russells, here's Buster with his all-time favorite toy. It's going to be a tragic day when that thing gives up the ghost.

Buster © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

Quince Cottage style is where rustic and sparkly rub shoulders. 

Think gilded mirror against a plank wall, and you'll know what we mean. 

We prefer our opulence a little beat up and our recipes 

GOOF-PROOF!

Hygge and Cwtch (and Cookies)

Hygge. Decoristas tell us this Danish word is having its fifteen minutes of fame, give or take. It means cozy gathering and includes the state of mind that goes along with the action. Something like, "Yeah, the weather is BLEAK, so let's light some candles, bake cookies, and pull our comfy chairs a little closer to the hearth." That's what CottageLife is all about, right?

Another word we like is "cwtch" which is Welsh and means cuddle or hug. It rhymes with "butch". "Give us a cwtch, Cariad." (Cariad means sweetheart, and apparently was an endearment often used by Rhiann's great grandmother).
Wales is a magical place. If you ever get the chance to go, take it! In the meantime, enjoy an armchair tour by feasting on our Wales Pinterest board Cymru Hiraeth .

But, speaking of feasting, back to the cookies...

As you may know by now, Quince Cottage loves super EASY, customizable recipes. An easier, more forgiving cookie recipe would be hard to find. You'll need to tear yourself away from snuggling by the fire for only a few minutes to make them!
Various recipes for these goodies have been floating around social media, so citing an original source would be close to impossible. We looked at a few and modified.
This recipe makes approximately 3 dozen cookies.

CAKE BATTER COOKIES RECIPE:

Ingredients
1 box of cake mix (flavor of your choice)
2 eggs
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp cornstarch (because we now know this helps make a thicker cookie)
1/2 C semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 C white chocolate chips

Customization: Use the cake mix flavor of your choice, and the chips or other add-ins of your choice (nuts, dried fruit etc.)

Directions
1. Mix the first five ingredients together.
2. Stir in whatever extras you want.
3. You can and probably should chill the dough at this point (it will help prevent cookie "spread" when you cook them, and make the dough easier to work with, as in less sticky).
4. Scoop by TBS onto parchment lined cookie sheet. With your fingers shape the individual lumps into elongated spheres (see photo below). This also helps curtail cookie spread.
5. Bake 8-9 min. at 350 degrees
6. Let sit on sheet 5 min. then remove to wire rack for cooling.

Now, if you want to sprinkle them with confectioner's sugar, or drizzle them with glaze, or dunk them in melted chocolate, don't let us stop you!

Elongated cookie balls © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

Cake Batter Cookies © Rhiann Wynn-Nolet

Quince Cottage style is where rustic and sparkly rub shoulders. 

Think gilded mirror against a plank wall, and you'll know what we mean. 

We prefer our opulence a little beat up and our recipes 

GOOF-PROOF!