NBM, Day 13: Orange Brownies

I love the chocolate-glazed, mint-frosted version of the Classic Brownies from Cook's Illustrated. Since I was really craving something with orange and chocolate (it's a winter thing, right?), I tweaked their recipe a bit to create a brownie that pushed that citrus button for me. I added orange zest and chunks of an orange-flavored Lindt bar to the brownie batter, orange zest to the frosting, and then more of the orange Lindt bar to the glaze. Totally hit the spot!

NBM, Day 6: Classic Birthday Cake

For day six of National Baking Month, I decided to try King Arthur Flour's 2019 recipe of the year, Classic Birthday Cake. Really a nice cake, all in all. I like that this cake is adaptable to both 8-inch and 9-inch pans (if I'd used the 8-inch pans, I'd have been tempted to halve the layers and fill them with a complementary flavor, maybe something peanut butter or raspberry). The cake is made with a combination of butter and oil, which gives it a great spongy texture. The frosting is a chocolate American buttercream made with cocoa powder. I added a couple of tablespoons of heavy cream to lighten the frosting; without the additional cream, I sensed that the frosting would be difficult to spread.