Grandma's Tortelettes (Daring Bakers' Challenge)

This month's Daring Bakers' Challenge was holiday celebration cookies (hosted by Peta of Peta Eats).  This challenge had two parts - to make one of the dozen recipes listed by Peta, and to make another celebration cookie of our choosing.  For the second requirement  I picked out and made some of my grandma's holiday cookies - ones that she called tortelettes.  Due to an unfortunate kitchen malfunction, I didn't get to the first of the criteria.  So, this post is all about grandma's tortelettes!

Walnut Carrot Cake

I've always disliked carrot cake.  In my experience, it is often too dense, the frosting is usually too sweet, and it almost always commits what I consider to be a major cake felony - it contains chunks of nuts and carrots right in the cake, which messes with the texture in an inexcusable way (this is totally my opinion - I know lots of people like this). 

I decided to create a carrot cake that I would like: light, moist, and free from chunks in the cake - all without losing the carroty-ness and nutty-ness that defines a good carrot cake.

Baking Experiment! Cupcakes with Varying Sweeteners

I've been neglecting my studies.  Last year, I got How Baking Works by Paula Figoni as a gift and have been slowly (very slowly) working my way through it.  At the end of each section, there are experiments that demonstrate the concept being taught.  I learned about different flours in a previous experiment, but I hadn't done a single experiment since then.  It's time to change that - this weekend I did an experiment to determine the effect of the amount and type of sweetener used in pound cupcakes.