Chocolate Cake/Cup Cake

Chocolate cake is I think, one of the most, if not the most known dessert of all times. But the best part is that there are millions of recipes from millions of different people. I think that happens because maybe at the beginning everyone had the same recipe only that as time went by there were some people who decided to add more sugar, take some flour and so on, and that’s why we ended up having the different recipes.

I think that it happens because of the different taste we each have, and I think the best way to knowing if you like something the way it is or not, is by trying it and finding out by yourself. The great thing about recipes is that most of them can be transformed or modified to fit your likes. Sometimes it´s sad that things are changed and they are not what they used to be, but it´s even more important that you enjoy what you cook and what you eat.

This is the recipe I have:

Ingredients:

3 cups flour
2 cups brown sugar
3 / 4 cup unsweetened cocoa
1 teaspoon baking soda
A pinch of salt
a splash of vanilla essence
3 / 4 cup oil
1 cup milk with lemon or vinegar
1 cup hot water
2 cold eggs

Preparation:

Sieve the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt.
Mix first all dry ingredients.
Add eggs, oil, vanilla essence and buttermilk.
Add hot water last.
In the buttered mold (or cup cake recipient) put a sheet of paper.
Put the mixture there, and let bake at 350 degrees for 35 or 40 minutes.
For the frosting you can use Betty Crocker frosting.

You can decide if you want to change something, and also decide if you want to make it into a real cake or into cup cakes. For the decoration I used nonpareils, but it´s really up to you and the occasion. It was fun making it.

Pretzels Religious?!

In 610 A.D a monk in northern Italy or maybe southern France came up with pretzels. At first they were soft because they were made of bread dough. The monk saw there was left over dread dough and decided to twist it around until he got the perfect shape.

That shape was of a child´s arms folded when making a payer. The children would get pretzels as a reward when they learned their prayers, because pretiola in Latin means reward, but when it got to Austria and Germany the pretiola became pretzel. It would be really funny if one of the kids made a prayer asking for a pretzel instead of having to learn and say the other prayer, people should be able to pray for whatever they want, in this case a pretzel.

But that’s not all, pretzels have done much more than just brighten children’s days, they have also been part of weddings and even war.

Believe it or not, pretzels were used to “tie the knot” between royal families, so in weddings they had the tradition of wishing on a pretzel. To do this they would (bride and groom) hold the pretzel side by side and make a wish. Then they would pull and the one that ended up having the bigger piece of the pretzel would have its wish come true. Most of the time both the bride and the groom would wish for happiness and so they would usually get their wish anyway. I think that after doing that they would probably eat the pretzel right away.

Around 1510 A.D. the Turks tried to go over (and even under)Vienna´s walls and that way be able to conquer them, but in the middle of the night there were Viennese pretzel bakers that were still awake baking some pretzels, heard a weird noise outside, so they ran and told the people about the attack of the Turks and were able to save the city. Everyone was extremely happy with them, specially the king, who decided to have a special coat of arms to thank the bakers for their bravery, so the shield was decorated with a lion and a pretzel. Since then it has been the baker’s emblem.


I think all this is just so amazing. Who would have ever imagined a pretzel could actually mean and do so much? Because after all, this has been the one with the most stories to tell. We definitely have a lot to thank to the pretzels and understand that after all, pretzels are NOT just pretzels.