Lemon Peeps Popcorn - Crazy Ingredient Challenge

If it feels like I am phoning this post in, it is because I am. It's been quite a week. The highlight was my hard drive deciding it did not want to live anymore. Woohoo!

This month's ingredients for the Crazy Ingredient Challenge were lemon and Peeps. I've seen Peeps in the supermarket but never tried them. I was actually shocked to learn that they were just marshmallows covered in colored sugar. I thought the entire candy was whatever colour it was on the outside. My bad. I also expected there to be a flavour above and beyond the marshmallow. Wrong on that front too. But you know what I was not wrong about? Lemons plus Peeps plus popcorn. DELICIOUS! Don't tell anyone that I ate all 9 cups of popcorn in one sitting.

Lemony Peeps Popcorn 

9-10 cups of popped popcorn (this was from 6 tablespoons of unpopped popcorn)
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1 3oz package of Peeps


Place butter and zest over medium low heat and melt while stirring. Add the Peeps and stir slowly until completely melted. Immediately pour the mixture over the popcorn. Stir carefully with a wooden spoon to coat all the popcorn. Some of the Peeps mixture may pool at the bottom of the bowl so check for that and stir some more. Sprinkle any sugar from the packets over the popcorn.
Enjoy!

An InLinkz Link-up

#BundtBakers: Hot Cross Mini Bundts

Happy Easter!

When I saw that the theme for this month's Bundt Bakers, I was stumped. Easter in Jamaica means bun and cheese. It's not exactly a cake holiday. Our bun is similar to hot cross buns with dried fruit and spices. However. we bake it in loaf form. Some recipes use yeast while my recipe ditches the yeast and uses stout. I'll admit that Easter bun isn't my favourite (I'm usually not a fan of the mixed peel that some recipes use). However, when I am away from home, I crave bun at Easter time. Sometimes I just need to smell it.

I went back and forth about whether or not to do the bun in cake-form Tara, our host this month, reminded us that Easter encompassed Spring. That's infinitely easier to think of but I just could not let go of the fact that for me, Easter always means bun (and cheese). So I set about to put all the bun flavours into a mini bundt. It turned out to be a lot more simple than I expected. I decreased the flour so it would not be as dense and used a bit more melted butter. I was completely happy with the results.

What does Easter mean to you? Do you have foods that you only eat at Easter time? Here's what the other Bundt Bakers did with the theme this month:

• Babka with Bittersweet Chocolate Chunks from Laura at The Spiced Life
• Bunny Nest Carrot Mini Bundts from Stacy at Food Lust People Love
• Bursting-With-Berries Lemon Curd Bundt Cake from Felice at All That's Left Are Crumbs
• Carrot Tea Cake from Vonnie at My Catholic Kitchen
• Colorful Spring Bundt Cake from Varada at Varada's Kitchen
• Easter Bunny Bundt from Jane at Jane's Adventures in Dinner
• Easter Egg Cake from Margaret at Tea and Scones
• Easter Pound Cake from Lauren at Sew You Think You Can Cook
• Hot Cross Mini Bundt from Kelly at Passion Kneaded
• Lemon & Elderflower Bundt Cake from Maria at Box of Stolen Socks
• Lemon Coconut Bundt Cake from Kathia at Basic N Delicious
• Mini Lemon Spring Bundts from Tara at Noshing With The Nolands
• Pineapple Pale Ale Bundt Cake with Brown Sugar Glaze from Melanie at Melanie Makes
• Strawberry Lemon Bundt Cake from Lauren at From Gate to Plate
• Strawberry Poppy Seed Cake from Renee at Magnolia Days

Hot Cross Mini Bundts

Recipe by:  Kelster

Yield: 4 mini bundts (1 cup mini bundt pans)

Ingredients ½ cup raisins (plus liquid for soaking) Maraschino cherries (optional) 1 egg ½ cup stout ¼ cup milk ½ cup melted butter ½ cup sugar 1 ½ cup flour 2 tsp baking powder ¼ tsp salt ½ tsp ground cinnamon ¼ tsp ground ginger ¼ tsp ground nutmeg ¼ tsp ground cloves Melted jam or sugar syrup (optional) Melted white chocolate or frosting.

Directions Soak the raisins in stout, wine or water overnight . Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour mini bundts. If using cherries, chop the cherries and place at the bottom of the bundt wells. In a medium bowl, whisk together egg, stout, milk, melted butter and sugar until thoroughly combined.  Stir together flour, baking powder, salt, ground cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and cloves. Add the dry ingredients to the wet. Slowly stir in until just combined. Be careful not to overmix. Drain the raisins and stir them in. Pour into prepared mini bundts. Bake for 17 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into one of the mini bundts comes out clean. Cool and remove bundts from pans and brush with melted jam or a sugar syrup (equal parts sugar and water heated until thickened).  Using melted white chocolate or frosting, pipe crosses on the mini bundts.

Notes

#BundtBakers is a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme.  Follow our Pinterest board right here. We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient.  If you are a food blogger and would like to join us, just send an email to Stacy at foodlustpeoplelove@gmail.com. All recipes and photographs can be found on our individual blogs or our Pinterest board.

#BundtBakers: Rum & Ginger Grapefruit Cake

Have you ever heard of a Moscow Mule? It consists of vodka, ginger beer and lime. I hadn't heard of it until I was searching to see if anyone had made a cake with the combination that I had in mind. Ginger is one of my favourite spices and I knew almost immediately that it would be in the cake that I chose for this month's Bundt Bakers' spice theme. Thanks for hosting Deepti!  I had a different cake in mind but realized it would be perfect for a cake that I will make later on. That meant trying to figure out what else to do with ginger.

A chai tea cake was in the running until I remembered that grapefruits were in season and I'd never baked with grapefruits before. My favourite citrus is actually the orange. Unfortunately, when I was in my teens, I realized that oranges triggered my migraines. It took me a while to accept that I could never peel and eat an orange without dealing with pain later on. I'll admit that every few years or so, I buy an orange and test the waters. What can I say? I'm stubborn.

This cake was pretty easy to come together and a nice way to end a meal. It's a dense cake so if you make it, be sure to pour all the grapefruit syrup over it. It can handle it. This would also be great with ice cream. But unfortunately, I did not have any ice cream when I made this. I guess I will just have to make it again. Be sure to check below to see what great cakes the others baked.

Rum & Ginger Grapefruit Cake

Recipe by: Kelster

Yield: Kelster

Ingredients 1 cup sugar 1 tablespoon grapefruit zest 2 cups flour 1 tablespoon baking powder 1 tablespoon ginger ½ teaspoon salt 2 eggs 1 cup plain yogurt ¾ cup oil 1 teaspoon vanilla 1  cup grapefruit juice (about 1 grapefruit) ¼ cup sugar ½ cup rum

Directions   Rub the zest thoroughly into the cup of sugar and set aside. Preheat oven to 350 F.  Thoroughly grease and flour a Bundt pan. Combine flour, baking powder, ginger and salt in a medium bowl. In a large bowl whisk the eggs and zesty sugar then add the yogurt, oil and vanilla. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients.  Pour batter into the prepared Bundt pan and use a spatula to evenly spread it around the pan. Bake for 30 – 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.   5 minutes before the cake is finished, combined the grapefruit juice and sugar over medium-low heat and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Turn up the heat and allow to boil then remove from burner. Add the rum.  Return to burner for 30 seconds stirring all the time.   Remove cake from oven and immediately poke it several times with a skewer. Drizzle a third of the grapefruit mixture over the cake and allow the cake to cool for 15 minutes. Invert cake onto a serving platter. Poke several times and slow drizzle the grapefruit mixture over the cake.

Notes

#BundtBakers is a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme.  Follow our Pinterest board right here. We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient. This month Deepti from Bakingyummies is hosting and she has chosen the theme as spices. Last month all of us baked with chocolate and after thoroughly enjoying each other's cakes, it was time to add some spice to the group. If you are a food blogger and would like to join us, just send an email to Stacy at foodlustpeoplelove@gmail.com or ask to join our private Facebook group. And don't forget to take a peek at what other talented bakers have baked this month. Here are the links:

• Orange Cardamom Mini Bundt Cakes by Alice at Hip Foodie Mom
• Cinnamon Roll Bundt Cake by Tara at Noshing With The Nolands
• Fresh Apple Cake by Lauren at Sew You Think You Can Cook 
• Sweet Potato Pound Cake by Renee at Magnolia Days
• Rum & Ginger Grapefruit Cake by Kelly at Passion Kneaded
• Apple Cinnamon Bundt Cake by Kathya at Basic N Delicious
• Spiced Applesauce Bundt Cake with Brown Sugar Rum Glaze by Lauren at From Gate to Plate
• Saffron and Tahitian Vanilla Infused Bundt Cake by Laura at The Spiced Life
• Honey and Beer Spiced Bundt Cake by Felice at All That's Left Are The Crumbs
• Saffron and Vanilla Bean and Orange Mini Bundt Cake by Deepti at Bakingyummies
• Peach and Spiced Tea Bundt Cake by Stacy at Food Lust People Love