Baked Sunday Mornings: Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cake

I think my favorite part of the Baked Explorations (CLEARLY DESSERT) cookbook is that Matt and Renalto include a breakfast section. Where was this section when I was growing up and trying to convince my family that chocolate definitely had its place at the breakfast table? 

Although some of the breakfast selections are clearly breakfast foods (remember the Honey Corn Muffins?), most have not been. So far, I've made Nutella Scones, Olive Oil Orange Bundt Cakes, and Rosemary Apricot Squares, all from the breakfast section. This oatmeal chocolate chip cake falls clearly into that second category. 

It's an oatmeal cake, but the oatmeal is made with a stick of butter, it includes almost 3 cups of sugar AND a cup of chocolate chips. The finished cake is dense and moist, similar in texture to banana bread but much more enjoyable. 

Matt and Renalto include the recipe for an optional cream cheese frosting, but I omitted it. I found this cake just perfect on its own. I enjoyed thick slices for breakfast, and I had several pieces as afternoon snacks. 

The recipe for the cake can be found here. Visit the Baked Sunday Mornings Facebook group to see other bloggers who cooked the recipe! You can also check out our recipe schedule, get the cookbook, and bake along with us!

Radish Leaf Pesto

I throw too many things away, particularly when I'm cooking. The dark green stems from leeks. The husks from corn. Radish leaves I'm particularly bad with. I just take off the beautiful red radishes and immediately discard the dirty greens.

But thanks to this recipe I stumbled across, I'll be able to take radish leaves off that list. From now on, I'm turning them into radish leaf pesto.

The recipe couldn't be easier, and I found it just as tasty as basil pesto. Mine was a kitchen-sink pesto of sorts. I only had pumpkin seeds in my cabinet, so that's what I used. I made pesto pasta salad out of my pesto, combining a container of cooked pasta with the pesto and peas. The color was beautiful, and it was cheap, made mostly from an ingredient I would have thrown away.

This recipe is by by food blogger Clotilde Dusoulier, woman number 18 on Gourmet Magazine's list of 50 women game-changers in food history. Of the selection, Gourmet wrote: Dusoulier's 2003-vintage blog Chocolate and Zucchini is the Francophile's dream. She posts from Montmartre about cheese and brioche--but also, to be fair, mochi and muffins. Her fifth book--her translation and adaptation of the 1923 French equivalent of Joy of Cooking, Ginette Mathiot's Je Sais Cuisiner ("I Know How to Cook")--is already iconic. 

Be sure to visit the other women who are paying tribute to Clotilde Dusoulier today!
Val - More Than Burnt Toast
Joanne - Eats Well With Others
Taryn - Have Kitchen Will Feed
Susan - The Spice Garden
Claudia - A Seasonal Cook in Turkey
Heather - girlichef
Miranda - Mangoes and Chutney
Jeanette - Healthy Living
April - Abby Sweets 
Katie - Making Michael Pollan Proud
Mary - One Perfect Bite
Kathleen -Bake Away with Me
Viola - The Life is Good Kitchen
Sue - The View from Great Island
Barbara - Movable Feasts
Kathleen - Gonna Want Seconds
Amy - Beloved Green
Jeanette - Healthy Living 
Linda - Ciao Chow Linda
Linda A - There and Back Again
Martha - Lines from Linderhof