Say it with Sprinkles: A baking blog filled with recipes & photos of sweet treats & savory eats.

If you’re a vegetarian or vegan, this post might reaffirm your choice to avoid meat. Either that or you’ll renounce your non-meat-eating ways for the delicious, barbecue sauce coated deliciousness you see here! I’m just kidding…sort of =)

Saturday turned out to be the perfect California day for a Texas-style pit BBQ!…Nevermind the fact that I don’t know what type of day is generally perfect for a Texas BBQ, or a Texas anything for that matter. Just because I’ve never been to Texas doesn’t mean I can’t imagine what it might be like, though- sitting beneath what I’ve been told is a giant sky (everything really is bigger in Texas, right?), sweet tea in hand, enjoying the summer day while wafts of mesquite scent the air.

Wafts of mesquite can only mean one thing in Texas. Maybe not. Mesquite can probably mean more than one thing. But I hope it usually means delicious, barbecued chicken, brisket, and ribs. I can imagine bbq sauce to be the only acceptable condiment in Texas, too, though I could be wrong? Don’t shatter my dreams, it’s definitely my favorite anyway!

What all of this comes down to is that my family doesn’t know an authentic Texas pit bbq any better than we know a traditional Louisiana crawfish boil or Greek celebration, but that didn’t stop us from using our imaginations and the slew of movie-driven stereotypes we’ve accumulated in our minds to recreate those events in the comfort of our own parents’ home. It’s just what we do. And since my oldest bro was planning to be in town for the SF Marathon next weekend, this weekend was the perfect time to round him up with the rest of the family & a couple good family friends (Hi Becky, Daniel, Lane & Marina!) for swimming, squirt guns, volleyball, food, and various other forms of debauchery. Always a good time!

I hit up the fruit stand last week for all the necessary produce. And then, this is just one of the THREE well-stocked refrigerators my parents have. How will we ever get by?!

Barbecue barrel! I know what you’re thinking. Seems a little crazy, right? But I promise you everything wasn’t just chucked in the barrel haphazard. As far as I know. I can’t, however, promise you my brother had any idea at all what he was doing. That being said, we must have had a good amount of luck on our side, because everything came out a-maz-ing!

Slow & low in the BBQ smoker, slow & low…and TA-DA!

Along with the barbecued chicken, brisket, ribs, and hot links, we enjoyed potato salad, fruit salad, corn on the cob, rolls, & bacon baked beans.

Once everyone passed out on the ground digested a bit, we continued the rousing game of volleyball that was started before dinner. The way we play, I’m not sure anyone really comes out a winner, but everyone had fun. I’ve been told that’s all that really matters. Played until the ice cream maker sounded like it’d give out if we waited any longer, and served it up with my raspberry peach cobbler!

I’ll post the recipe once I’ve finished digesting and recovering from this weekend’s craziness! It’s only 8:30pm and I can hardly keep my eyes open…
Nighty night 😉

I really need a food scale, I’ll tell you what.  I had to do wayyyy more math today than I ever thought I’d have to again after having finished calculus.  And now my head hurts. 

See, it’s not that the metric system is annoying in baking; in fact, if I could have weighed out all of my ingredients, it would actually have been much more accurate!  I’ve learned from Alton Brown that this is true in general: it’s something you don’t normally think about, but different flours, sugars, and various other ingredients differ so much in their density, mass, and volume that a cup of one flour might be very different from a cup of another type of flour…and totally throw off your recipe! 

Luckily, along with the stoichiometric skills I learned in none other than chemistry class, this recipe seemed to be very forgiving and turned out great, regardless!

Now that I’ve got that discussion out of the way, can we talk delicious chocolate and cinnamon cake?  I thought you might like that.  I found this recipe over on my new friend, Nuria’s blog, and instantly knew I had to make it!

Actually, to be honest, I instantly fell in love with every recipe, dessert or not, that I laid eyes on- and that doesn’t happen often since I tend to naturally gravitate towards all things sweet, if you know what I mean! Her photos are so vibrant, colorful, and yummy-looking, I just can’t help myself! Not to mention, Nuria is one of the sweetest people I have met in the blogging world thus far!

I adapted the recipe to fit the ingredients I had on hand, and to make it gluten and dairy free (not vegan, though, I’m afraid- I have to draw the line somewhere!)  It’s so delicious and perfectly chocolatey and cinnamony!   My version definitely turned out more like a dense quick bread than a cake or even a sponge cake, which I think is the English translation of “Bizcocho”…please forgive me if I’m a little off, I know maybe 2 words of Spanish! :) 

In any case, I’m just guessing here, but I think it would be great for dessert, breakfast, a snack, or maybe all of the above…I won’t tell!  Just make sure you enjoy it with a creamy cup of dark-roast coffee or maybe some chai tea.  You will thank me!

You can find the original recipe for Bizcocho Con Chocolate here

Bizcocho con Chocolate (gluten free, dairy free)

Ingredients:

* 1 cup Bob’s Redmill sorghum flour
* 1/2 cup white rice flour
* 1/4 cup Bob’s Redmill millet flour
* 1 tsp baking powder
* 1/4 tsp salt
* 1/2 tsp xanthan gum
* 4 oz. individual serving of applesauce + Earth Balance spread to make just shy of 3/4 cup
* 3 eggs
* 3/4 cup brown sugar
* 2 Tbsp cocoa powder
* 1 Tbsp cinnamon
* 1 Tbsp vanilla extract
* 2 Tbsp coffee liquor
* 1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:

Cream together the Earth Balance, applesauce, and brown sugar in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, mixing between each addition.
Sift together the flours, baking powder, xanthan gum, and salt in a separate bowl.
Mix the wet ingredients with the dry until combined. Divide the batter in half. To one half, add the cocoa powder, coffee liquor, and half of the chocolate chips. To the other half, add the cinnamon, vanilla extract, and the rest of the chocolate chips.
Spray or line a loaf pan with parchment paper and pour in the cinnamon batter. Pour the chocolate batter on top of the cinnamon batter, and swirl the two together slightly with a knife.
Bake at 350 degrees F for 30-40 minutes, depending on your oven. My oven runs VERY hot, so I ended up overcooking mine a little (oops!) just make sure you check it at the 30 minute mark and keep an eye on it. Generally, gluten free flour breads require less cooking time, but make sure a toothpick comes out clean when you test it.

Muy delicioso! (I hope I just said “Very delicious!” and not something really inappropriate!) 😀