Veggielicious Quinoa Burgers

Yummy veggie burgers with chickpeas, quinoa and kumin 

A few weeks ago I stumbled upon Jamie Oliver's 30 minute meals while I was watching tv. He was making some kind of black bean "happy cow" wooptido veggie burgers or something, and I thought, I gotta make that! Although, I didn't really want to make his veggie burgers .. no, I wanted to invent my own (veggie burgers Olivia-style). Since I really enjoy falafel, especially when it's really really fresh I decided to have that as my inspiration for my veggie burgers. The combination of chickpeas, parsley and kumin is fantastic. I had some quinoa left over in the fridge and I thought, "hey, why not, you can never go wrong with quinoa"! So my veggie burger mix ended up containing pretty much a bunch of left overs from the fridge, but the result was sooooo yummy, probably 10 times better than Jamie's happy cow burgers. 

Ingredients
2 garlic cloves
1/2 yellow onion
1/2 red chili pepper
2 carrots, grated
1/2 tbs paprika powder
1 tbs kumin powder
lemon juice (half lemon)
1 can of chickpeas
1 cup bolied quinoa seeds
a handful of finely choppad parlsey

How to do it:
Start off by chopping up the garlic, chili pepper and onion. Heat up some olive oil in a frying pan, toss in the garlic and cook for a minute or two (just don't burn it), and then add the onion and chili pepper. When the onions are golden, add the grated carrots, and the paprika and kumin powder. Mix well, and add a little water to let it boil and soak in all the flavors. While the mixture is cooking for a few minutes on the stove (medium heat) poor the chickpeas in a blender with a little bit of water. Blend until it becomes a paste. Poor it into a bowl, add the 1 cup of pre-boiled quinoa and mix well. Take the onion and carrot mixture off the stove, let it cool and then add to the chickpeas and quinoa. Squeeze out the juice of half a lemon, add the chopped parsley and season with salt and pepper (whatever suits you). Refridgerate the mixture for about 2 hours prior to cooking. When the mixture has been refridgerated, form into veggie burgers, and brown them on each side in olive oil.

Serve the veggie burgers on top of your chioce of bread with avocado and tomato, on a salad or just as it is. It really doesn't matter how you eat them, they're so damn good that you'll enjoy them any kind of way. 

Happy days! :)

Grandma Judy's Molasses cookies

Crunchy chewy cookies with a hint of Christmas

Let me tell ya, this is a hell of a cookie. The person that usually bakes these is my grandma Judy. When it comes to making perfectly chewy cookies, she definitely has talent. Today I tried to make molasses cookies just as my grandma makes them, but of course, they never turn out as crispy, thin, chewy nor flavorful as my grandmother's. It could be because of the fact that she uses Crisco (the quite unhealthy, trans fat packed shortening that people use for making kentucky fried chicken) in her cookie batter. But I mean, if that is what it takes to produce the ultimate molasses cookie, then I should perhaps buy myself a big jar of Crisco to bring back home to Sweden. 

Ingredients
3/4 C shortening (crisco) or butter
1 C sugar
1 egg
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp salt
2 C sifted flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/3 C molasses

How to do it:
Cream together the shortening/butter and the sugar. Add the molasses and the egg. Beat the mixture well. Sift together the cinnamon, ginger, cloves, salt, flour and baking soda and then add to the wet mixture. Mix well and chill in the refrigerator. After about an hour, take out the dough and form into 1 inch balls, roll them in granulated sugar and placed on  a greased cookie sheet 2 inches apart. Bake in oven for 8-10 minutes, 375˚F/190˚C.
If you want them chewy, take them out a little bit earlier and let them cool on the cookie sheet before placing them on a cookie rack.

These cookies with a big glass of milk is the perfect treat on a cold winters day ;) Enjoy!

Mexican Wedding Cakes

A classic Benson family christmas cookie

These cookies have been a family favorite even before I was born. Whenever we are together for Christmas, in Sweden or in the States, we always make sure to bake Mexican Wedding Cakes. The reason why I love them is because they just melt in your mouth. They have the perfect balance of sweet and salty and by using toasted walnuts and pecans, it adds a wonderful flavor and texture to the cookies.

Ingredients

1 C butter

1/2 C confectioners sugar (florsocker)
1 tsp vanilla paste/vanilla sugar
2 C flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 C pecans and walnuts 

How to do it
Toast the nuts in the oven (make sure they don´t burn). Cream butter, sugar and vanilla until fluffy. Sift the flour and salt and add to the creame mixture, blending thoroughly. Chop the nuts and add them to the mixture. Mix well and form into 1 inch balls and place on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake in preheated oven (325 F/165 C). Bake 15-20 minutes, until delicately brown. Let them cool completely before rolling them in powdered sugar.

Enjoy! 

Saffron buns with gooey vanilla filling

Swedish christmas bread

Believe it or not, but saffron is more expensive than gold. This flavorful red delicacy is definitely not a cheap spice, but the good thing is that you only need small amounts of it when baking or cooking. For a long time it's been a Swedish tradition to use saffron in the baked goods that we usually eat around christmas. Instead of making "kanelbullar" (cinnamon rolls) for fika, we make "lussekatter" (saffron bread). We also use other exotic spices around christmas such as ginger, cloves and cinnamon. To make a batch of outstandingly delicious saffron buns like these, you will need 1,5 grams of saffron. It takes about two days to make these babies, but don´t worry, it will undoubtedly be worth it. Especially if you´ve never tasted anything like this before ;)

1. Preperation-dough (1 day before baking)

1,5 g saffron
650 g cold 2 % milk
900 g all purpose flour
75 g fresh yeast 

Mix the saffron with the milk, and then mix all the ingredients together in a bowl. Cover up and place in the refrigerator for 12-24 hours in 4-8˚ C.

2. Dough

175 g butter
175 g sugar
20 g salt
125 g eggs
100 g high fat buttermilk (kesella)
1 tsp ground cardamom 
500 g all purpose flour

Take out the pre-dough from the refrigerator. It should have doubled in size over night. Mix the dough together with all the remaining ingredients (butter, sugar, salt, eggs, cardamom and flour). Work the dough in a kitchen aid for 15-20 minutes on medium speed. When the dough is done it should be elastic and shiny. Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl, cover and place in the refrigerator to rise for at least 1 hour. 

3. Vanilla filling

200 g butter (room temperature)
110 g sugar
100 g almond paste (mandelmassa)
20 g all purpose flour
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
1tbsp real vanilla bean paste or
1-2 tbsp vanilla powder
1 pinch of salt

To make the vanilla filling, just mix all the ingredients together in a bowl. Make sure it tastes good :)

4. Make the buns

Divide the dough into 2. Take one piece of dough and use a rolling pin to flatten it out (so it becomes a rectangle, about 1 cm thick). Spread half of the filling evenly on half of the rectangle, and then fold over the other half. Cut 1-2 cm wide pieces using a knife. Cut each piece in half, leaving one part of it still attached. Twist both of the ends and form into a nice not. It´s a little tricky, but I usually just wing it and it always turns out good ( it should look a little bit authentic). Do the same with the remaining dough. Place the buns on a non stick baking sheet, cover and let them rise for 1-2 hours in room temperature. Turn the oven on 230˚ C/450˚ F. When the buns are finished rising, brush them with some whisked egg, sprinkle on some sugar (pärlsocker) and put them in the oven. Bake for 12-14  minutes until golden brown. 

Enjoy these baked treats with a cold glass of cold milk, hot cocoa or a cup of traditional "glögg" (spiced warm christmas wine that we traditionally drink around christmas in Sweden). 

Hönökaka

A soft Swedish flatbread

It was one of those breads that my sisters and I used to eat as we were growing up. After school we´d all come home and gather around the table to have our afternoon "fika" with fresh bread, butter, cheese, ham and marmalade. It was probably one of the best moments of the day... eating moms freshly homemade bread with the family. 

So, what makes these round Swedish flat breads so special? Well, I can start off by telling you that in the authentic recipe for Hönökaka, there is a combination of 3 spices that is common for a lot of Swedish breads. To some this might seem crazy but the recipe actually calls for 1 tsp of ground fennel, anise and cumin (brödkryddor/breadspices). It gives the bread a unique flavor, and is definitely worth trying if you want to step out of your bread baking comfort zone.

Makes about 12 hönökakor

Ingredients

50 g fresh yeast

100 g butter salted

0,5 litre of 2 % milk

1,5 tsp salt

4 tbs sugar/corn syrup

1 tsp finely ground fennel, anise and cumin

4 dl graham flour/whole wheat flour

6-7 dl of high protein flour (King Arthur)

How to do it:
Start off by melting the butter. Add the milk and warm it until lukewarm (37˚C/ 98˚F). With fresh yeast, you need to crumble it into small bits in a bowl. Add the lukewarm milk and butter to the yeast and mix well. Add the salt, sugar, spices and flour and mix well, either manually or in a bread dough mixer. When the dough starts to release from the sides, but is still a little bit sticky, sprinkle some flour on it, cover it with a towel and put it someplace warm to let it rise for 1-2 hours. When it is done rising it should have doubled in size.

Turn the dough over on a floured surface and kneed it until it has a nice, flexible consistency. Divide it in half and cut each half into 6 pieces. Use a rolling pin to get each piece of dough flattened out until about half an inch thick. When done with this, use a fork to poke holes all over the surface of the dough. Otherwise it will fill up with air in the oven. Turn the oven on, about (275˚C/530˚F). Let the flatbreads rise for another hour before cooking in the oven. When I cooked my flatbreads in the oven I used a pizza stone, in order to get the nice golden color on both sides. 3-4 minutes is all it takes to get the flatbread soft on the inside and nice, golden brown on the outside.

Best way to enjoy a Hönökaka is to eat it warm (preferrably fresh out of the oven) with butter on it. The butter melts and the Hönökaka soaks up all the juiciness. It is insanely good :)



Fika (pronounced "fee-ka") is a social institution in Sweden, which most commonly means taking a break with one´s colleagues/familymembers in the afternoon to have coffee/tea with smörgåsar (open faced sandwiches), cookies or kanelbullar (cinnamon rolls). 

Pot Stickers
Chinese dumplings with pork filling

Yesterday I decided to use the wonton-dough that I had in the freezer. I bought it last fall, thinking I was going to throw a bad ass asian dinner party for my friends, but instead I ended up making it for me and my sister last night for dinner. This was the first time I ever made these little dumplings and it did indeed take a lot of time, precision and most of all... patience! I didn't have all the cool asian ingredients that I needed at home, so I ended up making my own recipe for the filling and the dipping sauce. As long as you use your creativity and think asian it's fine!


Ingredients for filling
250 g ground pork
1/2 tbsp sesame oil
1/2 carrot
1/3 of an apple (my little touch)
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
1/2 shallot
1/2 tsp ginger (fresh or powdered)
a package of wonton dough
1 cup of water, pinch of salt


Ingredients for sauce
soy sauce
rice wine vinegar
sesame oil
teriyaki sauce (just 1 tsp)


How to do it:
Start with the pork filling. Finely chop the shallot, carrot and apple. Add to the ground pork. Mix in soy sauce, rice wine vinegar and ginger. When I had mixed it all together I did a test by rolling a little ball of pork and cooking it in a pan. It's important to taste it to make sure that all the flavors are right. The pork filling should have plenty of flavor (so if it needs a little more soy sauce or sesame oil, go ahead and add a tad more). When the pork filling is done it's time to fill the little wonton dough squares. Wonton dough is very thin, but still easy to handle. Place a little more than a teaspoon of filling on each wonton square. Brush the sides of the wonton dough with water and simply squeeze it together to form a pocket. Make sure they are sealed tight, so the filling doesn't end up falling out. The pork filling will make about 20-25 dumplings, depending on how much you fill each one. 

Heat up a little bit of canola oil in a cast iron skillet (medium-high heat). Place the dumplings next to each other in the pan and fry for about 2 minutes or until you see that they are nice and golden brown underneath. Add the salted water, reduce the heat to low, cover with a lid and let the dumplings simmer for about 5-6 minutes. Remove the lid from the pan and let the water burn away. Pot stickers tend to stick a little bit to the pan (therefor the name) but don't worry, you'll get them out of there. 


For the sauce:
This is the easiest part of preparing this dinner. Just combine soy sauce, sesame oil, a hint of teriyaki and rice wine vinegar in a bowl and stir. Taste if it has the flavor that you like. I always kind of "wing it" when I make any kind of sauce. You can always add a little more of something and adjust until it's right where you want it to be. 


Pot stickers are normally served as an appetizer but it really doesn't matter, considering they're quite filling and satisfying as a main course as well. I also made chinese pickled cucumber to complement this dish. Adding something fresh, tangy and crunchy to this meal just tops it all off!

津津有味
Enjoy!

Almond butter
with a hint of pecan and walnut

























This is my new favorite thing to keep in the fridge. Almond butter. It's packed with good stuff like nutritious fats, vitamins, fiber and proteins. I can do nothing but just LOVE this thick, sticky, slightly crunchy nutty butter. As for me, making home made almond butter from scratch instead of buying it in the store is simply the best! 


Whipping up the almond butter is an easy task, but if you don't have a really good blender it might take you some time to get the alomnds ground up and eventually into a paste. It took me almost a whole day to get the almond butter just the right consistency that I wanted (also because I had the worst stick blender to work with). 


Igredients
2 cups of almonds
1/2 cup of pecans
1/2 cup of walnuts
1 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla sugar
a couple pinches of sea salt


How to do it:
Start off by toasting the nuts in the oven. It's a good idea to keep an eye on them while they're in the oven, if they are left in too long and roast too much the toasty flavor gets overpowering. After they've cooled down and gotten dry it's time to start grinding them up. I used a blender. Don't do all the nuts at the same time, it can get tough for the blender to mix it all. What's great about making almond butter is that you don't just have to stick to almonds. Dumping in some pecan, walnuts, macadamia or why not sunflower seeds is a prefect way to give the butter a different but subtle dimension in flavor and consistency. I love how this almond butter turned out, with a hint of the pecans and walnuts in the background. Adding vanilla sugar also gives the almond butter a round and cozy flavor that goes perfectly well in combination with the different nuts.

Olive bread
An earthy tasting bread with fresh
olive oil and greek kalamata olives


























I admit, I am "the ultimate olive fanatic", and whoever reads my blog is going to have to deal with that fetish of mine. My addiction is pretty serious considering I've already written a cook book about olives and, hold your horses, my middle name is Olivia! Anyway, I love the little suckers in all their different forms and colors. I love olives in salads, I love them in my glas of dry martini and of course, I love them in my bread! See, I can't behave myself. My love for olives is downright invincible.


As for this bread, all I did was I used the recipe for Pan à l'ancienne (posted prior to this) as a guide line. I used it because I just love the texture of that bread when it comes out of the oven. So, Peter Reinharts Pan á l'ancienne is turned into Olive bread á l'Benson!


When making the dough I added about a cup of good extra virgin olive oil (I always prefer spanish oil) and 1,5-2 cups of chopped kalamata olives. I mixed the two extra ingredients into the dough with everything else before placing the dough in the fridge over night. The bread is super easy to make, just make sure that there is enough flour in the dough since adding olive oil and olives (that contain a lot of liquid) can tend to make the dough more loose. Just add a little more flour until you find the consistency of it to be right.

I made four of these leaf-shaped olive breads. On two of the breads I sprinkled thyme and sea salt, just to give it some variety in looks and flavor. Also, shaping the bread as a leaf is so much fun, and very easy to do. It doesn't have to look perfect, that's the finess of it. Just dump the dough on a baking sheet, spread it out (be careful though, you don't want to push out the air) and use a pair of scissors to cut the holes. Your friends will be very impressed if you are having a dinner party with this type of bread!


























A little over a week ago my mother, Monika, turned 50 and she wanted to celebrate this birthday with a humungous party in our home town Lund. There was a lot of preperation going on last week, and luckily my mom wanted be to be a big part of it. So I cooked and I also did a lot of baking, because we were of course refusing to buy store-bought bread. Home made bread beats it all, especially when it's made from real sourdough and fresh ingredients. Me and my sister Emily were responsible for the bread table, so we each made 3 different breads. This olive bread was on of the breads that I made, and here's a picture of our bread table. It's a real treat for the eye, just to look at it.

On the bread table we have Danish ryebread, Pan al ancienne, Ciabbatas, Beer bread, Olive bread, Levain (sourdough bread) and swedish sourdough crispbread.

On the sign by the bread table it says; "St. Benson´s convection oven bakery" instead of "St. Benson´s stone oven bakery". That´s me and my sister Emily, just making a statement that you don´t need a fancy oven to make wonderfully tasting bread! 

Pan à l'ancienne
From Peter Reinhart's "The Bread Baker's Apprentice"

This bread, lo and behold, is your shortcut to a perfect almost sourdough like french baguette, with a crunchy golden crust and wonderfully chewy inside. It is, in other words, pretty much the easiest complex looking bread you can make. The secret is using a technique called delayed fermentation. You basically put the baking "on hold". I can only tell you this. Pan à l'ancienne is a bread far from labor-intensive, perfect for the lazy bums who still have a desire to enjoy rustic-looking and flavorful bread. 


Now always keep this in mind when making any kind of bread. Storing a dough in the refrigerator over night is always an option, if you have to put the baking on hold. It also benefits the flavor of the bread, giving the result a more profound and intense aroma. Now, for the recipe. It does not contain any sour dough starter at all, but instead instant yeast. I've always found it irritating when baking with yeast, just because the result of the bread always turns out too "store bought"-soft and without any a good crust. But, what I've discovered now is that if you don't have the time or motivation to start from scratch with your own sour dough, just go ahead and use instant yeast but make sure you combine it with the technique of delaying the fermentation. Sure, you will have to start the dough the day before you bake it, but how big of a deal is that? The bread or pizza crust will turn out to be delicious, with almost the same flavor and texture as of a real sour dough baguette/pizza.

Makes 6 small baguettes or 4 pizzas

Ingredients:

6 cups high protein flour (King Arthur is what I normally use in the US. In Sweden I'd go with Jan Hedhs Monitoba Cream or just Vetemjöl Special)

2 1/4 teaspoons salt

1 3/4 intstant yeast (in Sweden I'd use fresh yeast)

3 cups of ice cold water

How to do it:

Day 1:

Combine the flour, salt, yeast and the water in a bowl. If you have an electric mixer, go ahead and use that to mix the dough. I myself prefer doing it manually, especially when handling a dough that is pretty small like this one. When the dough is mixed it should release from the sides of the bowl but still be sticky on the bottom. Lightly oil a large bowl, and immediately place the dough in it. Dust the top with flour, cover the bowl with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator.

Day 2: 

The next day, the dough should be partially risen (at least a little bubbly). Leave the bowl of dough out in room temperature for about 2 to 3 hours prior to baking. I have a funny routine of placing my doughs on top of the washing machine in the laundry room, just to give it some extra warmth and comfort while rising. This will allow the dough to wake up, lose it's chill and continue fermenting.

Preheat the oven to 500 ̊ F ( 300 ̊ C). Make sure you have a stone or a baking sheet placed in the oven to bake the breads on. When the dough has doubled from its original prerefrigerated size, sprinkle the counter with plenty of bread flour. Gently scrape out the dough on to the counter, making sure not to press out any air from it. These are the bubbles that we want to keep! What you have now is a big wet dough laying like flat pancake on your counter. What I do is I dust the dough with plenty of flour, making sure it's coated all over. Then I cut it lenghtwise into 6 longs pieces of dough. Each piece of dough is then placed on a baking sheet with baking parchment and pulled out lengthwise to create a baguette. The dough might look very flat and wet, but I can assure you that it will rise and puff up in the oven. I place three baguettes on each baking sheet. Let them rest for 5 minutes.

When the oven is heated, open it and slide the parchment paper with the breads on to the stone or the baking sheet that is already in the oven. I usually throw in an ice cube or spray in a good amount of water to give the bread a good crust. After 8-9 minutes they should be golden brown and have puffed up into nice round baguettes. Take them out and place them on a cooling rack.

Baked mussles with garlic butter

Moules gratinées à l'escargot
















I've always admired the way how garlic and butter, two simple ingredients cooking gently on the stove, can spread so much comfort and warmth in a house. It's one of those smells I've grown up learning to love and appreciate in a way that most people don't. It's just remarkable how something so simple can fill the entire house with such a cozy and appetizing smell,  almost as satisfying as eating the food itself.


Enough about my philosophical thoughts about the wonderful marriage of garlic and butter. I will now be sharing a delicious belgian recipe that just captures the essence of what I just wrote up above. I had these garlic mussles at a restaurant in Brussels last autumn and oh are they to die for. I've always been a sucker for, believe it or not, the french dish Escargot, snails in garlic butter. Actually, my secret conclusion is that anything with garlic and butter ends up tasting like a piece of heaven in your mouth. Finito!


Ingredients
2 lbs of blue mussles (preferably already cooked and in halves)
2 sticks of butter
2 small shallots, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1/3 of a cup of parsley, finely chopped
salt and pepper
breadcrumbs (optional)


Baguette - to compliment the dish (preferably your own homemade sour dough bread ;)


How to do it:
Preheat your oven at 400 ̊ F (205 ̊ C). Start off by rinsing the mussles well. When making the garlic butter, make sure the butter is room temperature. Mix together the chopped shallots, garlic, parsley and gently incorporate it into the soft butter. Add a pinch of salt and pepper to taste. Place in fridge to cool before handling putting it on the mussles. Place the mussle halves on an oven tray. Put about 1 teaspoon of garlic butter on each half, making sure every mussle gets a good amount of that wonderful garlicy goodness! This is optional, but I like gicing the mussle a little crust on top. Sprinkling some fine bread crumbs on each mussle gives them a very appetizing look and it'll turn nice and golden brown in the oven.
Bake the mussles for a few minutes, keeping a good eye on them.


Serve the mussles when fresh out of the oven. I prefer the family style way, you know, placing the tray in the middle of the table and letting people pick them up one by one as they eat. This will without doubt create a very intimate and enjoyable meal for family or friends. I like to keep it simple some times, not too pretentious. Having some bread with this dish is perfect considering the fact that you really NEED to have something to soak up all those garlic butter juices in the bottom of the tray. I personally say bread was invented just for that reason. 


Hope you enjoy this and don't hesitate 
to give me your input or comments on the dish! 
/Oliv

cupcakes take the cake

Mini fudge brownie cupcakes 
with decadent coffee frosting 
















If you are looking for the beyond ultimate chocolate comfort food, this cupcake is the absolute thing for you. A little treat, smaller than a golf boll, that fits perfectly in your mouth just in one bite, that's what I'm talking about. And even better, that with a cup of freshly brewed coffee or, what the heck, a glass of ice cold milk is pretty much unbeatable.  My grandmother Judy was hosting a baby shower a couple of weeks ago, and she gave me full responsibility for the cupcake section of the buffet table. Two little mini cupcakes were to be made, so I decided to go with a carrot cupcake and a brownie cupcake. The carrot cupcakes turned out excellent considering we were using grandma's all time favorite recipe containing the secret ingredient crushed pineapple (now not so secret anymore though). This made them moist and down right delicious, but still I think there was something about the brownie cupcakes that wowed many more people than the carrot cupcakes could ever achieve to do.


Now for these yummy brownies, the trick is not to add too much flour to the batter, in order to get them real fudgy and chewy. At least that's how I and Katherine Hepburn like our brownies. Another thing is to not whip the eggs with the sugar, since that'll add air to the batter creating a fluffier brownie. Instead, sifting all the dry ingredients together, and then at last adding the wet ingredients while carefully stirring to combine is the best way to do it.


Ingredients for fudge brownie cupcakes
100 g butter
3 dl sugar  ( about 1,3 cups)
1,5 dl flour ( 0,6 cups)
5-6 tbsp cocopowder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract or vanilla powder
2 eggs, room temp.


Turn on the oven (350˚ F / 175˚ C). Start off by melting the butter, then let it cool. Sift together all the dry ingredients into a bowl. Add the melted butter and eggs to the dry ingredients and stir carefully with a wooden spoon to combine. The batter should be pretty thick (gooey like) and dark. Distribute the batter into mini size cups and place on a baking sheet. Bake in the oven for about 10 min, although it depends on how fudgy you want them to be. When the cupcakes are done baking they can cool off on a cookie rack. I place them in the fridge to speed up the "cooling down period".


Ingredients for coffee frosting
100 g butter room temp.
confectioners sugar
2-3 tpsp espresso/very strong coffee
1/2 tsp salt
vanilla extract/vanilla powder
whipping cream (for extra creamy frosting!)


Beat the butter with a little bit of the sugar. Add the coffee, salt, vanilla extract and whipping cream. Beat until combined and smooth. Last add the rest of the sugar (in this case, as much as needed to form a smooth think frosting). 


Enjoy! (don't forget to eat this little treat with a cup of coffee, or cold milk. It'll enhance the chocolatey sensation of the brownie. yum.)