Stir it! Scrape it! Mix it! Bake it!

Wordless Wednesday: Dorie's chocolate oatmeal drops (BFMYHTY)

2012-02-01T09:07:00.000-06:00

Fig bars (Modern Baker)

2012-01-31T09:29:00.001-06:00

I was so excited to see that Nick Malgieri's Modern Baker came with a recipe for homemade fig newtons...they've always been a favorite of mine!

It took me forever to get around to making them, though, because I couldn't find the dried Calimyrna figs that NM calls for. Finally, Phyl said that he thought regular mission figs would work, so that's what I went with.

The dough is NM's biscotti regina (I made a 1/2 recipe). The dough is rolled into long ropes, pressed out into rectangles, and then folded around the fig filling. I only had 8 ounces of figs, so I made a 1/3 recipe of the filling with figs, water, apricot preserves, dark rum, cinnamon, and cloves.

My bars baked for a long time without ever getting golden; finally when they had just a hint of color, we pulled them out. I thought the filling was spot-on for fig newtons...delicious! The outside was more like shortbread than a traditional chewy fig newton; I'm not sure if that's because I baked them for so long? Regardless, hubby and I enjoyed these!

Coconut pecan chocolate chunk bars (Modern Baker)

2012-01-30T09:38:00.000-06:00

I'm just loving the cookie section from The Modern Baker. The only problem is figuring out which recipe to try next!

Luckily, Kayte saved me this time, posting this amazing picture of NM's coconut pecan chocolate chunk bars. Once hubby caught a glimpse, he was in full support of my stopping everything to make them immediately.

These have a taste reminiscent of seven layer bars, but with a cleaner, better flavor. They start with a buttery dough pressed into the pan and baked lightly. The topping is made with brown sugar, eggs, sugar, vanilla, coconut, pecans, and chocolate (I used a combination of chopped 60% and semi-sweet chocolate chips).

NM says to store them at room temperature, but I saw that Margaret had put hers in the fridge to firm up, so I went that route.

While these were yummy straight from the oven, chilled, they were ah-maz-ing! Definitely a new favorite around here.

English muffins and mini-pizza-snacks

2012-01-29T15:43:00.001-06:00

I've loved all of the recipes I've tried from Peter Reinhart's Artisan Breads Every Day, in a large part because they're all so easy: mix up some dough, shove it in the fridge, bake the next day. I've been wanting to try his English muffin recipe, but unlike the recipe from BBA, in which the English muffins are shaped sort of like buns, in ABED, the muffin batter is more similar to pancake batter and thus requires muffin rings...which I didn't have. :(

Flash forward to the beginning of this year, when my friend Melanie emailed me to tell me that Santa had left her a new set of rings...but she'd just gotten herself a set. She offered to send the extra set to me, and I was just thrilled.

It didn't take me long to break them in; hubby absolutely loves English muffins!

The dough is mixed together: honey, olive oil, warm milk, bread flour, salt, and instant yeast, and then placed in the fridge.

When I pulled the dough out of the fridge the next day, it was bubbling like crazy. Right before baking, I dissolved some baking soda in warm water and gently folded into the dough. Meanwhile, I turned on my electric griddle, set to 300º.

The rings are coated with cooking spray and cornmeal, and then placed on the griddle and filled with 1/3 c of the dough/batter. It was so much fun to watch them turn into English muffins before our eyes...I think that's my favorite part of making English muffins: you get to see the bread making action up close and personal!

We used these to make mini pizzas / pizza snacks, which were staples in both hubby's and my home when we were growing up. We have very different philosophies: hubby's family used cheddar cheese, chopped ham, onion, and green peppers. My mom always made mine with a little pizza sauce and mozzarella, much more like a real pizza. Luckily English muffins are small enough that everyone can make one that fits their needs.

Hubby and I loved these muffins....the kiddos were sadly not as impressed with the pizza snacks, maybe because they're accustomed to pizza with homemade crust on a regular basis. The rest of the muffins have been used for breakfast, with eggs, and I'm sure this recipe will become a new staple around here.

Thanks, Mel! :)

Wordless Wednesday: Some days, I really love my fridge

2012-01-25T21:25:00.000-06:00

Better late than never: Dorie's CCCs

2012-01-20T07:50:00.000-06:00

Finally, finally after reading so many of my Twitter pals' delicious TWD posts, I caved and ordered my very own copy of Baking: From My Home to Yours.

TWD: BFMHTY started before I even knew that food blogging existed, or had even heard of Dorie Greenspan. In fact, if I remember correctly, I believe that in January 2008 when TWD started, I was busy with a not-quite-one-year-old, trying to figure out how in the heck I was going to deal with the new baby who was due in a few short months.

Anyway, I've made quite a few TWD recipes, after seeing the recipes posted on my friends (and others') blogs, and finally realized that if I was going to make so many of those recipes, I needed to own my own copy of the book. And it is gorgeous! I am so excited to own it...I can't believe how many incredible recipes there are and how many variations. The pictures are amazing and I love the baking techniques. So I know I'm late to the party, but I'm really happy to be here. :)

My first official recipe that I baked from the book (rather than from recipes posted on blogs) was her chocolate chip cookies. There were no surprising ingredients, but I did follow Dorie's advice to use quality chocolate, chopped in chunks. I did need to shorten the baking time, as mine were really brown after 10 minutes. Regardless of degree of doneness (I experimented with several baking times), these cookies were amazing: almost toffee-like, tons of chocolate, filled with buttery goodness.

This is all that was left for a photo.

What did she want to do as soon as she walked in the door?

2012-01-19T19:18:00.004-06:00

Make more of these.

Cooking with kids: pigs in a blanket

2012-01-16T19:47:00.003-06:00

In my final Mellow Bakers' post, I talked about how excited I was to be finished with my bread baking challenge(s). Finally, I'd have time to experiment! To bake on a whim. Hubby noticed tonight that I've been doing just that: making fun little desserts again, baking a spontaneous batch of rolls for a quick lunch, cooking for fun.

So, on a whim, yesterday I picked up a package of beef lil' smokies. When we got home from our museum adventures today, I mixed up a half-batch of PR's BBA white bread (with a little white whole wheat thrown in). Because it was already 3:00, I helped the dough a bit by letting it rise in my slightly warm oven.

Once doubled, I measured out 9 two-ounce portions which I rolled into balls. I used my rolling pin to roll out the rest of the dough into a big sheet of dough, about 1/8" thick. I used my pizza cutter to cut out one-inch strips, and then trimmed them to about 1 1/2". And this is where the kiddos came in: they rolled each strip of dough around one of the lil' smokies. As they rolled, they talked to their sausages, "Good night, little piggie. Time to go to sleep! I'm rolling you up into your little blanket!" And then they sang good night songs. Good times were had by all.

I let the pigs in a blanket (and the rolls) rest on their baking sheet for another 45 minutes or so, and then baked them in a 350º oven for fifteen minutes. Because I was brushing the rolls with melted butter, I brushed the piggies, too.

These were a huge hit! And unlike many bread baking projects, they actually had a pretty quick turn-around time. They're so tiny that they only needed to cool for about three minutes before the kiddos (and hubby) started gobbling them up.

Honey peanut wafers (Modern Baker Challenge)

2012-01-12T19:12:00.000-06:00

The other night, I posed this question to my husband: "Should I go to bed early or stay up for a bit and bake some cookies?" Can you guess how he responded? Yeah, kind of a no-brainer.......

Still, it was close to bedtime, so I wanted something quick and easy. I paged through my Modern Baker book and found just the thing: honey peanut wafers, a cookie on my to-do list that doesn't require softened butter or a mixer.

In fact, this cookie is incredibly easy. The only ingredient that might not be in your pantry already is honey-roasted peanuts. But if you pick up a canister to have on-hand, you'll be able to decide to bake cookies, preheat the oven, mix them up, bake them all, do the dishes, eat a couple, and still be in bed in an hour. That's what I did!

First, you whisk flour and baking soda in a small bowl. Then in another bowl, you whisk an egg, honey, and melted butter. Fold in the flour and then the chopped honey roasted peanuts (there are a LOT of peanuts in this recipe!). The batter is really wet, but I just used my scoop. I only put about six cookies on the sheet because I was worried about spreading (NM says to space them FOUR inches apart; I've never seen directions to space them out that much before!)...and rightfully so. These spread a ton and grew huge in the oven.

The verdict: Not surprisingly, considered they're called "wafer" cookies and they spread so much, these cookies are really thin. Parts of them have an almost-toffee-like consistency, and then there's a nice crunch from the bits of peanut. They have a very strong peanut-honey flavor (again, not surprising), so if you didn't like either of those flavors, you wouldn't like these. But if, like me, you love both peanuts and honey, these cookies are delicious! They're very sweet (I could see cutting down the honey just a bit), but we all (my hubby, dad, and me) found them quite delicious and addictive. (The kids, who are anti-nut, wouldn't even try them.) I will definitely make these again when I'm looking for a quick salty-crunchy-sweet treat!

Turkey wild rice soup in bread bowls

2012-01-08T20:11:00.000-06:00

Sometimes, things are just supposed to happen: within a few days, I finished the Mellow Baker challenge, which means I can bake any bread I want (yay!), KAF wrote a post about bread bowls, and Nancy, Rebecca, and I, visiting over Twitter Saturday night, decided Sunday should be soup day. Yep, this meal was meant to be.

I actually made a really similar meal last year for Christmas Eve (here's the post). These bread bowls came together more quickly, a really easy recipe. And I much preferred this wild rice soup recipe (plus it made a whole lot more).

Bread bowls
adapted from King Arthur Flour

100 g bread flour
100 g white whole wheat flour
50 g semolina flour
200 g all-purpose flour
10 g (1 1/4 tsp) salt
15 g (1 tbsp) sugar
35 g (1/2 c) dry potato flakes
14 g nonfat dry milk
9 g (2 1/2 tsp) instant yeast

1. Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl. (I used my stand mixer.) Knead or mix with the dough hook for 3 or 4 minutes until a smooth dough forms.
2. Place the dough in a large bowl lightly coated with cooking spray and allow to rise until doubled (about 60-90 minutes).
3. Divide the dough into six pieces (mine were 144 g each) and round each piece into a large ball. Place the balls on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Cover with plastic wrap.
4. If baking right away, allow to rise until puffy, 60-90 minutes. I mixed the dough early in the morning, so put the covered baking sheet into the fridge for the day. I pulled the tray out about an hour before baking the rolls.
5. Bake the rolls for 25 minutes at 350º. Cool on the pan.
6. Cut a cone shape out of the top of each bread bowl, fill with soup, and serve!

KAF instructs you to pull out all of the bread from the bowl; I just use my fingers to press it in. The bowl isn't quite as big that way, but you get lovely chunks of bread in each spoonful of soup. These bowls are fairly small; each only held 1/2 cup of soup. I'd be wary of making the bowls bigger, though; that's an awful lot of bread. The 1/2 cup was perfect for the kiddos. Hubby and I just refilled our bowls once.

Creamy wild rice-turkey-ham soup
adapted from Cooking Light
makes 8 servings (about 1 to 1 1/2 cups each)

1 tbsp butter
1 1/2 c chopped carrot (3 large carrots)
2 1/2 c chopped onion (1 giant onion)
1/4 tsp dried rosemary
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
2 tsp minced garlic
32 oz fat-free chicken broth
2 c chopped turkey (I used Christmas dinner leftovers that I'd frozen)
1 c chopped turkey ham
1 c uncooked wild rice
2 tbsp butter
1/3 c all-purpose flour
2 3/4 c 2% milk
2 tbsp dry sherry
1/2 tsp salt

1. Melt 1 tbsp butter in a large Dutch oven over medium heat. Add carrot, onion, ham, spices, pepper, and garlic, and sauté until softened, about 8 minutes.
2. Stir in wild rice and turkey. Add broth and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer for one hour, or until rice is tender.
3. About 10 minutes before the timer beeps, make a roux. (Cooking Light didn't include this step, but it was suggested by one of the commenters. Ours definitely didn't taste floury, so maybe it was worth dirtying the extra pan.) Melt 2 tbsp butter in a saucepan. Whisk in the flour and stir until flour turns a nice light brown, about 5 or 6 minutes. Whisk in the milk a bit at a time until smooth.
4. Add the roux, sherry, and salt, and cook (uncovered) for about 8 more minutes or until thickened.

Donna Hay's rainbow whoopie pies (Twitter avatar fun)

2012-01-07T11:11:00.001-06:00

Our first chef-of-the-month for 2012 is Donna Hay, chosen by Kayte. I'd never heard of Donna Hay, but apparently she is a very famous and prolific Australian cookbook author. I spent quite an enjoyable amount of time browsing her site and checking out recipes. She has a kids' section, which especially appealed to me.

Baby girl and I picked the rainbow whoopie pies...baking them together was a perfect way to spend a Saturday morning! I've heard a lot about whoopie pies on the blogosphere over the past year, but had yet to try any. We still have a counter-full of holiday cookies that hubby's mom left for us when she visited last week, so I knew we didn't need a lot more sweets, so I just made a third of the recipe.

The cookies were easy and the little girl had fun dumping ingredients into the bowl and using the scale to make sure we had the right amount. DH says the dough is wet (which it is) and difficult to form into balls, but we used one of my cookie scoops, which worked just fine. I actually got 16 cookies from the 1/3 batch, and they were perfectly done in 15 minutes. While they baked, I made the filling with marshmallows, butter, and a little white chocolate. Unsurprisingly, the taste and texture was very similar to a rice crispie bar. I'm a little confused about the amounts; I made over 1/3 of the filling recipe, and yet it was only enough to fill the three sandwiches you see in the picture above. So we had ten plain chocolate cookies leftover (unfortunately, I'm out of marshmallows so I couldn't make more filling).

These were delicious little treats! Hubby especially enjoyed his with his coffee, although I'm not sure they technically count as a healthy breakfast treat. :) And the leftover cookies made perfect ice cream sandwiches for dessert. ;)

Donna Hay's rainbow whoopie pies
scaled from Donna Hay
makes 8 or 9 whoopie pies (this is 1/3 of the cookie recipe and 2/3 of the filling recipe)

83 g unsalted butter, softened
60 g light brown sugar
55 g superfine sugar
1 egg
125 g all-purpose flour
17 g cocoa
scant 1/2 tsp baking powder
100 g marshmallows
20 g unsalted butter
40 g white chocolate (chips or chopped bar)
rainbow sprinkles

1. Preheat oven to 300º.
2. Beat butter and sugars together in a large mixing bowl until pale and creamy.
3. Add egg and beat until combined.
4. Sift flour, cocoa, and baking powder on top of the wet ingredients and stir until combined.
5. Use a cookie scoop to portion cookie balls onto parchment-lined baking sheet.
6. Bake cookies for 15 minutes, until baked through. Cool on wire rack.
7.While cookies are baking, make filling: combine marshmallows and 20 g butter in a small saucepan and cook over low, stirring constantly, until smooth. Off heat, add chocolate and stir until smooth. Set aside to cool. (It will get firm and sticky instantly, so I transferred it quickly to a bowl to cool.)
8. Match cookies up by size. Put filling on one side, put another cookie on top, and sprinkle the sprinkles around the outside.

Sourdough seed rye: Mellow Bakers finale

2012-01-06T20:57:00.000-06:00

Well here we are at the end! (again) When I was nearing the end of the BBA Challenge and wondering, "What in the heck am I going to do without a new bread to bake every week?!" Paul suggested a Mellow group...a group of bakers who would spend two years baking through Jeffrey Hamelman's amazing book Bread. Even though I wasn't quite finished with the BBA, I happily jumped on board.

And here we are...94 weeks and 64 breads later.

I've thoroughly enjoyed participating on the ever-helpful Mellow Bakers forum and meeting so many wonderful bread bakers. And of course trying so many new bread formulas and techniques. I feel like the BBA introduced me to bread baking and taught me so many basics. Baking through Bread turned me into a bread baker. My confidence has improved a ton, as well as my knowledge, and not many recipes intimidate me anymore.

My top recipes from the book (all of which have been made repeatedly) are:

Rustic Bread
Bialys
Brioche
Whole wheat multigrain levain
Pain de mie

There is some talk on the forum about choosing a new book and starting a new challenge. At this point, I think I will probably purchase whichever book is picked so that I can bake along occasionally, but I will not plan to bake my way through another bread book. My family is really excited about the possibility of getting to pick their past favorites and have me actually be willing to bake them again because I'm not so worried about finishing breads for a challenge! :)And I'm excited to be able to bake things that look/sound good from various sources.

So the last bread I baked was actually a December bread that I missed with all of the holiday baking last month. Having just made the roasted garlic (which hubby says makes the most excellent eggs in a nest, FYI) and the 66% sourdough rye, and knowing how anti-seed breads my kiddos are, I only made a 1/4 of the recipe, enough for one small loaf. I made the levain and the flax seed soaker late at night, and then mixed the dough together after work on Friday (bread flour, rye flour, toasted sesame and sunflower seeds, the flax seed soaker, the levain, salt, and water). The dough was quite wet, but developed a lot of strength after two stretch-and-folds. (Never one to let bread dough get in the way of life, this bread actually came with us to the Children's Museum. It had a lot of fun watching the kids play, and I folded it at 50 minute intervals...after thoroughly washing my hands of course!) :) Once we got home, I shaped it into a round loaf and, as JH recommends, left it in the fridge for an overnight rest. Surprisingly, it took the full 40 minutes to bake the small loaf; I'm guessing because it was still cold from the fridge. The bread is quite dense, with excellent flavor from the toasted seeds.

bread dough playing at the Children's Museum

66% Sourdough rye (Mellow Bakers)

2012-01-04T17:23:00.001-06:00

I made this bread (a Mellow Bakers from December) over the weekend, while making the roasted garlic levain, but I passed it on to my official sourdough rye taster (my dad) and had to wait for his report. (My first December bread was the unkneaded six-fold French bread, which I made this past summer.)

The 66% sourdough rye was similar to many of the other sourdough ryes we've made. Actually the enormous number of sourdough ryes has been my biggest struggle with this challenge, since it is not a favorite bread around here and there are just so many different versions.

I made the sourdough starter and let it ripen over night. The next morning, I mixed everything (rye flour, bread flour, some vital wheat gluten to fill in for the high-gluten flour, water, salt, and a pinch of instant yeast) together in my stand mixer. I often have the problem of my dough hook refusing to mix ryes, especially when I've cut down the recipe and there's not much dough in the bowl. The hook ends up mashing around on top of the bowl without ever actually doing much kneading. So I tried a new technique: I saved a little of the bread flour and sprinkled it around the outside of the dough. It seemed to do the trick, giving the dough hook a little something to latch on to, and the dough actually kneaded well.

Once everything was kneaded, this was actually a really quick bread, with two very short rises and then a quick bake. After a 24 hour rest, my dad reports that the bread was delicious with butter for breakfast along with his tea. Nothing unusual about it, just another good sourdough rye. My dad will definitely be the only one in the family sad to see the end to all of these rye breads.

Roasted garlic levain (Mellow Bakers)

2012-01-04T17:19:00.002-06:00

Here we are at the final month of the Mellow Bakers...hard to believe! I actually made the other two January breads already, the semolina in December when I was looking for a quick one-day bread for dinner one night and the five-grain levain over a year ago.

This weekend I refreshed my starter in preparation for my last three breads (my last January bread and two December ones that I missed). When it was good and bubbly, I mixed up sourdough builds for all three (I later realized that I forgot to make the soaker for the sourdough seed bread, so I only ended up making the 66% sourdough rye and this one, roasted garlic levain).

I followed the instructions from KAF for roasting heads of garlic (I needed less than half of one for the half recipe, but I made two heads and dumped the rest of the cloves in a baggie with some olive oil and stuck it in the freezer).

I mixed all the ingredients in my stand mixer (bread flour, whole wheat flour, olive oil, water, instant yeast, salt, garlic, and the levain). I let the bread rise for two hours with a fold in the middle. I shaped the loaf into a long oval and then life got in the way. I ended up changing our dinner plans and the loaf went into the fridge for 24 hours. The loaf exploded in the fridge. I was nervous about slashing it, but decided to risk it, and sure enough it started deflating immediately. Happily, it recovered somewhat in the oven.

We ate the bread with our favorite chicken-veggie-noodle soup. My little guy who usually only likes white breads of the ciabatta/French bread/dinner roll variety actually gobbled up two big pieces. Hubby loved it (no surprise there). The garlic flavor was consistent but not overpowering, and it paired especially nicely with the soup.

From tragedy to triumph

2011-12-31T10:06:00.002-06:00

Or from cake disaster to delicious dessert, at any rate: bombe cake to the rescue!

My baby sister's birthday is New Year's Eve. She loves chocolate, but we were going to celebrate her birthday in the evening, and frankly, too much chocolate in the evenings makes for a really impossible bedtime for us. When I saw this new recipe for a moist yellow cake (better than a box!) with a fudgy frosting from KAF, I thought it might be just the thing.

Late the night before our party, I baked up the cake. I followed the recipe exactly, but when I opened the oven, I saw this:

My cake had completely fallen in the center. I'd never seen anything like it; I'm not sure the picture does it justice, but the sides were a full 2" high and the center had sunk to maybe 1/2". There was no way frosting could salvage this cake. I was really bummed; I definitely didn't have time to make another cake. What to do?

Suddenly I was hit with inspiration: what if I tore the cake apart and used it to create something like the ultra-successful devil's food bombe I made this summer? I knew it would need a thicker frosting than the fudge frosting that was posted with the cake recipe, so I browsed around some more on KAF's website and found this one: super-simple chocolate frosting, supposedly quick and easy, and should be thick enough to hold the cake together. With my plan in mind, I went to sleep.

The next morning, I got to work. I sliced the cake into layers (because of the sunken middle, most were missing a center) and used pieces to fill up the bottom of a small mixing bowl. I spread some frosting (which really was quick and easy...and delicious!), then more cake, more frosting, more cake, and on, until I reached the top of the bowl. I was able to get two slices that were big enough for the top of the bowl and actually had centers, so they covered the top of the bowl. After several hours in the fridge, I slipped the cake from the bowl and used the rest of the frosting to cover the cake.

The kiddos were very excited to decorate Auntie R's birthday cake.

It was a huge hit, and no one knew that this cake was not what was intended (until I told them, of course). :)

Happy birthday, little sister!

Wordless Wednesday: Merry Christmas to me!

2011-12-28T15:44:00.001-06:00

Baking with Julia and some new plates for blog pictures from my hubby.
A well-loved and well-used hand-me-down from my dad:
his copy of Modern French Culinary Art.

The rest is from my first-ever cooking store shopping spree,
also courtesy of my awesome hubby.

What to get for the lady who has everything

2011-12-26T21:09:00.002-06:00

My stepmom is one of those people who is impossible to shop for. She spent many years as an independent career woman, and when she wants something, she gets it for herself. Christmas becomes something of a trial then, because she can't think of anything that she wants.....usually, I end up buying her some jammies.

This year, though, just before Christmas, KAF posted this blog post about Pecan and Salted Caramel Candies, and I was inspired. My stepmom loves turtles...whenever we're looking for a special little thank you candy treat, I always pick her up a little box. What about homemade turtles?!

Part of the fun for me is making things as homemade as possible, so while I used the KAF post for inspiration, I didn't really want to settle for using store-bought blocks of caramel or wafers of chocolate.

I've made caramel sauce before, but never caramel candies. After some research, I finally settled on this recipe from David Lebovitz for salted butter caramels. I followed his recipe exactly, except that I'd calibrated by thermometers just before and adjusted the temperatures accordingly. (I say thermometers because, while I have a candy thermometer, I don't really trust it...so I use it to give me an approximate sense of where we are and then pull out my thermapen for exact readings as I get close.)

I found this recipe by Emeril for homemade turtles, so while I used a different recipe for the caramel, I used Emeril's for technique. I toasted pecans for 10 minutes in a 350º oven, stirring half-way through. Then I arranged them (I couldn't quite achieve Emeril's star-shaped pattern) into eight piles on a buttered jelly roll pan.

I poured the caramel into a loaf pan (an 8" instead of a 9") and let it cool for about 10 minutes. Then I used an oiled tablespoon to pour a tablespoon of caramel over each pecan stack. The caramel definitely stayed in place better after the 10 minute rest (the caramel I tried to pour immediately just ran all over).

While the caramel was hardening, I cut up a 4 ounce bar of chocolate (60%) and melted it. Once it had cooled to 80º, I used a spoon to pour it over the turtles. (I skipped the shortening that Emeril called for.) Not knowing how she'd feel about salted caramels, I sprinkled sea salt over half of the turtles and left the other half plain.

Because I only made eight, hubby and I didn't actually get to try any of the turtles. But, and I am not normally a caramel person, the buttered salted caramels were amazing...especially sprinkled with a little sea salt and dipped into some of the leftover chocolate!

Show-stopper!

2011-12-22T20:25:00.001-06:00

When hubby told me that his work holiday party was going to be on Wednesday, I was thrilled....for the first time ever, our schools actually had parties on the same day! AND we both signed up for dessert. That meant I could make one dessert, split it in two, and call it a day. Hurray!

I wanted a show-stopping recipe, so I put out a call to my Twitter baking buddies for suggestions...and then spent hours and hours on my computer reading all of their suggested recipes and all of the associated comments for each recipe.....What? Doesn't everyone do that?? :) That's why I love having online baking friends...they understand things like that when most of my real-life friends say, "Why don't you just run to the store and pick up a couple of boxes of cookies?!"

Nancy and Di both gave two-thumbs up to this recipe from Dorie Greenspan, and when I gave hubby a few choices, it was the one he picked: Black forest torte, called cherry fudge brownie torte by the Tuesdays with Dorie crew.

The recipe was a process, including lighting dried cherries on fire! It was my first time ever trying to flambé anything, and it was quite exciting. :)

I made a full recipe of the brownie cake, but divided it between two six-inch pans. Because I don't have any mini springforms, I just used my two six-inch cake pans. I tipped out the brownies from the pans, and once they were cool enough, hubby built me a couple of parchment collars and then came up with the brilliant idea of using binder clips to hold the parchment together after we'd tried and failed with every kind of tape in the house.

The marscapone-cream cheese mousse layer was pretty easy to make, and we dumped half on each brownie with its collar, threw them in the fridge, and went to bed.

The next morning, I attempted to pipe some leftover preserves onto the top of my cake. It didn't go very well, so I just sprinkled hubby's with cocoa. And then we brought them to work.

To say this recipe is a show-stopper is an understatement! I walked into the lounge at the end of the day to witness people picking at the plate and having "just one more tiny nibble." Apparently there were huge debates going on in first lunch about whether the torte was homemade (everyone voted that it was purchased at a bakery...is it just me, or is that the greatest compliment ever?). Today, a coworker said, "It was just so mind-blowingly good!" Apparently hubby's coworkers were still talking about it today, too.

Oh, and we all loved it, too. I'm not usually a cherry fan, but I really liked the chocolate-cherry combination in this brownie, and the addition of the chunks of chocolate. It was so fudgy and dense and delicious. And the mousse layer was just divine...I could've eaten a bowl of it! :) Hubby's email, after he first took a taste, read, "OMG, sooooooooo ridiculously good!!!!!!!"

Wordlessish Wednesday: Gift bags

2011-12-20T17:32:00.002-06:00

Gift bags for preschool teachers and our co-workers.

Hot-chocolate-on-a-stick (to dissolve in milk or just eat plain):
idea, cocoa blocks, marshmallows, and

candy cane biscotti dipped in white and dark chocolate.
And many thanks to Di for gift bag inspiration. :)

Twitter avatar fun: Jamie Oliver and a recap

2011-12-19T20:43:00.002-06:00

About a year ago, Nancy suggested that a bunch of us Twitter pals liven up our avatars by choosing a chef-of-the-month, cooking one of his or her recipes, and using a picture of the dish as our avatar for the month. I have had such great fun exploring many new-to-me chefs and trying out different styles of meals!

Our December chef was Jamie Oliver, and he was actually chosen by a group vote. Although I've heard a bunch about JO, I'd never actually tried one of his recipes. I spent a bunch of time browsing on his site, and actually enjoyed reading the articles as much as perusing the recipes. I love his commitment to teaching kids about nutrition and how to prepare their own healthy foods ~ especially as someone who witnesses the nutritional habits of teens on a daily basis!

Life has been a bit hectic these days, so (as seems to be usual for me), I choose a recipe for a good dinner rather than picking something that would make a good avatar picture. Ever the practical one, that's me! :) I picked Jamie's chicken tikka masala (recipe here). The dish took about an hour and a half to prepare (which includes a 30 minute marinade of the chicken) and smelled absolutely delicious. It made a nice dinner, but I have to say that we much prefer a similar recipe that I've been making for the past couple of years: chicken with curried tomato almond sauce (found on the Daring Cooks website). That recipe contains cinnamon and peas, both of which lend the dish just a hint of sweetness that was missing tonight. Still, we all enjoyed dinner and I look forward to trying more JO recipes!

And now, the recap:

January: Thomas Keller's caramel corn
February: James Beard's snickerdoodle pear cake (a quick and easy favorite!)
March: Emeril's cheese crackers
April: Jaques Pepin's ricotta dumplings
May: David Chang's steak lettuce wraps
June: Eric Reipert's shrimp and rice pilaf
July: Ina's barbecue sauce and mashed potatoes (a big hit, especially on bbq pizza!)
August: Rick Bayless' shredded chicken with potatoes and tomatoes (we loved it!)
September: Nigella's pumpkin seafood curry
October: Mark Bittman's banana chocoalte-chip pancakes (now in the dinner rotation!)
November: Ghillie Basan's veggie tagine
December: Jamie Oliver's tikka masala

Sour cream brownies (Modern Baker)

2011-12-17T17:36:00.002-06:00

My bookclub enjoyed the brownies paired with homemade marshmallows.

My fourth Nick Malgieri brownie recipe is another from the cookies & bars section of The Modern Baker. This one is made with technique similar to the others (truffle, Florida, and cocoa nib), but includes the addition of sour cream and walnuts. I knew that most of the people I was baking for (my kiddos and my debaters) wouldn't eat the nut version, so I actually made the recipe walnut-free and then stirred walnuts into the batter in one corner of the pan.

For all of the other brownie recipes, the 30 minute cooking time seemed perfect (even when I only made a half-recipe in an 8x8 pan), but for this one, I wondered if they might have been slightly over-baked. The toothpick test came out mostly clean. Nevertheless, these were a big hit with the kids, hubby, friends, and students. The one brownie I sampled okay; these were definitely my least favorite of his brownies...not that that's saying much, since the rest are so out-of-this-world fantastic!

Homemade marshmallows

2011-12-16T20:42:00.000-06:00

Homemade marshmallows have been on my to-do list for a long time. I've bookmarked several recipes: one from Deb at Smitten Kitchen, one from David Leibovitz, one from Alton Brown, and most recently, one from King Arthur Flour. Whenever I'm bored, I start reading the recipes and all of the comments and think, "I really have to try these soon!" And then I get too overwhelmed at the prospect of all that mess.

The AB and KAF ones simply use sugar, corn syrup, salt, cold water, and gelatine. The ones Deb and DL posted both use egg whites. All four have pretty terrific reviews. In the interest of ease (and because I was inspired to start the process when it was nearly bedtime), I decided to go the non-egg white route, although I ended up bouncing back and forth between the four sites, using tidbits of advice from each. I started the process at about 8:30 and the marshmallows were ready to dry in their pan by 9:15, so really, it was easier than I expected.

I started by pouring cold water over gelatine in my stand mixer bowl. Then I boiled sugar, corn syrup, salt, and water until the sugar dissolved, and left it to boil untouched until it reached 238º on my instant thermometer (I actually tested my thermometer for the first time, and learned that my water boils at 210º).

Then I started my mixer on low and slowly slowly slowly drizzled the hot sugar down the side of the bowl. I increased the mixer's speed to 8 and mixed until the marshmallow was lukewarm (about 8 minutes). Thanks to Deb's warning not to touch anything! I resisted the urge to scrape the bowl and, I believe, saved myself the headache of the marshmallows sticking to everything in sight.

Finally, I used an oil-coated rubber spatula to spread it into my prepared pan, a 9x13 pan coated with a little coconut oil and then dusted with a confectioner's sugar/cornstarch mixture. I sifted some more sugar/cornstarch over the top and left the pan to sit overnight.

Today, I pulled the marshmallow slab out of the pan and put it onto a cutting board, and then used oil-coated scissors to cut it into pieces. I tried using a mini-cookie cutter to make fun shapes, but it was way too sticky. So the kids each made heart-shaped marshmallow and then I went back to cutting with the scissors. After cutting, I threw the cubes into a bowl of confectioner's sugar, stirred them to coat, and then set them in a strainer to shake off the excess sugar.

I can't believe I waited so long! These were a huge hit with the kiddos and the hubby; I'm not a huge marshmallow fan like they are, but even I couldn't resist grabbing a fluffy bite every time I walked past the pan. Next up, the egg white version!

Three-way gingersnaps (Modern Baker)

2011-12-14T19:44:00.000-06:00

Several of my Twitter pals were baking together from The Modern Baker this past weekend. I really wanted to join in and make the three-way gingersnaps, but a debate tournament and a family trip to the science museum ate up my weekend and left me with no time for baking.

But those gingersnaps were calling my name, so last night, I quickly whipped up a half-batch. These are called three-way gingersnaps because they're made with three different forms of ginger: ground ginger, fresh ginger root, and chopped crystallized ginger. (I didn't find fresh ginger root when we were grocery shopping this weekend, so I used bottled minced ginger from the fridge.)

The gingersnaps also have honey instead of the traditional molasses, so they were a little lighter in color.

These were absolutely delicious. In fact, the half-batch (about 3 1/2 trays of cookies) is just about gone. My dad, who loves gingersnaps, said they may have been the best he's ever eaten. I am positive we'll be making these again...maybe even within the week! :)

Semolina bread (Mellow Bakers)

2011-12-11T19:46:00.002-06:00

Even after all of this time, sometimes the miracle of bread baking just gets me. Tonight, sitting at the dinner table, eating yummy winter veggie soup and pillowy fresh semolina bread, I kind of couldn't believe that the idea to have bread and soup for dinner hadn't occurred to me until 9 a.m. this morning!

When the dinner idea occurred to me, I searched my final five! remaining Mellow Bakers for a nice one-day recipe; there was one left: semolina (duram) bread. There was also an option with a whole-grain soaker, but the kids aren't been fans of seeds, so I went with the simpler version.

I made the sponge out of duram flour, bread flour, warm water, yeast, and sugar. I let it rise for a little over an hour, and then combined it with the rest of the duram flour, bread flour, water, and some salt and olive oil. The dough was given one fold half-way through the bulk fermentation. Inspired by the BBA pane siciliano, I shaped this into a long baguette and then curled it into an S.

We loved it! The bread was soft and pillowy with an excellent flavor; it paired beautifully with the soup.

Peppernuts! (cookie exchange)

2011-12-04T08:53:00.000-06:00

I did try to get a picture without my little assistant's hand in it,

but it was impossible, so I gave up. :)

I've been enjoying all of the virtual meals and exchanges going on lately; the round-ups are an excellent source of new cooking/baking ideas! So when Di invited me to participate in this year's virtual cookie exchange, it was a no-brainer...the only problem was deciding what to bake.

My mother-in-law is the queen of Christmas cookie baking. When we used to spend Christmas with my in-laws in Montana (before having kids negated the idea of driving the treacherous mountain passes in the winter), hubby and I would trip over each other to be the first to get to the treat shelf. The treat shelf includes tins, baggies, and boxes of heath bars, cinnamon candy, crescent cookies, fudge, beef jerky, peppernuts, pizzelles, chocolate chip cookies, peanut blossoms, sugar cookies...all homemade.

Hubby's favorite cookies in the world are his mom's crescent cookies, so I thought briefly of making those. But he looks forward to that package more than anything each year, and somehow it seems wrong to make them here. :) So then I thought of one of my favorites: peppernuts. I'd never had peppernuts before meeting my in-laws, but I was immediately drawn to the crunchy, spicy little cookies. Hubby and I always took a big baggie of them with us on the drive home, and when the curvy roads would make me a little sick, they were the only thing I could eat. Did you know that ginger is a great remedy for an upset tummy?

My mother-in-law is one of those "by feel" bakers, telling me to add stuff until it looks a certain way or "to taste" (which was so hard for me before I became more confident in the kitchen!). I'm including weights and measures for what I used, but for the flour, you really have to just keep adding it until the batter is stiff enough to roll/shape into ropes. The only other change I made to the recipe was to use unsalted butter in place of shortening.

Anita's Peppernuts
makes about 560 bite-sized cookies

2 c (400g) sugar
1 c (113g) unsalted butter, softened
2 eggs (100g)
2/3 c (160g) sour cream
2/3 c (160g) brown sugar
2 tsp (10g) anise extract
1 1/2 tsp (4g) ground cloves
1 T (6g) ground cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp (3g) ground ginger
1 1/2 tsp (3g) ground allspice
1/2 tsp ground pepper
2 2/3+ c (335g - 600g) all-purpose flour

1. Preheat the oven to 400º.

2. Cream the sugar and butter in a mixer.

3. Add the eggs, sour cream, brown sugar, and extract, and mix to combine.

4. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour and the spices.

5. Add the flour mix to the wet ingredients and stir to combine. You may need to adjust the flour to get a stiff dough. (My MIL's initial recipe called to start with 2 2/3 c flour, which weighed about 335g; I ended up using about 560g of flour, and my dough was still rather sticky.) Some recipes I saw called for chilling the dough before rolling it out. I tried it both ways (rolling right away and chilling for a while) and didn't notice a difference; then I chilled the dough overnight and they were much easier to roll the next day.

6. Take a small portion of dough and roll/pinch it into a rope about 1/2" thick. Using a knife or bench scraper, cut the rope into really small pieces (1/2" long). Fill up a baking pan; these don't rise, so feel free to stick them close together.

7. Bake the trays for 10-11 minutes or until cookies are lightly golden. (You have to experiment with the texture you like; 12 minutes will make a really crunchy cookie. Hubby and I both prefer them crunchy on the outside but a little soft on the inside, so 11 minutes was about perfect for us. The batch that chilled in the fridge overnight took closer to 13 minutes.)

8. Let cool for a couple of minutes on the tray, and then use a spatula to transfer them to a bowl.

These cookies will last for quite a while, stored in an airtight container. You can also freeze them.

Be sure to check out Di's site later this week for the round-up of all of the delicious cookies people baked!

Caramel crumb bars (Modern Baker)

2011-12-03T19:07:00.001-06:00

I guess it says something that I'd already made three cookie/bar recipes from the Modern Baker Challenge by December 2nd, only two days into our first cookie month! There's just something about a good cookie recipe: quick and easy to whip up, fun to share, loved by everyone.

These caramel crumb bars were no exception, although this recipe does have a few more steps than your typical cookie or brownie recipe. Make a dough (softened butter, sugar, salt, vanilla extract, and flour), press it into a pan, and let it chill. Make the filling (butter, corn syrup, dark brown sugar, and sweetened condensed milk), and let it cool.

Then assemble: spread the filling over the dough, sprinkle with the crumb topping (just extra dough with a little bit of extra flour added until it makes a crumble) and bake. Being the confirmed chocoholic that I am, I prefer the brownie recipes, but these were a big hit with the family and my students.

Cocoa nib brownies (Modern Baker Challenge)

2011-11-25T12:43:00.001-06:00

When I gave my copy of The Modern Baker to my hubby so he could choose my "official" blogging cookie for the cookie section of the Challenge, he immediately picked cocoa nib brownies. I didn't commit, though, because I had no idea where to get cocoa nibs.

One of the best parts of being a part of this blogging community, besides having other people who love to talk about food as much as me, is getting advice and ideas. Melanie mentioned that she saw cocoa nibs at Whole Foods, and even though we live in different parts of the country, I checked and sure enough, they had them! Lucky hubby. :)

The brownies are made with a similar method to the truffle brownies and Florida brownies from Bake!, both of which are now family favorites. The butter is melted until it sizzles, and then the chocolate is added and allowed to melt. Meanwhile, the brown sugar is mixed with the eggs, and then salt, sugar, and vanilla are added. The chocolate-butter mixture is stirred in with a spatula, and then the flour is folded in. Finally half of the cocoa nibs are added to the batter and the rest of them are sprinkled over the top.

As with the other brownie recipes, NM says to refrigerate them overnight before cutting them. He also warns that it may be hard to pull the foil off the brownies because they're so moist; he's not wrong about that! Of course, when little pieces broke off, we just had to sample them, even though they hadn't been cooled overnight. These are so good! NM says, "Nibs are unsweetened, so they have to be used somewhat sparingly to avoid imparting a bitter...flavor. They're the perfect counterpoint to this fudgy brownie recipe, adding a little texture and a bit of balance to the batter's natural sweetness." I couldn't agree more!

Because they're so rich, I cut them into little 1" squares. I brought some to school to share with some of my debaters who helped to give a grant presentation the other day. Hubby brought some in to share with his coworkers; when he turned around, the container was empty. I had a little container leftover, saved for my photos, and asked hubby for permission to bring them to share with my coworkers....you should've seen the look I got! He was not going to give any more away! :) By the way, these are great alone, but even more excellent with a little scoop of vanilla bean ice cream.

Five-grain sourdough with rye sourdough (Mellow Bakers)

2011-11-25T12:24:00.001-06:00

My final November Mellow Bakers bread is a five-grain sourdough made with a rye sourdough. At the same time that the sourdough is prepared, a soaker is also prepared: flaxseeds, rye flakes, sunflower seeds, oats, and salt are all soaked in water.

After an overnight rest, the sourdough and soaker are combined with high-gluten flour (I used bread flour and vital wheat gluten), instant yeast, honey, and water. My dough was quite wet and I was a little nervous, but after an hour's rise (with no folds), the dough was actually easy to shape. I made a 2 pound loaf for my oval banneton and then two 2-ounce dinner rolls (I'd made a half-recipe).

The kids didn't like the bread, which was no surprise; they don't like seeds in breads. I really love multigrains, but found the rye flavor a little too strong; it was okay, but not a favorite. Hubby really enjoyed the bread with soup, as eggs in a nest, and with Thanksgiving leftovers.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-11-24T20:01:00.001-06:00

Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate it!

And to everyone out there, I hope your day was filled with lots of love and good food.
Thanks for cooking and baking and talking about food with me! :)

Butterscotch chocolate chip cookies (Modern Baker)

2011-11-18T10:54:00.001-06:00

Oh, you have no idea how excited I am to start this section! Cookies are technically supposed to be our last section of the Modern Baker Challenge, but knowing how many cookies people generally bake at this time of year, our brilliant leaders/members decided to flip-flop the final two sections. Looking at the list of possibilities, I positively could not commit to which recipes to pick; they all sound and look so good!

My first choice would probably have been these butterscotch chocolate chip cookies, but they'd already been taken.......But wait! Just because I'm not the official blogger doesn't mean I can't try them, right? Right! :)

I made these to bring to my debate class to thank them for their hard work hosting a middle school debate tournament last week.

I was surprised by the technique. You start by mixing softened butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and eggs in a stand mixer, just until blended. Usually you cream these ingredients for quite a while, but NM warns against over-mixing, so I really just mixed them until they all came together. Then you gently fold in the flour mixture (flour, salt, and baking soda) with a rubber spatula. I was worried that it wouldn't all come together; it just seemed impossible to get all of the flour incorporated. But with patience, it worked and I had smooth cookie dough with no extra flour. Then I folded in a lot of chocolate. NM calls for 6 ounces of chopped bittersweet chocolate and 6 ounces of chopped milk chocolate. I had a 4 ounce bar of bittersweet, so I used that. And then about 6 ounces of semi-sweet chocolate chunks. Even missing 2 ounces of chocolate, I felt like this batter was more chocolate than cookie.

The cookies are placed in teaspoon-sized rounds on the cookie sheets. NM says to cook two trays for 15 minutes, rotating the trays halfway. By 12 minutes, both of my trays were burned. I'm not sure if they were really supposed to be tablespoon-sized? Or if 15 minutes is just way too long? NM's baking times are usually pretty accurate for my oven. I experimented and ended up finding that 10 minutes, baking one tray at a time, seemed about perfect. I was able to get about two trays of good cookies. (I figured high schoolers would eat the burned ones anyway!) So be sure to watch these carefully!!

As for the flavor...they are definitely butterscotchy/toffee-y in flavor and texture and very chocolatey. These are quite different from our normal more traditional chocolate chip cookie recipe, and quite addictive. The containers of cookies (the "good" ones as well as the slightly-overdone ones) lasted all of about 30 seconds in class....and one of my kids asked me to make them again for Monday. :)

Bake! Chocolate meringue tart

2011-11-15T11:55:00.001-06:00

Gr. I purposefully left a mini tart so I could take a photo this afternoon.

And then forgot about it until it was dark again.

This only being home for one hour of daylight is killer on the food photography.

This weekend's Bake! pick was Margaret's; she picked chocolate meringue tart (or chocolate marshmellow pie, as my kids called it).

This one should've been easy, except that my little guy who is usually asleep by 7:00 was up until 9:30 last night, which meant this was definitely a case of distracted baking.

For the tart crust, NM calls for flaky pastry crust. I had a tart crust in the freezer, just labeled "tart crust," so I'm not sure which recipe it was (or even from which book, Modern Baker or Bake!). Either way, I divided it in half, used half to make three 4" crusts, rolled them out (easily!), and put them in the fridge to chill. (I used the other half to make this apple tart that Nancy posted earlier today; perfect for a bit of left-over tart crust and a few leftover apples.)

Meanwhile, I made the chocolate cream (a half-batch, which filled the three mini tart crusts and a large-ish ramekin): whole milk, sugar, half-and-half, corn starch, eggs, and bittersweet chocolate. Margaret had a problem with her cream not setting up...mine went the other way. It was really close for a long time...and then something happened with the little guy and when I looked back, it was so thick I could barely stir it. I was worried that it would taste curdled or lumpy, but the texture was actually perfect.

I baked the mini tart crusts until they were golden. Unfortunately, I forgot to weigh them down with beans, so they shrunk up quite a bit in the oven. While the crusts and chocolate cream were cooling, I made the meringue.

This part did not go so well. I'm not sure what happened, as I've used NM's method of heating the egg whites, sugar, and salt, and then whipping them before with great success. But mine never thickened up (check out Margaret's for a look at how beautiful and full-bodied it should've been), and again I was dealing with the little-guy-who-wouldn't-sleep, so I just gave up and dumped it on top of the chocolate. I think because of the lack of fluffiness, my meringue took a lot longer to turn golden in the oven.

It didn't matter. Hubby gobbled his mini tart right up. He said that he's normally not crazy about meringue, but he loved the crust and the chocolate, and the meringue had a more marshmellowy texture that was actually quite yummy. So despite everything, a success!

Mellow Bakers: Golden raisin and walnut bread (November)

2011-11-14T19:19:00.000-06:00

Well, my first November bread for Mellow Bakers came with me to daycare and work; this one came with me to the grocery store. It was the only way we could fit in shopping and still get the bread shaped and baked in time. So there I was in the parking lot, oiling up my hands and preshaping...... What we do for our breads! :)

I made a third of this recipe, which was enough for one medium loaf. The bread was made with a stiff biga (bread flour, whole wheat flour, water, and instant yeast), more bread flour, more whole wheat flour, salt, water, instant yeast, and golden raisins and walnuts.

This challenge has definitely changed my family's opinion on breads with fruit and nuts in them. While we used to dislike every one, we've really enjoyed the last couple, and this one was no exception. The walnuts gave a great crunch and the flavor of the bread was really enhanced by the sweetness from the golden raisins. A tasty accompaniment to dinner!

Twitter avatar fun: Ghillie Başan's veggie tagine

2011-11-13T19:25:00.001-06:00

Our November chef for our Twitter avatar fun was Ghillie Başan, chosen by Andrea. She is new to me; according to her website, "Ghillie Başan is known for her informative and evocative books on the culinary cultures of Turkey, the Middle East, North Africa and Southeast Asia." Sounded good to me!

There aren't many of her recipes on the web, but I did find several that sounded intriguing on her site, including the recipe for tagine of yams, carrots, prunes, and honey, a recipe from her book Modern Moroccan.

The recipe calls for yams, but with how many squash we still have in our basement, I did a little checking to see if there were any squash that could be substituted for yams or sweet potatoes. And I found one: delicata, which is even called "sweet potato squash." The recipe called for pearl onions, but I had a leek and some yellow onions in the veggie drawer, so I used them. The final substitution that I made was the stock; this is vegetarian dish which calls for vegetable stock, but I was all out, so I just used low-sodium chicken stock.

And the result? We really enjoyed this side-dish! The veggies are slightly caramelized and quite sweet. It was delicious with a roasted chicken, my most recent Mellow Bakers bread, and fruit.

Tagine of delicata, carrots, prunes and honey
adapted from Ghillie Başan

3 T olive oil
1 T butter
2 c sliced onions (GB calls for pearl onions, but I used a combination of leeks and yellow onions)
3 c peeled and cubed (bite-sized) delicata (GB calls for 2 lbs yams or sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces)
1 1/2 c cubed (bite-sized) carrots
3 T honey
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger
5 oz soft, pitted prunes, cut in half
16 oz low-sodium chicken stock (GB calls for vegetable stock)
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
chopped cilantro

1. Preheat the oven to 400º.
2. In a large dutch oven, heat the olive oil and butter. Add the onions and cook over medium heat until tender, about 3 - 4 minutes. Remove half of the onions and set aside.
3. Add the delicata and carrots to the pan, increase the heat to medium-high and cook until lightly browned, about 6 - 8 minutes.
4. Add the prunes, spices, and honey. Stir. Then pour in the stock, salt, and pepper. Stir and cover.
5. Put into the oven and cook for 45 minutes. Add the rest of the onions and cook an additional 10 minutes.
6. Sprinkle with cilantro and serve.

Ceremonial mask bread (Mellow Bakers: fougasse with olives)

2011-11-09T20:33:00.003-06:00

Hubby thought it looked like a ceremonial mask

My first November Mellow Bakers bread is an olive fougasse. I made half a recipe, which made one loaf, and I could've easily made the whole thing as the entire loaf was demolished in no time.

This bread got squished into life; it's the first time I've ever taken a bread-in-progress with me to work. :) I made the paté fermentée at dinner time and mixed the dough together the next morning before work. (Luckily it was fast to knead the bread flour, whole wheat flour, water, salt, instant yeast, olive oil, paté fermentée, and olives, as hubby was shooting me dirty looks because I was making us late!!) Carrying my little measuring cup of dough, I brought it to daycare drop-off and then to work. Right before the students arrived, I scrubbed my hands, did a quick stretch-and-fold, and threw my dough into the fridge. At the end of the day, I pulled the dough and let it come to room temperature during our faculty meeting. I preshaped the dough into a round while I was picking up the kiddos from daycare, and then we headed home. There I rolled out the dough, let it rise while I made the night's soup, and then baked it up. It was finished in 20 minutes and ready to eat five minutes after that.
As I said, a big hit with the fam, and while scheduling was interesting, it wasn't too challenging to make for a quick bread and soup dinner.

Fougasse with green olives

Thanksgiving dinner: Butternut squash bisque

2011-11-06T08:07:00.000-06:00

I love Thanksgiving dinner. No, I mean I really love it. It has always been my favorite meal of the year, and I've actually always insisted on the exact same meal for Christmas, just so I can eat it again (although I am trying to branch out a little more to honor my hubby's preferences). I love turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, pumpkin pie, apple pie, green bean casserole...and I really love leftovers.

So when Phyl, host of our pumpkin dinner a few weeks ago, offered (with maybe a little pressure?) ;) to host a virtual Thanksgiving dinner, I was so excited! So excited, in fact, that when he asked us to pick a menu item, I just couldn't decide; I love them all! I went back and forth (our famous mashed potatoes? my dad's awesome sausage wild rice stuffing? my mother-in-law's pumpkin pie? my mom's yummy turkey?) until finally all of the categories had been taken by others and I was left with........soup. Which we've never served at Thanksgiving dinner. Hm.

Luckily, Phyl recently sent several of us a great new Thanksgiving cookbook, so I started paging through...and came across butternut squash bisque. Now, I've mentioned our abundance of squash on more than one occasion; clearly, this soup was meant to be.

The recipe states that the soup can be made up to three days ahead of time, so I made the soup on Monday night and served it on Wednesday. It was easy to make, delicately-flavored, and delicious! It's one of those soups that feels creamy and indulgent, but actually only has a small amount of cream, with much of the texture imparted from the squash itself. I thought the garnish of fried sage leaves and popcorn seemed a little fussy, but they actually only took a few minutes to pull together and they really added something special to the final product; I'd definitely include them again.

Butternut squash bisque
from The New Thanksgiving Table by Diane Morgan

for the soup
2 pounds butternut squash (I used a 4.5 pound squash and used half for the soup, which ended up being about 2 pounds of puree)
2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
2 large granny smith apples, halved and cored
4 cups chicken broth (DM recommends homemade stock, but gives the alternative of canned low-sodium broth, which is what I used)
1/2 c heavy cream
1/4 tsp freshly grated nutmeg (I probably used closer to 1/2 tsp)
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper (the recipe actually says "salt and pepper to taste" but that drives me crazy; I need a starting point. I used 1/2 tsp of each, which seemed close to perfect, and then I sprinkled just a tiny pinch more)

for the garnish
3/4 c oil (I used safflower)
1/3 c fresh sage leaves
kosher salt
popcorn (DM suggests a mini bag of microwave popcorn, but we never have that in the house; I just had hubby make me a small batch of air-popped)

1. Preheat the oven to 350º.
2. Peel and cube the squash into 2" pieces. Toss with 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Spread in a single layer on a jelly roll pan. Place the apples, cut side down, on the sheet. Roast for 30 - 35 minutes or until the squash and apples are tender. (I didn't read this until too late, and roasted the squash the way I always do: peeled it, sliced it in half, took out the innards, and roasted the halve on a buttered piece of foil for about 2 hours. I added the apples when there were 30 minutes left on the timer.)
3. Purée the squash and apple (without the skins) in a food processor until smooth. Add 1 cup stock and process until smooth.
4. In a large (4-quart) saucepan, whisk the squash/apple mixture, the rest of the chicken stock, the cream, the nutmeg, and the sugar. Bring to a boil and then simmer for 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
5. Make the garnish: heat the oil in an 8" sauté pan until it reaches 365º. Fry half the sage leaves for 5 seconds, remove with a slotted spoon, and place on a paper-towel-lined plate. Then fry the second half.
6. To serve: ladle the soup into bowls or mugs and garnish with the sage leaves and popcorn.

Be sure to check Phyl's site later this week for the rest of this yummy Thanksgiving meal!

Bake! Ekmek, Turkish flatbread

2011-10-31T20:29:00.000-05:00

Our next Bake! pick was chosen by Andrea, and she picked Ekmek, basic Turkish flat bread. This was made with NM's basic Middle Eastern flatbread dough (bread flour, salt, yeast, water, and olive oil). The dough was extremely wet and hard to handle, but once again proved to me the power of the stretch-and-fold. When it finished mixing, I had to basically pour it into the bowl. After twenty minutes, I scraped it onto a lightly-dusted counter and gave it a stretch-and-fold...instantly I could see and feel the dough strengthen.

Although NM says not to let the dough rise for too long, there was no way I could make the bread in one day with the teaching-coaching-momming schedule, so I stuck the basic dough in the fridge. This afternoon, I pulled it out and continued with the rest of the Ekmek recipe: preshape the loaf, let it rest, stretch it into a long oval, dimple it, and bake. It worked out perfectly, even with the overnight rest.

I served the bread with our favorite Indian-spiced chicken with tomato chutney, and I haven't seen a meal disappear off the table that quickly in a long time!

As a sidenote: I was a little confused because the basic dough recipe says "makes enough for several flatbreads," but the ekmek recipe says "use one batch of basic dough, makes one loaf." I ended up using a full batch of the basic recipe to make a large ekmek loaf, and the pictures look just like the book, so I think that I made the right choice!

Happy Halloween from Smaug the Dragon and Bob the Builder!

Triple chocolate scones (Modern Baker)

2011-10-27T19:52:00.000-05:00

Hubby and I both had early morning meetings today, and nothing improves an early morning meeting like a shared breakfast treat!

As I always do when I need a quick and yummy breakfast treat, I turned to Nick Malgieri. Like all of the scone recipes in the Modern Baker, these came together in about 20 minutes using the food processor: chocolate, cocoa, sugar, flour, baking powder, salt, butter, an egg, and some milk. They baked in 15 minutes and the first tray was off to hubby's meeting. 15 minutes later, the kids and I packed up the second batch and headed out the door.

These chocolate scones were a huge hit, described by one coworker as chocolately without being too sweet. Hubby said, "They were a nice chocolate scone and then you got the burst of chocolate chunk which just made you say 'Ohhhh yeah!'"

FYI: The Modern Baker was just reissued in a beautiful paperback edition, available here. Nick Malgieri has been incredibly supportive of our Modern Baker Challenge, even commenting on some of our blog posts! Consider picking up a copy of this awesome book. :)

Mellow Bakers: Sunflower seed bread with paté fermentée

2011-10-26T19:43:00.001-05:00

This was one of those clean-out-the-pantry recipes; I was short on a couple of ingredients, so I made a few changes.

Our final October Mellow Baker bread is sunflower seed bread with paté fermentée; I made the paté fermentée first thing in the morning so it would be ready when I wanted to mix up the bread in the evening.

For the soaker, JH calls for rye chops; I used the end of a bag of rye berries (chopped) and the end of a bag of cracked rye. Based on Joanna's comments that the four-hour soak didn't soften the rye chops enough, I used boiling water. This seemed to soften the rye perfectly.

The rest of the dough was made with bread flour, water, salt, instant yeast, malt syrup, and sunflower seeds. My second clean-out-the-pantry was for the seeds: I toasted the end of a bag of sunflower seeds, the end of a bag of pumpkin seeds, and flax seeds.

I made a third of the recipe, which made five large rolls. We really enjoyed them with butter; they reminded me of my favorite seeded dinner rolls at one of my favorite restaurants. A surprise win!

Sesame bread sticks (Mellow Bakers) and winter veggie soup

2011-10-21T19:40:00.003-05:00

My second Mellow Bakers bread for October is a rarity in my bread baking books: the kids and I mixed up the dough for sesame bread sticks when we got home (about 3:00), and we ate the bread sticks for dinner at 5:30....talk about fast!

The dough is made from bread flour, salt, instant yeast, water, olive oil, and malt syrup, mixed together in the stand mixer for about four minutes. It rises for an hour, and then is scaled into 24 pieces weighing about 3/8 ounce each. These rest for 15 minutes and then comes the fun part; Natashya commented that little kids would love to help roll the "snakes," and she was absolutely right. My kids were thrilled to roll the pieces into long snakes, which I lengthened a bit, rolled on a wet cloth, and then rolled through a plate of sesame seeds. They're baked immediately for 20 - 25 minutes (ours were a little fat, so took a little longer).

These were a huge hit, and a perfect accompaniment to one of our new favorite soups. Next time, I'll probably skip the plain sesame seed topping. The kids made me scrape them off so they could eat the bread sticks plain, and the hubby and I preferred the "everything" version I made when I ran out of sesame seeds (sesame seeds, dried garlic, dried onion, and poppy seeds). I kept the sticks in a large zip baggie, and they were still good days later.

And now the soup! Several weeks ago, I was looking for a way to use up some leftover ham and a huge amount of CSA vegetables. I found this recipe, which I doctored based on what we needed to use up. Even if this soup wasn't delicious (which it is!), I would seriously make it just for the gorgeous array of colors in the bowl!

Winter veggie soup
adapted from Cooking Light

2 tsp olive oil
4 oz (125 g) chopped ham or turkey ham
1 large onion (125 g), chopped
2 tsp minced garlic
4 c (520 g) peeled, cubed acorn squash
2 c (315 g) peeled, chopped potatoes
1/2 c (80 g) carrot, chopped
1 tsp dried basil
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1/8 tsp crushed red pepper
28 oz tomatoes (I've used cans of stewed, diced, whole, and even fresh), drained (or not)
4 - 5 c chicken broth
4 cups (130 g) chopped greens (my favorite combination is kale, spinach, and red cabbage)
15 oz can small white beans (I've used pinto, great Northern)

1. Heat the oil in a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the ham and sauté for 3 minutes.
2. Add the onion and garlic and sauté for another 3 minutes.
3. Add the squash, potatoes, carrot, and spices, and cook for 4 minutes.
4. Add the tomatoes, and cook for 2 minutes.
5. Stir in the broth and bring soup to a boil. Simmer for 8 minutes.
6. Add greens, and simmer for 5 minutes.
7. Add beans, and cook for 4 minutes.
8. Serve.

makes about 8 servings (2 cups each)

Handmade loaves: Berne Brot Winston knot

2011-10-16T07:14:00.000-05:00

My friend Di, host of the most excellent Virtual Cookie Exchange last winter and Sundae Sunday this past summer, decided that now that the weather is finally cooling off, it's time to bake bread! Her autumn event is dedicated to handmade loaves.

My first Mellow Bakers bread for October is Berne Brot, a Swiss challah-like braided bread. Unlike challah, Berne Brot uses butter and milk. This is a quick one-day bread; I started mixing the ingredients when I got home from work and baked the bread before bed. I couldn't decide on the type of braid to use, and almost went with a simple three or four strand braid. But as I was paging through the Bread chapter on braiding, I re-encountered the Winston Knot, a braid I had tried with challah...unsuccessfully. My biggest problem back then was that I didn't roll the strands long enough, so I ran out of dough before I was through.

This time, I followed the wonderfully clear instructions Celia offers in her Winston Knot tutorial...and it worked! Hurrah!

I made a half recipe, which made about 840 grams of dough; six balls of 140 g, rolled out to about 60 - 65 cm (24" or 25"). I tried to err on the side of too-long, so that I wouldn't run out like last time. My dough was a lot softer than challah; in his braiding section, JH suggests dusting the braid strands with the tiniest, lightest dusting of flour to help prevent softer dough strands from baking into each other; it seemed to work.

The taste was similar to challah or a less-buttery brioche, so as we always do with both of those, we made French toast.

Berne Brot
adapted from Jeffrey Hammelman's Bread

425 g bread flour
30 g vital wheat gluten
204 g milk, warmed
1 egg yolk
1 egg
61 g unsalted butter, softened
26 g sugar
9 g salt
3 g instant yeast

1. Stir together the flour, vital wheat gluten, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Whisk the yeast into the warmed milk, and then stir the milk, eggs, and butter into the dry ingredients. Stir (I used my dough whisk) until it all comes together in a large, shaggy mass.
2. Knead in a stand mixer or by hand for 3 or 4 minutes, until the dough has developed.
3. Place dough in a lightly oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and let rise for an hour. Stretch and fold the dough, recover the bowl, and let rise for another hour.
4. Split the dough into equal-sized balls, cover with plastic wrap, and let rest for 15 minutes. Then roll each ball into a long strand and proceed with braiding. If you're interested in trying the winston knot, I strongly recommend checking out Celia's tutorial.
5. Place the braid on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. Cover with baker's linen and plastic wrap. Let rise for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. (JH warns against letting the braid rise fully before baking; he recommends letting it rise to about 85%.)
6. Thoroughly brush the loaf with an egg wash.
7. Bake at 375º for 35 minutes, or until the internal temperature reaches 200º.
8. Cool on a rack.

Head over to Di's blog later this week to see the handmade loaf round-up!

Wordless Wednesday: CSA squash, anyone?

2011-10-12T08:13:00.000-05:00

Bake! Thin-crusted pizza

2011-10-10T11:03:00.000-05:00

Our Bake! pick for this week is thin-crusted pizza, and it was picked by ME! :)

I actually picked this recipe because my dad loves pizza, but prefers thin-crust, and since none of my trusty pizza crust recipes are for thin-crust, I've never been able to share homemade pizza with him. But then we ended up having a bunch of people over for dinner, and we ate it all up! No fear, though: this recipe is super easy and super tasty, and I guarantee we'll make it again.

This morning, I made the dough, which only consisted of whisking flour with salt, yeast with water and oil, and then mixing the two together. The dough rises for an hour or until doubled (mine took a little longer), is folded over a few times to smooth it out, and divided. I divided mine into three 364 g portions (to fit on my 10x15 baking pans), floured the pieces, wrapped them in plastic, and stuck them in the fridge.

When we got home from our afternoon adventures, I pulled two pieces of dough out of the fridge, oiled two pans, and used my fingers to spread the dough out as much as possible.

I used NM's simple tomato sauce, and then topped the pizzas with a sprinkling of olives, pepperoni, mushrooms and onions. I ended with grated mozzarella and asiago. The pizzas baked for 9 minutes. Seriously, so quick and easy! A perfect meal for having friends over: both the crust and the sauce can be made ahead of time and the assembly was much easier than doing our usual individual pizzas.

The pizza got rave reviews from everyone. The crust was crispy and had great flavor. Check out Margaret's post for her beautiful margherita pizza!

Pumpkin dinner: Pumpkin muffins

2011-10-09T08:21:00.000-05:00

We've had such intense seasons over the past year: the coldest, snowiest winter in ages, followed immediately by weeks of blisteringly hot, humid summer, and now, all of a sudden, it's over: the leaves are changing, the furnace is running, and the squashes are overwhelming the CSA box. (Actually, although the furnace was running when I first wrote this, today we are experiencing record high temperatures, perfect weather for ice cream. Our weather is so bizarre!)

Happily, right after we got our first pumpkins in our CSA box, I got an invite from Phyl to participate in a virtual pumpkin dinner. There wasn't a lot of debate about what to make; the second my kids saw the pumpkins, they both yelled, "Pumpkin muffins!!!"

We have a favorite family recipe, based on a recipe that one of hubby's oldest friends gave us when we got married. This is the first time I've used fresh pumpkin, though.

I took two pumpkin-like squashes (our CSA grows many heirloom varieties, so I'm not always exactly sure which kinds we've gotten), cut them in half, and roasted them on a foil-covered pan in a 350º oven for about an hour. The skins slid off easily after roasting. Then I processed them in my food processor until they were smooth. I had a cup of puree to use for our muffins, plus another three cups to freeze for future pumpkin adventures.

The next morning, the kids and I got to work!

Julie's pumpkin muffins with cream cheese frosting
made 6 regular muffins + 20 mini-muffins

for the muffins
2 c (260 g) all-purpose flour
1 c (220 g) packed light brown sugar
1 tbsp (10 g) baking powder
1 tsp (3 g) ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1 c (200 g) pumpkin puree
1/2 c (125 g) milk
2 eggs
1/3 c (75 g) unsalted butter, softened

for the frosting (adapted from ATK's Family Cookbook)
2 1/2 oz (30 g) unsalted butter, softened
4 oz (110 g) cream cheese, softened
1/2 tbsp (8 g) sour cream
1/2 tsp (4 g) vanilla extract
5/8 c (80 g) confectioner's sugar

for the muffins
1. Preheat oven to 350º.
2. Whisk 1 c (130 g) of the flour with the brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda, nutmeg, and cloves in a large mixing bowl.
3. Add the pumpkin puree, milk, eggs, and butter. Beat on low until blended.
4. Beat on medium speed for 2 minutes.
5. Add the other 1 c (130 g) of flour and mix on low until blended.
6. Spoon into greased (or papered!) muffin cups.
7. Bake regular muffins for 25 minutes, mini muffins for 16 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out with just a few crumbs attached.
8. Cool in the pan for 5 minutes and then move muffins to a cooling rack.

for the frosting
1. Process the butter, cream cheese, sour cream, and vanilla in a food processor until combined, about 30 seconds.
2. Add the confectioner's sugar and process until smooth, about 10 more seconds.

Check here for the complete pumpkin dinner round-up. I have been on a pumpkin roll (pun intended) lately: pumpkin ice cream, pumpkin knotted dinner rolls, pumpkin seafood curry. And with six more small CSA pumpkins waiting, there will be more to come! :)

Pumpkin pie ice cream and Bake! ox tongues

2011-10-08T20:19:00.001-05:00

Right after I went on my baking/dessert hiatus, I stumbled on David Leibovitz's post for pumpkin ice cream. Each week when we picked up our squash-overwhelmed CSA box, I would click back over to the recipe and drool. I'm normally a chocolate-chocolate-chocolate girl, but for some reason, I have been obsessed by the idea of ice cream that tastes like pumpkin pie.

And today was the day! Today was our annual orchard/pumpkin festival trip with some good friends and their little ones, and we decided to come back to our house after the festival for dinner. I needed a dessert, and what better treat after a pumpkin festival than pumpkin ice cream?

I still had some pumpkin puree in the freezer, leftover from my pumpkin muffins (post tomorrow!), so I was able to skip the roasting-the-squash step. I started organizing for DL's recipe, and then said, "I wonder if Jeni has a recipe for pumpkin ice cream so I can skip the egg/custard part?" and sure enough, she did! Her recipe calls for Chinese five spice, and first of all, I didn't have it, and second of all, I really wanted a more pumpkin pie flavor. So this is what I came up with:

Pumpkin pie ice cream
adapted from Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams and David Lebovitz

3 1/8 cups (800 g) half-and-half (both Jeni and DL call for a combination of whole milk and cream, but half-and-half was all we had in the house)
2 tbsp (33 g) milk
1 tbsp + 1 tsp (13 g) cornstarch
3 tbsp (43 g) neufchatel cream cheese, softened
1/4 tsp fine sea salt
1/4 c (85 g) honey
3/4 c (180 g) fresh pumpkin puree
2/3 c (135 g) packed light brown sugar
2 tbsp (22 g) light corn syrup
1/2 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1 tsp freshly grated ginger
1 1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground cloves

1. Whisk the softened cream cheese with the salt in a large bowl. Then whisk in the pumpkin puree and honey. Set aside.
2. Combine half-and-half, brown sugar, corn syrup, and spices in a large sauce pan. (Use a 4 qt saucepan. I tried a smaller one and it boiled over!) Bring to a roiling boil over medium-high heat and boil for 4 minutes.
3. Whisk two tablespoons of milk with cornstarch.
4. After the milk mixture has boiled for four minutes, turn off the heat and gradually whisk in the cornstarch slurry. Bring the mixture back to a boil for one minute, stirring with a heat-proof spatula.
5. Pour the milk mixture into the bowl with the cream cheese/pumpkin mixture, whisking until smooth.
6. Strain the mixture into a gallon zip-top plastic bag. (I actually strained it into a measuring cup and then poured it into the bag to limit the mess.)
7. Put the bag into an ice bath for 30 - 60 minutes until cool. (Or put in the fridge overnight.)
8. Freeze in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions. Freeze in a container for four hours.

I decided that we needed a little cookie treat to go with the ice cream, and Phyl's Bake! pick of ox tongues seemed like the right choice. So I took a small piece of puff pastry from the freezer (about 200 g), rolled it out in some sugar, used a small round cutter to cut out small circles, rolled them into ovals, chilled them, and baked them for about 15 minutes until the sugar had caramelized.

This ice cream was a huge hit! In fact, the entire quart disappeared in one night, and one of our friends' little ones kept saying, "More? More?" after the container was empty. It tasted just like pumpkin pie filling, only in ice cream form. The ox tongues were perfect; a little piece of sugary buttery goodness to round out dessert.

Check out the layers!

Twitter avatar fun: Mark Bittman's pancakes!

2011-10-04T14:07:00.002-05:00

banana pancakes

Nancy came up with the brilliant idea for us to choose a new chef each month, bake recipes from that chef, and use a picture of one of those recipes for our Twitter avatar. It took me forever to settle on a chef for my month (October). Finally, looking through my cookbooks, I decided on Mark Bittman. I'd won his How to Cook Everything in a silent auction last July, and I wanted an excuse to start using it.

Suddenly it's my month, and I realized that in the past almost-year since I selected him, I've begun cooking from Mark Bittman a lot. I use his How to Cook Everything for reference all of the time. He offers so many basics with so many fun variations that you feel like you're creating your own recipe. His book was especially helpful this summer, as I tried to figure out what to do with all of our CSA veggies. Also, Mark Bittman has started writing a Less Meat, More Flavor column for Cooking Light, one of my essential cooking magazines, and we've tried a bunch of those recipes this year. And I've started following him on Twitter, so I now get links to his NYT recipes and articles.

Today, on the way home from preschool, I suggested pancakes for dinner. My kids (who always request pancakes when given the dinner choice) were ecstatic. Suddenly, my little guy said, "What about banana pancakes with chocolate chips?" (Where do they come up with these things?) Usually, we eat buttermilk pancakes with blueberries (using ATK's recipe). So I said, "Sure, I could give that a try."

When we got home, I turned to my trusty HTCE, and sure enough, he had a recipe for incorporating bananas into pancakes!

These were less fluffy than our usual buttermilk pancakes, but they were really yummy. The regular pancakes had just a hint of banana flavor, and with the addition of the chocolate chips, they were a huge hit and a definite repeat. Even hubby ate his without syrup!

secret ingredient: chocolate chips!

Banana chocolate chip pancakes
adapted from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything

makes 16 medium pancakes
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp sugar
1 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1 large banana
mini chocolate chips

1. Whisk the dry ingredients together in a large bowl.
2. Combine the melted butter, eggs, and milk. Mash the banana and add it to the liquid ingredients.
3. Whisk the wet ingredients into the dry, being sure not to whisk too much (you want some lumps in the batter).
4. Pour batter (in 1/4 cup increments) onto a hot griddle (we use an electric griddle, although you could cook them on the stovetop on a griddle with butter). Sprinkle some mini chips on the pancakes and cook until bubbles form on the top and the bottoms are golden. Flip and continue to cook until the other side is also golden.
5. Serve.

According to Mark Bittman, the batter can be made a day or two ahead of time and stored in the fridge until ready to use.

Bake! Mini apple lattice tarts

2011-10-03T18:46:00.000-05:00

Kayte's pick for our next Bake! recipe happened during my September baking hiatus. But with the weekend bringing a new month and a trip to the apple orchard, I knew that it was time to make......apple lattice tarts!

I had four mini tart doughs stored in the freezer, so I used those, even though they were cookie dough crusts instead of the flaky dough crusts that were called for. I figured they'd work just as well, and I was right. The dough was enough for three mini tarts and the lattice topping.

This may have been the easiest apple pie-type filling recipe that I've ever encountered. I simply peeled, cored, and chopped the apples, and then tossed them with a sugar, flour, and cinnamon mixture. Finally butter is dotted over the filling and strips of dough are placed on top to create a lattice. Easy-peasy. I made a third of the topping, which was enough for my three minis, plus a little ramekin of extra filling. They baked for about 35 minutes, and were absolutely delightful.

I'm back! BOM: pumpkin knot rolls

2011-10-02T19:39:00.000-05:00

Happy October! I'm so happy that it's October and my kitchen finally looks like my kitchen again: dishes in the dish drain piled to the ceiling, all attachments for my stand mixer hanging out, multiple baking sheets and cooling racks perched on corners of the counter.

I gave up baking for the month of September. This summer was good for our tummies, but not so much for our waistlines. Having kids old enough to play more independently combined with being two teachers on summer vacation meant that I had a lot of time to play in the kitchen and, with no one going to work, daycare, or preschool, all of the treats just sat on our counter and we ate them all. Tasty, but not good for us.

So, since September is a busy month anyway with the start of school, debate, and preschool, I vowed to clean it up: no baking (with the exception of two tiny loaves that I made for Mellow Bakers and made hubby eat), no pasta, no bread, no desserts, no ice cream. It was a long month. :) Just kidding. Actually it felt pretty good, and it wasn't until last week that hubby started asking plaintively, "How long until October?!?"

I think I actually missed the process of baking more than I missed the foods themselves. Yesterday (October 1st), I was at a debate tournament from 6:30 in the morning until 5:00 at night, and I came home exhausted. Nothing happened in the kitchen. But today.......we spent the morning at the apple orchard and I spent the rest of the day in the kitchen. *happy sigh*

Emeril's cola pot roast with CSA veggies, Peter Reinhart's pumpkin knotted dinner rolls, and Nick Malgieri's mini apple tarts for dessert (post coming tomorrow)

For the Artisan Bread Bakers' Bread of the Month for October, my friend Phyl chose pumpkin knotted dinner rolls. Kayte made them first, and since she hates pumpkins and absolutely raved about them, you know I had to try them.

This was an easy recipe, made by combining yeast (I used instant), warm milk, melted unsalted butter, eggs, sugar, salt, and flour (I used a combination of all-purpose, bread, and white whole wheat)...and the secret ingredient: pumpkin! I had an extra cup of pumpkin puree in the freezer, leftover from the pumpkin muffins that I made for next weekend's pumpkin roundup (stay tuned!).

After kneading, I let the dough rise for about an hour and a half, with a stretch-and-fold in the middle. Then I divided the dough in two, put half in the fridge for later in the week, and split the remaining half into 60g sections. These I rolled and knotted. They rose for another hour or so and then baked for 15 minutes.

These rolls are light and fluffy, with no hint of pumpkin flavor, but a beautiful orange color. Try 'em!

Spiced cinnamon roasted almonds

2011-09-24T12:51:00.001-05:00

One of my very favorite treats, one which I look forward to all year long, is the cone of cinnamon roasted almonds at the State Fair.

Two winters ago, I got a craving for those almonds, and the State Fair was still six months away. I started browsing for recipes, and I tried a bunch. Some didn't ever get crunchy, some were too cinnamony, some were not quite sweet enough for me. Finally, I found this recipe on Smitten Kitchen. I wasn't sure about the cayenne, since I'm a pretty big weakling when it comes to spice, but I tried it (with just a tiny bit of cayenne)...and we fell in love. I must've made these almonds a half-dozen times last year: we brought them to friends' Christmas and New Years' parties, we brought jars into work to share, and of course we ate a bunch ourselves.

This summer, when we went to the State Fair, I ordered my usual paper cone of cinnamon almonds...and we were all disappointed; we've gotten so accustomed to the more interesting flavors of our normal recipe.

Recently, some of hubby's coworkers asked for the recipe, so K and S, this is for you! :)

Spiced cinnamon roasted almonds
adapted from Deb at Smitten Kitchen, who adapted them from Elizabeth Karmel

1/3 c (85 g) dark brown sugar
2/3 c (160 g) white granulated sugar
1 heaping tsp (5 g) kosher salt
1/8-1/4 tsp cayenne pepper (use the larger amount if you like a little kick; the 1/8 tsp is barely detectable)
1 tsp (3 g) ground cinnamon
1 egg white
1 tbsp water
approx. 1 1/2 pounds whole almonds (I keep adding almonds until all of the egg white and sugar mixture are gone, usually about 1 1/2 pounds (711 g). I used 586 g, or about 20.7 oz, of whole almonds this time because it's all I had; I had a little of both the egg white and the sugar mixture left over.)

1. Preheat the oven to 300º. Line a jelly roll pan with foil.
2. Mix the sugars, salt, and spices until no lumps remain.
3. Whisk the egg white and water until slightly frothy.
4. Add almonds to the egg white and stir to coat the almonds. (I usually add them in three or four batches until all of the egg white is used up.)
5. Use a fork or a slotted spoon to pull the almonds out of the egg white and drop them into the sugar mixture. Toss the almonds until they're evenly coated. (Again, I usually do this in several batches until all of the sugar mixture is used up.)
6. Spread the almonds in a single layer on the pan.
7. Bake for about 30 minutes, stirring once about half way through. (If you steal a bite when they're done, be aware that first, they're very hot and you'll burn your mouth! and second, they'll still seem a little soft. Don't worry; they'll get crunchier as they cool. If you bake them until they're crunchy immediately, they'll end up tasting slightly burnt.)
8. Cool and then pour them into jars.

Makes 3 - 5 pint jars. (With 580 g of almonds, we got 3 1/2 pints plus an embarrassing number that were eaten off the pan while they were cooling. With a full 1 1/2 pounds, I usually get about 5 jars.)

The three players: egg white, sugar mixture, whole almonds

Almonds, ready to go into the oven

Almonds, just out of the oven

Ready to share!

Mellow Bakers: Whole wheat and whole rye (September)

2011-09-19T21:13:00.002-05:00

My third Mellow Bakers' bread for this month is whole wheat and whole rye, a not super-accurate name for a loaf that's actually made with a rye levain, whole wheat flour, and high gluten flour. Other than that, just a bit of salt, a tiny pinch of yeast, and some water.

I let this one rise for almost double the final rise time because I'd forgotten to preheat the oven beforehand, and I think that actually helped me a ton. It was very well-risen, had great oven spring, and I'm happier with my scoring than I've been in a long time.

The bread is very pleasant tasting with a hint of rye and a hint of sourdough, but no real strong flavors.

Twitter Avatar Fun: Nigella's pumpkin seafood curry

2011-09-17T20:06:00.001-05:00

CSA pumpkins...aren't they cute?!

Phew, September is already half over, and I've yet to change my Twitter avatar! This month's chef was chosen by Marthe, and she picked Nigella Lawson, another chef I've heard a lot about but have never tried.

Looking for a dinner recipe that would please the family and use up some of these CSA veggies that continue to overwhelm my kitchen, I stumbled across this recipe for Thai yellow pumpkin and seafood curry. It's not the most Twitter-avatar-friendly picture, but hey, you can't win 'em all, right? =)

I ended up making a ton of changes...not my original intention at all, but just because I was rushing to cook this after a busy day at the Renaissance Festival and texting hubby who I'd sent on an emergency trip the grocery store. In other words, a typical evening at my house! =) I used a different kind of chili paste because it was in the fridge, and had to sub in veggie stock because I didn't have any fish stock. My pumpkin ended up getting a little overcooked because hubby unknowingly chose shrimp that had to be deshelled, which took longer than anticipated. And I tossed in a bunch of extra veggies because we needed to use them up and I thought the extra color would be nice. Finally, I realized as I was going to serve the meal that, in the craziness of dinner prep, I'd forgotten to make rice, so I hurriedly soaked some Thai rice noodles and we had it over that instead. The rice noodles were fine, but I would definitely make rice next time.

It didn't matter. This recipe is amazing and flexible; the base is so good, and we spent much of dinner chatting about different variations we could try. I'd especially like to try mixing up the meats: making a chicken version, or a mixed meats one with chicken, sausage, and shrimp. And next time, I'll be sure to top it with cilantro which I forgot to put on the shopping list, and maybe even something crunchy on top like some slivered almonds? Whatever changes you make, this recipe is a must-try!

Pumpkin seafood curry
based on Nigella Lawson's Thai yellow pumpkin and seafood curry

1 can Thai coconut milk
1 tbsp red Thai curry paste (NL suggests 1-2 tbsp. I was worried about the heat, so only used 1. It wasn't hot at all, and I'd probably up it to the full 2 tbsp next time.)
1 1/2 cups vegetable stock (NL calls for fish stock)
3 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp sugar
zest from one lemon (NL calls for 3 lemongrass stalks, but we didn't have them.)
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
3 pounds pumpkin, peeled and cut into large bite-sized chunks
2 cups mixed vegetables (chopped red pepper, sliced carrots, and chunks of summer squash)
1 pound salmon, skinned and cut into large bite-sized chunks
1 pound raw shrimp, peeled (and cut in half if large)
1/2 cup swiss chard and spinach, destemmed and chopped
1 lime, juiced
(NL calls for cilantro for garnish, which we sadly didn't have.)
(Rice. I forgot it, so I'm adding it to the recipe so I remember next time!)

1. Skim the thick top off the can of coconut milk. Put it into a large dutch oven with the curry paste, and cook it over medium until it sizzles. Then whisk the two together.
2. Add the remainder of the coconut milk, stock, fish sauce, sugar, lemon zest, and tumeric. Bring to a boil.
3. Add the pumpkin, and cook on a "fast simmer" (as NL says) until the pumpkin is getting close to tender, about 10 minutes.
4. Add any hard veggies (carrots, peppers) and cook for another few minutes.
5. Keeping the stock at a fast simmer, add the shrimp and salmon, and cook until they're cooked through, about 4 or 5 minutes.
6. Add the greens and push them down. Once wilted, stir in the lime juice.
7. Off heat, add the cilantro. Serve over rice.

Mellow Bakers: Whole wheat bread with golden raisins and pecans (September)

2011-09-12T19:25:00.001-05:00

Boy, it's been a long time!

School started up again last week, so it's back to my normal schedule of rushing: rushing to get the kids up and dressed and breakfasted and delivered to Grandpa Daycare, rushing to school and mentally switching from Mom Mode to Teacher Mode, getting ready for the day, greeting and teaching 160 10th grade students, coaching debaters, and then rushing back home, switching back into Mom Mode, slapping together some dinner, getting the kids bathed and in bed, and slipping one last time into Teacher Mode to try to figure out a lesson for the next day. It's not left me with a lot of time to bake or keep up with my cooking/baking challenges.

However, this weekend, I was able to squeeze a Mellow Bakers bread in. It's a straight dough, thankfully, which meant I didn't have to do anything ahead of time and could just bake. (That's been a problem; on several occasions, I've had both the time and inclination to bake a loaf of bread, but haven't fed my starter or made a preferment or.....) My second September bread (thankfully I baked the first in August, knowing how busy September would be) was whole wheat bread with golden raisins and pecans (and a tiny bit of regular raisins and a tiny bit of walnuts, because apparently I hadn't checked to make sure I had enough of either ingredient).

This bread was quick and easy; the dough behaved exactly as promised. I made a half recipe, which yielded two pounds of dough, which I stuck in a loaf pan.

JH says to bake it with normal steam, and I'm never quite sure how to adapt that for a loaf pan. I spritzed it with water and covered it with an roasting pan for 15 minutes, but it was still a really pale loaf. I've had that happen with other JH loaves when I've baked them in a loaf pan. Any ideas out there??

We enjoyed the bread with butter tonight, an accompaniment to winter vegetable soup (appropriate fare for our last 90º day of the season, huh?). Hubby really, really liked it, which is saying something, since normally we aren't big fans of fruit and nuts in our bread.

Hopefully I'll be able to regain some sense of how to balance baking, life, and work, and get back to posting more frequently. I'd better figure it out soon...both hubby's coworkers and my own have already started asking where the treats are!

Mellow Bakers: Black bread (August)

2011-08-28T20:55:00.002-05:00

My final Mellow Bakers bread for August is black bread. This is a sourdough rye made with an old bread soaker (rebaked mixed-flour miche mixed with hot water, coffee grounds, and vegetable oil), rye flour, high gluten flour, salt, instant yeast, and sourdough.

The dough was fairly crumbly (there's no water added other than the water in the soaker and the sourdough), and my mixer couldn't seem to bring it together. However, after a few minutes of kneading by hand, it formed a workable dough and I was able to proceed. The bread has a relatively short bulk and final fermentations.

We tried the bread with a little butter. It had a really interesting, complex flavor, and we could definitely taste the coffee. We gave the rest of the loaf to my dad, the designated sourdough rye-eater.

Mellow Bakers: Mixed-flour miche (September)

2011-08-27T08:29:00.000-05:00

September? What? But I haven't finished August's Mellow Bakers breads yet!

Too true. But my last August bread (black bread) calls for using an old bread soaker, and unfortunately I haven't baked bread in soooooo unbelievably long (with the exception of hamburger and hot dog buns) that I don't have anything to use. So I decided to make a September bread that would fit the bill and maybe have a couple of pieces left over for the old bread soaker.

When I pulled Austin (my sourdough starter) from the fridge, I really couldn't remember the last time I'd fed him. He was gray and hoochy, and smelled very chemically. I refreshed him twice a day, and while he smelt better by the end of the first day, I decided to give him a few extra days to really get back in gear (continuing to refresh twice a day). I think it worked, as this bread rose more than any other pure-sourdough I've ever made. Wahoo!

The levain is made the night before with Austin, water, rye flour, and whole wheat flour. After a twelve hour rise, it's combined with more whole wheat flour and rye flour, bread flour, water, and salt. I let it proof for two hours with three folds, and then shaped it into a round. Without bothering to set a timer, I left it on the counter...pure sourdoughs (without any additional pinches of instant yeast) always seem to take longer...and was shocked to discover that it was rising really well!

The only downside was that when I went to put it into the oven, I realized that I'd prepped for pizza baking instead of hearth baking (pizza stone on the floor of the oven and no steam pan), so I had to do some quick adjusting of oven shelves with my welding gloves on, while yelling at the kids to stay away from the open oven, and then use the fake-steaming method, and my slashing suffered severely as a result of my frantic-ness.

We waited about eighteen hours before slicing into this bread, and this is definitely one of the tastiest breads I can remember from the levain section. While you can taste the sour, it isn't too sour; the flavor of the whole grains is clearly there, without the dense rye-ness of the sourdough rye breads. Yep, this one is a keeper!

Bake! Truffle brownies

2011-08-15T21:03:00.005-05:00

So August is officially our Bake! catch-up month, but knowing how crazily busy September will be with school starting up again, I decided to bake ahead a bit.......I needed a dessert to bring to a family cabin barbecue this weekend, so I let hubby pick from upcoming Bake! recipes. He choose the one for the first week of September which was picked by the newest member of our little group, Glennis: truffle brownies.

We've already baked the Florida brownies, which were to-die-for, and I have to say that the truffle brownies are just as dangerous.

Because we were going to the family barbecue, I made a full recipe (a 9x13 pan); unfortunately, the little girl got sick and we ended up spending the weekend hanging out at home. Hubby and I did quite a bit of damage to the pan. Luckily the girl was better by today and we were able to do an abbreviated trip to the cabin...saving ourselves from eating the entire pan....which we could've easily done.

At home, I served the brownies with Jeni's vanilla bean ice cream (via Food and Wine), which hubby declared the best vanilla ice cream he'd ever eaten. He was such a fan, in fact, that I've finally broken down and ordered her book.

Chocolate-filled Napoleons (Modern Baker Challenge)

2011-08-13T10:16:00.001-05:00

For my dad's birthday dinner on Thursday, I'd made two puff pastry layers. But because my hubby and baby girl don't like raspberries, I decided to turn one of the layers into chocolate-filled Napoleons, another puff pastry recipe for the Modern Baker Challenge.

NM's instructions indicate forming these into rectangles or squares, but my puff pastry layer wasn't big enough for two of my 8x8 pans, so I decided to go with circles and cut out two 6" rounds.

The mousse is made with heavy cream whipped with Grand Marnier, a meringue made with egg whites, sugar, unflavored gelatin, and cold water, and finally some melted bittersweet chocolate (I used 60%).

Assembly is easy: puff pastry, mousse, and puff pastry. A half-recipe completely filled my 6" round cake pan and left a little left over...hubby and I were not sad about that! =)

This was ah-maze-ing! After dessert, the little guy and baby girl wandered around our tailgating table, using their fingers to scrape out everyone's bowls, looking for tidbits of chocolate left on anyone's spoon. Even the birthday boy, who doesn't like chocolate, thought this was a yummy dessert. I, an admitted chocoholic, could've eaten a vat of the stuff. =)

Check out Margaret's beautiful Napoleons!

Modern Baker Puff Pastry and Raspberry Mille-Feuille

2011-08-12T14:51:00.000-05:00

Several months ago, one of our Bake! recipes called for puff pastry. Rather than purchasing some, I tackled my fears and made the recipe in Bake! I found this video invaluable; Nick Malgieri makes the puff pastry process look effortless.

And now, here we are in the puff pastry section of The Modern Baker Challenge. I began by following the recipe in The Modern Baker. As in his other recipe, NM focuses on a faster and easier method for making puff pastry, eliminating the 5,000,000 folds and turns and rests in traditional puff pastry. This recipe is slightly different from the one in Bake! You start by combining flour and salt in a food processor. Then you add chunks of butter and pulse just a very few times. Finally you add a bit of water, pulse a few more times, and dump it all out onto your counter. For some reason, I had a more difficult time getting this dough to come together; I think the one in Bake! was slightly easier for me, but this one did finally work.

I rolled and turned the dough, and then folded it. I cut it into four pieces (about 325 g each), stuck three into the freezer, and turned the smallest one into elephant ears...yum!

A few days ago, I moved two batches of dough into the fridge to defrost. And now a new challenge: baked puff pastry layer. When defrosted, I pulled the dough out of the fridge and began to press on the dough until it was soft enough to roll, turning 90 degrees after each press or roll. When I had each piece into a 12 x 15" square, I placed them on jelly roll pans lined with parchment paper and stuck them in the fridge.

When it was time to bake, I removed a pan from the fridge, pierced the dough with a fork, and covered it with another piece of parchment paper and another jelly roll pan. My layers were perfectly done in 25 minutes (15 minutes on the first side, 10 minutes on the second). Check out Phyl's detailed post on how to bake the puff pastry layers.

And now it's time for my official post for the puff pastry section: raspberry mille-feuille. Raspberries are one of my favorite fruits, but because hubby doesn't like them, I rarely bake the raspberry recipes. However, it's my dad's birthday, and he loves raspberries, so I thought this seemed like the perfect birthday dessert for him!

Knowing that hubby and the little girl don't like raspberries, I decided to make a half recipe of the raspberry mille-feuille and a half recipe of the molded chocolate-filled Napoleons (post tomorrow). So I took one of the baked puff pastry layers and, using a parchment paper template of my 6" cake pan, cut out two circles and two semi-circles.

I made a half recipe of the pastry cream, using milk, sugar, cornstarch, egg yolks, unsalted butter, and vanilla. It rested in the fridge overnight.

I whipped heavy cream with sugar and kirsch, and then combined a bit of it with the pastry cream. Even after the overnight rest and the addition of the whipped cream, my pastry cream was really liquidy. I'm sure I did something wrong; the pastry cream for the Parisian fruit tart worked perfectly last year.

Assembly was easy: layer of puff pastry, pastry cream, raspberries, whipped cream, puff pastry, pastry cream, raspberries, whipped cream, puff pastry. And a dusting of confectioners' sugar before serving.

This was a huge hit, with the birthday boy, my little guy, and even my raspberry-hating husband!

Summer squash (no-noodle) lasagna

2011-08-11T21:24:00.009-05:00

As I've been mentioning, we've been getting a ton of zucchini and summer squash in our CSA boxes. I've been looking for creative ways to use it, and read in several places about people who used planks of zucchini in place of noodles in their lasagna. I was intrigued. My first try was okay, but not great: way too much cheese, not enough meat, although it was clear that zucchini really did make an acceptable substitute for noodles in lasagna.

Tonight, I offered to make dinner for my dad's birthday at the ballpark; knowing pasta isn't good for him, I decided to give the no-noodle lasagna another try...and this time, it was perfect! My stepmom was the only one who said she could tell it was missing noodles, and my dad, who is my most honest critic, said it was really good! Even the kiddos, who didn't like the first version I made, ate theirs.

There are a lot of steps, but that's true of regular lasagna, too. This version is healthier, tasty, and uses up that plethora of zucchini and summer squash!

Summer squash (no-noodle) lasagna
makes six servings

for the sauce
1 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp minced garlic
12 oz ground meat (I used turkey)
28 oz can of crushed tomatoes
1/4 tsp dried oregano
1/8 tsp crushed red pepper flakes

for the lasagna
1 large or 2 smaller zucchini and/or summer squash, sliced into 1/4" planks (enough for 6 planks)*
1 red pepper, cut into four sides*
3/4 c ricotta (I used part-skim)
1/8 c + 1 tbsp Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
2 tbsp chopped fresh basil
1 cup mozzarella

*If you prefer, leave out the red pepper and use an extra 3 planks of zucchini or summer squash in its place.

1. Preheat oven to 425º.
2. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat.
3. Add the onion and salt and cook for about 4 minutes, until the onion is starting to get tender.
4. Add the garlic and saute for 30 seconds, until fragrant.
5. Add the ground turkey and cook for about 5 minutes or until no longer pink.
6. Add the crushed tomatoes, red pepper flakes, and oregano. Turn down heat and simmer for 15 - 20 minutes, until thickened, stirring occasionally.
5. While sauce is cooking, coat a large jelly roll pan with cooking spray or brush with olive oil. Put the zucchini, summer squash, and red pepper planks in a layer on the pan. Coat with cooking spray. Cook for 15 minutes, flip, and cook an additional 10 minutes or until vegetables are tender but not falling apart.
6. Place the red pepper (if using) in a zip-top plastic bag for about 10 minutes, and then remove the skins. (When I skipped this step, the red pepper flavor was much more dominant and the peppers were extremely difficult to cut through.)
7. While the sauce is simmering and the veggies are roasting, make the cheese blend: in a small bowl, combine ricotta, 1/8 cup grated Parmesan, 1/4 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon pepper, and chopped basil.

Once all of the pieces are ready (see photos below):
8. Spread 1/4 cup sauce evenly on the bottom of an 8x8 baking dish.
9. Place 3 squash planks on top of the sauce.
10. Spread 2 tablespoons of the ricotta cheese mixture on each of the squash planks.
11. Sprinkle 1/3 cup of mozzarella on top.
12. Pour 1 cup sauce on top and spread evenly.
13. Lay red pepper pieces on top (or squash, if omitting red pepper), being sure to keep them even with the squash slices below. (The first time I made this, I jigsawed the veggies rather than keeping them in even columns, and it was impossible to cut! When I was careful to maintain columns, it sliced like a dream.)
14. Repeat ricotta layer (you may not use all of the cheese), mozzarella layer, and sauce layer.
15. Lay final 3 pieces of squash on top, again maintaining the columns. Pour the final 1 cup of sauce over the top and spread evenly. Sprinkle on the rest of the mozzarella. Dust with 1 tablespoon Parmesan.
16. Cover lasagna with foil coated with cooking spray.
17. At this point, you can either bake the lasagna or stick it in the fridge overnight. When ready to bake, bake in a 350º oven for 30 minutes, covered. Then remove the foil and bake for 15 minutes uncovered.
18. Let sit for 10 - 15 minutes before slicing. (Because of all of the zucchs/squash, it will be more liquidy than normal lasagna.)

Bierocks (?!)

2011-08-10T08:35:00.000-05:00

As I've mentioned in some recent posts, we joined a CSA for the first time this year. It's always fun to see what goodies are in our box, and the boxes have been getting heavier and heavier each week.

I've found it a bit challenging to deal with the variety of veggies...but in a good way! Sometimes, there are veggies I've never seen before and I have to send a cell picture to people to help me identify them. Sometimes it's challenging because there's just so much of one thing; how many pickles can one family can and eat?! (Luckily, after making six jars of refrigerator pickles last week, and receiving another NINE cukes yesterday, I discovered that one of my coworkers (a young, single, just-out-of-college guy) loves cucumbers, so I sent a whole bag home with him yesterday afternoon.)

Last week, there was a cabbage. I was brainstorming recipes for our various vegetables and listing off some cabbage-related recipes, when suddenly hubby said, "Hey, what about bierocks? Would you make me some of them?!"

Um, what? I'd never heard of bierocks before. When I searched for recipes, most were from Kansas, which explains why hubby grew up on them and I've never heard of them. Hubby said that back in Kansas, they were often sold at school fundraisers; apparently they're very good frozen. When I asked Kayte about it, she said that German ladies in the town next to where she grew up used to make them; she said they were really popular with farmers, a quick grab-and-go meal.

The recipes all seemed fairly similar and fairly simple: cook beef with shredded cabbage and onion, season with salt and pepper, place in bread dough (or refrigerated crescent rolls), and bake.

Hubby was in seventh heaven at dinner last night; he said they were just as he remembered, but with better bread; he ate his with ketchup. The baby girl liked hers plain; the little guy preferred his with mustard (how he eats hamburgers these days, too). I thought they were pretty plain, but they still made a nice, easy meal. The ultimate comfort food.

Bierocks
for the bread dough (from PR's ABED)
1 3/4 c + 2 tbsp (425 g) milk, warmed to 95º
1 tbsp (9 g) instant yeast
6 1/4 c (794 g) bread flour (I used 400 g bread flour, 394 g white whole wheat flour)
2 tsp (14 g) salt
5 1/2 tbsp (78 g) sugar
6 tbsp (85 g) melted unsalted butter
1 egg (50 g)

for the filling
1 pound ground beef (I'd guess ground turkey would work just as well)
1 tbsp olive oil
1 head cabbage, chopped or shredded
1 large onion, chopped
1 tbsp minced garlic
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/4 tsp allspice

for the bread dough
1. Warm the milk. Whisk in the yeast until dissolved; let sit for 5 minutes.
2. Combine the flour, salt, sugar, oil, and egg in a large mixing bowl. Add the milk mixture and stir until it comes together in a shaggy, slightly sticky ball.
3. Mix with a dough hook in a stand mixer on 2 for 4 minutes (or knead by hand for 4 or 5 minutes). The dough will be soft and supple.
4. Form the dough into a ball and place in a large bowl coated with cooking spray. Refrigerate until ready to use. (Dough can rest in the fridge for 1 - 4 days.) OR Let rise until doubled, 1 - 2 hours.
5. Remove dough from the fridge and allow to come to room temperature, 1 - 2 hours.

for the filling
1. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat.
2. Add meat and brown, about 5 minutes.
3. Add cabbage, garlic, and spices, and cook until softened, about 15 minutes. Cool slightly.
4. On a floured surface, roll the dough into a large rectangle, about 1/8" thick (I actually rolled mine in several batches because I was working on a fairly small board).
5. Cut the dough into 4" squares.
6. Place 1/4 - 1/3 cup filling in the center of each square (I put in as much as I could fit, and they still tasted bread-heavy). Fold the corners up to form a little packet and pinch closed in the middle.
7. Place filled bierocks upside down on a parchment lined sheet pan. Cover and let rise for 20 - 30 minutes.
8. Bake at 375º for 15 minutes.

Bierocks can be frozen: Wrap cooked bierocks in foil and then place in a large zip-top plastic bag. When ready to eat, defrost in the fridge and bake for 10 - 15 minutes at 325º. (I'd bet they could be baked frozen, too, but we haven't tried it yet. I'll update when we do!)

Refrigerator pickles

2011-08-09T06:37:00.000-05:00

Even though our local CSAs are having a really rough year (weeks of over 100º weather followed by torrential, destructive storms), summer squashes and cucumbers are having a fabulous year. I've been doing my best to keep up. For the zucchini and summer squash, I've used them in egg bakes, made fritters, made a no-noodle lasagna, zucchini hash browns. There seem to be a lot of creative things to do.

For the cukes, I've really struggled. We use them on our dinner salads, but that doesn't even come close to dealing with my veggie drawer full of cucumbers. So I've been making a lot of fridge pickles. These are perfectly balanced: deliciously sour from the vinegar, slightly sweet from the sugar, with a hint of spice and a nice crunch. This is our new favorite recipe.

Fridge pickles
adapted from Cooking Light

3 English cucumbers, cut into 1/4" inch slices
1 large onion, sliced
3/4 cups apple cider vinegar
3/4 cups white vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper
1/4 tsp black pepper
2 tsp minced garlic

1. Layer sliced cucumbers and onions in jars.
2. Combine vinegars, sugar, and spices in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil and cook for 1 minute.
3. Pour over cucumbers and onions. Cool and refrigerate.

Makes 3 pint jars of pickles

Eggs in jars!

2011-08-08T09:28:00.001-05:00

A couple of months ago, Nicole linked to this awesome breakfast idea from Food in Jars. Hubby and I have been trying to start more of our days with protein rather than carb-laden breakfast cereals. But it's often challenging to spend time cooking anything more involved than pouring a bowl of cereal when we're trying to get ourselves and the little ones ready and out of the house by 6:30 a.m.

So I loved the idea of making a little jar of eggs in advance, and plus they're just so cute, aren't they?

At first, I was bothered by the lack of the specifics in the recipe (no specific amounts, no particular vegetables), but since then, I've experimented. I've used various meats (ham, sausage links, turkey sausage), veggies (onion, peppers, zucchini, squash, mushrooms, spinach), cheeses (cheddar, pepperjack, gruyere), all with success. I'm including specific ingredients and amounts below, just so you can get an idea. You can make these in little jars or ramekins, and I've tried both. I really love the wide-mouthed half-pint mason jars; they are a perfect serving size, after cooking you can just slap the lid on and stick them in the fridge, and the wide mouths make them easy to clean.

Eggs in jars
Cooking spray
1 tbsp olive oil
8 breakfast turkey sausage links
1 large onion, chopped
1 bell pepper, chopped1 small patty pan squash, chopped
4 ounces mushrooms, sliced
2 cups of fresh spinach
10 eggs, lightly beaten
1/4 cup grated sharp cheddar
1/4 cup grated pepperjack
1 tbsp butter (to coat jars)

8 half-pint jars, brushed thoroughly with melted butter
Preheat oven to 350º.

1. Spray a large skillet with cooking spray and cook the sausage on medium-high links until done (about 5 or 6 minutes). Remove the sausages.
2. In the same skillet, heat the olive oil. Cook the onion, pepper, squash (any of the harder veggies) for about 5 minutes, or until slightly softened and beginning to brown.
3. Add mushrooms and spinach (any veggies that don't need to cook as long) and cook for another couple minutes.
4. Slice the sausage and add to the veggie mix.
5. Divide the mixture evenly among the jars (I used about 1/3 cup veggies and meat per jar; the jars will be quite full).
6. Pour the eggs over the veggies.
7. Sprinkle about 1 tbsp of cheese over each cup and stir gently.
8. Cook in a 350º oven for 25 - 30 minutes, or until eggs have set.
9. Cool, cover, and place in fridge.

In the morning, just microwave the uncovered jar for about 45 seconds and enjoy a healthy breakfast!

Bake! Coconut cakes

2011-08-07T19:48:00.002-05:00

My next Bake! rewind recipe is one that Kayte, Phyl, and Margaret made shortly after they started baking through the book: individual coconut cakes.

I cut the recipe in half, and with my slightly-larger mini-muffin pan, I made nine cupcakes. My little girl helped me. First, she stirred together a bit of sugar, a tiny bit of flour, and some coconut (I used sweetened and cut the sugar a bit). Then she whisked egg whites, salt, lemon zest, and melted butter. Once combined, we filled the muffin pan, and she sprinkled a bit of coconut on the tops.

The kiddos didn't like them (I think it was a texture issue), but the hubby and I both thought they were tasty little treats!

Focaccia con formaggio (Mellow Bakers)

2011-08-05T19:23:00.000-05:00

The ciabatta with stiff biga recipe makes a little over three pounds of dough, perfect for the two 9" focaccias that ~~we devoured~~ I made yesterday plus just enough left over for focaccia con formaggio, our other Mellow Baker focaccia choice for August.

The focaccia con formaggio is a less-time consuming recipe than the regular focaccia. You go straight from bulk fermentation of the ciabatta dough to dividing and forming the focaccia to the oven to eating (JH says to eat it warm). I imagine the entire process could take less than an hour, as there are no additional rise times.

I, of course, had actually made the ciabatta yesterday, so I pulled the remainder of the dough out from the fridge, divided it in two (about 13 ounces each), and rolled each ball into a rectangle-ish shape. One rectangle is placed on a sheet pan covered with parchment paper; it's then spread with ricotta, olive oil, coarse salt and pepper, and toasted fennel seeds. Then the second piece is plopped on top, the edges are crimped, the top is brushed with a little more oil, some vents are cut, and the whole thing bakes on a preheated pizza stone.

Because I was also cooking dinner, my focaccia con formaggio actually got some rise time while the oven was busy. I'm not sure if that's why, but mine took an additional five or so minutes before it was golden on top.

This tasted much more like ciabatta than focaccia to me. Hubby and I both thought that it was really good, but that the fennel was really strong and unexpected (and I actually only used half of the specified amount because a tablespoon seemed like too much). I can see making something like this and using garlic or...some other spice inside. I served it with a salad, fruit, and a vegetable (non-noodle) lasagna ~ a recipe I'll continue to work on and hopefully perfect and post soon ~ it's a must for dealing with all of these CSA summer squash!

Everyone in the family preferred last night's focaccia, and we really like the normal ciabatta recipe, too, so I'm not sure we'll make this one again...but not because it wasn't delicious!

Mellow Bakers: Focaccia (August)

2011-08-04T19:45:00.004-05:00

My second bread for August for the Mellow Bakers is actually two new recipes in one: our official recipe is focaccia, but it is made with the ciabatta with stiff biga from earlier in the book. When ciabatta came up last December, I chose the one made with a poolish (which we loved), so this one was new to me.

Last night, I whipped up the biga (bread flour, water, and yeast) and let it rise overnight. This morning, I measured out the rest of the ingredients (more bread flour, water, salt, instant yeast)...and my scale errored right in the middle of weighing the water. Gr! I really need a scale that measures above three pounds, but it's so hard to justify getting something new when you have something that works perfectly well, you know?

But I digress. So I added a few more splashes of water and I think I added a bit too much as this was a very wet dough, maybe the wettest I've ever worked with, but I just did a few extra stretch-and-folds and they worked their magic: after two hours of bulk fermentation, I had a workable (although still really sticky) dough. Then I needed to go to book club, so I stuffed it in the fridge while I was out.

When I got home, I put about 400 g of dough into two 9" cake pans coated with oil. I stretched them into circles, put them on the counter to rise, and ran off to the Children's Museum. Even though I hadn't allowed them their proper rest after preshaping and they didn't fit the pans when I left, by the time I'd gotten home, they filled the pans beautifully.

JH doesn't give a lot of specific instructions about topping the foaccia, so I ended up using an herb-infused olive oil (which we loved on the BBA focaccia). I poured some olive oil in a small skillet, dumped in some Italian seasonings, kosher salt, and pepper, and warmed them. Then I added some sliced onions and one sliced mushroom. We are not usually very good at being minimalist with our toppings, so I worked extra hard at it today. I used the infused oil on both focaccias and then sliced onion, mushroom, a tiny bit of pepperoni, and a tiny bit of cheese (mozzarella and parmesan) on one; green olives, pepperoni, and cheese on the other. They baked for 20 minutes. (Note: The focaccia was very challenging to remove from the pan, even with all of the olive oil. Next time, I'll line the pans with parchment as well.)

As for the taste? Isn't a picture worth a thousand words?

Oh yeah, it was as good as it looked. We served the bread with a lovely salad (CSA greens, avocado, hard boiled egg, and pancetta with this buttermilk dressing) and a fruit salad (perfectly ripe nectarines and blueberries). Isn't it nice when a simple little supper puts a smile on everyone's face?

Bake! Danish apple strudels

2011-08-03T19:13:00.003-05:00

This week's pick from Bake! is mine! :) Knowing my dad's fondness for Danish and given that this is his birthday month, I picked individual Danish apple strudels.

The most challenging part of this recipe was doing the math. ;-) I didn't want to have too many sweets around, so I cut the strudel recipe in half (to make four four-inch strudels), which meant cutting the dough recipe in fourths (the strudel recipe uses 1/2 of the Christel's Danish pastry dough).

I've already made the quick Danish pastry dough, which is a yeasted dough, and used it in both Danish cheese pockets and Danish apricot pinwheels. I found this recipe to be easier than the other and the dough very easy to work with. You simply combine flour, baking powder, and salt in a food processor. Cut in unsalted butter. Pulse in whole-milk ricotta and egg yolks until the whole thing forms a ball. The dough behaved exactly as it was supposed to, spent a night resting in the fridge, and was very easy to roll out this morning.

Last night, I also made the strudel filling, another super easy recipe: cook down granny smith apples, sugar, and cinnamon; add some currants. Again, I let them rest overnight.

The strudels took about 20 minutes to roll out and shape this morning. My dough was nowhere near as neat a rectangle as the pictures in the book, but because you flip the rolled strudel over (seam-side down), no one would ever know! They chilled in the fridge for an hour, baked for 25 minutes, and cooled for about two seconds.

These were really yummy. In addition to preferring the process of making this Danish dough, I also really enjoyed the taste and texture of the finished product. As for my dad's opinion? He only got one little tiny bite because apparently apple strudels are my step mom's favorites...guess I should've made the full recipe!

Twitter avatar fun: Rick Bayless' shredded chicken with potatoes and tomatoes

2011-08-02T19:54:00.004-05:00

While reading up on our August Twitter chef, Rick Bayless, I discovered that his specialty is Mexican cuisine...and that got me thinking. Didn't my hubby receive a Mexican cookbook from his big sister shortly after we moved in together? I searched through our bookshelves and, sure enough, I found Bayless' book Mexican Kitchen in the office. When hubby received it, we did minimal cooking at our house: a few staples, but nothing adventurous. Since that time, of course, our kitchen has completely changed.

Hubby absolutely loves Mexican food, so I let him browse the book and pick our first recipe; he chose smoky shredded chicken and potatoes with roasted tomatoes. Although Bayless instructs you to let things cool several times in the recipe, I was in a rush (I decided to take a late afternoon nap instead of starting dinner early), so I just let them cool for a few minutes in between steps, and it worked fine. Dinner was on the table in less than an hour.

Let me cut to the chase: this dish is amazing! It doesn't sound that exciting, but the flavors compliment each other perfectly. Hubby took one bite and said, "Oh yeah, you're adding this to the dinner rotation!" I served it with our normal taquitos (although with this batch, I added in a can of rinsed black beans...good addition!) and some fruit.

Smoky shredded chicken and potatoes with roasted tomatoes
adapted from Rick Bayless' Mexican Kitchen

1 tbsp chipotle chilis en adobo (see step 2 for notes)
2 roasted garlic cloves (see step 2 for notes)
2 ripe tomatoes
2 tbsp olive oil
4 bone-in chicken thighs, skins removed
4 red-skinned boiling potatoes, peeled and coarsely grated
1 medium white onion, thinly sliced
1 tsp Mexican dried oregano
1/2 c Mexican queso fresco, chopped or crumbled
1 ripe avocado, peeled, pitted, and diced

1. Preheat broiler to high. Cut each tomato in half and lay them skin side up on a baking sheet. Roast under the broiler until blackened (mine took about 10 minutes). Peel and cool slightly.
2. Puree chipotle chilis, roasted garlic, and tomatoes (including all juices) in a food processor. (Notes: RB gives the option of using 2 stemmed, dried chipotle chilis, toasted, rehydrated, and then drained OR 2 canned chipotle chilis in adobo sauce, removed from sauce. I happened to have minced chipotle chilis in adobo sauce in my freezer; I used a tablespoon. The flavor was definitely there, but the dish wasn't spicy at all. If you like spice, you'd probably want to up the chilis. RB also gives instructions for roasting the garlic cloves, unpeeled, in a skillet over medium heat for 15 minutes and then peeling them; I also had roasted garlic in my freezer, so I just used a teaspoon or two of that.)
3. Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a medium (2 - 3 quart) saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the puree and stir for five minutes, until seared and thickened.
4. Add the chicken thighs to the sauce (I flipped them over once so both sides could get a coating of sauce), cover, and cook over medium-low heat for 25 minutes until the meat is tender. Cool slightly and then pull the meat from the bones, shredding it.
5. Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the onion and potatoes and cook for 15 minutes until well-browned, stirring occasionally and scraping up brown bits.
6. Add the sauce and oregano, and then the chicken.
7. Transfer to a serving dish and then sprinkle with avocado pieces and cheese.

We could easily see using this as a taco filling or maybe eating it for breakfast along with eggs. The recipe may sound a little complicated, but it's actually pretty easy to throw together, and it is so worth it! I'm excited to try more recipes from this cookbook.

Mellow Bakers: Oatmeal bread with cinnamon and raisins

2011-07-29T19:40:00.003-05:00

Well, what do you know...I needed a cinnamon-raisin bread for a French toast recipe I'm trying out, and when I checked the Mellow Bakers' recipes for August, guess what was on the list? Oatmeal bread! (with the possible addition of cinnamon and raisins)

This bread should be a simple one-day bread; however, I'm single-parenting this week and life got in the way...twice, actually. So the bread got two rests in the fridge: one for the bulk fermentation and one just prior to baking. Also, since I only needed one loaf, I scaled the recipe (which makes three loaves) back.

The bread is made by mixing oatmeal (soaked briefly in the water to soften it), high gluten flour (I used bread flour and a little vital wheat gluten), whole wheat flour, milk, honey, oil (I used safflower), salt, instant yeast, and ground cinnamon. The raisins (which have also been soaked in water to prevent burning during baking) are added at the end. This is the first time that I've seen a cinnamon-raisin bread where the cinnamon and raisins are baked right in the main part of the dough, rather than done as a swirl.

JH says that a 1.5 pound loaf should fit in a 9x5 pan; my loaf was about 780 g (so a little over 1.5 pounds), but despite a really, really long rise, the pan still seemed too big. (My 9x5 has often given me problems; I think it's actually a little bigger than normal.) Next time, I'd use one of my bigger 8.5" loaf pans.

I brought this bread up to the cabin with me, and we had a little taste before assembling the French toast. I think we were all a little disappointed. The cinnamon and raisins were definitely both present, but, as my dad said, "There's just too much bread flavor getting in the way!" My stepmom added that, if she's going to eat cinnamon raisin bread, she wants the sugar in there, too! So I think we all agreed that cinnamon raisin bread needs to have the traditional cinnamon sugar swirl; I doubt I'll make this one again.

UPDATE: I take back my "meh" report...this made delicious toast (with a little butter) for breakfast this morning!

Cinnamon raisin bread turned into a baked French toast

Mellow Bakers: Three-stage 80% sourdough rye

2011-07-25T06:40:00.000-05:00

It's flashback time for me. Let me take you back to January with the Mellow Bakers' three-stage sourdough rye. This bread has more time and temperature requirements than any other bread I've ever baked, and since most of the temperatures required are around 85º, I was not willing to try it in the midst of winter in the frozen tundra where we live.

The other day, however, my kitchen table maintained a pretty constant 85º all day long, so I was able to make this bread without stressing over creating the perfect bread environment.

I actually started almost a week ago by turning a bit of my normal starter (Austin) into a rye starter. Then I began the three-stage process:

1. Freshening: combining a teeny tiny bit of my rye starter with water and more rye flour to create a paste, which ripened for five hours.

2. Creating a basic sour: mixing the freshening paste with water and more rye flour to create a stiffer starter, which ripened for about 18 hours.

3. Creating a full sour: mixing the basic sour with water and more rye flour to create a stiffer than the first, looser than the second, paste that ripened for three hours.

4. And finally, mixing all of the other ingredients: full sour with more rye flour, bread flour, water, and salt. I heeded the other Mellow Bakers' advice and left out the optional commercial yeast.

The dough is very paste-like, so I used my wet hands to knead it briefly, and then let it rest for its short 20 minute bulk fermentation.

Because I'd only made a half-recipe, I didn't divide the dough. I just floured my board and shaped the dough into a round, which I placed in my round banneton. Following Joanna's advice, I ignored the instructions for an hour final fermentation, especially given the fail I'd had earlier in the day. I let the dough rise fully, for probably close to five or six hours in an 80º room, before docking the dough with a bamboo skewer and baking it at 480º for 10 minutes and 410º for 35 minutes.

The bread appeared to have very little, if any, oven spring, but I'm guessing it's because it had such a long rise time. As for the flavor? I don't know; I haven't tried it yet. =) My dad is the one who loves the dark ryes, and he was on his way to a cabin for a week when the bread came out of the oven. So I wrapped it in linen and sent it with him. His report after about 36 hours of waiting: "Bread is less complex than some of the other dense breads you've made. No embedded grains, seeds, etc. Predominant flavor is sourdough, with a strong sour. I will certainly eat it all, in the morning, with butter, but don't feel like you need to make this again soon." I'll have a chance to try it when I join him at the cabin on Wednesday.

It feels good to be caught up, finally! Here are the other Mellow Bakers' three-stage sourdough ryes.

Chocolate pudding pops!

2011-07-24T01:50:00.002-05:00

Happy Sundae Sunday! My friend Di is hosting a virtual ice cream social today, similar to the cookie exchange she hosted last winter, to celebrate July being National Ice Cream Month.

I only recently purchased an ice cream maker, and while I've been using it a ton, I've gotten many of my recipes from other bloggers who are attending the social. My challenge: finding a recipe that someone in the group hadn't already posted. At first, I made a strawberry cheesecake light ice cream, which was pretty tasty. But I was desperately craving chocolate.... I read up on all sorts of unusual chocolate ice creams: ones with cayenne, coffee, cherries. But I was really in the mood for chocolate-chocolate.

And then I remembered my most recent issue of Cooking Light and a recipe for chocolate pudding pops. Score!

These taste exactly like the chocolate pudding pops we grew up with: a perfect tasty treat for a 95º afternoon!

Chocolate pudding pops
adapted from Cooking Light

590 mL (2 1/2 cups) 2% milk
110 g (1/2 cup) sugar
50 g (1/2 cup) unsweetened cocoa, sifted
10 g (1 tbsp) cornstarch
pinch of salt
20-25 g egg yolk (from 1 egg)
4 g (1/2 tsp) vanilla extract
59 g (2 ounces) semisweet chocolate, cut into small chunks

1. Combine the milk, sugar, cocoa, cornstarch, salt, and egg yolk in a medium saucepan. Whisk continuously over medium heat for 8 minutes, or until the mixture is bubbling and has slightly thickened.
2. Off heat, add chocolate. Let rest 1 minute and then whisk in. Add vanilla.
3. Pour mixture into a bowl set inside a larger bowl filled with ice water. Stir occasionally until cooled.
4. Use a measuring cup with a spout, pour into popsicle molds and insert sticks. (Mine made 8 popsicles.)
5. Freeze completely.

Check here for the round-up of all of the Sundae Sunday tasty treats!

Bake! flashback: Tiger rolls

2011-07-23T19:37:00.003-05:00

Being already overwhelmed with my commitments to The Modern Baker Challenge and Mellow Bakers, I was not eager to join a new baking group, so when Kayte and Phyl started baking through Nick Malgieri's Bake! I was happy to sit back and watch........Until the recipes they were baking and posting became more and more irresistible, as did the fun they were having with their Twitterbakes.

I am so happy that I caved and requested Bake! for my birthday, as it quickly became one of my very favorite cookbooks. But, because I joined in late, there were several recipes that I missed, and the group has decided to use the month of August to catch up.

My little guy saw me writing "soup" on our weekly dinner calendar and requested a bread: "white with flour on it." (He means something along the lines of ciabatta or baguettes.) I thought back to the first recipes the Bake! group made and realized that I'd never gotten around to tiger rolls; they seemed like a perfect accompaniment to soup.

This recipe uses NM's one-step bread dough, a bread made with bread flour (I subbed in some white whole wheat flour), salt, active yeast, water, and olive oil. The method is very similar to the unkneaded six-fold French bread that I just made: mix, stir, rest, stir, rest, fold, rest, fold, rise. It was very quick and easy.

After its rise, the bread is divided into twelve rolls (mine were about 64 g per roll), and then it's time to mix up the topping that gives tiger rolls their name. This is a Dutch crunch, as we made for the BBA's Vienna bread, although this time I actually went out and purchased rice flour. The topping is made from active yeast, water, sugar, salt, olive oil, and rice flour, all whisked together, allowed a brief rest, and painted on the rolls. The rolls rise for a bit and then are baked for 25 minutes.

This recipe was incredibly quick: 2:00 start time, 5:30 dinner time, and even allowed us a quick trip to the park. We all loved these rolls; with a little butter, they were perfect with our soup, crunchy crackly crust, fluffy inside. I planned to use the rest for sandwiches for lunch tomorrow, but my little guy asked, "Mom, can we have soup and tiger rolls for dinner again tomorrow?" so I guess it's leftover night at my house!

Here are Kayte's tiger rolls, Phyl's tiger (or giraffe) rolls, Andrea's tiger rolls.

Mellow Bakers: Olive levain (July)

2011-07-22T12:43:00.002-05:00

Here's my last Mellow Bakers' bread for July: olive levain, the first fail I've had in a while.

The bread is made with a liquid levain (left out for 12 hours), bread flour, a little whole wheat flour, salt, and water, and then some olives are added at the very end of kneading. My kids love olives but aren't fans of sourdough, so I just made a tiny loaf again. It had a 2 1/2 hour bulk fermentation and then went into the fridge overnight. I tend to let pure sourdoughs (ie, without any extra added yeast) rise for much longer than JH specifies because I've had this problem before. However, I know from other breads in this book that the loaves can be baked straight from the fridge, so that's what I did. There was almost no oven spring, and when I cut it later, the texture was not good; it reminded me of one of my first-ever attempts at baking a basic sourdough. Although it reached an internal temperature of over 200º, it did not look cooked; the inside was doughy, gummy, yucky.

I think, despite the texture issue, that the bread tastes how it's supposed to: very strong sourdough flavor, clear salty olive taste. I'm sad that it didn't turn out, but given the flavor combination, I doubt I'll try it again.

Mellow Bakers: Sourdough rye with walnuts and raisins

2011-07-19T14:29:00.002-05:00

Just could not get excited about this Mellow Bakers bread, so I scaled the recipe down and made one small loaf. Even my hubby, who normally looks forward to pretty much any new recipe I make, said, "You know, you can't just dump walnuts and raisins into a recipe and call it something different. This is just like all of the other sourdough ryes." I think we're both getting a little tired of this genre of bread, even with some that have been surprisingly good.

With a constant heat index of 110º F for the past three days, I couldn't bring myself to preheat the oven and my baking stone for an hour, so I decided to bake the bread at a lower temperature in a small loaf pan. It baked for 30 minutes at 350º F, and, with no steam, it was one of the most anemic-looking loaves I've ever made.

We tried it toasted, with a little butter; the sourdough, rye, raisin, and walnut flavors were all very distinct. It seemed a little weird to combine the sweetness of raisins with the strong sourdough rye flavor, and hubby called the walnuts "startling" (not in a good way). At any rate, it wasn't bad, but we were not big fans.

Bake! Golden sour cream layer cake with chocolate buttercream frosting

2011-07-16T14:04:00.000-05:00

Our next recipe from Bake! is golden sour cream layer cake with chocolate buttercream frosting, chosen by Phyl for his birthday weekend. I'm not going to be around that weekend, however, and we were hosting a double birthday get-together today (for my stepdad and my nephew), so I decided I'd try out Phyl's cake...you know, just to make sure it was a good choice. =)

I cut the recipe in half, which made two perfect 6" cakes. It was an easy recipe, although because the milk and eggs in NM's butter cake recipe were replaced by sour cream and egg yolks, the batter was really, really thick. I checked mine after 20 minutes and the cakes still looked very light, so I continued to cook them for another seven minutes. I think they actually could've been taken out several minutes earlier...so note to future bakers: this is just a really light cake which never looks done, so use the poking the center test instead of color to judge doneness!

This morning, I made half of NM's basic buttercream, a recipe I've made many times before, always with great success. Even though I followed the recipe exactly, just as I always do, this frosting was much runnier than usual. It was the first time that I flavored it with chocolate, but I actually think that the bigger problem was the weather; I've only made this recipe in the winter, but today, it is hot and humid. I put the cake and the frosting in the fridge for an hour and then was able to frost the cake. Because it was so hot, I did end up keeping the cake in the fridge until it was time to eat.

The cake sliced so easily and perfectly that I was convinced that it was, in fact, overcooked. But when I took my first bite, I was happily surprised: the sour cream really kept the cake moist and gave the cake a rich, full flavor, much more interesting than a traditional yellow cake. The chocolate buttercream was a delicious accompaniment, as was the mint oreo ice cream that we served it with. This will be my go-to recipe for a basic yellow birthday cake from now on!

Unkneaded, Six-Fold French Bread (Mellow Bakers) and a tuna melt

2011-07-15T19:49:00.002-05:00

Browsing through my newest issue of Cooking Light the other day, I spotted a recipe for tuna melts with avocado. I almost always order a tuna sandwich when we eat out at a diner or sandwich shop, but I wasn't sure how my family would feel about it. I read the recipe to hubby and asked if it was something I should just make for myself or if it was something he would be willing to try; he said to go ahead and put it on the family dinner list.

The recipe calls for French bread, so I immediately turned to my bread books to see which recipe I should make. I happened to find one French bread from Hamelman's Bread that the Mellow Bakers haven't made yet, and loving to find one recipe that meets two goals, I jumped on it: unkneaded, six-folded French bread.

This bread is perfect for anyone who is scared of the kneading process and/or doesn't have a stand-mixer. It's a fairly quick recipe: I started gathering ingredients at 11:40 this morning, and we were sitting down to eat our sandwiches at 5:40. But while it's not difficult, it is fairly limiting: once you start, you pretty much can't leave the house.

Check out the process; it's fascinating: first, you place your ingredients into a mixing bowl (bread flour, water, instant yeast, and salt). You don't mix with a dough hook or knead with your hand; you simply take your bench scraper and, turning the bowl as you go, fold the ingredients over on themselves 20 times. Then you let it rest for 30 minutes. Then you do the same thing six more times: fold the ingredients (which rapidly become a normal-looking dough) 20 times and rest for 30 minutes. That's it.

At the end of this bulk fermentation, you shape the baguettes. I followed this video again. (I'd scaled the recipe down and made three baguettes of about 300 g each.) They rest for an hour (conveniently just enough time for the oven to preheat) and then bake; mine were done in 20 minutes.

The loaves were perfect with the tuna sandwich, and the family easily polished off the rest of the loaf that was sitting on the counter. The texture was pleasantly chewy with a crackly crust. It wasn't the best baguette we've ever had in this house, but it was really, really good bread, and definitely the best one-day baguette recipe I've ever made.

Tuna melts with avocado
adapted from Cooking Light

2 1/2 tbsp olive oil
1 bunch of shallots, thinly sliced (about 2 tbsp)
1 tbsp dijon mustard
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/8 tsp salt
1 - 7 oz can white tuna packed in water, drained
juice from one lemon
1 avocado, peeled and chopped
1 c grape tomatoes, quartered
grueyere cheese, shredded
1 1/2 baguettes, halved lengthwise and then cut in half again (leaves you with 6 open-faced sandwiches)

1. Preheat the broiler to high.
2. Combine olive oil, shallots, mustard, pepper, salt, and tuna in a bowl, stirring well.
3. Juice the lemon into a bowl. Add the avocado pieces and toss.
4. Add avocado, juice, and tomato to the tuna mixture.
5. Place baguettes pieces on a baking pan. Distribute the tuna mixture evenly. Sprinkle with 1 - 2 tbsp of shredded cheese.
6. Broil three minutes, or until cheese is bubbly. (Mine were perfectly done in three minutes.)

Indian dinner #2: Skewered barbecued chicken with saffron cream sauce

2011-07-13T19:58:00.001-05:00

Kayte organized another Indian dinner for us to cook this week, although I think Margaret and I may have been the only two to cook it tonight.

Front left is the saffron cream sauce. I have never cooked with spicely gold before, and when I was at the grocery store this morning, I initially decided to skip it: $17 for a tiny bottle?! When I got home, I did a little research (no substitutions and a little goes a long way) and my hubby convinced me to try it, so back to the grocery store I went. When I got home and was mixing up the sauce, I realized that I also didn't have any cardamom, so I substituted garam masala. We really, really, really loved this sauce, both on the chicken and the naan.

Center is the barbecued chicken. I'm not ambitious enough to cook lamb, as the original recipe calls for. The marinade is yogurt, sesame oil, and a lot of spices. I marinated the chicken pieces for about three hours and then hubby grilled them. The chicken was really moist and flavorful...again, we were big fans (the kids were, too).

Back right is our normal naan. Yum! And for the first time, the kids actually ate theirs, too.

Front right is a cucumber raita, something I've been curious to try, especially since I am a big tzatziki-lover. I'm not sure why, but the spice combination was just not good to me; I couldn't eat it and ended up throwing most of the bowl-full away. Hubby liked it okay with the chicken, but not enough for seconds.

Croissants

2011-07-11T19:08:00.001-05:00

Well, another fear bites the dust and another item checked off the must-learn-to-make list: croissants! Like puff pastry, the fluffy layers of croissants are created by lamination: folding dough and butter over and over to "create many thin layers that puff when baked." Unlike puff pastry, croissants use a yeast-based dough. I used Peter Reinhart's recipe from Artisan Breads Every Day.

The starting dough for croissants is called a détrempe, made by stirring together flour (PR gives the option of bread flour for structure or all-purpose flour for more tender structure; I used a combination of both), salt, sugar, instant yeast, cold milk, and melted unsalted butter. PR says the dough will be sticky, wet, pliable. Mine was dry and crumbly. I added a bit more milk, kneaded with my hands (even though he warns against handling it much) and stuck it in the fridge. And then re-read the recipe: ahhhhhh AND WATER. Right. Not wanting to mess around with a first-time recipe, I just dumped my first attempt and tried again, this time using the right amounts of both milk and water, and ended up with a dough that was just as he described. So that went into the fridge.

The instructions are long and relatively complicated (7 pages), but also very explicit. I was actually startled by how easy it all was: roll, measure, fold, rest, roll, measure, fold, rest, roll, measure, fold, rest. Even cutting out the croissants was easy once I figured out the process PR was describing.

Rather than rolling out the entire piece of dough into a 7" by 30" rectangle, I cut it in half. For half of the dough, I followed the instructions for making small croissants. (I ended up with eight.) For the other half, I followed the instructions for chocolate croissants, using a homemade chocolate bar for the filling (3 tablespoons of unsalted butter melted and combined with 1 cup of chocolate chips). I tried following PR's dimensions: 3.5" by 6" and they were huge so for the rest, I cut them in half. I ended up with two giant chocolate croissants and six smaller ones.

I let the croissants rest in the fridge overnight and then let them rise for two hours in the morning. They baked for about 28 minutes and, even though I'd followed PR's directions for making "small" croissants, they grew huge in the oven! And, even though I know from making scones that when I try to bake two pans at once, they burn, I baked two pans at once...and the bottoms definitely scorched. Luckily, because they're so flaky, I was able to flake off the burned parts.

These were really yummy, flaky, and buttery. But the chocolate ones were even better; I was really sad that I didn't make more. I also discovered that my family is not all that crazy about croissants, although they were pretty popular at bookclub.

More importantly, I am so excited that I made them...they turned out...they weren't that difficult...and I could make them again! Woohoo! (Note to self: next time, bake only one pan at a time!!!)

Bake! Devil's food bombe

2011-07-10T19:31:00.001-05:00

The next recipe that I baked from Nick Malgieri's Bake! was devil's food bombe, chosen by Margaret to celebrate her birthday on Father's Day weekend. We were out of town that weekend, and when we returned, I just didn't have a cake-worthy occasion; hubby and I do not need a giant cake just sitting around waiting to be eaten.

So when my mom and stepdad agreed to come over for dinner tonight to celebrate their 29th wedding anniversary with us, I figured it would be a good time to try it out. Hubby hates raspberries (I know, crazy, right?), so I had him pick up some strawberries to use instead. Happily, Kayte had already made this recipe and scaled it down, so I just used her math: half the cake recipe fit two six-inch pans and perfectly filled a 5.25" tall, 3.25" deep bowl (my 1 quart glass mixing bowl).

The cake was easily thrown together last night, with unsweetened chocolate, boiling water, white sugar, brown sugar, flour, salt, baking soda, safflower oil, sour cream, vanilla extract, and an egg. My two six-inch cakes baked for 32 minutes and popped easily out of the pans. After cooling them, I wrapped them up and stuck them in the fridge, figuring they would be easier to cut if they were chilled a bit.

This morning I assembled the cake, which only took about 25 minutes. The cake is thinly sliced and then patched together to line the bowl and separate the layers. In between the layers of cake, I dolloped sweetened whipped cream (I made a half batch, which was 2 cups of whipping cream, 1/4 cup of sugar, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract, and I had quite a bit left over) and strawberries. NM gives the option of sprinkling rum, too; I was curious about the flavor, but didn't want too much alcohol since I knew I'd be serving the cake to my kids, so I just sprinkled a tiny bit on the outer layer of cake and none of the rest. I had about 1/2" slice of cake left, which fit perfectly as a cap over the top. Then the cake went into the fridge until this evening, when I dumped it out of the bowl and finished it with more sweetened whipped cream.

My mom took her first bite while I was photographing the cake outside and all I could hear was, "Oh my! Oh my! Oh my! This is sooooooo good!" Seriously, this cake was ah-maze-ing. The devil's food cake was moist, chocolately, with just the hint of rum. Together, with the whipped cream and the strawberries...well, I just don't have the words to describe how good it was. The little girl said, "Mommy, this was the best cake ever of my life." And hubby said, "Next time I have to take something in to work, this is what you're making!" Thanks, Margaret, for such an excellent pick!

Ina's sauce, part 2: Barbecue chicken pizza

2011-07-09T19:03:00.000-05:00

So, as I said yesterday, Ina's barbecue sauce recipe ~ even halved ~ made a ton. Today, I discovered a use for part of that mason jar full of goodness:

Using ABED pizza dough, I spread out a couple of tablespoons of the sauce, then spread out diced barbecue chicken (leftover from last night), thinly sliced red onion, and mozzarella. Baked for seven minutes per pizza, added chopped cilantro when it came out of the oven: delicious! (even for a "pizza is only red sauce, green peppers, and meat" kind of guy!)

Twitter chef avatar fun: Ina's barbecue sauce and mashed potatoes

2011-07-08T19:17:00.002-05:00

Our Twitter avatar chef for July is Ina Garten, otherwise known as the Barefoot Contessa, and Phyl picked her. I'm glad he did because I've heard a lot about her, but have never tried any of her recipes (unless you include my granola bars, which are an amalgamation of a ton of recipes including this one by Deb at Smitten Kitchen, who says hers were an adaptation of Ina's, but that's pretty convoluted...).

I had a long list of recipes to choose from, but eventually settled on something I could make with ingredients that I already had on hand: barbecue chicken and mashed potatoes.

I followed the recipe for Ina's barbecue sauce exactly, although I cut it in half because I was running low on several of the ingredients and it seemed to make a lot. Indeed, I ended up having enough to thoroughly coat four large chicken breasts and still fill up a mason jar. It's an easy recipe: lightly cook some onions and garlic in oil until translucent. Then add a bunch of stuff (worcestershire sauce, honey, soy sauce, hoisin sauce, tomato paste, cider vinegar, dijon mustard, chili powder, cumin, and red pepper flakes) and let it simmer on low for thirty minutes.

I'd forgotten to defrost the whole chicken which I have in the deep freeze, so I decided to just make chicken breasts. And then hubby had a bunch of chores around the house, so he asked me to bake the chicken in the oven rather than firing up the grill. I baked the chicken breasts, which had been marinating in the sauce for several hours, in a foil-covered glass dish for about twenty-five minutes, and then I broiled them for about five. They were perfectly done, and we really enjoyed the flavor. Even the kids gobbled up their pieces. I'm excited to try the rest of the sauce on future meats and meals. Hubby prefers smokier sauces, but still said this one was excellent; with my sweet tooth, this one was perfect for me.

I tried to make Ina's buttermilk mashed potatoes to go along with the chicken. I boiled the potatoes, pressed them through my food mill, and then added the 1/4 cup milk and 4 tablespoons of unsalted butter that she calls for. At that point, she says to "add enough buttermilk to make the potatoes creamy"...but my potatoes were already beyond creamy. I ended up just adding a splash of buttermilk plus some pepper (she says to add a teaspoon of salt, but mine were already quite salty from the salted water). Even with these changes, the potatoes were excellent.

Ina's followers seem to be a devoted lot, and after these two winning recipes, I can see why!

Ice cream bon bons

2011-07-08T00:53:00.000-05:00

I have to dedicate this post to Di, who inspired me with her first Ice Cream Week post last week...until that time, I had never heard of Magic Shell. How is it possible that I've lived my life without knowing about this incredible substance?

For anyone else who is in the dark like I was, magic shell is this chocolate coating which hardens instantly and smoothly when it comes in contact with something cold (ie, ice cream). Super easy to make and really fun to eat!

I was intrigued as to whether I could make little bite-sized ice cream balls, completely coated in chocolate. It took some trial and error, but I finally figured it out.

I was initially going to make my normal vanilla bean ice cream, but I was so pleasantly surprised by this weekend's lemon curd ice cream that I decided to expand my horizons a bit. Di wrote about salted caramel ice cream which has long intrigued me, and I happened to find a recipe for it on Bon Appetit, so I tried it. I'm always amazed when plain ol' white sugar ends up a perfect caramel, but that's just what happened, and it's just what the ice cream tasted like. Not a favorite for me, but fun to try a new flavor.

There are a ton of recipes for magic shell out there on the web, with varying amounts of different kinds of chocolate combined with refined coconut oil (apparently the unrefined stuff makes food taste like Coppertone sunscreen, according to my most recent issue of Cook's Country). A few include a pinch of salt and several offer other flavoring options (which I may have to try at some point). I went with the basic recipe that Di posted, although I scaled it down so I only used one chocolate bar.

Ice cream bon bons
ice cream
115 g bittersweet chocolate, chopped
20 g refined coconut oil

1. Scoop ice cream into little balls and set on a tray. (I used my cookie scoop.) Put tray in the freezer for at least an hour. (This was my biggest trial and error...I kept taking them out to try to dip them and they just weren't cold enough to hold their shape until they'd been in the freezer for an hour or two...longer is better.)
2. Make magic shell: partially melt chopped chocolate in the microwave. Stir until completely melted. Add coconut oil and stir until combined. Cool slightly.
3. Once magic shell is cool and ice cream balls have frozen fairly solid, dip each ice cream ball in the bowl of chocolate, rotating until it is completely coated.
4. Briefly refreeze coated ice cream balls.
(Apparently magic shell can be stored, covered, in a mason jar at room temperature.)

Ta da! Delicious and fun ice cream bon bons! I can't wait to try chocolate-coated chocolate ice cream....mmmmmmm.

Mellow Bakers: Potato bread with roasted onions

2011-07-07T00:02:00.000-05:00

Wait! Haven't we seen this one before?

We Mellow Bakers did, indeed, already bake a roasted potato bread back in October, and my family loved it. Needless to say, we were pretty excited to see this one come up: essentially the same bread but with the addition of roasted onions.

This one starts the night before with mixing up a pâte fermentée and roasting potatoes and onions. All easy enough, except that I forgot I was only wearing one pot holder as I was dealing with the pan of hot onions and got a nasty little burn on my finger.

The rest of the recipe is the same as the roasted potato bread (bread flour, whole wheat flour, water, salt, instant yeast, and the onions and potatoes). Easily made and baked in a morning, with a little pause in the fridge while we went shopping.

I only made one 1.5 pound loaf and it flew off the dinner table. The little guy who never likes my bread ate thirds and the baby girl ate fourths (and both asked for another piece). This was a very flavorful bread.

We ate it with this recipe for Tuscan roasted chicken which I bookmarked on Margaret's blog during our vacation. Instead of fennel, I used shallots, which appeared in our first CSA box yesterday. (We actually are on week 3 of our CSA, but were out of town for the first two weeks of it.) We finished the meal with a little fruit salad and a CSA-inspired salad. Quite a tasty summer meal!

1st CSA box

Twittercook: No-butter chicken and corn with aromatic seasonings

2011-07-06T08:43:00.004-05:00

While catching up on Twitter yesterday morning, Kayte invited me to cook an Indian-flavored dinner tonight with several of our Twitter buddies. I'm always happy for new dinner ideas, especially in the summer when I have to plan three meals a day instead of just one!

The recipes can be found here: Bal's no-butter chicken and Corn with aromatic seasonings. Both recipes were really easy to make, although I only had a bit of garam masala left, so I threw in some additional spices to make up for it.

I wasn't super excited about the corn, but decided to make it anyway since we had two cobs leftover from the fourth. And I'm so glad I did; it was unusually spiced, but absolutely delicious! The chicken was good, too, but too spicy for the kiddos and me. The kids both took one bite, said "yum," then said, "water!!!" and then ate yogurt and cereal. I managed to eat a little, but it was way too spicy for me. I think I used too much cumin in my fake garam masala, and that there were too many pepper flakes for us. Easy fixes for next time! And hubby was ecstatic because he never gets to eat food that's as spicy as he likes! =) Cooking with friends and a delicious meal...what a perfect way to spend a summer evening!

Modern Baker: Lemon tartlets (and lemon curd ice cream)

2011-07-05T13:17:00.000-05:00

We've just returned ~~to my kitchen~~ home after nearly three weeks away, and my to-bake and to-cook lists have gotten insanely long while I've been away. We always spend two or three weeks with my in-laws in the summer. It is incredibly relaxing: my mother-in-law cooks amazing down-home meals (chicken and noodles with mashed potatoes, anyone?) and generally takes care of us, the kiddos play with their cousins for hours on end. It's such a great start to the summer.

But after about a week or ten days, I really start to miss my kitchen. This is when I start bookmarking recipes like crazy and spend hours making a to-do list and a grocery list for my return.

While we were in the car on our 17-hour drive home, some of my baking buddies decided to make lemon curd ice cream, spearheaded by Phyl. Tracey had posted a recipe on her blog, and she claimed to love it as much as her favorite ice cream, mint chocolate chip (also my favorite). As soon as we returned, it was the first thing I set about making. Happily, one of the few sweet tarts I have left from the Modern Baker Challenge was the lemon-lime tartlets, so I was able to make the lemon curd for those and use it in both.

I made 2/3 of the recipe for the lemon curd, which was enough for one 4" mini-tart, 50 g for the ice cream, and a little bit left over. The curd requires lemons, limes, sugar, unsalted butter, and egg yolks. I couldn't find organic limes; I picked up one regular lime, but had an impossible time zesting it, so my curd was almost all lemon, with about 1-2 tablespoons of lime juice thrown in. The curd was a little time-consuming, but not difficult: put the lemon zests in lemon juice and sugar, simmer, and then allow to rest. After discarding the zest, add the butter to the pan and simmer again. Temper the egg yolks and then stir the whole mixture until thickened. I refrigerated the curd overnight.

Today, I pulled cookie dough crust dough from the freezer and made two mini-tart crusts. NM says to use sweet tart dough, but Andrea thought the cookie dough would be a better pairing and it's what I had in the freezer. On my last post where I talked about my struggles with NM's cookie dough tart crusts, Heather commented that I might need to knead the dough a little longer before rolling. I tried it this time (also using more flour than usual), and I actually had way more success than I've ever had. (Thanks, Heather!) The crusts baked for about 15 minutes, cooled for about 30 minutes, and then I dumped in the lemon curd. The tarts were pretty good.........however:

Last night, I also started making the lemon curd ice cream. I tempered the egg yolks with heated milk, and then thickened the custard...and then suddenly smelled scrambled eggs and realized that the temperature of the custard had shot from 150 F to 210 F in just a few seconds. I dumped the whole batch into the trash, grumbled a bunch, washed all of my dishes, and started over, this time being very careful to keep the custard at low heat and my eyes on the pan. It worked! I whisked in lemon zest and lemon curd and then refrigerated the whole thing over night.

This morning, I whipped up some whipping cream and folded it into the lemon custard, along with some fresh lemon juice. This step seemed really fussy and I'd debated skipping it, but I'm so glad I didn't. This ice cream was the creamiest, dreamiest textured ice cream I've ever had. And the flavor was so light, lemony, refreshing. Even my little girl, who generally doesn't like fruit flavored things, said, "This is even better than vanilla ice cream!" and proceeded to lick every drop off the paddle of the ice cream maker. Hubby and I were both amazed by how wonderful this ice cream was...if you haven't tried it yet, and you have an ice cream maker, add this one to the list!

Cinnamon pull-apart bread

2011-06-23T20:52:00.000-05:00

My hubby celebrated his 36th birthday a few days ago. Normally he picks special foods for me to make for his day: a fun breakfast bread (or two), maybe a fancy bread for a picnic lunch, a special dinner, followed by his favorite chocolate cake with fudge sauce (an old family recipe from his grandma). This year, we were visiting my in-laws on his birthday, so we went out to lunch and hubby's mom cooked him a fancy dinner and baked his cake. I offered to make a special breakfast treat ~ my first time baking in someone else's kitchen ~ and he picked cinnamon rolls.

I used the all-purpose sweet dough from ABED, and although I was nervous at first, it was actually kind of fun to bake without my normal tools, kneading by hand, etc. I used 2/3 of a recipe to make a 9x13 pan of cinnamon rolls.

This morning, I knew the last third of the dough needed to be used, but I wanted to make something new. I'd first heard about pull-apart bread last spring, but had never actually seen a recipe until this one appeared on Tracey's blog last week. I thought it might be a fun use of our leftover bread.

So this morning, I rolled out the dough into a big (12x20") rectangle. I used my fingers to spread out two tablespoons of browned unsalted butter on the dough, and then sprinkled a little over 1/2 cup of sugar and 2 teaspoons of cinnamon on top. I cut the dough into six strips, stacked them, and then cut the line into six again. I dumped them into a 9x5 pan sprayed with cooking spray, poured the rest of the cinnamon/sugar from the counter on top of the loaf, let it rise for about 30 minutes and then baked it at 350 F for about 40 minutes.

This was a winner: super easy and we all loved it!

Mellow Bakers: Vollkornbrot (June)

2011-06-16T20:22:00.001-05:00

Here I am with the final Mellow Bakers bread for June: vollkornbrot, a dense sourdough rye bread with large amounts of whole grains.

This is one of those breads that makes a beginning(ish) bread baker like me a little nervous...made with coarse rye meal and sourdough starter, with no white flour or even whole wheat to lighten things up and only the teeniest tiniest bit of instant yeast to give it an extra push to rise. The dough barely moves and tends to look like paste...it requires pouring into the prepared pan, rather than shaping into a loaf. In fact, I debated skipping it. And then I thought about just scaling it way way down.

And then I thought, "Oh, what've I got to lose?!" and went ahead and made the whole nearly four-pound loaf. After all, this is my dad's favorite kind of bread, and JH says it keeps forever in the fridge, and if it turns out to be a nearly-inedible brick (like others' I've read about and like my own first experiences with 100% sourdough rye bread), well, it's only a little flour, right?

So after refreshing my starter and stopping at the co-op for rye meal and rye berries, I mixed up my sourdough: rye meal (coarse rye flour, aka pumpernickel flour), water, and mature sourdough culture. Then I mixed up my soaker of rye berries and water, forgetting that they only needed four hours of soaking and that it was getting pretty warm.

The first incident (because there's always an incident with me, isn't there?!) was when we opened the freezer and the bowl with the starter tumbled from the top of the fridge to the floor...thank goodness for sturdy glass bowls...no harm done.

I actually let my sourdough rise for 24 hours...my starter can be a little on the slow side, and I thought a little extra time wouldn't hurt anything. Sure enough, it was just about perfect, with a clear dome on top. Then I looked at my rye berries...and the white fuzz covering some of the top layer. Yep, too long, too moist, too warm: they were covered with mold. What to do?! I first posted for advice on the Mellow Bakers forum, then read some scary article about deathly fungus that can grow on rye plants, and then called my dad, who is my guru for all things nutrition and food related. I'd already scraped off the top layer and there was no visible mold anywhere else. I have a pretty sensitive nose and I couldn't smell it anywhere else in the bowl. And hubby and I both tasted a few berries; they tasted completely normal. My dad thought we'd probably be okay.

Moving right along...hubby and I chopped up the rest of the soaked rye berries to make rye chops. This was somewhat of a pain, especially given how many they were, but we managed. Then I mixed the rye chops with the sourdough, the rest of the rye meal, more water, salt, a tiny bit of instant yeast, and some sunflower seeds.

It was supposed to knead in my standmixer for ten minutes, but it was so paste-like that the dough hook kept pushing all the dough to the sides and then spinning around. So I mixed it by hand, folding the dough over on itself in the bowl for about ten minutes. There was no noticeable change. Then a twenty minute bulk proof right in the bowl.

I scraped the paste into my pullman pan, sprinkled rye meal on top of the dough, and covered it. I let it rise for about an hour, and was surprised to notice that it did, in fact, seem to rise a little. Then it baked for an hour and a half, and sat wrapped in a towel for a couple of days.

It seemed really hard when I tried to saw through it with a knife, but happily, the inside was moist and the crust was not too dense to chew. It was really interesting plain: you could taste all of the different grains. And it was actually pretty tasty with butter. In fact, I think it tastes like what it's supposed to taste like...imagine that! We're planning to eat some for sandwiches, and I'm hoping to get some cream cheese and cucumber for my favorite use of rye bread. Still waiting to get my dad's opinion on his half of the loaf...... After my recent tart crust near-disasters, I felt like I redeemed myself a bit to have conquered the vollkornbrot! =)

UPDATE: Dad, the rye lover, declared this bread absolutely fabulous. The half loaf that I gave him is already gone, enjoyed in thin slices with either butter or cream cheese.

Look at all of those grains!

Bake! Citrus-scented chocolate tart

2011-06-15T21:12:00.000-05:00

Marthe chose the citrus-scented chocolate tart for her Bake! pick.... Although it's not technically on the schedule until the beginning of July, I will likely not be baking much for the next few weeks, and we had our end-of-the-year staff picnic today, so it seemed like the perfect time to try it out.

This tart starts with the cocoa version of the sweet pastry dough. Given my success with the sweet pastry dough, I was excited to get a more workable chocolate pastry dough than the one I tried for the tartlets last weekend. Things seemed to be going well as I mixed up the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, unsalted butter, and egg (I made a half recipe for one 10" tart) in my food processor. I refrigerated the dough for a day. Sadly, once I began the rolling-out process, this dough gave me the same sticky, rippy problems I had with the other chocolate pastry dough. It actually really reminded me of the troublesome cookie dough crust; I ended up having to do a lot of piecing together to cover the pan. I much prefer the basic sweet dough and the rich pie crust for ease of rolling and transferring.

Anyway, after I got the tart dough in place in the pan, I set to work on the filling, which was easy and smelled heavenly. It was all mixed in a saucepan: half-and-half plus sugar, and then butter and semi-sweet chocolate, and then eggs and salt, and finally lemon zest, orange zest, lemon juice, orange juice, vanilla extract, and a bit of triple sec.

Mine baked for almost twice as long as specified in the recipe; it just kept looking jiggly and the instructions say "bake until the filling is set." I was surprised by the mousse-like texture of the final product; I was expecting something a little more solid.

The tart looked a little plain, and I didn't have any orange slices to use as a garnish, so I made a simple chocolate-butter mixture and drizzled some over the top, just to jazz it up a bit.

This tart was delicious. With my massive sweet tooth, I loved that it was made with semi-sweet chocolate instead of the bittersweet called for in many of NM's other recipes. My kiddos both loved it, as did hubby. One of my friends at the lunch today said, "Oh, my, the flavor just explodes in your mouth! This puts the rest of the food here to shame!" which I thought was quite a compliment. =) Even my dad, who doesn't like chocolate, said it was excellent (although too chocolately for him, of course).

Mellow Bakers: Semolina bread (June)

2011-06-14T21:27:00.000-05:00

My second June Mellow Bakers' bread was a semolina levain. With life being busy and much to be baked, I knew we wouldn't want a lot, so I actually only made a tiny loaf (1/4 of the recipe).

It started with a liquid levain: Austin (my starter), bread flour, and water, which developed overnight. Then the preferment was mixed with more bread flour, a lot of semolina, salt, and water. My standmixer really struggled with this one: it was pretty wet and there was so little dough that the dough hook couldn't grab on. I ended up adding a bit more flour (JH says the dough should be a little drier than usual) and then kneading by hand...the dough was easy to work with once I'd added the extra flour.

My only hiccup with this one happened when I went to place the dough into my round banneton: I'd been working on prepping for the Vollkenbrot (our final June bread), so I unthinkingly dusted the banneton with coarse rye meal! When I realized what I'd done, I quickly took the dough out, brushed off as much as I could, and added semolina to the banneton instead. I retarded it in the fridge overnight, and slashed and baked this morning.

My little loaf baked for about 25 minutes (with the fake steaming method). How did it taste? Well, when I got home from work to take a picture of the crumb, this is how much was left:

Hubby, both of the kids, and I all loved it with a little butter. Hubby said it was the perfect snack bread (and the kids seemed to agree)...I thought it might make nice little buns, too.

Twitter chef avatar fun: Eric Ripert's Shrimp and rice pilaf

2011-06-13T20:06:00.000-05:00

Better late than never!

This month's chef for our Twitter avatar fun was Eric Ripert, chosen by Leslie of Lethally Delicious. I'd never heard of Eric Ripert before, but when I looked through his recipes, I printed out several interesting dinner and breakfast ideas. I hadn't yet decided on one, but when looking through them again tonight, I realized I had everything on hand to make his quick shrimp and rice pilaf.

Shrimp and Rice Pilaf, Indian-style
adapted slightly from Eric Ripert, via Food and Wine

1 1/2 cups water
1 tbsp kosher salt
1 bay leaf
1 1/4 cups long-grain rice
2 tbsp safflower oil
1 onion, minced
1/4 cup slivered almonds
1/4 cup shelled pistachios, chopped
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp turmeric
1 lb shelled and devained medium shrimp, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
8 pitted prunes, chopped
1/2 tsp orange zest
1/2 tsp fresh dill, chopped
1 tbsp fresh lemon juice

1. In a 2-qt saucepan, combine the water with the salt and bay leaf. Bring to a boil. Add the rice, cover, and cook over low heat for 20 minutes.
2. Heat the oil in a 12-inch skillet. Cook the onion, almonds, pistashios, coriander, and tumeric over low-medium heat until the onion is softened, about 4 minutes.
3. Add the shrimp, prunes, and orange zest, and cook about 3 minutes, until the shrimp are cooked through.
4. Add the rice (without the bay leaf), and then the dill and lemon juice.

Verdict: Hubby absolutely loved this one. The kiddos liked the rice (and liked that it turned our tongues yellow!), but none of the "things" in it. It was really easy to throw together and quite tasty. The prunes and nuts added a fun texture and bursts of flavor; the citrus was quite distinct and brightened the whole dish. This was a winner!

Strawberry chocolate chip frozen yogurt

2011-06-12T19:30:00.001-05:00

I had some strawberries in the fridge to use up and decided to make my little guy's favorite treat: strawberry frozen yogurt. We usually use the recipe from David Lebovitz's Perfect Scoop. While the strawberries were macerating, I started browsing online, looking for other frozen yogurt recipes to change things up a bit. I found an interesting recipe from Food and Wine via The Bitten Word, which included some different ingredients (a little cream, some corn syrup, some lemon zest). I'd already started the process for DL's recipe, so I ended up making a conglomeration of the two, varying based on things I had in the house. And then, most of the way through the churning process, I thought about the tail-end of a bag of mini chocolate chips in the freezer. I pulled out a spoonful of the yogurt, dotted it with mini chips, and stuck it in hubby's mouth. "Good idea or bad idea?" He tasted, thought, and suddenly said, "Mmmm, good idea!!"

The results? Definitely a yummy treat! Creamier and richer than our normal frozen yogurt. The lemon adds a brightness, and the tiny bits of chocolate make you feel like you're eating chocolate covered strawberries. Yum!

Strawberry chocolate chip frozen yogurt
makes about 1 1/2 quarts

450 g strawberries (1 lb), washed, hulled, and cut into small chunks
130 g sugar
1 tsp kirsch
2 tsp fresh lemon juice
2 tsp instant fruit pectin
2 tbsp light corn syrup
1 tsp lemon zest
350 g plain yogurt
125 g heavy cream
1/4 c mini chocolate chips

1. Combine the strawberries, sugar, and kirch in a medium bowl and allow to sit for an hour or two. Then blend into a purée.
2. Add the fruit pectin to the lemon juice, stirring well to combine. (The Food and Wine recipe called for geletin, which I thought I had, but then didn't, so I subbed in fruit pectin, which seemed to work just fine.)
3. Heat the strawberry purée with the corn syrup until the sugar melts, about 1 minute.
4. Off heat, add the lemon juice/pectin to the strawberries.
5. Stir the yogurt with the lemon zest, and then add the strawberry purée, and finally add the cream. Stir well.
6. Place the bowl in an ice water bath and stir occasionally, until the mixture is cold.
7. Freeze in the ice cream maker according to the manufacture's instructions.
8. About two minutes before the yogurt is finished churning, add the mini chips.
9. Enjoy the yogurt immediately (it will have a soft serve consistency) or pack it into a freezer safe bowl and freeze for several hours.

Modern Baker Challenge: Chocolate Caramel Pecan Tartlets

2011-06-11T21:28:00.001-05:00

These little tartlets were one of my biggest challenges to-date.

I was looking for a quick and easy dessert to bring to a friend's 30th birthday party this afternoon. I wasn't sure whether or not she had a birthday cake already planned, so I wanted to pick something fun that would go with another dessert. Browsing through The Modern Baker, I settled on the chocolate caramel pecan tartlets; they looked tasty and I had all of the ingredients on hand.

My first hiccup with these was that I was counting on using some of the leftover sweet tart dough that I have in my freezer. Upon closer inspection, I discovered that these tarts actually call for the chocolate nut dough. While I was willing to compromise, hubby was pretty convinced they needed the chocolate dough, and since I'd never made it before and we didn't have any plans this morning, I decided to just make a batch. The tart dough was relatively easy: slivered almonds, sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, salt, butter, eggs, and water, all combined in the food processor. I used extra-large eggs, so I thought maybe I should omit the water because of the extra moisture. I should've listened to my instincts, since the dough ended up being quite wet.

While the dough was cooling in the fridge, I made up the ganache. I realized that I didn't have quite enough chocolate, so I scaled the recipe down (I made 3/4 of the recipe). NM says to use a large saucepan because the caramel boils up...it did, but I think the pan I used was way too large, so it made it a little awkward to cook. And while I was cooking the sugar and water and simultanously heating the cream, I got distracted with the dishes and ended up scorching the cream and having to start over with that part. Anyway, the ganache wasn't difficult: sugar, water, cream, milk, salt, bittersweet chocolate (I used 60% and 72%), and unsalted butter. I probably should've waited to make the ganache, since it was completely hard by the time the crusts were ready.

Ah, the crusts. I rolled out the wet dough, using quite a bit of flour to prevent sticking and tearing, and used a small round cutter to cut circles. I used my mini-muffin pan, one of NM's suggestions for mini-tarts. It was only after I put the pan into the oven that I realized I'd forgotten to pierce the crusts with a fork. I pulled them from the oven, where they'd already begun to puff up, and quickly pierced them. Too late of course; they were still quite puffy. I used a plastic measuring spoon to push the still warm dough down to make a little cup. I thought I was in the clear, until I tried to remove the little delicate forms from the mini muffin pan. There's a reason tart pans have a removable bottom. I was able to salvage a few of them, and then I used the remaining 1/4 of the dough (still in the fridge) to make two 4" mini tart crusts.

After the crusts were finally ready, I rewarmed the ganache over a pot of gently simmering water on the stove, which went surprisingly well. I filled one 4" tart crust with plain chocolate, and then added the toasted pecans and filled the rest of the tart crusts.

I prefer the bittersweet chocolate tart with sweet tart crust. These were pretty dark; I would've preferred them with some sweetened whipped cream or ice cream. And I don't think I'll make this crust again. And I definitely won't use the mini-muffin pan again (unless someone has a foolproof technique for removing the tarts...?). Still, they were pretty tasty and went quickly at the birthday party, so all's well that ends well, I guess!

Bake! Strawberry cream cheese crumble tart

2011-06-01T21:53:00.002-05:00

I'd never noticed what an alliterative cake this was until I was typing in the name: strawberry cream cheese crumble cake. How very appropriate for an English teacher!

Anyway, hubby's school had an end-of-the-year barbecue yesterday, and despite my sadness that he's done with school while I still have TWO FULL WEEKS left, I sucked it up and agreed to bake. When I asked hubby what he wanted me to make, he started listing off his favorite recipes, none of which were appropriate for a barbecue: bagels? scones? pizza? Seriously?

So rather than get into a big fight, I told him to look at our up-coming recipes for our Bake! twitterbakes and choose from there. He thought they all looked good, and then settled on this upcoming weekend's pick, by Kayte, strawberry cream cheese crumble tart. Looked good to me!

It was pretty easy to make the components the day before. NM cautions us not to assemble it ahead of time, although you can make all of the parts early.

The crust was the cookie dough crust. Normally, when I see that crust, I sub in his sweet tart dough which has been much more successful for me. The cookie dough crust and I did not get along when I made the Parisian fruit tart. However, that was from The Modern Baker, so I thought that maybe I'd have better luck with the one from Bake! It was easy to mix up in the food processor: slivered almonds, confectioners' sugar, flour, salt, unsalted butter, vanilla extract, and egg yolks. I pulsed and pulsed and worried that it was never going to come together and form a ball...but have faith, because eventually it did. The dough felt much better than the one from MB, not so crumbly, and I stuck it in the fridge as instructed. However, when it came time to roll it out, again it started breaking and tearing and I ended up having to piece it together. It was fine...definitely way easier than my last experience, but I still prefer the sweet tart dough for its supreme ease of rolling. And like the last time I made the cookie dough crust, it was quite crumbly.

The cream cheese filling is easy: cream cheese, confectioners' sugar, lemon zest, and vanilla extract, all mixed in the trusty stand mixer. The only issue I had with this one is that I made it early, left it in the fridge over night, and when I went to scrape it into the tart, it was way too hard. Because it's so easy to whip up, I think I'll just make it the day-of next time.

The crumb topping was a bit odd: flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, salt, and chopped slivered almonds, all combined with melted butter. Then the whole thing is placed on a baking sheet and baked for 20 minutes. (It's supposed to be baked at the same time as the crust, but I hadn't read ahead to know that the crust benefits from an overnight rest - in the pan - before baking, so I baked it the morning-of...something to remember for next time!) This was my least favorite of NM's crumble topping, and I'm not sure why. It felt like it wasn't sweet enough. Or maybe it baked too long.

Anyway, the baby girl and I assembled the whole thing before the barbecue: baked crust, spread with cream cheese mixture, cut fresh strawberries, more cream cheese mixture, crumble topping, a dusting of powdered sugar, and a strawberry placed on top (the baby girl did that part).

This was a huge hit at the party. People were still raving to hubby today ~ except those who didn't get any, who complained. =) My hubby managed to grab one piece for photographing before it was all gone, and the four of us split it. Although it wasn't my favorite, the rest of my family loved it.

Mellow Bakers: Roasted hazelnut and prune bread (May)

2011-05-31T12:30:00.000-05:00

Our final May Mellow Bakers bread was roasted hazelnut and prune bread. I've never been a big hazelnut fan, and I've been subbing other nuts whenever our breads have called for hazelnuts. But I'd finally found some at the store, so I decided to try them.

This is made with a stiff levain, some whole wheat flour, bread flour, a tiny bit of instant yeast, salt, water, a bit of butter, roasted hazelnuts, and some chopped up prunes.

I made the levain last night and mixed everything this morning. Then the little ones asked for a visit to the science museum, so I stuck the dough in the fridge. When I got home, the dough had doubled, so I pulled it out and shaped it. It took quite a while to rise, and then I baked it with steam.

This bread was okay. I was right; I really don't like hazelnuts, but my hubby thought they were pretty good. In the future, I'll go back to replacing them with other nuts.

Bake! Danish apricot pinwheels

2011-05-30T20:34:00.001-05:00

Finally!!! Our grocery store finally had apricots yesterday, so I was finally able to make Andrea's Bake! pick: Danish apricot pinwheels. I've never purchased fresh apricots before...or eaten them (I don't think), so I was really curious.

I still had a pound of quick Danish pastry dough in the freezer (from the Danish cheese pockets), so this recipe was actually pretty easy to put together.

For the filling, I mixed ground almonds, unsalted butter, sugar, egg yolks, lemon zest, vanilla, and flour.

Then it's assembly time: roll out the pastry dough, cut it into four-inch squares, and then form the pinwheels. Dollop a heaping teaspoon of the almond filling in the center, put half of a fresh apricot on top, and fold alternating corners of the pinwheels to the center. You're supposed to use a one-inch circle of dough in the center; I don't have one, so I used a mini-heart. It looked pretty cute! I was surprised by how easy the assembly actually was.

The pastries rest for a bit and then bake for 20 minutes. Then they're sprinkled with a healthy dose of powdered sugar before serving.

These were pretty yummy. The apricots were a little bitter, which contrasted nicely with the sweet from the sugar and the pastry crust. Are apricots always slightly bitter or were these just not ripe yet? I couldn't taste much of the almond filling; I had a bunch of it leftover, so I think next time, I'd up the filling until I'd used all of it. A fun breakfast treat!

Frying, part 2: homemade corn dogs

2011-05-28T20:03:00.001-05:00

I made a batch of Peter Reinhart's all-purpose sweet dough (from ABED) a couple of weeks ago, pretty much just for fun. I used half of it for my monkey muffin experiment, and then split the other half into a 500 g and a 250 g batch to freeze.

Last night, I pulled out the 500 g, and this morning I made a batch of homemade doughnuts for my bookclub (and my hubby...and my kids...and me).

There was already a pan full of oil and my house already smelled like deep frying, so I decided to try this intriguing recipe for corn dogs that Freida posted last week. (Not our healthiest day ever: doughnuts for breakfast, corn dogs for lunch.)

I followed Freida's recipe, and my batter was even thicker than hers in her pictures. We had a bit of difficulty getting it to stick to the little hot dogs; eventually, my hubby ended up almost painting it on. We discovered that less is more; just a thin coating of batter made a perfect corn dog. I also only cooked mine for about a minute until they were beautifully golden.

These seriously tasted just like State Fair corn dogs...soooo tasty and so much fun! Thanks, Freida!

Mellow Bakers: Pissaladière (May)

2011-05-23T19:47:00.001-05:00

I never, never would've expected I'd be willing to make a recipe that started with this:

so you can imagine my emotions when I saw pissaladière on the May list of breads for Mellow Bakers. JH describes pissaladière as: "the pizza of Provence, replete with onions cooked long and slow, fresh herbs, anchovies, and pungent black niçoise olives."

On the one hand, we are not fish people; on the other hand, we love pizza more than just about any other meal.

Due to scheduling and life and whatever, I actually made this bread over three days. I made the pâte fermentée (bread flour, water, salt, and yeast) on Saturday evening and let it ripen until Sunday afternoon. At that point, I added more bread flour, some whole wheat flour, water, salt, yeast, the pâte fermentée, and finally, some olive oil. The dough was kneaded briefly and then allowed to proof for two hours, with a strech-and-fold halfway through.

But then I realized we didn't have any onions, and we needed to feed the kids dinner, so I threw one pound of dough into the freezer and one into the fridge.

Tonight (after buying some onions), I made the topping: onions and garlic sautéed in olive oil and mixed with fresh thyme and salt and pepper. I dumped them on the crust, along with black olives, thinly sliced anchovies, (and pepperoni). We baked it for about 10 minutes at 515º.

I kind of wish this had been described as an appetizer, a flatbread with unusual toppings, instead of as a pizza. We are red sauce and mozzarella pizza people (especially my hubby), and this was nothing like our usual pizza. However, the crust was tasty; I liked the addition of the whole wheat flour. And the onions were pretty good (I wish I'd cooked them a little longer to caramelize them). I was going to try the little anchovy corner, but the smell just did me in, so hubby was the designated taste tester. His comment: "salty."

Not one we'll make again, but I'm glad we tried it. I'm sure we'll make our traditional pizza with the remaining pound of dough.