I love this kind of Sunday

Hubby spent the day reading The Fellowship of the Ringto the kids and then watching football while the kids were upstairs building giant forts out of every pillow and blanket in the house.

I spent the day in the kitchen. Hadn't planned on it, but things kept coming up, and at the end of the day, I was looking at this counter full of food. I love it.



Today's breakfast treat was pumpkin doughnut muffins, recommended by Di. I made a half recipe, which made eight muffins. I baked them for 26 minutes; we loved the flavor but they were a tad dry...I'll take them out earlier next time.

Rebecca tweeted about Sara's baked applesauce yesterday, conveniently a day we spent at the orchard. I made 5 pounds of apples with a sprinkling of sugar, cinnamon, and fresh nutmeg, and they baked for about 55 minutes. It made a much smaller yield than I'm accustomed to, but this is easily the best applesauce I've ever tasted in my life (and that's with forgetting to add the pats of butter!).

My little girl has a cold and was sneezy and drippy all morning; I said, "What about chicken noodle soup for dinner tonight?" "YES! [it's a favorite] With flour bread!" That's what the kiddos call ciabatta, because of the dusting of flour. I got right to work, using the recipe from ABED, and letting five hours in the middle of the day sub for the overnight rest it's supposed to get.

And then I remembered reading Deb's post for chicken noodle soup the other day, and decided to give it a try. I always make turkey stock for gravy, but believe it or not, I've never made my own chicken stock for soup. I ended up using a combination of Deb's recipe and the recipe from ATK's family cookbook. Knowing that I wanted broth for tonight's soup, as well as tomorrow's dinner, I upped the recipe by about half. The soup was so good, with a light and clear broth. I'm not sure it will fit into our schedules to make it this way all the time (we eat chicken noodle soup a lot), but if I have a Sunday at home, I can certainly see stocking up (hehe) again.

Finally, I picked up a bag of Meyer lemons at the grocery store today and it's been ages since we've had homemade ice cream, so I whipped up a batch of Meyer lemon curd frozen yogurt.

It was a good day.

Homemade chicken stock
makes 13 cups broth, 6 cups cubed chicken
5 pounds chicken pieces (I used 4 leg quarters and 2 bone-in breasts)
1 1/2 onion, chopped
2 bay leaves
1 T salt
freshly ground pepper
12 c water
1 T safflower oil
1. In large stock pot, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion and cook until softened and beginning to brown, about 4 minutes.
2. Pat chicken dry with paper towels and add half to the pan, making sure the skin is touching the bottom of the pan. Cook 10 minutes, until chicken is nicely browned. Remove first batch of chicken and repeat with second batch.
3. Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Simmer with the lid mostly on until chicken is done (took about 45 minutes for me; some of my chicken pieces were very large). (Skim off scum as necessary.)
4. Remove chicken. Let cool, remove skin and bones, and chop.
5. Strain stock into a large measuring cup.

Chicken noodle soup
makes 7 servings
2 tsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
3 carrots, chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
2 parsnips, chopped
1 small potato, chopped
1 tsp dried thyme
8 c broth
6 oz egg noodles
3 c cubed chicken
1. Heat oil in large stock pot (I used the same one I'd cooked the stock in) over medium heat. Add veggies and cook for 4 minutes.
2. Add broth, bring to a boil, and simmer 15 minutes.
3. Add noodles and cook for time on package, adding the chicken for the last 2 minutes of cooking time.
4. Serve with flour bread and fresh baked applesauce. :-)


A simple meal, but it makes me happy to know that I know the ingredients of everything I put on the table because it was all made right here.

Weekend doughnuts

A month or so ago, a group if my Twitter pals got to talking about our doughnut pans (because, well, that's the kind of thing we talk about). We decided it would be fun to use our pans more frequently, and, thanks to Kayte, our doughnuts for weekend mornings pinterest board was born.

Baked doughnuts clearly fit in with a weekend full of baking, but they are also quick and easy enough for a busy morning. Mix the batter while the oven preheats, make the glaze and do the dishes during the eight minutes of baking time: 30 minutes tops between deciding we need a breakfast treat and enjoying fresh baked doughnuts...can't beat it! And easy enough for the kiddos to make, with a little bit of help.


First up were these pumpkin doughnuts from KAF, a clear favorite with everyone. I used half the batter to make 6 regular and 6 minis on Saturday morning, stuck the rest of the batter in the fridge over night, and made the rest on Sunday morning. Easy to do and way tastier than eating day-old donuts! We topped these with cinnamon-sugar (although the little girl preferred them plain).


Next, we made apple cider doughnuts, also from KAF. These were my least favorite, but hubby said that, with the glaze, they tasted like apple pie wrapped in apple pie. We used half cider glaze (powdered sugar, milk, boiled cider) and half cinnamon sugar.


Last week were citrus doughnuts: officially orange, but I think some of my orange zest from the freezer may have been lemon zest...who knows. I used a little extra zest and used orange juice for half the milk in the glaze. Yummy.


Today we had simple spiced doughnuts. Based on Kayte's experiences, I made a half recipe, but used the full amount of spice. I also used Kayte's glaze (powdered sugar, milk, cinnamon, and vanilla) for half; cinnamon sugar for the other half. A half recipe made five doughnuts, but it's clear I overfilled my pans, so I'll make six next time.

It's fun to get more use out of a specialty pan, and I can't wait to see what gets chosen for next weekend!

Triple citrus rich frozen yogurt

Today's ice cream week theme is frozen yogurt, and it's no surprise (to me anyway) that I did a new riff on an old familiar recipe.
The one recipe that I look up on my own blog over and over again is this one for rich lemon curd frozen yogurt. It uses the instant lemon curd from KAF in the lemon froyo recipe from Jeni's book, and there is just something about the bright lemon flavor and the incredible creamy texture that just captures me.... I am a chocoholic and normally won't even consider a non-chocolate dessert, but this is the one flavor of ice cream that I can't stay away from, continually sneaking into the freezer to have just one more small scoopful.
Before we went out West, I made a version in which I subbed in orange for the lemon. It was delicious and we ate it before I got any pictures, but it was definitely missing a little something.
Today, I was thinking about both the lemon and the orange froyo, and when I opened my fruit drawer, I ended up pulling out the lime, too. How about a three-citrus frozen yogurt?
Thinking about my discussions with Di yesterday about the unsatisfying non-fruitiness of many fruit ice creams, I decided to up the citrus flavor even more. I made 1 1/2 times my usual amount of curd, and used juice and zest from the three fruits. With the exception of a few spoonfuls "just to see how it tastes," I used it all in the yogurt. My ingredients were:
40 g egg
90 g sugar
45 g melted unsalted butter
60 g fresh orange juice (from one orange)
30 g fresh lemon juice (from one small lemon)
zest from a lime, a lemon, and an orange (a healthy pinch of each)

Then I followed my normal process for making the curd and the froyo, again using a pinch of all three citrus zests in the ice cream base.
I think I love this version as much as the original lemon. Our good friends are visiting from out East. Their comments were, "That's frozen yogurt?!?" and, "It tastes like really good lemon cheesecake." My hubby's addition: "And it will prevent scurvy!" ;-)

Wordless Wednesday: Zest!

or You know you have a problem when you have to take a picture of citrus zest just because of the pretty colors.
 

Rich lemon curd frozen yogurt

Pucker up! It's another virtual blog party, this one hosted by my friend Di with the spring theme of Citrus Sunday.

Ever since I first made the amazingly-easy instant lemon curd posted by KAF, I really wanted to make lemon curd ice cream, which we enjoyed multiple times last summer. But I also had a carton of plain yogurt in the fridge, so I began searching my ice cream books for a lemon frozen yogurt recipe. I found one in Jeni's book: she uses a lemon syrup for hers; I subbed in a tiny batch of instant lemon curd instead.

The result is an incredibly thick and creamy frozen yogurt with a prominent lemon flavor, definitely a new favorite here. This recipe uses both cream and milk with the yogurt, so it's much richer than our usual frozen yogurt which only includes strawberries and yogurt (and therefore probably not quite as healthy). :) But oh man, is it lemony-delicious!!!

Rich lemon curd frozen yogurt
lemon curd adapted from King Arthur Flour 
frozen yogurt adapted from Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams at Home

for the lemon curd
30 g (1/2 large) egg
60 g (1/4 c) sugar
30 g (1 oz) unsalted butter, melted
60 g (1/4 c) freshly-squeezed lemon juice (from 1 large lemon)
zest of 1/2 a lemon**

for the frozen yogurt
275 g (1 1/4 c) drained plain yogurt*
375 g (1 1/2 c) 2% milk
125 g (1/2 c) heavy cream
130 g (2/3 c) sugar
44 g (1/4 c) light corn syrup
zest of 1/2 - 1 lemon**
22 g (2 T) cornstarch
35 g (2 T) 2% milk
50 g (4 T) cream cheese, softened
55 g lemon curd*** (recipe above)

1. For the lemon curd, whisk the egg and sugar together in a medium microwave-safe bowl. Whisk in the melted butter and then the lemon juice and zest. Microwave on high in one-minute increments, stirring well after each minute, until the lemon curd is slightly mounded and coats the back of a spoon (it takes 3 minutes for me).

2. For the frozen yogurt, combine the milk, cream, sugar, corn syrup, and lemon zest in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Boil for four minutes. Turn off heat.

3. In a small bowl, whisk the cornstarch with the 35 g milk. Add cornstarch mixture to the saucepan, and return to boil, stirring constantly with a heat-proof spatula, for one minute.

4. In a large bowl, whisk the cream cheese until smooth. Slowly add the hot milk mixture, whisking vigorously until all of the cream cheese lumps are gone.

5. Whisk in the drained yogurt and the lemon curd. Chill and then proceed according to the directions of your ice cream maker.

Notes:
*To drain the yogurt, Jeni instructs you to use a quart container of plain yogurt. Cover a sieve with a couple layers of cheesecloth and set it in a strainer over a bowl. Pour the yogurt into the sieve, cover with plastic wrap, and let it sit overnight in your fridge. I never plan ahead that well. My process of draining yogurt is a little messier, but much more quick. I dump my yogurt (I used 682 g, about 2/3 of a container) into a clean, white, floursack towel. I wrap it up and squeeze the towel over the sink, which gets rid of all the liquid. Then I open the towel on the counter and scrape out the drained yogurt.
**If you don't like the texture of the zest, you can leave it out of the lemon curd and/or strain it out of the ice cream base.
***The second time I made this, I just used all of the mini-batch of lemon curd (about 75 grams); I couldn't tell a difference.

Check out Di's post for the other great citrus links!