Thanksgiving Challenge Results!

Hello there!  Although I truly meant to post results on Friday, I admittedly got caught up in Holiday decorating and postponed the post to today.  So without further ado, here are the results of the Thanksgiving Challenge.

The first thing I did was to check the rise times, bake times and temperatures of all the breads so I could minimize the time frame and keep everything moving.  This worked out pretty well, and would only need a few tweaks as the evening went on. 

I estimated that it would take me roughly 6 hours to make the four breads and the one pie, and I came in on time!  If I did the challenge again next year, I would consider taking a half day and starting earlier in order to not be up till midnight, since I needed to get up by 5 am to start the turkey.

Challah

Unfortunately, I burnt the Challah:(  It was the most time consuming of the breads, and the prettiest, but I should have checked it sooner, and the tops burnt.  (My oven runs hot and I am constantly readjusting times and temperatures in order to get an even bake.)  Luckily the inside was still good, so I hulled the loaves and broke them into little pieces which I set out with my Goat Cheese and Truffle Oil dip the next day.  I'm happy it worked out taste-wise, but sad I wasn't able to display these lovely braided loaves. 

Buttermilk Whole Wheat

 

Since this was my first wheat bread, I wasn't sure what the coloring should be like on top, so I thought at first that it was a bit over done.  The taste is a bit dry on it's own, but it makes super yummy toast!  It's also quite hearty- you don't need much.

Scottish Buttermilk

Looks like I forgot to take a picture of the Scottish Buttermilk, but it's a round loaf that is biscuit-like in texture and taste and it's technically a soda bread.  It's very crackly on top and is wonderful with jam.

Rosemary Ale Bread

Rosemary Ale Bread is what I am dubbing my new creation, which I adapted from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads*, a Half Price Books find that I am eternally grateful for.  This was the tastiest of all.

 The recipe that I ended up with is as follows:

3 cups self-rising flour or an equal amount of all-purpose flour plus 1 tablespoon baking powder and an additional 1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 12-ounce bottle of ale (I used Blue Moon Mountain Abbey Ale)

1/4 cup Rosemary

1/2 cup (1 stick) melted butter

Preheat the oven to 350.  Mix together the flour, sugar and salt.  Pour in the ale and add the rosemary: mix until thoroughly blended.  Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan, and poor the melted butter over the batter.  Bake until golden, about 45-50 minutes.  (For my oven, it only took about 35 minutes.)  Remove the loaf once done and let sit for 15 minutes.  Turn the bread out on a cooling rack and let sit another 15 minutes to allow the butter to drift back through the loaf.  Enjoy!

*All recipes for the challenge came from this book, either in full or, in the case of the Rosemary Ale Bread, adapted.

And the pie!

Chocolate Buttermilk Pie

Oh man, this turned out really nicely.  It's got a custard like texture and is very chocolaty and creamy.  The recipe came from the Kitchen Scoop website.

Happy baking everyone!   

 

Thanksgiving Challenge

I am hosting Thanksgiving for the first time, and wanted to make some loaves of bread for our family.  I've also been looking for an excuse to make a few new different kinds of bread, so I thought I would make it fun and challenge myself to a personal bake-off.

 So I'll be making four new-to-me loaves of bread in one day!  I'm excited to learn some new recipes and see how everything turns out.  I also made bread for our stuffing (Exhibit A above) which is now chilling in the fridge, waiting to be baked with hazelnuts and sage. 

I'll be making:

~ Challah
~ Buttermilk Whole Wheat (with the buttermilk I'll also be using for the Buttermilk Chocolate Pie)
~ Butter-Beer Batter Bread
~ Scottish Buttermilk Bread (gotta use it all!)

Updates to follow on Friday.  Happy baking my friends, and enjoy a wonderful Thanksgiving with your family and friends.

Stovetop Hot Chocolate

This past weekend we got our first really strong cold front, and it was the perfect time for hot chocolate.  Since we didn't have any mixes, I decided to try my hand at making some.  Here is the recipe I ended up with:

1 1/3 cups milk
2 Tbsps chocolate mix
1 1/2 Tbsps sugar

Melt over the stove until bubbly and serve immediately!  I used regular cocoa powder, but it would be nice with dark chocolate and a bit of cinnamon or cayenne pepper.

 

I hope you all had a Happy Halloween!  Stay warm and cozy friends.

Photo from Hello Giggles.

Buttercream Frosting for the Win

Have you ever made frosting?  I'm embarrassed to say it, but I have been trying for years!  But now I know that I had been trying to make the wrong kind of frosting.  Since my mantra is Simple Is Best, I had shied away from any kind of frosting that seemed fussy, and in doing so, missed out on the most surprisingly simple yet wonderful tasting thing.

Buttercream.

My cousin slathered heavenly buttercream on our wedding cakes a year ago, and I thought there was no way to compete.  It was so decadent, I was convinced it was most likely the most complicated thing in the world.  Even when she told me the ingredients, I was not convinced.  

A year-ish later, I was commissioned to make a cake for my parents' 35th wedding anniversary.  I looked through my cook books and found a recipe for buttercream.  I saw the photo and thought "It's time".

Luckily I had just bought a giant bag of powdered sugar, because even though I halved the recipe, it still took four cups!

The recipe I ended up with is as follows:

Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

1/2 cup softened butter

4 cups confectioner's sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1/3 cup of milk

First you beat the butter and sugar together.  All of the sugar.  And it goes everywhere, like it's snowing.  Aprons are handy if you happen to wear a lot of, oh let's say, navy blue.  Butter and confectioner's sugar don't cream together the same way butter and granulated sugar do- it's not grainy.  And it's not the same as butter and flour either- it doesn't clump.  It truly looks like it shouldn't work: it's still very powdery.  I had an urge to add more butter right away, but I thought better of it, and it's a good thing I did.

After you've combined the butter and sugar, add the vanilla and about 1/4 cup of milk.  See how it looks, and then add more milk if needed.  I urge you to start with 1/4 since the full recipe was 1/2, and go from there.  I ended up needing 1/3 cup.  

And like magic, you have frosting.  It's so very simple, and so. damn. good.  My husband is a frosting connoisseur, and he couldn't get enough.

 The cake is vanilla too, because yum.

This ended up being enough to frost an entire 9" round cake, including a thin layer between the two cake layers and a bit extra for licking:)  It would be tasty with fig jam (or any other kind of your choosing) in the middle as well.

And there you have it!  A perfectly simple, rustic, tasty vanilla cake with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting.

I hope this inspires you to try that recipe you've always wanted to try.  You should.  It will be amazing.

 

Happy anniversary mom and dad!

Apple Spice Bundt Cake and Happy Anniversary!

We did it!  Will and I have been married a year as of Saturday, September 27.  We celebrated by going to Perkins Observatory on Friday and looking through their giant telescope.  We saw Mars, a ring nebula, a giant star cluster and Saturn.  Complete with rings.  It was insane!

We were invited to a brunch the following afternoon at Will's aunt and uncle's house, and while we were told not to bring anything, I'm not the best listener when it comes to bringin food:)

So I made an Apple Spice Bundt Cake from this recipe.

While the recipe says to bake for 70-90 minutes, my oven runs hot and I found it was in good shape at 60 minutes.  I also used some apples from my friend's tree instead of the Granny Smith it calls for: I imagine that the Granny Smith would provide a more tart cake.

And there you have it!  I don't have any after pictures because (a) I forgot to take one as it was finished and (b) it got eaten pretty quickly, which is always nice.

I put powdered sugar on my cake instead of caramel sauce and it looked very pretty.  The cake is moist and spicy with a bit of crunch from the pan.  I would definitely make it again and highly recommend it. 

Happy Anniversary Will!

 

The Bread of Wiesbaden

The other day I was wandering in Half Price Books, as we Fisher (Kenny's) are wont to do, lingering heavily in the cooking section.  I love a good food memoir, don't you?  There's something about the mix of lovingly crafted recipes and simply curated stories that speak to my heart.  Like a patchwork quilt of food and life.  I ended up bringing home Kitchen Confidential, a cookbook about lost American recipes and a knife technique book made by Sur la Table that also contains recipes.

But I digress.

 

While browsing, I discovered a French Baking book, and of course I dropped everything and picked that baby up.  The pages were full of yummy goodness, certainement, and though it was too expensive for me to buy, I enjoyed spending some time with it.  Nestled within the pages was a recipe for something called Wiesbaden Cookies.

What?!

My family is from this lovely town in Germany, but I had never heard of the cookies.  Oma was holding out on me on this one!  Or maybe they weren't that good.  Or maybe she didn't like them!  They certainly appeared easy enough- cinnamon, flour, sugar, lemon and a few other things that I'm sure I'm forgetting.  So I came home and looked for a recipe.  And looked.  And I could not find one!  

Le sigh. 

I thought it was hopeless until I came across something even better... it's true.  I discovered a traditional Christmas cookie called Wiesbader Brot.  The name translates to the Bread of Wiesbaden, and it is THE cookie of Wiesbaden.  Or so a few websites say.  Since the ingredients were roughly similar, I took it as fact that the cookie in the French Baking book was based off of the Wiesbader Brot.  I noticed a lack of lemon, but the cinnamon and copious amounts of sugar seemed too similar to be a coincidence.  Oh, and the name;)

They are time consuming in that they require a full 24 hours in the fridge, but the recipe, (which I found here), was super easy.  And here they are!

My goal is to find a way to make them look prettier, but they taste like a cinnamon teddy graham.  Which, if you are a child of the '80's like me, is pretty much perfect.

Do you have any family recipes for a traditional cookie?  Or any family favorites?  Usually when I bake cookies, I use my mother-in-law's recipe, because she makes the best cookies.  Period.  But I'm excited to make this cookie my own Best Cookie and start making it for our family Christmas Eve celebrations every year.  

Genießen!

A Sense of Community

This Sunday, New Beginnings Animal Shelter is hosting a Bake Sale at Sam's Club in Reynoldsburg, and I am happily providing some goodies to sell!  Last week I also baked some treats: Gluten-free Brownies, Vegan Pumpkin Coconut Cake and my signature Blueberry Rosemary Muffins in mini form.  The Cake sold so well, that I'll be doing another batch this week.  I'll also be making Blueberry Cake and Edge-of-your-cup Sugar Cookies.

My kitchen in full bake sale swing

The Sugar Cookies are cutout stars that have an opening on one leg so you can put it on your cup.  I got the cookie cutter at World Market.  I made them today and I would say the best tip I can provide is to make sure when you roll out the dough, that you leave it on the thicker side.  Due to the delicate nature of this cutter, you don't want it too thin or your cookie will break.  Sad.

So this idea of community bake sales brings me to a story my sister was telling me the other day about a woman in her neighborhood who passed away.  My sister lives in an area that is extremely environmentally conscious- they even have a Freecycle page that you can become a member of.  (If you haven't heard of Freecycle, its pretty much exactly what it sounds like.  You can post things you no longer need and people will come get them.)  The woman's name was Elizabeth Marsh.  A neighbor of hers posted on Freecycle that her belongings were on the curb and that anyone was welcome to come and pick up whatever they would like.  A storm was brewing, and people ran out there pretty quickly to save what they could, my sister included.  When she got there, she found old notebooks and music, furniture and an organ, among other things.  My sister took the notebooks and a table, since that was all she could fit in her car.  She was sad to see that no one had come for the organ, and probably wouldn't before the rain hit.  When she got home, she found that the notebooks contained old meeting minutes.  She jumped online and saw that other people who had gone by Elizabeth's home had picked up old photo albums and were posting pictures of her online.  From the notebooks, music and albums, the people started to piece together her life.

What struck me about this was the fact that even though these people didn't know Elizabeth, they felt the need to preserve her legacy.  It is a striking example of a community coming together to prove that one person's life mattered, and by that token, each person's life matters.  You matter.

So make something tasty to share with those you love.  Here's the Pumpkin Coconut Cake recipe, if you want to give it a try.

Pumpkin Coconut Cake

Preheat oven to 350 F

Whisk together 1 cup canned pumpkin puree, 1 cup  packed brown sugar, 1/2 cup canola oil and 1/2 cup canned coconut milk or soy milk.  Mix in 1 3/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour, 1/4 cup sugar, 1 tsp baking soda, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp nutmeg and 1/2 tsp salt.  Stir until blended, then add 1/3 cup of unsweetened coconut flakes.  Scrape batter into a 9x9 square baker for a thinner cake, or a 4 1/2 x 8 1/2 loaf pan for a thicker bread.  Bake for 45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.   

~ This recipe also doubles nicely so you can use a whole can of pumpkin puree.  
~ Swap out the coconut for dark chocolate chips for a richer dessert.


If you would like to stop by the New Beginnings Animal Shelter this Sunday, the sale runs from 10am-6pm at Sam's Club in Reynoldsburg.