Design Instead of Food

Today, and part of yesterday, plus a day a week ago, I was really glad that I spent the time last fall and winter learning InDesign. Sometimes it comes in handy to know a bit about Illustrator and Photoshop, too.

As I know I've mentioned in the past, I belong to a great group of gals called P.E.O. Chapter AJ. We are part of the larger P.E.O. International organization, which is a philanthropic education organization, meaning a large number of women working together to fund educational opportunities for women. Just this year our Chapter has been part of awarding over $6,000 in scholarships to 7 women. Organization wide we are talking millions of dollars to help women reach for the stars and meet their educational goals. We've been around since January of 1869 in the U.S. and for almost that long in Canada.

So why am I telling you these two things dear reader? Because yesterday and today I spent the time I probably would have used to cook or bake something (which could be posted here) to create an invitation to our Chapter's 100th Birthday party.

We're going to invite all of our Chapter members and some friends to a tea party...and I got to create the invitations graphics and text...and print them...and cut them...and fold them...and stuff the envelopes...and address and stamp them. It's the kind of thing I'm good at and enjoy...and it's for a very round number birthday. You know that I love birthdays!

So tomorrow I'll be back with something yummy I cooked or baked and photos of the same but for today I only have photos of the filled envelopes and the front of the invitation. Wish you were going to be coming.

If you have any questions about P.E.O. send me an e-mail or leave a comment. There are chapters throughout the United States and a womens' college, Cottey college, too (http://www.cottey.edu/). If you live in California, I know that there are a number of scholarships given at the state level to support many kinds of majors and those can be applied for just by visiting the California P.E.O. website (http://www.peocalifornia.org/) and applying. In these difficult financial times when college is so expensive this information might just help a woman you know.

Stupendous Milkbar Cookies

It isn't often that I come across a completely new concept in baking. For years and years and years I've browsed cookbook, magazines and (lately) the Internet picking up cooking and baking ideas and techniques from sources old and new.

For example when I had my muffin company I scoured old cookbooks to see what variations there were for muffins...and found more than the way I had grown up making them! Learning to make sponge cakes was such fun when all I had known was cake mixes and then batter cakes that start with creamed butter. Yeast raised waffles are different from ones where the rise comes from baking powder and/or folded in whipped egg whites. You get the idea...I like to understand the process as well as enjoy the product.

So when I picked up a copy of Momofuku Milk Bar cookbook and started looking through it the sensations I felt were excitement and confusion. Who knew that things call Crack Pie and Compost Cookies start with components called crunch, crumb and soil and things like pumpkin ganache and liquid cheesecake? Had to have a copy for my own, so was thrilled to get one thanks to Natasha...yay Christmas! If you love sugar and butter you will come to agree that Christina Tosi is a genius, too.

The first thing that I figured out was that all that crunch, crumb, soil, crust and so on is predicated on making a lot of these desserts. That's fine for a commercial bakery or restaurant but not so great for this homemaker plus hubby...we don't need trays and trays of cookies. A lot of the components freeze which would be fine if I had lots of freezer space, but I don't. I still think it is an awesome book and that the recipes sound amazing, but I think I'll need to save some of it for when I can do a lot of 'baking and giving away the results' at one time.

One recipe that I did figure out how to make without storing components was Compost Cookies. They really sound cool...a buttery cookie dough gets combined with ground coffee, rolled oats, potato chips, pretzels and other goodies like mini chocolate chips. Then the mixture gets chilled, then baked into enormous, gigantic cookies that are so delicious you want to eat every single one of them! This is dangerous people. I might have to make Crack Pie after all.

A key thing to know about this recipe is that it requires patience. You absolutely want to cream the butter and sugar for the full 2-3 minutes and definitely want to beat for the full 7-8 minutes after adding the egg and vanilla. That is about 9 minutes longer than, say, Toll House cookies. After the fun part of just barely mixing in the rest of the ingredients you do want to follow the recipe and chill the portioned dough for at least an hour. Worth the wait, believe me.

I'm going to give you the measurements for the actual amount of Graham Crust that the recipe calls for. If you buy the book you might want to make the whole amount because there are other great recipes that call for that component. I'm also going to give the ingredients by teaspoons and cups because that's what I used to make 'em.


Compost Cookies
from Momofuku Milk Bar Cookbook by Christina Tosi (makes 14-20 cookies)

16 tablespoons (2 sticks) butter, at room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
2/3 cup tightly packed brown sugar
2 tablespoons glucose (couldn't find this so used same amount of Golden Syrup)
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/3 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher salt
3/4 cup mini chocolate chips (I used regular since the market was out of the mini ones)
1/2 cup butterscotch chips (instead I used 1/4 cup toffee bits and 1/4 cup white chocolate chips...hay they said to put in the stuff we like...and so can you)
the Graham Crust (recipe follows)
1/2 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
2 1/2 teaspoons ground coffee (whatever you use to brew coffee with...but not the grounds you have already brewed coffee with...nor instant coffee granules either)
2 cups potato chips (I used Ruffles but might try Kettle chips next time)
1 cup mini-pretzels

Combine the butter, sugars, and glucose (golden syrup) in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and cream together on medium-high for 2 to 3 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and the paddle then add the egg and vanilla and beat for 7 to 8 minutes until light and fluffy.

Reduce the speed to low and add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Mix just until the dough comes together, no longer than 1 minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and the paddle.

Still on low speed, add the chocolate chips, butterscotch chips (or your choice of mix-in snack food), graham crust component, oats, and coffee and mix just until incorporated, about 30 seconds. Add the potato chips and pretzels and mix, still on low speed, until just incorporated, hardly at all.

Using a 2 3/4 oz ice cream scoop (or a 1/3 cup measure) portion out the dough onto a parchment-lined sheet pan. Pat the tops of the cookie dough domes flat. Wrap the sheet pan tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or up to 1 week. Do not bake your cookies from room temperature dough - they will not bake properly.

Heat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Arrange the chilled dough a minimum of 4 inches apart on parchment or Silpat lined sheet pans. Bake for 18 minutes. The cookies will puff, crackle, and spread. After 18minutes they should be very faintly browned on the edges yet still bright yellow in the center. Give them and extra minute or so if that's not the case. Try to avoid watching the State of the Union Address while the cookies are baking as I did...they probably cooked a minute or two longer than they should...but were still addictively good.

Cool the cookies completely on the sheet pans before transferring to a plate or an airtight container for storage. At room temp cookies will keep fresh for 5 days; in the freezer they will keep for 1 month. Good luck with having any left after 1 week much less 1 month!

Graham Crust (enough for 1 batch Compost Cookies)

Toss 6 tablespoons graham cracker crumbs, 1 tablespoon dry milk powder, 1/2 tablespoon sugar and a scant 1/4 teaspoon salt together in a medium bowl to evenly distribute the ingredients.

Whisk together in a small bowl 1 tablespoon melted butter and 1 tablespoon heavy cream.

Add the butter mixture to the dry ingredients and toss again to evenly distribute. The mixture will resemble small clusters of graham cracker crust. Set aside until needed for the Compost Cookies.

Hanging In There

Why on earth did I decide to try to post everyday during the month of January? I must have been feeling New Years euphoria or something. It gets harder as the month passes. All the 'extra' posts that I had photos for have been used up. So have some of the 'things about me you might want to know', although we still may go there. Curiosity about others never seems to wane. I do have something yummy for today and (I think) tomorrow, but we may get to parlor games by the end of the month. Still, as anyone who knows me can testify, I am super stubborn, so now that I've started I'm determined to finish.

Do you have any challenges you set for yourself that you later questioned your own sanity for making?

So, slightly insane, today's goodies are ones that I had been meaning to make before Christmas as a surprise Christmas gift for Sweetie. He always buys the things he wants when he sees them so it is difficult to find a gift he both needs and wants. That leaves unneeded and/or unwanted. Given that we overindulged over the holidays this probably qualifies on both counts, but we each stopped ourselves after a small taste. The rest will probably be given away to some lucky fire fighter, mail person or librarian.

The recipe I adapted this from used additional toppings I didn't have on hand when I finally made this a few days ago. No peanut butter cup candy, not Reese pieces or peanut M&Ms, but honestly it wasn't needed. Since the peanuts I used were unsalted, I did sprinkle on a bit of sea salt and I'm glad I did, but if you use the honey roasted or even salted peanuts you can follow the recipe...or not. It is fun to mix your own combination and if you use good quality chocolate almost anything you like will taste good this way.


Peanut Toffee Bark Candy
Makes about 2 pounds or 30 two-inch pieces
• PREP: 20 minutes
• TOTAL: 50 minutes
Recipe adapted from one of the Bon Appetit Test Kitchen, October 2010

Ingredients

• 1 pound bittersweet chocolate chips
• 3 1.4-ounce Skor or Heath toffee candy bars, cut into irregular 3/4-inch pieces or 10 oz. toffee candy pieces (I used the Heath bar pieces from a bag)
• 8 0.55-ounce peanut butter cups, each cut into 8 wedges
• 1/4 cup honey-roasted or regular roasted peanuts
• 3 ounces high-quality white chocolate (such as Lindt or Perugina), chopped

Preparation
• Line baking sheet with foil. Stir chocolate chips in heavy medium saucepan over low heat until melted and warm (not hot) to touch. Pour chocolate onto foil; spread to 1/4-inch thickness (about 12x10-inch rectangle). Sprinkle with toffee candy or pieces, peanut butter cups, and nuts, making sure all pieces touch melted chocolate to adhere.

• Put white chocolate in heavy small saucepan. Stir constantly over very low heat until chocolate is melted and warm (not hot) to touch. Remove from heat. Dip spoon into chocolate; wave from side to side over bark, creating zigzag lines. Scatter Reese's Pieces and M&M's over, making sure candy touches melted chocolate.

• Chill bark until firm, 30 minutes. Slide foil with candy onto work surface; peel off foil. Cut bark into irregular pieces.


Elle's note: I only made 6 oz. of chocolate (Scharffenbergers instead of chocolate chips, with a few drops of vegetable oil added) worth of this, scaling down the ingredients to fit. Left out the peanut butter cups, used unsalted peanuts instead of honey roasted, but sprinkled on some sea salt after the peanuts were added.)

A Bread For and With Tea

One of my Christmas presents was Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads and it is a beauty. Hundreds of breads, both yeasted and not, dozens of new techniques to try, lots and lots of new flavor combinations, too. It was difficult to know where to start.

One recipe that caught my eye was the Tea Brack. Brack comes from the Irish word brac, meaning speckled – you can see that each slice is speckled with dried fruit and candied peel. It makes one loaf and the author plainly states that he loves to drink tea and that this lovely loaf has tea as one of its main ingredients as well as being a great thing to eat while drinking tea. It also has golden raisins and currents and I love both of those dried fruits in baked goods. You do need to start this the day before you bake it so that the fruit has plenty of time to marinate overnight.

I had expected a dense somewhat dry bread but it turned out to be very moist and chewy and fairly light for a bread with such a lot of fruit in it. I love the spiciness and hint of brandy, too. Truthfully, even though I used a good strong Irish Breakfast brew for the tea, you really couldn't taste the tea as such. It does, however, go really well with a cup of hot tea and a good book. Although Sweetie enjoys it so much that there probably won't be any left by day's end, this kind of bread usually lasts quite a while without getting stale because of all the fruit.


Tea Brack
one medium loaf
from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads

1 cup white raisins
3/4 cup dried currants
1/4 cup chopped candied peel (I used half lemon and half orange peels)
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 1/2 cups cold tea (orange pekoe is fine, I used Irish Breakfast)
1/4 cup rum or brandy (I used brandy)(optional but nice)
2 cups bread or all-purpose flour (I used all-purpose, unbleached)
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon EACH ground cinnamon, grated nutmeg and salt
1 egg, room temperature, well beaten

Grease and line sides and bottom with buttered waxed paper - 1 medium (8" x 4") loaf pan. Leave the paper ends sticking out about 1/2 inch so the loaf can be pulled from the pan. Set aside. (You can prepare the pan the next day after the fruit is marinated.)

In a bowl combine the raisins, currants, candied peel, brown sugar and cold tea. Add a dollop of brandy or rum to give it a secret goodness, although this is optional. Cover tightly with plastic wrap so that no moisture escapes and let marinate overnight.

The next day...Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. while making the batter.

In a clean bowl mist together, with your clean fingers, or a spoon, the dry ingredients: 2 cups flour, 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon each cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Pour the dry ingredients into the marinated fruit mixture, stir well to combine, and add the egg. The mixture will be on the thin side. Pour or spoon the batter into the prepared pan.

Bake the loaf slowly in the 325 degree oven until a toothpick comes out dry when pierced into the load, about 1 1/2 hours. If using a convection oven, reduce heat; bake at 300 degrees F.

Remove the bread from the oven. Place on a wire rack about 5 minutes to cool, then remove the bread from the pan, discard the paper, and let cool completely before slicing.

Serve with butter or cream cheese...and tea!

Chicken and Chard Bundles for a Chilly Sunday

One of the delightful thing about going through old papers as I did recently while cleaning out and moving my office is that you discover buried treasure.

I think that a fine recipe I had clipped out of a magazine in 2005 counts as treasure, and it was absolutely buried in reams of paper and way too many envelopes and address labels. I think that I saved it because I adore chard and it used fresh chard to wrap cheese enhanced chicken breasts. I also love roasted onions and they are part of the base for this dish.

As it turns out the onions are fantastic, but the chard acts in much the same way parchment does when you have parchment wrapped packets; they become browned leaves but the chicken and cheese underneath are moist and yummy. I just pushed the leaves aside and ate the chicken/cheese parts. Next time I'll add more leaves under the chicken packets and a bit of chicken broth, too.

The fragrance of the onions, carrots, garlic and herbs is wonderful when this is baking. I served it with some green beans because the recent freezes had significantly reduced the available Swiss chard in the garden. There was enough for the parcels but not a lot more. Will make these again when there is a lot more chard so I have some for below the chicken. I also cooked some rice in chicken broth since rice could easily soak up the juices I thought would be a lovely part of this dish. As it turned out there was very little liquid under the chicken, so broth will be added next time.

We ate these during the final quarter of the regular playing time of the 49er - Giants game, which was exciting enough, but the overtime was nail bitingly tense so I'm glad we'd finished dinner by then. Great game and disappointing loss for 'our' team but well played and a surprise for those who remember the 49ers from recent years past.

Chard Wrapped Chicken with Roasted Onions and Carrots
adapted from a recipe in Better Homes & Gardens May 2005
Serves 4

1 medium onion, cut into thin wedges
1 cup baby carrots
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper, freshly ground preferred
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 tablespoons snipped fresh herbs (dill, oregano, sage, thyme)
1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
4 medium boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
4 Swiss chard leaves, washed and stems trimmed off
Snipped herbs for garnish (optional)

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. In a large baking dish combine the onions, carrots, 1 tablespoon olive oil, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1/8 teaspoon pepper. Toss to coat the vegetables in the oil and seasonings. Place the baking dish in the oven, uncovered, and roast 10 minutes.

While the vegetables are roasting, combine the 2 tablespoons olive oil, herbs, and 1/8 teaspoon pepper with the feta cheese. Mash mixture together with the back of a spoon to form a paste.

Top each chicken breast with 1/4 of the mixture, pressing firmly. Wrap center portion of the chicken breasts with the chard leaves, leaving ends exposed.


Once the vegetables have roasted 10 minutes remove the baking dish from the oven. Top the veggies with the prepared chicken parcels. Bake, uncovered, for 25 - 30 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink (170 degrees F).

Serve the baked chicken and roasted vegetables together. If desired, sprinkle with some extra snipped herbs.

Comfort in a Bowl, Mug or Thermos

Pure comfort is assured, whether you are curling up in front of the fire on a cold, wet, blustery day or spooning it up from a thermos at school or during a football game, or working on enough appetite to get some down while getting over a cold or the flu. Such is the power of chicken noodle soup. Our mothers and grandmothers knew it and the soup manufacturers know it. So do we.

What some don't know is that good chicken noodle soup is fairly quick and easy to make from scratch and then you also know whats in it. Onions and carrots (for this recipe) and sometimes celery and garlic are softened and partially caramelized in some olive oil. Add some broth and diced up chicken breast meat, or chicken thigh if you prefer. Let it simmer while you add freshly ground black pepper, dried thyme and some lemon juice for spark.

Cook some noodles in another pot in chicken broth (to keep a good solid chicken flavor...not water here...and to prevent the noodles from overcooking), then add them and more broth, followed by some frozen peas for color and another flavor burst. That's it. If you have your own homemade chicken stock you are golden, but a good quality canned broth is fine, too. You can skip the peas and it will still be good, but try to add the lemon juice. Think of the blast of Vitamin C in that juice.

If you like you can do what I did and use a head of roasted garlic instead of fresh garlic. I slid each roasted clove out of its skin, then finely diced them all and added them before I added the chicken pieces. The depth of flavor is wonderful this way. I hope that you'll try this before the weather gets warm. We had it yesterday with our friends while the rain came down outside. Just the right kind of weather for chicken noodle soup.


Freshly Made Chicken Noodle Soup

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, peeled and chopped
1 cup chopped carrots
2 cloves fresh garlic, finely chopped or 1 head roasted garlic, cloves peeled and finely chopped
2 cups diced raw or cooked chicken, either breasts, thighs, or a combination
about 42 oz. chicken broth, divided
1/2 lb dry flat noodles (I used the no yolk kind)
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper (or to taste)
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
juice of 1 medium lemon, seeds removed
if desired, additional salt to taste
1 cup frozen peas

In a large pot saute' the onions and carrots in the olive oil for 2 minutes, then reduce the heat, cover, and let 'sweat' for 7-8 minutes until soft and lightly browned, stirring occasionally.

Add the garlic or roasted garlic, stir and simmer, covered for 2 minutes.

Add the chicken and 1 cup of the broth, stir, cover and simmer 5 minutes.

While the chicken is simmering in the broth, heat 14 oz. chicken broth in a medium pot until boiling. Add the flat noodles, stir, cover, reduce heat and cook for 5 minutes, until partially cooked.

Add the contents of the noodle pot, the rest of the broth, the pepper, thyme, lemon (salt if using), and peas to the broth and chicken. Stir, cover, and cook over low heat to heat the peas through, about 5 minutes. Taste and adjust seasonings if needed.

Serve and enjoy. Tastes even better the next day.

Beef for a Blustery Day

One of the nice things about having so many recipes collected on this blog is that I can easily revisit favorites and make some changes on the return visit. I did that last night with a dish that Sweetie particularly enjoys, beef and mushroom potpie.

When I made it before I used puff pastry on top and baked it in individual dishes. This time I cooked the meat part a few days in advance and let it chill to allow the flavors to really mingle. Things that have cooked onions in them often taste better with a day or two of sitting between the initial cooking and the eating. I also substituted refrigerated pie crust dough for the puff pastry because I had some in the fridge.

Instead of individual dishes I used a casserole dish and put the pie crust on top to make it a potpie. This is a hearty dish and makes at least 4 servings. I suspect that the leftovers will be tasty tomorrow, too. This makes a rich, savory, meaty, warm dish with the added delight of shards of crisp pastry from the crust. Some of the crust will be less crisp but delicious because it has soaked up the wonderful meat gravy.

The rain is coming down quite steadily today and there is some wind, too. We had a nice lunch with our friends/relatives from Healdsburg. Could be that a recipe will be posted from that meal in a day or two. I've also been working on the family cookbook revision and reading a new book which arrived today from Powell's bookstore in Portland, Oregon. It's the Momofuku Milk Bar book with lots of unusual dessert recipes. There will undoubtedly be something inspired by that book posted here within a week or so...maybe sooner. Thank you Natasha for the book!
Now, for that wonderful potpie. If you don't have Irish stout, a good dark beer would suit, too.



Beef and Mushroom Potpie with Stout
Adapted from a Gourmet 2004 recipe

2 pounds boneless beef chuck, cut into 1-inch pieces
4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground (if possible) black pepper
2 tablespoons vegetable oil (I used olive oil)
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
4 cloves roasted garlic, mashed
1/4 cup water
1 cup can tomato sauce
1 can beef broth
1 cup Guinness or other Irish stout
1 Tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon dried thyme
2 tablespoons butter
4 oz. sliced white mushrooms, wiped clean if necessary
4-5 stems Italian parsley

Ready-made, or home-made single pie crust (I used Pillsbury Ready Crust)
1 tablespoon egg white

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place race in center or just below center of oven.

Place flour, salt and pepper in a clean paper bag and shake to combine. Pat beef dry and place 3-4 cubes at a time in the bag and shake to coat. Remove from bag, shaking off the excess flour and place on a plate or piece of waxed paper. Heat the oil in a wide 5 -6 quart ovenproof heavy pot over moderate-high heat until oil is very hot. (I used a large soup pot...that way the grease spatter from the browning meat mostly stayed inside the pot. It is ovenproof and has a tight lid, so I baked the dish in it, too, and it worked perfectly.)

Brown the meat in 3-4 batches, turning at least once, about 5 minutes per batch, transferring the browned beef to a bowl as each batch is done.

Once all beef has been removed to the bowl, add the onion, garlic and water to the pot and cook, scraping up any brown bits from bottom of pan and stirring frequently, until onion is softened, about 5 minutes. Add tomato sauce, beef broth, stout, Worcestershire sauce and thyme and bring mixture to a simmer. Stir in beef and any juices from the bowl. Simmer one minute. Cover and simmer until beef is very tender and sauce is thickened, about 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours. If sauce is too thin, thicken with a slurry of 2 tablespoons each flour and water, stirred into the sauce and cooked until sauce thickens.

Chill at least 4 hours or overnight to meld the flavors.

While stew is cooling, melt butter in skillet and sauté' the mushrooms, letting them brown lightly on each side. While they are browning, chop the parsley in a fine mince. Bring stew to room temperature.

Increase oven temperature to 425 degrees F. Place baking dish or dishes onto a shallow baking pan. Divide room temperature stew among the dishes (or put all in one large shallow baking dish). They won't be completely full. Spoon the cooked mushrooms over the stew, dividing evenly among the dishes or spreading over the larger baking dish if using. Sprinkle minced parsley over each dish or over the baking dish of stew.

Roll out pastry dough on a lightly floured surface with a lightly floured rolling pin into a circle about 9 inches in diameter and prepare for topping the stew; if using small dishes, cut the pastry into squares, place one on top of each dish of stew. If topping a larger dish of stew, roll up edges toward the center of the dough circle, flute the edges, cut a hole in the center and slash in four places, then use to top the large baking dish of stew. Brush tops of either kind of pastry with the egg white.

Bake pie(s)in preheated oven until pastry is golden brown, about 15 - 20 minutes.
Reduce oven temperature to 400 degrees F and bake 5 minutes more to fully cook the dough. Serve right away. Sides that work well include almost anything with potatoes. I like to serve green peas or a green salad, although steamed broccoli works well too.

Spelt and Sourdough

A lot of time when the urge to bake with the sourdough starter hits I just make something pretty simple...flour, water, salt, sourdough starter, maybe some flax seed or whole wheat flour for variety.

Sometimes I get slightly more creative like this last time. I wanted to cook up some Irish steel cut oats and use them in the dough but the tin was almost empty. Looking in the pantry I found the spelt flakes which I add to the muesli when the package seems to have too much in the way of dried fruits and not enough grain. I've never made bread dough with cooked spelt flakes but I know that Astrid, fellow Bread Baking Babe over at Paulchens Foodblog loves spelt and adds it to most of her bread, so that's what I did.

We are finally getting rain after a long dry spell this winter. Winter is usually the season when we get most of our rain for the year, so this is very welcome rain. It does mean that much of the house is chilly, so the bread gets to rise near the new stove in the livingroom.

The rest of the bread beyond the spelt was still pretty simple: bread and whole wheat flour, salt, water, dry yeast and a bit of honey. I made enough dough for two loaves. One was in a smaller pan and it rose higher. I gave that one to Grandma Loyce since she loves freshly baked bread but says she doesn't have the bread making gene. The other has been enjoyed as toast and it does make a fantastic toast!


Spelt and Sourdough Bread

1/4 cup spelt flakes, cooked for 3 minutes in 3/4 cup water in the microwave, then cooled to tepid
1 cup sourdough starter
1/2 cup warm water
1 tablespoon honey
3 cups bread flour
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
1 teaspoon salt

Whisk the sourdough starter, water, honey and cooled cooked spelt together in the bowl of a stand mixer.

Mix the bread flour, whole wheat flour, yeast and salt together in another bowl.
Using paddle attachment, mix 1 cup of the flour mixture into the wet mixture in the stand mixer bowl. I used a clean hand with my fingers spread, but you could use the paddle attachment or a wooden spoon. Let sit for 10 minutes. Repeat with another cup of the flour mixture. Let sit again for 10 minutes.

Using the dough hook, incorporate two more cups of the flour mixture by 1/2 cups until a soft dough forms. If needed, use more bread flour, a tablespoon at a time, to make a dough that cleans the side of the mixer bowl. Knead with the mixer and/or by hand for 8 - 10 minutes until dough is elastic and somewhat smooth.

Place dough in oiled bowl; turn dough to oil other side. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise until doubled in bulk, about 2 hours.

Punch dough down and turn out onto a floured board. Knead lightly a few times to release trapped air. Divide dough in half. Shape each half into a loaf shape and put into a loaf pan. Cover and let rise until almost to the top of the pans, about 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. about 15 minutes before bread is ready to bake.

Cut slashes in the top of the loaf, if desired, and bake in preheated oven for about an hour, until top of bread is golden brown and loaf sounds hollow when bottom is tapped. Cool on a wire rack for at least 45 minutes before slicing. Makes 2 loaves.

Meyer Lemon Cheesecake with Coconut Crust

Oohhhh this is so good! I know it is a terrible choice for healthy eating, but every now and then a treat like this is essential. When I realized that our daughter had arrived a day early and that she was going to be with us for dinner, I decided that the cheesecake would become the only birthday cake we were likely to have with her, even though it is a bit early. She and her fellow loved it and I sent a huge piece along with them for the journey, too. Then Sweetie and I had another piece for breakfast...decadent.

You don't really need Meyer lemons to make this cheesecake. Regular lemons or limes or Key limes all would work just fine. With limes I would use a graham cracker crust and a little cinnamon in the crust instead of vanilla wafers and coconut, but for lemon cheesecake the coconut is sublime. This cake is actually a version of one I made a while back HERE.

I only have the one photo, but hope to add another one tomorrow. Happy Birthday a little early K!

Meyer Lemon Cheesecake with Coconut Crust

Crust:
1 1/2 tablespoons butter, softened
1 ½ cups vanilla wafer crumbs
1 cup flaked coconut
1/3 cup melted butter

Rub a little of the butter in the bottom of a 9” spring form pan. Use the rest of the butter to butter the sides of the pan. Line the bottom with a circle cut out of baking parchment paper.

Mix the wafer crumbs, coconut and melted butter together until well mixed. Pour the crumb mixture into the bottom of the pan. Spread out with clean fingers, making the layer as even as possible, with some of the mixture pushed up the sides about a half inch to an inch. Using the bottom of a flat bottomed glass, press the mixture down and press the mixture up against the sides. Sides will be uneven in height. Refrigerate the pan 5 minutes.

Bake in a preheated 350 degree F. oven for 7 minutes. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack. When cool, wrap the whole pan, on the outside, in heavy duty foil. Turn oven temperature down to 325.

Filling:
Have everything at room temperature.
1 ½ lbs cream cheese
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon vanilla
2 teaspoons grated peel of Meyer lemon zest, colored part only
1 (14 oz.) can sweetened condensed milk
1 cup sour cream
½ cup Meyer lemon juice (about 4-6 lemons), seeds removed
4 large eggs

Using an electric mixer, on low speed, beat the cream cheese just to soften. Scrape bowl and beaters often throughout the rest of the recipe. Add the sugar in a slow stream, beating on low just until mixed. Add the flour, salt, vanilla, zest and beat on low just to mix. Add the sweetened condensed milk and sour cream. Beat on low just until mixed. With mixer running on low speed, add the lemon juice in a slow stream, beating just until mixed. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing each in before adding the next egg. Beat last egg in just until mixed.

Pour the filling into the prepared crust. Place the foil-wrapped pan into a large roasting pan. Place pans in oven and fill roasting pan with hot water until water is half way up the cheesecake pan. Bake for 1 hour, or until filling is set, but center is still a bit jiggly.

Remove roasting pan from oven carefully. Remove cheesecake pan from roaster water bath and place on wire rack. Run a sharp small knife around the sides of the pan to loosen and keep the cheesecake from cracking as it cools. Cool at room temperature. When cool, remove foil wrapping, wrap in plastic and refrigerate 4 hours or overnight.

To serve, remove from refrigerator. Run a sharp knife around the pan sides to loosen the cheesecake. Remove the pan sides. Slide the cheesecake onto a serving plate and bring to room temperature.

If desired, frost the sides of the cake with whipped cream and pat on some toasted coconut. Garnish with whipped cream and thin lemon slices. (No time for this decoration last night.) Serve thin slices of the cheesecake, using a knife which has been run under (or dipped into) hot water, then wiped dry.

Bright and Sunshiny Lemon

For years I've loved the sweet lemon flavor of Meyer lemons and how nice they look, too, with their bright yellow skin almost the color of egg yolks. In its native China it was a decorative houseplant. In the early 1900s Frank N. Meyer brought it back to the U.S. as part of his job with the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

I've been fortunate now and again to have friends with too many Meyer lemons to use themselves who knew that I would gladly accept any they didn't need. I love to make lemon curd with them because they have just a bit of mandarin orange flavor, too and are not as acidic as regular Eureka lemons. Of course the regular lemons have a nice thick skin which means they can be shipped easily, so Meyer lemons which have a thin skin were until recently a treat for locals near where they grew, often being sold at farmers markets.



This year I have my own Meyer lemons! In the spring I purchased a dwarf Meyer lemon tree and planted it in a pot. The good news is that has allowed me to bring the tree under the shelter of our porch for most of the past month when we have had frosty nights. Lemon trees are not big fans of frost. The bad news is that the tree didn't grow as much as it might have if planted in the ground, so fewer lemons. They are also far from picture perfect lemons...I'm still learning how to protect them from their kind of pests.



I decided to use about 1/3 of the lemons the tree produced to make a coconut crusted Meyer lemon cheesecake. It took 6 of the lemons to make enough juice for the recipe and I was also able to use the zest from about half of them.


The cheesecake is in the fridge chilling, so no photo of it yet, but I can show you my lemons!

Do you have a favorite citrus recipe to use when it's citrus season? I'm always on the lookout for recipes using citrus, especially Meyer lemon.

Hopefully I'll add a photo of the cheesecake tomorrow. If I also add the recipe it will be in it's own post. In the meantime, here's some sunny yellow lemons.

Bread Baking Babes Bake a Quick One

Have you ever had a time when you wanted fresh hot yeast bread but time was short? Perhaps you had made soup or stew for supper and realized that some bread would be the perfect thing to go with it. Or one morning you were planning to have sandwiches at lunchtime in a few hours but discovered you were out of sandwich bread. Usually it takes 4-5 hours to make a loaf or two of yeast bread from scratch. What to do, what to do?

Try this delightful Cuban Bread from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads. It only takes two hours or a bit more. The clever Bread Baking Babes are gathered around the kitchen table of Ilva of Lucullian Delights this month and she discovered this tasty bread and challenged us to bake it. Now to give a serious bread baker a recipe like this is a bit dangerous because I love to bake bread and now I know I can make this one almost on a whim.

This is not a No-Knead bread but you can let a food processor or mixer do most of the kneading if you like. It does used a healthy dose of active dry yeast to speed things up but doesn't taste too yeasty. It has a nice crumb and crust and uses an unusual process where you start baking it in a cold oven! I used sesame seeds on top and put a teaspoon of herbs de Provence in the dry ingredients because I love herby bread.

Hope you will be a Buddy this month and give this one a try. It's quick and easy and you get lovely warm fragrant bread to eat when the two hours are up. To be a Buddy just bake the bread, take a photo and send an e-mail to Ilva with a brief description of how the baking went for you and that photo. Just the photo isn't really enough because we love to know if you enjoyed the bread, if you found the process interesting or difficult or easy and so on. Ilva says, "If you do the Buddie, please bake and send me the link to your blog post about it before midnight Saturday 28th of January to luculliandelights AT gmail DOT com, please write Bread Baking Buddy a the subject so that I don't miss it!"

While you are thinking about this wonderful bread, do check out the loaves made by my fellow Babes. The list with links is to the right.

Thank you (I think) Ilva for asking us to bake Cuban Bread as our first challenge for 2012!


CUBAN BREAD
from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads

1,2-1,4 litre/ 5-6 cups of bread or AP flour (I used 4 cups bread flour and 2 cups whole wheat flour and had about 1/2 cup left over)
2 packages dry yeast, I used 50 g fresh
1 tbsp salt
2 tbsp sugar
1 teaspoon herbs de Provence (optional)
500 ml/ 2 cups hot water
sesame or poppy seeds (optional)

by hand or mixer (15 mins)
Place 4 cups flour in a mixing bowl and add the yeast, salt and sugar. Stir until they are well blended. Pour in the hot water and beat with 100 strong strokes, or three minutes with a mixer flat beater.

Gradually work in the remaining flour (using fingers if necessary), 1/2 cup at a time until the dough takes shape and is no longer sticky.

kneading (8 mins)
Sprinkle the work surface with flour. Work in the flour as you knead, keeping a dusting of it between the dough and the work surface. Knead for 8 minutes by hand or with a dough hook until the dough is smooth, elastic, and feels alive under your hands.

by processor (5 mins)
Attach the short plastic blade.
Place 2 cups flour in the work bowl and add the other ingredients, as above. Pulse several times to thoroughly mix. Remove the cover and add 2 more cups of flour. Replace the cover and pulse to blend.
Add the remaining flour through the feed tube, pulsing after each addition, until the dough begins to form and is carried around the bowl by the force of the blade.

kneading (45 secs)
Turn on the machine to knead for 45 seconds.

rising (15 mins)
Place the dough in a greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and put in a warm (26-37°C/80-100°F) place until double in bulk, about 15 minutes.

shaping (4 mins)
Punch down the dough, turn it out on the work surface, and cut into two pieces. Shape each into a round. Place on the baking sheet. With a sharp knife or razor, slash X on each of the loaves, brush water, and, if desired, sprinkle with sesame or poppy seeds.(I did an egg white wash and sprinkled on the sesame seeds before I did the X slash, and I slashed pretty deeply.)

Baking (205°C/400°F; 45-50 mins)
Place the baking sheet on the middle shelf of a cold oven. Place a large pan of hot water on the shelf below, and heat the oven to 205°C/400°F. The bread of course, will continue to rise while the oven is heating. Bake for about 50 minutes, or until the loaves are a deep golden brown. Thump on the bottom crusts to test for doneness. If they sound hard and hollow, they are baked.

A Shot of Green Sunday

I should be out pruning rose bushes, then spraying them. It's also a good time to do outdoor painting because for some reason we have been having a period of dry and warm weather when it is usually rainy and cool.

Instead Sweetie and I searched yesterday for the break in the invisible fence that needs to be repaired before we can bring a new dog home. I have been missing Xam but also missing the joy of having a dog. Our neighbor was telling us yesterday of his positive experience with GGLRR, a local rescue group. He was grinning like a boy while we were meeting his recently adopted yellow lab. We still have a few things to do before we can go looking but I like the idea of a rescued dog instead of a puppy.

I've also been having a really fine time reading a book called 'As Always, Julia' which is a compilation of some of the letters between Julia Child and Avis DeVoto. Their friendship began when Julia read an article by Mrs. DeVoto's husband where he was a strong supporter of steel knives vs stainless steel ones. The steel ones hold their edge better. Julia sent him some French ones and a nice letter. Avis was helping with his mail and so she sent a return letter and the friendship began that way. They didn't even meet for a long time but found that they had similar interests in cooking and in politics. There were even some mutual friends.

Since I love the topic of cooking and love Julia Child's way with a recipe, plus have been a lover of politics since I was about 10 years old, this book is enthralling for me. It's also of extra interest because the time frame is the 50's when a lot was going on in American politics. I was a history major in college, but our curriculum never covered anything past the Second World War, so I'm learning a lot, even if it is from a certain perspective. Avis' husband Bernard was also influential in conservation issues, particularly Western ones, so that's also of interest. Once I've finished the book I hope to spend time on the Internet following up on some of the footnotes.

The other thing I've been up to is ...surprise!...bread baking. Tomorrow I'll have the perfect recipe for any of you who want the delight of freshly made yeast bread but don't have a lot of time. The next day, hopefully, I'll be able to post a lovely Spelt and Wheat Sourdough Loaf that is currently shaped and rising.

For today I have a suggestion on kitchen decor. Although I love to have a little bouquet on the window sill, right now the only thing in my garden that could be used for that are lavender stalks. I love them but the gray green isn't uplifting. Instead I've found that an inexpensive bunch of Italian parsley brings a nice shot of bright green into the kitchen and is handy for cooking too.

Happy Sunday!