2009 Was A Very Good Year

If the number of posts is any indication, 2009 was wonderful for blogging. It was also the year of bread, so much so that in March I created a new blog Bread Baker's Dog, to take up some of the extra bread recipes I wanted to blog about...why?...because I wanted Feeding My Enthusiasms to reflect ALL my enthusiasms, not just my passion for bread baking. 

Many of my recipes this year came from cookbooks, often tweaked a bit as I like to do. Do you have favorite cookbooks or do most (or all) of your recipes come from the internet...or hand written recipes from a recipe box...or a combination?

Another great thing about 2009 was that my loved ones realized that cooking and baking were taking a more prominent place in my life, so they gifted me with culinary laurel leaf wreaths, shears to chop herbs, foldable colander,  a good scale, a digital thermometer and more.

A lot of thought goes into each post and then more time writing and editing photographs and putting it all together, then proofing (usually but not always) the post before posting. Dishes that we have as part of our normal life get posted once then are not posted later, so what you see are in some ways extra things that I want to make. Every now and then I will repeat something, but I try to keep it fresh and new.

One of the Christmas cookies that we have every year has been posted a number of time or has been linked to. It is Sweetie's favorite because of all the molasses. It's the Swedish Ginger Cookie recipe and I love it, too because it's a roll-out and cut-out cookie that is easy to roll, keeps it's shape when baked, and is delicious. I usually decorate the cookies with white Royal Icing, which contrasts nicely with the brown cookie, and maybe a few cinnamon red hots for a pop of color.

In 2009, towards the end of the year, I did my first post with suggestions for Thanksgiving, including links. I had a number of positive comments, plus a comment from No Handle on making a brined turkey with great gravy. Since it has been just a bit over a year since he died, it was a jolt to read the comment...I had forgotten that he had written. Rest in peace, Brother No Handle.

The fall also brought a few good recipes for squash including a fairy cake that is really a kind of pumpkin muffin, a two squash soup, and pumpkin pie made with sugar pie pumpkins. Truly there is something special about using locally grown fresh squash to make these fall treats.

October included two French treats that I have made again over the years...macarons and French yogurt cake. Both are fairly simple, but the results are wonderful. If you get a chance, follow the links and try them yourself.

Of course October is also my blog birthday. Here is what I wrote for the third birthday:

"One of the best things lately to start in the fall is this blog. Three years ago I barely knew what a blog was and there were far fewer food blogs.

I checked back to the brave folks who were the first few to comment here. The first four or five no longer are blogging. I guess it didn't match their needs in the same way that it matched mine:

I love the fact that I have 'met' people from all over the world through blogging...and that we are mostly the same...food obsessed :)

I love that blogging brings out my creative side. I get to play with food. I borrow lots and lots of cookbooks from the library and sometimes even bring the librarians samples of things I've baked to enjoy, especially of the sweets. I love that my photography has improved. I love that I have come under the sway of the magic of bread baking, seduced by all things baking, inspired by combinations of flour and butter and sugar and seeds and grains. Most of all I have been amazed that I can sit down at the computer, find words to fill the Blogger template time after time, and create something that other people actually read and look at and are occasionally inspired by.

As Sweetie would say (in jest), "Not bad...for a girl." He is actually my biggest fan and promoter, telling perfect strangers that they have to go visit my blog. Sometimes they even accept the URL from him.

I love hitting the Publish Post button and I especially enjoy the comments...and wish that there were more. You CAN comment anonamously as Natasha did recently. If you give me hints and I already know you I can even figure out who you are...a sort of puzzle. However, even if you never comment, I do hope you will continue to visit now and then. The place to click on to comment is usually at the bottom of the post. Try it...you might enjoy it.

Believe it or not, I don't have a clue how many people actually visit this blog. I could find out easily, but I guess I'm not really interested. Recently one of my sisters assured me that many family members stop by and read to see what I am up to. I suspect that there are a few folks beyond immediate family...and I welcome you all!

This is the 360th post. I think that comes out to an average of something like a post every third day."

One of the advantages of having this be a blog that includes a few things other than food is that I can get creative. In late September one post included a Land of St. Honore' story, a recipe for vol au vents as part of a Daring Baker challenge, and a photo and explanation of a set of model World War II ships that Sweetie made and created a display case for, too. My Mom had asked for a photo (we talked every week on the phone on Saturdays) and I knew that she would be looking for the St. Honore' story, so I included the photo. I suspect that I might have had more followers if I had stuck strictly to baking or baking sweets, but what fun is that?

September also brought the first Index for the blog. Since there were at least 300 recipes by now, that was a good thing. Now there are well over a thousand recipes and a multi-page Index. I still need to migrate the old index recipes into the new one, but maybe that will happen in January when the weather is usually rainy and it's a good time to hunker down inside.

Although I usually try to write out recipes so they are like those in cookbooks, sometimes I just write them out as I would if I were giving you a recipe on a piece of scratch paper...in narrative form. A good example (and a delicious recipe) is for bruchetta, a great recipe for harvest time.

This is the year that I began baking with the Bread Baking Babes, my longest running blog group. I still bake bread with them and post it on or after the 16th of the month. First I baked as a Buddy and eventually was invited to join. The group kept the number at 12, so I had to wait until there was an opening. These days we hardly ever get Buddies and our numbers have been reduced, but the challenges are still fun and educational and the results are usually delicious! The first bread was in February for the Babes first anniversary. It was 5-Grain Bread with Walnuts by Carol Field, an artisan loaf (or two) that was really hearty and delicious. 

Another fun, new thing this year was that I did a journal of our first trip to Ireland, with most of the posts being in June even though the trip was in May. These included little maps to show where we were. There are also lots and lots of photos and usually a recipe at the end, often not really related to the Ireland story. Here is the first one (and it has a recipe for Irish Brown Bread) that is set up as a real journal, although there were a few I wrote while there that can be found in late May...you can follow the rest on your own.

Sometimes there is a recipe that becomes a favorite with you, dear readers. One of these is Spinach Rice Casserole from the Moosewood cookbook of 1977, so it really is an oldie but goodie. It can be a main dish since it has milk, eggs and cheese along with brown or wild rice and spinach, but it can also be a great side dish if you have someone in your family, like I do, who really likes some meat with their meal.

Another milestone from 2009 is one that from 2020 looks almost quaint. In January Barack Obama became our President and many were very hopeful that we had turned a corner in our nation and could put racism behind us. We celebrated at my work and arrived early enough to watch the inauguration on TV...and I baked and brought bagels for part of the celebration. They are a lot of work, but so delicious. As it turned out, racism just went underground and grew in the dark. People of color knew that the election had not changed much for them, but it took the rest of us a long time to realize that so much of it was systemic that it still blights our nation. That needs to change.

I'm going to end with a pair of recipes that are perfect for this time of year. I just picked the first two Meyer lemons from the shrub by the barn. I have quite a few this year, so look for more lemon recipes in the next few months. The one is a link to a post that has both gingerbread and my Mom's clear Lemon Sauce. They go really well together!

If you have read this far, you are a trooper! 2009 had 135 posts, most of them with recipes, so feel free to wander around and discover the ones I didn't include in this round-up.

Going With the Flow On Christmas Cookies

Well, we made it to December, safe and sound. With Christmas only 23 or so days away, I've started to think about what I'd like to bake and cook for the season. Topping the list is Christmas cookies. Somehow the smell of the molasses and spices of gingerbread cookies gets my inner elf going, so the prospect of holiday shopping and wrapping and shipping (to say nothing of decorating the house) seem less daunting.

This year my darling daughter was home for Thanksgiving for the first time in a long time. As part of her visit we planned a cookie decorating evening with a neighbor whose company we really enjoy. It's fun to have a chance to be a kid at heart and play with decorations the way I did when I was young. One of the ways to bring out that inner child is to have lots of options for decorating. We even did Ninja Warriors.

 Not only did we have gingerbread cookies, but I had also made some dough from a recipe I found in the current issue of Bon Appetit magazine (recipe below). The cookies are vanilla and bake up a little flatter, crisp and delicious. We started out the decorating process for both by icing them with a slightly thinned royal icing to create a canvas for painted decorations...the flow because you thin the icing enough that it flows flat to create a canvas for the painting.

 K brought some luster dust decor bottles with her in silver, copper, red, green, and blue. Combined with lemon extract, they became paint that added a wash of color and a sheen of luster that was quite pretty. I also had some regular royal icing in white, red, and green to be used for accents or to attach silver balls or sanding sugar or other decor to the cookies.

 Lots of opportunity for creativity! Most of the photos are for the gingerbread cookies, but we did bake some with the vanilla dough, too. Look for the star with the blue outline and the round one that looks like a pizza, for example.

We had a blast and I think the cookies are little works of art in many cases. One of my favorites was the little piggy. Terrible photo, but hopefully you'll get the idea. It had red flow icing as a base and AM used silver paint to delineate the various cuts of meat one could get from a pig.

This can be a fun activity to do with kids, too. If they are really young, it is recommended that you roll, cut out and bake the cookies ahead of time. If you are making the flow iced ones, do that in advance, too, so the icing has time to set. That way the kids get the fun part of painting and adding embellishments to their creations without a waiting period. A muffin tin with different decors in each section is an excellent way to corral the sugars, silver balls, small red hot candies and other embellishments.

Disposable pastry bags work well for the royal icing, either with an added icing tip or not. If not, be sure to keep the hole you cut in the tip pretty small so your icing stays small, too, and doesn't overwhelm the cookie. The tip or hole for applying the flow icing can be bigger, but the one for adding details needs to be small. K bought the Wilton brand luster dust on Amazon, but I think some crafts stores might have it, too, if they carry Wilton cake decorating supplies.

Ultimate Sugar Cookies
from Bon Appetit magazine, Dec. 2013

3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3 cups sifted all purpose flour, plus more for rolling

1 1/4 cups (2 1/2 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces

1 cup sugar

1 large egg

1 egg yolk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Place racks in lower and upper thirds of oven. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

Whisk salt, baking powder and 3 cups flour into a bowl.

Using an electric mixer on high speed, beat butter and sugar until well combined, about 3 minutes. Butter does not need to be fluffy. Add egg, egg yolk, and vanilla. Beat just to combine.

Reduce speed to low and gradually add dry ingredients. Mix just to combine.

Form dough into tow 3/4-inch thick disks. Wrap disks in plastic. Chill at least 2 hours.

To bake: Let 1 disk of dough sit at room temperature until softened slightly, about 5 minutes. Roll out on a lightly floured sheet of parchment paper until about 1/4-inch thick, dusting with flour as needed. If dough gets soft or sticky, chill on parchment until firm. Cut out shapes with floured cookie cutters. Transfer cut-outs to parchment-lined baking sheets.

Bake cookies, rotating baking sheets halfway through, until edges are golden, 12 - 16 minutes, depending on size. Transfer baked cookies to wire rack and let cool. Repeat with scraps and remaining dough.

Decorate cooled cookies as desired.

Cookie dough can be made 1 month ahead; freeze instead of chilling. Cookies can e baked, but left un-decorated 2 weeks ahead; wrap tightly and freeze. Makes 2 - 3 dozen, depending on size.

Royal Icing for decorating

Using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat 3 1/4 cups powdered sugar and 2 large egg whites until white, thickened and tripled in volume, about 5 minutes. Add water by the tablespoonful until icing no longer holds a peak. Test some if you are going to do the flow icing to make sure that it is thin enough. Icing for adding details needs to have less water added. When icing is desired thickness, divide icing into smaller bowls and color with food coloring as desired. Once colored, put icing into pastry bags.  Makes about 2 cups.

To make paintable cookies: Follow the Ultimate Sugar Cookie directions. When cookies are cool, load a pastry bag, fitted with a plain tip, with white or colored Royal Icing.

Pipe a line around the outside edge of the cookie top, then fill in the shape. Icing should be just thin enough that it will flatten on the cookie once piped on. Let the iced cookies dry completely, allowing at least two hours.

Thin luster dust with lemon extract in a small bowl until smooth and the consistency of half and half. Use a clean small paintbrush to paint on designs. Let dry.  

Ginger, cinnamon, molasses...wonderful scents of the season...will perfume your home if you make these cookies.

I've been making these for Christmas for a long time. I first found the recipe in a Woman's Day magazine December issue over 30 years ago, but later found it printed in Maida Heatter's first cookie cookbook called Maida Heatter's Book of Great Cookies.

The dough is easy to work with, something that is not true of all rolled gingerbread recipes. It's also fun to make these because when the baking soda is added to the boiling spice, sugar and molasses mixture it foams up dramatically! Try this with your kids (and if they are old enough be ready to explain about the chemical reaction of the acidic molasses and basic baking soda)...they will be fascinated.

These cookies can be baked thin and crisp or thin and chewy or thicker and more cakelike...it is up to you. Roll them thin and bake them longer for crisp.

This dough works well for making Gingerbread Houses, too. Use a sharp small knife to cut around cardboard templates...file folders make great template materials, then re-cut if needed, again using the templates, once the cookies are baked. Since the pieces for a Gingerbread House are usually large, you will probably need two batches of the dough and will want to bake them at a lower temperature (300 degrees F) and longer to have the house pieces nice and crisp and well shaped.

Royal Icing can either be used to decorate cookies or to be used as 'glue' to hold Gingerbread House pieces together and stick on decorations and for 'snow' and 'icicles'. I've made ornaments decorated with Royal Icing and cinnamon candies and silver dragees. I'll thread some fine ribbon through the hole to use for hanging them.

Decorating the cookies or gingerbread house can be a delightful project to do with children. If they are too little to cut out and bake the cookies, you can do that part and then have them help with decorations. The cups of a muffin tin are great for keeping small decorations like sanding sugar, mini dragees, mini M and Ms, cinnamon red hots, etc. handy for adding to the wet Royal Icing. The really good news is that these cookies not only look great and are easy to make, they taste wonderful! The spices and molasses give them some bite and depth of flavor.Sweetie has taste tested them for me and he assures me that they taste great undecorated, too.

Swedish Ginger Cookies
from Maida Heatter’s Book of Great Cookies
Note: because cookie cutters and thickness of dough will vary, a count of how many the recipe makes isn't possible.

2/3 cup dark or light molasses
2/3 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
11 tablespoons butter, at room temperature (almost a stick and a half)
¾ tablespoon baking soda
1 egg
5 cups sifted all-purpose flour

For regular sized cut-out cookies, preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. If you will be making large cookies, preheat to 300 degrees F.

Line a baking sheet or cookie sheet with foil, parchment, or silicone mat.

In a heavy 2-quart saucepan over moderate heat, bring the molasses, sugar, ginger, and cinnamon just to a low boil, stirring occasionally.

Meanwhile, cut the butter into 10inch pieces and place them in a large mixing bowl. (I use my stand mixer, so I use the stand mixer bowl).

When the molasses mixture comes to a boil, add the baking soda and stir until the mixture foams up to the top of the saucepan. Then pour it over the butter and stir to melt the butter.

With a fork, stir the egg lightly just to mix and then stir it into the molasses mixture. Gradually stir in the flour with a rubber or wooden spatula.

Turn the dough out onto a large board or smooth work surface and knead lightly until it is mixed thoroughly.

If you are making thin cookies, work with half the dough at a time (this is what I did) but for thick cookies work with it all.

Place the dough on a lightly floured surface and form it into a ball. With a lightly floured rolling pin, roll the dough to the desired thickness. (I baked mine about ¼ inch thick, but you can make them thicker if you like. If you are using this dough to make gingerbread houses, you will want it at least ½ inch thick and will want to bake the pieces at 300 degrees F for at least 15 minutes, but up to 45 minutes, until crisp. You will be able to judge by the feel of the cookie.) Cut the shapes you want, using cookie cutters or a sharp knife. You may find that you need to flour cookie cutters so they will release the dough.

Gather the scraps into a ball and roll out again, incorporating as little flour as possible. Repeat until dough is used up.

Place the cookies on the prepared cookie or baking sheets. At this point you can cut a hole in the cookie for hanging as ornaments if you wish (an icing tip makes a good hole).

Bake in the preheated oven, switching back to front half way through. Bake until cookies feel firm to the touch.

Cool on a wire rack for a minute or two, then remove from the baking sheet with a spatula to finish cooling. If you are using them for ornaments, check as soon as you remove them from the oven to make sure the hole didn’t bake closed. If it did, recut the hole.

To Prepare Cookie to Be Used As Christmas Ornaments:

If you have cut a hole in the cookie and re-cut once out of the oven, it is pretty simple to put a thread, thin ribbon, etc. through the hole for hanging. You can decorate the cookies as you wish, but a traditional way is to use Royal Icing. The Royal Icing can be used alone for a brown and white design, or it can be used to ‘glue’ on small candies, dragees, gumdrop slices, etc. Use a pastry bag with an icing tip or place some of the icing in a reclosable top bag, close it tight and snip a small amount off a corner of the bottom, squeezing icing through that hole onto the cookies.

Royal Icing for Decorating (This makes a generous amount)
1 pound (3 ½ cups, packed) confectioners’ sugar
1/3 cup egg whites (2-3 eggs), at room temperature
¼ teaspoon cream of tartar.

Strain the sugar by pressing it with your fingertips through a large strainer set over a large bowl. In the small bowl of an electric mixer beat the egg whites with about half of the sugar at high speed for 5 minutes. Beat in the cream of tartar. Continue to beat while gradually adding more of the sugar, about ½ cup at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition, until the icing reaches the desired consistency…it should be thick enough to hold its shape without running or flattening on the cookie, but not so thick that it is difficult to use or will not stick to the cookie. Usually you won’t need to use all the sugar. If the icing is too stiff, add more egg white or a few drops of water, very little at a time. If it is too soft, add more sugar. Keep the icing covered with plastic wrap to keep a crust from forming. If desired, divide the icing into small bowls and color with food colors for several different colors.