Last week was an interesting week of baking. For the first time in a year I made no bread or crackers. I had my starter hibernating in the refrigerator downstairs not being fed. I did not even make pizza dough for Sunday night pizza (fortunately I had some dough leftover in the freezer from before Passover began). I made an almond pancake recipe which none of the kids liked except my oldest so I won't do it again. I made matzah caramel crunch which I've seen with saltine crackers before.
My middle showed an interest in baking cookies before Passover began so he baked some sugar cookies. During Passover he wanted to bake some Passover sugar cookies. It was an interesting recipe containing potato chips for crunch (didn't really work - probably needed thicker, kettle style ruffle chips). They were very dry and sandy and probably needed less flour or more butter or something. But to these he added citric acid to try to make them very sour. But he did not add enough so no one tasted the sour. We'll see if his interest in cookie baking continues or abates now that he made his joke cookies.
My starter is back up. I've fed it but it's still cold, compressed, and thick. So I'll see how it is tomorrow and see if I can make crackers with it. I did have five dough rounds for pizza so I made five instead of seven pizzas which means no pizza for lunch today but everyone seemed happy last night.
Not sure what else I'll do. Might make some rye bread. I have some white rye flour to use up which I do not like so much but I need to use it.
I made the 3 layers for Will’s birthday cake (next Sunday) and wrapped and froze them. It’s Claire Saffitz’s carrot cake and the batter is delicious. I will frost it on Saturday while the layers are still frozen with her brown butter cream cheese frosted bong.
I am doing a small pre-sliced ham today. Well, I'll heat a few slices for me, my wife prefers hers without being marinated and baked.
Probably some potatoes au gratin, too.
Somehow I don't think crab stuffed shrimp (they must be big ones) is the 'easy' route, though.
King Arthur has posted instructions for making rye puff pastry (using rye and wheat flour) and several things you can make with it
Rye Puff Pastry
Today I made a new, to me, rye bread recipe, the KAF Double Light Rye Bread. We haven't cut into it yet, but it looks terrific. I may have finally mastered baking bread in my new Breville!! I put it on the very lowest possible rack setting, so it is literally right on the heating elements. I set it for 350, 30 minutes, on plain Bake. At 30 minutes it looked perfect, light brown bottoms, medium brown tops (two loaves), but internal temp was only 165*. I set it for 5 more minutes, and they were then at 194*. Done! I'm so pleased. I do hope they have an OK texture and flavor. They didn't rise a lot, and very little oven spring. Next time I'll leave them alone and see if another 10-15 minutes get more rise.
Dinner tonight was Japchae, really good.
BakerAunt, I often have a wrap for lunch. You could have some fun tweaking recipes to make your own nutritious wraps; I often make my own, but keep a package of store-bought in the freezer. I find they freeze nicely. I usually spread a thin layer of mayo sprinkled with Penzey's Foxpoint or Sandwich Sprinkles, or whatever you like. I happen to dislike avocado, but you could use mashed avocado instead of mayo. (Or, skip the mayo and avocado, but sprinkle the layers of veggies with a flavored balsamic vinegar before wrapping it all up.) Then layer on the veggies -- greens of some sort, onions, sweet peppers, tomato, shredded carrots, beets, zucchini, cabbage, sprouts, etc. Cheese and/or thin slices of leftover meat or bacon will add protein. It's another delicious way to clean out the bits and pieces in the veggie drawer!
On Saturday, I made avocado toast for lunch for the first time. I mashed an avocado and added 1 tsp. of Penzey’s Pico & Salsa (recommended in a Penzey’s email) and had it on two slices of toast. I struggle with having good lunches, since I do not use processed lunch meat; tuna sandwiches or almond butter sandwiches or a one-egg omelet on bread have not given me enough variety. (I await tomato season and turkey bacon and tomato sandwiches—as long as it is a turkey bacon with a smoked flavor.)
I need to find a healthy, plain cracker recipe so that I can eat the avocado concoction as dip.
Your Easter baking sounds so good, Rottiedogs.
Congratulations on the fantail rolls, Mike!
We have been eating too many cakes of late, so I scaled back for Easter tomorrow by baking six bunny cakelets in the specialty Nordic Ware bunny pan. (I think KABC has it for sale; I bought mine for a lot less at T.J. Maxx a few years ago.) I used the recipe that came with the pan, but I substituted one-third barley flour and used King Arthur AP for the rest. I reduced the sugar from 1 cup to 3/4 cup, and I replaced 1/2 cup butter, melted, with 1/3 cup oil. I whisk together the wet ingredients and the sugar before using a cake whisk to add the dry ingredients. These are cute, although they puff up a bit too high, so I will have to trim the tummy area to get them flat on a plate. I plan to put a vanilla glaze, and maybe some colored sprinkles over them tomorrow.
My husband just said: You only made six? Clearly he does not share my concern that there are a lot of bread and cake items around of late.
It is ambitious but I do it every year. Outside of the kolacz and rye bread I only make the rest of it for Easter.
Easter pizza looks like a giant ravioli. The dough has an egg and some oil in it besides the normal flour - water - salt - yeast. It gets rolled out maybe 16 inches around. The filling is:
1 1/2# Ricotta Cheese drained
1# Italian Sausage (casings removed cooked, cooled & crumbled)
Proscuttio (one slice about 1/4" thick) diced fine
1/4 cup chopped Italian parsley
1/4 to 1/2 cup grated Romano or Parmesan cheese ( I never use parmesan. We always had Romano growing up.)
Black Pepper to taste
1 to 2 eggs (depending on how watery the Ricotta is)
Mix together everything but the egg(s) (I use a fork to mash the cheese & other ingredients) then add the egg or eggs and mix well.
Put the dough on a cookie sheet or pizza pan after it is rolled out. I put a piece of parchment on the cookie sheet before I place the dough. The filling goes on the bottom half of the dough leaving an inch all around so the edges can be crimped. Flip the dough over the top of the filling and trim to make the edges even. Dip a fork in flour and crimp the edges well. Brush the top with an egg yolk. Bake at 375 for 45 minutes until nice and brown.
I posted this on the old old BC years ago. I'm sure it got lost like so many other recipes did.
Easter bread ingredients are the same as for the Easter pizza adding about 1/2 cup of sugar and a couple teaspoons of vanilla. It is shaped in a ring and gets frosted with a simple powder sugar glaze and non-pareils. Growing up my grandmother would put colored eggs in the dough. I don't eat them so I don't bother doing it even though it is tradtional.
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This reply was modified 5 years ago by
rottiedogs.
I got tomato plants started indoors today, 8 different varieties. I'll probably start another set of them in a week using a slightly different approach. (These were done in pellet pots, the next batch will be in peat pots with soil.
The link I gave earlier used flour, sugar, water and milk. I can see how a little made with some yeast or a fat (including egg) might be softer but still enough different in color to make the cross visible.
Or you could go the opposite way and make the cross darker, such as by adding cocoa.
Our house is open concept by necessity (smaller lot, so narrow and long). Unless I'm in the first floor bedroom or bathroom, I hear what is happening in the kitchen if I'm also downstairs, and some noise will even travel up the stairs to the second floor.
I have started the dough for a sourdough pan pizza for this evening.
My Hot Cross Buns came out well. I had decided to go ahead and add the raisins at the end of the bread machine cycle (when it dings for additions), and that does not appear to have affected the rise. I will cut the amount of flax meal next time, as it caused the dough to be overly gummy. (I had to dampen my hand before shaping each roll.) The overnight rise in the refrigerator went well. I used my usual trick of setting the oven 25F higher, then turning it down once the rolls were in. We had four of the sixteen for breakfast
Well, the tangzhong batch of hot cross buns didn't rise as much as the original recipe batch, either in bulk proof (even though I gave them additional time) or in final proof. The internal crumb is a bit finer, a lot of smaller holes rather than not quite as many holes but bigger. Hard to compare taste, the interiors are different, the exteriors are similar.
I'll see how they taste again tomorrow, but right at the moment I'm leaning towards the original version as better. I'll also be watching to see if they stay moist longer
We had salads followed by hot cross buns (with extra icing, of course.) Slightly better than yesterday's meal. 🙂
