What are you Baking the Week of April 21, 2024?

[Mike Nolan]

I may try to make some blueberry muffins this afternoon.

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[BakerAunt]

I made Mixed Grains Pumpkin Oat Waffles on Sunday morning. It's a thorough re-working of a Pumpkin Oat Waffles recipe at the blog No Empty Chairs, with not a lot in common with the original. My husband and I like it almost as much as our favorite Cornmeal-Pumpernickel Waffles. Our dog, Annie, likes any waffles--Any waffle breakfast for her means best morning ever! We tried some of the King Arthur maple cream on the waffles but ended up switching to maple syrup. The waffles need a higher proportion of liquid in their topping. I will save the maple cream for wholegrain scones.

[BakerAunt]

I made granola on Sunday afternoon.

I also baked my adaptation of Peanut Butter Honeys, a cookie recipe that Mumpy posted on the King Arthur Baking Circle (June 30, 2012), and which now lives on the Nebraska Kitchen site, having been moved by dedicated volunteers when King Arthur shut down the circle. For my adaptation, I replaced the ¼ cup of butter with 3 Tbs. of avocado oil. I used white whole wheat flour and added 2 Tbs. milk powder and 2 tsp. flax meal. My peanut butter of choice is a natural one that requires stirring. I used Santa Cruz crunchy peanut butter. The honey is local, from the farmers market. I use a #40 food scoop and get 23 cookies, which I bake on a 1 2/3-sheet pan.

Back when Mumpy posted the recipe, we thought the Baking Circle was forever. I am grateful that Mike established this site, so that at least some of the recipes were saved, and we can still meet to talk about cooking and baking.

[Mike Nolan]

Zen said she had a copy of all the recipes, but she hasn't responded to any of my emails about them and the site that she set up seems to have disappeared now. Is anybody still in touch with her?

[Mike Nolan]

Personally, I'm of the opinion that nothing is forever on the Internet, unless it's something you're trying to get rid of. 🙂

[BakerAunt]

On Tuesday, I baked Len's recipe for Semolina/Rye/Whole Wheat buns. I made ten buns. We began using them at dinner for ham sandwiches.

[RiversideLen]

I made a batch of buns.

[Italiancook]

https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/chewy-chocolate-chip-cookie-bars-recipe

Calling you expert bakers: Last afternoon, I baked King Arthur's Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars, link above. Recipe calls for 11 tablespoons butter. Without thinking, I used only 7 tablespoons unsalted butter. I used a glass Pyrex 9x13" dish, so I heavily greased it with 1 tablespoon butter.

The recipe recommends letting bars sit overnight, so I cooled for 3 hours then covered with foil.

In the middle of the night I realized my butter error. I expected the bars to be too hard to cut. First thing this morning, I portioned them for the freezer. It was easy to cut them.

I had made these once before using the 11 tablespoons butter. Both times, I used 1 cup Ghirardelli bittersweet chips, 1 cup Nestle caramel chips & 1 cup finely chopped walnuts. It was a couple of years ago, but the goofed bars seem as moist as the ones with the 11 tablespoons butter. So I don't understand what the 4 tablespoons butter I didn't use would have done for the cookie bars. I guess I don't understand the purpose of butter in batters. I always thought butter was for moisture & taste. What am I missing? Thanks! And in case butter helps the rise, I think my goofed bars rose as much as the ones with the recipe amount of butter.

[Mike Nolan]

My understanding of brownies is that there are two ratios to watch:

fat to sugar
fat to flour

Playing with the fat/flour ratio moves you along the fudge-like/cake-like scale. At the extreme end of this scale is the so-called Katherine Hepburn brownie recipe, which has almost no flour in it, and is almost like a piece of fudge.

The fat to sugar ratio moves you along the tenderness/crispness scale, although IMHO that's more noticeable in cookies than in things baked in a pan, because cookies can spread out.

Changing from 11 to 7 tablespoons of butter may not have been enough of a difference to be readily apparent, but they'd probably be a little more cake-like, meaning they might have raised more.

The type of fat you use in brownies is another factor, butter-based ones tend to be softer and have a nicer sheen on the top than oil-based recipes.

[BakerAunt]

I baked Jammy Muffins on Wednesday morning, using a jar of black raspberry, blackberry, and raspberry jam that I had canned nearly two years ago. My base recipe was "Cherry Almond Muffins," which appeared in King Arthur Flour's discontinued The Baking Sheet 20.4 (Summer 2009), p. 13. In addition to the jam substitution, I replaced ¼ cup of the flour with quick oats and the other two cups with white whole wheat flour. I reduced the sugar from ½ cup to 1/3 and next time will try ¼ cup. I also reduced the baking powder from 1 Tbs. to 2 ½ tsp. and halved the salt. These muffins are a great way to use surplus jam.

In the evening, I baked Blood Orange Almond Cake, which I adapted from a Nordic Ware recipe. I decided to use my 6-cup Bundt pan instead of a loaf pan, so the baking time was a bit shorter at 40 minutes. (I always check with the instant thermometer; it should be 200 F when done.) I delete ¼ cup of sugar in the cake and use a different glaze--about half of what the original recipe uses. I will glaze it tomorrow.

[Italiancook]

Thanks, Mike, for your detailed explanation. I learned from it. Next time I make these I'll go to 8 tablespoons butter and leave the recipe at that.

[chocomouse]

I have apple-cinnamon muffins almost ready for the oven. I used my usual muffin recipe, adding two chopped apples. I put one scoop of batter into each muffin tin, then added about a teaspoon of home-made cinnamon schmear, and topped that with another scoop of the apple batter. I swirled it with knife, and sprinkled with demerara sugar. I think I won't wait until breakfast to eat one!

[BakerAunt]

Your muffins sound delicious, Chocmouse.

I will bake my Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers on Thursday evening. I was going to do it this afternoon, but we had something unexpected arise that took up a large chunk of it.

[Joan Simpson]

I'm baking brownies to take tonight when we play cards.

[BakerAunt]

We were out of cookies for teatime. I remedied that situation early Friday evening by baking Big Lake Judy's Best Ever Molasses Cookies, which are a favorite of ours. My only changes are to halve the salt and add 2 Tbs. Bob's Red Mill milk powder.

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