What are You Baking the Week of February 9, 2020?

[BakerAunt]

On Sunday morning, I took a break from the steel-cut oats and made a half recipe of the Cornmeal-Rye Waffles in the King Arthur Whole Grain Baking Book (p. 21). These are completely whole grain, using cornmeal and pumpernickel flour. I replaced the 3 Tbs. of melted butter with equivalent canola oil. It's an excellent recipe, and with the whole grains, I don't miss the butter. A half recipe made 7 waffles, and we had no problem consuming all of them.

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[RiversideLen]

I love whole grain waffles, BakerAunt. I like to put some cocoa in mine.

I made a chocolate cake today, one that uses oil instead of butter. I replaced 1/2 cup of the oil with buttermilk.

[Joan Simpson]

I baked banana bread yesterday.Today is my husbands birthday 69 years old and he insisted no cake so no cake for him.I sure will be glad when his taste comes back.

[BakerAunt]

I can’t make my wonderful Valentine’s sugar cookies, since the amount of butter is prohibitive when I don’t have other people around who can help eat them. I pulled out a Nordic Ware heart Bundtlette pan. I was delighted to find the recipe from the original packaging was “Hazelnut Heart Cakelets with Vanilla Glaze,” and that it uses oil and not butter. I substituted 1/3 barley flour for that much AP, added 1 Tbs. Bob’s Red Mill milk powder, and replaced 1/3 of the canola oil with that much buttermilk. (That means ½ cup oil and ¼ cup buttermilk.) I made a half recipe of the glaze, as the amount seemed too much, and the half recipe was perfect. I put the glaze in the center and let a bit drip down the sides. These are lovely and delicious.

[skeptic7]

Yesterday I made my oatmeal-maple-walnut quick bread with the wonderful Canadian Dark Robust maple syrup. The Dark maple syrup gives it a little more flavor but its still very subtle. I think I'm going to keep the maple syrup for pancakes, and hot chocolate and frosting. It does make a great baked bean dish but that seems such an extravagant use of it.
Has anyone tried maple syrup on cheesecake? It shouldn't require a lot of maple syrup to just drizzle some one top.

[Mike Nolan]

I dunno, IMHO cheesecake shouldn't be sticky-sweet.

[chocomouse]

I use my basic cheesecake recipe, one that calls for 4 8oz packages of cream cheese and 4 eggs, and 1 cup of sugar. I just substitute 3/4 cup of dark robust syrup for the cup of sugar. The flavor is still subtle, but you can taste the maple. You could also drizzle a little syrup on each serving. I've noticed that many recipes that use maple syrup for flavoring and sweetness also call for use maple flavoring, or extract of some sort to enhance the maple flavor. You could also try using maple sugar, although I have no suggestions for how to substitute that for regular sugar since I've never tried it.

[Joan Simpson]

I made a peach cobbler,we had that with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

[chocomouse]

I made rye bread this morning. After I shaped it into a sandwich loaf, I planned to let it rise a minimum of 30 minutes, but most likely 60 minutes, since my notes from 2016 say it was a slow riser. I checked it in 15 minutes, and it had already split open on the top and one side, so into the oven it want because I didn't want to take the time to reshape it. It didn't get much oven spring, and it didn't split open a lot more. It doesn't look pretty, but tastes fine and it's bread!

[Mike Nolan]

Slashing the loaf might have helped, but usually that's done just before it goes into the oven, and it had already split open by then.

I'll be doing another rye bread from the Ginsberg book tomorrow, I was going to start it last night but the instructions said to do step 1 in the morning.

This morning I noticed an inconsistency. It says to do step 1 in the morning then wait 12 hours before adding more flour and water for step 2 in the afternoon, then bake 6 hours later. Somehow that just doesn't add up right, I could have started it last night after all. So I'm going to do step 1 this evening, do step 2 in the morning and bake it in the afternoon.

[BakerAunt]

I have limes from my lime tree in the refrigerator. A recipe that I miss is Lime Pecan Cookies; the amount of butter is prohibitive. On Thursday, I decided to take a recipe that I have for Lemon Walnut Biscotti (from Bon Appetit April 2005, p. 119), replace the lemon with lime, and replace the butter with a mixture of oil and buttermilk. I added 3 tbs. Bob’s Red Mill Milk powder and used pecans rather than walnuts. I also used half AP flour and half white whole wheat. I refrigerated the shaped rolls for an hour before baking. I decided not to use an egg wash; instead I spritzed with water and sprinkled with demerara sugar. I had a taste of one this morning, and I do taste the lime. While they will never be the same as the recipe with 10 Tbs. butter, these will be nice to have with tea or coffee.

[Italiancook]

I made a Texas Chocolate Cake for my computer tech. Normally, I make him (and his colleagues) Double Chocolate Brownies, but I still haven't purchased chocolate chips. Nevertheless, they have a good snack. Making the cake this time was easier than the one I posted about recently. I measured everything for the frosting before I started the cake. That made the frosting less time-crunched to make. But I started cooking the frosting too soon. Partly, because the caked needed 4 extra minutes baking time. Partly, because I was unsure of how much time it'd take. The frosting was on the stove too long, and I think too much water from the milk and butter evaporated. The frosting was thicker than last time. I was in a hurry to get cake done and cooled, so I used the thicker frosting. I'm sure I'm the only one who knows the difference. My husband has eaten what I didn't give the tech, and he hasn't complained.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by Italiancook.

[Mike Nolan]

I make the frosting while the cake is baking and keep it on simmer. If it looks like it has dried up a bit too much, I just add another tablespoon or two of buttermilk to it.

[BakerAunt]

For dessert on Valentine’s day, I baked a Chocolate Heart Cake, using a La Forme pan from Kaiser Backform (Heart Flan Pan) that I bought some years ago and had only used once before. The beauty of being retired is that I have time to celebrate the holidays. One of the recipes that came with the pan is “Chocolate Strawberry Heart.” I was delighted that it did not use butter, only ¼ cup oil and ½ cup buttermilk. It also uses coffee liquor, and I still have a partial bottle of Kahlua. I used the Grease on the pan. At first, I was unsure if it was going to release, but I rapped the rack with the inverted pan on top on the counter, and it came out beautifully. The plan was to make a filling with fresh strawberries and glaze. However, dinner took so long, I didn’t get that done, so I came up with a Plan B. I mixed up 1 ½ recipes of the glaze I used earlier this week. I spread it in the center of the heart, pushing it up along the sides. I felt it needed something, so I rummaged through my stash and found some large crystal red sugar, which I sprinkled on it. The cake is more like a kind of brownie, which worked well with the glaze. We both liked it, and of course my husband had a second piece, oblivious to the Kahlua.

I have a heart-shaped platter--from King Arthur years ago--and the Kaiser heart fits on it perfectly.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by BakerAunt.

[Joan Simpson]

I baked a one layer chocolate cake with chocolate icing and I dusted the inside of pan with cocoa and no white flour spots.

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