What are You Baking the Week of March 12, 2023?

[BakerAunt]

For breakfast on Sunday, I baked Butternut Squash Crumb Muffins, a recipe from Ken Haedrich's The Harvest Baker (34-35), using a cup of the butternut squash puree I made last week. I tweaked the recipe by replacing the AP flour with white whole wheat flour and adding 2 Tbs. milk powder and 2 Tbs. flaxmeal. I cut the salt by a third and reduced the brown sugar from ¾ to 1/3 cup. I replaced the milk with buttermilk, so I reduced the 1 Tbs. of baking powder to 2 tsp., and added ¼ tsp. baking soda. I made my own crumb topping, using 5 Tbs. flour and 3 Tbs. brown sugar, ½ tsp. cinnamon, and 2 Tbs. avocado oil. I baked these as 6 large muffins, so they needed 25 minutes.
It slowed breakfast by baking on the first morning of the return to that accursed Daylight Savings Time, with which we will be stuck for nearly eight months, as we woke up at our usual time, but it was already an hour later by DST. However, I had assembled the dry ingredients the previous evening, so the preparation went faster. I was happy to have a warm, mostly nutritious muffin on a cold, snowy and rainy, March morning. My husband happily had one with his afternoon tea. He commented that their odor seemed strange, but when he bit into it, the taste is wonderful.

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[Joan Simpson]

I baked the chewy peanut butter cookies.

[BakerAunt]

I baked Orange Pecan Biscotti on Monday, using the zest and some juice of two Cara Cara oranges. I discovered this variety last year. They are sweet and delicious, and I will never go back to regular naval oranges in my baking. I had baked this recipe last year, so I kept my tweaks and reduced the sugar a bit from 1 ½ cups to 1 1/3 cups.

I also baked a Crumb-Topped Apple Pie with most of my remaining Winesap apples that needed to be used. I wanted to have a pie for Pi Day tomorrow!

[Joan Simpson]

I baked buttermilk biscuits.

[Joan Simpson]

I made this icebox lemon pie but put meringue on top and it turned just like my mom use to make.I'm one happy lady.The only thing I forgot to bake my graham cracker crust for 10 min but my mom never baked her crust so I knew it'd be ok.I cut it just awhile ago and it's perfect..not running out in the plate.Happy here.

Lemon Icebox Pie

[aaronatthedoublef]

I took my pie dough out of the freezer too late! Plus I had work so no pie here.

But I had ciabatta dough I had to use to make room in the freezer so I made some buns from that. They were more successful than my last attempt!

[BakerAunt]

One of my best friends is in the area and will visit us tomorrow, stay overnight, then continue her trip. She cannot have dairy, so on Tuesday, I baked Honey Oatmeal Rolls, a recipe that I adapted from the King Arthur site. I used oat milk in place of the milk, and I substituted 3 Tbs. avocado oil for the butter (as I always do these days). I cut the salt to 1 tsp., the yeast down to 2 tsp., and replaced 2 cups of the AP flour with whole wheat and used bread flour for the rest. My husband and I will sample them with the stew tonight.

[Mike Nolan]

We both had two slices of the chicken pot pie for supper tonight, it was excellent. I need to make this more often!

[BakerAunt]

That chicken pot pie looked delicious, Mike.

[aaronatthedoublef]

It's a little off topic but does anyone have a method for neatly chopping chocolate?

I'd like to cut is in neat, small squares to put out for people to sample and see the difference between different chocolates so I don't want the rough chop I use for baking. I tried heating a chef's knife but the chocolate and that didn't work. Should I melt the chocolate and poor it into molds? Then I probably need to temper it which I've never done and is another, non-trivial process in itself.

Thanks

[BakerAunt]

I haven't any ideas on how to cut chocolate so that it does not break up, Aaron, so I'll wait and see what others say.

I baked the King Arthur Favorite Fudge Birthday Cake on Thursday for my husband's birthday on Friday. I used olive oil for 2/3 of the oil (other third was canola), and instead of King Arthur flour and cornstarch, I used Gold Medal AP flour for both. The result is a lovely, tender cake.

My husband and I discussed the glaze. While the KABC version is wonderful, it is also quite heavy on saturated fat, and there are only two of us to eat the cake. I gave him the option of a half-recipe (6-inch) cake or the glaze I used on the Valentine's cake. He chose the latter, so I increased it by a third, so that I would have enough for the center and top of the cake (no split layers). I also used buttermilk rather than regular milk. It went very well with this cake, so I will do it again. Indeed, I think that the original frosting to some extent overwhelms the cake, so that it does not get as much appreciation.

The ingredients were 2 cups of powdered sugar, which I then sifted into the bowl. 5 Tbs. + 1 tsp. double dark cocoa powder (also measured then sifted), 4 Tbs. buttermilk, and 2 tsp. of vanilla. I beat well with a hand mixer.

My only concern is that the new frosting tastes a bit strongly of the powdered sugar to me (my husband does not notice it), so I need to figure out how to neutralize that and get more of the chocolate flavor to the fore. Any ideas?

[Mike Nolan]

It's hard to break up chocolate that doesn't have score lines into neat pieces. A chocolate chopper might help, it looks sort of like an ice chopper. But I generally only use mine to chop chocolate up for faster melting.

I made the Paddy's Clonmel Kitchens Double Crusty bread today, using butter instead of oil, because I think it is more like Vienna bread that way.

[aaronatthedoublef]

My weekly challah bake. Only had enough for six loaves as I miscalculated my apple cider. 🙁

Braiding is better. I dropped off four at the temple.

Thanks Mike. I have a chocolate chopper but I've never been able to cut neat chunks.

I need something like a corona wire in a printer but those things are truly dangerous.

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[BakerAunt]

Lovely Challah, Aaron!

[Joan Simpson]

Nice looking bread Aaron!

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