What are you Baking the Week of September 27, 2020?

[Mike Nolan]

Summer is definitely over, the predicted high for the next week is 74 and the low is 33. Not sure what I'm baking yet, but something will be in the oven.

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[BakerAunt]

Our weather is also predicted to be colder this week. My husband expects that we will have the first fire of the season in the wood stove.

I realized last night that we would be out of bread after lunch today, so I baked my more whole wheat version of Buttermilk Grape Nuts Bread. I decided to try the technique of heating the oven 25F hotter, then turning it down once I put the loaves in. I had a good result with the Whole Wheat Sourdough Pan Bread I baked two weeks ago with that technique. The Grape Nuts Bread loaves had superior oven spring, so I will continue trying this technique on most of the other loaves that I bake.

[BakerAunt]

I wanted to use up some limes that were drying out, so I grated what zest I could, then squeezed them for 1 ½ Tbs. juice. My tree produced these limes last year. My husband had had them in the apt. refrigerator, so they were overlooked. I decided that I would see if I could adapt Nick Malgieri’s Macadamia Lime Cookies recipe from Cookies Unlimited (p. 188). It was a favorite of mine back when I could eat buttery rich treats without a second thought. I made up a half recipe, using white whole wheat flour and replacing what would be 6 Tbs. of butter with 3 Tbs. canola oil and 1 Tbs. buttermilk. I added 2 tsp. water as I was shy ½ Tbs. lime juice. I mixed by hand. The dough was crumbly, and I realized after trying to do them as drop cookies that it would not work. Clearly, they need the fat the butter provides to hold together. I pulled out a glass 6x10 inch baking dish, greased it, then pressed the mixture into it. I baked at 350F for 23 minutes (checked at 20 minutes) on the third shelf up in my oven (above halfway).

We won't be cutting the bars until tomorrow, so I'll report then how they taste.

[chocomouse]

BakerAunt, I just saw this on Deb's weekly email, and though immediately of you. No butter or oil! I've put it on my list to make next week.

apple sharlotka

[BakerAunt]

Thanks, Chocomouse! Apple season should be here. We are trying to figure out how to drive to the nearby orchard and stay safe on the trip. The vendor who came to the farmers' market occasionally has not sppeared this year.

[BakerAunt]

Autumn is here, so on Tuesday afternoon, I baked Skeptic’s Pumpkin Biscotti, using white whole wheat flour.

Dinner on Tuesday was sourdough pan pizza (half-sheet pan). I topped with my own sauce, Canadian bacon, 4 oz. low-fat mozzarella, mushrooms, red bell pepper from our garden, green onions, black olives on my half, and Parmesan cheese. Dinner was about an hour late because with the cooler weather, the sourdough crust needed longer first and second rises.

[chocomouse]

I baked peanut butter cookies with chocolate chips, an adaptation of a KAF recipe. I haven't tasted them yet, but I'm looking for a chewy, not a crisp or crumbly, peanut butter cookie.

[Joan Simpson]

I baked a lemon supreme pound cake today with confectioner sugar lemon glaze for a neighbors birthday.

[chocomouse]

I love lemon flavor and that sounds so good. I've been thinking it's time for another lemon coffeecake with lemon streusel topping. And probably shredded zucchini in it also --- to make it a healthy snack!!

[Joan Simpson]

I got out one of my pie crusts that was in the freezer and baked a coconut pie today.I'll have a piece tonight .

[BakerAunt]

We are out of crackers. Like Aaron, I have a problem with crackers disappearing fast. I made another batch of dough on Wednesday for the Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers. I will bake them next week.

I also baked cornbread to go with soup for dinner. I put the batter into a Nordic Ware Autumn Muffin pan (two leaves, two pumpkins, two acorns). It was slightly too much, but they still came out well. I reduced the temperature to 375F and baked on the third shelf up, which seems to work better with the Nordic Ware pans.

My last project was to make a levain for Honey-Spelt Sourdough Bread, which I plan to bake tomorrow.

[skeptic7]

Its definately pumpkin season here. I've bought a nice big Pink Banana which falls into that category of winter squash/odd shaped pumpkin. I'm going to wait a while before cooking it, I still have some containers of pumpkin puree in the freezer from last fall. I need to look through my pumpkin recipes again and see which ones are relatively healthy. There is probably pumpkin biscotti in my future, I don't think I made it last year.
I made apple pizza today with the last of the Gold Rush apples. These have been in my refrigerator since April and were getting wrinkled but were still sweet and firm. The flavor actually improves with time, they are more mellow than they used to be.

[BakerAunt]

My baking plans were disrupted on Thursday because the electricity was off from 9 a.m. until almost 4 p.m. The work was related to repairing the storm damage from a tree to the line to the large storage shed/workplace we have across the road, but they also needed to do some upgrading, so the electricity to the house was also shut off. I worried about the levain that I had started early yesterday evening, but it was cold enough in the house that it went slowly.

I was able to proceed with the bread in the late afternoon. The recipe is from KAF, Honey Spelt Sourdough Bread, and when it works it is excellent. I mostly follow the recipe, but I use ¼ cup of my sourdough starter, rather than the 1 Tbs. in the recipe, as I have a more liquid starter than KAF uses. I replace the 2 Tbs. butter with 2 Tbs. olive oil. I decided to use ½ cup BRM artisan bread flour and ½ cup KAF AP for the white flour. The spelt is a combination of BRM, and enough of a bag of Arrowhead Mills spelt to make the full four cups. I bought that bag at Kroger in May when flour was disappearing fast, but people were ignoring some of the specialty ones.

The bread has a first rise of an hour and a second rise of 90 minutes. I bake it in my Emile Henry long baker. It did have good oven spring, but I did not manage to do a good job at the slashing, so it is a bit rustic. I look forward to cutting into it tomorrow

[BakerAunt]

My bread is a delicious, chewy bread. I'll keep the changes I made to the recipe.

On Friday afternoon, I baked another batch of Maple Granola. My husband, who daily snacks on raisins, had eaten all the raisins in the house, so I used 2 cups of a bag of KAF’s Bakers Blend of dried fruit that I had on hand. I have made a note to hide a package of raisins after we go shopping again.

[Mike Nolan]

I'm making another batch of the semolina/austrian malt bread today. I used up the last of it for croutons.

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