What Did You Bake the Week of December 11, 2016?

[BakerAunt]

It has been a hectic week, and I have not had time to do the Christmas baking that is for me so much a part of the season. Between the business of the end of a semester, and packing to move some of our furniture to Indiana, most of my baking has been necessity. On Sunday, I baked my variation on Ruth Wakefield's Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars (recipe in The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion). I've been working on a healthier version--substituting in 3/4 cup of whole wheat pastry flour and adding 2 Tbs. special dried milk and 2 Tbs. flax meal. Instead of nuts, I put in 1/4 cup pecan meal. I reduced the brown sugar this time by 1/4 cup, as I've always found them too sweet. Instead of chocolate chips, I used red and green Christmas M&Ms, and I also put Christmas colored sprinkles on top. I also baked Semolina Rolls (KAF recipe from the back of a bag of semolina flour) to go with our pot roast. I substituted in a cup of buttermilk (did not use buttermilk powder), used the 1/3 cups of additional water, and used almost the full one cup of regular flour. On Friday, I baked two loaves of Grape Nuts Bread. On Saturday, I baked an eggnog Bundt cake for our family Christmas celebration that evening.

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[Italiancook]

I decided I didn't want to do Christmas baking this year. Yet, I wanted to give gifts. So I used Trisha Yearwood's (Food Network) "Slow Cooker Chocolate Candy." They are yummy and simple to make. I strongly suggest that if you want to try this recipe you watch the video and read 4 or 5 pages of the reviews. Some reviewers had problems with burnt ingredients. For my slow cooker, melting the chocolates worked fine with 2-1/2 hours on Warm and 30 minutes on Low. But as the reviews indicate, slow cookers are different in temperature. The recipe says it makes 30-40. I ended up with 50.

[Joan Simpson]

I've always wanted to do the crock pot candy so maybe I will,if so I'll let you know how it turns out Italiancook.I baked for my sister and niece this week made them Coconut pies and Lemon Chess pies.For us I made a Cherry Pie which is almost gone,gotta get back in the kitchen.

[Italiancook]

Joan, I'm going to throw out this information in case it helps you plan the logistics of your candy-making. If you find it useless, just ignore it. And, thanks for letting me know if you make this. I found it easier than baking cookies, but the crock pot temperature was an issue for several of the reviewers of the recipe.

I have a small kitchen and only 2 standard muffin pans. I made 50 of the candies with a little maneuvering. I placed the hot candy in the papers of one pan and set it aside. I did the other pan. Then, I carefully moved the papers from the first muffin pan to a half-sheet tray. I set aside the second pan and placed the hot candy in the first, then alternated between the pans and the half-sheet tray. I might add that I kept the crock pot on warm until it was empty. I didn't want the candy to set up in the cooker.

I made the mistake of buying pricey Christmas cupcake liners for this project. I thought the candies would be given away in the papers. But the oils from the candy leech through the paper ruining how they look. After the candy was set, I peeled off the papers and put the unwrapped candy in gift-giving containers and bags.

[Mike Nolan]

I haven't looked at the crock pot chocolate recipe, but based on what I learned at Chocolate Boot Camp I'd be very wary of the temperatures, monitoring them closely, infrared thermometers work well for this

Chocolate will scorch if it gets much over 50 degrees (C), lower for milk and white chocolate The temperatures to create and maintain well-tempered chocolate are rather precise (between 28 and 34 degrees C for dark chocolate, a little lower for milk chocolate and even lower for white chocolate), and most crock pots don't have heat controls that are that accurate.

A few days after I got home from Chocolate Boot Camp I ordered a Martellato Mini Meltinchoc pot for my chocolate work. This was about the lowest priced tool I could find that I felt was sufficiently accurate for chocolate work.

[cwcdesign]

No baking for me last week

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