[BakerAunt]

I roasted a large chicken, about 6 ½ lbs. for New Year's Day dinner. I also made Pepperidge Farm dressing to go with it. (I bought two extra bags at Thanksgiving, so we are set.) To make the broth for the dressing, I pulled out some bones from chicken breasts that were in the freezer. Annie was beside herself, as she had been smelling chicken all day, but her reward awaited her. We also had microwaved fresh broccoli. Dessert was pumpkin pie.

[BakerAunt]

Happy New Year Everyone!

We began ours with Cornmeal-Pumpernickel Waffles.

[BakerAunt]

I baked three loaves of Whole Wheat Oat Bran Bread, using my new Ankarsrum mixer. Although Pleasant Hill Grain sent me a quick start guide with a bread recipe, it called for freshly ground whole wheat flour, gluten, and bread enhancer, none of which are found in my kitchen. However, the recipe was helpful in that I looked at the amounts of flour and liquid. I decided that the four-loaf recipe was close to my recipe which makes three loaves. (I think their loaves are smaller.) I added another 2 oz. of water to the 6 oz. in my recipe, and I ended up using about 40 g less of the bread flour. I also included a rest after adding the whole grain ingredients and half the bread flour. I'm still learning about how long to knead it. Speed 2 seems to be the correct one for bread, although I mixed at Speed 1. It required about 9 minutes. The loaves baked up beautifully, and my husband was impressed. The mixer requires less hands-on time than my Cuisinart did, and it is much easier to clean.

To go with soup for dinner, I baked a half recipe of Rory's Irish Scones, a recipe from the newer Baking Sheet series that I first baked this summer. I managed a much lighter texture this time.

After dinner, I baked a pumpkin pie. We had too many other goodies around for me to bake it for Christmas, but New Year's Day works!

[BakerAunt]

For New Year's Eve dinner, I made pea soup, using a hambone from the freezer. We had it with some scones I baked. We had snow on Sunday to Monday, then a break before more snow Tuesday night and today. It may not have been a snowy white Christmas, but it will be a snowy New Year's Day. Earlier, for lunch, I made curried butternut squash soup from the rest of the puree I made last week.

[BakerAunt]

My baking plans for Tuesday afternoon were derailed by a pantry shelf collapsing, which collapsed the shelf below it. Fortunately, I was right there, so only one item fell out before I held the doors. I passed items to Scott. We were fortunate nothing broke. I have had it with these cabinets and their plastic holders for shelves. Scott is researching metal holders to replace the plastic ones.

[BakerAunt]

Dinner on Tuesday was pecan coated roasted salmon, leftover mashed potatoes, and microwaved fresh broccoli. It was an easy meal after our big shopping trip to the larger town about thirty minutes away, where we dropped off the recyclables, shopped Aldi's, Walmart, and Kroger, and did a run by Ross and Marshall's. After lunch we shopped our local grocery store. We had hoped to find a turkey, but not a single store had one, so we have settled on a chicken to roast for New Year's Day.

[BakerAunt]

We repeated last night's dinner of salad and pork tenderloin on buns.

[BakerAunt]

On Monday, I made dough for Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers using my new mixer. With my husband's blessing, I bought an Ankarsrum to replace the Cuisinart mixer which died in November. It arrived on Christmas Eve, but I only opened the box today, when I had time to devote my full attention to it. I watched some of the videos on YouTube, before making the cracker dough. I am pleased with how the mixer handled the dough. I wanted to start with an easy recipe before moving on to bread.

[BakerAunt]

It's challenging, Mike, to bake in someone else's kitchen with their tools.

I baked my adaptation of the recipe for Ellen's buns, but I made them as 12 rolls, which I baked in a 10 x 10-inch pan. We used some of the rolls for pork tenderloin sandwiches this evening, and we will have them again tomorrow.

[BakerAunt]

I made yogurt on Sunday. I really missed my homemade yogurt when we were in Florida.

For dinner, we had pork tenderloin sandwiches on the rolls I baked today, along with a salad. I let Scott finish the applesauce.

[BakerAunt]

On Saturday, I roasted two butternut squash, scooped out the squash and pureed it. I froze a cup to use for muffins in the future, set aside a half cup to use in a recipe that I want to try, and then used a cup to bake Butternut Squash Crumb Muffins, a recipe from Ken Haedrich's The Harvest Baker (34-35). I make some changes by using white whole wheat flour, reducing the brown sugar in the muffins from ¾ to ½ cup, replacing the milk with buttermilk and adjusting the baking powder and adding baking soda. I add 2 Tbs. milk powder and 2 Tbs. flax meal. I delete a teaspoon of vanilla. I do a streusel with 3 Tbs. brown sugar, 5 Tbs. King Arthur AP, ½ Tbs. melted butter, and 1/2 Tbs. avocado oil, to which I added a bit of pecan meal. The recipe made 13 muffins, so I put a muffin paper in small ceramic dish for the extra one. It took about 5 minutes longer to bake than the ones in the muffin pan. I am looking forward to having these for breakfast over the next few days. Scott will likely have one with his afternoon tea.

[BakerAunt]

We had leftover pork tenderloin and muddled mashed potatoes with microwaved frozen mixed vegetables, as well as more of the applesauce.

[BakerAunt]

Bagels are on my baking list for 2026, Mike.

I was pleased with how my Pfeffernusse turned out this year. I was able to order the candied citron from Sal and Frank back in November. Thanks to Italian Cook for recommending the company to me. This is the second time I've ordered from them.

This year, I did not use the Boynton Anise extract that I used last year. It was just not the right flavor. I had an older small bottle of it as well, and it did not have any Anise smell to it. I dumped both of them. However, I had some Loran Anise oil that smelled fine. I googled and found that I should use a quarter of the measurement for anise extract, so I used 1/8 tsp., and that was just right. Scott says he does not care for anise, but I note that he eats the Pfeffernusse, maybe because of the powdered sugar.

[BakerAunt]

We had leftover noodles with turkey and vegetables from a few nights ago for dinner on Friday.

[BakerAunt]

The trifle is beautiful, Mike.

Merry Christmas to all my baking friends at Nebraska Kitchen.

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