BakerAunt
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I saw two snow peas on one of the plants tonight. It also looks like there might be a green bean or two. The tomato plant I bought at the farmers' market has grown and is flowering. The two that were stunted by the grow light--or did not get what they needed from the grow light--are now growing, but they are small. The honey-nut squash plants may be about to bloom.
We cut into the loaf of sweet potato bread that I baked yesterday. It is excellent, with a slight density, and a reminder of the sweet potato texture. I will bake Ken Haedrich's recipe again, with my changes, whenever I have leftover sweet potato to use.
Thanks for the information, Mike. It makes sense that the breed of cow and food would make a difference in calcium content.
I get discouraged trying to keep up with nutritional information, and as we have noted in other threads, it is not an exact science, or maybe there have not been enough well-grounded research. I am bemused by the articles on nutrition that suggest certain foods but do not take into consideration that some of those foods are seasonal, and that where and how they are grown may make a difference.
I live in something of a produce desert, except when the farmers market finally gets going.
Joan, your apple turnovers sound delicious. I also like your statement of a food item in the fridge that is not getting eaten that you did not want to waste. In my case, there was a small amount of cubed sweet potatoes in the refrigerator, left over from two dinners last week. I do not like food going to waste, especially more expensive organic sweet potatoes.
I did some searching for recipes that use mashed sweet potatoes and settled on the Spiced Sweet Potato and Chocolate Chip Bread from Ken Haedrich's The Harvest Baker (p.55). I halved the recipe, since I had about 3/4 cup of mashed sweet potatoes and baked it in a 3x7 pan, coated with The Grease in my countertop convection oven for about 50 minutes. I reduced the salt by half and added 2 Tbs. Bob's Red Mill milk powder. I omitted the chocolate chips but included the pecans. I slightly reduced the granulated sugar from 1/2 to 1/3 cup. The pan was perhaps slightly small, as the sides rose above the pan, but the loaf still baked nicely. When I bake the recipe again, I might look to see if I have a slightly larger pan.
I will add a note to this post once we slice and taste the bread.
While we are discussing nutrition, I will add an observation about milk. I was accustomed to 8 oz. of milk containing 300 mg calcium, even if it were low-fat or non-fat. For the last few years, the 1% milk I buy here in north central Indiana has only 250 mg. I had wondered if that were because it was being calculated differently. However, when we were in Colorado Springs for a wedding, the 1% milk i bought had 350 mg per cup.
There is a brand that has higher fortification--and is more expensive--but I would have to buy a bottle of nonfat and a bottle of 2% and mix them, as they do not carry 1%.
Interesting. I ran it as "Irish Oatmeal Bread," and the recipe came up, along with my comments on it, and some of yours from the past. Maybe the search tool does not work well with your phone? (Something else for Mike to explore--sigh.)
I always thought that the taste of the BRM oats was better than that of other oats, which is why I have been using them these past years. I only bought one box of the Aldi's oats, so I will be going back to BRM, even though the price has jumped significantly. I will need to see if Walmart has bags by the case.
I wonder what other nutrients might be missing. At one time, BRM listed everything, but now they only list what government has mandated, which is what most other brands do.
For barley flour, I bought from "Food to Love," and that company does give a complete nutritional profile.
Here is a link to the original recipe here at Nebraska Kitchen:
I baked it, then wrote in a reply what I did. I do not know if that helps, CWCdesign.
If you use the search tool here, you can also find your comments from when you baked it in the past. (That weekly baking thread comes in handy!)
For Tuesday dinner, I made my hamburger stroganoff, which we eat over brown rice. We were supposed to have a side salad, but time got away from the salad maker, so we had microwaved frozen vegetables instead.
Tuesday is still cool enough for some baking. I experimented with adapting a recipe, "Bob's Delicious Chocolate Chip Muesli Cookies" (from Bob's Red Mill), by using oil rather than butter. I replaced the stick of butter with 1/4 cup canola oil and adding buttermilk to bring it to 1/3 cup. I slightly reduced the brown sugar to 2/3 cup, cut the salt in half, and used white whole wheat flour. I used a scant 1/3 cup of chocolate chips (45 g). I used a #30 cookie scoop and got 13 cookies. I baked at 350F rather than 375F because I thought oil-based would bake better at the lower temperature. and baked for 14 minutes, turning halfway. The cookies spread in the oven, some connecting with others, but I was able to separate them while hot on the pan. The taste is excellent. Next time, I might increase the muesli to 1 ½ cup to get less spread. These cookies would also be good without the chocolate chips, which I reduced from 1 cup. I rarely use them in cookies anymore, but I wanted to give my husband a special treat.
On Tuesday, I also baked my Rye-Barley Crispbread topped with pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, and sesame seeds. This crispbread is my favorite savory snack.
On Monday, I baked Maple Granola, using the King Arthur recipe with my personal variations.
I also baked my Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers from dough I made up last week.
Thanks for sharing your method, Len
For Monday's dinner, I made black-eyed peas with farro. I always cook the black-eyed peas and the farro separately. Then, in a larger pot, I saute chopped celery and yellow bell pepper in olive oil. I add chopped ham to the black-eyed peas, along with dehydrated onion and 1/2 tsp. thyme. I bought salad turnips at the farmers market this past weekend, and the tops were good, so I washed and cut up the turnip greens, then stirred them with the vegetables. I add the black-eyed peas to the pot with the sauted vegetables before stirring in the farro and 2 tsp. cider vinegar to balance the greens. We have enough left over for at least one more meal.
Aaron--I bought my "bun pans" from King Arthur a long time ago when they were a new offering there. The older one was before USA was making them; the other is a darker, non-stick version. One actually has "sample" written on the back! I bought them for buns, but as we like smaller buns, and I have gotten better at shaping them, I have not been using them for that purpose. These are also great for sweet rolls, and I have made an apple sweet roll recipe from King Arthur in them. (If I figure out how to transform the saturated fat in the recipe, I will bake those again, when apple season rolls around.)
We had a high of 79 today, so it was a good day for baking here.
A friend gifted me a subscription to Cook's Country. When I saw the recipe for Asparagus, Leek, and Goat Cheese Quiche in the April/May 2022 issue, I was excited for asparagus season. I was able to buy asparagus at the farmers' market a week ago, and on Sunday, I finally had time to make it.
I made some changes. I used my oil-buttermilk crust. I substituted two diced shallots for the leek, as I do not have access to leeks. I used avocado oil rather than butter to sauté the shallots and asparagus, and I added the minced garlic to that mixture at the very end. (For some reason, the original recipe has the minced garlic being added in the egg-milk mixture, which seems wrong to me.) I omitted the teaspoon of lemon zest, as I did not want to open a lemon. I cut the salt by a third and used a bit less pepper, as mine is freshly ground. I replaced the 3/4 cup heavy cream with an equal amount of 2% evaporated milk. For the pie plate, I chose one of my 9-inch Emile Henry ceramic pie plates. As always, I baked the "pie" on the round, with hole in the center, pie sheet that was here when we bought the house. The quiche was done in 40 minutes. My changes drastically reduced the saturated fat. It is cooling now, but I will add a note to this post after I have some for dinner tonight.
Added Note: The quiche is excellent. I will be typing up this recipe with my changes.
I also baked two loaves of my Whole Wheat Grape Nuts Bread, and I managed to time it so that there was only a five-minute gap between when the quiche came out and the loaves went in. Originally, I had planned to bake a different bread with a recipe that makes three loaves, but I realized that I did not have enough buttermilk to do so. My husband is happy to have his favorite bread.
