[BakerAunt]

In my quest for more cookie variety that fits a low-saturated fat way of eating, on Thursday I baked Biscotti al Cioccolato, a recipe from a small cookbook, Biscotti, by Lou Seibert Pappas (pp 26-27). I probably picked up this book from the marked down rack at Barnes & Noble some years ago. These chocolate-hazelnut biscotti do not require added fat, just three eggs, and the recipe uses natural cocoa, which I have but do not use enough. I made two slight changes. I replaced ¾ unbleached AP flour with that much white whole wheat and used the King Arthur AP for the rest. Instead of 1 Tbs. powdered coffee, I used 1 tsp. of the King Arthur espresso powder, which I think is stronger than instant coffee. With slightly damp hands, the dough was easy to form into logs. I have tasted some of the crumbs and think these will go well with either milk or coffee. My husband is not overly fond of them; he does not appear to be a hazelnut fan, but I doubt that will stop him from eating them.

I also made dough for my Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers on Thursday. I will bake them sometime next week.

[BakerAunt]

Specialty ingredients always disappear when you need them, Aaron! I look forward to pictures of the gingerbread house.

I baked an apple pie on Wednesday with a crumb topping.

I also baked a new recipe, "Seeded Squash Breadsticks," from The Healthy Baker, an ad-free magazine I picked up in CVS last week. It seems to be assembled by Food to Love, a company that carries some specialty and organic grains and flours. What caught my eye is that the recipes do seem to be healthy and not fads.

This recipe was almost half whole wheat and used butternut squash puree. I cut the salt from a tablespoon of sea salt flakes (I assume they meant kosher salt) to 1 tsp. regular sea salt. I used the bread machine to mix the dough. After I shaped the dough, I put on the egg wash before the rise and pressed on some pumpkin seeds, although the instructions were to let them rise, brush with egg wash, then sprinkle with pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, and poppy seeds. However, since there were sunflower seeds in the dough, and poppy seed does not go well with my husband, I left out the last two. Rather than breadsticks, these are more like six small, narrow loaves of bread. The dough did shrink back from the 12-inch ropes to about 10 ½ inches. Possibly, a rest period before shaping would help since bread flour is used. We split a warm one with our stew. They were good, so I expect they will be even better when properly cooled.

[BakerAunt]

We have had a rainy, windy Wednesday, which I mostly spent in the kitchen. I roasted a butternut squash for puree for a baking recipe. For dinner, I made beef stew with carrots, potatoes, mushrooms, red bell pepper, dehydrated onion, garlic, and peas, as well as other seasonings. I used ground oats as the thickener. It was perfect for today, and there are leftovers for at least two more meals.

[BakerAunt]

Egg prices here were in the $2.50 range for the longest time. As more places in Indiana are hit with bird flu cases, the prices have increased.

[BakerAunt]

I also noted higher egg prices at Aldi's today. I think that I paid $3.34 per dozen. Chicken prices are higher as well.

I did not notice a shortage of products at Aldi's, Walmart, or Kroger today, except that Kroger had an excellent price on King Arthur AP flour, which is probably why there was none left on the shelf. That has happened before, so I think it is a stocking issue.

I was hoping to order some almond paste from King Arthur, but they do not carry it anymore.

[BakerAunt]

I looked at the recipe, and it mentions allrecipes.com
I will look to see if I can locate it there.
I printed it on 10/29/2011. Sometimes, it takes a while to get around to trying a recipe. 🙂

I checked. It is not at allrecipes.com

I'm planning on writing it up with my changes, and I will post it here when I do.

[BakerAunt]

I made broth on Tuesday from the chicken bones. For dinner, I roasted one of the aberrant squashes that came from one of the seeds in the honey nut squash package. It was like a butternut squash except that it had a very long neck. It is not as sweet as the honey nut. I think that I need to roast it longer or at a higher temperature. We had it with leftover chicken and microwaved frozen peas.

[BakerAunt]

For dinner on Monday, I roasted a small (3.17 lb.) chicken. I also roasted a honey nut squash from the farmers' market (we ate all of the ones from our garden). We had microwaved fresh broccoli, some of the last from the farmers' market. That broccoli was so good that it will be hard to go back to the store broccoli, which is shipped from California, no matter what time of the year.

[BakerAunt]

Update: Martha Rose Shulman's Mixed Grains Bread is wonderful. It has a dense, yet soft texture and a delicious flavor. It will become one of my regular breads.

[BakerAunt]

Congratulations on your baking success--and growing baking reputation--CWCdesign! I had a similar experience at Christmas bakes sales at a church I attended in California years ago. My Limpa bread sold just as I took it out of the bag. (It helps to have people of Swedish heritage.)

I'm glad that your cake came out well on the repeat.

[BakerAunt]

I made my adaptation of Cornmeal Pumpernickel Waffles for breakfast on Monday. I had previously halved the salt, cutting it from 2 tsp. to 1 tsp. Today, I further cut it to ¾ tsp., given that the recipe (from King Arthur's Whole Grains baking book) also has 2 tsp. baking powder and 1 tsp. baking soda. We did not miss the extra salt. I usually make waffles on Sunday, but yesterday was the last day, for two weeks of duck hunting season, and hunters set up off of our lakeshore, so I needed to take the dog over to our Annex, as she is terrified of the gun noise. As it turns out, no ducks showed up, and the hunters packed away their decoys and left around noon. There will be two more weeks of duck season starting December 26, provided the lake has not frozen. However, there have not been that many ducks for several years.

[BakerAunt]

I remembered that I have some millet flour in my freezer. I bought it for a King Arthur recipe for scones, which I made and found underwhelming, and so it sat in the freezer until today, when I decided to try a new bread recipe that called for about 2/3 cup. If we like the recipe, then I will be able to "use it up!"

[BakerAunt]

Very impressive, Mike!

My husband is growing lettuce in a long planter on the porch. This time he is using soil from the store rather than the sandy soil from one of the woodland properties, and that seems to make a difference. The grow lights seem to be working well for the lettuce.

[BakerAunt]

I plan more cookie baking this week, but today was about bread.

I was looking through my pile of untried recipes and came across "Mixed Grains Bread," which Martha Rose Shulman contributed to Zester, a newsletter and recipe site that went out of existence some years ago. In the headnote, she said that it was her signature bread when she began cooking in the '70s and was still a family favorite.

We were out of bread, except for a loaf of Challah in the freezer, so on Sunday, I decided to try baking this bread. As an added advantage, it called for quinoa flour or millet flour, and I have some millet flour taking up freezer space. I made a few changes. I used just 200g of water and replaced the other 475 g with buttermilk. I used bread flour rather than unbleached white flour, since the bread is mostly wholegrain. I reduced the salt from 20g to 15g. Her instructions were for kneading by hand, but I used my stand mixer. It is a heavy dough, but my Cuisinart 7-qt. mixer has the power to handle it. I added the salt with the final flour addition. The bread had a biga stage, and it also had two risings before it is panned for the final rise. I left off the light sesame seed topping in deference to my husband, but I had some egg wash left from two projects late last week, so I did the two egg washes. It baked in 50 minutes. The 9x5 loaves had good oven spring and have a rustic look. I look forward to slicing one tomorrow, at which time I will report on taste and texture.

Note: I tried to find a link to the recipe, but since I printed it eleven years ago, and Zester is no longer a site, I could not find it online anywhere. (This might be a job for the Way Back Machine.) If anyone is interested, I can post the recipe here, with my re-worked instructions to use a stand mixer.

[BakerAunt]

I made my regular batch of yogurt on Sunday.

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