BakerAunt
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Skeptic--I'm always bemused by the run on certain products before a storm, as these are usually products that I keep well stocked.
Monday night's dinner was Oven Crispy Fish and Chips with Dill Tartar Sauce and microwaved frozen vegetables. I had intended to make coleslaw in the afternoon, but I have been having an issue with my foot, and my doctor had an open appointment. Scott drove me over in the early afternoon. I am glad we have four-wheel drive. The roads were mostly ok, but we still slid a bit a couple of times. No other cars were around when we did.
For dinner on Tuesday, I made Pork Loin Roast with Butternut Squash, Barley, and Kale. It is a perfect recipe for winter, as the pork and barley cook in a braise, then while the roast rests, the squash, kale, bit of cider vinegar, and grated Parmesan are added. We have enough for several days. The roast and the two butternut squash I used came from the autumn farmers market.
We have had another five inches of snow as of late Sunday morning. That called for Pumpkin Oat Wholegrain Belgium Waffles for breakfast. Annie approved. Scott says the waffles have powered his snow shoveling. Overnight snow means shoveling more of it at once. When it snows during the day, he can clear it periodically.
I baked Rustic Sourdough Wholegrain Bread in a Cloche in the afternoon. I have posted the recipe as I have made it in the past with the other mixer. (Yes, I know that I have liquids in oz. and dry ingredients in grams.) Tonight, or tomorrow, I will write about my experience making the dough in the Ankarsrum in the thread about the mixer that I will start in Discussions. It is a lovely loaf of bread, so I will try to add a picture tomorrow as well.
From last night into this morning, we had another 5 1/2 inches of snow. We finished up the beef stew for dinner, with more cornbread.
I also made yogurt today.
Ok, I will start such a thread, under Discussions, probably tomorrow. I will also post my Whole Wheat Oat Bran Bread recipe, as that will allow people to compare the amount of flour in my three loaves. My thought is that the Ankarsrum should handle a double recipe of Paddy's bread with ease.
I baked Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers on Saturday. I also baked cornbread to go with leftover stew for dinner
I mixed the levain for my Wholegrain Sourdough bread this evening in preparation for bread baking tomorrow. We have had a high of 6 F today, and the ice fishermen were out in their tents. The birds were appreciative of the seed we put out for them.
Aaron--I am still learning to use the Ankursrum, which I have had for less than a month. So far, I really like it for my three-loaves batches of bread. I use the dough knife and dough rollers. A dough hook is included, but it is suggested only for heavy bread or making mincemeat. I find that I use less flour in recipes with this mixer than with my Cuisinart stand mixer--and with it, I used less flour than when I kneaded by hand. I also give it high marks for making Sourdough Cracker dough.
I have not yet tried mixing cookie dough. Their recipes call for using the second plastic bowl that comes with it and is affixed over a central post. There is a "cookie whisk" attachment that comes with the mixer to use. Butter must be very soft. There is also a balloon whisk attachment that came with it.
I'm not so sure this mixer would work well for making frosting. That would be a reason to keep a small Kitchen Aid around.
I'm hoping to try cookies and a cake in the next week. Maybe I should start an "Adventures with the Ankarsrum thread?
With cabinets, be sure to know what you are getting and to measure. My Franciscan ware Desert Rose plates are too wide for the shelves in our cabinets. As I had never had that issue any where I lived before, it never occurred to me to go in with tape measure and measurements of my dishes. I did not go for pull out drawers in the lower cabinets only because I was expecting FULL shelves, but modern cabinets only have half second shelves. We put in two large utility cabinets to use for the pantry, but I did not realize how deep they are or that they only allowed for three shelves on the bottom and one on the top. They are too deep, and the shelves too far apart to be as useful as they need to be. And of course, I have had the problem of shelves in the utility cabinets collapsing because it did not occur to the designers that I would be putting a lot of stuff on them. Scott and I are currently trying to work out how to modify them. If I had had my druthers, and the space, I would have preferred open shelving in that back area, or better yet, I would have loved a walk-in pantry, because where we live, the big grocery runs happen only every three or four weeks.
With whole wheat, I think that bitterness is in the taste buds of the person eating it. I recall a guy on the Baking Circle who was particularly sensitive to tasting bitterness in whole wheat. As for me, I never found it bitter. Perhaps, it is genetic.
I baked five small loaves of Wholegrain Pumpkin Bread on Friday, using more of the puree from the "basketball" pumpkin. The puree is thick and does not have water separation after resting in a bowl. I used half whole wheat flour this time, and I think that is what I will use from now on rather than white whole wheat flour or whole wheat pastry flour. The pumpkin and spices are strong enough that the whole wheat does not overwhelm them. I will freeze three loaves. I always think of S. Wirth when I bake this recipe, as she pointed it out to me in the recipes at Nebraska Kitchen that were saved from the Baking Circle. It has become my go-to pumpkin bread recipe.
On Friday, it was 0 F when I awoke, and it never got above 2 or 3 F. I made and canned six more pints and one 4 oz. jar of apple butter, with some left for us to have on bread and rolls. I do the canning in the Annex apartment's kitchen, so I bundled up when I went out. It was tolerable as it is a short distance, and Scott did a great job getting all the snow off the sidewalks, so they were dry when the deep cold set in. We are in for at least a week of deep cold. The lake has frozen. A couple of ice fishermen went out, but not for long.
For dinner, I made Beef stew, using stew meat from the farmers market that I bought a while back and incorporated some fresh rosemary from my rosemary plant.
That is a lovely pizza, Len. I'm particularly fond of thin crust pizzas.
We had the rest of the spaghetti squash lasagna for dinner on Thursday. That allowed me to spend the afternoon cutting up apples for the 6 1/2-quart and 3 1/2-quart crockpots. These are for apple butter, which I will finish making and canning tomorrow.
Our temperatures are also dropping, and we are in for a week of bitter cold.
Joan--I am also fond of avocado toast. I usually mash the avocado with Penzey's Salsa & Pico blend to give it a bit of a guacamole taste.
I do have plenty of the Bob's Red Mill milk powder, which I buy from Vitacost, so when I run out of the special dry milk, I will switch to it. I've mostly used the BRM for non-yeast recipes.
Aaron--Williams Sonoma sells a version of the crank popcorn popper that is induction compatible. I know because several years ago, I bought a Whirley Pop for my sister and nieces, then had to have them send it back for a Whirley Pop that is induction compatible. The advice I gave my bonus daughter and her fiancé on cookware is to buy cookware that will work on an induction stovetop, even if that is not what they have now because induction is likely the future.
We had more of the Spaghetti Squash Lasagna for dinner on Wednesday, along with some pumpkin whole wheat rolls that I baked.
Very helpful picture, Joan!
On Wednesday, I pulled out Stella Parks's recipe for "Yeasted Pumpkin Bread," which I first baked perhaps five years or so ago. We discussed the recipe at Nebraska Kitchen; it is one of her recipes that uses the food processor to mix the dough. I am not a fan of cleaning the food processor after mixing dough, so I instead mixed and kneaded the dough in the Ankarsrum. I am still working out how to knead a smaller amount of dough in it. The recipe has some challenges in that it was written for the food processor, and using fresh pumpkin puree means that the flour will vary. I also decided to use at least half whole wheat. I held back some of the bread flour, which is typical with this mixer. I baked it as twelve rolls in a 9 x 9 pan for 23 minutes. The rolls went very well with the spaghetti squash lasagna. The "basketball" pumpkin puree is more assertive than the usual pie pumpkin, but we did not mind it.
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