BakerAunt
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I baked a pear crisp on Friday using some pears from the farmers market. I have bought pears from two different vendors, and in both cases, the pears just do not soften even though they are sitting out. They did get more yellow in color, and a couple were getting bad spots, so I used eight of them in the crisp. They just do not have the flavor that a nicely ripened pear has. I wonder if they were picked a little too early, even though I know that pears need to ripen off the tree. I do not know what kind of pears they are. People here seem to move into places that have pear trees that someone planted in the past. The crisp was just ok due to the pears not being juicy enough, and probably not being ripe enough.
First, a note on the bread I baked. It is soft but firm, so I may not need to change much, but I still might add a little more water to the dough.
On Thursday, I made dough for Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers, which I will bake next week.
I also baked a half batch of Rory's Irish Scones, which is a quick recipe, so that we could have them warm with the beef stew.
I made beef stew on Thursday, so we are now in autumn mode, although for the most part the weather is warmer than expected, with daily highs in the lower 70s. The stew used meat from the farmers market, red bell pepper and garlic from the market, and a "hill" of our potatoes from the ones Scott planted last spring. The carrots, mushrooms, and frozen peas were from the grocery store. I use Penzey's beef base, as well as the smokey paprika and Tsardust Memories blend for seasoning, but I also used some of my rosemary. Dried onion, a bit of sugar, Worcestershire sauce, 1 ¼ cups of Merlot, and tomato paste, along with freshly ground pepper were the other seasonings. I always thicken it with a slurry made of ground oats. The flavor was perfect this time.
While the stew was simmering, after I had added the bell pepper, carrots, and potatoes, and knew that I had an hour, Scott and I took our last boat ride of the season. Tomorrow, the guy, who helps Scott with the boat, will come to take it out and prepare it for storage in our shed for the winter.
I made yogurt on Wednesday. I got a late start, so it was not done until 10:20 that evening. For dinner, I roasted a honey nut squash, which we had with the rest of the pork and the rest of the green bean salad and applesauce.
We needed more bread for tomorrow, so I decided on Tuesday that I would try the recipe on the King Arthur Rolled Six Grain mix bag. However, it was for a single loaf, and I like to save time, and electricity, by baking at least two loaves, so I worked out a doubled recipe. I also used bread flour rather than AP and made the white whole wheat and the bread flour a 1:1 ratio rather than 2:1. I replaced the sugar with honey, replaced some of the water with buttermilk, reduced the milk powder, and salt. I was not sure how much yeast to use and settled on 3 ¼ tsp. (single loaf used 2 tsp.). I also baked them in 8 x 4 rather than 9 x 5 pans. The house is cooler than it has been, with drier weather, so that may have given them less rise than I expected, and I did increase the wholegrains. I think that the dough could have used another ounce of water. I ended up with two respectable small loaves. They may be denser than I would like, but I will not know until I slice one tomorrow.
Kimbob--I've done that with potatoes from the store, but I never thougt to do it with green onions. I'm making a note for next year.
Your dinner looks delicious, Len, and yes, easy clean-up makes it the sweeter.
I was able to get a pound of beans and more cherry tomatoes at last Saturday's farmers market, so I made the Green Bean, Cherry Tomato, and Feta salad again for Tuesday's dinner. We had it with leftover pecan pork from last night and applesauce, with zucchini bread from the freezer for dessert.
I made pecan coated boneless pork chops for dinner on Monday. We had it with a large salad, topped with the rest of the bean salad. We also had applesauce from the freezer.
Sending best wishes to Shorty for an easy recovery.
The Vegalene has worked well with all my other recipes. I think that it might have to do with using too high of a temperature in the Bundt muffin pan.
I also have a few green tomatoes that are stubbornly refusing to turn red, so I might also be in need of a recipe for green tomatoes if do not decide to try to ripen them off the plant inside.
Dinner on Sunday was pea soup and the rest of the cornbread muffins. There is enough soup left for me to eat it for lunch tomorrow.
I made Pumpkin Oat Wholegrain Waffles for Sunday morning's breakfast, a fitting start to a day when there was a light frost on the neighbor's roof but not enough to kill any of the remaining plants in the garden. Somehow, Annie always knows that I am making waffles, even before I get out the waffle iron. She is an amazing dog, and she loves her waffles.
For dinner on Saturday night, I made Crispy Oven Fish and Chips again, which we had with the rest of the dill tartar sauce and leftover Green Bean, Cherry Tomato, and Feta salad.
We had pea soup and cornbread again.
My lime tree had a rough start toward producing fruit this year. It bloomed during the two weeks when we were away for my bonus daughter's wedding, so it did not get pollinated, as it was inside because we could not be sure there would not be a freeze while we were gone. However, Scott put the tree out (it overwinters in the Annex) after we got back, and it bloomed again and formed fruit. I have a harvest of six limes. I used two of them on Thursday to bake Lime Pecan Biscotti, which is a nice addition to teatime.
In the evening, I baked cornbread to go with pea soup for dinner. I wanted to use my Nordic Ware 12-well pumpkin pan. A regular muffin recipe does not fill it, so I made 1 ½ a recipe of my cornbread, which worked well. I used the Vegalene spray, which has been great for other recipes, but to my surprise, the muffins initially stuck and had to be gently loosened, with one having a chunk break out. (I gave it to Annie.) I had lowered the cornbread temperature from 400 to 385 F and baked it for 22 minutes, at which time they tested as done. They were good, but the pan cleaning was not the usual easy one I expect when using this spray. One possibility is that I should lower the temperature to 375 F. It might also be that there was residue on the pan from previous bakes when I used "the grease." Another possibility is that Vegalene does not work well with cornbread.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this? I have a hazy memory that the Grease did not work well with cornbread.
Skeptic--I have a pork loin roast recipe that I got from America Test Kitchen that simulates using the oven as a "slow cooker." One thing that helps is to put a piece of foil, shiny side facing down on top of a Dutch oven, then put the lid on it. That reflects the heat back into the pan. I recall that I increased the oven temperature from the recipe, as it did not cook enough at the very low temperature. If you want me to look up that temperature I will.
I made split pea soup on Thursday, using a ham bone that I had in the freezer. Our weather is cooling, but we are having more rain. This summer was the fifth wettest on record for Indiana, going back to 1885, according to the Indiana climate report that my husband received today. It certainly played havoc with our tomatoes and green beans.
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