[BakerAunt]

I had no idea and picked the one I thought most likely, and I was correct. I also learned something. Double Win!

[BakerAunt]

On Saturday evening, I experimented with adapting the recipe that came with my lamb cake mold (bought from King Arthur, perhaps eighteen years ago) from butter to oil. I replaced 1/2 cup butter with 1/3 cup canola oil. I also substituted a scant quarter cup of half and half, combined with 1% milk for the 1/2 cup milk in the recipe, and I replaced 25% of the AP flour with barley flour. I used The Grease on the pan. I used a mixing method that I've developed for oil-based cakes and was very careful not to overmix once the wet and dry ingredients were combined. I filled the bottom half of the mold to barely from the top. I had about 3/4 cup batter left over, so I put it into a single 1 cup Bundt mold to bake alongside the cake (20 minutes). I always put the lamb cake mold on a baking sheet, and once it is in the oven, I put an iron pan on the top to hold the top down and encourage the batter to fill the mold. I've not used my Wolf oven for this mold, but I've noticed that Bundt cakes bake better slightly above center (three racks from the bottom), so that is what I did. I baked it for 50 minutes. There was the usual minimal amount of batter that dripped onto the baking sheet, which always happens with this mold.

The top of the mold lifted off cleanly, and I was pleased that the cake had indeed filled the pan. While I let the cake cool for 15 minutes in the bottom of the pan, I used a small knife to cut away any batter that may have stuck around the outside. However, I missed around one ear, so while the cake came cleanly out of the pan, one ear broke off. Sigh. I'll try to use glaze to attach it tomorrow.

I won't be frosting it with that lovely simple buttercream frosting tomorrow. I may try the simple glaze that I used on the Hot Cross buns, or else a reduced butter frosting.

I'm very pleased at how the cake came out, even with the damaged ear. I hope that the taste is good.

[BakerAunt]

Dinner on Saturday was Salmon and Couscous with Penzey’s Greek seasoning. We had microwaved frozen mixed vegetables with it. The frozen vegetables are from the Gordon Food Service 2.5 lb. package that appeared this week in our local grocery, as the manager finds sources who sold to restaurants. These are quite nice, as they have FIVE vegetables: carrots, corn, peas, green beans, and baby lima beans. There were still a bunch of bags when we went again later in the week, so we bought another at $3.99 per bag.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by BakerAunt.

[BakerAunt]

I made another batch of yogurt today. I used the last of my Stonyfield full-fat plain yogurt to do so. (It lasted remarkably well and gave me five batches.) The next batch of yogurt will have to be made with yogurt from this batch. That will work for a while, but eventually I will need a new carton of plain yogurt.

[BakerAunt]

So far, it has not been difficult to get milk where I live. I always buy it at the CVS, as it has a closed refrigerator. The local grocery has open shelves, and I've had their milk go bad faster. I used to buy buttermilk there, until they stopped selling 2-quart containers. When I'm desperate, I buy the overpriced 1-quart.

We so far have plenty of cheese, but the yogurt that's available is not what I prefer to use in making my own yogurt. I prefer yogurt that does not use starch to thicken it.

I also heard that some farmers are destroying eggs that were slated to produce future chickens because there would not be the market for them. In Florida, one grower dismissed the pickers for yellow squash because the company that usually takes the squash notified the grower that it had no place to sell them, and so could not pay the grower, who in turn, could not pay the pickers.

Our local school busses are also delivering USDA food to students, but that was food already in the pipeline.

I'm glad that Chocomouse's area has organized itself. I wish that more of that were going on at the next level.

[BakerAunt]

My last two posts have gone to the spam file. Sigh.

[BakerAunt]

Yikes. Don't tell me my edited post has again gone to junk-mail land.

I was going to add that https://www.everythingkitchens.com/

also has the hearth bread pans that KAF no longer sells.

[BakerAunt]

I found a site that people might want to check out:

https://www.everythingkitchens.com/

They actually have that 5-well perforated sub roll pan that KAF sold years ago.

[BakerAunt]

Most of the restaurants in our little town have continued on with take-out, and with the people coming in to their second homes to ride out the pandemic, which is a problem in other ways, the restaurants at least have a customer base. One restaurant has limited itself to weekends, but one coffee shop has hours every day, as do the other three. Only one is completely shuttered.

To second Aaron's other point, before the pandemic hit, two of our restaurants did fund raisers for the local Boys and Girls club. Two also stepped up and did fundraisers when a family of six lost everything due to a house fire. The local coffee shop has also been generous to local causes.

[BakerAunt]

I've been reading and hearing stories about the farmers and animal people who produce for restaurants and schools. They suddenly have food that they cannot sell, and a lot of it is being dumped (milk) or plowed under because they cannot afford to pick it without having a place to sell it.

I wish that there were a group assigned to try to deal with diverting some of that waste to people in need, not to mention to the groceries. I know that it is complicated to try to change supply lines, and there will be lost food, but I worry about how it will impact us over the months ahead, and if it will make it more difficult for the restaurants to re-start.

[BakerAunt]

I've done the cut and paste, but some recipe sites make it so difficult--only allowing you to catch a certain amount of text at a time (and I think BA is one of those annoying ones)--that I usually give up and just print.

Epicurious--which I think BA took over--actually does a pretty good job with printing.

What I would like is for my printing program to allow me to edit then print. I'd get rid of the ads, and the annoying lists I don't need, and save paper and toner.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by BakerAunt.
• This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by BakerAunt.

[BakerAunt]

I'm sure that you brightened that family's quarantine, Mike.

I enjoyed a freshly baked and just cooled Hot Cross Bun with glaze last night. I was surprised that this morning, the flavors seem to have come together, and they are yet more delicious.

I may have to try the Fat Dadio pan. I was hoping for the straight sides, as on the USA square pans, which I have in 8x8, 9x9, 10x10. When there were more small cooking stores out there on the internet, it was easier to find the odd-sized pan. Occasionally, KAF has a non-standard size, so it's a buy when you see it there.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by BakerAunt.

[BakerAunt]

I guessed wildly and missed.

[BakerAunt]

My Hot Cross Bun recipe makes sixteen, and I bake them in an 11x11 inch pan that I bought from King Arthur years ago. I wish that I could find that size of pan again, since I sometimes do a blueberry Hot Cross bun in the summer, and I've discovered that the acidity in the blueberries takes the finish off the pan (it's not a non-stick). I had a similar occurrence with apples in an apple cake in my USA pan.

I used a simple glaze (the one from my Cinnamon Roll recipe) this time, except that I used Half and Half instead of milk. It worked very well. I ate one tonight, and my husband, who was out eradicating invasive plants in his woods, was hungry and ate two.

[BakerAunt]

It's Good Friday, so I am making Hot Cross Buns. These are my own wholegrain version, and I think that I have the recipe fine-tuned now. I use the Zo bread maker to do the mixing and kneading, and it handled the amount of dough well. I kneaded in golden raisins after the first rise, and I'm waiting on the second rise, in our somewhat cold house before they go into the oven.

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