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The last set of papers and exams I will ever have to grade are finished, so Friday evening found me back in the kitchen. I tried a new recipe, "Lemon-Poppy Seed Bread," from the KAF Whole Grain Baking (p49-50). I made two substitution, by using buttermilk in place of lemon yogurt and using Penzey's dried lemon peel in place of the fresh zest. I baked it in three mini-loaf pans (remember Baker's Secret pans?) rather than a 9x5, so that I can freeze two of them. I chose this recipe because it used up 1/2 cup of lemon juice from the freezer, and 1/4 cup of poppy seed, which I also need to use up.
I then baked the Four Leaf Clover Rolls from the KAF website, but I made them as eight rolls on a baking sheet. This was a way to use some of the Irish Wholemeal flour in my freezer and some golden raisins and walnuts. I will freeze some of these as well. I used half regular yeast, and half gold yeast, because I am running out of regular yeast and I have a lot of the gold yeast.
Addendum: I made it as 9 rolls, because after I weighed the dough, the math was easier (101 grams each). This time, I also brushed them with 1 Tbs. of melted butter when I took them out of the oven. Oh, it was so good for Saturday morning breakfast, that I had to forbid myself to eat two.
I'm not sure how anyone has the space in a regular kitchen to bake 144 loaves. Perhaps they rent space. Different states also have different requirements for home bakeries, and these sites must be Farmer's Markets located in major urban centers.
Once we have moved and gotten settled, I plan to try selling at the Farmer's Market in the small town that has an influx of summer people. Over the past summers, I have been observing what is sold, and I would look for a niche that I could fill. Small Bundt cakes and scones seem good possibilities. The bakers I've seen there mostly do sweet rolls and cupcakes, except for an Amish woman who does a little of everything. I'm not looking to start a business but to finance my baking addiction once I retire.
I only recall making one recipe from an edition of The Joy of Cooking that my mother had (and did not use), and that was for a plum coffee cake in an effort to use up a bumper crop from our plum tree. I have my mother-in-law's copy, which I think is from the 1960s. Hm. I may have used that one for a peach pie this summer, so perhaps my total is two. My mother either went to her red and white checked Better Homes & Gardens, or a bunch of little cook booklets that were in an Encyclopedia of Cooking binder. I have some of those booklets, and I broke down and bought a binder at an estate sale. (One of my sisters has the other one.)
I'm currently going through some stacks of Bon Appetit magazines and pulling out any recipes that I think that I might cook or bake some day. I stopped subscribing in the early 2000s, as there was too much in the magazine that I would never use. Now that we are packing to move at the start of July, I need to lighten the load as much as possible.
On Saturday, I tried a new recipe, a Bundt cake from KAF, titled "Orange Pound Cake with Bourbon Glaze." Cwcdesign had suggested that I could make it with lemon juice instead (I have a lot of frozen lemon juice), so I tried that suggestion. Although the recipe said a 10-cup Bundt pan, that seemed small to me for the amount of batter, so I used my older 12-cup one, and I'm glad that I did because the cake filled it. I will not glaze it. I also baked my favorite oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. The Bundt cake and cookies are for after service snacks at church tomorrow.
Next Day Update: The lemon cake is on the tart side, which is fine for me, but anyone looking for a sweeter cake might want to increase the sugar a bit, being careful not to unbalance the cake. I suspect that because the original recipe used orange juice, which is sweeter than lemon juice, this cake is naturally more tart. People at church did like it. I'm going to serve the remaining slices for our family dinner this evening with strawberry shortcake topping (we found lovely strawberries at the store) and Stonyfield frozen nonfat vanilla yogurt.
On Thursday, I made an enormous pot of soup, using onion, garlic, red bell pepper, mushrooms, celery, carrots, canned low-salt Spam, some beans I had frozen, about 10 cups broth, a can of diced tomatoes, 1 1/2 cups of pearl barley, 1 Tbs. Penzey's Paprika Smoked Spanish Style, 1/2 tsp. chili powder, 1/4 tsp. cayenne, and fresh parsley. I began by sautéing chopped onion and garlic in olive oil, then added the red bell pepper, and mushrooms, and chopped celery. I added the cubed Spam, then the chopped carrots. Then I added the rest of the ingredients, brought to a boil, then simmered for 30 minutes.
I like to do "throw together soups," using what I have around the house. (A can of Spam is unusual.) The hard part for me is figuring out the spices. I've used the paprika blend for pot roast, but after adding it here, I felt it needed a gentle kick, so I added the chili powder and cayenne. Of course, my broth is flavored with rosemary, sage, thyme, and sweet curry powder. I will freeze some of it, but the rest will get me through lunches in a very busy week ahead.
