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My apologies that I never wrote back about my remake of the Irish Chocolate Cake last Wednesday. It was a success. I used the melted butter/cocoa powder paste to grease the larger of my two bundt pans. I made sure my butter was soft and mixed everything through the eggs with the stand mixer. I then added the flour and liquid by hand and it was the right texture to go in the pan. I baked it for 50 minutes and it wasn't quite done so I baked for another 5. I didn't want to over bake again so I took it out. It un-molded beautifully. So after it cooled, I wrapped it and put it in the freezer. On Friday, I took both cakes (the rum cake and whiskey cake) out of the freezer and wrapped them for the bake sale - I borrowed large saran from work so you could see the cakes. One neighbor saw me taking them to the car for delivery to the sale with pretty ribbons and all and got excited about the sale. When I got to the gardens, everyone wanted to buy them then - we don't allow members to buy early. Turns out my neighbor asked a friend to get there at 9:00am on Saturday and she got my rum cake - I guess the members kept looking for it after that!

On Thursday, I made bourbon balls with crushed cookies (Chocolate Bourbon from a Bakery we buy from for the store - they had passed their best by date, so we had to damage them out - you can still eat them, you just can't sell them.), pecans, powdered sugar, cocoa powder, maple syrup and of course Bourbon for a neighborhood Christmas party. I rolled half in sparkling sugar and half in chocolate sprinkles. Everyone wanted the recipe and one neighbor asked if he could pay me to make them. I said I was sorry, no, but I'd happily give him the recipe!

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I made a sheet pan dinner with chicken sausage, sweet potato, broccoli and red onion with olive oil and Penzey's Now Curry for the seasoning. I had some cranberry sauce with it instead of chutney. As Will is out of town I have dinner for a couple of more nights.

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On Saturday, I baked a Caribbean Rum Cake which I unmolded on Sunday and wrapped and put in the freezer for the Bake Sale this Saturday. Also, on Sunday I made my Irish Whiskey cake which was probably the worst one I've ever made. I've never baked a dry one before. Anyway I cut it in to sections to share with friends who are good enough friends that they understood. I said it needed ice cream or whipped cream and one of them said Chocolate Sauce!

I will make it again on Tuesday. I will use my larger bundt pan and I will incorporate the flour and liquids by hand. I will go back to my usual way of prepping the pan with the paste made from melted butter and cocoa powder from America's Test Kitchen. I tried oiling it and sifting in cocoa powder, but I think the cocoa powder stayed on too thick and absorbed a lot of the moisture from the cake. The cake also stuck in one part. I'm determined to redeem myself.

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For dinner tonight, we had some of the Caesar Chicken and I roasted asparagus and cut up potatoes to go with.

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Will baked 3 loaves of sourdough this morning. He heads to LA on Thursday for 10 days. I will be baking over the weekend for the garden club bake sale the following weekend - I will freeze my cakes

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I'm making slow cooker Caesar Chicken which we'll have either in wraps or as salad. I brought home a salad on Wednesday that was left from our Take n' Bake Thanksgiving dinners - for Thanksgiving we take orders for Dinners or parts thereof that people can pick up on Wednesday for duh, Thanksgiving. The turkeys and prime rib are prepped and ready to go in the oven to be cooked. All the sides are fully cooked, desserts, rolls and corn muffins come from the Bake Shop and our Kitchen also makes charcuterie trays. We had 81 orders this year - some complete dinners, some a quart of gravy. The salad came with a pint of Caesar dressing, so we figured we would use it for something else.

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Did anyone see Claire Saffitz's new pie crust recipe in King Arthur? It's interesting and there's a video - I might have to try it
https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2022/11/09/claire-saffitz-flaky-pie-crust

Chocomouse so sorry to hear about your infection. Glad to know you're on the mend

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We've decided to not do anything special for Thanksgiving this year as it's just Will and me. I'm dog sitting for a friend Wednesday through Friday over by the beach. Since we are really busy at work this week the down time will be really nice as we are closed on Thursday.

Today I tried a recipe for chicken and wild rice soup which came out pretty well. I overcooked the rice a little, but that has a lot to do with the new stove. Learning how to use the induction has a learning curve, but we're both really happy with it. The oven works well - we had baked salmon, asparagus and potatoes last night. We haven't tried the convection or air fryer yet.

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On Saturday night, I made sheet pan salmon with potatoes and asparagus. I love the new stove! I think Will likes it too - he's just a bit grumbly about it, like his dad, cuz he has to learn new tricks.

Asparagus was on sale at HT this week, so I bought 2 bunches. Tonight, I'm going to use the second bunch with pasta, cream sauce, Caprese chicken sausage and sun dried tomatoes.

BTW Joan, I followed your lead and went to Publix today when I was in Brunswick. The AP was still on sale so I had to buy 2. I also bought a bag of bread flour cuz it was cheaper than HT.

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Your timing is impeccable, chocomouse. Our new refrigerator came last week and Will claims the freezer doesn't hold as much but he got it all in. We've decided to buy the flour containers from KABC that are made in New Zealand and hold a 5lb bag of flour. But first, we'll put the flour in the freezer for 24 hours just to make sure any potential critters are gone.

Then I discovered my "dead" bananas were in there so I made 2 loaves of whole grain banana bread, one for us and one for work. They had a comment in the tips about subbing some maple syrup for some of the brown sugar and they mentioned that you needed to add an extra tablespoon of flour (per loaf). I did that and am really happy with the results. They were baked in the new oven which is great! Will baked sourdough today.

I also have a full bag plus a partial one of the sprouted wheat flour that's taking up room.

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I've been meaning to report back on the Broccoli Cheddar Casserole with Pretzels, but it has been a busy week -so what else is new.

Anyway, I took the dough and the casserole/soup out of the refrigerator about an hour before I wanted to cook. I should have shaped the dough at that point as it would have come to temp sooner. While it was a fun recipe, I would not make that particular one again. We like the version of Panera soup that we have been using forever better. As for the Pretzels, I would make them smaller and bake them separately as they were too much like a dumpling for our tastes. The top definitely pretzel-ed, the inside cooked, but the bottom was dense. Oh, and to answer Mike's question - yes, the recipe says to boil them in a baking soda solution for about 30 seconds - which may also have contributed to the bottom problem. Photo attached.

The appliances were delivered on Thursday - the stove is installed and so far, Will has made chicken thighs and stir fry on the stove and baked focaccia in the oven. Everything was delicious. It is an induction - my new pans work just fine. The oven temperature is accurate. It has a convection feature which Will did not use at my recommendation - I told him we needed to research what works best in convection. It will also convert traditional baking temperatures to convection and has a convection roast setting. It has an air fryer setting and a steam cleaning setting as well. My contact at the appliance store says that the other people who have gotten it are happy with it. I think we will be too.

As for the refrigerator, when the delivery people went to take the doors off to bring it in, he discovered that the waterline was cut - they even brought me out to put me on the tail lift to see it. They had called the warehouse manager first and then I talked to him. They took it back and are getting me a new one - it takes less time than ordering the part. I should have it by Wednesday - this is not the first time they have seen this. As a matter of fact, the last time, they discovered when they turned the water on in the fridge. I only have an icemaker, not a water dispenser (my choice).

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I added a can of tuna to my leftover rice/artichoke salad in order to stretch it. It actually is quite good.

Will is coming home today and I have to work late so I made the parts of a recipe from HBH and put them in the fridge. It is Creamy Broccoli Cheddar Casserole with Garlic Butter Pretzels. I made the pretzel dough in the bread machine just through the kneading and popped it in the fridge. Then I made the "casserole" which is more like a thick soup.
We will take them out about a hour before cooking so they can come up to temp. Then I will shape and boil the pretzels to put on top of the casserole before it goes in the oven.

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I hope you stay safe Mike - fires scare me more than hurricanes.

I made half a recipe of a rice, artichoke, green olive salad that I haven't made in a long time. It was good, but I used brown rice instead of the white rice called for in the recipe - I think it's better with white rice which absorbs the dressing better.

The windows and slider are all in and are beautiful and tight - my bedroom is warm and I can't hear every single noise outside. The white trim inside (since they were very old Andersen windows, they were brown metal inside as well as out) makes the whole condo brighter.

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I made Dan Dan noodles last night. I'm hoping that flavors developed overnight. I enjoyed them, but they were a little bland. I subbed in teriyaki sauce for the oyster sauce -hoisin would probably have been better and Worcestershire for the fish sauce. I added the sesame oil to the sauce by mistake, so I had to use more oil for sautéing.

My windows arrived today! Three are in. The one they are taking out next has some rot, but they had to leave because of the rain. They'll be back tomorrow. Since the inside sashes are white - they look so much better and brighter.

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Interesting Len, I did not know that they processed all the fat out. I assumed that the processing was for 2% and skim and that the whole milk was what they started with. I forgot that when we got milk from the local dairy when I was a kid, we had to shake to combine the cream on top with the milk below. But then again, the milk was still really good on it's own.

Thanks, Mike - I think I will leave the egg out next time. I'm thinking that part of the reason it's there is to add "fluffiness."

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