[Janiebakes]

Years ago focaccia baked with chopped up vegetables was popular in grocery store bakeries in Charlotte, where I lived at that time. Yesterday, thinking about what to make for dinner I realized that I had random bits of veggies, cheese and a chicken sausage to use up so decided to go that route. I don't like thick bread focaccia so I decided to use pizza crust. Looking in Peter Reinhart's "American Pie" I picked his recipe for pizza americana crust. He said it was bready and stood up to heavy toppings. I was suprised to see it included sugar or honey as well as milk but went ahead and followed the recipe. The topping was two carmalized onion, three grated, well sauteed zucchini and sauteed sweet mini pepper rings, a three oz chicken sausage and a handful of grated Swiss and Romano cheese. The crust edges browned but stayed as soft as Wonderbread. The crust was amazingly soft and sweet. There was too much dough for my pizza needs so I shaped the remainder into a small boule and baked it. Today we sliced it up and ate it toasted with formage blanc with lemon and blueberries. Very dessertish with a cup of coffee. I would not use this crust recipe again. Way too soft and sweet. My go to from that book is the Roman pizza dough.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 11 months ago by Janiebakes.

[Janiebakes]

I remember when there was a thread on the old BC about these rolls. All crust and hollow on the inside if I remember right. There was a lot of discussion about finding/buying the right cutter. So did you find an authentic one Baker Aunt? I saw a post from Mike about his son making on with his 3D printer. My son was a machinist before he got his engineering degree and also has a 3D printer if that would be of use to anyone.

[Janiebakes]

Happy birthday Swirth. I hope you get some time to enjoy watching the birds in your yard.

[Janiebakes]

Chocomouse, sometimes our Costco carries whole smoked white fish. Near one of the Jewish holidays but I can't remember which one.

[Janiebakes]

Thank you for mentioning me Baker Aunt. So glad to hear that Cass is doing well. I think I mentioned him in one of my first few posts so I remember him fondly as well. Please wish him the best from me.

[Janiebakes]

Simple dinner tonight. A few stray veggies sauteed and scrambled with a couple of eggs. Served on corn tortillas crisped in the toaster and salsa verde.
My husband also grills year round. He does a big batch of veggies and some meats. We freeze the meat in dinner portions, the grilled vegetables go fast.
Mike, if they lemon juice you found is Volcano brand in the big green bottle, then I agree that it is much better than Real Lemon. That brand has always smelled kind of skunky to me.

[Janiebakes]

Sometimes the dinner vegetable steals the show. I bought Japanese sweet potatoes because they looked better than the regular ones. The peel is purple, the inside a pale yellow. There is a very light scent of some tropical fruit when you cut into it but I can't put my finger on which one. They can be baked or microwaved and the flesh tastes a bit like chestnuts. The recipe called for baking the sweet potatoes then slicing and glazing with a mix of miso, tahini, butter and lime juice with a bit of salt and the lime zest. I think oil would work as well as the butter did. Unusual and really good.

[Janiebakes]

We were just talking about this at dinner the other night while eating haddock. Swai, haddock, pollock, orange roughy and cod seem very similar in flavor to us but the texture varies. Just like we had "red flavor" KoolAid as kids, we now eat a lot of "white fish" flavor. The bags of prefrozen pieces we buy are surely not the finest examples of any of these fish. Cod from Mitchell's Seafood restaurent is noticably better in texture for example and I don't think it is because of my fish cooking skills. All these fish with butter, capers, lemon juice or used in a cioppino are good for a tasty and fast dinner.

[Janiebakes]

I felt like an epsisode of Semi Homemade today. Used a carton of Ginger Miso broth from Trader Joe's to cook some Trader Joe's shumai. Put those and their sauce on one sushi platter. Had some bok choy to use and thought of fresh Spring Rolls so cut off the leafy green part and fine sliced. Added the finely sliced ribs to the ginger miso broth. Thin sliced a carrot, cooked some shrimp and boiled some rice noodles. Put it all together (3 each) and plated it on another sushi platter with hoisen sauce and chopped peanuts in the little dipping bowls. Added the leftover greens, carrot, and rice noodles to the broth, along with sesame oil and stirred in two beaten eggs. Made a nice lunch.

[Janiebakes]

I made aother batch of the Oaty Biscuits from the war time rationing blog. Here is the basic recipe.
4 oz (115 g) margarine or butter.
3 oz (85 g) of sugar
7 oz (200 g) of rolled oats
5 oz (150 g) self-raising flour or plain flour sifted with 1 teaspoon of baking powder and a pinch of salt
1 reconstituted dried egg or fresh egg
A little milk if needed

Form into walnut sized balls, flatten on parchment lined baking sheet and bake at 350 for 15 minutes.

So far I have subbed oat flour for the self rising flour, subbed brown sugar for the white sugar and both of those worked. Today I subbed golden unsulfered molasses for the sugar. I followed the instructions at https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2017/08/18/baking-with-liquid-sweeteners. It was very informative. I used 3.9 ozs of molasses to completely replace the sugar.The cookies came out great. A little more crumbly than crunchy but the edges of the oat flakes were crisp. The cookies just cried out for raisins. Trying to figure out the nutritional info I ran across the best recipe calorie and nutrition calculator I have seen. https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076 Calories, fiber, saturated fat, vitamins... does it all.

[Janiebakes]

Dinner was courtesy of "the pierogi lady" The local farm we discovered during the pandemic was having their three year anniversary celebration today. Grass fed meat, bakery items and homemade soaps for sale. Food trucks with their homegrown hamburgers and sausages. The pierogi lady had a plate of chicken paprikash, pierogis, and spatzle with cabbage you could get to go. Beautiful blue skies and green farm fields for a much needed outing.

[Janiebakes]

We put in a raised bed garden this year, previous years used large pots and planters. The peas went in late and are just now coming up. Lettuce, parsley, onion starts and red cabbage doing well. Last year we planted seeds I saved from the grocery store butternut squash. Grew mounds of vines, very few flowers and not fruit. May have been some kind of hybrid. Highlight of the garden for me this year is a pot of potatoes we planted with our two year old granddaughter. Every time she comes over we add a little more dirt to the pot and wait for the stems to grow out again. Can't wait to show her how to pinch some new potatoes out from under the plant.

[Janiebakes]

Dinner tonight was courtesy of DH, spaghetti and marinara from a jar. I was busy today making yougurt and Mexican pickled vegetables. That didn't take too long but I am also digging through the closet in my sewing room.

[Janiebakes]

Pumpkin cornbread. That is imaginative and sounds delicious.

[Janiebakes]

Dinner was the New York Times cheesy bean bake. It is one of their pantry staples done in 30 minute meals but it is much better when you take a little more time. Instead of canned beans I used dried that I cooked myself. Added onion, used a whole can of tomato paste instead on 2 tablespoons and added a 14 oz can of diced tomatoes. Added Better than Boullion chicken flavor to the hot water called for and used Italian seasoning. Used a blend of romano cheese and Jarlsburg that I grated fresh, mixing some into the beans and sprinkling the rest lightly over the top. Baked until hot and cheese melted.Most of these changes came from the reader comments. Served with a green salad. Every bit disappeared.

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