[skeptic7]

I've started my Hot Cross Bun recipe too. This is from the NY Times cookbook and I've made it since I've been in High School. Its the most elaborate of my recipes and I always do it as the culmination of the Hot Cross bun season. Its a soft dough now, and will be refrigerated overnight. Tomorrow I'll knead it, adding more flour as necessary and shape it into buns. The baking will be either Saturday or Sunday depending on how it rises. This uses 8 cups of flour so makes quite a few buns.
BakerAunt; how many Hot Cross Buns are you making?

[skeptic7]

I've seen a reference to pomegranate molasses, but was wondering if that was like "oat milk" and more an advertising gimick.

[skeptic7]

No I have a decent selection of spices but very few liquors, and I don't want to go out to buy more.

[skeptic7]

I guessed wildly and correctly. I love pastrami in sandwiches.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by skeptic7.

[skeptic7]

I have some oranges, maybe I can put in fresh orange zest. I saw Blood Oranges in the store and inspired by BakerAunt's recipes I bought a bag. I have eaten all but two but I can save one for a ham pie.

[skeptic7]

I am doing a chicken pot pie -- well actually three individual ones. This is a new variation, I am using some mole verde concentrate which I bought from the store as the main flavoring ingredient and having onions, celery and sweet peppers as the vegetables. I am using an oil based pie crust as the topping, but since I love pie crust its rather thick.

[skeptic7]

I will do my special Hot Cross Buns starting Friday and baking it on Easter Sunday, but I will be freezing any I can't eat myself. I won't be running around giving it away and my friends can't come pick it up.
I saw a recipe for a ham and raisin pie, more a quiche than anything else and I think I will make that leaving out the Grand Mariner as I don't have that. Would brandy work? I have some homemade chocolate peanut butter cups which I will eat, and plan to look at either donut recipes or Pain au Chocolat recipes.

[skeptic7]

I got it.

[skeptic7]

I made another batch of Hot Cross buns, the texture is good but this recipe has much less fruit and currents than I normally use. The texture is much more like a regular dinner roll it has so little fruit to weigh it down. The recipe was a gift from a friend but she won't leave the house to pick some up. She wants me to freeze a couple for her.

[skeptic7]

I did Northern style cornbread yesterday and clam chowder. Both were very tasty. I made up a quart of milk from dried milk powder as I was out of fresh milk. I don't like the taste very much but its ok for cooking. I'll use this is the clam chowder, probably adding more dried milk to make it thicker and richer.

[skeptic7]

I was at the local Coop, which had yeast but only in freezed dried bricks. I bought a 2 lb package of active dry yeast, the other option was 1 lb packages of instant yeast. I used to get a cup or so of dry yeast in a plastic bags which would last me for years. I wonder if I should divide this with friends.

[skeptic7]

BakerAunt;
That bread sounds wonderful. York apples are very good keepers, I keep my in plastic bags with air holes in the refrigerator for months. Do you have to do anything special to store your apples? I've seen cardboard forms with hollows for the apples so they don't bruise each other and the air can circulate around them. I find apples need a bit of care - not enough air, like in the vegetable bin of the refrigerator encourages rot, too much air lets the apple dry out.

[skeptic7]

An egg shell isn't poisonous but I can't consider it edible. I know chickens are often fed egg shells as a calcium source, but does this do people any good?

[skeptic7]

I did cottage pie for last night's supper and today's lunch. The filling was the ground beef and onions and carrots and potato mixture I used for the Cornish Meat Pie last week. Yesterday's topping was mashed celeric, and today's was mash potatoes. The celeric mashed up okay and had a mild slightly turnipy taste, but mashed potatoes made a much better topping. It was softer and richer and smoother. Both toppings benefited from butter and pepper.
Individual cottage pies are easier than individual pot pies and possibly have less fat -- I wouldn't know as I didn't actually measure the butter that went into the mash potatoes.

[skeptic7]

BakerAunt;
Is there any place warm that you can start seedlings and move them to your porch after they start to grow. I never thought that energy efficient windows would actually block heat from entering the house -- I know that they were designed to do it, but I didn't think that it could work that well.

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