Color!

Spring color!

My front yard all in bloom!

Easter Eggs!

I neglected to blog about Easter, other than some cool videos about The Ten Commandments. The daughter took me to task, so here is my Easter blog post!

Do you like the eggs she decorated? I blew them out for our Easter meal, and she decorated them all by herself.

The whole family got together and had a nice mid-afternoon br-lunner. I had it in my head that we'd have brunch, but somebody's odd work schedule prohibited an earlier meal, so there we were. Breakfast foods in the afternoon!

We had scrambled Easter Egg guts, home-baked coffee cake (a specialty of mine), turkey bacon, asparagus, home-baked toasted English muffin bread, fresh strawberries, and mimosas made with freshly squeezed orange juice made from oranges off our little tree and Chuckie and Jerry's hand-me-down Jack LaLanne juicer. YUM!

You will like this recipe for an easy coffee cake:

Quick Coffee Cake (Kuchen) from Joy of Cooking

Preheat oven to 375ºF. Grease a 9-inch square baking pan.

Sift together:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

Beat until creamy in a large bowl with a wooden spoon: (I use a mixer)

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, softened

Gradually add and beat until light and fluffy

1/4 to 1/2 cup sugar

Beat in:

1 large egg

2/3 cup milk (Shoe's note: have it at room temperature so that it doesn't congeal the butter)

Beat in the dry ingredients. Add

1/4 teaspoon grated lemon zest or 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Shoe's note: I add some cinnamon; I've never measured it but it is probably 1-2 teaspoons)

Stir until smooth. Spread the batter in the greased pan.

Cover with Streusel (below). Can also cover with 1 1/2 cups blueberries or cherries tossed with 1/2 cup sugar.

Bake about 35 minutes if covered with streusel, 25-30 minutes if covered with fruit. Cool on a rack.

Streusel:

(Shoe's note: This is doubled from the original recipe--always double cinnamon and sugar!)

Combine 2/3 cup sugar, 4 Tablespoons all-purpose flour, 4 Tablespoons unsalted butter. Blend these ingredients until crumbly. Add 1 tsp cinnamon. Sprinkle the over the dough and bake as directed.

Don't wait until next Easter to bake it!

Rainy Days and Mondays Fridays

It was rainy. I baked.

Here is the recipe from King Arthur Flour.  Cinnamon Rolls. Oh, my!

First, make the dough.

The KitchenAid stand mixer makes it easy to knead the dough.

Turn the dough into a greased bowl and let it rise a good long time.

Ready for the first rise.

Puffy!

 Next step: patting it into a square.  This is a soft dough and so easy to work with.

Double the recipe for the cinnamon filling. Sprinkle it over the dough.

Yummmmm.  Cinnamony goodness!

Roll it up long-ways.  It stretches!

Ready for cutting.

Place them in a greased pan and smoosh them down a bit.  Cover them and let them rise again. Go take a nap while you listen to the rain.

Ooooh, aren't they pretty!  Ready for the oven!

They take only 20 minutes to bake.

 ..... And a simple vanilla sugar glaze finishes them off.

YUM!

I love my family.  That's why I feed them cinnamon rolls!

English Muffin Bread

We adore Trader Joe's! They have such fun and delicious foods in every department. They are always introducing new foods, so, sadly, room must be made for the new stuff, and the old stuff is often discontinued. Even much-loved favorites.

Like English Muffin Bread.

Annette had been missing it, so she did what any sensible Eu___ r girl would do. She found a solution. She looked on the internet for a recipe and found this one. We baked a loaf the other night, and ate it all.

It's super easy and quick. It takes only couple minutes kneading in your KitchnAid stand mixer, and it needs just one short rise! And it's delicious!

English Muffin Bread with Honey Butter

Ingredients

• 3c flour, divided
• 1/4t baking soda
• 2-1/2t yeast
• 1c buttermilk
• 1/4c water
• 2-1/2t sugar
• 3/4t salt
• Cornmeal for dusting (don't skip this)

For Honey Butter:
• 4T butter, softened
• 2T honey

Instructions

1. In stand-mixer bowl, mix half of the flour, yeast, and baking soda together.
2. Heat buttermilk, water, sugar, and salt in microwave safe dish, about 60 seconds. Stir (buttermilk will separate, don't be alarmed).
3. Gradually add milk mixture to the flour mixture, then add the rest of the flour. Knead quickly with dough hook attachment for 2 minutes.
4. Grease a loaf pan and dust with cornmeal. Form dough into a loaf and place in prepared pan. Dust top with cornmeal and place in oven with the light on to rise, 45 minutes.
5. Remove loaf and preheat oven to 400. Bake loaf 25 minutes. Remove from baking pan to cooling rack promptly.
6. In a dish, mix softened butter and honey until combined.
7. Slice bread and toast it thoroughly in toaster, on a high setting.
8. Spread with honey butter. Serve.

Notes

Store unused honey butter in refrigerator.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

Black Magic Cake with store-bought frosting. Yum!

This is my absolute favorite cake recipe, which I first learned back in the 80s when I got my first Cuisinart (thanks, Chuckbert!). It was in a Cuisinart recipe booklet.

(No, I wasn't drunk--I just suck a wielding a can of decorating frosting!)

Go bake a cake!

We recently supped...

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread-and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness-
O, Wilderness were Paradise enow!

             --Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

Valentine's Day Goodies

OK, so I was able to avoid a computer crash and too many do-overs and was able to extract my photos from my camera!  Yay!  I'll be doing a few catch-up posts, so keep watch here on Izzy's Net.

Note:  click on each picture for a bigger version, and click on it again for a full-screen version.

On Valentine's Day, I made King Arthur Flour's Cinnamon Rolls for my family. MMMmmmm... cinnamon rolls!

I made the dough and assembled the rolls the night before. I used twice as much cinnamon filling as the recipe called for.  I placed them in this cute pan and put them in the fridge overnight.  I woke up early on Valentine's Day and took them out of the fridge for their final rise.  I went back to bed, and when I got up again they were just about ready to bake!

Here they are before I put them in the oven:

and here is our breakfast table.  Cinnamon rolls, fruit, and Valentine candy!  Yippee!

Easy Turkey (or Chicken) Pot Pie

I found this easy recipe from Food & Home magazine, which we get free in our mailbox every once in a while. I've made it a few times, and it is always a hit. The original recipe called for chicken, but it was a perfect use of our leftover dark meat Thanksgiving turkey. The original called for puff pastry from Trader Joe's, as well as one of those whole grilled chickens from TJ's. They've discontinued both of those, so I use "Just Chicken" from TJ's, for ease, and a puff pastry from the regular grocery store.

Chicken (or Turkey) Pot Pie

The crust:
1 package frozen puff pastry
Egg Wash (one egg mixed with 1 T. water)

The filling:
1 T. olive oil
1 container of mirepoix (found at Trader Joe's)
1/2 cup fresh, small button mushrooms, quartered
1/2 cup frozen peas (defrosted)
about 2 cups chopped cooked chicken (or turkey!)
salt and pepper to taste

The gravy:
3 T. butter (the recipe called for clarified butter, but honestly, for gravy? Who'll know?)
3 T. flour
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup heavy cream
squeeze of a lemon
dash of hot sauce

Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Take puff pastry out of the freezer and let it thaw at room temperature. Heat oil in a large heavy saucepan on medium-high heat. Add the mirepoix and mushrooms and sauté until soft, about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the chicken and peas and cook an additonal 2-3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Set aside.

Prepare the gravy. In a small saucepan over medium heat melt the butter until hot. Add the flour all at once and cook for about 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Add the chicken broth, heavy cream, squeeze of lemon and dash of hot sauce. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the sauce is thickened and coats the back of a wooden spoon.

Mix vegetables, chicken, and gravy together. Spoon into an 8 x 13 pan. Cover the chicken mixture with puff pastry. Brush top with egg wash. Bake in 400º oven for 30-45 minutes, until puff pastry is golden brown.

Note: I did a quick measure of the veggies in the mirepoix, if you want to chop them yourself. It was about 1 1/2 cups diced celery, 1/2 cup chopped onion and 1 cup diced carrots -- I think! I didn't measure them very accurately. The mirepoix is so easy, though!

Enjoy!

Here it is before baking:


And here it is ready to eat!



There is usually a little bit of puff pastry left over. I spread it with butter and sprinkle it with cinnamon sugar, baking it until it is cinnamon-y, buttery, puffy, and yummy!

Happy Sweet Sixteen!

My baby is growing up!

Erin had a good day. Low-key, but nice, with presents, dinner at the Beachside and cake! I made the usual Black Magic Cake, and this time tried some mint frosting on part of it. We affectionately call it "Ugly Cake."

H*A*P*P*Y**B*I*R*T*H*D*A*Y, S*W*E*E*T**S*I*X*T*E*E*N*!

Surprise Cake

I baked a chocolate cake last night!






I served it to the family today. Here are some comments:

Kevin: "This cake is awesome!"
Mikey: "It's okay. It's good."
Erin: "It's good. A little too dry."

Indeed, it was a little dry, but the taste was good!

It had a surprise ingredient. From our organic produce delivery box. I never know what do do with them, cuz no one likes them. So I found a recipe that uses.......















BOILED BEETS!


Yum.

Here is the recipe.

Crackery Cheese Puffs

Or Cheese Cracker Puffers.

I tried Chuckbert's recipe again, this time with the proper half-n-half, unsalted butter, and salt.

I wasn't shy about really working the dough and rolling it out thin. I could see the cutting board through the dough. I cooked it in two batches it was so thin.

I put Kosher flake salt on one and the flake salt and fresh ground pepper on the other. They took far shorter to bake than my first thicker try.

They came out puffery good! YUMMERS!

Lovin' the Kitchenaide

OK. I've fallen in love with baking bread. Pagrs pointed me to King Arthur Flour's recipes, and they really are great recipes! The Kitchenaide Stand Mixer makes it sooooo easy!

So far, I've made one loaf of white bread (recipe from the Kitchenaide recipe book), four loaves (2 batches) of Classic 100% Whole Wheat, and two loaves of 100% Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread. This last recipe is my favorite. The first loaf was great, though not perfect. The second one just came out of the oven. It looks and smells fantastic. I have a feeling this one will be near-perfect!





I can't keep up with the demand for bread! I have a teenage boy in the house, you know. I have a feeling I'll need to adjust my weekly routine to include a bread-baking day. I'll enjoy that, though, because it smells so good!

Thanks again, BobBIE!

Jumping in the Cracker Barrel

Seems like every one else has tried Chuckbert's cracker recipe, so I had to follow suit tonight.

My recipe changes included:

• I used salted butter, and then left out the salt (I was going to add part of the amount, but plumb forgot),
• I sprinkled Kosher salt on top,
• I used non-fat half-n-half.

"What's that? Non-fat half-n-half? I didn't know there was such a thing!"

Neither did I. Never buying half-n-half, I grabbed the one that my hand reached for first, not reading the label. It wasn't until I got it out for the crackers did I notice. Fat-free half-n-half. Isn't that an oxymoron?

I don't think I got the crackers thin enough, as they were soft-ish, except the ones on the edges, which were crispety.



They were good, and we enjoyed them!





They were plenty salty. I'll try the recipe again with real half-n-half, I'll roll them out thinner and maybe work them more to make them flakier (the added fat of real half-n-half should help, too), and I think I'll try Poss's technique of separating them before baking, as that will make them brown better, I think.


What's the story with fat-free half-n-half???

Valentine's Day Cupcakes

My third use of my new Kitchenaide was making Valentine's Day cupcakes. I used the White Cake recipe from the Kitchenaide recipe booklet. It was fast n' easy! The hardest part was separating the eggs, but Erin did that part!

All I had was bread flour. I had grabbed bread flour instead of all-purpose flour the other day. So they probably aren't the best they could've been.

Here they are:

There is one missing because some little Elf came home in the wee hours of the morning and sampled them. By "little Elf" I mean "Little Mikey," my Valentine!

I am going shopping with E. today to Bed Bath 'n' Beyond to get some new baking pans for my invigorated baking career!

Girl Scout Memories

I was a Girl Scout for a year. I wasn't too active, but I did find this one badge I managed to earn. I don't know how many badges I earned. This one was still in its envelope. It didn't make it to the sash. Maybe it was the only one I earned. Are you surprised at the subject?

Books Badge

The one thing I remember most about Girl Scouts, besides trying to eat the crabapples growing outside the church where we held our meetings, was bringing Mom's Ginger Snap Cookies when it was my turn to bring the snack.

Oh! Those ginger snaps were divine! The memory made me salivate, so I had to make some. They are such a perfect cookie for this time of year!

Mom's Ginger Snaps in all their crinkly goodness!

Click here for a printable recipe. Enjoy!