Eggs

My girls have finally blessed me with some beautiful fresh, homegrown eggs. Right now they are a little small yet to use much for baking, but I guess that is what a kitchen scale is for.

Disasters and frustrations

I tried my hand at some French macarons this weekend. They were a total disaster. So much of a disaster, I do not have a photo. There was no foot. They turned brown. Terrible.


This is Tornado. He is the other sort of beast that I enjoy wrangling. I have had him for ten years through much good and bad. He has been frustrating me here lately because I have recently purchased a new trailer and he refuses to get on it. Now, I just need to train him to get on it, but like those macarons I have never made before, there is a lot of trial and error along the way. Quite honestly, I have become almost fed up with both things (ok, I haven't given the macarons much of a fair try but still) that is until I went to lunch today.

I work in a small town and for lunch there are mainly fast food options. Consequently, I end up eating a lot of Subway if I forgot to pack my lunch. Today as I was standing in line, a new employee waited on me. There was no one in front or behind me so he took me through the whole sandwich himself, no assembly line today. Now I have eaten at Subway countless times. I have been waited on by dozens of staff members, who are usually extremely efficient, getting my sandwich to me in the smallest amount of time possible. But not today. Today, this new employee painstakingly arranged my spinach and tomatoes. He carefully counted out my pickles and onions and squeezed on just the appropriate amount of mayo. Not to little or to much. It struck me that a sandwich I had eaten so many times could be so lovingly prepared. Something that was typically slapped together, today was carefully arranged just so.

It made me contemplate how vary common it is for me to rush through a task, especially in baking, and then am frustrated with the result. How if maybe I were more conscientious with my work, perhaps more success would come my way. I need to learn to be less bogged down by the clock and to just enjoy the time I have with each task be it learning a new recipe or trying to load my horse on trailer.

English Muffins

My husband is a breakfast food fanatic. Especially if this breakfast food entails eggs of any variety. Consequently, we frequently eat breakfast for supper, especially if there has not been a trip to the grocery store in quite some time. Since I got home from work before him, this particular day, I decided to make English muffins to accompany our eggs.

English muffins are surprisingly easy to make. The English muffin recipe that I use is from Peter Reinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice (big surprise). It is made using the direct dough method, so you can decide on a (sort of) whim to whip these up. They only take a few minutes of mixing and raise in a couple of hours. One thing that I learned about making English muffins, are that they are initially pan fried and then finish baking in the oven. I have made these before, but had a little trouble because they stayed fat, the muffin did not flatten like traditional English muffins. I then read Nicole's post about English muffins that stated if your dough was too stiff, the muffins do not flatten out appropriately. I then increased the water a bit and had more success this time.

My husband and I made bacon, egg, and cheese sandwiches with them later that evening and the next morning I enjoyed another one with butter and jam. The key to getting the signature nooks and crannies is to fork split the muffin, not to slice it with a fork. They quite delicious. Next time I may change it up a bit and add some whole wheat flour or maybe some raisins.

Homemade Marshmallows

It seems everywhere I look, food bloggers have made homemade marshmallows. And in reading their posts, these homemade marshmallows sound absolutely delightful. The photographs of these marshmallows look spectacular, like fluffy clouds of awesomeness. I just had to make homemade marshmallows. They actually were surprisingly easy to make, boil the sugar and the corn syrup, whip with the gelatin until fluffy. Yes, they were sticky, but candy making always is

My sister is getting married and in the spirit of looking for a pretty dessert for the dessert tray, I decided to cut them into heart shapes and dip half into chocolate. They turned out so cute. I took them to her, quite excited about my newest creation. She told me they were beautiful and took a great big bite. "Oh Heather, these would be perfect if they didn't taste so much like Peeps." She was right. My homemade marshmallows taste like Peeps. Or at best, store bought marshmallows. But nothing like the greatness I was hoping for. The recipe I made called for a vanilla bean, however, I did not have any vanilla beans and consequently used vanilla extract. That may have been my downfall. I would like to try and make them again, maybe with a different flavor, maybe with a real vanilla bean.

Sour Cream and Onion Potato Bread

I love using mashed potatoes in my white bread. I don't know exactly what it does for my bread, but it just tastes amazing. I find it a fantastic way to use up that last little bit of mashed potatoes from Sunday dinner. Typically, I make a sweet potato bread, that is perfect with a little butter in the morning for breakfast, but when I found this recipe on The Knead for Bread, I knew I had to give it a shot. If bread with potatoes in it is good, then an addition of sour cream and chives must be better.

You can find the original recipe here. I tweaked the recipe a bit based on what I had in the kitchen that afternoon. What you get is a soft, fluffy bread that is great on its own but makes a fantastic sandwich bread. Its got just enough onion to give it flavor, yet not enough to be overpowering.

Sour Cream and Onion Potato Bread
1 1/2 cups mashed potatoes (I used instant because I was out of regular potatoes. If using regular potatoes, you may want to add butter and milk when mashing them for flavor.)
1/2 cup sour cream
1 1/2 tsp salt (I used garlic salt because a little garlic flavor is always a good thing)
1 egg
1/2 cup chopped green onions
2 1/2 tsp instant yeast
4-5 cups bread flour

Make up instant mashed potatoes according to directions. Add sour cream, egg, yeast, and green onions. Mix in 2 cups of the flour and allow the dough to rest for 10 minutes. Add the salt. Gradually mix in the rest of the flour. Allow the dough to dictate how much flour is needed. The dough should be tacky but not sticky. Knead until the dough passes the windowpane test. Cover and allow to raise until double (about one hour).

Turn out onto floured breadboard and shape dough as desired. I made one regular sized loaf and two mini loaves. I would imagine these would make fantastic rolls as well. Allow to rise again for approximately one hour.

Bake at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes or until done. My tiny loaves actually only took about 20 minutes to bake.

BBA Challenge: Challah

The next bread for the BBA challenge was casatiello, which I made, but was devoured before I could take any pictures or post about it. Hopefully I will make it again and remember to photograph it so that I can post about it.

At any rate, the next bread that I made from the BBA challenge was Challah. Challah is an egg rich Jewish celebration bread. I have made Challah in the past, but nothing prepared me for the deliciousness of this recipie. The dough was easy to put together and hand kneading it was a dream. It wasn't sticky, but soft and tender to work with. Braiding this dough was a dream and the finished loaf pulled apart in fluffy chunks.

My husband finished the loaf by making challah French toast. I did not get any, but I hear it was amazing too. The eggs in the bread really added to the taste of the French toast. I would make this recipe again in a heartbeat.

When friends give you zucchini, make zucchini bread

I am one of those special people that has a total black thumb. Growing up and living in rural Illinois, I have a good many friends and relatives who are farmers. People who grow things for a living. They cannot figure out my total lack of ability to grow things. (It likely stems from lack of watering my plants regularly, but hey). At any rate, I cannot grow zucchini. So I am one of those people who quietly buys her zucchini from the grocery store or farmer's market. That is, until one of those previously mentioned farmer friends get wind of my purchasing zucchini and bring me a huge grocery bag full.

For my zucchini bread recipe, I turned to my trusty family cookbook. My mother and grandmother were both prolific zucchini growers and had a ton of recipes for zucchini bread. I decided to adapt one of the recipes to try an make a lower fat version and was met with success. I changed the sugar to honey (and in some cases Splenda) and I replaced the cup of oil with applesauce or yogurt. I also experimented with taking out the some of the eggs and replacing them with egg whites.

Zucchini Pineapple Bread
2 cups sugar (or Splenda or honey)
2 cups shredded zucchini
1 cup vegetable oil (or plain yogurt or applesauce)
1 8oz can crushed pineapple
3 eggs (or 1 egg and two egg whites)
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 cups all purpose flour ( you can use 3 cups all purpose flour if you do not have whole wheat flour)

Mix ingredients together and pour into two loaf pans. Bake at 350 degrees until done (about 50-60 minutes)