8 posts tagged “bread”
We've eaten out a lot this week, and not on purpose. It just happened. So it was only natural that we felt like we needed to have a healthy meal last night. Why is it we stuff our bellies at restaurants, but not so much at home? Anyway, thanks to my Mom and Dad's garden (shame on us, we did not even attempt to grow our own food this summer), we were able to have a meal with six, yes six different vegetables.
I was lucky enough to find Crisp Tomato, Zucchini, and Eggplant Bread Gratin in the Sept. '08 Food and Wine Magazine (This month's issue is full of great recipes. I've already made three of them this past week). With this recipe, I'd use up some vegetables and the inside of the bread from the salami sandwich. When I was making the sandwich, I couldn't bring myself to throw out the extra bread taken from it's middle. Here was my solution.
I followed the techinique of the recipe, but not so much the ingredients to the letter, so I guess I should write out my version instead of theirs. You may get a different product with their recipe...although I'm sure it would be very good, maybe even better. I didn't have eggplant and I used summer squash instead of zucchini. I also used dried herbs instead of fresh. (Oh, the horror).
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
In a colander, toss 1-2 small-medium sliced yellow squash with 1/2 t. salt and let stand for 20 minutes. Drain well and gently squeeze out any excess liquid.
Meanwhile, in a small bowl, stir together 2-3 T olive oil with 2-3 smashed cloves of garlic. Brush a bit of the garlic oil into an 8x8 inch square baking dish. Tear one 7-oz loaf or rustic bread with crusts removed into 2-inch pieces and line the bottom of the baking dish with bread, fitting the pieces tightly together. Brush the bread with more of the garlic oil. and season with salt and pepper. Crush some dried basil over the bread.
In a medium bowl toss the squash with some of the garlic oil and season with salt and pepper. Sprinkle 2 small-medium tomatoes, sliced, with salt and pepper. Arrange squash and tomatoes over bread, overlapping if necessary. Sprinkly with dried thyme and basil. Drizzle with remaining garlic oil.
Bake the gratin for about 40 minutes, until the vegetables begin to brown and the bottom of the bread is golden brown. Remove the gratin from the oven and let stand until colled slightly, about 10 minutes. Serve.
I picked a small bucket of cherries last week. Picking them was quite easy...it took just under one hour for my bucket. Pitting them was not...it took a few hours. It was such a tedious task I divided the time over a few days. Waa waa, I shouldn't cry too much. We've had fresh cherries to eat, and there's some in the freezer for future pies. Husband loves sour cherry pies.
Sour Cherry Muffins with Coconut Struesel tasted great! They, however, were not pretty muffins. I didn't listen to my intuition when assembling. The recipe says to fill the muffin cups to the top. I've made enough muffins to know not to do this. I did it anyway, and I had flat, spread out, spilled over muffins. The coconut struesel topping made the muffins. Delish!
Sorry for the lack of posts, but we're going on vacation tomorrow! The last week or so we've been trying to "clean out" the fridge. It's been quite a task trying to come up with meals from ingredients we already have, and honestly none of them have been blog worthy.
Today, I had reason to bake! Tonight we're having house guests. Sister and Brother-in-law are flying in for the weekend. We'll get to spend about an hour with them tonight before we're off to bed dreaming of sunny skies and blue water. We've got an early flight in the morning, and we'll be at the airport before our guests wake from their slumber. The thought of them waking in an empty house without a proper breakfast was too much for this hostess to bear. It took a few minutes to find something I could make without specialty ingredients, but I found it. I don't know about you, but we always have a leftover cup of coffee from the morning. Coffee Break Muffins. It's a good 2 - for - 1. Their morning cup of coffee is baked right into the muffin. I've made these muffins once before and they are delish!
The recipe is courtesy of Dorie Greenspan of Baking: From My Home to Yours. This is an excellent baking book. It's so good there is a group of bloggers, Tuesdays with Dorie, who are working their way through the book. I've often thought about joining this group, but my dislike for group activities and lack of desire to commit to baking a particular recipe each week has kept me from it. So...I just drool over the recipe/photos each week. While I'm away, check out this group. They blog each week's recipe on Tuesdays.
Coffee Break Muffins
by Dorie Greenspan of Baking: From My Home to Yours
2 c. flour
1/3 c. sugar
1 T instant espresso powder
1 T baking powder
1/2 t. ground cinnamon
1/8 t. salt
1/3 c. packed light brown sugar
1 c. strong coffee, cooled
1 stick unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 large egg
1/2 t. vanilla
400 degrees. Line muffin pan with paper muffin cups.
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, espresso powder, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Stir in the brown sugar, making certain there are no lumps. In a large glass measuring cup or bowl, whisk the coffee, melted butter, egg and vanilla together until well combined. Pour the liquid ingredients into the dry ingredients and, with the whisk or rubber spatula, gently but quickly stir to blend. Don't overmix. Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups. Bake for 20 minutes. Transfer pan to rack and cool for 5 minutes before removing muffins from tin.
Makes 12 muffins.
I'll post when we return from vacation!
I brought home leftover ham from Thanksgiving. I was determined to spring some life into it. It wouldn't be a piece of ham on the plate tonight. What's the name of that foodnetwork show? Oh, Ham on the Street. I don't like traditional ham and beans, but when I saw this recipe I thought it looked pretty good. It essentially is a "light" soup with bacon! Can't be that bad. Space cadet me, however, forgot to bring home the bacon from the store, so this was an even lighter soup...and quite good. Finally, a delicious ham and beans. Imagine what it would taste like with bacon? Where was this on those school lunch menus? Bacon, Ham and Lentil Soup came from Cookinglight.com. I, as well as other reviewers, left out the fennel and reduced the amount of lentils. Also, halved the recipe.
What goes with ham and beans? Cornbread, of course. For my birthday I received a cookbook from 1954. It was a ladies church cookbook that they probably used for a fundraiser at the time. My grandma had a recipe for pecan pie in the book. It's probably the same recipe she uses today. I'll have to ask her. Anyway, I found a sour cream cornbread recipe in this book and thought I should give it a try. It was great. There was a bit of an ordeal at the store. They were out of yellow cornmeal, so I fought my temptation to buy an easy fix - Jiffy mix cornbread - and I tried the white cornmeal. It didn't seem to make much difference in this recipe. I think I'll make this again. Below is the original recipe. I halved it for just the two of us.
Sour Cream Cornbread
1 c. yellow cornmeal
1 c. sifted flour
1 tsp. soda
1 T. sugar
1 tsp. salt
1 egg
1 1/2 c. sour cream
1 T. shortening, melted
Sift dry ingredients, add beaten egg. Add cream, then melted shortening. Pour in 8x8 pan and bake at 345 degrees until golden brown.
I routinely head "out of town" for work. I'm usually gone for a few days to a week at a time. This has been going on for about three years now. I remember my very first trip and the now tradition that I started.
I'd like to think that I'm frugal, not cheap. You see, for these trips, I'm given a per diem in addition to my regular fee. Trying to make money off of this small stipend, I decided to bring my own breakfast, and it has continued over the years. My muffin making began. Not only do I save money, but I get a little bit of home-baked goodness on the road. I've made all flavors, but my very favorite is apple. On my last trip, I had a zucchini lying around as well as an apple. This proved to be a very good muffin. I would go as far to say that this is a must try muffin!
Zucchini, Apple and Pecan Muffin (adapted from Muffin Madness, Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home)
2 eggs
1/2 c oil
3/4 c. brown sugar
1/2 t. vanilla
1/2 t. cinnamon
1 c. grated and peeled apple
1 c. grated zucchini
2 c. flour
1 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1/2 c. chopped pecans
350 degrees. Mix together first 5 ingredients. Stir in apple and zucchini. Stir in baking powder and salt. Then add flour. Lastly, fold in pecans. Spoon batter into oiled standard muffin tins and bake for 20 - 25 minutes.
I love cinnamon rolls, but only my mom's. I think husband was tired of hearing this until he placed his lips on one of the "famed" rolls. This weekend I learned how to make them. Fun and delicious!
In the effort to make it more healthy, I usually use a pizza crust recipe that uses whole wheat and oat flour. I have recently come to find out that husband doesn't like my regular pizza crust too well.
I've been eyeing for quite some time White-Truffled Grissini from Caviar, Truffles, and Foie Gras: Recipes for Divine Indulgence. I don't usually have all of the "divine" ingredients for the recipes from this book, but I had just come into some white truffle oil. I decided to use this dough. Instead of making grissini, I would make pizza.
White-Truffled Grissini (Caviar, Truffles, and Foie Gras: Recipes for Divine Indulgence)
3/4 c. warm water
1 t. active dry yeast
3 T white truffle oil, plus more for brushing
2 c. all-purpose flour
1 1/2 t. kosher salt
Cornmeal for dusting
Pour water into the bowl of a heavy duty mixer and sprinkle the yeast over the surface of the water. Let sit until foamy, about 5 minutes.
With the machine fitted with the paddle attachment and running on low speed, beat 1 T of oil, 1/3 of the flour, and the salt into the yeast mixture. Add another T of oil and then another third of flour, then the remaining 1 T oil and remaining flour to make a soft dough.
Switch to the dough hook and knead dough for 10 minutes on low speed. (I added another 1/3 c. of flour). Brush medium bowl with truffle oil, add the dough, and cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Let rise in a warm place until tripled in size, 2 - 3 hours. (I did not have this long. Only 1 1/2 hours for me).
(This is where I shaped into pizza crust and proceeded as normal).
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Turn the dough out onto a work surface and press the dough into a rectangle about 4 by 14 inches. Using a pizza wheel or a knife, cut a cross to divide the dough into 4 pieces. Cut each section of dough into 5 long pieces. Stretch and roll each strip of dough on your work surface with open flat hands into a round stick about 14 inches long. If the dough is sticky, lightly flour your hands, not the work surface.
Place the grissini on two cornmeal-dusted baking sheets and brush them with truffle oil. Bake for 20 - 25 minutes, rotating pans back to front once during baking, or until light brown. Let cool on rack.
The verdict? Both of us liked the crust. Husband could taste a definite truffle influence, I couldn't tell much difference. (I might have been a bit desensitized by the very strong odor of the oil while making the crust).
So tonight I knew I needed to use chicken and, hopefully, yogurt. I went to my favorite food website: Epicurious. Sure enough after typing in both of my ingredients, several options turned up. I decided on Chicken Tikka. I had all of the ingredients, and it seemed to get good reviews. Knowing I would now have an Indian inspired main dish, I carefully choose my sides. In the most recent issue of Saveur Magazine there was a recipe for Naan. (Oh, naan. So good when it's warm). Anyway, I also made Indian Chickpea Spread from Moosewood Restaurant Low-fat Favorites. (Do you see a trend here? I love that cookbook). You'll also notice from the photo that we had asparagus yet again. (It's been on sale).
Naan (from Saveur Magazine)
Whisk together 4 cups of flour, 1 T plus 1 t. baking powder, 1 T salt, 1 T sugar in a bowl. In another bowl, whisk together 1 1/4 c. milk, 1/3 c plain yogurt, 2 T canola oil and 1 lightly beaten egg. Pour milk mixture over flour mixture; mix into a dough. Knead dough on a floured surface until smooth, 10-12 minutes. Form dough into a ball; cover with a towel; let rest for 30 minutes. Place a baking stone on the middle oven rack; heat oven to 500 (or 550 degrees if possible). Divide dough into 12 pieces; cover with a towel. Working with 1 dough piece at a time, stretch it over a medium inverted bowl into a 6-8inch circle. Heat a large cast-iron skillet over high heat until very hot. Peel dough off bowl; lay in skillet. Bake until puffed on top, 2-3 minutes. Brush naan with butter. Makes 12.
I made a few changes. First, I cut the recipe in half. Second, I skipped the cast iron skillet all together. I placed the dough straight into the oven on the heated baking stone. It worked well. Cooking time 3 minutes plus 1 minute on opposite side.
