Week 1: Re-Do- Roasted Garlic & Parmesan Focaccia

February 8, 2019February 13, 2019Leave a comment

Did you know that in Sicily pizza is sometimes made with Focaccia bread and is called sfincione? And guess who loves pizza and has a baking challenge theme to catch up on???

Yup, so since I’m playing catch up with the challenge, I have been pondering over what to do for week 1’s re-do theme. For this, you can either re-do something you made last year or just pick something off the previous year’s challenge list. I thought about making something with choux pastry, but in the end I got the hankering for some bread making and wouldn’t you know that leavened bread was a theme in the 2018 challenge.

And the lucky winner is Focaccia.

I used to make this bread on occasion with my mother when I was younger, because we were stereotypical Sicilians, so it has a special place in my heart. Its also easy to make and super delicious. And customizable!

Much like other Italian foods like pasta or pizza, Focaccia is different region to region. In Venice, for example, its made with eggs, sugar, and milk. In Northern Italy its made sweet with sugar, honey, and raisins or even chocolate. For an example, check out this recipe from Eataly here.In Liguria in particular its made super thin and crispy….and stuffed with cheese!

Focaccia di Recco of Liguria, courtesy of Wikipedia

Last but not least, as I mentioned at the beginning, the Sicilians also use it to make a sfincione style pizza. (Sorry, I get a bit overexcited about regional variations in Italian food…)

Sicilian *Sfincione*, courtesy of Wikipedia…Again.

Since I’m making ~fancy cupcakes~ this weekend, I thought a Focaccia would be relatively quick and painless to put together, especially with this no-knead recipe from Serious Eats. Just roast, mix, let sit forever, and then bake. Perfect~

Roasted garlic is incredibly delicious, but I also decided to add freshly grated Parmesan cheese in. Because why not, who would say ‘no’ to that? I think this bread is gonna pair very well with a nice Ribollita or minestrone soup!

I followed the Serious Eats version for the most part, but did change it a bit by not using oregano and instead using fresh parmesan cheese in the dough. I also didn’t cook it at 550° degrees, but at 450 ° for about an extra 10 minutes. 550 ° in my oven would guarantee a burnt loaf, for sure.

So, could I, in fact, bake this bread?

Yes…kind of….

Not sponsored by Chicago Cutlery…unless they’re looking for people to sponsor?

Ok, truth time. I forgot to mix in my cheese and had to knead the bread to work it in. I got distracted making dinner. But that’s all I did, I promise! Only one goof!

I baked it in a 15-inch cast iron pan, so it came out a tad bit thinner than I expected. However it was delectably crusty on the bottom and soft on top, life a Focaccia needs to be. Plus roasted garlic is a miracle food, as I have lauded.

It smelled so good that I couldn’t wait to cut it….and proceeded to break the loaf, lol. Don’t cut bread fresh out of the oven, folks. But it tasted like sweet roasted garlic and had a bit of that cheesy tang of freshly shaved parmesan. The crumb was nice and moist and chewy, and the flavor yeast also really came through (thanks, 24 hour proof!). This is a denser bread it works it so well~

So, yeah, successful bread! Yay!

I’ll be making some cupcakes for the next challenge soon, then I’ll finally be all caught up, thank the gods.

Baking Sidetrack- Spicy Honey Roasted Almonds

February 5, 2019February 13, 2019Leave a comment

Ok, so I know roasted almonds aren’t technically a “baked good” but they are a sweet snack/ dessert and are cooked in an oven. Plus they’re delicious.

I think almonds are a great blank canvas to carry a lot of flavors, just Google roasted almond recipes. You get ones for cinnamon, cocoa dusted, barbeque, chili lime, curry, tumeric and garlic. The list goes on and on.

So then, why make a post about almonds? A.) Because my photos came out gorgeous and B.) I actually kind of edited this recipe enough to warrant a recipe, C.) Cause baking relieves my daily stress and gloom, D.) I like almonds, ok? They’re high in protein and a good source of several vitamins. Too bad they’re horrible for the drought-ravaged environment of California.

Well, I adapted it from a recipe found on Allrecipes here. But in all honesty, the recipe for honey roasted almonds has pretty much the same mechanics across the board, I found it on several other food blogs all having very similar directions.

My particular version adds a nice amount of cinnamon and a dash of cayenne pepper to help balance out the sugary honey goodness.

Spicy Honey Roasted Almonds

Time: 30 minutes
Difficulty: easy
Print

Credit: Allrecipes

Ingredients:

2 Cups almonds
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons honey
3 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon neutral oil, I used canola
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Directions

Spread almonds in a single layer on a baking sheet and place in a cold oven.
Turn oven on to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Bake almonds until tan and fragrant, 12 to 15 minutes. Be sure to stir them once or twice while roasting for an even roast.
While the almonds roast, mix sugar, spices, and salt together in a bowl bowl. Keep about 1 tablespoon sugar mixture and add it into a large bowl, reserve the rest to later toss over the almonds.
Add honey, water, and oil together in a saucepan. Stir together and bring to a boil. Be careful to watch it as it will burn if you aren’t careful!
Add almonds; Reduce heat to medium low and cook and stir until almonds have absorbed all the liquid, about 5 minutes.
Transfer coated almonds to the large bowl with the smaller sugar mixture. Sprinkle remaining sugar mixture over almonds; toss to coat evenly.
Spread almonds onto wax or parchment paper to cool completely. Store at room temperature in an airtight covered container.

*Add the cayenne pepper to taste. If you like a lot of spice add more, if you can’t handle the heat add none!

I also wanted to use this post as a practice for using shortcode to make recipe boxes. While researching how to make recipe boxes I realized that you can only get the WordPress plugins if you have a business subscription…and since I’m kind of unemployed and still depressed, I couldn’t gather the enthusiasm to pay for it….Maybe if I get a steady stream of readers down the line….far, far down the line. Even then, this hobby is for me, not for the views.

Off topic….back to the topic…

I probably won’t post my own recipes often, usually only if I make noticeable changes, just so you guys know.

Week 4: Drop Cookies- Caramel Apple Cookies

February 2, 2019February 13, 2019Leave a comment

Today me will live in the moment, unless its unpleasant in which case me will eat a cookie
Cookie Monster

So I play Dungeons and Dragons. Ok, I really play a lot of different kinds of Tabletop Role-Playing games (TRPGs). I even wrote (one of) my Master’s Thesis on these kinds of games. I love these games and they are a huge part of my life. I met one of my oldest and dearest friends because of these games and have successfully roped in a lot of my friends into playing them, or met friends through them.

Why? They let you be creative and live out your craziest dreams. Wanna try and seduce a dragon? Go for it. Wanna be a spy or a superhero? You can find a game for that. You work together with other people to make a story. Its a lot of fun. I recommend it, and Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) is a good place to start, mainly because its the biggest one.

My main group of TRPG people actually just started picking up again after a few months off, so needless to say D&D is consuming my life again. Podcasts like Critical Role, fleshing out character backstory and how I want to play, lurking on the Reddit forums for inspiration, helping out the newbies in the group. Its all over my life right now, which is a nice change from the existential dread that has been looming over me the last year.

Now Jenni, you may be asking, I thought this was a blog about a baking challenge? Where are the pics of your nearly destroyed kitchen? We’re waiting for the first epic failure of the challenge, hop to it!

So, the reason for the dip into D&D is that this weeks challenge idea is cookies and my current and currently most beloved character has a thing for apples. And pastels but that isn’t really relevant here. I decided that his family owns a cidery (or is it a winery, cause fruit?) and apple orchard, and my character likes to cook and always has apple products on him.

Yeah, this is the kind of stuff D&D has. Its not weird.

In his honor I decided to do an apple recipe, inspired by my character! Plus, I needed a recipe a bit more laid-back after the Medovik Honey cake earlier this week. What I decided on was a caramel apple drop cookie inspired by House of Yumm. I did change it up a bit by using only cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger, cause I just didn’t want to buy anymore spices. And I used butterscotch because the store didn’t have those caramel baking bits.

So, could I, in fact, bake these cookies? Were they good?

I can bake these! Actually, I sort of expected these to not turn out, mainly because I’ve baked more drop cookies than I can count so it would make sense that they burned or I mixed up the salt and sugar or something.

In the end, though, they came out golden brown and chewy. Just what you want from a cookie with brown sugar in the mix!

Not to worry, though, I did manage to drop a tray of these cookies tripping over my cat.

I think I’m getting better at this food photography thing…

Poor things.

They weren’t very difficult to throw together, so I also made some Oatmeal lace cookies.

I was going to drizzle chocolate on them or fill them with Nutella and make sandwiche cookies but, eh, I got tired of making cookies.

Whelp, that’s it for week 4. Next week the challenge is piping, so I sense I cake coming on! Fancy, decorated cake. What could co horribly wrong? Eventually I’ll also get around to catching-up on week 1’s “re-do” challenge. I’m thinking something Pate Choux….cause that pastry hates me.

See ya!

Baking Sidetrack- The Joy of Pizza

February 1, 2019February 13, 2019Leave a comment

Any pizza can be a personal one if you cry while you eat it.
Aparna Nancherla

There are two things in this world I am almost 100% sure about: 1.) that my dog completely owns my existence, and 2.) that all pizza is good pizza.

Look at him in his cute little hoodie using my winter coat as a blanket…Guess I’ll freeze to death!

Ok, so I know pizza is a contentious topic. People arguing over Chicago or New York style, pineapple yes or no, what kind of oven you need to use to bake it. for me though, I’ve never had a pizza so horribly bad that I couldn’t finish it. May it be bagel or pocket, thin crust or thick, deep dish or Neapolitan, delivery or DiGiorno. I like all styles and I’ve had bad versions of each, but I still always eat it.

Ok, so this might be a personal bias since my brothers all worked in pizzerias one point in time

I think a lot of people can actually agree with that. Who hasn’t been helping a friend move or be at some undergraduate dorm event and just mindlessly ate some mediocre pizza. Like, humans just love pizza. We’ve been eating versions of it since ancient times (I’m looking at you flatbread with cheese and topping on it! You’re just pizza without sauce!)

The best part about pizza is that you can literally make it homemade super easily. Not in less time than delivery (well, depending on the recipe) and but it will taste better than frozen. No shame if you eat a lot of frozen pizza, though. I eat a lot of frozen pizza. A LOT. I recommend thin crust DiGiorno or the fancy Publix store brand, cause I’m from Florida and I love Publix. Go to Publix.

So. Pizza dough. What’s it’s deal?

Pizza dough is a lean dough, meaning its got minimal ingredients, very little fat, and don’t require a lot of kneading. It gives you a crusty exterior and a light and airy interior. Sound familiar? Pizza dough! or bagets or no-knead bread.

Enriched dough is the opposite. It gets a lot of attention kneading and rising wise, has more fat, and results in a softer crust and a tender dough. Think sandwich bread or cinnamon roll dough, which I recently made.

Now, the basic requirements for a pizza dough are:

1 pack active yeast, sugar, water, and flour. That’s it. Maaybe some cornmeal for the bottom of the pizza and a little olive oil in the dough for flavor.

For specifics you can find a lot of great recipes online. For a quick, 30-mintes or less option look here at Joy Food Sunshine. I used this one recently, it takes literally 30 minutes to throw this one together. My dough came out a little bready and a bit thick, but it made a sturdy and reliable crust.

If you want a recipe that let’s the dough rise and makes a less bready and a more flavorful, at least in my opinion, crust try out the always reliable Sally’s Baking Addiction

This pizza was kind of a last minute thing. I used the Joy Food Sunshine recipe because it was already 7:00pm and I knew it would make a good quick crust. Sadly, the mushrooms I had in my fridge had already gone bad, so I made the unique zucchini and onion pizza, haha.

A few days later the bread-making bug struck again, so I made pizza for the second time this week. Don’t judge. For this one I used the dough recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction, since I had more time to let it rise. I also remembered I had a pizza pan. and had time to buy actual normal pizza toppings.

~win~

So crispy. So cheesy. So pizza. I went with a spinach garlic mushroom pie, cause vitamins. The crust is definitely less bready than the first, but that quick recipe is no slouch! I’d definitely recommend giving both a try!

So yeah. It was a pizza kind of week. The drop cookie challenge of the week is coming, just got a bit sidetracked this week!

Week 2: Russia- Medovik ‘Honey Cake’

January 28, 2019January 6, 2020Leave a comment

The great thing about cake is it doesn’t feel like work. You forget about work. Kids, adults, they all get the same look in their eye when they’re decorating cakes… That’s the magic right there.
Duff Goldman

Oh Duff Goldman. If only you could have seen me trying to make this cake. This nightmare of a cake-baking experience. This is the story of my Week 2 catch-up challenge. My Medovik cake. That bitch.

First off, Natasha of Natasha’s Kitchen is a goddess. Her directions and videos are so clear and simple to follow. Heck, she’s where I got the recipe for my Genoise sponge I tried a few weeks ago. So this is all on me.

Everyone has those moments when a recipe just, decides to personally victimize them. To scar them. To break their blender. The Russian Medovik (honey cake) is that for me right now.

The Medovik cake is a layered cake, kind of like a mille-feuille but with no custard or pastry cream, not exactly puff pastry, and honey in the dough. Ok, so maybe it isn’t like a mille-feuille…

Its really, really similar to a Russian Napoleon cake, but again, honey in the dough, and the layers are more like a cookie than a straight-up flaky pastry. However, some recipes seem to use puff pastry like the mille-feuille, but from my experience a lot of dessert recipes vary a lot from family tradition to family tradition. As far as my general internet research showed they’re more or less in the same family of cakes though.

A traditional Mille-Feuille, courtesy of Wikipedia

If you want to give this cake a try after reading about my horror story, check out the expert recipe from Natacha’s Kitchen here.

So….How’d I do? Could I, in fact, bake that?

The first thing that really should’ve tipped me off that this would be a bad baking experience was burning my wrist while making the dough. I’m definitely gonna have a nice big blister in the next few days. But, you may be asking, how’d you burn yourself making cake dough?

Cause this dough is actually similar to a pate a choux dough; you gotta cook up stuff and then add flour. And then be miserable…..I have a…history with pate a choux…

So after melting the honey, butter, and sugar you gotta quickly whisk in the eggs in a thin constant stream. If you just dump them in the hot honey and sugar mix it will scramble the eggs. Don’t do that. Then, add enough flour so its not sticky…..mine never got completely not-sticky, and I almost added in 4 cups of flour, whereas the recipe said about 3.

The real fun part was rolling out the dough. You divide the dough into 8 equal little balls, then roll out super thin. Then you cut out a 9-inch circle and bake. I, thinking that I bake quite a bit and am going to be prepared, cut out a circle in parchment paper… too bad the dough turned out to be a nightmare to work with. IT JUST KEPT STICKING, no matter how much flour I used… Lucky for y’all my hands were covered in dough so there are no disastrous torn up dough pictures.

Even then, my layers weren’t perfect circles. I just got to a point that the dough was getting suuuuper thin, like almost too thin…so I just had to accept the weird shapes.

The dough bakes for 4-5 minutes, until golden brown and I guess slightly puffy, it reminded me a lot of pita bread coming out of the oven. Now I want hummus. Dang it.

The fun part of any cake is making the icing, and the Medovik cake has an extraordinarily yummy sour cream whipped cream icing. Its very yum.

Mix together a ton of sour cream with powdered sugar, whip the heavy whipping cream, then fold both together. Finally, trip on a pile of that flour you used to roll out the cake dough and fling your blender into a wall… Then, put the baked up extra dough bits into the blender and blend, having a cloud of blended cake/cookie fly into your face from the cracked blender you didn’t notice until now. So much for grinding up the cake crumbs…

And then experience the final trauma of icing a cake with uneven layers and an icing that really isn’t thick enough to fill in the gaps. Its no buttercream or cream cheese icing.

Also, remind me to get a cake stand for decorating purposes.

By the end of it I just started flinging icing back at it, haha. See? What other food blog shows you the nitty-gritty of the baking process? All the failure that goes into it?

I’m sure there’s like, a thousand blogs.

Finally, top with the crushed up cake bits and put the cake in the fridge to set overnight and sadly eat the remainder of the icing in defeat…

~24 hours later~

The moment of truth…. did it turn out ok? Was the dough under-cooked? Did it cut cleanly? Did my friend who came over for D&D enjoy eating it?

Pay no attention to the hole in the side of the cake…

Ok, so I have no idea how I managed to make what I think was a perfect-adjacent Medovik cake. But I really think I did? Some of the layers did just of get smushed, but I think I did that as I angrily smothered on the frosting.

My friend and I devoured this cake. Like, I’ve made a lot of cakes in my day and this is definitely in the top 10 of best cakes I’ve ever made. Not that you fine folks reading this blog are familiar with my past baking exploits, so…just trust me on this. The cake layers were so soft and delicate. The sour cream icing is tangy and slightly sweet, and got a very nice creamy texture after sitting in the fridge overnight.

Just. Yum. Much yum.

I actually think…I might make this again. For a special occasion of course.

So, in the end, I’d have to say, yeah, I can bake that! Painfully and messily, but I can!

Later in the week I’ll be posting about Week 4’s topic, drop cookies. Stay tuned for potentially burnt cookies!

Bye!