Due to a new job, lots of travel, and a snafu when it came to renewing my domain name, this blog has been out of commission for a while, but stay tuned for new recipes and updates in the coming weeks.

Life the past few months has been a whirlwind of activity:  visiting family and friends, life, and starting a new job.  In fact, I travel about four days a week now!  But I continue to cook and bake, I just haven’t had the time or the energy to tend to my humble blog.  That, and the fact that I misplaced my camera (still to be found . . . maybe the suitcase I stored away ?) have slowed me down.  So, today I present a roundup of some of the TWD treats I have baked,currently without pictures because they are on the memory card of my missing camera.

Jennifer of Cooking for Comfort chose Nutty, Chocolatly, Swirly Sour Cream Bundt Cake on page 182.  Let’s see, nuts?  Sour cream?  CHOCOLATE?  What’s not to like?  Loved this one.

Betsy of A Cup of Sweetness chose Lemon Poppyseed Muffins on page 10.  We are big muffin fans around here, and these were delicious even though I could not find my one pound bag of poppy seeds.  Maybe they are with my camera?

A treat that I did not get to make but plan on tackling in the near future?  Margo of Effort to Deliciousness choice of Fluff-Filled Chocolate Madeleines on pages 170-171.

Laurie of Slush and Julie of Someone’s In the Kitchen chose Midnight Crackles on page 74, and these were wonderful.  The one change I made was to leave out the cinnamon and cloves, and add in about 1/2 teaspoon of instant espresso powder.

Another winner, Jill of Jill’s Blog chose Dorie’s incredible Cardamom Crumb Cake.  This was fantastic, and will make repeat appearances in my kitchen.

The very odd Apple Coconut Family Cake, chosen by Amber of Cobbler du Monde, received mixed reviews.  I switched out the apples and put in pineapple.  I really disliked this cake, but everyone else liked it, including Master Chow who usually hates coconut.

Finally, the Peanuttiest Blondies from way back in early November, picked by Nicole of Bakeologie, also won rave reviews from everybody but me.  Everybody liked these, but I didn’t, and I think it’s just because I like chocolate brownies, not chocolate wanna-be’s!

Be sure to go to the Tuesdays with Dorie blog to see what everyone else’s results were this week!

I have been so busy, my life has been interfering with my cooking and baking, and that’s what life should be about, don’t you think? Ha!

At any rate, over the next couple weeks, I will be posting not only the weekly TWD dish, but others that I made but did not have time to post.  So, today, in addition to a fantastic apple pie, I’m also posting the Double Apple Bundt Cake and coffee-less muffins.

First, this week’s All-American, All-Delicious Apple Pie on pages 300-302, chosen by Emily of Sandmuffin.  Really, the only change I made was to eliminate the crumbs, and double the tapioca to four teaspoons, since I can’t stand a runny filling.  This pie was outstanding, and both my honorable husband, Master Chow, and I thought the addition of the lemon zest is what made it so good.  I’ve used lemon juice in the past, but from now on I will use the zest.

A couple weeks ago, TWD baker Lynne of Honey Muffin chose Double Apple Bundt Cake on pages 184 and 185.  Another winner, and the flavor really mellowed overnight.  I did not have apple butter, but I did have a jar of this pumpkin butter on hand and I needed to use it up.  Absolutely delicious, and I also substituted dried cranberries for the raisins.  Yum.

Finally, from back in September, I made the Coffee Break Muffins that Rhiani of Chocoholic Anonymous chose.  Except that I eliminated the coffee because my husband hates coffee.  So, I substituted 1/2 cup of orange juice and 1/2 cup of milk for the coffee, and added the zest of an orange and 1.5 cups of frozen cranberries.  Voila!  Orange cranberry muffins, that also go on the repeat list!

I have to thank Dorie and all the TWD bakers for their wonderful choices.  It is so much fun to bake things that are so successful your family wants you to make them again!

I’ll be putting up a bunch of posts, including TWD.  I’ve been out of town and just got back.

This week, Jasmine of Jasmine Cuisine selected Peanut Butter Crisscrosses on page 78 of Dorie’s book for Tuesdays with Dorie.  Quick and easy to make, the cookies came out thick and crispy, and chock full of peanuts.  I like my peanut butter cookies a bit more on the chewy side, but these were definitely a hit with the peanut lovers who tried them.

What’s been going on with me?  Well, my neighbor accidentally cut my phone and internet line, and it took the phone company 18 days to repair it.  The repair took about 30 minutes.  I’ve been looking after my 80 year old auntie.  Summer projects. Misplaced my camera and could not find it for about a week.

And, best of all, I was at King Arthur Flour for a week, taking an advanced bread baking class.  I’ll be posting more about it, but you can read my two previous posts here and here.

Be sure to check the TWD blogroll to see what everyone else baked!

As promised, here is another entry about my advanced baking class at King Arthur Flour.  In keeping with my previous post about brioche, I thought I’d show you another item that we baked, something that is not common in this country:  Brioche Feuilleté.

If you don’t eat butter, read no further.  Brioche Feuilleté has a LOT of butter.  Did I mention butter?

Speaking of butter, here is one of my favorite Saturday Night Live skits:

Actually, we made three mouthwatering breads with the brioche dough:  brioche feuilleté, coffeecake, and bienenstich (bee sting).  Today I’ll talk about brioche feuilleté, and save the other two for another day.  Soon, I promise.

Brioche Feuilleté

Well, what can you say about taking brioche dough, which is loaded with butter, and laminating it (like puff pastry) with MORE butter?  Yum.  Pass it on down.

Chef Hamelman (his book is one of my favorites: Bread: A Baker’s Book of Techniques and Recipes)  first learned to make this at his first baking job about 34 years ago from a French baker.  Basically, you roll out the brioche dough, and incorporate butter into it by folding, similar to the way you would make danish dough or puff pastry dough – that’s the “feuilleté” part. Here is the brioche dough before the lamination process, which I didn’t get pictures of because I was too busy:

In the photo above, we are cutting and weighing dough portions.  Once that is done we divided our dough into three equal portions and rolled them out:

Brush the top edge of each strip THINLY with egg wash, and then pipe the filling in a thin strip near the bottom edge.

The filling was a mixture of ground hazelnuts, puff pastry crumbs (you can even use old bread crumbs), simple syrup, and egg whites.  Roll each strip closed, pinching the bottom seam if you have to.

Keeping the seam side down, braid the three strips together and place in a standard loaf pan, brush with egg wash, and let rise until puffy.  Then bake until it’s a rich, deep brown and the sides are firm.  Baking temperature is about 350 F, but no higher than 375 F.

When the loaves were done, we brushed them with an apricot glaze, which I could have eaten straight out of the pot, and then Chef Hamelman drizzled a fondant glaze over the loaves.

This was so good, I was practically beside myself.  The aroma was incredible.  Buttery, fluffy brioche with little pockets of sweet nuts from the filling.  Amazing.  Its even good when it’s stale – just toast it.  You can even top it with more butter, if you dare!

This post has been Yeastspotted!

Sorry for the lousy photo above, but don’t let it stop you from making this delicious tart.  I found this fabulous recipe over at Smitten Kitchen, and I’ve made it twice so far, to rave reviews.  Even Master Chow, my honorable husband, fell in love with this, although he was skeptical that zucchini in a tart shell was much to rave about.

What I changed:  I doubled the filling and added a bit of Dijon mustard to the recipe.  That’s it.  This is a winner and I’ll be baking it often!  Recipe after the jump.
continue reading "Zucchini and Ricotta Galette"

I just returned from the one week long Advanced Bread Baking course with Certified Master Baker Jeffrey Hamelman at King Arthur Flour (KAF) in Norwich, Vermont.  How was it?

FABULOUS.

The last couple years have been exhausting in a number of ways, with lots of travel and caring for an ill family member.  My husband recommended a vacation.  For some reason, I just wasn’t interested.  But I kept going back to the class offerings at KAF, and they REALLY interested me.

I met all sorts of wonderful people; some were in second or third careers, some were thinking of launching their own bakeries, and all of us were enthusiastic and eager to learn, and learn we did.  Over the next couple weeks, I’ll be posting about all the wonderful breads and pastries that we made,but I’ll start with the brioche.

I’ve made a lot of brioche, but never Brioche à tête because I was intimidated by the shaping.  Thanks to Chef Hamelman, I was able to produce a decent looking brioche, albeit a bit top heavy.  I named her Dolly Parton.  I’m not posting the recipe because we were baking in professional quantities, but any good brioche recipe will work for you.

Some tips:

• weigh your ingredients, including the eggs (Dorie’s recipe in the link above doesn’t have weights, but it works)
• develop the gluten in the dough until it “sheets” and you get a really good windowpane
• keep the dough cold.
• don’t drown the dough in flour when shaping, but keep your HANDS well floured the whole time so that you don’t rip the dough ball
• when you are making a hole for the top knot, push all the way down to the bottom of the  pan and make sure that the circle of dough surrounding the hole is of even diameter all the way around so that the brioche rises and bakes evenly
• with dry, floured hands, really push that top knot into the hole, pushing until you feel the bottom of the pan
• with a pair of scissors, make about five slashes evenly around the periphery of the brioche, right next to the edge of the pan, before the final proof.
• the brioche in the picture above is NOT burned – that is the color you should get if you are using 100% butter.  Dark is good.
• this is important:  to test to make sure your brioche is done, remove it from the pan and feel the sides of the loaf.  Are they soft and giving, even if they look brown?  If yes, the bread is NOT finished baking.  Return it to the pan and the oven and check again in a few minutes.  Why?  If the sides are not baked firmly, the gluten structure will collapse and you will get an “hourglass” effect instead of the structured sides you are looking for.

Stay tuned for more posts on what I learned.  I came home with over 100 pounds of flour, so I anticipate that my bread baking obsession will be well nurtured for the foreseeable future.  And be sure to check out Susan’s weekly roundup called Yeastspotting!

I’m at King Arthur Flour in Vermont, taking the advanced bread baking class. When I drove up and saw the sign, I felt like I’d arrived at the promised land!

Between no internet and phone, a trip to check on my auntie, and this trip, I have a backup of TWD posts to get up, plus info on the class. I’ll be posting the TWD post next Tuesday, so stay tuned.

In the meantime, my head is swimming with Baker’s percentages!

Fourteen days ago (yes, 14) my neighbor accidentally cut our phone and internet line while replacing the fence between our properties.  It took ten days for the phone company to actually send a tech out to repair the damage.  Only Verizon forgot to tell her that the LINE HAD BEEN CUT.  So, she arrived unprepared for the task, but managed to rig a patch after telling us that our entire line would have to be replaced.  That will involve ripping up our yard and digging a new trench.

So, that’s what’s been going on.  Sometimes, I think weird stuff happens to us.  Oh, and all this is on top of an $8,000 chimney repair.

But, as grandma used to say, we have our health, food on the table, and a roof over our heads.  Hallelujah!