This week Kelly of Baking with the Boys selected Fresh Mango Bread for us to bake from Baking: From My Home to Yours.  I thought that I had everything on hand, but Fate interceded, and I had to cobble the recipe together.

First, I thought I had enough mangoes:  two from the store, and two from a friend’s tree in Florida.  I had to throw the store mangoes out because they were so nasty they were an affront to all mangoes.  I lived in Hawaii for almost 13 years and I had a mango tree, so I know a good mango from a bad one.  The Florida mangoes were perfumed perfection, but together they only gave me a little over a cup of fruit, instead of the required 2 cups.  So, I threw in some canned crushed pineapple.

Second, I couldn’t find my ground ginger, so I subbed two tablespoons of diced crystallized ginger.

Third, I realized – in the middle of baking – that I’d used up all my limes, an extraordinarily rare event around here since I have a citrus obsession.  Remedy:  lemon zest.

Fourth, I decided to use my industrial strength Vietnamese cinnamon, so I cut back on that, too, as recommended by Penzeys.

Fifth, I nixed the raisins and added some chopped walnuts.

Finally, I cut back the oil to 1/2 cup from 3/4 cup.  I made up the difference with more crushed pineapple.

The loaf baked to a deep golden brown in an hour and fifteen minutes.  Let me tell you, folks, this smells wonderful when it’s baking.  The top had little bits of caramelized pineapple peeking out.  I had some left over passionfruit buttercream (yes, after a year, it was still good!) from a previous Daring Bakers challenge, so I rather absent-mindedly smeared my first slice of the mango bread with some of it.

DING! DING! DING!  Flavor explosion!  Taste perfection!  I’m writing down everything I did, because I loved this bread and I want to make it again.  None of the spices overwhelmed the moist bread, everything worked together, and the passionfruit buttercream was literally the icing on the cake.  Definitely on the repeat list!  Check out Kelly’s blog for the original recipe, and the TWD website for the blog roll.  My adapted recipe after the jump . . .
continue reading "TWD: Mango -Pineapple Bread with a Little Passionfruit on the Side"

And here we have our last participant in my New Year’s Day dinner, which included prime rib, and iceberg lettuce wedges with blue cheese dressing.  According, to Master Chow, the Best Meal that I have Ever Made.

We will now have a moment of silence as I look at my feet and kick the dirt.  Modestly.

OK, let’s move along.  I realized that it had been years and years since I had made popovers for my now-honorable husband, my then-honorable boyfriend.  When I was thinking of what to serve with New Year’s dinner, popovers came to mind.  Of course, since I have but one oven, making them for dinner would require a bit of juggling, but juggle I did.

I didn’t have the time to dig out my old popover recipe (where IS it?), but I found one over at Epicurious that I tweaked a bit.  Long ago I discovered that the key to popovers is not so much the recipe, but the technique.  Let the batter sit at room temperature for a while, and preheat the empty pan in the oven before you fill it.  That’s about it.  Oh, and you need a hot oven.  So, basically, I ignored about half the instructions in the recipe, and had excellent results, I must say.

The recipe made 5 large popovers.  I stuck the leftovers in a plastic zip top bag, and we ate them the next morning for breakfast.  Were they as great as they had been fresh out of the oven?  No, but they were still tasty and had a slightly chewy texture that I liked.

So, without further ado, you will find the popover recipe after the jump.  If you want to jazz them up a bit, you can always add a bit of your favorite herb or spice to the mixture.  Recipe after the jump. . . .

continue reading "Popovers, Revisited After Many Years (No TWD – I’m Out of Town)"

A while back, I bought come extra sharp cheddar cheese at our local Costco.  All I have to say about the “extra sharp” adjective is – HA!  FAT CHANCE! It was about as sharp as a baseball.  Needless to say, I can’t stand wasting food, so I had to find a way to use it up.

First up, Bacon Cheddar Quick Bread with Dried Pears, (by Dorie Greenspan in the October 2008 issue of Bon Appetit).  Yes, I made something out of the magazine, even though I’ve been very disappointed with the change in format this year.  For me, the biggest strike against the magazine is the microscopic, hard-to-read font that they’ve been using.  A few months ago, I counted five different fonts on one page alone, and finally gave up.  And, I’m not alone in my disappointment over the changes in a much-loved magazine. I really appreciate Bon Appetit trying to keep things fresh and interesting, but I think they went a bit too far.

Now that I’ve got that out of my system (thanks for listening), what can I say about this quickbread recipe from dear Dorie?

Pros:  good texture and great idea. I will try it again, but I will tweak the recipe.  Dorie offers some great alternate flavoring suggestions.

Cons:  the flavor.  I hated the bacon and the sage, and I used a quality bacon from Whole Foods, and I usually like sage.  The aforementioned cheddar was completely indiscernible.  Neither Master Chow nor I would eat more than a slice of this bread (and I picked all the bacon out of mine), so it sits in my freezer.  If you decide to make it (and Brilynn had great results, so don’t be afraid), use a really, really sharp cheddar.  The kind that will put hair on your chest.

What I will do differently in the future:  no sage or bacon.  I will use blue cheese, and increase the pears and walnuts.  Did I say no sage?

On to experiment number 2 – a cheese souffle made with the same shameful IMPOSTOR of an extra-sharp cheddar cheese.  If you’ve never made a souffle before, you should know that it is very important to make a strongly flavored base, so that the dish actually tastes like something once it has been mixed with the egg whites, and baked.

I got to work and doctored this recipe from Food and Wine by adding both anchovy paste and sundried tomato paste, since I didn’t have gruyere (nooooo, I had a crappy cheddar).  Voilá! A pretty good cheddar cheese souffle and, unlike the savory bread, Master Chow had several servings of this, as did I.  If you used a really good flavorful cheddar, this would be excellent.  Recipe after the jump . . . .
continue reading "A Cheddar Cheese Tale"

Behold, my lopsided cranberry orange bread, another winning recipe from Beth Hensperger, this time from her classic tome,The Bread Bible: 300 Favorite Recipes. I confused the cooling instructions with another one for a different bread, which said to cool the bread on its side. This resulted in my tasty but deformed loaf.

This is a wonderful little bread that takes advantage of the cranberries, oranges, and walnuts that are filling our markets this time of year. It is not too sweet, and the flavor of the cranberries really comes through, despite the presence of the zest of two whole oranges in the batter. The bread freezes very well, if you wrap it carefully. I wrapped it in plastic wrap, then foil, and then put the whole packet in a freezer-safe plastic storage bag.

I was out of ground ginger, so I substituted very finely minced crystallized ginger, which dissolved in the batter. This bread is definitely on my repeat list. And take a look at the batter – isn’t that a beautiful pink color?

Cranberry Orange Bread

Adapted from The Bread Bible: 300 Favorite Recipes by Beth Hensperger
Makes one 8 1/2 inch-by-4 1/2 inch loaf

1 1/2 cups cranberries, fresh or frozen (if frozen, do not thaw)

1 cup sugar

2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1 T baking powder

1/4 t salt

1/2 t freshly grated nutmeg

1/2 t finely minced crystallized ginger

grated zest of 2 oranges

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

3/4 cup fresh orange juice

2 large eggs

1 t pure vanilla extract

4 T unsalted butter, melted

Position rack in the center of the oven, and preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a 8 1/2 inch-by-4 1/2 inch loaf pan.

In a food processor, coarsely chop the cranberries and set aside.

In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, and ginger, and mix well. Add the orange zest and walnuts, and toss to mix well.

In another bowl, combine the orange juice and eggs, and mix until frothy. Add the vanilla and cranberries. Pour over the dry ingredients, and then drizzle with the butter. Stir until just moistened (do NOT over mix) and the cranberries are evenly distributed.

Pour batter into the loaf pan. Place pan on a rack in the center of the oven. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes. The top should be crusty and golden, and a skewer inserted into the center of the loaf should come out clean.

Transfer to rack to cool. Wrap in plastic wrap and let bread sit overnight before serving. Believe it or not, I actually was able to do this last step!

Last Christmas, we bought some Sam Adams Light beer for dinner guests. Because Master Chow and I do not like beer, five bottles have been sitting in our basement since December. What to do?

Beth Hensperger and Beer Batter Bread, to the rescue. Master Chow loved this! The taste of the beer that you use really comes through, so pick one that you like. I added 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne to the batter, and even for me (I don’t like a lot of heat in food) that wasn’t quite enough, so you may want to eliminate it, increase it, or substitute other herbs. Dill and caraway might be a nice combination, or rosemary.

The bread is best the day it is baked, but I froze some and it was wonderful, toasted with butter, a few days later.

Beer Batter Bread

Adapted from Williams-Sonoma Collection: Bread

• 3 cups (15 oz./470 g) unbleached all-purpose flour

• 3 Tablespoons firmly packed light brown sugar

• 1 Tablespoon baking powder

• 1 teaspoon salt

• 1/4 teaspoon powdered cayenne pepper

• 1 bottle (12 fl. oz./ 375 ml) beer, unopened and at room temperature

• 4 Tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, plus extra for greasing the pan

Preheat the oven to 375 F, and grease a 9-by-5 inch loaf pan. Place a rimmed baking sheet in the oven, on the middle rack, while you prepare the batter.

In a large bowl, mix together the dry ingredients. Open the beer and add it all at once – it will foam up, so be sure to use a large bowl. Stir briskly just until ingredients are combined, about 2o strokes. The batter should be slightly lumpy and thick. Pour into loaf pan, and drizzle with the melted butter.

Place the loaf pan on the baking sheet in the oven. Bake about 35-40 minutes, or until the top is golden brown and crusty, and a cake tester inserted in the middle comes out clean. Let loaf rest about 5 minutes before turning out onto a cooling rack.

Enjoy with plenty of butter, or plain.