Martha Stewart Baking at Home

Pecan snowballs (otherwise known as Mexican Wedding Cookies)

2009-03-13T17:20:00.001-04:00

These are one of my favorite holiday cookies. They should be sweet, crumbly, and melt in your mouth. I know it doesn't make much sense to post about holiday cookies in March, but I can't help it if my cravings don't always follow the seasons! It's not my fault if they look like miniature snowmen.

I've eaten many different versions of these cookies, so I was curious to try Martha's version. Her recipe is very simple.

Ingredients:

1 cup (3 1/4 oz) pecans
2 cups powdered sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp almond extract

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and place oven racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.

Grind the pecans and 1/4 cup powdered sugar in a good processor until the nuts are finely ground.

Whisk together the sugar-nut mixture, flour, and salt in a large bowl.

Using the paddle attachment of your stand mixture, cream the butter and 3/4 cup powdered sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add the vanilla and almond extracts and beat until combined.

Add the flour-nut mixture and beat on low speed until everything starts to hold together.

Roll small pieces of dough into 1/2 - 3/4 inch balls and place them 2 inches apart on the baking sheets. Bake the cookies until they are lightly browned on the bottom but still light on top, approximately 10-12 minutes. Rotate the baking sheets (top to bottom and front to back) halfway through baking. The cookies may flatten slightly while baking.

Transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool.

After the cookies have cooled completely, toss the cookies with 1 cup powdered sugar in a large bowl. Make sure the cookies are completely covered with sugar.

Enjoy!

Perfect Popovers (Part Deux)

2009-03-06T14:40:00.000-05:00

Remember my first attempt at making popovers? To summarize: they were a minor disaster. Popovers should not deflate after you take them out of the oven!

I was determined to try to make these again. For my second attempt, I used the popover recipe from Martha's web site, which is slightly different than the one in her book. I had high hopes for this recipe, for a number of reasons. First, it uses fewer eggs. This is a good thing, because I thought my first batch of popovers tasted much too eggy. Second, the instructions involve baking the popovers at high heat for 15 minutes, and then lowering the temperature while continuing to bake the popovers for an additional 20 minutes. I've seen other popover recipes that employ this technique, so I thought there must be something to it.

I didn't take photos of the mixing and preparation steps this time, since everything looked pretty similar to my first popover post. In case you've forgotten, this is what a popover pan looks like. You can try to make popovers with a muffin pan, but they won't turn out as well.

I mixed the ingredients together, blah blah blah, and poured the batter into the popover tin.

After 35 minutes in the oven, I removed the popovers from the oven, slit them with a sharp knife to let the air escape, and removed them from the pan. And they didn't deflate! Woohoo!

Look, perfect popovers! They're light, fluffy, and golden brown, just like they should be!

Popovers should be very airy (almost hollow) on the inside, and these were no exception.

I am ridiculously happy with the way these turned out. With the right recipe and proper technique, these are actually very easy to make. They have very few ingredients, and most of them are things you probably already have in your pantry (well, except for the popover tin). If you've had trouble making these in the past, I highly recommend this recipe. Traditionally, popovers were eaten with butter and jam, but I think popovers make a great alternative to regular bread. They are a tasty accompaniment to winter soups or stews (or pretty much anything else).

Perfect Popovers (makes 6)

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon table salt
2 large eggs
1 1/4 cups whole milk

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Liberally spray popover tin with non-stick cooking spray, and then lightly coat with flour.

Whisk together the flour and salt in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs, milk, and butter. Pour the egg mixture over the flour mixture and fold together until the entire mixture is just blended. It's OK if there are a few small lumps of flour left in the batter.

Evenly distribute the batter between the 6 popover cups.

Bake at 450 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce the temperature for 350 degrees and bake until the popovers are puffy and well-browned on top, approximately 20 minutes. Warning: if you take them out of the oven too early, they will deflate. Remove tin from the oven and immediately remove popovers onto a wire cooling rack. Use a sharp knife to cut a small slit in the sides of each popover (this prevents them from getting soggy or deflating). Serve immediately.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Raspberry Buttercream

2009-02-25T11:00:00.001-05:00

I've been a bad, bad blogger. I don't have a good excuse why I stopped blogging in November. I made tons of baked goodies for the holidays, and the backlog for my blog kept growing. But I'm back! Even better, I've realized that I can publish recipes as long as I write my own text. Whee!

I love cupcakes, and I also love the combination of chocolate and raspberry. Martha Stewart has a great, easy recipe for one-bowl chocolate cupcakes, but I didn't want to do the typical thing with chocolate frosting. I found Martha's recipe for strawberry buttercream, and I decided to adapt it to raspberry buttercream. It turned out wonderfully!

Cupcake Ingredients:

3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (NOT dutch-process)
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
3/4 cup warm water
3/4 cup buttermilk
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Instructions:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, sift together all of the dry ingredients (cocoa powder, flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt).

Add the eggs, water, buttermilk, oil, and vanilla extract. Mix everything together by hand until the batter is smooth, approximately 3 minutes.

Pour the batter evenly into the cups of a regular muffin tin lined with paper liners (if you don't have paper liners, butter the tins so your muffins won't stick). Bake for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the muffins comes out with only a few crumbs attached.

Let the muffins cool completely on a wire rack before you frost them. This is what the muffins looked like when I took them out of the oven:

Now it's time to make the buttercream! This is an unusual buttercream recipe, because it calls for egg whites instead of egg yolks. It's very good though.

Raspberry Meringue Buttercream Ingredients:

4 large egg whites
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature, cut into tablespoons
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups (12 ounces) raspberry jam

Instructions:

First, puree the raspberry jam in a food processor until it is completely smooth. If the jam has seeds, make sure the seeds have been pulverized.

Combine the egg whites and sugar in the bowl of your electric mixer. Place the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water and whisk constantly, until the sugar completely dissolves and the mixture is warm to the touch.

Attach the bowl to your stand mixer (with the whisk attachment) and beat on high speed until stiff peaks appear. Continue beating until the mixture is fluffy and has cooled. This should take approximately 5-6 minutes.

Remove the whisk attachment from your mixer, and add the paddle attachment. Turn the mixer on medium-low speed and slowly add the butter, one tablespoon at a time, beating well. After all of the butter is incorporated, add the vanilla extract. Turn the speed to low and beat for 2 additional minutes.

Add the pureed raspberry jam to the mixture, and combine with a spatula until smooth.

Now you have raspberry meringue buttercream! You can use a spatula or knife to spread the frosting on top of the cupcakes, but I wanted to do something a little more decorative.

I cut a corner off of a large ziploc bag and attached a star-shaped decorative icing tip. I filled the bag with the buttercream and iced my cupcakes with some simple stars and lines.

These cupcakes were very pretty, and also very tasty. I love the color of the raspberry buttercream. Yum!

Pumpkin Pie with Gingersnap Crust

2008-11-23T12:27:00.003-05:00

Every year, I bake a pumpkin pie for my family's Thanksgiving Dinner. In my world, it's not really Thanksgiving unless you have pumpkin pie. I often experiment with the type of pie I make, and this year, I decided to make a pumpkin pie with a gingersnap crust. I absolutely love ginger, and I think pumpkin and ginger taste great together.

I used Martha Stewart's pumpkin pie recipe. I also modified a recipe that I found for a graham cracker crust, but I substituted gingersnaps instead of the graham crackers. I guessed that they would be interchangeable, and based on my results, I think this substitution worked wonderfully.

Gingersnap Crust

Ingredients:

5 oz. gingersnaps, crushed (I prefer the Triple Gingersnaps from Trader Joe's or the 365 brand from Whole Foods. Both have great ginger flavor.)
5 TBSP melted butter
3 TBSP sugar

Directions:

Pulse the gingersnaps in the bowl of a food processor until they resemble coarse crumbs.

Add the butter and sugar, and pulse until the mixture becomes clumpy and starts to stick together.

Using a rubber spatula, spread the gingersnap mixture evenly over the bottom and sides of a 9-inch pie plate. Bake at 350 degrees until edges of crust turn golden brown, 12 to 14 minutes.

Now we move on to the pie filling. Pumpkin pie is incredibly easy, because you mix all of the ingredients together in one bowl. Whisk until smooth.

Pour the filling into your crust, make sure it's spread out evenly, and then bake. Voila! Pumpkin pie!

For some reason, my photos of this pie didn't turn out very well, but I promise it's delicious! The pie filling is a fairly traditional one, but the addition of the gingersnap crust gave it a nice kick of flavor. This is a great recipe if you want a traditional pie with a slight twist.

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

2008-11-20T19:45:00.000-05:00

Life has gotten very busy lately, so I've been neglecting my blog. I hope to rectify this with some new posts over the next few days. Sorry!

Recently, I've seen a lot of people blogging and talking about making Pumpkin Whoopie Pies, which are kind of like pumpkin moon pies. This seems to be the trendy home baking dessert of the season. They sounded great to me, so I thought I'd give them a shot for a work potluck.

Martha Stewart has a recipe for Pumpkin Whoopie Pies on her web site, but her recipe involves chocolate cakes and pumpkin filling, which isn't what I wanted. I wanted to make a version with pumpkin cakes and cream cheese frosting. A friend sent me another recipe, which sounded like what I wanted. I adapted it slightly, and I'm excited that I can actually post a full recipe here!

Ingredients:

1 1/2 sticks (6 ounces) unsalted butter, 1 stick melted, 1/2 stick softened
1 cup packed light brown sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature, lightly beaten
1 cup canned pure pumpkin puree (NOT pumpkin pie filling)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon plus 2 pinches salt
1 2/3 cups flour
4 ounces cream cheese, chilled
1 cup confectioners' sugar

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and baking powder.

3. In a large bowl, whisk together the melted butter and brown sugar until smooth. Whisk in the eggs, pumpkin puree, spices, 1 teaspoon vanilla, and 3/4 teaspoon salt. Using a rubber spatula, fold in the flour mixture.

3. Using an ice cream scoop or tablespoon, drop 12 generous mounds of batter, spaced evenly, onto each baking sheet. Bake until springy to the touch, about 10 minutes. Transfer to a rack to cool completely.

4. Meanwhile, using an electric mixer, cream the softened butter with the cream cheese. Add the confectioners' sugar and the remaining 2 pinches salt and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla; mix on low speed until blended, then beat on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2 minutes.

5. Spread the flat side of 12 cakes with the cream cheese frosting. Top each with another cake.

Now for the step-by-step procedure with photos:

First, I mixed together the melted butter and brown sugar until smooth.

Then I whisked in the eggs, 1 teaspoon vanilla, and 3/4 teaspoon salt.

I added the spices and pumpkin, which made the batter much thicker.

Then I folded my flour mixture (which also included baking powder and baking soda) into the liquid batter.

Step One:

Step 2 (with the flour half-way mixed in):

Step 3, with the flour completely incorporated:

I spooned the small cakes onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

And this is what they looked like when they came out of the oven.

While the cakes were cooling, I made the filling. First, I mixed together the butter and cream cheese.

Then I added the confectioner's sugar. Mmmm... creamy.

I added a generous amount of filling to the bottom half of 12 cakes, and then topped them with another cake. There was a lot of cream cheese frosting, so I didn't have to skimp.

These were fun, very tasty, and also easy to make. I would definitely make these again!

Ebony and Ivory (aka Black and White cookies)

2008-11-04T12:42:00.000-05:00

Ebony and ivory/live together in perfect harmony/side by side on my piano...

I asked my husband to pick his Top 3 cookie recipes from Martha's Baking Handbook, and he immediately chose the Black and White Cookie. He grudgingly found two other possibilities, but he was practically giddy with excitement over these cookies, so I decided to be nice and make them for him.

My only knowledge of Black and White Cookies comes from the infamous Seinfeld episode where Jerry and the gang visit a bakery to buy a hostess gift for a party they are attending. Elaine almost kills a woman over a chocolate babka, and Jerry finds comfort in a Black and White Cookie (which, ironically, eventually makes him sick). Hopefully these cookies will have better karma than Jerry's.

I started by making the cookie dough. I whisked together the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, salt) in a large bowl.

Next, I creamed the butter and sugar together, using my stand mixer.

Nice and fluffy!

I added the eggs, one at a time, and then the vanilla extract. I blended them until they were well-incorporated and the batter was creamy.

Finally, I added the flour mixture and some heavy cream. You know a recipe is going to be good when it involves heavy cream.

The batter tasted okay (yes, I always taste my batter... don't you?) It tasted like typical sugar cookie dough. I'd never tried Black and White cookies before, so I wasn't sure what to expect.

Per Martha's instructions, I formed the dough into small balls and placed them on cookie sheets to bake in the oven.

After my first batch, I realized the cookies didn't flatten very much during baking, so I needed to form the dough into a disk-like shape before baking them. Unfortunately, I didn't take another photo of them after I started doing this, but I basically just flattened out the balls of dough I made the first time.

Per Martha's instructions, I took them out of the oven when the edges were ever-so-slightly browned. My husband supported these instructions, because he said the cookies were supposed to be cake-like.

My dog REALLY wanted a cookie. (She also desperately needed a hair cut. She could have claimed the title of The Shaggy Dog when this photo was taken. Don't worry, she's gotten a hair cut since then.)

After I baked the cookies, I realized that they didn't look as perfectly round as the ones in Martha's photos, and I knew I should have used a cookie cutter (this isn't part of her recipe). So I decided to improvise, and I decided to make slightly more perfectly round cookies by cutting my cookies with a round biscuit cutter. You can also see a photo of Martha's cookies in the background of this photo.

At this point, I ate some of the cookie scraps (it was my duty to test them), and I was slightly underwhelmed. They tasted like plain sugar cookies, and I'm not a huge fan of plain sugar cookies. I wasn't sure if this project was going to be worth it in the end, but I forged ahead. My husband, on the other hand, thought the cookies tasted perfect at this stage.

While the cookies were cooling, it was time to make the icing. The icing was very simple - just heavy cream and powdered sugar for the white icing, and then you add dutch-process cocoa powder to make the chocolate icing.

First, I sifted the powdered sugar into a large bowl. This frosting used a lot of powdered sugar. Like a whole box worth. There was powdered sugar all over the place by the time I finished this!

I whisked the heavy cream into the sugar until it was smooth. This frosting was VERY sweet.

I poured half of the white icing into a second bowl, so I could turn it into chocolate. I added a healthy amount of cocoa powder, and voila - chocolate frosting! This was DELISH, by the way. I had a little extra, and I'm saving it for some other purpose. Like maybe eating it with a spoon.

Side note: I had to use some cookie scraps to make an Obama cookie. Mmm edible politics.

Where was I? Oh yes, icing. I started with the white icing. I used an offset spatula to frost the cookies. I folded a piece of parchment paper in half, so it had a straight edge on one side, and I flattened it over half of the cookie, in an attempt to try to form a relatively straight line in the middle of the cookies. Then I frosted the side that wasn't covered by parchment paper. They aren't perfect, but I think I did a pretty good job.

You may notice that one of the cookies in this photo is completely covered in white icing. There was another cookie that fell into the bowl of chocolate icing, so it was completely covered in dark brown frosting. I called it The Augustus Gloop Cookie.

After the white icing had dried, I frosted the other side with chocolate.

I think they turned out pretty darn well, if I do say so myself. They were a pain to make, but they look pretty good. And now I'm a Black and White cookie convert. They are delicious! The icing definitely adds a lot to the cookie, especially on the chocolate side. I could eat a dozen of these with no problem.

Pumpkin Cupcake-Muffins

2008-11-01T10:00:00.007-04:00

I call this recipe Pumpkin Cupcake-Muffins, because I was trying to create something that was dense and moist like a muffin, but slightly decadent, like a cake. I was making these for a weekend brunch, so I wanted them to be more appropriate for breakfast than for dessert. My vision was to make individual pumpkin treats that had a layer of cream cheese inside, instead of on top, of the muffin.

This is one of those recipes that sounded good in theory, but didn't work out quite the way I had hoped. But in the end, they turned out great after I did some improvisational tweaking.

Martha Stewart has a great recipe for pumpkin cupcakes (minus the cream cheese) on her web site. This is the basic recipe that I used for the cakes.

I started by whisking together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and spices in a large bowl.

Next, I used an electric hand mixer to beat together the sugar, eggs, and canola oil (I substituted 1/2 cup oil instead of the butter in Martha's recipe, because I wanted these to resemble pumpkin muffins instead of cupcakes). I also added some molasses for flavor. Normally I would've used my stand mixer for this, but I was trying to keep it clean so I could use it to make the cream cheese layer.

This is what the mixture looked like after I mixed everything together. After creaming the eggs, sugar, and oil, I added the pumpkin puree, and then folded in the flour mixture. I forgot to take a photo of this step (sorry)!

Now I had to figure out how to make the cream cheese layer. I ended up using this recipe:

Cream Cheese Layer:

9 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature

¼ cup granulated sugar

¼ cup brown sugar

6 TBSP real maple syrup

1 tsp maple extract

1 TBSP all-purpose flour

1 large egg

Beat all ingredients together for 2 minutes until smooth and creamy.

This is what the ingredients looked like before:

And after:In retrospect, I think this mixture needed to be a LOT thicker. Maybe there was too much maple sugar. Maybe I should have creamed the cream cheese, sugar, and eggs together first, so they could have become lighter and fluffier. The mixture tasted good, but the texture was wrong. Nevertheless, I marched onward.

I tried to layer the cupcake/muffins with a layer of pumpkin cake on the bottom, topped with a layer of the cream cheese mixture, and then another layer of pumpkin cake on top. This didn't work out so well, because the cake mixture was MUCH thicker than the cream cheese layer, so it kind of collapsed. See what I mean?I didn't give up though. I decided to go ahead and bake them, and I crossed my fingers that they would turn out well. They actually baked up fine, although the cream cheese mixture completely blended with the pumpkin cake, and they ended up looking like this.They didn't have a defining cream cheese layer, which I thought was necessary for flavor contrast. So, I decided to whip up a pumpkin cream cheese frosting to put on top of the cakes.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Frosting:

6 oz. cream cheese

1/4 cup pumpkin butter (I bought this from Trader Joe's)

1/4 cup confectioner's sugar

Beat all ingredients together on medium speed for 3-4 minutes until light and fluffy.

This frosting was INCREDIBLE, by the way. I love pumpkin and cream cheese. This would make a great cake frosting.

Because of the additional frosting, these ended up resembling cupcakes more than muffins, but they were still delicious!

Buttermilk Biscuits

2008-10-24T16:58:00.000-04:00

On a cool fall day, what's better than a hearty bowl of soup paired with warm, fluffy, fresh-from-the-oven buttermilk biscuits? These are quick and easy to whip up for a weeknight dinner, and they're much tastier than the instant-mix versions (Bisquick, I'm looking at you).

In the interest of full disclosure, I based my biscuits on Alton Brown's recipe, not Martha's. Mr. Judge insisted that Alton has the Best. Biscuit. Recipe. Ever., and he insisted that I try his recipe first. Sorry, Martha! I'll try your recipe next time.

Technically, I used the recipe from Alton's baking book, not the recipe on the Food Network site. The recipes are similar, but slightly different.

As usual, the first step was to mix together the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt). Alton's recipe included the unique step of using a box grater to grate the butter into the dry ingredients. He thinks this is easier than the usual method of using a pastry blender to cut the butter into the flour.

Next, he recommends rubbing the butter into the flour with your fingers, until half of it is integrated with the flour, and the rest of the butter is pea-sized (or smaller).

The recipe in his baking book uses only butter, not shortening.

Next, it was time to combine the liquid ingredients. Alton's recipe calls for buttermilk and yogurt, which is kind of unusual (most biscuit recipes don't include yogurt). Apparently the yogurt adds extra moistness and a nice tang. His recipe specifically states that you cannot use fat-free yogurt, which is what I usually buy. I knew my husband had recently picked up some yogurt at the store, so I asked him what kind it was. He assured me it was whole-milk yogurt, because he would never buy skim yogurt. So, I looked in the fridge, and guess what I found?

D'oh! But instead of giving up, I decided to forge ahead with the fat-free yogurt and hope for the best. I decided if the biscuits didn't work out, I would blame the yogurt first, and my husband second.

I mixed together the liquid ingredients (buttermilk, yogurt, and one egg).

Then I added the flour mixture to the buttermilk mixture. This formed a very gloopy, lumpy batter.

I turned the batter out onto some parchment paper before kneading, because I knew this would be an extremely sticky process.

Instead of "kneading" the dough, I used Alton's suggestion of folding it three times, kind of like a tri-fold wallet. This is what it looked like after the third fold.

I flattened the dough to about a one-inch thickness, and I used a 2-inch round biscuit cutter to cut out the individual biscuits. They were very sticky, and my hands were covered with dough, so I couldn't take a good photo of them during this stage.

I placed the biscuits on a baking sheet and put them in the oven.

Twenty minutes later, I had warm, fluffy biscuits. They were moist and buttery on the inside, and crusty brown on the outside. Mmmmm yum.

This is how I like to eat them - with a nice pat of butter on top. They're also very tasty with pumpkin butter (which is how I ate them for breakfast the next day).

Alton Brown's recipe was a success, and I'm going to try Martha's recipe next time. Either way, I highly recommend making your own biscuits from scratch. The small effort involved is well worth the result.

Miniature Gingerbread Cakes

2008-10-17T16:15:00.000-04:00

I was invited to attend a Fall Baking potluck brunch last weekend, and I wanted to take something seasonal and festive. I had a feeling there would be a lot of apple and pumpkin treats, so I decided to be a rebel and make these gingerbread cakes. Aren't they cute? Ginger is one of my favorite foods, so this was perfect for me. This also gave me an opportunity to use my decorative mini-muffin tins for the first time. This means they were a good investment, right?

As usual, I used the recipe from my copy of Martha's Baking Handbook, but I think this is the identical recipe on Martha's web site.

I made some slight modifications to her original recipe. Her recipe calls for mixing together one cup of boiling water and 2 teaspoons baking soda, setting them aside, and then adding them into the batter as one of the final steps. I've never heard of doing this before. I spent some time searching the internet, trying to figure out what kind of magical chemical reaction occurs when you mix together boiling water and baking soda. I couldn't find anything useful related to cake baking (although I did find a lot of recipes for polishing silver). So, in my infinite wisdom, I decided to skip this step entirely. I added the baking soda to the rest of the dry ingredients, and instead of adding one cup of water to the batter, I substituted one cup of milk. I thought this would give the cakes a richer flavor. Did it work? Stay tuned....

First, I sifted together the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, spices) into a large bowl.

Then I creamed the butter and brown sugar together in my stand mixer.
See, nice and fluffy. I added molasses, freshly grated ginger (key ingredient!), eggs, and milk to the butter/sugar mixture. Then I added the flour mixture to the rest of the cake batter. When everything was mixed together, I poured the batter into my cute little cake tin. Correction: my heavily greased cute little cake tin. I was really worried about the batter sticking to my molds, so I used a lot of non-stick spray on these babies.

After 15 minutes in the oven, they were perfectly baked.

I carefully flipped over my cake tin, and they came out of the molds perfectly!

The recipe in Martha's book involves covering the tops of the cake with chocolate ganache. That sounds amazingly good, but I thought it would be a bit heavy for a brunch, so I decided to dust the tops of the cakes with powdered sugar instead. The sugar also emphasized the different shapes of each cake.

Perfect for the holidays! And so tasty, too. I really loved these. They have a very strong ginger flavor, which I love. They also freeze very well, if you wrap them up individually in plastic wrap.

Fresh Strawberry Scones

2008-10-09T10:55:00.001-04:00

I found some great strawberries on sale at my local market, which is a rare treat for October. I usually try to eat produce in season, but these were so irresistible! I bought two pounds of berries, and I decided to use half of them for baking. I wanted to try something a little different, so I flipped through Martha's Baking book until inspiration struck me. Scones! I love scones, but I've never made them before, and I've never tried strawberry scones.

Martha's Book includes three different recipes for scones, but none of them use fresh fruit. I had a feeling there would be some major differences in the moisture content with dried vs. fresh fruit, and I wasn't sure if wanted to "wing it" by myself. Luckily, one of my favorite food bloggers, Katie at Good Things Catered, published a great recipe for fresh strawberry scones. I decided to adapt her recipe for my own scones. Thanks, Katie! And this means I can actually print my recipe, instead of worrying about copyright infringement (I hear Martha Stewart has great lawyers).

Fresh Strawberry Scones

Ingredients:
2 1/4 cup all purpose flour (plus a little extra for handling the dough)
1/4 c. granulated sugar
1 Tbsp raw or sanding sugar
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick (8 Tbsp) butter, chilled and cut into small pieces
1 egg
1/4 cup yogurt (I used plain Greek-style yogurt)
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp orange zest
1 pound fresh strawberries, diced (about 2 cups)

Directions:

-Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line baking sheet with parchment.

-In a small bowl, combine egg, yogurt, milk, and zest. Whisk to combine thoroughly and set aside.

-In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, powder, salt, and whisk to combine.

-Using a pastry cutter or two knives, cut butter into flour until all pieces are smaller than pea-sized.

-Add diced strawberries, and toss to coat.

-Add wet ingredients to dry and mix in lightly with a fork until dough just comes together.

-Turn dough out onto well floured work surface and pat into large ball. If the dough is too sticky, you can add up to 1/4 cup of extra flour, 1 Tbsp at a time. I had to add about 1/8 cup extra.

-Cut the large ball of dough in half.

-Shape half of the dough into a flat disk shape and cut it into 6 slices using a sharp knife.

-Place individual scones on the baking sheet, one inch apart. Repeat with the other half of the dough.

-Sprinkle the tops of the scones with raw (sanding) sugar and place in the oven.

-Bake until scones turn slightly brown, about 25 minutes.

-Remove from the oven and let them cool on the baking sheet for 10 minutes.

-Transfer to a wire rack and let them cool for another 10-15 minutes.

Time to eat!

These scones were delicious! I will definitely be making homemade scones again. Yum yum yum! You could adapt this recipe to use any fresh berry.

Maple Pecan Cupcakes with Maple Buttercream Frosting

2008-10-08T10:23:00.002-04:00

One of the first recipes I flagged in Martha's Baking Handbook was her recipe for Maple Walnut Cupcakes. I love maple, I love cupcakes, and while I don't love walnuts, I do love pecans. And who doesn't love buttercream frosting? Now that fall is in the air, I decided it was time to create some maple-themed goodness.

Although I used the recipe from Martha's book, there is a very similar recipe on her web site. That recipe is for a layer cake, but you can easily turn it into cupcakes by pouring the batter into lined cupcake tins and baking them for 25 minutes. I actually think the web site recipe may be better, because it uses maple syrup in the cake batter (the recipe in her book does not; it relies on the maple buttercream for all of the maple flavor).

These cupcakes were fairly easy to make, although there was one kitchen casualty. You have to keep reading for the details.

The first step of the recipe required sifting together the dry ingredients in a large bowl (flour, baking powder, salt, ground spices).

Then I used my stand mixer to cream the butter and sugar together.
I added the eggs and beat everything together until they were thoroughly combined. The mixture got nice and fluffy.Next, I added the rest of the liquid ingredients (maple syrup, vanilla extract) and stirred until everything was combined. (Sorry, no photo of this step.)

The recipe called for medium-to-finely chopped nuts. I toasted my pecans before chopping them, because I wanted to give them some extra flavor. In hindsight, I think I should have chopped them more finely than this, but I think this is a matter of personal taste.
I added the dry ingredients to the liquid ingredients and mixed them together with a rubber spatula.
Finally, I mixed in the pecans with a wooden spoon.

Now that my batter was ready, I poured it into lined muffin tins. I made half of them into regular-sized cupcakes, and the other half into mini-sized cupcakes.

This is what they looked like when I took them out of the oven. They were lightly browned on top, and they passed the "toothpick test."

Now I had to create the buttercream frosting. I love buttercream, but shockingly, I've never made it before.

The first step of the frosting recipe was to beat 6 egg yolks on high speed, until they became fluffy. This is a picture of the egg yolks while my mixer was whirring.

In the meantime, I had to boil the maple syrup on the stove and cook it until a candy thermometer reached 240 degrees, which was supposed to take about 15 minutes. I have never made homemade candy before, and I wasn't even sure if I had a candy thermometer, but I found one in the back of my utensil drawer.

If you've never done this before, I can tell you that maple syrup gets kind of volatile after it's been boiling for 15 minutes. It looks fine here:

But after about 10 minutes, it threatened to overflow the rim of my saucepan. Stirring it only made things worse! I had to remove the pan from the burner several times, to prevent boiling maple syrup from erupting all over my stove.

Can you see the candy thermometer clipped to the left side of my saucepan? When the maple syrup reached the proper temperature, I tried to remove the thermometer, but the sticky syrup didn't want to let the thermometer go. Part of the glass of the thermometer broke off, and the thermometer came apart into several pieces. RIP candy thermometer. My first Martha-related kitchen casualty. :(

After removing the syrup from the heat, I slowly poured it into my egg mixture, and I beat them together for about 2 minutes. Then I added the chilled butter, and I thoroughly beat everything together for several minutes, until the frosting was nice and fluffy. Hello, maple buttercream! Come to mama!
Nom nom nom! We ate the cupcakes with homemade maple ice cream (which is my new favorite ice cream, by the way).

I want to give an honest evaluation of all of the recipes I make, so I will admit that these were not the best cupcakes I've ever had. I LOVED the maple buttercream, and I will definitely make that again. But the actual cupcakes were only okay. They seemed more like muffins than cupcakes to me. I think the nuts threw me off, because the texture of the cupcakes reminded me of the banana-nut muffins I made earlier in the week. Also, the recipe in Martha's book didn't add any maple syrup to the actual cupcakes. They weren't nearly maple-y enough. If I wanted to make these again, I'd try the recipe on her web site, which uses maple syrup in the cake. I'd also chop the nuts more finely, and possibly reduce the amount of nuts in the recipe.

I Live to Eat

2008-10-07T09:26:00.008-04:00

There are a few different lists floating around the internet about the Top 100 Foods you must eat in your lifetime. The most well-known is the Omnivore's 100 (there's a different list for vegetarians). There's also a list based on American foods, and even a list for sweets. I like to think I'm fairly open-minded when it comes to food, so I'm going to post them here and see how I do.

Here are the instructions:

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Italicize any items that you would never consider eating.
4) Optional extra: Post a comment here at www.verygoodtaste.co.uk linking to your results.

Here's my list, with comments in parentheses.

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding (I'm open minded, but this just sounds disgusting.)
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper - I haven't just bitten into one, but I've eaten them with other things
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda - I've never heard of this before, but after looking it up, I want to try it!
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar (I've had both, but not together)
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O (this is on the list? really?)
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat (I accidentally ate this in India. It wasn't bad.)
42. Whole insects (I have a severe insect phobia. There is no way I'd voluntarily eat them.)
43. Phaal (I'm not sure if I've eaten this, so I'm not bolding it.)
44. Goat’s milk (I've had cheese made from goat's milk... does that count?)
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut (mmm heaven)
50. Sea urchin (didn't like it much, but I ate it)
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini (didn't like it, but I've tried it)
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin (I googled this, and it seems to be the drug found in Kaopectate. Huh?)
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears, or funnel cake
68. Haggis (no innards, please)
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe (I've had plenty of absinthe... not sure about the type though) 74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky (I saw some in an Asian market and decided to try it. Didn't like it.)
84. Tasting menu at a Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef (shockingly, I don't think I've had this)
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse (that's just wrong)
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor (I've had lots of lobster, but not thermidor.)
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

Eaten - 79
Don't want to eat - 8
Need to try - 14

100 American Foods

This is a similar list, but it's specific to American foods. If a geographic location is named, I'm going to count it if I've eaten food in that style (even if I didn't necessarily eat it in that exact city or state).

1. New York pizza (I've eaten the real thing in NY, and Oh My God it can't compare to pizza anywhere else.)
2. Hoppin’ John (We make this for New Year's every year.)
3. New Mexico green chile
4. Homemade buttermilk biscuits
5. Tasso (I love this with some shrimp and grits.)
6. Whole Maine lobster (Eaten at a lobster pound in Maine.)
7. Calabash-style shrimp and hushpuppies
8. Kansas City barbecue ribs (I've never been to KC, but I've had bbq in this style.)
9. Hot glazed Krispy Kreme (First eaten when I was in high school in Florida.)
10. San Diego fish tacos (Love them with some fresh lime juice squeezed on top.)
11. Cheese curds
12. Key lime pie (Hello, I'm from Florida. I have Key lime pie running through my veins.)
13. Philly cheese steak (I prefer Geno's over Pat's.)
14. Memphis pork barbecue sandwich
15. Lowcountry boil
16. Huckleberry pie (I've eaten huckleberries, but I don't think I've ever had them in a pie.)
17. New England clam chowder
18. Boiled peanuts (Tried them once, and that was enough.)
19. Buffalo burger
20. Eggs Benedict
21. Pastrami on rye (one of my favorite sandwiches)
22. Corned beef and cabbage
23. Pancakes with maple syrup
24. Everything bagel with cream cheese and tomato
25. Thin Mints (preferably frozen) (I prefer Tagalongs)
26. Frito pie
27. Potato knish with mustard
28. Silver Queen corn on the cob
29. Soft pretzel from a street cart
30. Fresh-picked blueberries (I love wild Maine blueberries in the summer.)
31. Sourwood honey - never had it, but now I want to try it
32. State fair funnel cake
33. Chesapeake crab cakes (I live in Maryland. Enough said.)
34. Candied yams
35. Oyster dressing (except I call it "stuffing")
36. Snow cone or snowball
37. Wild Alaskan salmon
38. Sautéed morels
39. Persimmon pudding - I've never heard of this, but I'm going to look it up, because I actually have some persimmon at home right now.
40. General Tso’s Chicken
41. Frozen custard
42. Italian sausage with peppers and onions on a hoagie bun
43. Chili dog
44. Buffalo wings with blue cheese
45. Spam musubi - I saw this in Hawaii and I was horrified.
46. Saltwater taffy
47. Fluffernutter sandwich on Wonder Bread
48. Black and white cookie
49. Frybread (I still have dreams about the frybread I ate on a Native American reservation in Arizona.)
50. BLT with thick-cut applewood bacon
51. Baked beans
52. Pumpkin pie
53. Collards with vinegar and Tabasco
54. Tex-Mex fajitas with skirt steak and sautéed peppers
55. Fried green tomatoes
56. Succotash
57. Shrimp and grits (One of my favorite foods of all time.)
58. Hot water cornbread
59. Barbecue chicken pizza with red onions
60. Chicken fried steak
61. Carnitas burrito
62. Apple butter
63. Geoduck (Apparently this is a type of clam?)
64. Soft-serve ice cream cone dipped in chocolate shell
65. Pecan pie
66. Catfish supper at a church or fire station (I haven't eaten it in those locations.)
67. Oysters Rockefeller
68. Homemade cranberry sauce
69. Pimiento cheese
70. MoonPie washed down with R.C. Cola (Moonpie, yes. RC Cola, no.)
71. Pickled watermelon rind
72. Cracker Jacks at the ball game
73. Smithfield ham
74. Meatloaf and mashed potato blue plate special at diner
75. Chicken and waffles
76. Po’Boy
77. Green bean casserole with French’s fried onions
78. Stuffed sopaipillas
79. Turducken (I've never had it, but my dog eats a food called "turnducken.")
80. Shad roe on toast (and I never want to eat it again)
81. Sweet potato casserole with or without marshmallows
82. Cioppino
83. New York cheesecake
84. Pan-fried river trout
85. Jambalaya
86. North Carolina pig pickin’
87. California rolls
88. Burgoo
89. Penuche fudge
90. Fried peanut butter and banana sandwich (the Elvis)
91. Scrapple or livermush (kind of disgusting)
92. Elk medallions in red wine reduction (I actually ate Elk somewhere out West)
93. Muscadine grapes
94. Cheeseburger at backyard barbecue
95. Open-face turkey sandwich
96. Chicago deep dish pizza
97. Cobb salad
98. Peach pie a la mode
99. Macaroni and cheese with Tillamook sharp cheddar (I use Tillamook cheddar when I make mac and cheese at home. It's truly the best!)
100. Root beer float

Eaten - 91
Don't want to eat - 0
Need to try - 9

I still have a lot of eating to do! How many have you eaten?

Popovers, Part One

2008-10-04T17:00:00.000-04:00

Why "part one?" Let's just say this baking experiment didn't turn out quite the way I wanted it to. To see what went wrong, keep reading.

My husband looooves popovers. When he noticed there was a recipe for popovers in my Martha Stewart Baking book, he practically begged me to make them. Martha's recipe strongly suggests that you use a special popover tin, which is different from a regular muffin tin. However, I didn't have a popover tin. I knew if anyone could figure out how to make popovers without a popover tin, it would be Alton Brown. Alton hates kitchen "unitaskers" (kitchen gadgets which only serve a very specific purpose, i.e. egg slicers, avocado slicers, grapefruit spoon, pickle fork). Coincidentally, Food Network aired Alton's show on popovers last week. Guess what he used to make his popovers? A popover tin. Sigh.

After a brief trip to Williams-Sonoma, I had my very own unitasker... errr, I mean popover tin.

By the way, you can find Martha's recipe for popovers here.

The ingredients are incredibly simple: butter, flour, milk, eggs, and salt. You whisk them all together and pour the batter into the tins (the batter should only fill the lower 1/3 of the cups).

The steep sides of the popover tins are supposed to help the dough rise in the oven. I put the popovers in the oven and waited for them to rise. After about 20 minutes, the dough had risen to 3 inches above the surface of the tin, which is exactly what Martha said it should do.

This is where something went wrong. The recipe said I should bake the popovers for approximately 30 minutes. But they looked right after 20 minutes in the oven, so I went ahead and took them out. They *immediately* deflated when I took them out of the oven.

Waaaaaaah! My husband said they tasted good, but the texture was completely off. I think I should have kept them in the oven longer, so their shapes could stabilize. I'm going to try this recipe again soon, and hopefully it will work next time.

Banana-Coco-Nut Muffins

2008-10-02T10:47:00.001-04:00

I'm probably a weirdo, because I like to eat my bananas when they're still halfway green. After they start to get brown specks, I'm not interested in eating them anymore. So what do I do when I have a bunch of very ripe bananas? I make banana bread, of course!

I used Martha's banana bread recipe, but I decided to turn the bread into muffins, because I thought they'd be easier to grab for quick breakfasts and snacks during the week.

I also decided to rename this recipe and call it Banana-Coco-Nut Muffins, because I added coconut, pecans, and chocolate chips to the muffins. (Coconut is part of Martha's original recipe; she also suggests using pecans or walnuts. The chocolate chips were my own addition, because I love the combination of chocolate and banana.)

If you're playing along at home, here's a recipe for banana bread from Martha's web site. There are some differences in the ingredients between this recipe and the one in her book (sour cream vs. buttermilk; butter vs. vegetable oil), but there are many different variations of banana bread, and I think it's hard to mess it up.

I also mixed the ingredients in a different way than what Martha suggested. In the past, when I've made muffins, I always mixed the dry and wet ingredients separately, and then I added them together at the end, being careful not to over mix. I decided to stick with this tried-and-true formula.

First I mixed together the dry ingredients.

Then I thoroughly mashed four ripe bananas in a bowl (this is more than what the recipe called for, but I wanted extra banana flavor).

I also toasted my pecans before chopping them, so they would get extra nutty flavor.

I added my mashed bananas to the rest of my liquid ingredients. Then I poured the entire liquid mixture into my bowl of dry ingredients, and then added the chopped pecans. I carefully mixed everything together until the flour was incorporated into the batter, but I was careful not to over mix. I made the first half-batch of the muffins without chocolate, and then I added 1/2 cup chocolate chips to the second part of the batch.

I poured the batter into my muffin tin, filling them almost to the top (but not all the way).

After 20 minutes in the oven, they were perfectly baked.

These muffins made a perfect breakfast, and I'm looking forward to eating them throughout the week. I think they'd be especially good with some Nutella.

Peach-Raspberry Pie

2008-09-28T15:31:00.001-04:00

It's late September, which is the very end of peach season around here. I found myself with a wonderful abundance of late-summer peaches, and I wanted to use them in a dessert. I flipped through Martha's Baking Handbook, but she only had a few recipes which featured peaches. I was inspired by her recipe for Peach, Apricot, and Cherry Pie. I didn't have apricots or cherries on hand, but I know apricots are members of the peach family, so I thought it would be fine to substitute extra peaches for the apricots in the recipe. Several of Martha's recipes encourage bakers to substitute different berries for each other, so I decided to use raspberries (which I had in my freezer) instead of cherries.

If you're playing at home, here's a recipe for Peach-Raspberry Pie from Martha's web site.

I've never made peach pie before, but I thought it was interesting that this recipe called for unpeeled peaches. I'm used to peeling fruit before baking with it. But who am I to question Martha? If she wants sliced, unpeeled peaches, then that's what I'll use.

I defrosted my frozen raspberries and drained off most of their liquid, because I didn't want a soggy pie. I added the raspberries, as well as all of the other ingredients of the pie filling, to the peaches.

The filling still seemed very liquidy, but I wasn't sure if I should remove more of the liquid before adding the filling to the pie crust. I ended up draining about half of the liquid, but in retrospect, I probably should have removed even more. Martha's instructions were to keep the fruit juices in the filling, but I think the fact that I used frozen raspberries changed things.

Next, I added the filling to the bottom of the pie crust, and I dotted the top of the pie with small pieces of chilled butter.

See how much liquid was in there? Alarm bells were going off in my mind, but since I'd already filled the crust, I didn't think there was much I could do at that point.

Finally, I topped the pie with my lattice crust and sprinkled (raw) turbinado sugar over the top for some extra crunch and texture.

After an hour in the oven, I had a freshly baked pie!

As you can see, the crust could not fully contain the fruit juices, so they started to spill over the top. This wasn't a huge problem, except that it made the pie a little messy, and the bottom crust had less structure than I would have liked.

But the flavor... oh, the flavor of the pie was incredible! The peaches were ripe and full of flavor. The raspberries added just a hint of tartness. The crust was delicate, flaky, and oh-so-buttery. I had to control myself from eating half of the pie in one sitting. This one is definitely a keeper.

Pate Brisee (pie dough)

2008-09-28T15:30:00.002-04:00

I've baked a lot of pies, but I'm not sure if I've ever made a flaky, butter pie crust from scratch. I usually make my own graham cracker or cookie crusts, but I feel like those are much simpler. When I need a "real" pie crust, I usually buy a frozen or otherwise pre-made one from the grocery store. They're incredibly easy, and I always thought they tasted good. I didn't think it was worth the hassle to make my own crust from scratch. Well, all of that is about to change.

I decided it's time for me to make my first homemade double-pie-crust. And not just any pie crust, but one with a lattice top! Woohoo, I'm pulling out the big guns, now!

As usual, I used the recipe from Martha's Baking Handbook, but here is her recipe for pate brisee on her web site (there are some slight differences between the two versions).

It all started with some simple ingredients - flour, butter, and water in the food processor.

After I mixed in the water, the dough started to look like... well, dough. I separated the dough into two equal(ish) halves, and then wrapped it in plastic and put it in the fridge to chill.

After the dough was chilled, it was time to roll it out to a large circle that would fit over the bottom and sides of my 9-inch pie plate. This is where things started to get tricky.

So, I have this nice, flat, very thin piece of dough. Now how the heck do I get it onto my pie plate in one piece, without smooshing or tearing it?

I'll wrap it back around my rolling pin, and then attempt to unroll it again over my pie plate. Voila! (It took me two attempts to do this, by the way.)

Look how well it fits! I trimmed the overhang to about one-half inch, maybe a smidge longer.

Now I had to figure out what to do with the top of the pie crust. I wanted to make a lattice-top, which looks kind of like a basket weave. I took my second ball of dough out of the fridge, rolled it out, and cut it into 1-inch strips. Then I practiced weaving them together on parchment paper, before I transferred everything to the actual pie. It wasn't difficult, once I got the hang of it.

Martha's Baking book recommends that novice bakers weave the lattice top on parchment paper, then refrigerate the dough until it gets hard, so you can transfer the entire lattice top onto the pie in one fell swoop. I tried to do that. It didn't work. The lattice was too large and unstable to move by itself, and it was too difficult to use the rolling pin trick. So I had to undo the entire thing and re-weave it over the top of the pie. It was kind of a pain, but I knew what to do the second time around, so it only took me a few minutes.

This is what the pie looked like (before baking) with both crusts in place. The brown stuff on top is raw turbinado sugar. The rest of the pie recipe will be in my next post!

Braided Challah Bread

2008-09-25T13:45:00.001-04:00

I've never baked bread before, except for "quick breads" like pumpkin bread or banana bread. In other words, I've never baked anything with yeast. I'd heard that there's a huge learning curve for novice bread bakers, so I was feeling a little intimidated when I decided to bake my first loaf. I was inspired by the fact that Whole Foods increased the price of their challah bread (which I love) from $3.50 to $4.70 for a loaf. Um, no. During this time of rising food prices, I have to draw the line somewhere!

I encountered my first stumbling block early, when I realized Martha's recipe calls for fresh yeast. There was a picture of it in her book, and it looked kind of like a block of cheese (soft, smooth texture). My husband has baked bread before, so I asked him where I could find fresh yeast. His answer: "no where around here." Lovely. I'm not ready to order ingredients from mail-order catalogs, so I decided to substitute "active dry yeast," which we had in the house. I found some conversions on-line, and I crossed my fingers that it would work.

My first bread-baking project ended up being a two-day process. I started making the dough one evening after I came home from work, not realizing that I'd have to stay up until 2 am if I wanted to see it through to the end. I had to let the dough rise (for 2 hours), then punch it down and let it rise again (for at least 90 minutes). Then I had to braid it and let it rise a THIRD time before baking. The Husband suggested that I could leave the dough in the fridge overnight, and it would rise more slowly. I was nervous that this wouldn't work correctly, but I was too tired to stay up all night, so I decided to try it.

The next day, I braided the dough, let it rise again, and finally baked it. I was VERY impressed with the final result, especially considering the modifications I made. The bread looked perfect. The texture was a little denser than what I'm used to, but the flavor was spot-on. I think the difference in texture may be due to the way I let the dough rise, so I want to try making it again. But all in all, I was extremely pleased with the result.

I should have taken some pictures of what the dough looked like before it baked, but I wasn't thinking. I'm definitely going to make this recipe again, so I'll try to take photos next time.

A slice of challah with some blackberry jam makes a perfect breakfast!

The closest recipe I could find on Martha's web site was for this pumpkin challah bread. It's not traditional, but it sounds great for fall.

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

2008-09-22T10:15:00.002-04:00

When I asked my husband what he wanted me to bake this weekend, he said "oatmeal cookies." I'm not a huge fan of traditional oatmeal-raisin cookies, mostly because I don't like a lot of raisins in my baked goods. So, I decided to use Martha Stewart's recipe for oatmeal-raisin cookies, but I substituted dark chocolate chips for the raisins. It turned out really well, but I'm sure it would also be great with raisins or another type of dried fruit, if that's what you prefer.

The recipe in her book is very similar to this one for oatmeal-raisin cookies from her web site.

The first step of the recipe was to mix together the dry ingredients (except for the oats). There were a couple of unique ingredients in this recipe, including shredded coconut.

Then I creamed the butter and sugar in my stand mixer. Here is a "before" picture...

And an "after" picture....

I added eggs and vanilla, and then added the flour mixture to the sugar/butter mixture. Finally, I stirred in the oats and chocolate chips.

This is a great cookie dough batter to eat raw. I ate a little too much of it that way!

I baked the cookies in my convection oven, and I was able to cut down on the recommended baking time by about 1/3. I think the final results speak for themselves:

This is a great, hearty cookie with a lot of oat flavor. I think it emphasizes the oats as much as the chocolate. If you're looking for a traditional chocolate chip cookie, this may not be the best recipe for that. But if you want really good oatmeal flavor, with a decent chocolate kick, and a hint of spice, I would recommend it.

Maple Pecan Apple Crisp

2008-09-16T09:23:00.001-04:00

This is actually a modified Cooking Light recipe, not a Martha recipe, but I thought it was worth sharing. I love apple crisps, because they're delicious, but incredibly easy to make. I modified the original recipe by substituting pecans for walnuts, because I strongly prefer pecans. But you could use either one, and I'm sure it would be tasty. I like to eat it for breakfast, but you could also serve it a la mode for a scrumptious dessert.

Ingredients

1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/3 cup regular oats
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 cup chilled butter or stick margarine, cut into small pieces
3 tablespoons chopped pecans
7 cups sliced peeled apples (about 3 pounds) - I used Jonagold, but any baking apple will work.
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Preparation
Preheat oven to 375°.

Lightly spoon flour into a dry measuring cup; level with a knife. Combine flour, sugar, oats, and 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon in a medium bowl; cut in butter with a pastry blender or 2 knives until mixture is crumbly. Stir in pecans.

Combine apple and remaining ingredients in a large bowl; toss well. Spoon apple mixture into an 8-inch square baking dish or 1 1/2-quart casserole. Sprinkle with crumb mixture. Bake at 375° for 30-35 minutes or until golden brown. Serve warm.

Nutritional Information (for 9 servings, calculated by Cooking Light)

Calories: 208 (31% from fat)
Fat: 7.1g (sat 3.4g,mono 1.9g,poly 1.3g)
Protein: 1.8g
Carbohydrate: 36.5g
Fiber: 2.3g
Cholesterol: 14mg
Iron: 0.9mg
Sodium: 58mg
Calcium: 27mg

Apple-Spice Layer Cake with Creamy Goat Cheese Frosting

2008-09-14T21:45:00.004-04:00

I love to bake, but I'm also inherently lazy. I often prefer to doctor cake mixes instead of baking from scratch. I received a copy of the Martha Stewart Baking Handbook as a gift, and I thought this would be a good opportunity to expand my baking repertoire.

It's mid-September, which means apple season in my neck of the woods. My husband and I have a tradition of going apple-picking at a local farm every fall. We just took our first trip to the farm, and we picked several pounds of delicious early apples - specifically, Jonagold (for baking) and Cameo (for munching). Naturally, I wanted my first Martha recipe to involve apples.

Apple pie seemed too obvious, but then my eyes alighted upon a recipe for an Apple Spice Layer Cake with a Creamy Goat Cheese Frosting. I LOVE goat cheese. I can eat an entire log of it in one sitting. I also love cream cheese frostings on cakes, but they're usually limited to carrot cakes, and I'm not a huge fan of those (I just don't think carrots belong in dessert). I was very excited to try this recipe.

The first step of the recipe is to make, essentially, homemade chunky applesauce. First, I caramelized some sugar in a medium saucepan, and then added chunks of apples and a little bit of lemon juice. I cooked the apples down until they were soft and mushy.

After about 5 more minutes of cooking, I had fresh, homemade applesauce!

While I let the applesauce cool, I mixed together the dry ingredients, including the spices. I increased the spices called for in the recipe, because I've learned that I generally like a little extra cinnamon and nutmeg in my baked goods. I also used grated fresh nutmeg, which smells and tastes fantastic.

I used my Kitchenaid stand mixer to beat together butter, sugar, honey, and eggs. If you don't have a Kitchenaid mixer, and you plan to do a significant amount of baking, you should run out and buy one immediately. It is, by far, my favorite small appliance. After beating in all of the eggs, I added the dry ingredients and mixed on a slower speed. I watched carefully to make sure I didn't overmix the batter.

I divided the batter evenly between two cake pans, and while the cakes were in the oven, I turned my attention to the frosting. It's a very simple recipe - just fresh goat cheese, cream cheese, and powdered sugar, beaten together in my beloved Kitchenaid mixer.

Side note: I'm a very impatient person, and I usually have an incredibly hard time waiting for cakes to cool completely before frosting them. I've tried to frost my share of warm cakes, and I know it causes them to fall apart into a crumbly mess, so I SHOULD KNOW BETTER. But I still don't want to wait 2 hours to frost my cakes. I took a tip from Martha's book, and after I cooled my cake layers on wire racks for 20 minutes, I wrapped them in plastic wrap and stuck them in the fridge for another 40 minutes. Voila - perfectly cooled cakes in half the time!

Per Martha's suggestion, I made caramelized apple slices to decorate the top of my cake. The glazed apples were tasty and delicious! I also topped the cake with a sprinkling of candied ginger, which I had in my pantry.