Easter Bread

Long time, no see! Or as my Grandmom Julie would have said... "Where you been all your life?"

I was thinking about my great-grandmother a lot today while I was baking this Easter bread. She never made it. She was too busy making cheese bread and hard boil eggs died shades of pastel I could never replicate. But it was one of the few things I remember my mom baking, and she got the recipe from Grandmom Julie's neighbor, Frances.

Frances scared the bejeebies out of me when I was a kid. She lived in the little row house next door to Grandmom Julie, and the only time I really remember seeing her was when she stood on the back balcony and shouted over it to talk to my grandmother in Italian while she hung her laundry on the line. I never understood why she didn't just come over, but she always sounded angry so I didn't say anything. Grandmom Julie and Frances were both immigrants, they both lived alone (for most of my memory), and they were the only people I knew who still hung their laundry out to dry. When I called my mom for the recipe and she told me she got it from Frances, I pictured the little old Italian lady shouting the recipe across the balconies to my mom.


I called this sweet bread when I was growing up, but after baking it myself I now realize it isn't actually that sweet. At least not on it's own. But then my mom and I remembered that it was supposed to have a powdered sugar glaze. And sprinkles. The little round rainbow colored ones to be exact. Unforunately I remembered the sprinkles too late, and so they didn't make an appearance on this year's bread. Next year though, I will be prepared with the sprinkles.

O, and a long time ago I mentioned that my mom made Easter bread shaped like bunnies. That was this bread, but apparently I did not inherit the dough sculpting gifts. After a failed attempt that looked more like a fat hamster, I went with braids. Which makes this look like challah.


Frances's Easter Bread
Makes 2 braided loaves, or apparently four bunnies.

Ingredients:
2 cakes yeast (or two packets active dry yeast, 4 1/2 tsp.)
1/4 cup lukewarm water (105-115 degrees)
1 cup milk
1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. salt
2 large eggs. beaten
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 egg yolks, beaten to brush on before baking
powdered sugar
milk
rainbow sprinkles

Directions:
-Dissolve the yeast in the warm water with a pinch of sugar and set aside. It should froth up in 5 to 10 minutes. If it doesn't, either the water was the wrong temperature or the yeast is dead (expired).
-Scald the milk in a saucepan or in the microwave for 2 minutes.
-Pour the hot milk into a bowl (you can use the bowl of a stand mixer if you have one) and add the butter, sugar, and salt and mix. Cool to lukewarm.
-Add the flour a little at a time, enough to make a thick batter. Save the rest of the flour for later use.
-Add the yeast and two beaten eggs. Beat well.
-Add the rest of the flour a little at a time until the dough comes together into a loose ball.
-Transfer the dough to a floured surface and knead, adding flour as needed. (This can also be done with the dough hook attachment on a stand mixer, it takes about three minutes on medium speed.)
-Shape the dough into a ball. Spray a large bowl with cooking spray, put the dough into the bowl, cover with plastic wrap or a clean kitchen towel, and let rise on hour and a half or until doubled in size.
-Punch down the dough. Let it rest in the bowl 15 minutes, covered.
-Shape into a bunny or another animal or just a braid and place on an ungreased baking sheet. (You can also put a hard boiled egg--colored or not--into the dough and lattice the dough in an X over the egg to hold it on).
-Cover the loaves with clean kitchen towels and let rise about an hour and a half.
-Brush with egg yolk before baking.
-Bake at 350 for 25 to 30 minutes.
-Make a glaze by adding a few tablespoons of milk slowly to about a cup of powdered sugar. Add milk until you reach the desired consistency (about the thickness of yogurt). When the bread is cool, brush it with the glaze and sprinkle on the sprinkles while the glaze is still wet.

When Two Become One, Part 2

This is the follow up to yesterday's post. Using the basic off-white sandwich bread recipe I posted yesterday, you can add a few ingredients to get this awesome cinnamon-raisin loaf. And if you want a loaf of each, instead of two loafs of one or the other, you can do that too with a little alteration.

Cinnamon-Raisin Bread
Adapted from the Bread Bible, by Rose Levy Beranbaum
Makes two loaves.

Ingredients:
one recipe of off-white sandwich bread
1 cup raisins
1/4 cup plus 2 tbs. sugar
4 tsp. cinnamon
one lightly beaten egg

Directions:
If you want to make both loaves cinnamon-raisin.
-Follow the directions for making the off-white sandwich bread. Mix in 1 cup of raisins when you mix in the milk-yeast mixture and the butter (after the starter is done fermenting).
-After the dough rises for the first time, fold it like a business letter once (see video here), then return it to its bowl and place it in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
-Combine the cinnamon and the sugar in a small bowl.
-After an hour, divide the dough in half. Return one half to the fridge, and roll the other half out until it is a 7 by 14 inch rectangle. Brush with beaten egg, then sprinkle with half of the cinnamon sugar, leaving a 3/4 inch margin on all sides.
-Starting with a short side of the dough, roll the dough up tightly. Brush the top of the dough with egg and squeeze the dough gently with each roll so it will adhere to the filling. When you get to the end, pinch the dough to seal in the filling. Fold under the sides and pinch to seal.
-Place the dough seam-side down in a greased 8.5X4.5 in. loaf pan.
-Repeat with the second loaf.
-Cover both loaves with oiled plastic wrap, and let rise 1 to 2 hours or until the center is 1 1/2 inches higher than the sides of the pan. If you press the dough with your finger, it won't bounce back quickly.
-Preheat the oven to 350 degrees with one rack in the lowest possible position, and the other rack just above it. Place a baking sheet on each rack. (If you have a pizza stone, place that on the top rack.)
-Set the pans on the top baking sheet. Toss 1 cup of ice cubes into the baking sheet on the bottom rack and immediately shut the oven door. Bake for 50 minutes or until the bread is golden brown and the internal temperature is 210 degrees. Halfway through, rotate the pans.
-Remove the bread from the oven and let it rest on a wire rack until cooled. Remove from the pan and cool completely, about 1 hour, before slicing.

If you want to make one loaf of cinnamon-raisin and one loaf plain.
-Follow the off-white sandwich bread directions until after the first rise. When you scrape the dough out of the bowl to fold it, divide the dough in half. With half of the dough, proceed with the off-white sandwich bread directions (fold like a business letter twice, return to bowl, rise again, etc.) With the other half of the dough, gently incorporate 1/2 cup of raisins into the dough while folding the dough like a business letter once, then return to the bowl. Place in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
-Combine 2 tsp. cinnamon and 3 tbs. sugar in a small bowl.
-After an hour, roll out the cinnamon-raisin dough until it is a 7 by 14 inch rectangle. Brush with beaten egg, then sprinkle with the cinnamon sugar, leaving a 3/4 inch margin on all sides.
-Starting with a short side of the dough, roll the dough up tightly. Brush the top of the dough with egg and squeeze the dough gently with each roll so it will adhere to the filling. When you get to the end, pinch the dough to seal in the filling. Fold under the sides and pinch to seal.
-Place the dough seam-side down in a greased 8.5X4.5 in. loaf pan.
-Cover with oiled plastic wrap, and let rise 1 to 2 hours or until the center is 1 1/2 inches higher than the sides of the pan. If you press the dough with your finger, it won't bounce back quickly.
-Preheat the oven to 350 degrees with one rack in the lowest possible position, and the other rack just above it. Place a baking sheet on each rack. (If you have a pizza stone, place that on the top rack.)
-Set the pans on the top baking sheet (you can bake the off-white sandwich bread and the cinnamon-raisin at the same time). Toss 1 cup of ice cubes into the baking sheet on the bottom rack and immediately shut the oven door. Bake for 50 minutes or until the bread is golden brown and the internal temperature is 210 degrees. Halfway through, rotate the pans.
-Remove the bread from the oven and let it rest on a wire rack until cooled. Remove from the pan and cool completely, about 1 hour, before slicing.

When Two Become One, Part 1

I was never a fan of the Spice Girls, but I couldn't help but think that was a catchy title for this post. I was feeling crafty this weekend, so I decided to try to make two different kinds of bread from one dough: off-white sandwich bread and cinnamon-raisin bread. I mean if I'm going to work my way through four rises (including the starter), I might as well get as much out of it as possible.

I just started to get into baking bread, so I picked up some books at the library and decided to try a few loaves this weekend when I was relatively un-busy. I really liked the no-knead bread we made a few months ago, but I wanted to try something a little more practical. (And by practical, I mean something I wouldn't just tear chunks off of and eat while standing in the kitchen. Because now that I'm done marathon training for the time being, there is no excuse for that many carbs.) In the Bread Bible, I found a recipe for basic white sandwich bread, which made two loaves, that I figured I could adapt for the ingredients I had on hand (i.e. real not dry milk and active not instant yeast). After scanning through the rest of the book, I noticed that the cinnamon-raisin bread recipe was almost identical up until the point where you add the raisins (duh), so I decided to try to divide the dough and make both.




I was really impressed with the results, especially the sandwich bread--which became off-white because 1) I ran out of white flour, and 2) I always feel better about myself when I use a little wheat flour in my baking. The sandwich bread was amazingly soft, softer than any store-bread I have bought in a long time, but that might be because I only buy the whole-wheat stuff that is sort of like cardboard. It also has great flavor, due in part to that wheat flour I threw in.

The cinnamon-raisin loaf was also delicious, but my method for incorporating the raisins was a little flawed. Because I only wanted raisins in half the dough, I waited to add them until right before I formed that half of the dough into a loaf, instead of mixing them in between the starter and the first rise. I tried to just sprinkle them on with the cinnamon sugar and roll them up, but I think it would have looked better and the raisins would have been better distributed if I had kneaded them into the dough. So you go ahead and do that.

All-in-all, I think this is a pretty solid, basic bread recipe. The results were great, even if the process was a little fussy. I'll definitely use it again--next time I might try dried apricot and cardamom instead of the cinnamon raisin--but if I want to ever get to the point where I make all my own bread, I'm going to have to find a technique with fewer steps.

I'll post how to turn this sandwich bread into cinnamon-raisin bread tomorrow, along with instructions on how to make a loaf of each from the same dough.

Off-White Sandwich Bread
Adapted from the Bread Bible, by Rose Levy Beranbaum
Makes two loaves.

Ingredients:
for the starter
1 3/4 cups warm water (105-115 degrees)
2 tbs. plus 1 tsp. honey
3/4 tsp. active dry yeast
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/4 cups plus 2 1/2 tbs. all-purpose flour

for the dough
2 cups plus 3 tbs. bread flour (you could substitute all-purpose, it will change the texture slightly)
1/4 cup skim milk, scalded (brought to a simmer), then cooled to 105-115 degrees
3/4 tsp. active dry yeast
9 tbs. unsalted butter, softened
2 1/4 tsp. salt

Equipment:
twp 8.5X4.5 in. loaf pans, lightly greased with cooking spray
two baking sheets
stand mixer, fitted with a dough hook (this could probably also be done in a food processor, but I haven't tested it myself yet, you could also do it by hand but that's just insanity)

Directions:
-In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the warm water and the honey, then sprinkle the yeast on top. Let sit for 5 minutes until the yeast froths. If the yeast doesn't get foamy, dump it out and start over with new yeast.
-Add the 1 cup whole wheat flour and 1 1/4 cups plus 2 1/2 tbs. all-purpose flour to the yeast mixture in the bowl, and whisk until very smooth to incorporate air, about two minutes. The starter will be the consistency of pancake batter. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.
-Sprinkle the 2 cups plus 3 tbs. bread flour (or all-purpose flour) on top of the starter. DO NOT MIX. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit for 1 to 4 hours. After the first hour, the starter can be put in the refrigerator to ferment overnight. The sponge will bubble up through the loose flour as time goes on, like in the picture above.

-After the starter is finished fermenting, take the scalded milk (105 to 115 degrees) and sprinkle the 3/4 tsp. yeast on top of it. Let it set for 5 minutes until foamy.
-Add the milk-yeast mixture and the butter to the dough and mix with the dough hook on low speed for 1 minute or until the dough is well combined. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let rest for 20 minutes.
-Add the salt to the dough and knead the dough on medium speed for 7 to 10 minutes, or until the dough comes away from the sides of the bowl and forms a ball. The dough should be smooth, shiny, and slightly sticky. If it is not stiff, add a little flour. If it is not sticky, add a little water.
-Spray a large bowl with cooking spray. With an oiled spatula, scrape the dough into the bowl. Spray the top of the dough with cooking spray (or lightly oil), cover with plastic wrap, and let rise at warm room temperature for 1 1/2 to 2 hours or until doubled in size.

-When the dough has doubled, scrape the dough onto a lightly floured surface. Flour your hands. Gently form the dough into a rectangle. Try not to deflate it. Pull the dough out to make it into a longer rectangle, then fold it like a business letter. Pull the dough out the opposite way, and fold it like a business letter a second time. (This video demonstrates the folding process quickly.)
-Set the dough back into the container, oil the surface, and cover with plastic wrap. Let rise for another 1 to 2 hours, until doubled.

-When the dough is done the second rise, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface. Cut the dough in half.
-Shape each half into a loaf by pressing it into a wide rectangle with the long side facing you. Press down on the dough with your fingertips to deflate any large bubbles. Fold over the right side of the dough to just past the center. Fold over the left side of the dough to just overlap it. Press the overlapped section to seal the dough.
-Starting at the top of the dough, roll it over three or four times until it reaches the bottom edge of the dough. With each roll, push the dough away from you slightly on the counter to tighten the outer skin of the dough.
-If the loaf is not as wide as the pan, roll it back and forth with your hands working gradually from the center to the edges to widen it. Tuck the sides under, and place in the loaf pan.
-Spray a piece of plastic wrap with cooking spray and cover each loaf. Allow to rise until the center of the loaf is about 1 inch above the side of the pan, about 1 1/2 to 2 hours. When you press the dough with your finger, the dough will not spring back quickly.

-Preheat the oven to 350 degrees with one rack in the lowest possible position, and the other rack just above it. Place a baking sheet on each rack. (If you have a pizza stone, place that on the top rack.)
-Set the pans on the top baking sheet. Toss 1 cup of ice cubes into the baking sheet on the bottom rack and immediately shut the oven door. Bake for 50 minutes or until the bread is golden brown and the internal temperature is 210 degrees. Halfway through, rotate the pans.
-Remove the bread from the oven and let it rest on a wire rack until cooled. Remove from the pan and cool completely, about 1 hour, before slicing.

Romano Cheese Pull-Apart Rolls

My great-grandmother (Grandmom Julie) used to make cheese bread every Easter. She would mix mounds of flour with piles of freshly grated Romano cheese right on the table top, adding the wet ingredients into a little well in the center. When she baked the big circular loaves, the entire house filled with a cheesy aroma. My favorite part of Easter was going to her house for a slice of cheese bread and a hard boiled egg (died the strangest colors, colors I don't think could come from the packet of food die.) My mom has tried to make it a few times since she passed away, but it is hard to replicate. Maybe her table top doesn't have the same seasoning effect.

I haven't tried to make Grandmom Julie's cheese bread yet, but when I bit into these rolls, they instantly reminded me of it. These rolls are light and airy (where Grandmom Julie's cheese bread was dense). The cheese flavor is also a little more subdued in these rolls, although I suppose you could amp it up by adding more cheese. I usually only make rolls or bread when we have company coming for dinner--because I'm afraid I'll eat the entire batch myself if I make it otherwise--but these are so wonderful, I might start making a half batch for myself every week.

Romano Cheese Pull-Apart Rolls
Adapted from Gourmet, February 2009

The original recipe calls for Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, but I prefer Romano. Asiago or another strong, hard cheese would probably also work.

Ingredients:
2 tsp. active dry yeast
1 tsp. honey (or sugar)
2/3 cup warm milk (105 to 115 degrees), divided
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus 2 tbsp. for sprinkling
1 1/4 cups finely grated Romano cheese (1 1/3 oz.)
1 tsp. salt
3 large eggs
5 tbs. unsalted butter, cut into 1 tbs. pieces and softened
1 tbs. water

Directions:
-Stir together honey and 1/3 cup of warm milk in a the bowl of a stand mixer, and sprinkle yeast on top. Let stand until the yeast is foamy, about 5 minutes. If the yeast doesn't foam, dump it out and start over with new yeast.
-Whisk together 2 1/2 cups flour, cheese, and salt. With mixer on low, add flour mixture to yeast mixture along with the remaining 1/3 cup milk.
-Increase mixer speed to medium and beat in 2 eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition.
-Beat, scraping down sides of bowl occasionally, until a soft dough forms, about 3 minutes.
-Beat in butter, one tbs. at a time. Beat until dough is elastic, about 2 minutes. (Dough will be very sticky.)
-Scrape dough into center of bowl, sprinkle with remaining 2 tbs. flour, and cover with plastic wrap. Let rise at warm room temperature intil doubled in size, 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
-Punch down dough (do not knead) and turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Cut dough into 12 equal pieces. Roll each into a ball by cupping your hand and pushing dough against work surface as you roll in a circular motion.
-Arrange rolls 1 inch apart in a buttered 9 inch cake pan or spring form pan. Cover with a clean kitchen towel (not terry cloth), and let dough rise until doubled in size and dough fills pan, 1 to 1/2 hours.
-Preheat oven to 375 degrees with rack in middle.
-Whisk together remaining egg with water and brush on top of rolls. Bake until golden brown, 20 to 25 minutes.
-Cool rolls on a rack at least 20 minutes.

Notes: Rolls are best fresh out of the oven. They can be frozen for up to one month. Thaw, then reheat on a baking sheet in 350 degree oven until warmed through, 5 to 10 minutes. (I didn't try this myself, but Gourmet says it will work.)

The BEST Bread You Can Make At Home

I try not to use superlatives too often, because if I was getting on here everyday telling you I made the BEST X and the BEST Y, you'd never believe me and totally think I was full of it. And really not every recipe is the BEST. Most are just mediocre, some are special, and a rare handful are the BEST--the recipes that you know will become splattered with food and fingerprints because you will use them so much.

This No Knead Bread recipe is the BEST. That's right, NO kneading. A little stirring, two folds, and minimal shaping.

Okay, so I'm starting to sound like a bit of a Mark Bittman groupie this week, since this is the third recipe of his that I have posted about, but I promise after this I will put down my copy of How to Cook Everything and step away from the Bitten blog. (Bittman actually got the recipe from Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery in New York City, so he's really more of a messanger here.)

This bread has been raved about on pretty much every food blog, forum, and Web site out there since it was first published in The New York Times in 2006 because 1) it's ridiculously easy, and 2) it is more like fresh bakery bread than anything else you can make at home. And as soon as you make it, you will rave about it to whoever listens to you too. Trust me. I swore I wasn't going to do it. I thought I would just make it, eat it, and leave it be. But once I tried it, I knew I had to spread the word, even if there is only one person out there who hasn't heard about it yet.

I mean look at it:

Perfectly crispy and crunchy on the outside, with a fluffy, light crumb inside. Some of you might live near great bakeries, and buy your bread, but if you don't or you want to save a few bucks during this lovely recession we've got going on--try this. It takes absolutely no talent, less than a handful of ingredients, and just a little time. Okay, 24 hours start to finish. But most of that time you're off doing something else anyway. That being said, you need some sort of cast iron, enamel, Pyrex, or ceramic pot that has a lid. That's the key to this bread. The pre-heated covered pot creates an oven inside your oven and the wet dough sort of "steams" itself. The other key is the long rising time, which gives it its delicious yeasty, almost buttery, flavor.

And COMING SOON: cake made from whole lemons, peel, pith and all.

Jim Lahey's No Knead Bread
From Mark Bittman
Make 1 large loaf

Ingredients:
4 cups all-purpose or bread flour (I use bread)
Scant 1/2 tsp. instant yeast (I use active dry yeast and rehydrate it in the water heated to 110 degrees before adding)
2 tsp. salt
2 cups water at about 70 degrees (110 if using to rehydrate active dry yeast)
2 tbs. extra virgin olive oil (optional)
cornmeal, semolina, or wheat bran as needed

Directions:
-In a large bowl combine the flour and salt. If using instant yeast, add to the flour at this point. If using active dry yeast, rehydrate in the 2 cups of water heated to 110 degrees. (Use a thermometer, yeast is very particular about its baths.)
-Add the water (either with or without yeast in it) to the flour and stir until combined.
-Cover with plastic wrap or put the olive oil in a second bowl and transfer the dough to that, turn to coat with oil, and cover with plastic wrap. (I don't like to dirty extra bowls, so I just covered mine up and called it a day.)
-Let the dough rest and rise for about 18 hours at 70 degrees. When the dough is ready, its surface will be dotted with bubbles. Dough rises faster in warmer temperatures and slower in cooler temperatures.
-Lightly flour a work surface, remove the dough, fold once or twice. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest for 15 minutes.
-Using just enough flour to keep the dough from sticking, form it into a ball. Coat a cotton (not terry cloth) towel with cornmeal or wheat bran. Use a lot. (You can also use a silicone baking mat instead of the towel.) Put the dough seam-side down on the towl, dust with more flour or cornmeal and cover with another cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours or until double in size. It won't spring back readily when poked with your finger when it is done.
-Half an hour before the dough is ready, preheat your oven to 425 degrees and put a covered pot (with the cover on) in the oven as it heats. (Mine was enameled cast iron and 5.5 qts. The recipe says you can use a 3 to 4 quart pot, but I am skeptical because my loaf completely filled my pot.)
-When the dough is ready, carefully remove the pot from the oven and flip the dough over into the pot, seam-side up. Don't worry if the dough doesn't look perfect, it will even out while its baking. Cover the pot with the lid and bake for 30 minutes, then remove the lid and bake for another 20 to 30 minutes until the loaf is browned. If the dough starts to smell scorched, lower the heat a little. (If you want a really crusty, brown loaf remove the lid at 20 minutes and bake uncovered for 30 to 40 minutes.)
-Let the bread rest on a wire rack for at least 30 minutes before slicing.

Cranberry-Orange Bread for Bribery

Monday night, after my lovely book club trailed out the door and after I cleaned up, I remembered that I had promised to bake something for my office as a Thanksgiving treat. It was 10 p.m. and I had had some red wine, but I was determined not to disappoint. I have this theory that bringing snacks to work gives me a smidgen of extra job security. I'm not delusional. I still work really hard to do a good job. But I figure if times get tight, and they have to lay someone off, and they are choosing between me and someone else, and we both do the same work equally as well... then I'll have the edge. Because I bake bread. With this in mind I pulled my gigantic, five-pound bag of cranberries (I love Costco) out of the fridge at 10:15 p.m.

By 11:15 I had one normal size loaf and four mini-loaves of cranberry-orange bread. My pre-work taste test the next morning was a thumbs up. Cranberry and orange zest might be my new favorite flavor combination for the holidays, which is good news because I have a lot of cranberries left. (The scones from earlier this week were also this flavor.) The bread was deliciously tart, and the overall texture was very light for quick bread, which can sometimes get a little cakey. I was impressed with how good this tasted considering the relatively small amount of butter and sugar. Nic found it to be a little bit too tart, so I might consider adding few tablespoons of sugar to the cranberries before I mix them into the dough next time. If you don't like tart, you should definitely do this. If you are big fan of tart cranberries (like me), you can probably leave the recipe as is.


Cranberry-Orange Bread
Adapted from Good Things Catered
Makes 1 loaf

Ingredients:
1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour*
1/2 cup granulated sugar (+ 2-3 tbs. for sweeter, less tart bread)
1 tbs. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tbs. grated orange zest
2/3 cup orange juice
2 eggs, lightly beaten
3 tbs. unsalted butter, melted
1 1/4 cup fresh cranberries, coursely chopped

Directions:
-Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
-Sift together flour, 1/2 cup sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl.
-Use a vegetable peeler to remove the zest from an orange, then finely chop the zest. Add zest to the flour mixture.
-In a small bowl, combine orange juice, eggs, and butter.
-If adding sugar to the cranberries, combine 2 to 3 tbs. sugar with chopped cranberries in a small bowl.
-Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and stir until just combined.
-Fold in cranberries.
-Bake for 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. (Mini loaves take 35-40 minutes.)

*You can use 2 cups of all purpose flour if you prefer, but I find that half and half does not compromise the flavor or texture too much.

Note: I asked Katie, from Good Things Catered, if letting the bread chill on the counter wrapped up in plastic wrap, changed the flavor, since her original recipe called for doing this. She said: "If you wait a day or two [to eat the bread] the flavors meld and the bread ends up tasting a *bit* sweeter because of it. But not by much. It is fresh cranberry, so you could add some more sugar if you like." Thanks Katie! (P.S. Not only do we share a name, but she is also part Lebanese on her dad's side. Crazy, right?)

Irish Soda Bread w/ Dried Cranberries

Sometimes, in over ambitious moments, I buy ingredients because I plan to make something. Like when I bought buttermilk to make a pumpkin butterscotch layer cake on a Friday night to bring to a friend's house Saturday morning. (Never happened.) Then I have a quart of buttermilk sitting in the fridge giving me the evil eye every time I open the door. I can hear it saying, "I'm going to go bad and smell awful and make you feel guilty for wasting me." Drives me nuts. And it's not like you can just throw some buttermilk on your cereal in the morning.

Then I saw this recipe that called for buttermilk on blog I like to read, herbivoracious, and it had about 15 less steps than the pumpkin butterscotch layer cake, and I don't even want to guess how many less calories. So last night when I got an unexpected reprieve from cooking dinner, I decided to make this so my oven didn't get lonely. It seriously took me about 10 minutes, start to finish, including washing the bowl, and there is only one bowl to wash. I really don't know why I ever made bread with yeast. This is just as good and there is no rising and kneading (well there's a little kneading, but nothing intense.) And there is no chance the bread will rise too much, overflow the bowl and make a mess. Not that I ever do that.

The bread was delicious for breakfast this morning with a little bit of butter. It's not a sweet bread but a nice hearty bread with a little tangy sweetness around the edges because of the cranberries. It is little bit denser than yeast bread, but not that much denser. (And if you live around here, where you can't buy decent bread even if your life depends on it, then it is probably lighter than some of the bread you've eaten.) A much better way to make buttermilk into breakfast than pouring it on your cereal. I will definitely be making this again, maybe with something else folded in instead of cranberries or maybe plain.

Irish Soda Bread w/ Dried Cranberries
Adapted from herbivoracious, which adapted from Saveur magazine. Go ahead adapt your own.

Ingredients:
2 cups pastry flour*
2 cups whole wheat flour
4 tbs. sugar (use 2 tbs. for a plain loaf)
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
4 tbs. butter, cool
1 cup dried cranberries
1 egg, beaten
2 cups buttermilk

Directions:
-Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
-Sift together flours, sugar, salt, and baking soda in a large bowl.
-Cut in butter using two knifes until the butter is in very small little chunks (smaller than a pea).
-Mix in the egg and buttermilk with a spoon. A loose dough should form. It should be sticky but able to hold the shape of a ball.
-Add the dried cranberries and knead them into the dough. You can do this in the bowl.
-Grease a cookie sheet and place the ball of dough on the center.** Cut an X in the top with a sharp knife.
-Bake for 40 minutes or until the bread sounds hollow. (Internal temperature should be 180 degrees, if you have a meat thermometer you can use).

*herbivoracious notes that the pastry flour will make a more tender bread, but you can basically use 4 cups of any flour. I trusted him on this and used the pastry flour, and my bread was very tender indeed.

**The loaf pictured is half of this recipe. You can make it all as one loaf or you can divide it in half and make two smaller loaves. When making smaller loaves, it takes slightly less time to cook, 30-35 minutes.

Apple Cider Bread

In case you missed it, I started baking two weeks ago. Unfortunatly after one successful baked good, I got way too ambitious, and last week I tried to make gluten-free oatmeal chocolate banana mini muffins (sooo many ingredients!) for one of my co-workers who can't eat gluten. They weren't horrible, but they definitely need some "perfecting." They were not good enough to be posted because if anyone made them they would never make one of my recipes again. But the gluten-free baked goods you get in the store must be really horrible, because my co-worker thought these were great in comparison.

I decided I needed to back up and just make something from someone else's recipe. Then I saw this Chai-Spiced Bread on the Sweet Savory Southern blog, and it sounded too good not to try. It went really well with the dinner I made for friends Saturday. One small problem with the recipe. It says to wait two hours for the bread to cool before slicing. That bread was LONG gone before two hours went by.

Well if you can make bread that tastes like a chai latte you should be able to tweak the recipe and make bread that tastes like apple cider right? RIGHT. And it is moist, yummy, not too sweet, and absolutely addicting to eat. I think making the bread with whole wheat flour gives it more substance, and I like the taste better, but you can substitute all purpose flour if you prefer.



Apple Cider Bread
Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup apple cider
1/3 cup skim milk
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups whole wheat flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/8 tsp. all spice
1/8 tsp. cloves
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. salt
crushed pecans for topping

Directions:
-Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 9X5" loaf pan with shortening or cooking spray.
-Beat butter and sugar in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until fluffy. Beat in eggs, cider, milk and vanilla. Stir in flour, baking powder, cinnamon, all spice, cloves, nutmeg and salt until well combined. Spread in pan and sprinkle top with crushed pecans.
-Cook 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
-Cool on wire rack for 10 minutes. Then remove from pan.

A Fall Feast

I had some friends over for dinner tonight, and I wanted to put together something simple but seasonal. Fall is my absolute favorite season, the weather is beautiful and the air just smells cleaner.

I made one of my favorite looks-more-impressive-than-it-is meals: Roasted chicken and vegetables. Then I threw in a side of smashed butternut squash and a mixed green salad with toasted pecans and craisins. The table was a riot of fall colors. And the best part is while the meal cooked, I had plenty of time to clean up before my friends got here.


I am also proud to say I made my first bread, garlic knots! I kneaded the dough and everything (Thursday night, well in advance). I was inspired by the yummy recipe Katie posted on her food blog last week. I pretty much followed her instructions, but I substituted half of the all purpose flour with whole wheat, trying to be healthy. They were pretty good, but I think the wheat flour sacrificed some of the fluffiness. But my conscience felt better.



And for dessert: hot apple cider=fall.

And a special thanks to Taylor, who took pictures for me while I scrambled to get everything on the table.

Roasted Chicken and Vegetables
The chicken was amazingly moist because I let it brine in the refrigerator for over 24 hours. Osmosis works wonders! And the fresh herbs and citrus were great, simple, fall flavors.

Ingredients:
For the chicken and pan sauce
3-5 lb. whole chicken
brine (4 tbs. salt+water, enough to cover chicken)
butter
salt/pepper
handful fresh thyme
handful fresh rosemary
1 orange, cut in quarters
1 cup red wine
1 cup chicken stock

For vegetables
12 small "confetti" (colorful) potatoes
3 carrots
4 scallions
4 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
1 tbs. fresh rosemary, roughly chopped
1 tbs. fresh thyme
olive oil
salt/pepper

Directions:
-Brine chicken in a covered bowl or pot in the refrigerator for 4-24 hours.
-Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
-Rinse chicken, pat dry. Place in roasting pan. Brush skin with melted butter, put some under the skin as well. Season inside and outside of the bird with salt and pepper. Stuff the cavity with thyme and rosemary then with the orange pieces.
-Place on the middle rack of the oven and cook for 15 minutes. Lower the temperature to 375 and cook for another 45-60 minutes. The chicken is done when the internal temperature of the bird is 170 degrees.
-Remove from oven. Let the chicken rest for 10-15 minutes on a platter under foil before serving. That keeps all the juices in.
-Put the roasting pan on the stove top and skim off most of the fat. Add cup of wine. (This is a rough measurement, it depends on how much juice from the chicken is already in the pan. The sauce should look somewhat purple.) Simmer until the sauce is reduced by half. Add cup of stock. Simmer until reduced by half again.
-Once the chicken is in the oven, cut potatoes and carrots into big chunks. Keep them all relatively similar in size so they cook evenly. Remove the root end and the skin from the shallots. Toss potatoes, carrots and shallots in a bowl with enough olive oil to lightly coat them. Add salt, pepper, rosemary and thyme and toss. (Use a generous amount of salt.)
-Put the vegetables in a baking dish in the oven about 45 minutes before you think the chicken will be done.

Let the baking begin: Cran-Almond Bready Bars

As you can see, I baked something. That might seem like a "so what?" but I hinted at my Achilles heel in the potato soup entry. I hate to admit it, but I don't really bake. I have "successfully" baked two things in my life: pumpkin cheesecake (and I almost smoked us out of the apartment on that one, but it was delicious) and chocolate-raspberry cheesecake bars. They were great and I enjoyed them both thoroughly, but the key was they did not involve the normal baking ingredients, you know flour, baking soda, baking powder, etc.

My main deterrent from baking was that I was always afraid to bake because I didn't want to screw it up. When you cook, you can throw in what you want, and as long as the ingredients 1)taste good together and 2)are in somewhat reasonable proportion to each other, you end up with something edible and hopefully amazing. Baking is just more finicky. I was the little girl who wore overalls, and baking seemed to belong in the domain of the little girls who wore flowered dresses and patent leather shoes, if you know what I mean.

I learned most of what you need to know about the basics of cooking from my Mom, Mommom, and Grandmom Julie, when I was growing up. Armed with that knowledge, I feel confident experimenting with my cooking. But baking? Well, none of the aforementioned cooking mentors really baked all that much. I give my Mom credit, she made birthday cakes, but I remember her painstaking decorations on top more than the cake inside (she's an artist). And once a year, around Easter, my mom made sweet bread in the shape of a bunny (again sculpture emphasized more than baking), and Grandmom Julie made the infamous cheese bread. But once or twice a year does not a baker make.

My secondary baking deterrent was that I would rather eat a bowl of mashed potatoes and gravy for dessert than a cookie. I like sweets, I really do, but I prefer my highly-fattening carbs savory most of the time.

But now that I have a blog and my own kitchen, I felt like I needed to conquer my fear of baking. Sometimes things will turn out, sometimes they won't. (When they don't, obviously I will not post them, except for maybe to lament my failure, but with a clear disclaimer NOT to try this at home.) And I do have at least a few baking genes in me. My Poppop is a great baker; he was a baker in the Navy during WWII. And since he has entrusted me with the family cannoli recipe, which will make an appearance here around Christmas, the least I can do is try to become half the baker he is.

And maybe it was beginner's luck, but my first effort turned out awesome. Cran-Almond Bready Bars. Moist, crumbly, lots of texture from the cranberries and the chopped almonds, and a tangy, sweet, smooth touch of cream cheese icing. Why not call them cake bars? Because I was trying to make cranberry almond bread, and then realized I didn't have a bread pan... because I don't bake, or rather I didn't bake. So when in a pinch, make due with what you have. I had a baking dish, hence the bars. And once they were in bar form, I figured some icing wouldn't hurt. So obviously, if you do have a bread pan you can try this recipe in that, which is what I will do next time I make it.

As an aside: this is an original recipe, but I looked around online for awhile to figure out the right proportions of flour to sugar to wet ingredients and so on. Not that I'm claiming this is rocket science or a break through in baked goods, but I'm not plagiarizing. (I'm a journalist for goodness sake!)


Ingredients:
For the cake bars
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp. ground all spice
1/8 tsp. ground cloves
1 cup chopped cranberries
1/2 cup chopped almonds
1 egg
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 cup apple sauce

For the cream cheese icing
8 oz. package cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup sifted powdered sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions:
-Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 8X11 baking dish.
-Add together flour, sugar, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, all spice and cloves in large mixing bowl. Mix in cranberries and almonds.
-In a separate bowl mix egg, oil and apple sauce.
-Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix well.
-Pour mixture into baking dish and bake on 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
-Cool in baking dish for ten minutes, then remove to wire rack to continue cooling.
-Whip together cream cheese, butter, powdered sugar and vanilla until it is light and fluffy.
-Ice and slice!

*NOTE: These received a warm welcome at the office. Success!