Pumpkin Cornbread

As you probably noticed last year, I have jumped on the pumpkin band wagon.  My latest venture into the world of baking with pumpkin was some pumpkin cornbread to go with my vegan/vegetarian chili. I found this recipe on Two Peas And Their Pod.  It was the first time I've been disappointed with one of their recipes. I first got concerned when I saw how long the ingredient list was: flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, brown sugar, cornmeal, eggs, pumpkin, olive oil, and molasses. 11 ingredients!  

The first step was to mix the dry ingredients together--all 7 of them!

Then I mixed the remaining 4 wet ingredients together and combined them with the dry ingredients, mixing just until moistened.

Next I scooped the batter into greased muffin tins.  The recipe made 12 muffins and some mini muffins. 

After coming out of the oven they looked and smelled great. 

And, as you can see here, they had great texture.  You must be asking yourself at this point why this recipe was a failure. After all, I just said they looked great, smelled great, and had great texture.  The problem was that the taste was off.  Because olive oil was the only fat used in this recipe, the muffins tasted like, well, olive oil. 

I think if I were to try pumpkin cornbread again I would do one of three things: replace the olive oil in this recipe with canola or vegetable oil; find a new recipe that does not use olive oil at all; or use a Jiffy mix and replace some of the wet ingredients with pumpkin.  Have you had any luck with pumpkin cornbread?

Focaccia

 

After I made my vegetable broth, I wanted to use some of my leftover vegetables.  I decided to put them to good use on top of some focaccia. The recipe I used came from the Food Network. Since you can check out the recipe with the link, I won't go into too many details about the process. 

Basically, first I made dough and let it rise. I modified the recipe by substituting half of the flour with whole wheat flour. That is why the dough has a darker coloring.

After the dough doubled in size, I spread it out on a pizza pan and let it rest for a few minutes.

Then, I sprinkled on my toppings and baked it in the oven. You can see here that I added roasted vegetables, olives, cheese, oregano, parsley, and rosemary.

 

This focaccia had a great texture, even with the whole wheat flour.  I ate it for lunch most days of the week that I made it.  I found that heating it up in the toaster oven worked wonderfully.

Oatmeal Spice Muffins

Lately I have been trying to squeeze in as much goodness into my recipes while also squeezing out as much of the unhealthy ingredients as I can.  Sometimes trying to make unhealthy foods healthy doesn't turn out as well as you'd like.  This dish is one example.  I tried to make a healthy muffin with whole wheat flour, oats, lots of spices, and without any added fat. I found the recipe on another blog: Lemon Savory.

The muffins had great coloring and texture, but tasted, well, healthy.  There was a distinct "health" taste about them.  Needless to say, half of the batch is sitting in my freezer waiting to be eaten...

Indian Feast

Last weekend my boyfriend Brandon and I cooked ourselves a feast of Indian food. We were both really hungry while we cooked, so there are no pictures of the process, just two pictures of the final product. In the one below you can see the four dishes that we made:

• Naan (we didn't really make this, but heated it up in the oven)
• Chicken Tikka (marinated overnight in a variety of spices and yogurt and then broiled)
• Curried Chickpeas (the spice mixture was from a kit and was way too salty)
• Daal (from the Skinny Bitch cookbook)

 

Overall, this meal was very fun to make.  The daal and naan turned out the best in my opinion.  Brandon liked the chicken tikka and naan the best.  I thought that the chicken tikka was a little mild.  We'll have to up the spices next time--and find out how to make it red!

Baguette french toast

Looking for another way to use day old bread?  Look no further.  Last night I had leftover baguette from dinner earlier in the week.  I didn't really feel like cooking (surprise, surprise), but didn't want the baguette to go to waste--this was a yummy one from a bakery, not one that I botched making.  To keep it from getting stale and inedible, I made french toast out of it.

Everyone probably already knows how to make french toast, but here's a refresher.  First, I scrambled two eggs with a little milk and some cinnamon and nutmeg.  Next, I dipped the sliced baguette into the mixture, letting it absorb. 

 

Then, I cooked the soaked bread in a frying pan over medium heat until the mixture set up and the bread was lightly browned. 

 

What's left to do but smother the toast in butter and syrup and eat up? Simple, but delicious.  A great easy meal for breakfast or dinner, using leftover ingredients. 

Croutons

Well, I might have lied a little in that last post.  I said that I ate the first loaf of bread.  It turns out I only ate about half of the loaf.  I really just don't eat that much bread.  After it had sat out for about a week, and was getting nice and crusty, I decided to put it to good use...and make croutons.  While I had never done this before, it turned out to be really easy. Here is the half loaf of bread that I started with.

 

 The first step is to cut up the bread into cubes, that are about 1/2 inch across.

 

Then, mix the bread cubes with melted butter or spray with non-stick spray and sprinkle on whatever spices you want.  I chose a little garlic salt and parsley.  All that's left to do is bake the croutons in the over for about 15 minutes at 350 degrees.  Voila, you have your very own home made croutons from bread that might have otherwise gone to waste.  Store the croutons in an air tight container use them on anything from soups to salads! 

Bread

Last weekend I decided to bake some bread.  Normally I don't eat too much bread, and stick to tortillas and pita, but nothing beats a good loaf of home made bread.  This time I opted for an oatmeal wheat loaf.  I wanted to document the rising process, so there are a lot of pictures. First up is the dough as I finished kneading it.

 

After I was done kneading the dough, I put it in a big red bowl to rise.  Here is its initial size.

 

One hour later, the dough had doubled in size. Here it is in the same bowl.

 

 

At this point, I punched down the dough, and let it rise for another half hour.  Then, I took it out of the bowl and formed two loaves with it.  

After a short period of letting the dough rest, I transferred it into bread pans for its final rising session.

 

According to the recipe I used, I was supposed to let the bread rise again until it had doubled (again) in size.  I got a little impatient, though, and baked the bread after it had risen to this size.

Everyone says that patience is a virtue.  This is especially true when baking bread.  Allowing the bread time to rise lets the yeast do its job and develop air pockets within the dough.  When you rush the process, the yeast does not have time to aerate the bread, and you end up with a denser loaf.  This is what happened to me.  Despite its denseness, it was still pretty tasty, and made great toast. Here is the final product. I ate one loaf, and put the other in the freezer to save for later.

Baguette fail

While studying abroad in Paris, I feel in love with French bread, specifically the baguette.  Every morning I would have the same thing for breakfast: plain yogurt, baguette, tea, and milk.  I remember one day my host mom went out early in the morning to get a fresh baguette for my breakfast.  When I woke up it was still warm.  I said thanked her she responded with "c'est les petites choses" or "it's the little things."

The word baguette actually does not mean bread.  It refers to the long skinny shape of the loaf. Anything that is long and skinny can be called a baguette.  The first time I went out for Chinese food in France, I got very confused when I was asked if I wanted baguettes.  I thought wow, I know the French love their bread...but in a Chinese restaurant?!? The waiter actually asking me if I wanted chopsticks!

When I came back from France, I took an entire day trying to recreate a true baguette with my mom.  We let the baguette rise over and over and over.  We brushed it with water while it was in the oven to create the crispy crust.  After belaboring over the bread, we had a pretty decent product.  Not as good as in France, but pretty close.

Last weekend, I decided to try again.  I found a recipe in my Better Homes and Gardens cookbook and immediately became suspicious.  The directions only called for an hour of rising.  I thought, this probably won't work, but I'll try it anyways.  As it turns out, my instinct was correct.  The baguette looked pretty delicious, but the texture and taste were both off.  It was so bad I only ate one piece and threw the rest away.  Next time I'll leave it to the boulangerie.

 

P.S: In case you're wondering how a baguette keeps its long skinny shape, the answer is a baguette pan.  This pan, pictured above, is basically two half cylinders attached to one another.   There are also wider versions for making artisan loafs.