Sunny Sunday!

Yay! I am back to my "normal" functioning self... everything is unpacked, I'm not on the verge of a mental breakdown, there's food in the fridge, and I'm restarting the healthy diet/daily jog thing.

And given the happy sunshine streaming in through the windows, I was in a relatively un-lazy mood and baked. Hooray!

I've been sitting on this recipe for a while... from the August issue of Gourmet:
Plum Kuchen (Recipe by Ruth Cousineau)

1 (1/4-ounce) package active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water
2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, divided
1 cup sugar, divided
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup plain whole-milk yogurt (preferably Greek-style) at room temperature
1 large egg, warmed in shell in warm water 5 minutes
1 1/2 teaspoons grated lemon zest
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 sticks unsalted butter, cut into tablespoons and softened, divided
3/4 lb firm-ripe plums (about 4 small), halved and pitted

Stir together yeast and warm water in mixer bowl and let stand until foamy, about 5 minutes. (If mixture doesn’t foam, start over with new yeast.)

Add 2 cups flour, 2/3 cup sugar, salt, yogurt, egg, zest, and vanilla to yeast mixture and mix at medium-low speed 1 minute. Beat in 1 stick butter, 1 Tbsp at a time, until incorporated. Beat at medium speed until dough is smooth and shiny, about 5 minutes. (Dough will be very sticky.)

Scrape down side of bowl and sprinkle dough with remaining 2 Tbsp flour. Cover bowl with a kitchen towel (not terry cloth) and let dough rise in a draft-free place at warm room temperature until doubled, 1 1/2 to 2 hours.

Spread remaining 2 Tbsp butter in bottom of a 9-inch square baking pan and sprinkle with remaining 1/3 cup sugar.

Cut each plum half into 5 or 6 slices and arrange in 1 layer in pan.

Stir dough until flour is incorporated, then spread evenly over plums. Loosely cover with buttered plastic wrap, then kitchen towel. Let rise in a draft-free place at warm room temperature until almost doubled, about 1 1/2 hours.

Preheat oven to 375°F with rack in middle.

Bake until kuchen is golden-brown and a wooden pick inserted into center comes out clean, 30 to 35 minutes. Cool in pan 5 minutes, then invert and unmold onto a rack to cool completely.

Storage:

Kuchen is best the day it is baked but can be kept, loosely covered, at room temperature 1 day.

Notes:
Proofing the yeast was SUCH A PAIN IN THE BUTT. I tried 3 times, and couldn't get it to foam. So I just moved on... and of course my dough didn't rise, but it still turned out ok. A bit dense, but not unpalatable, especially warm out of the oven. The lemon zest was really nice in lightening up the shortbread like "cake". I would definitely try it with other stone fruits as well. But I think the plums look really pretty with the dark red skins and light flesh.
Overall, this was pretty easy to make for something so "fancy" looking. It just takes time to wait for the dough to rise - if it ever does, that is.

I also baked a familiar batch of brownies...

AND made a quicky sammich, inspired looooong ago by Reeni of Cinnamon Spice and Everything Nice. I'm still dying to make her version as it is though!
12-grain bread with pesto, mozzarella, sliced tomatoes, and deli cut chicken.

I got these loaves via a Foodbuzz Tastemakers opportunity... Nature's Pride. I never really have a preference for bread... I tend to just pick a loaf that is either cheap, or whatever I need for any sandwich makings. And I've never had 12-grain before... and I guess I like it!

i'm not dead.

... just waaaay overwhelmed. its been a crazy busy month, starting with the move. October should calm down some... and hopefully I'll have built my bed frame by then!

Keep in store... i have some fab recipes lined up!


I miss baking. Sad face.

Almost done...

Ok. I swear... only one or two more brownie posts after this!

This particular one from justJenn struck my fancy... peanut butter + chocolate brownie! yes please!!

Peanut Butter Brownies

Melting the chocolate + butter.

Melting together the PB "batter".

Folding the flour into the chocolate mixture.

Poured the PB mix over the brownie mix.

The weird texture that the PB mix bakes up to be.

So as usual, I had a bit of a timing issue. I pulled it out of the oven just in time, maybe just a taaaaad over, but there wasn't a burnt hard crust or anything. I added on an additional 30 min of bake time. Seems like I do that a lot. I did the toothpick test, as well as just watched for the top PB layer to set. It takes a while.

The result was still a super moist and thick and chewy brownie. The peanut butter "topping" is definitely a treat, but I don't think it was peanut buttery enough for some of the people that sampled. But still good!

The tricky part with this recipe too was not cooking the eggs when mixing them into the batter. Tricky tricky business!

Also, I used this:

It is apparently awesome because it's just simply peanut butter. No monosodaieoriehsiuasida or polysaturagestadas... just peanuts and other pronounceable ingredients.

Also, given the heat (again!!!!) and the laziness that comes with having to pack up my apartment... I ordered out and decided to try the pastas from Pizza Hut. Bacon Mac n Cheese, Chicken Alfredo, Breadsticks. Not too shabby a meal. Not phenomenal. But its a nice change from just pizza being delivered to your door.

a quick diversion

So, I'm still on the brownie train... but today, I made the pie pops! At last!
Check out Bakerella and Luxirare for their creations too. (and the better pictures)

I made the dough from scratch from the Basic Pie Pastry recipe from the Willams-Sonoma book I still have on loan. Very easy. And quick.

Oh. And this book is awesome in that it has all the different measurements- cups/oz/grams- for every recipe. Measuring goes a million times faster!
Basic Pie Pastry
1.5C/7.1oz/235g AP flour
1/2tsp Salt
0.5C/4oz/125g Vegetable Shortening
3-4 T cold water, +/- as needed

Combine flour and salt. Add shortening. Combine with 2 knives (which I did) or a pastry blender, until it becomes the consistency of coarse bread crumbs. Then add in water 1 tbsp at a time, stirring gently with the fork after each addition of water. Add just enough water for the dough to come together roughly. Form into a disk with floured hands. Dough is ready to use now! Roll out on floured surface, yadda yadda...

And I still get very frustrated when rolling out dough. So, I knew this would be purely experimental/experiential. I would have made fresh filling, buttttttttt right out of the can seemed better this time around. Sad I know. But whatcha gonna do?

I forgot to brush the first batch with egg whites. The second batch I did, and also sprinkled with sugar. Also, just made some stickless, 'cause I could. I think I should skip on the salt in the recipe since there wasn't enough fruit filling to be sweet enough... I knew I should have rolled the pastry out thinner, but rolling it out as is was hard enough.

the olden days...

I feel like it was just yesterday that I wrote about my fun bday gifts...
but here we are again! (Holy crap, that means I've been doing this blog thing for over a year now?!?)

Here's to the birthday Fun-Fun!


Ila did an excellent coverage on the festivities too!

Now, back to baking!
More brownies! (Cupcakes using my new cupcake making kit soon! promise.)

Dark Chocolate Chip Brownies from Evil Shenanigans
Interesting recipe... with honey! So I gave it a try, even though I'm not a honey person.
And wow. I may have overdone it with the honey... you can really smell it baking up, and also just taking a bite. It's also chewy! These came out nice and moist! It wasn't as dark as hers... and I skipped out on the chips. Also didn't have cake flour, so I "subbed" with less AP Flour + Cornstarch. Also didn't have instant espresso. Maybe I'll give this another go when I have all the right ingredients.


Deep Dish Brownies from Hershey's
I used dark cocoa for this. It wasn't sweet at first bite... so I wasn't all that impressed. But its still good! Moist and thick. More often than not my brownies tend to "crater" in the center... as this recipe did. but the previous didn't. At all. Weird.


Upon eating a bite of the "honey brownie" then sneaking a piece of the "Hershey's brownie"... the sweetness came out from the latter. Pretty delish!

Anyways... good practice in baking! Didn't overbake, didn't underbake. Win-win.

'til next time!
Hopefully I'll get around to doing those cute pie pops that have been going around lately!!!

Baking Mondays

My day off always flies by... but I get lots of baking done!

Strawberry-Shortcake Cookies from Martha Stewart Living

My photos are in no way as good at the featured picture... but:

These cookies are super soft... taste good, but not much of a cookie as a mini cake. Maybe I used too much cream. I'm not sure if this is something I'd add to my repertoire. Great recipe though!

Also, made another batch of brownies, Earl Grey Brownies (minus the earl grey part)...
I didn't want to make the ganache if the brownies were going to be poop. Aaaaand... they didn't turn out right. Yet another batch with a tough crust - overbaked, of course.
But the preparation of this batch stood out from the past few... mainly REALLY beating the eggs and folding them in...

More brownies!

Gianduia Brownies - take 2 - I've made another version of these before from Giada.

I was VERY cautious with the timing and toothpick testing on this one...
and it was a success!!

I opted out on the hazelnuts.
And... seriously?... Nutella in brownies?



These are amazing.
Moist and delish. But didn't taste much of the Nutella.

Next time though, rather than buttering and flouring the pan, I'll just do the parchment paper thing.