Wednesday, October 27, 2010

A giant cookie

I decided to bake some of nanny's cookies the other day but Zoe wanted a giant cookie so here it is!  It almost flowed off the baking sheet.



The only other thing I've done this week (besides make curtains and keep organizing the house) was mix up a cake mix from a box.  Maybe the house fairy will come soon and bring me a bigger house with a huge kitchen and a small price tag.  A girl can dream can't she?!

Happy baking and if I'm motivated enough I'll make some popcorn pumpkins with the kiddies by this weekend.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Splitting wood.

Nanny P needed some help splitting wood this weekend (for the wood furnace) so those willing to brave the rain on Saturday went out to help.  Sleeping babies and bad knees kept me from doing too much but I did bring desert and helped out with some food when it was all finished.  The apple crisp seemed to be a hit, which is good since I made so much of it. 

I havent' been doing very much baking but we have managed to get a ton of stuff done with the house, new carpet is going down on Saturday, and the realtor is coming right after that!  I'll be baking in my new kitchen in no time (I hope!)

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Great weekend!

I got to spend the weekend with my wonderful family as usual but this weekend we drove to see my aunt and uncle who I don't get to see nearly enough.  It was thanksgiving weekend and a perfect time to take a little post-summer road trip. 

Of course we at too much while we were there but that always happens when we have jiggs dinner.  If you're not familiar with jiggs dinner you don't know what you're missing.  It's basically a traditional Newfoundland boiled dinner consisting of salt beef or pork, potatoes, carrots, turnip, cabbage, peas pudding, and we usually do a roasted chicken and a blueberry pudding.  Everything is put in a pot and boiled for hours. I found this link which has a big of an explanation about where jiggs dinner came from and a recipe at the end but everyone does it just a little bit different and I can't imagine trying to go by a recipe, but then again, I grew up with it.

Anyway, we had the jiggs dinner and a roast turkey and homemade bread that I brought with me.  Even Zoe tried some turnip and cabbage which she never eats.  Yummy!  and I brought some apple blueberry loaf that we picked at after the dinner dishes were cleaned away.

I'm anxious to get back to baking this week but I need some down time to get over the 4 hour drive back home.

Thanks to Aunt L and Uncle L for the great weekend. I can't wait to do it again!!!

Friday, October 8, 2010

What's your favorite brownie recipe?

I have to say that my absolute favorite brownie recipe is on the the Fry's coco tin.  My mom always made those for us and the chewy ones on the outside were too irresistible and I had to grab one of those first.  Add some walnuts to the batter and eat it with a glass of ice cold milk and I think I was in heaven.  I think it's a pretty hard recipe to screw up too.

I'm planning on making these either tonight before I go to bed or after the holiday weekend but either way, here's the recipe if you don't have it already.  Might turn out to be desert for Thanksgiving this weekend.  Oh and Happy Thanksgiving to everyone celebrating this weekend.

Fry's Fudgy Brownies

1 1/3 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup butter
1 cup Fry's Cocoa
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1 cup chopped nuts

Stir together flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl.  Melt butter in a large saucepan.  Remove from heat.  Stir in cocoa.  Blend in sugar, eggs and vanilla.  Blend in dry ingredients and nuts.  Pour batter into greased 13x9x2-inch rectangular baking pan.  Bake in preheated 350F oven 30-35 minutes or until done.  Cool.

I'm also going to try to post some of the recipes for other things I've baked lately.  Right now I have another blueberry apple cake in the oven, an apple cake ready to go, and some bread dough rising for something yummy later on.  It's a cold rainy fall day and I'm in a baking mood!

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Blueberry Apple Cake

Yesterday's baking project was a blueberry apple cake.  The original recipe is for just blueberries but since I've still got a pile of apples to use I did half apples and half blueberries.  It worked out really well!  How can you go wrong with apples?  or blueberries?

NO pictures since I did it while the kiddies worked on homework and helped at the end with folding in the fruit, but another one will be made tonight and I'll try to get a picture before we eat it all up.  Last night's cake is nearly gone already.  Yummy!!!

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

More Tea Buns.

I made three batches of tea buns on Monday and yummmmmmmmm.  I'm not sure if I'm just good at baking or if I'm finding good recipes.  Maybe a combination of both.  I've been baking and cooking since I was a little girl so I must be pretty good at it by now.

Anyway, tea buns.  The recipe is from the Purity/Cream of the West cookbook.  I say both because I'm pretty sure the only thing that is different is the cover.  I've seen both and that's the only thing I can find.

I also want to credit 'campy' for the recipe since they posted it on 50Plus Discussion Forums. and that's where I got it the other day.

TEA BISCUITS

Preheat oven to 425 F

Sift together
2 cups Purity Flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

With a pastry blender or two knives cut in finely.
1/2 cup shortening.

Add 1 cup milk.

Stir with a fork to make a soft dough.
Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead gently 8 to 10 times
Roll or pat to desired thickness (biscuits will double in height when baked)
Cut with a floured 1 3/4 inch cookie cutter
Place biscuits on an ungreased baking sheet, close together for soft sided biscuits or about 1 inch apart for crusty biscuits.

Bake in preheated 425 F oven for 12 to 15 minutes.  Makes 20 biscuits.

A tea biscuit dough should be soft and slightly sticky. A little kneading improves the quality of the biscuits but should be done with a gentle touch as too much handling tends to make them tough.

I made ham and cheese biscuits again and just added 1C of sharp cheddar cheese and 1C diced ham right before I added the milk so that it would all be mixed in evenly. 

I also made apple cinnamon raisin tea biscuits.  And wouldn't you know it, they were all gone yesterday.  I had to guess at amounts but I must have guessed right.  With the dry ingredients I added 1 1/2 tsp of cinnamon.  Then after the butter was cut in I added two apples (peeled, cored and diced), and I didn't measure but it was around 3/4C of raisins that I rehydrated in some boiling water for a few minutes.  It just makes them softer and nicer in the biscuit. 

Both kinds are baked the same as a regular biscuit so additions are the only changes.  I think if you add something fairly wet, like pineapple, you might have to add some more flour or decrease the milk amount but I'll experiment some more as soon as I get to the store to replenish my baking powder supply. Maybe I'll do raisins dates and walnuts next, or chocolate chip, or cornmeal cheddar and jalapeno, or.......

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Are ours better???

I stopped for coffee and tea biscuits this morning...ham and cheese biscuits to be exact.  Oh and mediocre coffee.  But as I was eating I thought 'I have ham home in the fridge and I also have several big blocks of cheese in the freezer.  I could make these!'. So that's what we did and YUMMMMMMMMM.  If I could find my pastry blender I'd go into business.  NO not really but I'm certainly going to make some more and find some room in my tiny little freezer.  They will be great to take out for a quick breakfast or mid-morning (afternoon, midnight, anytime) snack.

Zoe helped me, as usual, and we think hers turned out a little fluffier than mine.  Delicate little hands???  Maybe.  But all of them are super yummy and I'm sure won't last past tomorrow.  Oh Lord help my waistline!!!!!

I also took some pics of my mini chicken burgers that I mentioned yesterday, and I found some pictures of the bread and calzones that I made last weekend. Oh where is the time going?????  It seems like I just made all that stuff.  But I guess it's October 2 already and soon we'll be trick-or-treating and then into birthdays and then Christmas.  So much baking, so little time.....and with that here are some pictures.

You want me to eat what????

Here's my giant calzone.
Mini chicken burgers (nuggets)


Fresh bread right from the oven.




The final product. mmmmmmmmmm

Friday, October 1, 2010

Mini Chicken Burgers

No pics of this (yet), but I made the perfect size chicken burgers for the kids the other day.  I cooked regular sized chicken nuggets and put them on the mini buns that I got from Superstore.  Add some ketchup, cheese, or whatever else they wanted, and voila, mini chicken burgers!!!!