iced gingerbread cookies

Looks like my posts/recipes are out of chronological order. I suppose it doesn't matter too much. I'm letting my phone connect to google plus so I can access my cooking phone photos via blogger directly without having to download them and take up memory I don't have available on my grandpa of a computer, but g+ seems to be willy nilly picking them and not going in any order. As you wish, google.

I made this recipe a few nights ago because I had some free time, and I felt like doing something that might make me feel a little more in the Christmas spirit. I had made gingerbread cookies a few weeks ago when I first got to NYC and had time to kill during Hurricane Sandy, and they turned out really well. I used a different recipe for these, and they were a lot drier. They crumbled from dough to rolling. I gave up on rolling and just balled them up and flattened them out, hence their plain jane shape. Then I was grateful for our funky oven and having a dish of water to keep them moist; otherwise, I'm sure they'd have been dry and terrible. Luckily they turned out okay, and once I put the icing on, I was surprised that they were actually pretty good. A stroke of luck and sugar. I decided to decorate them in Christmas colors as well as good luck cookies for my roommate's finals! I'm pretty sure she nailed them, and I'll take a point or two of credit from the snacks. :)

3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 stick butter or margarine, softened
2 large eggs
1/4 cup molasses
3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting work surface
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt


1 cup confectioners' sugar, sifted
1 to 2 tablespoons milk
Food coloring, as desired
*I loosely measured and then added milk and sugar until I got a consistency that was spreadable but would harden after a bit

Using an electric mixer at low speed, cream the sugar and butter until thoroughly combined. Add the eggs and molasses and mix until combined. Sift together the flour, ginger, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture and combine with a spoon or spatula.

Remove the dough from the bowl and wrap in plastic wrap; place in the refrigerator until firm, about 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. Allow the dough to sit at room temperature for about 15 minutes, until pliable. Take about 1/2 cup of dough at a time and roll onto a floured board until about 1/8-inch thick. Cut out with gingerbread boy and girl cookie cutters. You can re-roll the scraps. Using a spatula, transfer the cookies from the board to the prepared cookie sheets.

Bake for 10 minutes, until just beginning to brown at the edges. Transfer to wire racks to cool.

To make the icing, combine the confectioners' sugar and milk. Divide the mixture into thirds; leave 1/3 white, and color 1/3 green and the final third red. Decorate piping eyes, mouths, buttons, and bow ties.

Pumpking Cinnamon Rolls

I'm sticking with my pumpking typo as a thing. What of it?!

Anyway, in our fall cooking festivities, I ventured to try SK's pumpkin cinnamon rolls. It was a little challenging at moments, but teamwork is great help, and they were tasty. I didn't get a strong pumpkin flavor, but it was good. Plus it felt fun and fancy to have made them by hand. Also, I think my yeast wasn't great because it didn't rise as it should have, so I think that explains some discrepancies between her pictures and mine.

Fair warning: this is pretty involved and took me quite a few hours over the course of an afternoon and a morning. Just know what you're getting yourself into.

Dough
6 tablespoons (85 grams) unsalted butter, to be divided
1/2 cup (120 ml) whole milk, warmed (but not over 116 degrees)
2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast (from 1 .25-ounce or 7 gram envelope yeast)
3 1/2 cups (440 grams) all-purpose flour, plus extra for rolling out
1/4 cup (packed) (50 grams) light or dark brown sugar
1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated sugar
1 teaspoon (6 grams) table salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cardamom (optional)
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
2/3 cups (160 grams) pumpkin puree, canned or homemade
1 large egg
Oil for coating rising bowl

Filling
3/4 cup (packed, 145 grams) light or dark brown sugar
1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated sugar
1/8 teaspoon table salt
2 teaspoons (5 grams) ground cinnamon

Glaze
4 ounces (115 grams) cream cheese, softened
2 tablespoons (30 ml) milk or buttermilk
2 cups (240 grams) powdered sugar, sifted
Few drops vanilla extract (optional)

Make your dough: 
Melt your butter, and hey, if you’re melting it in a little saucepan, you might as well brown it for extra flavor. Once the butter has melted, keep cooking it over medium heat for a few additional minutes. It will become hissy and sizzle a lot, then take on a nutty flavor as golden bits form at the bottom of the pot. Remove from heat and set aside to cool slightly.

Combine your warmed milk and yeast in a small bowl and set aside. After five to seven minutes, it should be a bit foamy. If it’s not, you might have some bad yeast and should start again with a newer packet.

In the bottom of the bowl of an electric mixer combine flour, sugars, salt and spices. Add just 1/4 cup (or two-thirds of; leave the rest for assembly) of your melted/browned butter and stir to combine. Add yeast-milk mixture, pumpkin and egg and mix combined. Switch mixer to a dough hook and run it for 5 minutes on low.

Scrape mixture into a large oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Set aside for 1 hour in a draft-free place; it should just about double.

While it is rising, line the bottom of two 9-inch round cake pans (8-inch round should work too, as does an 8-inch square) with parchment paper and butter the sides of the pan and the paper.

Assemble buns: 
Scoop dough onto a very well floured surface and flour the top of it well. With a rolling pin, roll the dough to an approximately 16×11-inch rectangle. Brush reserved melted/browned butter over dough. Stir together remaining filling ingredients and sprinkle mixture evenly over dough. Starting on a longer side, roll the dough into a tight spiral. It’s going to make a mess because the dough is crazy soft and some stuff spills off the ends; don’t sweat it. It will all be delicious in the end.

Here’s how to cut cinnamon rolls without squishing their pretty spirals: With a sharp serrated knife, using absolutely no pressure whatsoever (only the weight of the blade should land on the dough) gently saw your log with a back-forth motion into approximately 1-inch sections. When a soft dough like this is rolled, it tends to grow longer, which means that you’ll have the option to either make more buns (say, 18 instead of 16) or just cut them a little larger (in generous inches).

Divide buns between two prepared pans. You can sprinkle any sugar that fell off onto the counter over them. Cover each pan with plastic wrap and let rise for another 45 minutes.

If you’re doing this ahead of time, you can now put them in the fridge overnight. In the morning, leave them out for an hour to warm up and finish rising.

15 minutes before you’re ready to bake them, heat the oven to 350°F. Meanwhile, you can make the glaze. Beat your cream cheese until it is light and fluffy. Add powdered sugar and vanilla. Drizzle in milk until you get the consistency you’re looking for, either thick enough to ice or thin enough to drizzle.

Finish your buns: 
Remove the plastic and bake buns for 25 minutes, until puffed and golden and the aroma brings all the boys to your yard is like a snickerdoodle. Transfer pans to wire cooling racks and drizzle/schmear with cream cheese glaze, then have at them.

Pumpking Beer Bread

This was one of the first recipes I cooked for my now-boyfriend when we first started hanging out this summer/fall. It was starting to cool off, and stores were stocking up delicious fall treats for October. We decided to have a fall cooking weekend, so I pulled up this pumpkin beer bread recipe a friend showed me and decided to give it a whirl. Very yummy. I'm giving the recipe as I originally found it, but I made it a second time and doubled all the spices and really liked that better. 

Also I keep mistyping Pumpking instead of just pumpkin, so I'm officially just going with it and dubbing this bread Pumpking Beer Bread. King of the pumpkin beer breads. Why not?

[as I mentioned before, I doubled all the spices the 2nd time I made it because I love delicious spices]


Oil or butter for greasing the pan
1¼ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup whole-wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground ginger
Pinch ground nutmeg
Pinch ground allspice
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 cup pumpkin purée
1 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup pumpkin ale

1. Heat the oven to 350°F. Grease a 9-inch loaf pan. Combine the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and allspice in a large bowl.

2. Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over low heat (or in a medium bowl in the microwave). Remove from the heat. Stir in the pumpkin and brown sugar, then stir in the eggs. Finally, stir in the pumpkin ale. Add the pumpkin mixture to the dry ingredients and stir just until combined, then transfer the batter to the greased pan.

3. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean, about 1 hour. Cool thoroughly, then slice and serve. (Leftover pumpkin bread can be wrapped in foil or plastic wrap and stored at room temperature for up to a few days.)

Brownies

I've been negligent. But I've also been cooking a little bit lately, and I wanted to get my last bits of Austin cooking endeavors up on the blog. I know you've all been waiting with bated breath (at this point, I'd make some joke about my mom being the only one reading this, but I know she doesn't, so...).

I think this was a Joy of Cooking brownie recipe. Or maybe Smitten Kitchen. Either way, it was simple. Theoretically, it was easy, but it still took me three attempts to get it right. I think for one (or all? It was a couple months ago), I used this SK recipe. The first time, I accidentally used rancid butter. The whole time, I could tell that things smelled/tasted funky, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Finally, after a beautiful batch of brownies came out of the oven, I connected the dots and realized it was terrible. I even tried to eat a bite, and it was so bad I just had to throw it all away. I can't remember what trick I pulled on the 2nd batch that I ruined, but eventually, I made a simple batch of brownies. Huzzah!

 Nice totally sick filter from my hipstamatic. 

Yes, I admit to using it. I love the way the pics look except that the downside is that you have to think ahead and pick the filter first. That means I use the same one pretty much always. 

Because you noticed/asked/cared.

10 tablespoons (140 grams) unsalted butter
1 1/4 cups (250 grams) sugar
3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons (65 grams, though some brands may weigh more) unsweetened cocoa powder (natural or Dutch-process)
1/4 teaspoon salt (or a heaping 1/4 teaspoon flaky salt, as I used)
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 large eggs, cold
1/2 cup (65 grams) all-purpose flour
2/3 cup (75 grams) walnut or pecan pieces (optional)

Position a rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat the oven to 325°F. Line the bottom and sides of an 8×8-inch square baking pan with parchment paper or foil, leaving an overhang on two opposite sides.

Combine the butter, sugar, cocoa, and salt in a medium heatproof bowl and set the bowl in a wide skillet of barely simmering water. Stir from time to time until the butter is melted and the mixture is smooth and hot enough that you want to remove your finger fairly quickly after dipping it in to test. Remove the bowl from the skillet and set aside briefly until the mixture is only warm, not hot. It looks fairly gritty at this point, but don’t fret — it smooths out once the eggs and flour are added. [Note, many people who have tried this recipe have found that this step works just fine in the microwave. Couldn't test this because we don't have one, but it sounds like it would work.]

Stir in the vanilla with a wooden spoon. Add the eggs one at a time, stirring vigorously after each one. When the batter looks thick, shiny, and well blended, add the flour and stir until you cannot see it any longer, then beat vigorously for 40 strokes with the wooden spoon or a rubber spatula. Stir in the nuts, if using. Spread evenly in the lined pan.

Bake until a toothpick plunged into the center emerges slightly moist with batter, 20 to 25 minutes is Medrich’s suggestion but it took me at least 10 minutes longer to get them set. Let cool completely on a rack. (I go further and throw mine in the fridge or freezer for a while; it’s the only way I can get them to cut with clean lines.)

Lift up the ends of the parchment or foil liner, and transfer the brownies to a cutting board. Cut into 16 or 25 squares.

purple potatoes three ways

Well, to be totally frank, I made the potatoes sort of three ways and then turned one into one that I already had, so I really mostly ate them two ways: roasted and mashed. And they are so good that way. The third way, that semi-involved a recipe that I mostly didn't follow, was fork-mashed and with a zesty flavor profile as per this SK recipe. I didn't quite have everything on-hand to make it, so when it didn't seem stunning, I just made them creamy and mashed and delicious. While they look like a weird purple yogurt when mashed, they taste pretty yummy, so I don't mind. They were also delicious roasted. What vegetable isn't delicious roasted? I have yet to meet it. It's such a simple and elegant solution to any veggie "problem," and I never have any problem cleaning a plate full of roasted vegetables. They just hit some flavor spot that my mouth is a big fan of and my conscience feels great about.

So... so much for a recipe. Here's some pics of roasted purple potatoes and squash (some with olive oil and spices, some with olive oil and cinnamon sugar). And some other veggies that got roasted and eaten straight off the foil in a dignified manner.

iphone hipstamatic or nice olympus picture?

I honestly can't decide which is better, which is frustrating...

paleo salmon salad

My friend, a rower/teammate who is now a workout trainer in Colorado, recently got hooked on the paleo diet. She posted about this salmon salad in her blog (about working out and eating paleo), and while it struck me as a strange combination of ingredients, she was really enthusiastic about it so I figured I'd give it a try. I didn't have blueberries or coconuts and subbed in dried cranberries for cherries, but man! It was delicious! I am impressed and very happy that I tried it. I'll be stocking up on canned salmon now so that this can be a go-to for me as well. Give it a try!

Apologies for the pictures - I snapped a couple on my phone, but the quality was sub-par (and worse than they normally turn out) plus the color scheme here was a bit rough to manage well. Don't let appearances fool you! You want to eat this.

1 can of salmon (wild salmon has a great omega 3 to omega 6 ratio btws)
½ cup blueberries [didn't have on hand]
¼ avocado
¼ cup unsweetened coconut flakes (the BIG kind, not the shavings) [I didn't have this]
2 Tbs golden raisins
2 Tbs dried cherries [I used cranberries instead]
dash o’salt, pepper, and onion powder
hefty drizzle: olive oil and balsamic vinegar

Basically, just mix it all together and enjoy! Also, I bet this would be pretty good if you put it on top of lettuce like a chicken salad or if you weren't paleo, mixed with quinoa or cooled pasta or something. I don't know, but it seems pretty flexible and is really just satisfying.

Nutritional Information (full recipe with my version of ingredients):
427 total calories
28.3 g total fat [but it's all good fat - salmon, avocado, olive oil]
0 g cholesterol
20 g total carbs
5 g fiber
10 g sugar
22.5 g protein

Spicy Roasted Pepper Sauce

I saw this recent post on Smitten Kitchen about a roasted pepper sauce, and because I still had a plethora of veggies laying around (down to potatoes, a squash, and maybe a couple peppers or something), I thought I'd wing this recipe with what I had to use up all my peppers. I appreciate peppers, but I'm not a huge fan, so I wasn't really eager to just eat them raw or in anything else because that's just not what my taste buds liked. I haven't, in the course of the week, really found a use for it yet - but I think that is more because smoky, spicy, pepper flavor isn't my bag and not because this isn't totally delicious and worth having on your food.

 how cute beyond cute are those little guys?

also, I think they are the spiciest ones, so big things in small packages, etc.

Yield: 1 2/3 to 2 cups steak sauce.

1 red bell pepper, small was suggested [I had 3 tiny peppers, 2 small green bells, and 1 larger yellow bell pepper]
2/3 cup canned or fresh tomato purée
1/4 cup orange juice [I used lemonade because that's what I had]
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon molasses [I didn't have any so I used syrup]
3/4 teaspoon table salt or more to taste
1 teaspoon ground mustard [I just used some dijon]
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger [didn't have]
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon onion powder [didn't have]
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice [didn't have]

Preheat your broiler. Place your pepper on a baking sheet and cook it under the broiler until all sides are charred, turning with with tongs as needed. Don’t skimp on the charring as this skin will add a fantastic flavor dimension. Mine took about 15 minutes, but I have a terrible broiler [I think mine were in there for like 45 minutes, but I just had them in the oven at 400 with other veggies to roast]. Yours might only take 5 to 8 minutes. Transfer pepper to somewhere to cool until you’re able to handle it, about 15 minutes.

Tear open the pepper and remove the seeds and membranes with your fingers or a paring knife [mine were so soft this was crazy easy]. Add the pepper (with its skin) to the blender along with the remaining ingredients. Puree mixture until as smooth as possible. Transfer mixture to a small saucepan. Simmer it gently over low heat for 15 minutes, stirring from time to time. It will yield a fairly smooth that can be used as is, but if you’d like a smoother consistency, you have two options: running it back through the blender or food processor again (I got a smoother blender after the fibers had cooked down more on the stove)[this is what I did] or pressing it through that fine-mesh sieve (I started doing this, then decided it wasn’t worth the trouble).

Store in an airtight jar in the fridge for one week, though I suspect it will keep for two.

Muffin Bread Pudding

As I did not eat up all my muffins from the other day and they got sort of stale, I wanted to see if I could make them into a bread pudding, which I've never made before. According to Joy of Cooking, you can't make muffins into bread pudding, so that made me sad, but I decided to google it before I gave up. SK didn't have anything, but I found a couple random blogs that had recipes, and this one seemed to match what I wanted to do most similarly. The cinnamon in it was really nice, so I would maybe add a bit more next time because I liked it so much. Looking over the recipe, I really didn't even use a lot of what it had, but I got the basics and it turned out pretty well. More cinnamon would have been good, and I guess I could have cooked it for longer, but it was tasty. Especially with some Blue Bell homemade vanilla ice cream, which will always be my love of loves for simple desserts.

1/4 cup sugar
2 eggs, slightly beaten
2 cups milk
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp almond extract [didn't have]
6 muffins, crumbled (about 4-5 cups) [I only have 5 muffins]
2 Tbl butter, melted [didn't use and didn't even see until now...]
1/2 cup raisins (optional) [didn't use]
1/2 cup slivered almonds, chopped [didn't use]

1. preheat oven to 350 f. spray or lightly butter a 9 x 5 x 3 inch loaf pan.
2. beat together sugar, eggs, and milk in a medium size bowl.
3. beat in cinnamon, nutmeg, and almond extract.
4. add crumbled muffins to the pan.  carefully toss with optional raisins.
5. pour melted butter over muffins.  add milk mixture and sprinkle with almonds.
6. bake for about 45 minutes until top is crusty and pudding looks set and is firm to the touch.
7. cut into slices while in the pan.  serve plain or with suggested accompaniments.

blueberry peach muffins

My mom bought some fruit while she was in town visiting me (yay for mommies), but sadly, I couldn't eat it all before it started getting too soft for my liking. So I baked it! Best solution to handling overripe fruit. This time I went with a Joy of Cooking basic muffin recipe and threw in the rest of my blueberries and two peaches (which I know are peaches thanks to some helpful identifying advice from a friend - peaches, nectarines, apricots, my brain can't keep them straight). They weren't the best muffins I've ever made - I used half and half (my mom bought it and I'll never use it otherwise), so maybe that was why? Or maybe because I used oil instead of butter, and I don't love oil? Or probably I overmixed it because it was smooth. I'm not sure but I just wasn't crazy about the texture. The fruit is yummy, though, of course, and my friends liked them enough to eat them, so problem solved.

2 cups all purpose flour
1 tbsp baking powder (make sure its not clumpy, I keep finding them in my finished products)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp grated or ground nutmeg (I also add some cinnamon and cardamom, why not?)
2 large eggs
1 cup milk or cream
2/3 cup sugar or brown sugar
1/4 to 1/2 cup (1/2 to 1 stick) butter, melted, or 1/4 to 1/2 cup oil
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Mix flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg together. In another bowl, whisk eggs, milk, sugar, butter/oil, and vanilla. Mix together with a few light strokes, just until the batter is moistened but not overmixed and smooth. Add in cut up fruit. Pour into muffin tin.

Bake for 17 minutes (longer with fruit) until toothpick comes out clean. Let cool for 2-3 minutes before removing from pan. Serve warm with some butter, and it's delicious!

I've found that when I keep baked goods, it is actually better to not seal them fully because they get soggy sometimes. But it depends on a lot of things. 

fried okra

From my big veggie jackpot from volunteering, I still have a lot to get through before they go bad. Actually, I'm sad because I had to throw out the mysterious greens (no one, not even my mom, could identify them!) and a couple peppers. But I hope I'll get my eggplants before they go bad and I think the squash and potatoes won't go bad before I get to them. Anyway! I had a bag of okra that I didn't know how to handle, so I consulted Irma in the Joy of Cooking. There weren't too many options, and I wasn't really in the mood for stewing (or have any proteins to make anything more exciting), so I went fried. Not healthy, I know. I don't know if I didn't do something exactly right because they were still sort of crunchy and not as coated as the couple times I've eaten them in restaurants, but they can't have been too bad because I ate them all. With ranch. (Now I feel a little nauseous and guilty.)

I don't know how much okra I had, but it used most of the coating.

1/2 cup cornmeal
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic or onion powder
1/4 tsp cayenne
1/8 tsp ground black pepper
1/2 lb whole okra
1/4 cup flour
1 egg beaten with 1 tsp water
vegetable oil

Mix cornmeal, salt, powder, cayenne, and pepper.

I cut the okra into little slices, but Joy of Cooking says whole. Do as you please.

Dredge okra in flour. Dip that into the egg water mixture. Dip into cornmeal. Heat oil to 365 degrees F in a large skillet (I don't have a thermometer). Add okra to oil in batches, frying until golden, about 2 minutes. Remove okra with a slotted spoon and drain on paper towels.