The Bread is in the Baking

I got the idea for this recipe off Foodgawker, but I didn't really follow the recipe. I just scanned it and then did my own thing. Pretty much, you can take all of your left overs and stuff them into these small oval shaped tasty treats.


What is a croquette you might ask? A croquette or croquetas is a small ovular shaped fried or baked dumpling. They are usually made of mashed potatoes, and/or meat and vegetable, and bread crumbs, egg, onion, spices and herbs. These croquettes will be made out of all your left over Thanksgiving goodies!


Baked Thanksgiving Croquettes
Finely diced turkey
Mashed potatoes
Stuffing
Gravy
Sauted finely chopped onions and garlic
Pepper and salt to taste
Fine bread crumbs

Since you never know how much leftovers you're going to have the recipe is based in ratios. You want the amount of turkey to mashed potatoes (1:1) half the amount of stuffing to turkey/mashed potatoes (1/2:1) and enough gravy to hold the ingredients together in an oval shape.
Preheat the oven to 450° F.


Mix all the ingredients (except the bread crumbs) together in a bowl until evenly mixed. Then begin to form the ingredients into egg shapes and toss them in a bowl of bread crumbs. Place the now breaded croquettes on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake in the oven for 15 minutes and they're done!


Tastes great with cranberry sauce!


Total Time: About an hour

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I bought a bunch of apples with the intention to snack on them, which is what I have been doing, but since there's only one of me and I only eat a few every couple of days, I'm not eating them fast enough. I stumbled on this recipe on Food Gawker, which is a WONDERFUL recipe site. I love it. Anyhow, I thought "Perfect!" and then realized I didn't have any cinnamon (I live in the dorms, okay?) but I did have pumpkin spice, so I used that instead and it came out great.

The recipe is a bit messy, but if you're careful it's really not much worse than anything else you'll make. I've cut some of the rising and proofing times down and cut some ingredients I didn't care for or have (orange zest, cinnamon, dark rum) and I chose not to make a glaze (it's sweet and sticky enough as it is), but if you want to see the real recipe it is here.

 Apple Spice Bread

Ingredients for the Dough:
1/2 Cup (4oz) Water, lukewarm
1/4 Cup Runny Honey

1 1/2 Tbs Dry Active Yeast
7 Tbs Vegetable Oil
2 Large Eggs
17oz. All-purpose Flour (about 4 cups, but it's best to weigh it)
1 1/2 Tsp Salt
1/2 Tsp Ground Cinnamon
1 1/2 Tsp Vanilla Extract

Ingredients for the Apple Filling:
2 Medium/large Apples, cored and diced in 3/4" chunks
1 Tsp Ground Cinnamon
1/4 Cup Sugar

Mix the warm (not hot) water with the honey and yeast. Then add the rest of the ingredients for the dough. Mix and then knead them, using a mixer with a bread hook, or by hand, until you have a soft, smooth and elastic dough (about 8-10 minutes).

Put the dough in a oiled bowl and let it rise, covered, for 1 1/2 hours or until it's puffy and nearly doubled in size. Lightly grease/butter a 9inch springform pan or cake pan (I suggest you use a springform pan, they work really well).

Toss the apple chunks with the sugar, pumpkin spice.

Gently deflate the dough, transfer it to a lightly greased work surface, and flatte n it into a rough rectangle, about 8 x 10 inches.

Spread half the apple chunks in the center of the dough.

Fold a short edge of the dough over the apple in order to cover it, patting firmly to seal the apples and spread the dough a bit. Spread the remaining apple atop the folded-over dough. Cover the apples with the other side of the dough, again patting firmly (Basically, you've folded the dough like a letter, enclosing the apples inside.). Take a long knife and cut the apple-filled dough into 16 pieces. Cut in half, then each half in halves, etc. (This is the messy part)

Lay the dough chunks into the pan (Crowd them so that they all fit in a single tight layer and just tuck fallen apple pieces in among the dough pieces, or simply spread them on top.).

Cover the bread gently with lightly greased plastic wrap or a damp towel and let it rise for about 1 hour until it has almost doubled in height. Twenty minutes before the end of the rising time, preheat the oven to 325° F. Place the bread in the lower third of the oven. Bake it for 45 minutes, or until the top is at least light golden brown all over and has no white spots.

Remove the bread from the oven, and after 5 minutes loosen the edges and carefully transfer it to a rack.

Total Time: About 3 1/2 hours

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At lunch today one of my friends remarked out how many people at school are sick and how she wanted to make soup for some of them, specifically Thai Chicken Coconut soup. Then looked at me and said "want to make soup?"
I said "yeah!"
So we spent a good 5 plus hours getting ingredients and cooking. Most of the cooking is just sitting back and watching the soup to make sure it's not boiling.
It turned out great and we didn't even use a real recipe! This is college style soup, yo.

Thai Chicken Coconut Soup

1 raw whole chicken
3 stalks of celery broken in half
1 yellow onion diced
4 tbls curry paste
2 cans of coconut milk
4 lemon grass stalks diced
2 hand fulls of mushrooms
1 1/2 limes
Salt and pepper to taste

Gut and wash chicken, stip off as much skin as you can (this will lessen the fat content) and place in a large pot. Fill the pot with water just above the chicken, add onion, celery, lemon grass, mushrooms and let simmer (not boil) on the stove for 2 hours, stir occasionally.
Take the chicken out of the broth and take all the meat off the bones and put the meat back in the broth and throw out the bones. Pour in all the coconut milk and stir. Squeeze the lime juice into the broth and stir. Stir in the curry paste. Add salt and pepper to taste and enjoy!

If you like a less fatty soup, skim off the fat from the top of the soup or you can place the soup in the fridge overnight, the fat will rise to the top and harden and then you can just take it off.

Total Time: About 3 hours

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I've used this recipe a couple times, it's a bit temperamental and so far I've gotten it close to perfect. This is one of those recipes you need to follow to a T, with the exception as to how much water to add, that always varies. In order to get the pita to puff up you need to flatten the dough with a rolling pin. I got this recipe from The Fresh Loaf. If you have questions about baking bread, this is a great site to look at, although a lot of the recipes can get really technical and complicated.

I'm the president of the Culinary Society on campus and we made the pita and after it came out of the oven we stuffed it with some sauteed mushrooms, spinach, ground lamb and feta cheese. So delicious! I definitely suggest it.

Pita Bread
Makes 8 pitas
3 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 Tablespoon sugar or honey
1 packet yeast (or, if from bulk, 2 teaspoons yeast)
1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups water, roughly at room temperature
2 tablespoons olive oil

Mix the yeast in with the flour, salt, and sugar. Add the olive oil and 1 1/4 cup water and stir together with a wooden spoon. All of the ingredients should form a ball. If some of the flour will not stick to the ball, add more water gradually.
Once all of the ingredients forms a ball knead the dough for approximately 10 minutes. If you are using an electric mixer, mix it at low speed for 10 minutes.

When you are done kneading the dough, place it in a bowl that has been lightly coated with oil. Form a ball out of the dough and place it into the bowl, rolling the ball of dough around in the bowl so that it has a light coat of oil on all sides. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a damp kitchen towel and set aside to rise until it has doubled in size, approximately 90 minutes.

NOTE: 90 minutes is the minimum time you need to let the dough rise. However, if you let it rise in the fridge overnight, the pita will have more flavor and will be more like to poof up when you bake them.

When it has doubled in size, punch the dough down to release some of the trapped gases and divide it into 8 pieces. Roll each piece into a ball, cover the balls with a damp kitchen towel, and let them rest for 20 minutes. This step allows the dough to relax so that it'll be easier to shape.

While the dough is resting, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. If you have a baking stone, put it in the oven to preheat as well. If you do not have a baking stone, turn a cookie sheet upside down and place it on the middle rack of the oven while you are preheating the oven. This will be the surface on which you bake your pitas.

After the dough has relaxed for 20 minutes, spread a light coating of flour on a work surface and place one of the balls of dough there. Sprinkle a little bit of flour on top of the dough and use a rolling pin stretch and flatten the dough. You should be able to roll it out to between 1/8 and 1/4 inch thick. If the dough does not stretch sufficiently you can cover it with the damp towel and let it rest 5 to 10 minutes before trying again.

Open the oven and place as many pitas as you can fit on the hot baking surface. They should be baked through and puffy after 3 minutes. If you want your pitas to be crispy and brown you can bake them for an additional 3 to 5 minutes, but it isn't necessary.


Total Time: About 2 1/2 hours

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Doesn't the name of this bread just sound mouthwatering?

And oh it is.

I've been meaning to make this bread for the last couple of weeks, but I haven't had time. Now I'm back at school and finally have a day to relax. Got all the ingredients and my friend Eddie and I got down to business. This is a ingredient intensive bread, so get ready to do some shopping!

Overall we stuck with the original recipe, we cut back on the flour by 3/4 of a cup and 1/2 cup of Parmesan and added garlic to the filling and I don't have a cake pan at school so we used my mini loaf pans instead.

The downside of using the small pans is that not all the tomato pieces stayed with the bread, so we left it with the tomatoes on the bottom when we served it. I'll have to invest in my own cake pan and make it the way it's supposed to be done and see if it makes a difference. The upside of doing it this way is that makes portions really easy. I used 5 mini pans which made 10 portions.

Upside-Down Tomato Basil Bread

Dough

2 1/2 teaspoons (or 1 package) active dry yeast
1 cup plus 3 tablespoons warm water
4 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon olive oil
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
2 teaspoons sea salt
1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper


Filling

4-5 tablespoons fresh basil, finely chopped (basil from store produce pkg, about 1 oz)
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup olive oil
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper (or three-pepper mix)
fresh-ground red pepper flakes, to your more hot/less hot taste -or- 1/2 teaspoon hot red pepper flakes

Tomato Topping

3 large or 4 small-medium tomatoes


Make Bread Dough:

Stir the yeast into warm water in mixer bowl; let stand about 10 minutes, until yeast looks bubbled and creamy. Fit mixer with dough hook. Stir in olive oil first, combining with yeast, then mix in flour, Parmesan cheese, sea salt, ground black pepper and hot pepper flakes. Kneading about 5 minutes, until dough is combined, soft and elastic.

Place dough in lightly oiled bowl; cover loosely with plastic wrap, then dish towel. Set aside and let rise until doubled, about 2 hours. Dough should feel very smooth, moist and soft.

You can start making the filling and cutting up the tomatoes for the topping while the dough rises. You won't need more than 45 minutes to prep and make the filling.

Make Filling:

In small bowl, place chopped fresh basil, Parmesan cheese, olive oil, sea salt, ground pepper and red pepper flakes. Stir to combine well, and set aside.

Tomato Topping:

Remove cores and chop tomatoes to small, rough pieces. Place in bowl (without accumulated liquid) and set aside.

Assemble Tomato Basil Bread

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F

Lightly oil (with olive oil) bottom and sides of 10″ round cake or springform pan (can also use 9 x 13 metal pan, Pyrex dish, or similar). Drain any excess juices from chopped tomatoes, then spread evenly over bottom of pan. Set aside.

Turn risen bread dough out on lightly floured surface. Gently pull and stretch dough to a rough rectangle, approximately 11″ x 24″. Using spatula, gently spread Filling evenly across dough to cover, reaching edges. Starting at long edge, roll dough up jelly roll style, as for cinnamon rolls. Try to roll evenly and without air gaps. With seam side facing down, make sure filled roll is solid and combined by patting sides and edges.

Using a thin, sharp knife (serrated is best) cut 1″ slices from dough roll. Arrange slices, spiral side down, on top of chopped tomatoes in prepared pan. In a 10″ round pan, you will have little to no room between slices (if using a larger pan, arrange slices barely touching, with small amounts of space between them.) Cover lightly with plastic wrap and allow to rise slightly, about 20 minutes.

Place filled pan on wider sheet pan or foil (important – to catch drips!) Bake on lower rack 40 – 45 minutes, until top rolls are medium brown, feel hollow when tapped, and tomato juices have bubbled and thickened. Remove from oven and cool on rack for 5 minutes.

Total Time: 4 hours

Picture courtesy of Eddie Barksdale

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While looking for recipes for dessert last night I stumbled upon this lovely recipe. I LOVE brioche. For those of you who don't known, brioche is similar to challah but more like pastry bread.

I found this recipe on the Foodbeam blog, a blog I have been wanting to try out for a while, but their recipes are very fancy so I hadn't gotten a chance. This recipe is not real fancy, just takes a bit of time since you have to let the dough rise overnight. Which makes this recipe perfect for breakfast (although morning prep and bake will take roughly 1-2 hours).

I changed very little of this recipe: I used more flour than the recipe asked for because the dough was still very sticky after 4 cups of flour. I used 5-10 chocolate chips in each brioche instead of chocolate squares.

Chocolate Heart Brioche

makes 24 small brioches

500ml warm milk
42g fresh yeast
4-8 cups flour
200g caster sugar (regular sugar works fine too)
a pinch of salt
2 large eggs
160g melted butter
24 milk or dark chocolate squares (or 1/3- 1/2 cup chocolate chips)

Combine the milk, yeast and a teaspoon of the sugar in a bowl. Stir once or twice and allow rising for 10 minutes.
In a large bowl, mix 4 cups of flour, remaining sugar and salt and pour the yeast mixture on top of it.
Add the eggs and melted butter and mix, first with a round knife and then with your hands – until it forms a ball.
Place the dough on a lightly floured surface and knead for 8-10 minutes. It should be soft and not sticky. (You can knead the dough in the bowl if it is large enough)
Butter a large bowl generously. Place the dough in the buttered bowl and let rise overnight in the fridge.

The next morning, allow the dough to come to room temperature (this is not completely necessary though it will make your brioche a bit lighter.
Preheat the oven to 393°F (200°C).
Knead the dough and cut off pieces of dough to form small 90g balls and insert a chocolate square in the centre of each ball.

Fill two 12-bun muffin tin with the dough balls and let rise for 20 minutes (I put muffin cups in the tin, but it's not necessary if you grease the tins and they come out far prettier if you don't). Brush with a little egg, then bake in the preheated oven for 15 minutes.

If the tops get too brown loosely cover with foil.

Total Time: roughly 14 hours (40 minutes to make dough, set over night and then 1-2 hours to prep and bake in the morning

The beautiful picture was taken by my dad. THANK YOU!

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Yesterday I was lazing around in my bedroom and my mom peaked her head in.
"We're having company tonight, what should we make? I was thinking ratatouille and then some meat."
"Salmon?"
"We always do salmon..."
"yeah, but salmon is good."
"Okay, so Salmon, ratatouille and polenta?"
"Yum."
"We need a dessert, can you make it? It just needs to be chocolate."
"Sure thing."
So I went online and searched my favorite food blogs and found a chocolate pistachio cake.
Now, I don't like pistachios. I did at one point, but I think I ate too many in one sitting and got sick, so I don't like them anymore. Even if they are kind of fun to crack open. But what my family does really like are walnuts. And walnuts and chocolate go really well together. So I substituted walnuts for the pistachios and the cake came out beautifully!
This cake is not a light cake, if you want it to be lighter I would try substituting some of the regular flour with cake flour (but don't take my word on it, I haven't tried).

Chocolate Walnut Swirl Cake with chocolate ganache

Chocolate part of the cake

1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/3 cup butter (room temp.)
1 and 1/8 cup sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup plain yogurt (greek is fine)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup chocolate chips (plus a little extra)

Walnut part

1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/3 cup butter (room temp.)
1 and 1/8 cup sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup plain yogurt (greek is fine)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup chopped walnuts

Ganache:
120 g (3 oz) semisweet dark chocolate
125 ml (1/2 C) whipping cream
(this ganache is a bit bitter, if you want it to be sweeter I'd ad 1 tsp of sugar)

Preheat your oven to 360 F. Grease a 10-inch cake or loaf pan, preferably nonstick with a removable bottom.

Prepare the chocolate batter.
In a food processor, mix together sugar and butter until fluffy. Add in eggs, one at a time, mixing between each. Add in the yogurts and the vanilla extract and mix again. In a medium bowl, combine the flour with the baking powder, baking soda and the cocoa mixture. Add the flour mixture into the food processor and mix again until just combined. Pour the batter into the cake pan, and reserve in the refrigerator.

Rinse the bowl of the food processor, and prepare the walnut batter:
Mix together the sugar, butter. Add in the eggs, one at a time, mixing between each. Add in the yogurts and mix again. In a medium bowl, combine the flour with the baking powder and baking soda, and the chopped walnuts. Add into the food processor and mix again until just combined.

Take the cake pan out of the fridge, and sprinkle the chocolate chips evenly over the surface of the chocolate batter. Gently pour the pistachio batter on top, and smooth out the surface with a spatula. Put into the oven to bake for about an hour or until a cake tester comes out clean. Let rest for five minutes on the counter, then turn out on a rack to cool completely.

Prepare the ganache:

Melt the dark chocolate with the whipping cream in a double boiler (or in a bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water), stirring with a spoon regularly until completely melted and velvety. Let the ganache rest in the fridge until it has thickened a bit, about 30 minutes to an hour, and frost the cake using a small spatula.

Let the cake cool completely before frosting.

Total Time: About 2 hours

The beautiful picture was taken by my dad! Thanks!

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Stir fry is one of those things that once you figure out what flavors you like it's really easy to make. I made this lovely stir fry while I was in Australia. I'm a huge veggie fan (as my homestay parents can attest to) and this is by far one of my favorite stir fry's. You should use this recipe as a jumping off point, not the end all be all stir fry. Figure out what you like and what you don't and do what you want!

FIRST AND FOREMOST CUT ALL THE VEGGIES UP! This will make cooking a lot less hectic. You won't be all "ohmygod the asparagus isn't cut and the broccoli is burning!" I always forget to do this, or maybe I just think I'm some sort of superstar and I can do everything while other ingredients are cooking, but I can't. And most recipes don't tell you to do this first so I just jump right in.

Veggies and Tofu Stir Fry
1 large head of broccoli (chopped into bite-size florets)
1 bunch of asparagus (chopped into 1/2 inch pieces)
1 bag of spinach
1 block of tofu (cut up into about 18 pieces)
1/4 cup hoison sauce
2 tbs finely cut ginger
3/4 cup cashews (diced)
2 garlic cloves (diced)
2 tbs vegetable oil
1 tbs sesame seed oil

Heat the sesame seed oil in a large wok or frying pan and lightly fry the tofu until all the pieces are brown on all sides. Remove the tofu, making sure to leave as much of the oil as possible, and place them in a bowl covered in a paper towel to soak up the extra grease. Add 1 tbs of the veggie oil, the garlic and the broccoli into the pan and cover it with a lid for a couple minutes stirring every minute or so (this will steam the broccoli). Then add the asparagus and cover again for a minute or two. Pour the hoison sauce over the vegetables and stir till everything is completely covered by the sauce. Add the spinach and cook till all the spinach has wilted. Add in the tofu you set aside and the cashews.

Serve alone or over rice!

This should feed 3-5 people

Total Time: About 45 minutes

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Okay, so before I made this, I thought that making your own icy treats was really hard. I'd see ice cream recipes and just think "nope, too hard. Can't do that" and move on to the other recipes.
So now I'm just going to tell you from experience:
MAKING ICE CREAM IS REALLY REALLY EASY.

You just need the right machinery to make it, and by machinery I mean you need an ice cream maker.

This recipe for frozen yogurt is really good, I adapted it from a recipe from Tartlette. The original recipe on that site is for Asian Pear Frozen Yogurt, but they aren't in season so I used raspberries instead, from the backyard.
Fancy fancy!

Raspberry Frozen Yogurt

2 Cups of fresh raspberries (or whatever fruit you want to use)
1/4 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon or lime juice
16 oz. Greek yogurt (use a little less if you don't like it too tart)
1/2 cup sugar (use a little more if you like it sweeter)
generous pinch of fine sea salt

Rinse and strain raspberries and sprinkle lemon/lime juice over them then place in blender and puree until the raspberries have become a smooth jam-like consistency. Mix greek yogurt, sugar, salt and raspberry puree in a large bowl, cover with plastic and place in the fridge for 1 hour.
Churn the mixture in your ice cream maker according to manufacturer's directions (which is about 30 minutes of really really annoying noise).

NOTE: This recipe does take some planning in advance, your ice cream mixing bowl needs to be frozen before you can churn it, which takes about a day to do. My family just leaves the bowl in the freezer all the time, so whenever we feel like making something with it, it's ready to use.

Total Time: About 2 hours

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First soup post! This soup is really good and simple. I'm excited to make it when I go back to college next year. I found this soup on Cookbook 101, one of my favorite recipe sites. The soup is vegetarian and you don't need to add any broth to it. I changed the recipe a little from the site, I used nonfat yogurt and canned diced tomatoes instead of crushed.

Greens and Lentil Soup

2 cups black beluga lentils (or green French lentils), picked over and rinsed (I used French)
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
1 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
1 28-ounce can diced tomatoes
2 cups water
3 cups of a chard/kale/etc. rinsed well, finely chopped (I used chard and it was very nice)

Saffron Yogurt
a pinch of saffron (30-40 threads)
1 tablespoon boiling water
two pinches of salt
1/2 cup Non-fat Greek Yogurt
(I did make the saffron yogurt, but I think plain greek yogurt would have worked fine too, since Saffron is pretty pricey)


Bring 6 cups of water to a boil in a large saucepan, add the lentils, and cook for about 20 minutes, or until tender. Drain and set aside.

While the lentils are cooking, make the saffron yogurt by combining the saffron threads and boiling water in a tiny cup. Let the saffron steep for a few minutes. Now stir the saffron along with the liquid into the yogurt. Mix in the salt and set aside.

Meanwhile, heat the oil in a heavy soup pot over medium heat, then add the onion and salt and saute until tender, a couple minutes. Stir in the tomatoes, lentils, and water and continue cooking for a few more minutes, letting the soup come back up to a simmer. Stir in the chopped greens, and wait another minute. Taste and adjust the seasoning if need be. Ladle into bowls, and serve with a dollop of the saffron yogurt.

Total Time: 1 hour

NOTE: would go very well with a crusty bread, like the baguettes or the dark rye

Picture courtest of Eddie Barksdale

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It's the end of my sophomore year at college and I had a can of pumpkin under my bed, not something I really need to bring home, soooo what's a girl to do?
MAKE PUMPKIN BREAD, or a pumpkin loaf as I like to call it since there's no yeast in it and you don't have to let it rise, and those are the defining characteristics for bread to me.
I found this recipe online, it's pretty decent. Very light and soft. I would like a stronger pumpkin taste, but it's nice and sweet. I changed the recipe a little, I substituted some pumpkin pie spices for one of the cinnamon tsp (because I only had about a teaspoon of it left). I was unable to add pecans, because I didn't have any, but I think it would probably make it taste better and add some crunch.

Pumpkin Loaf
3 1/3 cups Flour
3 teaspoons Cinnamon
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
2 teaspoons Baking soda
1 teaspoon Baking Powder
1 1/2 teaspoons Salt
2 2/3 cups Sugar
2/3 cup Vegetable Oil
4 Eggs
1 can (15 oz) Pumpkin
2/3 cup Water
1/2 cup Pecans chopped (optional)

Preheat oven to 325.
Mix dry ingredients together. Beat sugar and vegetable oil together until blended (mixture will still look dry). Add eggs, 1 at a time, until blended. Add pumpkin and mix thoroughly. Add dry ingredients a little at a time, alternating with water. Mix in pecans Pour batter into 2 9x5x3 or 5- 5 3/2x3 loaf pans. Sprinkle tops of loaves with cinnamon sugar before baking.

Bake at 325 for 55-60 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool for 15 minutes before removing from pans. If you use smaller pans it will take about 50 minutes instead, not a lot less time.

 Total Time: About 1 hour and 30 minutes

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These are one of my favorite desserts. I first had one in Portland at Ken's Bakery, which is one of my favorite Bakeries, the other favorite being Bakery Nouveau. One in Portland, one is Seattle.

ANYWAY, back to Canelés. Canelés are a french pastry with a dark caramelized outside and a soft dough center. They have a rich buttery flavor and you can add citrus zest to give them more of a bite, if that's what you like. They come in a many sizes, but you need a specific mold in order to make them. The mold helps make the outside of the Canelé hard and crunch, while leaving the inside creamy.
The mold I use can be found on amazon, I bought a silicon mold that makes 18 tiny canelés, but I'm probably going to buy some larger molds soon. The silicon mold works very nicely because it's very easy to pop the canelés out, but if you get any batter on the outside of the mold it'll stains the mold.
I've tried a couple of variations of this recipe and I only achieved success with the last recipe. I've made the recipe a little simpler and added a little more flour. The batter can also be left in the fridge to use later for about 3 days. You'll just need to stir it back together.

Canelés
2 cups whole milk
18 tablespoons sugar
3 teaspoons vanilla extract or 1 vanilla pod, split
4 tablespoons butter
16 tablespoons flour
2 egg yolks
3 teaspoon dark rum
Butter for the molds(unless you're using silicon molds, than none is needed.

Preheat the oven to 375.

In a medium saucepan heat milk, sugar, vanilla, and butter until butter has completely melted. Let cool completely (and remove vanilla pod if you used it).

When milk is completely cool add the egg yolks and rum, and then gradually add the flour. Mix with a whisk until batter is smooth and no flour lumps.

Butter molds with melted butter and let stand for 2-3 minutes. Spoon batter into molds just below the rim.

Cook for about 1 1/2 hours. If you use smaller molds you will only need to cook them for about an hour.

Total Time: About 2 1/2 hours

Note: My dad pointed out a couple weeks ago that I had used a couple different spellings for "canelés". I changed this entry so the spelling is the same throughout the post, BUT I have found different variations on the spelling including: Canelle, canele, cannele and cannelle. All the different spellings will turn up different recipes.

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I was going through the recipes I have bookmarked that I haven't tried yet and stumbled upon this one. The recipe is very similar to the other baguette recipe I have on here, in that it's the same ingredients, but this recipe has you make an actual dough, rather than a batter, and takes a couple hours off the time. Which is awesome in my book. I've made a couple revisions from the original recipe but nothing huge (pretty ballsy of me for a first try, right?). Note about the way I bake: use as few bowls as possible.

So here we go:

Mini French Baguettes
4 cups bread flour
1 tsp active dry yeast
2 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
About 1 cup Warm water

Proof the yeast by mixing it with 1/2 cup of warm water and a teaspoon of sugar. Let it stand for a few minutes until it becomes foamy.

Incorporate the flour and the salt into the bowl with a spoon.

Gradually add warm water until you obtain a dough ball that detaches itself from the edges of the bowl, wash your hands off and coat them with flour and continue kneading dough until smooth (you may need to add some more flour, but don't add too much and you can do this step on a counter or, if your bowl is large enough, inside the bowl).

Place the dough into a bowl lightly coated with oil, cover with a kitchen towel or a plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature for 2 hours. The dough should double in volume.

After the dough has doubled. Transfer it to the floured surface and gently knead for 4 minutes and divide dough into 8 equal pieces.

Gently stretch each piece and roll it to form a log that will later be shaped into a mini baguette. Set aside and repeat this process with the remaining pieces of dough. This allows each piece to relax a little.
Starting with the first log that you shaped, elongate each baguette by rolling it back and forth on the work surface until the loaf reaches the desired length. Be mindful that the bread will expand as it bakes.

Place the mini baguettes on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or lightly floured. Make 2 diagonal slashes on each loaf with a sharp knife and dust with a little flour.

Cover with a kitchen towel and let rise for 40-60 minutes until the mini baguettes have become slightly bigger and more rounded.

30 minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 500 degrees F. Place an empty roasting pan on the bottom rack.

After the oven temperature has reached 500 degrees F, pour 2 cups of hot water into the roasting pan to create some steam and place the baking sheet with the baguettes on the top rack.

Bake for 10 minutes at 500F, then lower the oven temperature to 400 degrees F and bake for 20 -25 minutes until the mini baguettes are golden brown and crisp.

Total Time: About 4 Hours
 (Picture taken by Eddie Barksdale)

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This is really tasty, but not like any doughnut you've every had. It's very bread-like, but sweet and a little flaky. If you think this recipe is going to be healthy because it's baked, it's not: you dip these doughnuts in butter. I got this recipe off of this site, which has a lot of other great recipes you should check out too.
I've changed the recipe a tiny bit, but not a lot. Mostly, I've made some of the ingredients less specific.

Baked Doughnuts
1 1/3 cups warm milk
1 packet active dry yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
2 tablespoons butter
2/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
5 cups all-purpose flour
A pinch or two of nutmeg, freshly grated (optional, I haven't used it)
1 teaspoon salt

Toppings
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon

Place 1/3 cup of the warm milk in the bowl of an electric mixer. Stir in the yeast and set aside for five minutes or so. Be sure your milk isn't too hot or it will kill the yeast. Stir the butter and sugar into the remaining cup of warm milk and add it to the yeast mixture. With a fork, stir in the eggs, flour, nutmeg, and salt - just until the flour is incorporated. With the dough hook attachment of your mixer beat the dough for a few minutes at medium speed. If your dough is overly sticky, add flour a few tablespoons at a time. Too dry? Add more milk a bit at a time. You want the dough to pull away from the sides of the mixing bowl and eventually become supple and smooth. Turn it out onto a floured counter-top, knead a few times (the dough should be barely sticky), and shape into a ball.

You can also do all of the above by hand.

Transfer the dough to a buttered (or oiled) bowl, cover, put in a warm place (a slightly heated oven works too) and let rise for an hour or until the dough has roughly doubled in size.

Punch down the dough and roll it out 1/2-inch thick on your floured countertop. You can cut out your doughnuts with a big round cookie cutter or a large mug, just press down firmly on the rolled out dough. you can use a smaller cookie cutter or a shot glass to stamp out circles.

NOTE: You may have trouble getting your dougnuts moved after stamping out the center so try to do it on the baking sheet your going to use.

Transfer the circles to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Cover with a clean cloth and let rise for another 45 minutes. Preheat your oven to 375 degrees as you wait for your dough to rise again.

Bake until the bottoms are just golden, 8 to 10 minutes. Start checking at 8 minutes. While the doughnuts are baking, place the melted butter in a medium bowl. Place the sugar and cinnamon in a separate bowl.

Remove the doughnuts from the oven and let cool for just a minute or two. Dip each one in the melted butter and a quick toss in the sugar bowl. Eat immediately if not sooner. They taste best warm!

Makes 1 1/2 - 2 dozen medium doughnuts.

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Okay, so this is one of those, "hey I have a really good easy recipe for something that everyone likes" posts. I found this recipe on this site which has a lot of other great waffle recipes too, if you want to check those out. But this one is very straight forwards and really good.
Some of my friends and I had a waffle Wednesday going for a while (we'd have waffles late Wednesday nights) so that may have been the reason they tasted so good. Anyway, here we go.

The 2 of Everything Except Butter (and salt) Waffle! (not the real name, but if you like memorizing recipes it's a good reminder)
2 cups of all purpose flour
2 teaspoons of baking powder
Pinch salt
2 teaspoons of sugar
2 cups of warm milk
2 eggs (separate the whites from the yolk, but only if you have a way of whipping your egg whites, if you don't, don't separate them)
one tablespoon full of melted butter.

First turn on your waffle iron!

Take egg whites and beat them until you get nice and smooth snow. (If you have the means to do so, if you don't do this step the waffles will still be really good).

Mix in all the milk, melted butter, sugar, and egg yolks so the sugar dissolves in a large bowl and then add in all the dry ingredients.
Stop mixing while you still have some lumps in the batter so you don't over mix it and make a batter that is to tight

Now add the egg whites and gently mix them in.

Put one cup of batter in the preheated iron waffle, close iron and wait 2+ minutes.

Total Time: About 10 minutes

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This is one of my favorite breads. It's rich, dense and full of flavor. This is a great bread with eggs for breakfast and for snacks because a slice of bread is very filling. I got this bread off of this site. The recipe that I'm posting here is pretty much the same. This recipe takes a lot of flour, which you just need to add until the dough is no longer sticky and it is soft.

Light Rye
2 packages active dry yeast
2 1/2 cups of warm water (barely warm to the touch)
2/3 cup molasses
5 cups bread flour
2 cups rye flour
1 tablespoon salt
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup cocoa powder
2 Tbsp caraway seeds (technically this is "optional" but if you don't like caraway seeds, don't eat rye bread.)

Dissolve the yeast in the warm water with the molasses. Put yeast mixture into a large metal bowl. Add caraway seeds, salt, vegetable oil, cocoa powder, 2 cups of rye flour and then 2 cups of baking flour, mixing into the yeast mixture after each addition. Add more bread flour, a cup at a time, until the dough is not so sticky and it is too hard too mix. At that point, spread a half cupful of flour onto a large, clean, flat surface and put the dough onto the surface. Knead the dough by pressing down with the heel of your hand, stretching it, turning the dough a quarter-turn, pulling the dough back toward you and then pressing and stretching again. Knead additional bread flour into the dough until it reaches the right consistency. Knead for 5-7 minutes, or until the dough is smooth and elastic. (you can do all of this inside your bowl with your hands if it's wide enough, makes clean up a lot easier)
Spread some vegetable oil around a large bowl and place the dough in it, turning it so it gets coated in the oil. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a damp cloth. Let rise at room temperature until it has doubled in size, about an hour and a half.

Gently press down on the dough so some of its air is released and knead the dough a few turns and then divide it by cutting it in half with a sharp knife. You use the knife so that you don't loose all the air in the dough, just some of it.
Shape each half into loaf. Place dough loafs into either oiled bread loaf pans, or onto a flat baking sheet or peel that has been sprinkled with corn meal, depending if you want to cook the loaves in pans or directly on a baking stone. Cover with plastic or a damp cloth.
If you are using a baking stone, place the stone in the oven. Place a pan of water at the bottom of the oven to create steam and preheat oven to 350°F for at least half an hour before baking (so now would be a good time).
Let rise again, this time not doubling in volume, but rising by about half of its volume, about 45 minutes, half as long as the first rising. The dough should be peeking over the top of the loaf pan if using a loaf pan.
If baking on a stone, score the dough a few times on the top of the dough right before putting it in the oven. Put dough in the oven. If you have a mister, mist the dough with a little water the first 10 minutes of baking. Bake for 40-50 minutes, or until done. The bread should sound hollow when tapped.

Total Time: About 4 Hours

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I found this recipe on Anne's Food blog. It has some great recipes, but the measurements on her blog are European so I've changed them here. The recipe is very easy to follow, but this is one of the messiest breads to make. The dough is very more of a sticky batter than a dough and and it takes 3 1/2 to 4 hours to rise. BUT it's really good and easy to make. I make the dough in my dorm room, go to class, come back and stick the dough in the oven.

Baguettes
2 1/2 cups water
3 1/4 cups flour with extra protein (bread flour)
1 tbs AND 2 1/4 tsp yeast (this is the confusing part)
2 tsp salt
extra flour for the shaping

Mix the water and flour and work with a machine (or heavy wisk) for ten minutes, adding flour as you go. Sprinkle over the yeast, and work for three more minutes. Add the salt, and work for three minutes again.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap (DO NOT USE A TOWEL it will stick) and leave to rise for four hours. I've found that if you put it in the oven your rise time is shorter by 30 minutes to an hour.

Preheat the oven to 527 °F (if your oven doesn't go this high, that's fine, 500°F will do the trick. When you turn the oven on put a large pan of water near the bottom of the oven, so that you'll get steam.

Prepare a large surface with lots of flour, and prepare a baking sheet with parchment paper. Pour the dough onto the flour, it will be very soft. Don't knead it at all. With generously floured hands, gently form two lengths and place on the baking sheet, twisting gently as you go so that they'll end up with a twisted shape. Dust with more flour, and leave to rise, uncovered, for 30 minutes.


Bake the breads for 10 minutes. Then lower the heat to 392°F, and open the vent. Bake for 30 more minutes.

Remove, and let cool uncovered on a rack.

Total Time: About 5 hours

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I started making pretzels my senior year of high school. My friend had to make them for a culinary class he was taking and I helped him out. Pretzels are very easy to make, probably one of the easiest breads because it takes only 20 minutes and you don't really have to wait for the dough to rise (but they'll be a little lighter if you let them rise for 10-15 minutes). These are great to make for snacks and really fun to make with little kids.
The recipe I used is from the cooking network, but I've changed it a little.

Pretzels
5 cups of all purpose flour
1 packet dry yeast (or 2 1/2 tsp)
1/3 cup brown sugar
2 cups warm water (add more if flour is not all absorbed)
1/2 cup of baking soda

First off: Preheat oven to 350

Dissolve yeast and brown sugar in warm water then add flour and salt. Knead dough until smooth. Fill a pot with water and add baking soda, let boil.

Cut off golf ball sized pieces of dough from dough and roll into thick sticks. Form a U then cross the ends, twisting at the middle. Fold the ends back down to meet the U (which is now an O) and press to secure the dough.
After the water and baking soda has come to a boil place pretzels into the water for 30 seconds and then place them on a cookie sheet, sprinkle pretzels with salt (or whatever else you like, cinnamon sugar, Parmesan, etc.)
Put the pretzels in the oven for 10 minutes or until golden brown then take them out and let cool and EAT!

Total Time: About 30 minutes

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