zonkered.net

Before I get too deeply into Rachael Ray and my issues with, plus ridiculously easy tomato soup, I feel like I should point out one thing: I have a baking blog now. It’s called Live Every Week Like It’s Cake Week. That is all, carry on.

I think I’ve mentioned before that I’m really not all that fond of Rachael Ray – I can’t watch her on tv, she just grates, endlessly – but to give her her due, I did rely heavily upon her approximately five years ago, when I was fresh out of graduate school, 1500 miles away from my mother’s cooking, broke as hell (heh, some things don’t change), and in need of dinner seven days a week.

I made a lot of Rachael Ray recipes those first two to three years, and while she’s slowly been phased out in favor of Jamie Oliver, Tyler Florence, Dave Lieberman, and Ina Garten, plus lots of food blogs and the ever popular Recipes Sent By My Mother…there are still one or two 30 Minute Meals I make.

And yes, they’re all soups. You know me so well.

There are two great things about this soup. First, it’s adaptable. Out of shallots? Yes, an onion works fine. No vegetable broth? I’ve made it with chicken and just plain water with no adverse effects. Craving bacon? Fry up a few slices and saute the onions/shallots and garlic in the fat. Can’t stand spinach? No one says you have to put it in.

The second great thing about this soup is that it takes fifteen minutes to make, and the most complicated part is chopping the shallots. Seriously, that’s it. It’s a great option when you’re exhausted and broke (otherwise known as: me.)

Continue reading

I’m never quite sure how to classify the muffin. Technically speaking, it resides in the the quick bread category, along with biscuits and scones and banana and zucchini bread, but I’ve adapted cake recipes to make muffins and I imagine I could reverse that in some cases. There are definitely more cake-like muffins out there. This isn’t one of them.

I first came across Elise’s Blackberry Muffin recipe back in 2005, and wanted to try it then, but when I blogged about it on my now inactive blog, my mother promptly sent me her sweet muffin recipe from Betty Crocker and informed me that they made the best fruit muffins ever, and I never got around to Elise’s. Then I was hunting around for something to bake today, came across them again, and finally, four years later, I’ve made them.

They might be the best raspberry muffins ever. Don’t tell my mother.

The secret is the sour cream, which makes for a fluffy, slightly dense, moist muffin. It’s also only got 2/3 cup of sugar, so it’s not overly sweet either; it’s perfect, and I’m currently devouring them as an accompaniment to my tomato and spinach soup for dinner tonight. I chose raspberries, my favorite fruit for muffins, but blueberries or the original blackberries work fine too.

Raspberry Sour Cream Muffins
2 C all purpose flour
1 T baking powder
1/2 t salt
2 large eggs
1 C sour cream
2 t Half-and-Half
2/3 C sugar
8 T warm melted butter (1 stick)
1 t vanilla
1 C frozen raspberries

Position rack in center of oven. Preheat oven to 400°F. Grease a standard 12 muffin pan or line with paper muffin cups.

Whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt in a large bowl.

In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, sour cream, milk, sugar, butter and vanilla.

Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and mix together with a few light strokes, just until the dry ingredients are moistened. Add the berries. DO NOT OVERMIX. The batter shouldn’t be smooth.

Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the middle of 1 or 2 of the muffins comes out clean, 17-20 minutes (or longer). Let cool for 2 to 3 minutes before removing from the pan. If not serving hot, let cool on a rack.

It actually makes 18 instead of 12, which amazed me, because even when a recipe says it makes 18, I only ever get 12.

Battle Two in my ongoing and unsuccessful war against my Bundt pan, I baked this cake for National Bundt Day. Which was two weeks ago. And had so many plans to bring it into work and wow the four other employees with my cake prowess, but again, I was defeated by a bundt pan that doesn’t want to release cakes.

Possibly I should stick with sheet cakes and round cakes and cupcakes, but I refuse to be vanquished by a Calphalon pan. But I digress.

This cake, other than the pan disaster, also heralded me realizing that my microwave had a minor smoking problem, required the purchase of alcohol and espresso powder, and had one of the most spatter-y batters ever, but it was incredible. When I dug into the broken quarter directly after it came out of the pan, I thought it was possible that I could actually get drunk on this cake. I don’t consider this a bad thing.

From the New York Times via Elise at Simply Recipes, it takes an entire cup of whiskey. Trust me on this: use it all. It makes for an immensely flavorful, immensely moist cake that, yes, you may be able to get drunk on.

Chocolate Bourbon Cake

1 C unsalted butter, softened

2 C AP flour

5 oz bittersweet chocolate

1/4 C instant espresso

2 T unsweetened cocoa powder

1 C bourbon whiskey

1/2 t kosher salt

2 C granulated sugar

3 eggs

1 T vanilla extract

1 t baking soda

1/4 powdered sugar, for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 325F and grease and flour a 10-cup bundt. Set aside. Melt chocolate in microwave or over a double boiler. Let cool.

Place espresso powder and cocoa in a 2-cup glass measuring cup. Add enough boiling water to make 1 C. Add 1 C of bourbon. Stir until cocoa and espresso has dissolved. Set aside.

Beat softened butter until fluffy (2-3 minutes on high). Add sugar and beat until well combined. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well between each addition. Beat in the vanilla extract, baking soda and melted chocolate, scraping down sides of bowl with a rubber spatula.

With the mixer on the lowest speed, beat in a third of the whiskey espresso cocoa mixture. When liquid is absorbed, beat in 1 cup flour. Repeat additions, ending with whiskey mixture. Scrape batter into prepared pan and smooth top. Bake until a cake tester inserted into center of cake comes out clean, about 1 hour 10 minutes for Bundt pan (loaf pans will take less time, start checking them after 55 minutes).

Transfer cake to a rack. Unmold after 15 minutes and sprinkle warm cake with more whiskey. Let cool. Sprinkle powdered sugar through a mesh sieve over the cake before serving.

Everything went well until the unmolding part. Also, I didn’t bother sprinkling with more whiskey – it didn’t need it, but your mileage may vary here.

These are a few of my favorite things other than cake: Mushrooms. Butter. Wine. Goat Cheese. Garlic. And these mushrooms hit all of them, and turned out marginally better than the roasted acorn squash. I’d almost take a picture, except for a couple minor things – the photograph embargo on this blog, and the fact that there are only three left.

I live alone. That should tell you how good they are.

They’re also ridiculously simple, nothing more than mushroom caps, sauteed in butter and then stuffed with plain goat cheese, and then topped with parsley, green onions, and garlic cooked in the remainder of the butter and some white wine. Bake for fifteen minutes, and you’re golden. Inspired by this recipe on The Pioneer Woman Cooks, but I, uh, have had bad experiences with brie.

Goat Cheese Stuffed Mushrooms with Herbs and Garlic

1 14 oz package of mushrooms, washed, stems removed

1 4 oz package of goat cheese

3-4 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 bunch flat-leaf parsley, chopped

4 green onions, sliced thin

1/4 C butter

1 generous splash white wine.

Preheat oven to 350F. Wash mushrooms and remove stems. Melt butter in a skillet and saute the mushroom caps for approximately five minutes, or until golden. Place in baking dish.

Chop parsley and garlic, slice green onions and dump in the same skillet the mushrooms cooked in. Saute until parsley is wilted and garlic is fragrant. Add wine and cook until evaporated.

Meanwhile, stuff the mushroom caps with goat cheese. I started with a knife, but just use your fingers. Really. You’ll thank me for it.

Top the mushrooms with the parsley mixture and cook for 15-18 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool slightly.

That’s it, really. It looks amazingly complicated, but it’s not. At all.

Welcome to my brand new, shiny baking blog. It’s still under construction – I want a header eventually – but for now, all the baking posts I’ve been adding to my main blog at zonkered.net can be here. Over this weekend I’ll probably post my two most recent cakes, but for now: the Single Girl’s Thanksgiving Menu (for 2009, at any rate). No cake, but there is pie, and even the savory items are baked.

Okay, or roasted, if you insist.

The only thing I’ve done so far is apple pie, loosely based on Deb at Smitten Kitchen’s recipe, but also planned for the day are stuffed mushrooms and roasted acorn squash, loosely based (yes, again) on a couple of the Pioneer Woman’s recipes.

Deb’s apple pie is from America’s Test Kitchen; thus, my pie is from America’s Test Kitchen + my mother + me, when I changed stuff around. I haven’t tried it yet. It may very well be a horrible disaster.

I doubt it, but you never know.

Apple Pie

3 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and sliced

4 Gala apples, peeled cored and sliced

3/4 C sugar

2 T flour

1 T Penzey’s Apple Pie Spice

1 T lemon juice

2 prepared pie crusts

Preheat oven to 425F and fit one pie crust to your pie plate. Let the edges hang over for now, and attack the apples. This is going to take a while.

Fill a bowl with water and add the 1 T of lemon juice – this will keep your apple slices from turning brown, and since you’re using seven of them, this is a concern. Peel, core and slice, and then drain the apples when you’re done.

In a medium bowl, combine sugar, flour, and pie spice. Toss the apples until they’re coated. Get in their with your hands; using a spoon is just going to make you lose apple slices, and you won’t get them coated. You’re going to get goop all over your hands anyway.

Pile the apples in the crust – they should mound up pretty high – and then cover them up with the second pie crust. Trim the edges and seal. Use a fork if you’re fancy, use your fingers if, like me, you’re lucky that the pie crust didn’t completely fall to pieces. Cut holes in the top to vent, unless again, you’re like me and managed to rip three holes in the middle while stretching it over the pie.

Sometimes being something of a disaster is a good thing.

Slide the pie into the oven; bake for 10 minutes at 425F, and then lower to 350F for an additional 40-50 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool for at least four hours before eating. Serve with whipped cream or ice cream or anything else that sounds fantabulous.

The mushrooms and squash might show up later. I make no promises.

Last night, when I was role-playing with Annie, Adrian Veidt served up a plate of lemon-lavender shortbread to the the character I was playing (of course Adrian bakes! What are you saying!), and it sounded so good that I immediately wanted some.  Coincidentally, shortbread is also the only cookie I had the ingredients for.

It ended up working out quite well, although we had to make some modifications when the dough wouldn’t come together. This might not have been necessary if my butter had truly been at room temperature. Recipe is based off of Jamie Oliver’s from Cook With Jamie, and can be modified with the flavorings you want – I had no lemon or lavender, so I went with orange flavor, and it was pretty good.

This is a thick dough, about the consistency of pie dough, so you won’t be able to pour it into the pan. Technically you’re supposed to roll it out to 1″ thick, but I work in a kitchen with no counter space, so I just flattened it in the pan.

Continue reading

I would be happy to celebrate but, well, I’m cleaning the kitchen today, and A&P isn’t bringing me my groceries until tomorrow. So celebration will have to wait until later this week, when I have bittersweet chocolate and espresso powder and a nice bottle of Jack Daniels for chocolate bourbon bundt cake.

But rest assured, this day will be appropriately celebrated. Just a little late.

When I love a pair of shoes, I love a pair of shoes. I wear them constantly. I make them work with any outfit. I wear them until they can’t take anymore, and then I mourn.

My favorite pair of shoes for the past two years have been a pair of magenta patent AK Anne Klein flats that I bought at Piperlime for $80. This was pretty expensive for me at the time – I was just getting into fashion and style stuff – but it paid off in this case. I wore them at least once a week, sometimes twice, in summer and winter, and for the past six months I’ve been wearing them despite the fact that I’ve actually worn a hole in one of the heels. But at some point you have to let go, and so for several months I’ve been looking for a replacement. Criteria: Flat, shiny, in a fun color that I can wear with a lot of things, and fairly inexpensive. I’m poor, people. I’ve worked only four days a week most of the year and was on furlough for August. Shoes over $100 weren’t happening.

It took forever to find anything; AK Anne Klein has an almost identical shoe this year, but it’s in yellow, which isn’t a favorite color of mine. There was a dearth of deep pinks and greens. A lot of purple, which I love, but nothing quite right – either was too lavender (I own some lavender peep toes already) or not patent, or absolutely perfect and $180 or something. I was beginning to wonder if I was going to need to tape over the hole or something.

Okay, not really. But still, it was dire.

Then someone in the comments of this post recommended Marais USA, and I went to check them out. They don’t have much in the way of selection – they’re a small, NYC-based firm that’s only been around for a few years – but what they do have is really cute, and I immediately began lusting after all three of their flats, especially in the Suit color. When the Mulberry Mary Jane went on sale at Urban Outfitters, I immediately bought them.

Continue reading

I have been thinking about making chicken pot pie for years now.

It began when my brother bought me the Marshall Field’s Cookbook shortly after (may it rest in peace) its untimely demise at the hands of Macy’s, something that Chicago will collectively never forgive Macy’s for. The cover recipe of the book is, of course, the dish that started it all: the Marshall Field’s chicken pot pie that was first served to two well-off Fields customers by an extremely accomadating saleswoman.

I’ve worked in retail, and hell would have frozen over before I gave any customer at Sears my lunch. But I digress.

Pot pie is somehow something I’ve never gotten around to. The Fields version involves fussy chicken preparation and individual ramekins and really, at heart, I’m lazy. Extremely lazy. As it is, pot pie is strictly a weekend meal, and my version isn’t even that difficult.

My version is cobbled together from various versions floating around the internet with some inspiration drawn from Nick Malgieri’s recipe in The Modern Baker. It has a biscuit top, loads of tender dark meat chicken, onion, mushrooms, carrots and peas. It’s time-consuming – probably 6 hours in total – but easy as (wait for it) pie.
Continue reading

A couple weeks ago, I made the apple spice bundt cake off Martha Stewart’s website, and it was delicious. Spicy, fruity, tender and moist. It also fell apart the moment I took it out of the pan (I probably didn’t let it sit long enough, honestly), so this weekend I decided to modify it to something a bit more foolproof.

Also, I live alone and I don’t need to eat a 12 cup bundt pan’s worth of cake. I like my jeans to continue to fit, thanks.

Muffins were the natural vehicle – they’re portable, work for breakfast or dessert and can be shared more easily than a large cake, especially when you rely on public transit, as I do. However, a 12-cup bundt probably would make at least 24 muffins, far more than I needed, so I also halved the recipe and make one or two other changes – such as omitting the vanilla in order to keep it more muffin-like rather than cupcake-like, and leaving out the salt, which wasn’t really necessary.

Continue reading