Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Honey Apple Mk. III

I used to bake lots of bread with yogurt but kind of got out of the habit gradually. I bought some yogurt Wednesday so I could make some bread to give to my aunt & uncle for staying with them this past weekend, and now that I've got some lying around, I wanted to make a pie with it.
A two-part yogurt ordeal, I've presently got four apples, peeled/cored/sliced, sitting in a bowl with a half cup of honey and a half cup of yogurt, and for the crust I figure I'll do the regular but I'll leave out the vinegar (because the yogurt is sour/acidic and because it is a milk product) and instead of gradually adding nine tablespoons water, I'll whip together six tablespoons yogurt six tablespoons water and add until moist.
My previous experiments with flavouring crusts with fluid have been just kind of lackluster since nine tablespoons is nothing to three cups, but I'm at least as interested in the texture anyways.
Also, since I don't want to reduce the apple fluid with the yogurt in it, I'm just going to make this a lattice top pie and hope it works out.
Updates when applicable!

Update the first: Pie is in oven. The crust was
  • 2 cups stone ground whole wheat flour (white would have been better but I am out)
  • 1 cup shortening
  • dash baking powder
  • 5 tablespoons yogurt
  • 5 tablespoons cold water

  • Rolled out the bottom crust, put the filling in. Rolled out the rest of the dough, cut lattice strips, assembled the lattice on the pie, put the pie on a baking pan to catch drips, and covered the pie with foil. It went in the oven five minutes ago and will spend a total of twenty minutes (somewhat arbitrary) covered in foil so as to steam/bake the apples properly, then the foil comes off so the excess fluid can evaporate through the lattice and not leave too soggy a pie. I'm considering leaving the foil on for longer, because apple pie should be juicy, but whatever.
    Oh and I meant to sprinkle brown sugar over the apples in the pie before putting the lattice on but forgot! Whoops!

    Update the second: Should have left it without foil the whole time, if anything, it looks like the volume inside the pie has increased. Hopefully it's just bubbling/swelling because of the heat. It's going to be a little messy to bike with...

    Friday, June 20, 2008

    COOKIES

    So I made some pretty sweet cookies for my friends from the internet. I can't recall the precise recipe, I will post it when I get home, but the basic premise was, mix up cookies dough, but before adding the flour, split the soft stuff (1/2 cup butter 1/2 cup shortening 1 cup packed brown sugar 2 eggs dash vanilla 1 tsp(???) baking powder) in half, and give one half white flour (1.5 cups?) and a half cup of cocoa powder, and the other a cup and a half rye flour (1.5 cups) and a cup of chocolate chips.
    Place the chocolate cookie dough between two pieces of wax paper, roll it out. Place the chocolate chip dough between two pieces and flatten. Place the layers on top of each, and roll it up. If you want, flatten again and fold to marble, or, if you've rolled it long side up, you may be able to just slice spiral round cookies off of the roll.
    Enjoy!

    Wednesday, June 18, 2008

    Pita Mk. II

    My friend gave me some delicious curry this morning, so I figured I ought to make something to give back. My first thought, then, was pita bread again.

    Same procedure as last time, except ingredients were:
  • 2 tsps dry yeast
  • 1/2 cup warm water
  • 1 tbsp malt syrup

  • 6 cups white bread flour
  • two cups corn flour
  • 2 1/2 tsps salt

  • 3 cups warm water


  • They are not done yet, though I have high hopes. The problem, though, is in the naming! What do I call corn pitas? Tortilla pita? Torpita? Portittia? Portilla? Torpilla? Tortita?


    P.S. dough to wet to roll, cut back by a quarter cup water next time. Rolling in coarse cornmeal made the outsides too crispy/crunchy, I think I'll stick with flour and just dust them off when they're done with a brush.
    Corn taste not too prominent, I'll try a higher ratio next time.

    Tuesday, June 10, 2008

    Pie Bread!

    So now that I've acquired some measure of skill in both pies and bread, it is time to commence work on the unholy bastard spawn of both foods!

    First attempt:
  • 1 1/2 cup warm water
  • 1 tablespoon malt syrup
  • 3 teaspoons (heaping) of 'dead' yeast
  • 5 cups flour
  • 1 cup shortening
  • 1/2 cup sugar

  • I proofed the yeast (which had been given to me by a fried who said it was possibly dead after not being properly refrigerated) with a half cup of the water and the malt, cut the shortening (which was slightly more than a cup) through the flour, added the rest of the fluid, and mixed until it was doughy/stretchy. That rose, then I rolled it out flat, poured on some thick smoothie like substance (some apples and strawberries, that had been sitting in a plastic tub in my fridge for a while and were promptly blended last night), and rolled it like what I assume a jelly roll would be like. This rose again in bread pan, and was then baked for about an hour.

    I really should have split the dough into two batches and made two loaves, but oh well. It didn't bake through because it was so dense and I didn't let it rise very long in the bread pan. However, I sliced the under done loaf this morning after it had sat/set overnight, then baked them again for curious results. Kind of a dense, slightly chewy fruity thing, which retained enough of the crumbly texture I was going for.

    Not a perfect success, but a good first step on my mad adventure. Would make excellent french toast.

    Tuesday, June 3, 2008

    Experimental Bean Bread

    I've just tried to come up with a decent bean bread recipe, I'm not sure how it's going to turn out, but here's the recipe (reimagined after having made it up while making it) that I used:
  • seven cups flour
  • two cups water
  • one can (~2 cups cooked?) black beans
  • 2 1/4 teaspoons yeast
  • 2 teaspoons molasses (not sure if that was a good idea or not)

  • Proof the yeast with the molasses and a quarter cup of the water. While that's doing it's thing, drain and rinse the beans, then put them in a blender with the rest of the water (I only put them in with one cup, but I think using all of it would give better blending). Put the flour in a bowl and make a well in the middle, then when the yeast is done, pour the liquified beans in the bowl along with the yeast. Mix and knead, rise twice, shape, rise if applicable, and bake.
    Will update when done!

    Bread has good texture, no particular black bean taste. If you want a curiously coloured bread with some protein, this recipe works, but I think I'll try using a cup less water and three cups less flour as a starting point (my initial plan, before I decided to add a cup of water to help blend the beans after I'd already mixed the water and yeast with the flour) and see if that gives more black bean flavour.

    Monday, May 26, 2008

    Special Summertime Beverage Edition!

    This has kind of turned into a place to post things for people to use as well as a place for me to record my notes, so, in that spirit, here is a specialtime-summerdrink edition! I posted this on some forums a few years ago, and it initially came from a little (jalapeno) recipe book my mom bought my brother. I make this every summer and love it dearly
    Simmer one and a half cups sugar in a half cup water, mix constantly till dissolved (clear). Remove from heat
    Add 6 cups water + 3/4 cup lemon juice (feel free to throw some lime juice in there if you want as well). Mix briefly.
    Toss in two Jalapeno peppers, diced, but large enough to be removed later. Let sit in fridge for anywhere from an hour to a day, then remove peppers.
    CAUTION: Do not boil the mixture with the peppers in it! That will make it way too spicy.
    Stir and test it maybe every hour or two after the peppers have gone in to gauge it. If making it for a barbecue when you think it'll all be consumed in one day, feel free to leave the chunks in. Remember to sip the drink, don't gulp. Mixes well with gin, if that's your thing.

    Wednesday, May 14, 2008

    Honey Apple Revisited

    Anton had us over for steaks he bought on discount last night, so I figured I could contribute to the meal with PIE.
    Assessing my assets, I figured honey apple would be the way to go. This involved maybe four smallish apples and three largish apples, peeled and sliced on my handy peeler/corer/slicer machine, tossed around with the juice of one lemon and maybe just over a cup of honey (all that I had left). This sat for a while, until I strained and reduced the juices, then re-assembled the apples and syrup in the pie crusts.
    Now, since honey was going to be a more dominant flavour, I didn't want to heavily spice it with any of the regular apple pie things that might conflict with it. So, thinking honey, I went for a whole wheat and almond crust! The crust was (for two two-crust pies) two cups whole wheat flour, one and a half cups white flour, and one cup fresh ground almonds (topped up with walnuts to make it a full cup), with 500 mL of shortening, two tablespoons cider vinegar, seven tablespoons apple cider, seven tablespoons cold water. The water was a bit too much, as it was measured for flour, not nuts, but the blend did a nice job of letting you taste the nuts in the crust this time. I was pleased.

    It was a big hit, we actually ended up eating two pies between four people. Also I managed to create a rig that lets me carry two pies on the back of my bike!