joy the baker bread.

Mmmm.  I love bread and I love Joy the Baker.  Here's a recipe from Joy's website for two crusty loaves of bread. Josh and I loved this bread so much that we I made it two weeks in a row.

Two Crusty Round Loaves

I found this recipe on Joy the Baker's website. These are mostly her words with a bit of my changes added in. (She found the recipe from Jaden of Steamy Kitchen)

4 cups bread flour (the higher gluten content is important)

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

2 teaspoons salt

1 1/2 cups warm water

Measure out 1/4 cup of bread flour and reserve a clean counter top.  Place the remaining 3 3/4 cup bread flour in the bowl. Measure the salt and place on one side of the flour and add the yeast to the opposite side of the flour.  Pour the warm water in the middle and mix until the dough just comes together.  Joy suggests using a stand mixer, but I did this by hand and it was totally fine.

When the dough forms a mass, mix it a little harder or knead it a bit for 2 minutes.  Dough should clear the sides but may stick to the bottom a bit.  If you feel like the dough is too sticky or too dry, feel free to add a touch more water or flour by the tablespoonful.  After 2 minutes, let the dough rest for five minutes.

After the five minute rest, mix or knead the dough again for 3 minutes. Place the dough on the counter and, using the 1/4 cup of bread flour we reserved in the beginning, knead the dough more.  You may not need to incorporate the entire 1/4 cup.  If the dough feels firm and solid enough, just knead for a few minutes and prepare it to rest.  You should have a satiny, smooth compact ball.

Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl, and turn the dough over to coat the entire dough lightly in oil.  Cover with plastic wrap and a kitchen towel and place in a warm spot to rest for 1 1/2 hours.  The dough should double in size.  Remove from the bowl, punch down and reform into a ball.  Return to the bowl, cover and allow to rest for another 30 minutes.

After the second short rest, place the dough on a lightly floured surface and cut into 2 pieces.  Form each piece into a smooth, round ball, tucking any haggard edges on the underside of the dough.  Leave to rest, covered with a damp cloth, on the lightly floured surface for 45 minutes to a hour.

During the last 20 minutes of the resting period, preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.  Place a baking rack in the lower third of the oven and leave either a baking stone or an upside down baking sheet in the oven to heat as well. Just before the bread dough is set to go in the oven, slash the top of the loaves with 2 to 4 slashes, using a sharp knife.  This will allow the bread to expand in the oven.  Remove the super hot baking sheet from the oven.  Carefully transfer the dough onto the baking sheets and return to the oven.

This is fun! Just after you put the bread in the oven, take 1/4 cup of water, open the oven door, quickly poor the water onto the hot oven floor and immediately close the oven door.  We’re creating steam here people… it’s exciting.  Wait 2 minutes and repeat the process.

Bake loaves for 20-25 minutes.  They’ll be golden and gorgeous.  Remove from the oven and insert a thermometer.  The temperature should be between 190 to 210 degrees F. Or if you’re not super high tech like me, you can just decide that they look good. Joy suggests letting the bread cool completely before slicing, but that’s hard.  It’s okay if you don’t wait, but if you do let it cool completely I think the outside gets crustier.  Enjoy!

Part of a completely wonderful breakfast :)

baked potato with herb roasted cauliflower and carrots

Josh and I have eaten this meal a few times in the past month because cauliflower, potatoes and carrots are super cheap this time of year. This recipe is my very own creation. (Although, somewhere in the world someone has probably eaten this already.) I usually like to follow recipes rather than experiment with cooking, so I am excited to share a Rachel original. 

Baked Potatoes with Herb Roasted Cauliflower and Carrots

Serves: two

Ingredients:

2 large potatoes (or 4 medium potatoes)

1 medium onion

1 large carrot

2 cups cauliflower florets

3 large garlic cloves

olive oil

Seasonings: salt, pepper, basil, thyme, rosemary, parsley, garlic powder

Plain yogurt (or sour cream) and butter for serving

1. Preheat oven to 425 F (218 C)

2. Bake the potatoes however you like- I just put it in the preheated oven for about an hour.

3. Chop onion in half and thinly slice it. Cut carrot into bite sized pieces and chop the cauliflower into florets.  Toss the veggies with olive oil and sprinkle generously with the seasonings. Toss again.  Put veggies onto a baking sheet and roast for 15-20 minutes in the preheated oven until tender and slightly browned.  Stir occasionally. 

4. Meanwhile, mince the garlic.  Add it to the veggies after 10-15 minutes.

5. When potatoes and veggies are done cooking, slice potato in half and fill with butter.  Top potatoes with the roasted veggies and a dollop of plain yogurt.  I imagine cheese would also be great on this, but we haven’t had cheese around in a while.

Eat and Enjoy!

apples galore.

Oh the apples of autumn have been so abundant and wonderful!  Not only do we have a friend who has let us pick juicy, ripe apples off her tree, but we have found various neglected trees which we decided to care for by harvesting the apples.  We've made batches of applesauce and have added apples to our oatmeal, pancakes and coffeecakes.  I thought I would share our applesauce recipe and the links to a few of my other favorite apple recipes.

Applesauce
Ingredients:
about 20 apples (but really, use as many can fit into your largest pot)
brown sugar
lemon juice
cinnamon
water

Okay, we don't really have a recipe with specifically measured ingredients.  But this is what we do:
1.  Core apples and cut into 8 pieces
2.  Put apples into a pot with 1-2 cups of water
3.  Add a few spoonfuls of brown sugar, several squeezes of lemon juice and several dashes of cinnamon.
4.  Cook for 1-3 hours or until apples can easily be mashed.  Taste the applesauce and decide if you want more sugar or cinnamon.
5. Eat some, let it cool and put your delicious apple sauce in jars for the winter!

Some favorite apple recipes found through the internet:
Apple Pancakes
Apple Cinnamon Coffeecake
Puff Pancake with Apples (Instead of sautéing pears, we sauteed apples)
Baked Apples

In addition to all the apples we've collected this fall, we've also accumulated two Norwegian sweaters!
Happy November!

cardamom bread.

With not a super busy schedule I've been enjoying some of my various hobbies a bit more.  Specifically in the past few weeks I have been doing a lot of baking.  In fact, I think I've been doing too much baking because we now have a freezer full of bread.  People we see at Abels Hage give us bread every Wednesday and Josh got some extra bread from his school, which also contributes to the bread cache.  Early on we figured out that it's cheaper and more tasty to make our own bread than to buy bread at the store.  After making my favorite french bread recipe for two weeks, I decided to branch out and try a new recipe for cardamom bread.  It was delightful- flavorful with a hint of sweetness!  I pretty much just followed this recipe, but replaced a 1/4 cup of white flour with millet.  Our Ugandan friend gave us some millet and we've been using it kind of like whole wheat flour.  Anybody know any other good uses for millet?  All that to say, you could definitely make this recipe healthier by using half white/ half wheat flour.  This was also my first attempt at braiding a loaf of bread.  I love the look, but I must need more practice because the slices of bread would often fall apart in certain spots.  I will definitely make this recipe again in the future, although I will have to wait until we eat up our current supply of bread!

Oh, how I love bread warm from the oven!

summer beats/beets

This post is mostly about beets-that awesome purple vegetable that stains everything the perfect purple color- but the pun was so good that I thought I also ought to post something about beats, you know as in music beats.  So here is a really cool song:

 

And now, for the beets.  I LOVE beets. I love their earthy taste and their purpely color. Plus, they are super healthy.  When I studied abroad in Costa Rica I learned about organic farming and more than ever before I began to care about the food I ate.  At that point in my life I was already a vegetarian, but after visiting farms and plantations, I began to care about eating food in season and eating locally grown food.  As a college student sharing food with four other girls, eating local, seasonal food is tough and sometimes expensive.  But as a college graduate living at home for the summer with a vegetable garden in the backyard, this is not as much of a problem.  A couple weeks ago I visited the local farmer's market and picked up many goodies including beets.  I like to boil them and eat them kind of lukewarm on a salad or just by themselves.  Here's my simple, step by step recipe:

Step 1: obtain fresh beets:

  
Step 2: cut beets into chunks:

Step 3: boil beets (covered) for 20-30 minutes until tender or the beets reach the consistency you desire:

 

Step 4: strain beets and run cool water over them several times:

Step 5: after beets have cooled a bit, peel off the skin with your fingers (it's easy!):

 Step 6: cut beets into smaller chunks if you want and enjoy!

Do you like beets?

What is your favorite summer veggie?

pumpkin nutella swirl bread

A couple weeks ago, Josh and I baked some delicious pumpkin nutella bread and muffins.  

I found this recipe on pinterest:

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour  (We used 1 cup white flour and 3/4 cup of wheat flour to make it a bit healthier.)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 tablespoon cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons nutmeg
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup canola oil
1/3 cup water
1 cup canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
8 tablespoons Nutella (2 tablespoons per mini loaf) ***see note below

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Spray 4 mini loaf pans with cooking spray. Set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, whisk together sugar, oil, water, pumpkin, eggs, and extracts. Whisk until smooth and combined.
4. Slowly stir in the flour mixture. Mix until ingredients are combined.
5. Pour the batter into the mini loaf pans, making sure batter is evenly divided. Drop 2 heaping tablespoons of Nutella onto each loaf pan. Swirl the Nutella into the pumpkin batter with a knife. Place the loaf pans onto a baking sheet and place in the oven. Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
6. Place the loaf pans on a wire rack. Cool for 15 minutes in the pan and then carefully remove the loaves. Cool completely before slicing.

*Note-You can make regular size loaves. This recipe should make 2 8×4 loaves. Adjust baking time to about 60 minutes.  You can also make muffins, but I am not sure how many you will get from a full recipe since I did some mini loaves and some muffins.  For muffins cook between 15-20 minutes.  I also recommend doing additional nutella in the middle of you muffins or loaves.  Just fill the pan half way and swirl in some nutella just like the recipe calls for on top.


Happy Fall!

simple summer lunch.

 Thursday's lunch was kind of my ode to gardens. After a long morning at soccer camp I walked outside to the garden and came back in with lunch.  My mom and I bought a bunch of heirloom tomatoes at a sale in St. Louis earlier this summer and so far the green zebras, isis candies and snow whites are ripe.  I'm loving it. I made a toasted bagel sandwich with homegrown tomatoes, homegrown basil, pesto and feta cheese.  My mom stemmed some homegrown broccoli and I sprinkled it with lime.  Delicious, simple and free!

Today I'm off to Italy. Ciao!

fall favorites.

Usually I like warm weather and fall means cold weather with winter right around the corner.  The start of Fall was fairly warm and sunny with beautiful, crunchy leaves.  The perfect bike riding, soccer playing weather.  However, I think it's starting to turn colder, which is not good.  As I try to always be optimistic, I'm reminiscing about my favorite things of fall.   Some of the best include: homemade pumpkin spice granola, pumpkin spice lattes, crunchy leaves, wearing tights, making useful and awesome things in Ceramics 101,  and a great Halloween costume.  What do you love about fall?

Fruit Pizza

 

I made this fruit pizza for a World Cup party at my house on Sunday and it was delicious!  Here's the recipe:

2 packages of sugar cookie dough

8 oz Cream cheese

8 oz Cool whip

3/4 cup powder sugar

2-4 cups of fruit   (If you use bananas, first dip them in pineapple juice to keep them from turning brown.)

Glaze:

1/2 cup white sugar

pinch of salt

1 Tablespoon cornstarch

1/2 cup orange juice (i used fresh squeezed)

2 T lemon juice

1/4 cup water

1/2 teaspoon orange zest

Press the cookie dough into a circle pan and cook according to instructions on package.   

Combine cream cheese, cool whip and powdered sugar and spread it over the cooled cookie.

Spread the fruit over the pizza.

To make the glaze, cook all the ingredients except orange zest on medium heat in a sauce pan.  Stir.  Let it come to a boil and boil for 1-2 minutes or until thick.  Take it off the heat and add zest.  Cool it for a few minutes, but don't let it set.  Spoon over the fruit.

Chill the pizza for 2 hours before cutting and serving.

Enjoy!

*I used bananas, peaches and blueberries because I had those on hand.  If you try this, let me know what fruit you use and how it turns out!