moving on...

After months of working on blogger I decided to move onto wordpress for better usability and design. Plus I bought my own domain! So check the savoury page out at http://thesavourypage.com.

Thanks!

all good things

My mom was the one who introduced me to baking. For bake sales and school events she should would bring out the Duncan Hines Marble Cake Mix and whip up a batch of cupcakes or when the bananas were about to go off she’d make banana bread from scratch. To this day my sibs will allow bananas to go bad in hopes she will bake some banana bread. But most of all she introduced me to rice krispies squares. The gooey marshmallows, hint of vanilla and crunchy cereal were heaven. Even to this day I still go crazy over it and even had a request for them at the recent office bake sale.

So you can imagine my delight when I came across the Peanut Butter Chocolate Crispy Bars. When it comes the classics I’m a purist but the recipe title called out to me. How can you say no to anything Peanut Butter? For starters you have to create a caramel/candy with sugar, corn syrup and water.

Once you’ve created the crispy candied treat, milk chocolate and peanut butter are melted together creating yet another delicious layer and then you top it off with a dark chocolate with a little more corn syrup added for good measure. I understand why this is the top refrigerator treat from Baked and after selling it at the bake sale I know why it should be in the fridge. This super sweet decadent treat was a gourmet option to the rice krispie square from my past. Both are good and I would pare back the layers next time to drop the overt sweetness, but nothing really beats the original.

PS - I am writing, listening and laughing to Tina Fey’s Bossypants audio book. I read the book in less than two days and loved it so much that I had to hear Fey tell her story. I know it’s not a cookbook, but Fey loves food so it’s worth mentioning.

bbe! (best brownies ever!)

I am a stress eater. Whenever anything stressful shows up in my life I instantly respond by shovelling large amounts of food into my small sturdy frame. Recently I had a blondie bar and two kinds of cake all in the course of four hours. Yes I’m that girl quietly eating her second piece of cake in the corner or pockets a cookie for later. It’s taken awhile to accept that I will never stress myself thin. There is comfort in the crackle of a chocolate wrapper or the sweet wafting smell of freshly baked choco chip cookies. So when Japan was hit with the earthquake and tsunami I instantly responded to the call for help by organizing bake sale.

Obviously I wanted to raise money for a good cause, but I also didn’t want to be the last baked good standing. My dad has instilled a competitive nature in me. In order to do that I had to call out the big guns. Having recently just purchased Baked: New Frontiers in Baking I decided to go ahead with the brownie that has made them famous. This dense, deep, rich, decadent treat requires a lot from its baker. Real chocolate, cocoa powder, instant espresso powder, a boat-load of eggs not to mention butter. It’s worth it.  Even a co-worker came up to me later and me that “they really are the best brownies ever!”

I still dream of them and recently during a time of upheaval and stress I thought about them but didn’t haven enough chocolate or eggs and had to settle for quicky rice crispy squares which brings me to my next post. Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito I think I love you….

chocolate chip cookie challenge part one

I swear by Smitten Kitchen's Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie. It has nice ratio between dough and chocolate chips. It's sweet and not overly so and like the recipe name suggests it's chewy on the inside and slightly crispy on the outside. What I also love is that it yields an enormous amount of cookies with very little effort. One batch makes  a dozen to bake and  a couple dozen more for freezing (I love a freshly baked cookie). I love sneaking into the kitchen and heating up the stove for a few warm gooey chocolate chips cookies. This recipe gives me that option and satisfies the craving whenever it hits, which is about once a week. I feel that they are the best chocolate chip cookies hands down.

Recently I purchased Baked: New Frontiers in Baking by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito. They are well known for their Baked Brownies which was voted Best Brownie by America's Test Kitchen. When I flipped through the pages I wanted to make and eat everything even their Chocolate Chip cookies. I couldn't resist a taste test and decided to make these cookies my first go round with this book. The recipe was fairly simple and straightforward and the tip about freezing the cookies for a warm treat later made me love them even more. In order to accurately test I also baked up a few of Smitten Kitchen's cookies. I had to do an honest taste test. 

The second I took the cookies out I instantly saw a difference. Baked's cookie was more cake like and smoother while Smitten's was more rustic looking. I lined them up called J down and we tasted them. While the sweetness and the texture of Baked's cookie was nice I'm not one for a cake type cookie, I like my cakes to be cakes and my cookies to be cookies. I think I'll stick with Smitten's...although I just picked up Chewy Gooey Crispy Crunchy Melt-in-Your-Mouth Cookies by Alice Medrich...I feel another challenge coming on.

discovery

A good friend had a birthday on the weekend and she is gluten free. Gluten free baking is hard. You don't always get the right texture and flavour. I have had a few successes and some failures. But I was determined to make it work. I returned to my cookbooks and came across a beautiful book that J. bought me last year called Red Velvet and Chocolate Heartache written by Harry Eastwood. I wanted the book because it looked amazing but never really thought about the actual recipes. What I didn't realize at the time was that it was a gluten free book that is also vegan.  I am a firm believer in eggs and butter but I had all the ingredients so I thought it was worth the try. I decide on the Cherry Brandy Chocolate Cupcakes. Harry (I love a boy's name for a girl) has cheeky write ups to go with each recipe and this recipe matched my friend. Sassy and bold it had a deep sweet richness brought on by quality cocoa powder. Instead of butter I swapped in butternut squash and I used almond flour and rice flour. The cupcake itself had a rich cocoa taste without being too sweet. I made the frosting which is comprised of 90% icing sugar....delicious. I wasn't sure at first but in the end it was the most moist gluten free item I've baked. At the end of the night there were on 2 out of the 12 left. So I guess it was a hit, although I still love eggs and butter in a cake this is definitely an option for the vegan friends.

...

I haven't posted in a while but I have been cooking. I had a brief fling with braising and and a couple of forays into soups but in these cold winter months I long for a familiar comfort....baking. I've been making whole wheat cocoa nib cookies, hippo cheese crackers and a giant New York Cheesecake. To be honest I've been doing a lot of Smitten Kitchen's recipes. I have taken a break from cookbooks as they have become an expensive habit and I wasn't feeling inspired. I tried the local library and was surprised that the Barefoot Contessa, Nigella or Sophie Dahl were not able to break my cookbook doldrums. 

A couple weeks ago I came across a post about The Communal Table, it's playful design and accessible recipes spoke to me. A Casual Setting is the first in a series of cookbooks about eating and gathering, curated and illustrated by Caroline Hwang. The recipes are accessible and appetizing. The bonus is that any money made from the books will be donated to a food-related organization. I can't wait to make the man steak for eight!

With Spring comes a new crop of cookbooks and while I have no interest in Gwyneth's book there were plenty of good books coming out. One in particular is Plenty: Vibrant Vegetable Recipes From London's Ottolenghi, I'm still on the waiting list for that one but I ordered another one with it that just arrived it's called Chicken and Egg: A Memoir Of Suburban Homesteading with 125 Recipes. I don't know if it's  the fact that we're getting more daylight or these new crop of cookbooks but I feel ready to cook again.

bakernoon turns to baking weeks

I’m going to say it “I hate winter.” Yes I know I live in Canada, I have lived here my whole life and it has never made winter any easier. Of course I love the snow and the chill in the air when it first shows up in December but when the holidays fade away and we move into the January and February I begin to resent the cold. Usually at this time I start to hibernate.  Baking returns with zeal now that the detox is over. I have decided that cookies are the ultimate food of choice. Over the last 2 weeks I have whipped up Smitten Kitchen’s Crispy Chewy Chocolate Chips (a favourite and one of the few things I repeatedly make), Dorie Greenspan’s Chocolate Roll Out Cookies in rabbit shapes and now Orangette’s Whole Wheat Sablés with Cacao Nibs.

I’ll always give a thumb up to the choco chip cookies. The rollouts were an experiment. As many of you may already know I don’t enjoy rolling out things, but I found a super cute rabbit cookie cutter that I had to use for Chinese New Years. It’s worth freezing the cookies for asked for time, the flavours were better, the dough was easier to roll and cut and the cookies did not spread as much. These cookies had a deep rich chocolate flavour due to mixing cocoa powder and chocolate together. They are definitely worth it if you roll them a little thicker (1/4 of an inch) and undercook them slightly. When you do that you get a bit more of a bite to it and had a brownie type texture to them. Dust them off with a little icing sugar and you’re good to go.

I’m not entirely convinced whole-wheat flour belongs in cookies but Molly from Orangette was convinced that this is the way. Using my last 1/3 cup of delicious cocoa nibs from Soma I made these cookies. Again I did something different by rolling the dough into a log and putting it in the fridge. Slicing them and baking them was a breeze. While there is a bit of nuttiness from the whole-wheat flour and a nice deep smoky chocolate flavour from the nibs I’m still not a believer. Molly says to give it day and it will taste better. I’ll try it again tonight and see….

Chocolate Roll Out Rabbits, adapted from Bon Appetit

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

3 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, room temperature

1 1/3 cups sugar

1 large egg

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat over to 350 degrees. Mix the dry ingredients (minus the sugar) in a bowl together.  Melt the chocolate on a double broiler remove and let cool. Beat butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Beat in egg. Reduce speed to low and add vanilla and chocolate. Add flour mixture and beat until just combined. Make a ball with the finished dough and cut in half. Flatten the balls into discs and plastic wrap them for at least 4 hours.

Take the dough and roll it out on a floured surface until about 1/4 inch thick. Cut out the cookies and place about 1 inch apart from each other on parchment lined baking sheets. Bake for about 10 minutes. The cookies will be puffier and firmer and have slightly darker edges. Take out and let cool. Dust lightly with icing sugar.

Warning makes a lot of cookies but they won’t last long.

p.s.

I’m not going to lie to you and say I’ve been super strict these past few weeks. I definitely had some days when I went off the rails. Yesterday morning being one of them. Last week I managed to catch Delicious Miss Dahl on the Food Network and was inspired by her very selfish day. I woke up Saturday morning at 7 am and snuck down to the kitchen. Instead of opting for the usual eggs and toast I decided I would kick start it with the Rich Chocolate Pot recipe. I was not disappointed by my choice. I could barely even get the chocolate or stewed strawberries into the cup as I was eating about half of the recipe as I was making it. It had a rich chocolate taste that mixed with the sweet syrupy strawberries (I can only imagine what it would be like if I had cherries and cherry brandy). It wasn't too sugary and it felt like the right amount of indulgence without pushing you over the edge. Here's the recipe I made. I don't even have a complete photo because it was devoured that quickly.


Indulgent (Rich) Chocolate Pots, adapted from Delicious Miss Dahl
serves 6


About 1/2 cup of hulled and chopped strawberries
1 tablespoon of sugar
200 g of 65% Lindt Madagascar Chocolate (two bars)
1 1/3 cup of whipping cream
2 large egg yolks


In a pot over medium heat dissolve the sugar in a little bit of water.
Add strawberries and simmer for about 5 minutes until the strawberries soften and have a slight jam like consistency. Remove from heat.
Using a double broiler (I used a heatproof bowl over a pot of simmering water) Heat the chocolate (broken into chunks) and the cream together. When they are combined remove from heat and let it cool slightly.
Whisk in two egg yolks until the chocolate mixture becomes glossy and smooth.
Spoon strawberry mixture into 6 pots and then evenly distribute the chocolate mixture. It's impossible not eat as you are making it but it's also nice to share (which I did, come on you don't think I'd eat all 6 servings by myself do you?).

opening the floodgates

After a week of strict restrictions, week two seemed like a breeze because I slowly introduced wheat, eggs, soy and dairy back into the diet. Added sugar was still out but that was okay because I had Flying Apron’s book, which was gluten free, vegan and used barely any sugar.

I’ve been really enjoying her savoury section in particular her soup one. I made the Potato, Leek & Sorrel soup and it was delicious! It had subtle yet complex layered flavours it also had spinach blended in it with our 80’s immersion style blender called Robot Susan (that’s what the package called it).

By mid-week I was ready for something sweet so I made the Wondie Bars. GF oat, mixed with raspberries and blueberries, olive oil and some corn flour. It was a little crumbly but was sweet and crunchy all rolled into one.

When the week drew to a close I kicked it off in my usually weekend bake style and tried the Mexican Chocolate Cupcakes. I used no eggs, butter or processed sugar (the holy trinity of baking). Instead the substitutes were banana, olive oil and a maple syrup, agave nectar combo. I brought it to a friend’s house and didn’t say a word. It was big hit! The texture was crumbly (a common occurrence in Flying Apron’s book) but the cupcake had a nice chocolate depth and richness I didn’t expect from a vegan recipe. I’m not saying I’m converted because I love eggs, butter and sugar, I just thought it was a nice alternative for those with food restrictions. And of course it was gluten free.

Flying high from my past successes I tried to up the ante and make the Blueberry Cinnamon Scones. I used garbanzo bean flour, my first mistake. It smelled a little like peanut butter but had none of its texture and binding power. I was not impressed because they came out dry, crumbly and a little lack luster in flavour. Thumbs down for sure on this one. J said they were fine but every time I picked them up they would explode in a crumbly mess and left a sticky dry texture in my mouth upon eating them. Ho hum indeed.

Next up the Indian Pockets (Gluten free bread wrapped around a warm yummy filling, two recipes in one). I think I like the savoury more than the sweet. And even though I had a few successes I really think baked goods need a little egg and butter to hold it all together.

week one complete

When I first started this plan I thought how hard could it be to give up added sugar, wheat/gluten, eggs, corn, soy, fruit juices and processed food for one week? The first day I was patting myself on the back, the second day the reality hit. While I made a few meals including Flying Apron’s Fennel and Carrot soup I was not prepared for how hungry I would be or how much I would crave chocolate and bread. I packed my meals for the day but found myself wanting more despite great food options. This week I made Martha’s millet bowl, blended healthy shakes every morning, snacked on a handful of mixed nuts (minus peanuts), I had quinoa and salmon, lentils and salmon, salad after salad and fruit snacks. While all of them were delicious I really felt I needed more. I was a healthy bottomless pit. But as the week progressed I became less hungry and by day five I no longer craved chocolate even when J waved a one kg Dairy Milk bar from the UK at me (he’s been doing it as well but had to break it when that sucker came out. Chocolate is a hard thing to resist).

I’m now on day seven and tomorrow wheat gets to come back in (for J not for me, back to gluten free) and the restrictions loosen up. I have to say that the food was delicious but it was hard preparing everything for the day and making sure I had options so that I would not give in to a flaky chocolate croissant (best of both worlds I gave it death stares but didn’t pick it up). I do feel better physically and I’m finding it easier now, but I definitely need a snack that is not a fruit or some nuts. This next week should be easier with eggs coming back in. What I’m really excited about is finally being able to do Flying Apron’s recipes especially since I had such success with the soup.

The Fennel and Carrot soup was made out of necessity instead of want. I had a bunch of carrots about to go off and I knew I could make a soup out of it. I picked up a fennel bulb and went to work. What came out was something both unexpected and delicious. I was never a big fan of fennel but have come to appreciate its light flavour and what it brings to a meal. The combination of the fennel and the carrot was amazing. It had a nice balance to it and when you incorporate coconut milk in and you’ve got probably the most grown up soup I’ve ever made. I’m glad I had those extra carrots otherwise I would never have had the joy of drinking this soup. This simple to make soup definitely gave me confidence in the rest of the book and it also made me jealous that I don’t live in Seattle. And now it’s time for the baked goods!

new year, new resolutions

This past week I’ve had a cold and I went back to work. It seems as if those two items combined make it impossible for me to blog or even think about it (the robot shot above captures my feelings of the past week). But I’m feeling better and it’s the weekend so here I am. During the holidays I really enjoyed doing more than one book and hope to review at least two every month. This month I’m doing something a little different.

Every New Year I start with resolutions on reducing stress, eating better and getting in shape. I always start with the best of intentions but no plan. Without a plan I find it difficult to focus. This year Martha Stewart’s Whole Living magazine outlines a simple action plan for both mental and physical wellbeing for 28 days. I can do 28 days! So that’s the New Year resolution, 28 days to a purified me.

The first week is a reduction of common allergens and other bad things (good-bye added sugar, you’ve been a dear friend). Gluten/wheat is back out as well. With that in mind I decided that I would try Flying Apron’s Gluten-Free and Vegan Baking book. Seemed like a good match to Whole Living’s plan. I seriously love me a baked good so I’m going to be realistic and try to do more responsible baking. Wish me luck I’m may be a little crazy after a few days of no added sugar…

But before I do that I have one more Kylie Kwong recipe to review.

I love noodles. We grew up not knowing the true name to any dish referring to them as the big flat one, the one with soup or the worm one; the worm one being a particular favourite. That was why I decided to do the Hokkien Noodles Stir Fried with Chicken. Once again it was a blend of different sauces to create an easy to make dish that was rich in flavour and delicious. Before I got this cookbook I didn’t really know who Kylie Kwong is and now I’m sorry I hadn’t been introduced to her sooner. She’s definitely sparked my desire to learn how to cook Chinese food and furthered my appreciation of the food my dad just whips up in the kitchen.