Text-based baking adventures

I'm just going to blame my lack of updates on the Republicans. And the Democrats, so as not to leave anybody out.

And this webcomic.

But I have been baking, and though I have been woefully unable to acquire any photographs of my efforts, I will attempt to placate all both of my readers who have been waiting, breath bated, for an update.

So I give you the text-only version of two of my most recent recipes: Cinnamon Roll Cookies and Kate's Phe-nom-nom-nom-enal Key Lime Pie.

Cinnamon Roll Cookies

Unlike most of my other recipes, I didn't deviate very much from the original (found here). The main thing I changed is, of course, the sugars. And some proportions here and there.

For the dough:  
2 ½ sticks (1 1/4 cups) unsalted butter, softened 
4 oz softened cream cheese 
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. dry active yeast  
3/4 cup granulated sugar 
1/4 cup honey 

3 ¾ cups all-purpose flour  
½ tsp. salt 

For the filling:  
½ cup brown sugar  
2 tbsp. cinnamon


For the glaze:  
3 Tb. soymilk (because we didn't have dairy milk)
1 cup powdered sugar
dash cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla

The process:  
Mix 2 tsp. cool/room temperature vanilla extract with 1 tsp. of dry active yeast. You don't want it to be warm because we're not trying to activate the yeast. You just want that yeasty flavor that makes cinnamon rolls so yummy; you don't want these cookies to puff up like them.  

Cream the butter, cream cheese, vanilla with yeast, and granulated sugar until smooth. You can do it with an electric mixer for about 2 minutes or with a fork like me because you're a BAMF. Add the salt, then slowly add the flour. Mix until combined. You'll end up with a nice malleable dough. Dump it out onto a clean flat surface and press it into a flat disk. Wrap the dough well so it doesn't dry out and pop it in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 375*. Mix 1/2 cup brown sugar and 2 tbsp cinnamon together in a small bowl. Pull your dough out of the fridge and cut it in half. Leave one half in the fridge while you work with the other half. Flour a clean workspace (or a piece of wax paper) and roll the dough into an 8-by-18-inch rectangle (1/4 inch thick). Cut the dough in half. Sprinkle half the filling mixture over each half of the dough, leaving an inch bare along one of the long edges. Starting with the long edge covered by the mixture, carefully roll the dough toward the bare edge. Press the seam firmly. Repeat this process with the half of the dough you left in the fridge. You should end up with four logs of cookie.

These will, if wrapped well, keep in the fridge for days or in the freezer for weeks. But why would you do that?

Cut the roll into half-inch slices and gently place the slices on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper (or greased with butter; not Pam). Bake for 10-12 minutes, depending on your oven.

While these are baking, whisk the powdered sugar, (soy)milk, vanilla and cinnamon together in a small bowl. Once your cookies are completely cool, dip the top of each cookie into the glaze and place them on a rack to set.

Kate's Phe-nom-nom-nom-enal Key Lime Pie

This recipe is a bit more original than the previous, and several times simpler.

For the crust:
1 inner sleeve of (cinnamon) graham crackers (about 1.5-2 cups)
1 stick (1/2 cup) butter
1/8 cup water
some vanilla
some cinnamon

For the filling:
2 cans sweetened condensed milk
1 cup lime juice
zest and juice of one lime
1/2 cup sour cream
some vanilla

Make the crust! First, crush the graham crackers. The quickest way is to crush them in a food processor, but the fun way is to toss them into a gallon-size plastic bag and go to town on them with a rolling pin until they're ground to a coarse powder. Melt the butter and mix it with the crushed graham crackers in a bowl. Toss in the water, vanilla and cinnamon and stir until the crust is sticky but not difficult to stir. If 1.5 cups of grahams makes the crust too wet, add more grahams a half-cracker at a time. If the crust gets too crumbly and won't stick to itself, add a slash of water. Stir well. Press the crust into a well-greased 9-inch round pie dish. It won't be perfect; that's kind of the point.

Next, make the filling. Zest the lime, then cut it in half. Chuck the condensed milk, sour cream, lime juice, zest and vanilla into a bowl. Squeeze the zested lime into the bowl; it's okay if a bit of pulp gets in there. Gives it character. Stir until well-blended and smooth. Pour that limey b*stard into the prepared pie dish and bake for 7-10 minutes or until small pinhole bubbles pop on the surface of the pie. Do not brown the crust. Let the pie cool for 20-30 minutes before placing it in the fridge to chill for another 2-3 hours. Serve this piece of heaven with freshly whipped cream. Nom nom nom nom.

Baklava

Since I did two cookie recipes in a row, it's time for something different. I took a poll on Facebook. Honestly, I was expecting requests for cakes, more cookies, maybe a pie... but what did I get? Croissants, tiramisu, souffles, and baklava.

 I'd never made baklava before. Baklava has never been my favorite dessert, mostly because I'm picky about how and when I eat nuts. Also because I had the pleasure of spending a week in Greece and partaking of authentic Greek baklava almost every day, and nothing I've had since can compare.

Naturally, my next thought was to make something that could compare.

So I pulled on my thick black gloves, my mad scientist goggles and channeled the long-dead fictional ghost of Dr Frankenstein. And by that I mean I took parts from different recipes and put them together to create my own. No I did not exhume dead bodies and dismember them and use their ground-up intestines as filling or use layers of their skin in place of the phyllo dough. Nor did I boil their cerebrospinal fluid with a stick of cinnamon and a dash of bile for the syrup. Why would you even think that. You sicko.

The first thing I did was thaw my phyllo dough. Since it's so thin, it won't take but 2-4 hours to thaw. But you may need to leave it out overnight. Once it's thawed, roll it out onto a clean, dry surface and cover it with a damp towel so it doesn't dry out and break when you breathe heavily.

Next I gathered my nuts. Pistachios were the only common thread across the board. Other options included walnuts, almonds and, oddly enough, Brazil nuts. My recipe ended up using one and a half cups of nuts. Half of that mix was pistachios. The other half was split evenly between almonds and pecans. A big soft spot exists in my heart for pecans. I have this incredibly vivid memory of my little sister and me gathering pecans from under the trees at my grandparents' house. And fighting over who got to roll around with the pecan picker-upper.

FRANK. STOP PLAYING WITH YOUR NUTS.

They say to pulse the nuts gently in a food processor to get a nice, chunky, even mix. But a blender worked just fine for me. After the nuts were, on the whole, evenly chopped (and I'd eaten the big chunks), I added my sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, cloves and allspice. None of the recipes online called for allspice or brown sugar, but if you haven't noticed by now, white sugar is not my favored sweetener of choice. Whenever I can, I substitute either honey, dark brown or light brown sugar for part of the white sugar. The honey is a bit better for you as a sweetener, and both it and the brown sugars add another subtle layer of flavor as well as sweetness.

We're all mixed nuts here.

 Next, I melted a cup of butter in the microwave. I took the time to ponder the rumor that the Greeks have a very healthy diet. Then I gazed at the golden delicious puddle of fat in the bowl I'd just removed from the mic, gazed at the sugar, the nuts, the honey...

Phyllo in the foreground and a demon in the microwave.

 Aw, screw it, I said to myself. I'll go eat some olives later.

So now, my nuts are mixed, my butter's melted and my phyllo is thawed. Time to start layering. This is where it gets time-consuming. For this part I would recommend collecting a friend and duct-taping them to a chair in the kitchen so you can have someone to talk to while you work.

Preheat your oven to 350, lightly grease a glass 9x13 pan and gently line the pan with a sheet of phyllo. Using a pastry brush, brush the sheet with butter. Do not fret if your first couple sheets fall apart or wrinkle; this will just add texture. Repeat this process seven more times until you have eight sheets of phyllo in the bottom of your pan, all brushed with butter.

I washed that paintbrush. Whatever's left on there will just give the baklava a little zing.

Next, spoon a layer of your sugary mixed nut deliciousness over the phyllo. After that, spread two sheets of phyllo over that, brushing each with the butter. Repeat this process until you've run out of the nut mixture.

This part took me almost two hours because I kept getting distracted by cartoons.

Lastly, spread eight sheets of phyllo over the top, buttering each one. Sprinkle the top with cinnamon. Pop that sucker in the oven for 30-35 minutes. Again, this varies by the temperature of your oven. I didn't go strictly by time. When the edges of the phyllo start curling up and getting lightly golden brown, I pulled it.

While your baklava is baking, make the syrup. This calls for sugar, honey, water, vanilla, lemon juice and a cinnamon stick. If you don't have cinnamon sticks, half a teaspoon of cinnamon is all you need. Chuck all the ingredients into a saucepan over medium-high heat, bring to a boil and then simmer for about 7 or 8 minutes, or until reduced by about a third. It should be slightly thick when you're done. Remove the cinnamon stick and let it cool for the remainder of the time that your baklava is in the oven. Resist the urge to use the cinnamon stick as a straw to drink the syrup.

Makin syrup. LIKE A BOSS.

Once your baklava is out of the oven, pour the cooled syrup over the hot baklava so it can sink in and the flavors can blend together. Let the baklava cool for about an hour. It really should be longer because you want it to be completely cool before you start cutting it. If it's not, layers go everywhere. I found this out the hard way so you don't have to. You're welcome.

It looks like a bed of deliciousness that I want to crawl into.

The numbers:
For the baklava:

• 1 1/2 lb. chopped nuts (I use pistachios, almonds and pecans, but most recipes call for walnuts)
  
• 1 lb of phyllo dough
• 1 cup of butter, melted
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1 cup white granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/3 teaspoon ground cloves
• ¼ teaspoon allspice

For the syrup:

• 1/2 cup of water
• 1/2 cup of sugar
• 1/4 cup of honey
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• dash vanilla extract
  
• 1 cinnamon stick

Several recipes have the option of garnishing this with some ground pistachios. I eschew garnishes simply because I'd rather spend the time eating than garnishing.

I will warn you: this recipe goes a little heavy on the sugar. The joy of baklava is the balance of flavors: the nuts (I used salted pistachios for this very reason), the cinnamon and spices, the delicate flavor of the dough, and the hint of honey, lemon and vanilla in the glaze. I would actually recommend easing up a little on each sugar to give the other flavors a chance.

Some alternatives I've seen: a teaspoon of orange zest in the syrup; a teaspoon of rose water in the filling; completely removing the syrup and instead using honey in the filling.

Please post questions, alternate recipes or changes in the comments section! Happy baking!

The Snickerdoodles of the Gods

Tuesday is still technically Monday, right?

OKAY SO. These cookies are deucedly simple, but as was not the case with the cherry vanilla oatmeal ones, proportion is key. If you don't get the proportions right, these cookies won't turn out soft and fluffy like they should. Yes, I said it. Soft snickerdoodles. What.

Ingredients!

The stuff in the bag is unbleached flour. Because I am ghetto.

Bet you've never seen honey in a snickerdoodle recipe, have you?

Mix dry stuff into a mediumish bowl. Next, cream butter, sugar and honey in a largish bowl. It helps if the butter is way soft, as in nuked in the microwave for 30 or so seconds after having sat out for 30-45 minutes. After that is just incorporated, toss in your eggs and vanilla. You should end up with something super soupy with a few lumps. That is just what you want. Then, and this is very important, pour the dry into the wet in parts. I do it in 3 additions. Once you're done, this batter should be thick enough for you to pick up with your fingers and form into little balls.

Looks like ice cream; smells like God's love.

If you didn't chill the batter for the last recipe, you really should do it with this one. 30 minutes in the fridge will give your dough a chance to firm up even more and be much less sticky to handle. It's not a bad idea to chill the cookie sheet as well. This will prevent your cookies from flattening out too much, as the honey tends to make things ooze. While you're waiting on your bowl of God's love to chill, take 3 tablespoons of sugar and 1 tablespoon of cinnamon and mix them. I pour them into a sandwich bag and shake. This is fun as well as effective. Then I pour the cinnamon sugar into a bowl. Once I tried shaking the cookie balls in the plastic bag like you'd coat chicken wings at home.

I wouldn't recommend it.

These cookies are so godly, even Eddy is amazed by the holy light above the cinnsugar.

 Once your dough is chilled, remove it and your cookie sheet from the fridge. You do NOT need to grease the cookie sheet. If you do, you run the risk of browning the bottoms of your cookies unnecessarily. Dust your fingers with a bit of flour (a bit) and form the dough into 1-inch balls. Feel free to go smaller. Also feel free to watch the Schweddy Balls sketch at this time.

Take your balls and roll them around in the bowl of cinnsugar to thoroughly coat each one. Thoroughly.

Big Sister-Eye is watching you.

 Every once in a while you may need to stop and lick the batter off your hands wash/reflour your hands.

If cinnamon were porn, I'd be Ron Jeremy.

 Bake for 10-12 minutes, depending on your oven. Mine's extra sexy, so it runs hot.

The goddess of cinnamon shines down upon thee.

Store these bad girls (yes, girls: sugar and spice and everything nice, y'all) in an airtight container to maintain softness.

The numbers!
Wet:
1 cup butter (2 sticks)-- softened
1 ¼ cup sugar
¼ cup honey-- or if you don't have honey, use 1/4 cup dark brown sugar.
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla

Dry:
2 3/4 cups flour
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon cinnamon

The dipping mix:

3 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon cinnamon

What else is there to say about these cookies? Other than they are what result from when butter, sugar, cinnamon and vanilla make sweet, sweet love and have about 3 dozen cookie babies.

You like how I mixed the sex metaphor and God metaphor, right? Right?

Happy baking!

Cherry Vanilla Oatmeal Cookies

The biggest compliment I've gotten on these cookies was the question, "Is it wrong to have cookies for breakfast?"

"Heck no," I replied. "Cherries are healthy. So are oats. And vanilla. The butter and sugar don't count. Especially not for breakfast."

First, gather your ingredients.

The dry stuff (lolkitten not included).

The wet stuff and add-ins.

Mix your dry ingredients in a medium bowl. Cream butter, brown sugar and honey in largish bowl until mostly free of lumps. Since there's honey, it won't be fluffy like a regular butter/sugar cream. You can use a mixer, but I use a fork because I'm hardcore. Mix in vanilla and egg.

Ickis helped.

 Add dry stuff to wet gradually. I do so in 2 additions. Toss in dried cherries and white chocolate chips (or nuts, if you're nutty). Mix until JUST blended. Overmixing will turn your cookies tough and chewy (in a bad way).

Lolkitten can not haz.

I don't measure the add-ins. I just dump until I'm satisfied.

 Chill batter in the fridge for half an hour. This step is very important. This will firm up the honey slightly so that your cookies won't flatten too badly in the oven. During this half hour, you can do Jell-o shots, Riverdance, taste the batter, resist the urge to eat the rest of the batter, fail, and preheat the oven to 350. After what's left of your batter is properly chilled, spoon onto a lightly greased cookie sheet by the teaspoon.

Don't do what I did. Use a good cookie sheet with a light grease. Not foil.

 Pop them in the oven and wait for the longest ten minutes of your life. Give them a minute or two to settle before you remove them to a wire rack to cool. I won't say not to eat them right out of the oven, because I know you'll try anyway. Don't sue me for mouth burns; that's all I ask.

Ickis you are in the way.

Batch yield: 2 dozenish. The smaller you spoon them, the more quickly they will get eaten. True story.

My cookies make lolcats forget about cheezburgers.

I'll be honest; I don't like crunchy cookies, so you won't see recipes on this blog that will yield crunchy cookies. These are soft and moist and chewy and are best stored in an airtight container to maintain that gooey softness that keeps folks rabid for these cookies. And I do mean rabid.

The numbers:
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/3 cup honey (there is wiggle room for the proportion of honey to sugar; just make sure there's more brown sugar than honey. Honey is what makes this recipe; too much of it will unmake it)
1 egg
1 tablespoon vanilla extract (very important)

3/4ish cup all-purpose flour (don't go over 1 cup or under 2/3; other than that, you're good)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2ish teaspoon ground cinnamon (I always go heavy, but don't go crazy. For once, you don't want the cinnamon to clash with the primary flavors; instead, you want it to enhance the vanilla and complement the oats)
1/4 teaspoon salt (I often use a half teaspoon, but I like more salt in my baked goods)
1 3/4ish cups rolled oats (don't go over 2 cups or under 1 1/2)

3/4ish cup cherries
1/2ish cup white chocolate chips
or 1/2 cup walnuts, pecans, etc.

Clearly, strict measurement is important to me. This is how I bake. I start with a basic recipe (oatmeal cookies, in this case), and throw stuff into a bowl until it smells good. That kind of experimentation is the best way to learn to bake and to cook in general. Don't be afraid to screw up. It happens to everybody. No recipe is foolproof. Happy baking!

Leave questions and recipe tweaks in the comments section. I'm looking forward to see how folks can improve upon this recipe!