Dog Cookies

 

Here's a recipe for Christmas cookies for dogs. I got it from a newspaper article last year. You can make them year-round, but it's so cute to make them at Christmas time with Christmas cookie cutters. You don't need an electric mixer for these--just a spoon and your hands--so they're easy to do. (You do need a rolling pin and cookie cutters, though, or at least some makeshift substitute.)

I usually use small cookie cutters to yield more cookies. This year Mom asked for some bigger ones, because one of her friends has a really large dog. I reached for the mid-sized Christmas tree, but Mom said, "Don't you want them to eat people?" So I made medium-sized gingerbread men instead.

I was going to mention that our dog doesn't like these cookies, but this year she proved us wrong:

 
 
 

She doesn't really like food, though. She's a terrier mix, and my theory is that she prefers live game, when she can get it. But as for these cookies--all the other dogs in the neighborhood like them, and our dog really does try hard to like them. One of our neighbors actually requested these this year, so it seems they're popular.

These cookies are made with whole wheat flour. DO NOT use any bleached white flour, because dogs' stomachs can't tolerate it. (Most white flour is bleached, unless you buy specially unbleached flour.) If you use bleached white flour, it will probably be on your pastry cloth, so clean it off first, or roll the dough out on something else.

These cookies are healthy for dogs. They have pumpkin, which dogs like (it calms their stomachs), and lots of fiber, and they don't have any sugar or much fat. People can eat these cookies too, if they want to.


Dog Cookies

1 cup canned pumpkin (not pie filling!)
1 cup water
3-4 tablespoons canola or safflower oil
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 1/2 cups oats
1 dash nutmeg
3 1/2 cups whole-wheat flour (the recipe says cake flour, though I'm not sure why. It also says to substitute another flour if the dog is allergic to wheat.)

Combine pumpkin, water, oil, cinnamon, oats and nutmeg in a big bowl. Add enough flour so that you can't stir the dough any more. Turn out the dough onto a pastry cloth heavily floured with whole wheat flour, and knead the dough (adding the rest of the flour as you go) until the dough is able to be rolled. (If it sticks to a floured rolling pin and a floured pastry cloth, you can't roll it out. Keep adding flour and kneading until it's less sticky.)

Roll dough out to 1/4" thick. Cut out with cookie cutters and put on an ungreased cookie sheet. (If you use parchment paper, you won't have to grease the cookie sheet or wash it sheet afterwards.) They don't really expand, so they can be almost touching each other.

Bake 40 minutes at 375 degrees. You can leave them at room temperature for a few days (in a plastic bag or other container.) For longer than that, put them in the fridge for a few days or, beyond that, in the freezer.

Pepparkakor (Swedish Gingerbread)

These are so much fun, especially with children. I have many fond memories of making pepparkakor. Before I share the recipe, here are some things I've learned over the years to make it work well. Some of this is just common sense and some of it is experience. Maybe it'll save you a bit of time, money, and frustration. But feel free to skip to the recipe if you want.

The dough must be cold for you to roll it out. That means you get out your container-the-dough-was-chilled in, take out a lump, and put the container back in the fridge before you roll out your dough. When you've cut out all the cookies you can cut out, put the scraps back in the fridge. If you try to roll them out again, you'll get a sticky mess. Use a freshly chilled lump instead.

Do not try to make a double batch of this dough unless you have an industrial size mixer. You will get a floury mess (and perhaps a broken mixer). A single batch makes plenty of dough, enough to keep you busy for hours.

Also, do not decorate the cookies with the cookie sheets on the stove (unless you have one of those completely flat stoves with no crevices). The sprinkles will get into the crevices on the stove. When you cook dinner on the stove, the sprinkles will melt and you will have a very colorful mess that is nonetheless very difficult to clean up. Put the cookie sheets on an easily cleaned counter or table so that you can wipe all the sprinkles off when you are done. It took us years to learn this, though I'm not quite sure why.

We never decorate our pepparkakor with icing, although you can do that after you bake the cookies. We decorate the cookies before we bake them using colored sugar (Mom's favorite), sprinkles (my favorite), and mini M & Ms (to which nobody objects). My sister likes to use colored sugar to give all the gingerbread boys blue pants and red shirts, and all the Christmas trees get green sugar with a yellow M & M on top for the star. The gingerbread girls get pink dresses, the stars get yellow, and the holly leaves get green. I'm not quite so methodical. I think sprinkles taste better, anyway.

Buy your sprinkles off-season if you can. After the holidays, you can find holiday-themed sprinkles at a steep discount. (After Halloween, I got some chocolate sprinkles, leaves, and orange sugar for 75% off.) You can often find multi-sectioned containers of sprinkles (at reasonable prices) at Ross, TJ Maxx, Marshalls, and HomeGoods, in the food aisle. Do not bother getting nonpareils (the little round balls, either white or multi-colored). They don't stick to the cookies. We've tried many times. (But you can press them into the centers of these cookies instead of nuts, and they'll stay there. It's the only use I've found for them yet.)

You will not get all the sugar and sprinkles on the cookies, no matter how hard you try, and some of your sprinkles will roll off. You can, however, reuse sprinkles. Bake your cookies on parchment paper, and after you've taken the cookies off, lift the parchment paper and guide the sprinkles left behind into a small bowl. Now you have multi-colored sugar-sprinkles mix that can be used just like regular sugar or sprinkles. I like putting it on stars and snowflakes, because it's cheery. To make it easier to use your sugar-sprinkles mix, put it into an empty sprinkles container and shake it on from there.

(Note: Parchment paper is a fantastic invention. It's paper that you can put on your cookie sheets instead of greasing them. You can use it over and over again, until it starts looking brown or yellowish around the edges, and you never have to wash your cookie sheets, because the cookies never touch the sheets. You can also lay out your cookies on parchment paper while the cookie sheet is in the oven baking more cookies, but I wouldn't decorate them until they're actually on the cookie sheet, because the sprinkles may fall off as you transfer it.)

I prefer using small cookie cutters. The cookies are very thin, and the smaller the cookies are, the less likely they are to break when you store or transport them. Mom sometimes quarrels with me on this--she still likes using the big cookie cutters sometimes--but she can't deny that the big ones break more easily. So the small cookie cutters are much better.

Get your cookie cutters off-season, too. Last year we found some lovely ones at Michaels a few days after Christmas. I think we got 20 small ones for $2. Joann's also has baking supplies. If you do small cookies, you will want to invest in some cookie cooling sheets that have a cross-hatch pattern (not just lines straight across), so that the cookies don't fall through and break. Michaels and Joann's often have 40% off coupons in their circular.

Since you roll out the dough very thin, some of the unbaked cookies will not transfer well to the cookie sheet. This is inevitable, although it's more likely if the dough is getting warm. Make sure your pastry cloth or work surface is well floured (along with your rolling pin and hands), and dip cookie cutters in flour before cutting out cookies. You can use a small metal spatula to help transfer cookies, but some of the shapes just don't do well--I remember having particular trouble with the dalarna horse and the reindeer, since their legs are so thin. If a cookie fails, put it in a lump to the side and return it to the fridge the next time you get the container out.


Pepparkakor (Swedish Gingerbread)

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine
2 eggs
1/2 cup molasses

3 1/2 cups sifted flour (or spooned LOOSELY into measuring cups and leveled with a flat knife. Do not shake measuring cups as you spoon flour in, because this packs it in tighter.)
2 teaspoons soda
1 1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt

In mixer, mix together sugar, shortening, butter, eggs, and molasses. Sift together dry ingredients (or--sorry, Grandma, but I never use a sifter--combine them in a separate bowl using a whisk) and stir into sugar mixture. Cover and chill several hours or overnight.

Heat oven to 375 degrees. On lightly floured board or pastry cloth, roll out a small amount of dough about 1/8 inch thick. (Keep remaining dough refrigerated.) Cut with floured cookie cutters. Place on ungreased baking sheet. Decorate with colored sugar and sprinkles if desired. Bake 6-8 minutes. Caution--they burn easily. (After they cool, you can decorate them with icing if you haven't already decorated them.)

Super-Easy Crockpot Roast

This recipe isn't new by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm posting it here because I've been enjoying it lately and because I have a couple of helpful tips. I may have broken my no-convenience-foods rule and my meat-is-only-for-special-occasions guideline (read here to find out why), but I'm still trying to make it as healthy, as un-processed, and as cheap as I can.

Since I was craving red meat, I decided to get a cut of beef and stew the you-know-what out of it in the crockpot. I wanted to get a good value for my money, so I did some reading about the leanest cuts of beef. Apparently the round cuts (top round, eye of round, bottom round) and the rump roast are the leanest cuts of beef, with about 20% to 25% fat. Top round is most tender and bottom round is least tender (not sure how rump roast compares), but when you're stewing it in the crockpot, that doesn't matter so much. For $7, I found a 2-pound roast that looked about the right size to feed me for a week. Last week, it was an eye of round roast; this week, it was a rump roast. (Sounds elegant, doesn't it?)

The next step is to pour onion soup mix over it, except for the fact that onion soup mix has MSG. So do the cheap beef bouillon cubes. I don't think I react badly to MSG, but I'd still rather stay away from it if I can. So I decided to assemble my own.

Onion soup mix is mainly made up of three things:

1) Beef bouillon, in some form. There's a store near here that sells beef-free beef bouillon powder that smells just like beef bouillon--and they sell 4 oz of it for under $1.50. I poured 1 teaspoon (equivalent of one bouillon cube) on the roast, poured 1/4 cup water over it, and then poured another generous teaspoon over the top of the roast.

2) Dried chopped onion flakes. The brand name 5th Season sells a good-sized jar of dried chopped onion flakes for 50 cents. You can find it at dollar stores or at some grocery stores (including Wal-Mart) on the bottom shelf below the expensive spices. I poured two tablespoons of those (at least) on top of the roast. (Since all these ingredients are dirt cheap, you can use as much as you want--you don't have to be limited by the size of the onion soup packet.)

3) Onion powder. This is cheapest when you buy it in bulk at a natural foods store, where you spoon some into a plastic bag and it costs a certain amount per pound. I got a 4 oz bag at the same place where I got the beef bouillon (for a similarly cheap price), and I poured 1 tablespoon of this on the roast.

4) If you want to add any celery salt or pepper, you can add some of that too. The beef bouillon will probably have a lot of salt, but if you want to add more table salt, sprinkle that on top.

To summarize: put unfrozen roast in crockpot, pour over aforementioned seasonings, and cook for a good long while. I like to do it 2 hours at HIGH and 4 hours at LOW. (This is because I can't seem to manage to get it in the crockpot early enough for it to cook for 8 hours on LOW.) It's done when it falls apart at the touch of a fork. Don't expect to slice it. It'll be too tender.

Now, a true Southerner would make gravy out of the drippings, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I asked my landlady how to dispose of the water-grease-mess that was left in the crockpot, and she replied: "You know what I like to do... I go out behind the house, off to the side a little way, and pour it out there for the critters. After all, they have to eat, too." I got quite a good laugh out of that, especially given that I was raised in suburbia (with homeowner's associations that forbid all kinds of random things), but she had a good point, and I took her advice. I hope the critters got a good meal out of it.

Failed Toffee Candy

 

So far I've made five batches of toffee (actually six, since one of them was a double batch), and three of them have turned out. The first one that failed was (I think) because I didn't cook it long enough. As for the other one, which was the double batch, my guess is that the butter wasn't good quality--not that it was rancid, but that it had too much water in it, or something like that. Or maybe I just didn't cook it long enough. For the first batch that failed, I just ate the chocolate off the top and threw away the rest. But I really didn't want to do that with the double batch, since it had an entire pound of butter (and a pound of sugar) in it.

By the way, if you're wondering what happens when toffee fails, it doesn't turn the color of toffee, and it looks and tastes like you melted butter , stirred sugar into it, and let it cool. And then there's a layer of melted chocolate on top. (Toffee does take time to set, so make sure you've let it cool overnight before you call it "failed.")

So I scraped the chocolate off the top and put the butter-sugar mixture back into the pan. I put it back over medium heat and cooked it awhile. I drained off quite a lot of liquid (the reason why I think the butter had too much water) , and then I saw some dark-brown color that looked like it was burning, and I decided it probably wouldn't turn into toffee, so I gave up on it. I took it off the heat, left the pot on the stove, and ate dinner. (end of a long day--can you tell?)

The next day I noticed it had hardened in the pot. Now it looked like maple sugar candy, except without the maple--but it had that texture. Sort of like toffee-flavored maple sugar candy. Anyway, I took a knife and chipped it out of the pot. Now it looked a bit like brown sugar but tasted a whole lot better.

Since it still had the toffee taste, I decided to make it into something else. I melted some dark chocolate, mixed in the crumbled failed toffee mixture, and added some sliced toasted almonds. I poured some into the toffee pan and dropped the rest by spoonfuls onto parchment paper. I cooled it in the fridge and cut it into squares. It's delicious. I can't stop eating it.

I'm going to make some more toffee today. Of course, I do want it to turn out, but if it doesn't, I can always make some more of this...

Esther Green's White Cookies to Frost

In our house, these cookies have become known as Esther Greens, but the full name is Esther Green's White Cookies to Frost. Every year I ask Mom who Esther Green was, and every year I seem to forget. Today I asked Mom again and learned (again) that two of Esther Green's daughters married two of my grandpa's brothers. I suppose that means she was Mom's great-aunt-in-law. Mom never met Esther Green, but we know her through these cookies. So her memory lives on.

Usually these are the last cookies we make. Mom doesn't like to make them earlier because they're so fragile. In the early part of December, the cookies we make go in cookie tins to be shipped, so it's not practical to make Esther Greens early--there are other cookies we have to make first. Sometimes they don't even get made until after Christmas! But they're one of my favorite cookies, so I decided to make them earlier this year because I can. I mixed up the dough while at a friend's house baking, and I baked them in my landlady's oven. (Thank you!!)

This recipe is charming because it's so sparse. It's typed on a 3" x 5" index card, and the word "chill" is misspelled as "shill." I suppose whoever typed it didn't want to throw out the card and start over. Even now that I have it typed up correctly on a computer, I still can't help thinking "make in roll, shill, and slice."

The recipe assumes quite a lot of cooking knowledge, so I'll do my best to spell out the things that everyone knew years ago when the recipe was first typed up. I haven't made much frosting, so a few years ago I got Mom to give me approximate quantities for the frosting recipe. It didn't help, at least not this year, but I'll definitely know how to do it in the future. (Which means there's a story coming. Mom laughed so hard when I told her. Keep reading.)

The frosting recipe doesn't give you much to go on. It only says:
Grate in orange rind, add orange juice, 10x sugar, and a lump of butter. Frost.

I also have a note written on there that says "add sugar until thick enough."

So I decided to do some logical thinking. Since it says orange rind and juice, it probably meant one orange, right? That means for my double batch of cookies, I'd need two oranges. So I got the zest from two oranges (using a handheld not-sharp-enough cheese grater, because I didn't want to wash a full size grater and cutting board after doing dishes all day) and juiced the oranges using my hands (because I don't have any sort of juicer). I decided that a lump of butter was probably 2 T., because if you get much bigger than that, it's not a lump anymore. I put zest, juice, and butter in my pan over low heat. Then I started adding confectioners' sugar until it was thick enough

By the time I had added a pound of confectioners' sugar, I started to think that I had probably used too much orange juice, but I kept adding sugar because it didn't seem thick enough. In all, I used a pound and a half of confectioners' sugar, which was all I had. Then I started frosting the cookies, and I realized I had made the frosting too thick. For it to be spreadable at all, I had to keep it hot, and since it was hot, it was burning my fingers and I kept yelping and running my fingers under cold water. Finally it occurred to me that I could add some more liquid and make it thinner. Since I didn't want to cut open another orange, I got some milk and stirred about 1 T. milk into the frosting. Then I could turn down the heat and frost the cookies without yelping.

When I finished frosting, I still had quite a lot of frosting left, so I took my landlady a sample of Esther Greens, and she really liked them, so I begged her to take the rest of the frosting off my hands. Then I asked to borrow some powdered sugar.

Anyway, without further ado, here are...

Esther Green's White Cookies to Frost

Cream:
1/2 c. butter
1/2 c. oleo (margarine)

Add:
1/2 c. 10x sugar (confectioners' sugar)
1 t. vanilla
2 c. flour
1/4 c. pecans, chopped (there are a zillion ways to chop nuts, but since I don't have a nut-chopper, I like to chop nuts by putting them in a plastic bag and whacking them with a meat mallet)

Make in roll, chill, and slice. Bake at 400 degrees for 6-8 minutes.

Expanded directions:
Cream together butter and margarine. You may want to soften them first (a minute or two at power level 1 on the microwave will soften butter quickly). Add confectioners' sugar and vanilla and beat at high speed until light and fluffy. (I always have trouble imagining that a mix of butter, margarine, and sugar could ever be "light," but that's what the recipes usually say. I try to imagine it being fluffy like clouds.) Using a lower speed on the mixer, beat in flour a cup at a time until well mixed. Add pecans and beat until just mixed. On wax paper or plastic wrap, form dough into a rectangular log about 2-3 inches wide and an inch high. Chill. Slice cookies, put on a cookie sheet, and bake at 400 degrees for 6-8 minutes, until almost browned or lightly browned, depending on how you like them. I think the lightly browned ones will be less fragile. Cool cookies completely before frosting.

Frosting:
Get the zest from a medium-sized orange (i.e., wash it and then grate the peel using the small holes on the grater, but only the orange part of the peel--you don't want the white stuff, because that's bitter). Juice half the orange and put the juice and zest in a small pot over low heat. Add 2 T. butter. Start with 2-3 T. of powdered sugar and add powdered sugar GRADUALLY until thick enough. It will also thicken as you cook it. You still want it to be pretty thin but not watery. Frost cookies and let cool. The frosting will harden on the cookies.

Italian Chews

This recipe comes from a lady named Jenny who lived down the street from my mom when my mom was little. Jenny had no children of her own, but all the kids in the neighborhood loved her. She had a thick Italian accent and a really big heart. When we make this recipe, my mom recalls Jenny and how kind she was to all the neighborhood kids.

These cookies are also incredibly good. My mom sends cookie tins every year to some of our relatives, and most of the tins have an assortment of six or seven kinds of cookies, but a couple of relatives want Italian Chews only, and my mom is happy to oblige. So we make lots and lots of Italian Chews.

Italian Chews

3/4 c. soft butter
2 T. granulated sugar
1 2/3 c. flour

3 eggs, separated
2 1/4 c. light brown sugar (or 1 pound of brown sugar--if you use a 1 pound box, you don't have to measure)
1 c. finely chopped walnuts
3/4 c. flaked coconut
Confectioners' sugar for dusting

Crust: Cream butter; add granulated sugar, beat until light. Add flour and mix well. Pat into 13x9x2" pan; bake at 350° for 15 minutes.

In a clean bowl, beat egg whites until they form stiff peaks. (If the bowl isn't clean, or if there's even a tiny bit of yolk in the egg whites, they won't get stiff. Stiff peaks means that when you lift the beaters out of the egg whites, it makes a peak, and the top of the peak doesn't fold over at all.) Set egg whites aside in a separate bowl. Beat egg yolks; gradually beat in brown sugar. Add nuts and coconut and mix; then gently fold in egg whites, using a spatula. (If you don't fold gently, the egg whites will lose the air that you beat into them.) Spread on baked mixture. Bake 25-30 minutes. Cut in 54 squares and dust with confectioners' sugar.


How to do a "double batch": Mix up one single batch of crust. Pat into a 13 x 9 pan. Mix up another single batch of crust. Pat into another 13 x 9 pan. Bake at the same time. Note that if one pan is darker than the other, it will bake faster. Wash mixer bowl. Beat one set of egg whites. Set aside. Beat the other set of egg whites. Set aside in another bowl. Mix one batch-worth of the filling, fold in egg whites, and spread on crust. Bake. Mix the second batch of filling, fold in egg whites, spread on second crust, and bake.

Cookies? I don't want any cookies!

Well, I did it. I broke my "no processed foods" rule. And my "meat-is-only-for-special-occasions" guideline. I've been having a lot of low-level nausea lately, and I haven't been wanting to cook for myself at all, not even to chop celery. So I gave in and bought some frozen prepared veggies, a premade rice side dish, and a cut of beef. The beef will go in the crockpot with onion soup mix, and the others will be cooked in the microwave. I suppose it's better than soybeans and bread for dinner, or maybe banana with peanut butter and a piece of bread.

Seriously, I've been having some of the weirdest meals lately. I just don't have much appetite, and I don't have the energy to cook things that I really don't want to eat anyway. Sometimes I do crave "real food," but not enough to do the work to make it show up in front of me. :-) So that's why I haven't been posting "real food" recipes lately. There's no recipe for soybeans and bread. You zap the soybeans and butter the bread--not much cooking there. If I'm feeling adventurous I might even make up a batch of biscuits, and if they're Bisquick biscuits I'll make sure to burn them a bit so they taste better. In any event, I'm trying to hit all the food groups, even if my meals have been a little odd.

I was pretty pathetic yesterday at the grocery store trying to figure out what I'd eat for the week. I didn't want food at all, but I was taking it on faith that I would probably want it at some point in the future. My thought process (and some talking under my breath) went something like this:
(look at something) Ick. (and something else) Ick. (and something that sounds really terrible) ick.ick.ICK! okay Rose, calm down, you don't have to get that... (repeat over and over)
I suppose someday I'll have a child saying that to me.

But I have been baking cookies. I'm not sure how I have energy for that. I think it's just habit: Christmastime means baking cookies. The one consolation is that I don't have to eat them. Yes, I mean that. I've baked double batches of three kinds of cookies so far, and I doubt I've eaten more than ten cookies. The toffee I've been making appeals to me, so I've eaten more of that than of the cookies. I think it tastes good because of the dark chocolate, because that settles my stomach. (Whole grains do, too: whole wheat bread, whole wheat biscuits, raw oats...)

In two weeks, I have a doctor appointment with a top-notch doctor, and we'll try to figure out this nausea thing. Until then, it's Tums for dessert, and in that sense I'm getting plenty of dessert. ;-) And I don't mind, honestly. I'm grateful for what I do get to enjoy, and I have a blessedly short memory for side effects. I know this isn't the first Christmas season I've had nausea, but I can't specifically remember any of the others. Isn't that wonderful? The Lord is so kind.

And, of course, the most fun part about cookies is giving them away.

Almond Spritz Cookies

 

I have to start off by saying THANK YOU to my mom for the spritz press she sent me. It's a Kuhn Rikon brand, and it works wonderfully. It's so easy to use. I think she found it at HomeGoods, and soon afterwards, I found it in the mail, to my surprise and delight. It actually has a few features that are nicer than my great-grandmother's cookie press (which we have at home, and which I've used for many years). I almost feel like a traitor saying that, but maybe one day my great-grandchildren will like this one the way I've enjoyed my great-grandmother's, and so it'll be all right.

Spritz cookies are fun because you put them through the press and they come out in wonderful shapes. They look so fancy! The directions say that they should be delicately browned, but if you burn them a little, don't worry, because the slightly burnt ones are the best. And, of course, the burnt ones don't look nice enough to give away, so you have to keep those...

If you haven't used a spritz press before, be patient with it. You raise the presser-thing up as high as it will go, insert dough in the tube (fill it as full as you can), put a disk with holes in it on the end, and screw the thing that keeps the disk in place over the disk. The cookie sheet must be cold and ungreased (it can't have a nonstick coating, and you can't use parchment paper or aluminum foil, because the dough has to stick to the cookie sheet). Put the cookie press on the sheet, click the handle, and raise the press just after you click. Every time you click the handle, enough dough for one cookie will come out. But the first four or five will never come out properly. For those, scrape the dough off the press and throw it back into the bowl. After that, you should start getting good cookies. The shape will change a little as they bake, since they spread out somewhat. Remove them from the cookie sheet with a very thin spatula as soon as they come out of the oven. Note that some shapes will cook faster than others, so expect variations in cooking time.

If, as you click the press, the dough starts coming out of places other than the holes in the disk, you haven't assembled it properly. Try to find out where it's undone, so you don't lose any more dough. You may have to throw some dough away if it's stained with metal ickiness (especially if your press is old). I've also heard the cookies will come out better if you don't use food coloring and if you don't refrigerate the dough.

I made a double batch of these cookies with my landlady a couple of days ago, and we had so much fun. We used every cookie sheet in the house (hers and mine combined), and we made lots and lots of cookies. We burnt some, and we broke some, and we ate some, but we still ended up with plenty of good ones. She's making plans to borrow my cookie press after I leave to go home for Christmas.


Almond Spritz Cookies

1 c. butter (must be butter)
3/4 c. sugar
1 egg or 3 yolks, beaten (note: if you make a meringue something, save the yolks for this)
2 1/2 c. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. almond extract

Work butter until soft and cream with sugar until light. Add beaten egg and almond flavoring and beat smooth. Add the flour sifted with salt and baking powder. The dough may be rolled and cut with fancy cutters or molded in a cookie press. Fill the press and force onto ungreased cold cookie sheet. Bake in a hot oven at 400° until delicately browned.

Chocolate Fudge Candy Cookies

 

These are nice because they don't require a mixer (I only have a hand mixer). However, it takes a sturdy spoon to ply the dough out of the pot after it's chilled, and your spoon may bend a little (don't use your best spoon). A grapefruit spoon may be helpful. As to letting the dough chill, you can put it in your garage if it's cold enough. I don't have my own garage, so I put it just inside my door to take advantage of the cold window and the slight drafts. I would have put it in the fridge, but that was crammed full of boxes of butter and heads of celery.

My mom got this recipe from a co-worker of hers back in the 70s. One year she gave the recipe to a friend who didn't realize that you have to bake the cookies, and the friend wondered why her cookies didn't turn out like my mom's...


Chocolate Fudge Candy Cookies

In top of double boiler:
Melt 9 oz. chocolate chips (about 1 1/2 cups); 2 T. oleo (margarine) and a pinch of salt.

Add 1 can Eagle Brand Sweetened Condensed Milk.
Add 1 c. sifted flour. Mix well.

I put the cover on and let it cool off for awhile in the refrigerator.

Lightly grease cookie sheets. Form mixture into small balls and put on cookie sheets. Place 1 pecan or walnut on top (can also use M&Ms). Bake at 350º for 10-11 min. Makes 50-60.



This is especially good with dark chocolate chips. By the way, we don't use a double boiler for this. We just do it in a regular pot

Secret Kiss Cookies

I've been baking cookies lately. It's a tradition in our family: every December we run the "cookie factory." There are seven different kinds of cookies we make, and we usually make double batches of them because we give so many away. It's a little different here with my toaster oven, but I've done toffee and chocolate fudge cookies in my own kitchen, and I'm finding other kitchens to bake in, too. I pay in cookies. People seem to like that.

My favorite part about the "cookie factory" is that we can make Christmas a little brighter for some people who wouldn't have much Christmas cheer otherwise. And if that means we use 15 pounds of flour (we've been known to do that), that's fine with us. I've used at least 5 pounds so far.

All that to say, if any of you want to join in our tradition, I'm going to post our recipes. The first one, Secret Kiss Cookies, comes from a newspaper article that my grandma read many years ago. We've been making them ever since. This is a nice recipe for kids to help with, since they can unwrap the kisses and "hide" them inside the dough. (Since there are no eggs in the dough, it's also safe for kids to eat.) I made a double batch of these yesterday, and two boys (ages 5 and 8, I think) unwrapped 100+ kisses and rolled most of the cookies. I stood by pinching off the extra dough from their cookies, so that we could make as many as possible. When the time came to lick the bowl, we didn't have any trouble finding volunteers...





Secret Kiss Cookies

1 c. soft butter
1/2 c. sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 c. flour
1 c. finely chopped walnuts
1 package milk (or dark) chocolate kisses
Confectioners sugar

Beat at medium speed butter, sugar, and vanilla until light and fluffy. Add flour and nuts; beat at low speed till well blended. Chill dough. Remove foil from kisses. Using about a teaspoon of dough, shape it around a kiss and roll gently into a ball. Be sure to cover kiss completely. Place on ungreased cookiesheet. Bake in a preheated 375 oven for about 12 or until cookies are set but not brown. Cool slightly; remove to wire rack. While still warm, roll in confectioners sugar. Cool. Store in tightly covered container. Makes about 40 cookies.

Toffee

 

Yum. This recipe is almost too good to share, but my landlady convinced me.

This is a pretty easy recipe. It comes from this wonderful cookbook, and it's not that hard, but make sure to be careful. Sugar burns are probably the worst kitchen burns, so wear close-toed shoes, use potholders or oven mitts, and by all means, don't taste any of it until you're absolutely sure it's cool. If you want to try it while cooking, spoon some out and let it harden or run it under cold water before you try it.

Prepare a 5" x 7" baking dish by buttering it (using a stick of butter). Don't use a nonstick pan unless you don't mind if the coating gets scratched--toffee is terribly hard to cut. In the bottom of the pan, put a single layer of sliced or slivered almonds.

On a cutting board, cut 4-6 oz. of chocolate into fine shavings. Put aside, but have it ready.

Measure 8 oz. of sugar on a kitchen scale. Put this into a small, sturdy pot and add 8 oz. of butter (two sticks). Use a spoon or butter knife to chop the butter into chunks. Put your pan over medium heat and start stirring. It'll take about 20 minutes to do the on-the-stove part.

When the butter is melted, add 1 t. vanilla. From here, the toffee will start to look stranger and stranger. It'll bubble a lot and be really slippery. Keep stirring until the sugar melts. When it has a light toffee-like color, and when it won't stick to a silicone spatula at all, and when there's water collecting around the edges on the top, it's done. Pour it evenly over the almonds and sprinkle the chocolate on top. The almonds will get toasted and the chocolate will melt because the sugar is so hot. Let the toffee harden overnight before you cut it.

When you cut the toffee, toffee shards will fly everywhere, so do yourself a favor and choose a spot that can be easily cleaned up. I mistakenly chose the kitchen table for the first batch, and now I have toffee shards all over the carpet. Use a sharp, sturdy knife. Don't expect to get even squares, because you won't. You'll get jagged pieces, plus a bunch of crumbs (which, of course, are the cook's prerogative). I intended to use the toffee crumbs in another cookie recipe, but then I realized they wouldn't stick around long enough to be used.

Note: After you put the toffee in the pan and cover it with the chocolate, the remaining toffee will harden pretty quickly in the pan, but it's too hot to eat right away. Scrape the leftover junk from the pan into a small bowl, and you can eat it from there after it hardens. It'll be a little grainier than the toffee will be, but it's a nice foretaste.

Further note: If you don't have a silicone spatula, don't stir the toffee with a plastic spatula, because the plastic spatula will melt. That's why they make silicone spatulas.


Update: If your toffee doesn't turn out, make it into some of this...

Chocolate-Oat Bars

This is a simple dessert, but I like it because it takes something luxurious (dark chocolate) and stretches it with two ordinary and cheap ingredients (half-and-half and oats).

Needless to say, it will only be as good as the chocolate you use. The best cheap source of baking chocolate I've found is Trader Joe's Pound Plus bars--you get more than a pound of chocolate for under $5, and it tastes good, too. But you can use any type of chocolate that you'd be willing to eat "as is."

Lately I've been reading the book Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking. It gives simple ratios for doughs and batters, mostly. If you like inventing recipes, it's a wonderful book and you should go buy it. The recipe here for ganache is from that cookbook. The other inventions are my own. This cookbook often measures by weight rather than volume because that makes the ratios work, so you'll need to get out the kitchen scale for this recipe.

You will need three ingredients: chocolate, half-and-half, and oats.

This recipe is based upon ganache, a chocolate and cream mixture. When ganache is hot, you can use it as chocolate sauce, like on ice cream. When it's cold, you can roll it into balls and make truffles out of it.

Measure out equal amounts of chocolate and half-and-half by weight. (The recipe calls for cream, not half-and-half, but it's a very flexible recipe and I didn't want to go buy cream.) I think I used 6 oz. chocolate and 6 oz. cream. Chop the chocolate into roughly equal-sized chunks and put it in a medium-sized bowl. It's better to err on the side of the bowl being too big. I know this--I really do--but for some reason I used a too-small bowl and made a mess as a result. Oh well.

Put the cream in a small pot and heat it gently (low to medium heat) on the stove for a few minutes. As soon as it starts to simmer (make a few bubbles that weren't there before), take it off the heat right away and pour it over the chocolate. DO NOT TOUCH for five minutes. After that, take a whisk (it must be a whisk--I tried a spoon and got the aforementioned mess, but a whisk worked perfectly) and gently stir the cream and chocolate together. Now you have ganache.

Get out the oats and pour in a lot. I must have used at least three cups, but it may have been more than that. Add as many as the ganache will comfortably hold. You want the ganache to hold the oats together, not the other way around.

Now spread out a large piece of wax paper or parchment paper on the countertop and tape it down. (Parchment paper works better, but wax paper is much cheaper and it will do, so that's what I chose.) You should have at least two feet of it. Put the ganache mixture on the wax paper and spread it out with a spatula. Put another piece of wax paper over the top of the ganache mixture, and press down with your hands so that it's all about the same thickness, 1/4 to 1/2 inch. Now leave it to harden. If you have fridge space, it'll harden pretty fast in the fridge, maybe in an hour or so. I have no fridge space, so I left it on the countertop for six hours.

When it's hardened, peel off the top layer of wax paper and then replace the wax paper on top. Now flip it over (wax paper on the bottom) and remove the wax paper from the top. Now it's been loosened from the wax paper. Slide it onto a large cutting board and cut it into small squares (a large cleaver works nicely for this).

 

Store the bars in a container in the fridge. Yum.

Note: If you want your chocolate bars to be sweeter, you can add corn syrup to the ganache, or you can dust the bars with powdered sugar at the end.

Cherry Pork Roast

Apparently this recipe is famous in our church. I'm not surprised. It's so good! I don't even know who it started with, but it seems like almost everyone in the church has made it at some point or another. I adapted it for some friends who can't eat sugar or other sweeteners (except for honey). I'm not much for sugar, either, and I actually like the low-sugar version better.

This recipe is intended for Sunday dinner, which is the meal after morning-church. It's a large and joyful meal, and a lot of fun. My kitchen may be modest, but this week I had six people over for Sunday dinner. It was delightful.

Make-ahead tip: You can make the sauce in advance, cool it, refrigerate it, and when you want to use it, heat it in the microwave on half power until it's the same consistency it was when you made it on the stove. My new "stove" didn't come until yesterday, so my landlady was kind enough to let me use hers to make the sauce two days in advance. She also provided the white wine vinegar. I have the best landlady ever.


Cherry Pork Roast

4-5 lb. Boston Butt roast or other pork shoulder cut, frozen

Place frozen roast in crockpot on LOW the night before serving. If the crockpot has an auto shut-off feature, make sure to turn it off and turn it back on partway through the cooking time so that the auto shut-off doesn't interfere.

An hour before serving, after noon the next day, make the sauce:

16-20 oz cherry spreadable fruit (it's with the jams and jellies, but it's sweetened only with fruit)
2 T honey
1/4 C white wine vinegar (the recipe says red, but I like the white better)
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. ground cloves

Combine sauce ingredients in pan. Bring to boil, stirring. Reduce heat and simmer 1 minute. Remove from heat.

Remove meat from crockpot onto a plate (it'll shred on its own) and drain grease from crockpot. (I learned this weekend that if you pour the grease down the drain, it'll coat your pipes like it would coat your arteries. Happily, I didn't learn that by experience.) Trim the fat off the roast, discard, and return meat to crockpot. Cover with sauce. Cook on LOW for 30 minutes to an hour more. Serve with sauce.

Make Your Own Mix (the easy way)

Lately, oat-sesame crackers and whole-wheat biscuits have become staples of my diet, so that I'm making crackers once a week and biscuits twice a week. Best snack foods ever.

I wanted to speed up the time it took for me to make them. I thought about doing the measuring to make a large mix, except that's a lot of math calculations, especially to know how much to measure out for each batch (so that I know how much of the wet ingredients to use). (Yes, I know I can do it, but it was really complex.)

Finally I decided to do it the easy way. I got out a large ziploc bag, and all the dry ingredients I put into the biscuit-bowl also went into the plastic bag. (1 cup of flour in the bowl, 1 cup in the bag. 1 tablespoon of baking powder in the bowl, 1 tablespoon in the bag, and so forth.) Now the plastic bag has all the dry ingredients measured into it, and it's easy to mix. Close the bag (but leave some air in it) and shake vigorously. I made up the biscuit mix in the bowl and put the bag in the pantry.

Today I want more biscuits. All I have to do is take my plastic bag, put contents into a bowl, add margarine and milk/lemon juice, and I have biscuit dough.

And once I get the electric skillet (in which kamut is cooking) off my counter-space, I can actually roll out the biscuits. Then I can put away the rolling pin and get out the oven...

Some things don't change.

Crockpot Mac & Cheese (with real cheese)

I don't have a picture for this one. I assembled it yesterday morning, let it cook during church, and by the time the potluck was over, the mac and cheese was gone. Which is why I'm posting the recipe.

It's from a healthy cookbook, but they made this recipe healthy by using fat-free cheese. I refuse to use fat-free cheese. What on earth is it made out of, anyway? My guess is that it tastes like cardboard. However, I was able to lighten this recipe in other ways. I lessened the amount of cheese and doubled the amount of pasta (the original wanted 4 cups of cheese for 1/2 pound pasta, which is insane).

My mom tells me that macaroni and cheese has to have at least some Velveeta in it to make it creamy. I think Velveeta is really gross (and she does too, even if she does use a tiny bit). I was glad this recipe didn't call for any, because I didn't want to pay way too much money for just a tiny amount of it. (Yes, I know they sell slices of it. I also know that one package of slices costs the same as a 2-pound block, and even if it does keep for eight weeks--ick!--how on earth would I use the rest of it?)

Here's a helpful hint. When testing to see if pasta is done, use a slotted spoon. Dip out a couple pieces of pasta, bring the spoon to the sink, and run cold water on the pasta before you taste them. I am so glad I can do this now that I have a slotted spoon! I've been looking at thrift stores for a slotted spoon with no luck (nothing that looked decent enough to buy), but I saw a good one in the $1 bin at Walgreens the other day, and I was delighted to have it. On Saturday night, after I cooked the pasta, I accidentally dropped a fork on my toe, tines down (ouch!), and I remember thinking, "Well, at least I have a slotted spoon."

By the way, why on earth do manufacturers keep making plastic cooking utensils with metal on the handle? They're always in the really-cheap bin, because the metal will burn your hand if you use it near the stove. I learned my lesson five years ago, but apparently the manufacturers haven't learned theirs yet. You would think they'd have figured it out by now...


Crockpot Mac & Cheese (with real cheese)
adapted from the Fix-It and Forget-It Lightly cookbook

1 pound of elbow macaroni (or other small shapes), cooked al dente
1 can fat-free evaporated milk
1 cup skim milk
2 eggs, slightly beaten
3 cups grated extra-sharp cheddar cheese
1/4 t. salt
1/8 t. pepper
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

1. Spray slow cooker with cooking spray (do not omit this step).
2. In the slow cooker, mix together everything except the parmesan cheese and 1/2 cup of the cheddar cheese.
3. Top with parmesan cheese and 1/2 cup cheddar cheese.
4. Cook on low 3 hours.

Whole Wheat Biscuits

 

I think I ate five of these today. I hope not. I hope it was only four. At least they were small. My biscuit cutter is only 2" in diameter. I have a larger one, but I'd rather use the smaller one, so that if I eat five of them, I won't have done too much damage.

Can you tell I love biscuits? Maybe that means I'm a Southern girl at heart, except that I don't like the really rich and buttery biscuits. It's overkill. I'd rather spread the butter on top than have oodles of it already baked into the biscuit. My default biscuit is the HeartSmart Bisquick mix, but it's all white flour and no fiber. Whole-wheat foods (and high-fiber grains) are really calming to my stomach, and since my stomach's been jumpy lately, I've been eating everything whole-wheat that I can get my hands on.

The first time I made these, I thought they were so-so, but now I can't get enough of them. They're a little chewier than regular biscuits, but that's to be expected with anything whole-wheat, and they still have that wonderful biscuit flavor. They taste delightful with just a little bit of that Earth Balance margarine spread on top...

I adapted the recipe a little from this site. You can find a nutritional analysis there, too.

Whole Wheat Biscuits

1 cup all-purpose flour (yes, there's some white flour, to keep the biscuits from being too dense)
1 cup whole-wheat flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 Tbsp. baking powder (yes, 1 tablespoon)
1/4 tsp. salt
Oat bran or wheat bran (optional--I like oat bran in biscuits because you can't see or taste it, and it adds fiber. It doesn't affect the actual baking, so there's no need to use a precise quantity)

3 Tbsp. stick margarine
2/3 cup skim milk mixed with 2 tsp. lemon juice (unless you just happen to have non-fat buttermilk in the house, in which case you should use 2/3 cup of that instead)

1. Thoroughly mix the dry ingredients (flours, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and bran) in a bowl.

2. Cut the margarine into the dry ingredients. Use a pastry blender if you have one; otherwise, use some cutlery. The standard method is with two knives, but I prefer to use a knife and a fork.

3. Add the milk/lemon juice mixture (or the buttermilk) and stir well. Pretty soon it will be too doughy to stir; when this happens, turn it out onto a floured workspace, add the bits of dough still left in the bowl, and knead until it's well-mixed.

 

4. Roll it out with a rolling pin. It stretches back (like puff pastry, which I found to be a nightmare), but with a combination of pressing and rolling you can get it rolled out to about 1/2" thick. Cut out your biscuits with a biscuit cutter (or an improvised biscuit cutter) dipped in flour. Put them on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper (or a non-stick cookie sheet, but then you have to wash it).

5. Get out the oven (unless you're fortunate enough to have a built-in oven) and preheat it to 325 degrees. Bake for 12-15 minutes. It's hard to tell when they're done, but if you're unsure, err on the safe side. You can always put them back in, but you can't "undo" those last few minutes of cooking time. (Wouldn't that be nice?)

Makes 16-18 small biscuits. For larger biscuits, the recipe says it'll make 8. These biscuits don't keep that long (only a couple of days). I generally freeze half of them and store the other half on the counter. When the counter biscuits are gone, I get out the frozen ones. Of course, if you devour them all the day you make them, it doesn't really matter, does it?

Pasta à la Rose

As I was heading out to Wal-Mart on Monday, I suddenly remembered a flavor of a certain dish, sort of like you remember a phrase from a song and suddenly you have to find out what song it comes from. So I was trying to remember what recipe this flavor came from, and it turns out it's from one of the first recipes I ever created, about ten years ago.

When I was growing up, sometimes my mom would make a chicken recipe that she got from a friend named Marge. We called it "Chicken à la Marge." I called this dish Pasta à la Rose. I'd forgotten all about it, but I made it again on Monday night and it tasted just as good as I remembered.

Pasta à la Rose

8 oz. (1/2 lb.) tiny pasta
1/2 large onion, minced or grated
2 oz. extra-sharp cheddar cheese, grated
1 egg

1. Saute onion in a bit of oil on medium to medium-high heat until onion is lightly browned and smells sweet.
2. Cook pasta according to package directions. When pasta is done, drain pasta but do not rinse.
3. Immediately put steaming-hot pasta into a large bowl. Break egg into pasta and add cheese. Stir a lot. The heat from the pasta should cook the egg and melt the cheese. Add onion and stir some more. Serve hot. Serves 4.

Option: If you want more onion flavor, serve it topped with dried minced onion (found in the spice section).


As a sidenote, many cheese-sauce dishes are really unhealthy, but there's an easy way to make them healthier. Most of these dishes have you make way too much sauce for the amount of pasta/potatoes/vegetables they call for. Double the amount of pasta/potatoes/vegetables, but keep the amount of cheese sauce the same. It'll still give you the flavor without all the extra calories. Also, always use extra-sharp cheese to give you lots of flavor with a smaller amount of cheese.

Alien Baker, Part II

 

My safety goggles came today! I tried them on and they fit wonderfully. Last week I asked for a recommendation at this site, and I bought from them the pair they recommended. They definitely got it right. I think my eyes are cheering.

Meanwhile, I went to a local hardware store yesterday to return the pair of safety goggles I bought there. I told the woman at the counter that the goggles were obviously made to fit a man's face, and as I don't have one of those, I couldn't wear them. A man in line behind me just smiled and shook his head. I suppose it was a pretty comical scene...

Pasta with Walnut Oil and Leeks

I bought walnut oil last week. From what I've read, it's not good for cooking on the stove, but it's good for dressings and for baking. On Monday I decided to use it for pasta salad, and while I was grocery shopping at Wal-Mart, I decided what would be in the pasta salad. Here is my invented-at-Wal-Mart recipe.

As always, it was attended with some mishaps. I bought enough food to fill my tiny dorm fridge to bursting: two half-gallons of milk (a gallon jug won't fit) and two feet of celery, among other things. There was no room for the leeks in my fridge, unless I cooked them first. So I chopped them, cooked them, and then discovered that leeks, once cooked, are highly perishable and only last a couple of days. Oops. I decided to freeze half the leeks (it's not best for flavor/texture, but it's better than losing them completely), and the other half I kept separate from the rest of the ingredients. If you expect leftovers, as I did, mix the salad on your plate so your leftovers aren't spoiled by leeks gone bad. (That sounds ominous, doesn't it?)


Pasta with Walnut Oil and Leeks


 


I don't have exact quantities, because I only cooked up enough pasta for a few days' worth and mixed only one serving (see above explanation.) Adjust based on how many people you're serving. This dish has enough protein to be a main dish.

1/2 box (6 oz) high-protein pasta (rotini are good for pasta salads, because they catch the sauce in their spirals)
Walnut oil (no more than 1 tablespoon per serving)
3-5 oz. grated Parmesan cheese
1 leek per serving

1. Wash the leeks well under cold running water (they're usually pretty dirty inside). Cut off the bottom (the root end) and discard. Chop the leeks in thin slices. Make sure you don't see any dirt in the slices. If you do see dirt in the slices, take the outer layer off, rinse the rest, and keep chopping. You may need to wash the entire leek again after you've started chopping it, because the dirt gets into all the crevices. Only cut the white and very light green parts of the leek. Discard the rest.

2. Put a bit of oil into a frying pan and saute the chopped leeks over medium heat for about 5 minutes, until they look wilted. Separate the rings as you're sauteeing.

3. Add some water (a little less than one tablespoon per leek), cover the pan, and turn the heat down to simmer. Simmer for 5 minutes or until the water is evaporated and the leeks look duly cooked.

4. Cook high-protein pasta according to directions on box.

The rotini looked really funny in my electric skillet, so here's a picture:

 

5. Drain pasta and put in bowl. Toss with walnut oil. Add leeks and plenty of parmesan cheese. Salt and pepper to taste.

 

Note: This is even better with truffle oil, but since truffle oil is rather expensive, walnut oil will do just fine.

Dishes and Contentment

Yesterday I found myself wondering how much time I would save if I had a full-size oven and a dishwasher.

It started like this: I made a double batch of crackers (and I'd already doubled the recipe once, so it was really a fourfold batch of crackers, if that's the right word). It started with four cups of flour, and by the time it was mixed and rolled out thin, I had a lot of cracker dough, probably enough to cover half of my kitchen table (if I had wanted to do so). Now, I have two cookie sheets: one is 9" x 9", and the other is about 6" x 8". I only put one sheet in the oven at a time, so that the other one could cool and I could load it up again. Each batch bakes ten minutes or so, but I have to turn it around halfway through because my oven doesn't heat evenly, and some batches took longer than others. I think each cookie sheet went in the oven four times, so that's eight batches, and while I was eating lunch I was getting up every five minutes (if not more often). I felt like a jack-in-the-box. Finally I had to declare a moratorium on cracker-baking until my lunch was safely settled in my stomach.

In the evening it was time to wash the dishes. Lots of dishes. How can one person make so many dishes in three days? I only cooked two of those days, and all I made were crackers and dinner. Well, except for the celery I chopped, and then there were the plates I ate from, and even so I still don't know where they all came from! But they were dirty, and so I had to wash them, and so I did. :-)

Anyway, I almost started calculating the time I'd save. Then I remembered that it is my duty and my delight to be contented with what I have.

I am content with what I have
Little be it, or much
And Lord, contentment still I crave
Because Thou savest such.

(bonus points to anyone who knows the source of that quote)

So I will not add up the time I would-have-could-have saved. I will focus on being content with what I have, because that is the best thing to do.

Besides, if I weren't in such a crazy little apartment, I wouldn't have anything to write about, would I?

Electric Skillet Success!

My wonderful landlady replaced my hot plate with an electric skillet. It looks really nice and I think it'll be very versatile. I've never used an electric skillet before, so this is a learning experience for me. It helped that I found the manual online.

I'm planning a new dish to be made pretty soon. It's high-protein pasta with leeks, parmesan cheese, and walnut oil. I'll let you all know how it turns out.

In the meantime, I cooked the leeks tonight--the inaugural use of my electric skillet. Here are pictures:

Alien Baker

Today I ordered a super-cool (or maybe super-weird) pair of safety goggles for... cooking. Yeah, cooking. I had a nasty episode over Labor Day weekend where I was making crackers and got some flour in my eye. It wouldn't come out no matter how many eyedrops I used, and by bedtime my eyes were red and irritated... not fun. Besides, eyedrops are really expensive ($10 per ounce, at least), and I wasted a lot of them trying to get that flour out of my eyes. The next day I had to go to the store and get better eyedrops (to the tune of $20 per ounce) to help my eyes recover.

I tried a pair of safety goggles from the dollar store, and established three things:
1) they work
2) I look really strange in them
and 3) you get what you pay for.

Then I went to the hardware store to see if I could find a nicer pair, but what lady in her right mind is going to go into a hardware store and ask if they have any goggles suitable for cooking? Yeah, right. The pair I picked out didn't fit at all. It was obviously made to fit a man's face, so it is going back to the store on Monday, because I want my $$ back.

That's why I turned to the Internet, because it's much easier to type a stupid question than it is to ask it out loud. Some nice customer service rep recommended this pair, and since the price is decent, I think it's worth a try.

For those who are wondering, no, I am not going to post a picture of me trying them on. I think they'll go nicely with my pinafore apron, thank you very much.

Has anyone else had this problem, or am I the only alien baker out there?

Cracker Perfection

 

I made another batch of the crackers tonight, and they turned out better than ever. They're really crisp and they taste wonderful! I updated the recipe to reflect the changes I made, and I added some pictures to show more of the process. If you're planning to make the crackers, be sure to check the updated recipe first.

Oat 'n Sesame Crackers

I don't buy grocery store crackers, because they're too high-priced for not enough food. (The only exceptions are store-brand saltines and oyster crackers, but they're all-white flour.) Lately I've been craving whole-wheat products, so I decided to start experimenting with crackers once again. It's been years since I made any crackers, and now I have such an array of ingredients--things like whole-wheat flour, oat flour, soy flour, wheat bran, and oat bran--that I know I can make really healthy crackers if I can just find the right recipe.

I started with one recipe just to try, but there was way too much butter in it, and the result ended up more like cookies than crackers. I didn't even bother to bake all of it. The rest of the dough went in the trash can. Then I found this recipe. It's my kind of recipe. It tells you what the essentials are and lists all kinds of variations (plus what will happen if you do them). So I took advantage of Labor Day weekend to start experimenting.

When I made my first batch, I decided I liked the crackers, but I wanted to make some changes. But when I finished eating the crackers I had made, I decided to make them the same way, with a dash of sugar and a little less oil. Of course, I forgot the sugar until the dough was already rolled out, but I did manage the "less oil" part, and the crackers were yummy. Those ones are gone too. Time to make more.

The second time around, I doubled the recipe, so now it makes about three cups of crackers. You can cut it in half if you like.

Oat 'n Sesame Crackers



2 c. oat flour (I'm thinking about replacing part of this with whole wheat flour)
1 scant t. salt
1 scant t. sugar, or to taste
Oat bran (optional)
2-3 t. toasted sesame seeds (look for a big jar in the Asian food section--don't buy these in the spice aisle of the grocery store, because the price is crazy and they're untoasted)
1 1/2 T. sesame oil
Water (at least 1/3 cup, but probably more)

The recipe I followed recommends using a food processor to mix the ingredients, so if you have one and know how to use it, get it out. I think the recipe works just fine mixed with a spoon and clean hands, so my directions assume you're doing it that way.

1. Mix together flour, salt, sesame seeds, sugar, and oat bran. Stir.

2. Add sesame oil and stir to mix. It'll look crumbly, as if you had cut shortening into it.



3. Add water gradually and stir. Keep adding and stirring until it forms into a compact ball, so that you could lift it out of the bowl with your hands. If it's sticky, add more flour. Mix the dough with your hands if you need to, making sure it's mixed thoroughly.

This is too sticky:



This is a compact ball:



4. Get out your rolling pin and flour it. Sprinkle your work surface with flour and divide the dough in two parts. Take the first part of dough and roll it out as thin as you can. This will make crisp crackers. If you want denser crackers, maybe a little chewy, don't roll the dough out as thick.

5. Get out a piece of parchment paper that fits your cookie sheet. Slide the parchment paper under the rectangle of dough, as below. (Note that parchment paper can be reused, at least for a few times.)

 

(If you have no parchment paper, you could probably use aluminum foil or a cookie sheet.)

6. Cut off edges of dough, if needed, so that it fits on your piece of parchment paper.

 

7. Ease the parchment paper onto the cookie sheet.

 

8. Now roll out the other piece of dough on its own piece of parchment paper.

9. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-15 min. Note that the thin edges may burn, depending on how you've rolled out your dough and how long you cook it. I like burnt edges, but if you don't, make sure you roll out your dough to a uniform thickness and don't overbake it.

 

10. Break crackers into pieces and enjoy.

Tabouli, anyone?

 

I'm not sure how many batches of tabouli I've made this summer. Five or six, maybe? I've used more than 2 pounds of bulgur wheat and made plenty of trips to raid my neighbor's mint plant, and my poor parsley plant (which is still alive!) gets frequent haircuts. I don't know why I've been wanting so much tabouli, but I can't get enough of it.

If you want to try making tabouli, this is the time to do it. Pretty soon, tomatoes and cucumbers and parsley and mint will go out of season, which means paying more $$$ for lower-quality produce. Unless you live in the Southern Hemisphere, of course...

I made another trip to the store where I get my whole grains, and I got oat flour, kamut (which I'm excited to try), lots of oats, and vital wheat gluten (the easy way to make seitan). More recipes coming soon!

Baked Barley and My Chinese Covered Casserole Dish

My hot plate is no more. Ever heard of slow-browned beef? I hadn't either, until my hot plate shut off 15 minutes after I started browning some stew meat. The pan and the burner were still hot, but pretty soon I figured out the heat was no longer coming and the beef was barely turning brown (though it was trying!). I gave up on the browning and continued with the recipe. Six hours later, I tried again with another pound of stew meat (this is what happens when you're making a meal for someone and preparing for a potluck too), and the hot plate did the same thing. So I gave up on it again. My landlady is now looking for a new hot plate, preferably something that works this time. :-)

In the meantime, I needed to cook another batch of barley for more barley salad. I decided the barley salad didn't need any more flavoring, and I liked it so much I wanted more of it. Since I couldn't cook the barley on the stove, I searched the net for other ways to cook barley, and I found a Food Network recipe for Baked Barley. But it needs a casserole dish covered with aluminum foil and a lid, and I didn't have anything to suit the purpose, until I searched my cabinets and came up with my Chinese Covered Casserole Dish:

 

I remembered that some of my bowls and plates are oven-safe, so I put one of each together. That's a picture of it inside the toaster oven. I can't help but think it looks Chinese. It doesn't have the foil on it yet because there was no barley inside it yet when I took the picture.

The casserole dish worked wonderfully, and the baked barley came out fine, so here's my version of the recipe. I think this is easier than cooking it on the stove. I left out the butter and salt, since I was going to add feta and other yummy things.

Baked Barley

Combine 2 cups boiling water and 1 cup pearled barley in a 1 1/2 quart casserole dish with lid. Cover the casserole dish with aluminum foil and put the lid on top. Bake at 375 degrees for an hour.

Note: Make sure the lid is oven-safe before you put it in the oven.

Is that a crockpot in the bedroom?

 

Why yes, I think it is! After all, there's a potluck tomorrow, and the corn mini-muffins need to be baked in the oven, so the oven displaces the crockpot...

In other news, I discovered this morning that my stove can only brown one batch of stew meat at a time, and only as much as will fit in an 8" pan. Then it overheats and turns off for who knows how long. I think it's an hour, at least.

Dark Chocolate Low Sugar Peanut Butter Cups

I've always loved peanut butter cups, but I'm pretty sensitive to sugar and I get a headache if something is too sugary. For years I've been wanting to make dark chocolate peanut butter cups, but the filling required way too much powdered sugar to get the right consistency.

Then my mom sent me some defatted peanut flour. At first, I really didn't know what to do with it, but I did some searching online and found that you can use it to make a candy filling. It has a very similar consistency to powdered sugar, so it can replace some of the powdered sugar.

Making the filling

Start with about 1/2 cup to 3/4 cup chunky peanut butter. I get the Wal-Mart brand, and it's a bit too chunky--aren't they supposed to break up the peanut halves?--so I beat it with a meat mallet first to break up the big chunks, and I added a little creamy PB to help.

When you're satisfied with your peanut butter, add a big spoonful of peanut flour. Stir. It should get pretty moldable.

Melt a scant 2 tablespoons of butter in the microwave and stir the butter into the peanut butter mixture. Now it's wet and sticky again.

Stir in confectioner's sugar and salt until the filling is as sugary and salty as you want it. I think I used four small spoonfuls of confectioner's sugar and plenty of shakes of the salt shaker. It does not need to be very sugary, just enough to barely taste the sugar (same for the salt).

Now add peanut flour until it's back to the moldable consistency. Here is the peanut butter filling:

 

By this point, you may also have a mess (see above). Clean up the mess, take a deep breath, and get out the chocolate.

I've found the best source of good cheap chocolate is Trader Joe's. They sell a 500 gram package (that's more than a pound) for around $4. We don't have a Trader Joe's nearby, but I stocked up the last time I was in a city that had one, so I have plenty of chocolate. If all you have are chocolate chips, compare this recipe--they melt chocolate chips with shortening. In any event, you'll need about 3/8 lb. (6 oz.) of chocolate in order to do 25 candy liner sized cups.

Lining the cups

Technically, you're supposed to temper the chocolate, but that requires a candy thermometer (which I don't have), and I'd have to get out the stove and the stove would have to go right on my workspace. If you are fortunate enough to have a normal kitchen, a Google search will tell you how to temper the chocolate. It ends up looking better, more professional. But this is The Modest Kitchen, so here's the method I used.

Before you start, cover your workspace with wax paper. Cut chocolate into small pieces and melt it in a covered bowl in the microwave. Cook it for 30 seconds on 50% power, stir, and repeat those two steps until it's mostly melted.

Using a pastry brush, paint candy liners or mini cupcake liners with chocolate (there's a picture guide at this link). Put each one upside down on the wax paper and let it harden. This may take an hour or two. If you have a normal-size fridge, they will harden more quickly in the fridge. Tempered chocolate should harden very quickly.

 

 

Assembling the cups

When they are hardened, fill each one with the peanut butter filling and flatten it down with clean fingers. Leave a little bit of room at the top. Melt your chocolate again, if necessary. Use a spoon to spoon enough chocolate on the top so that the cup is filled. Let harden again. Store in fridge. Makes 25 candy liner sized cups.

 

Now you have a bit of chocolate left, but not enough to be worth saving. Of course, you don't want to waste it, so the only solution is to eat it. This is the best part.

Tips

My big mistake was that I painted 50 candy liner sized cups (smaller than mini cupcake cups) and then discovered I only had enough filling for 25. Fortunately, I hadn't licked the bowl or the utensils from the filling, so I made another batch of the filling, using the recipe above.

Also, when you're painting the cups, you're not trying to paint a paper-thin layer. It needs to be a couple of millimeters thick. A paper-thin layer will not behave very well, but of course you can still eat it.

When you're working with melted chocolate, tape your wax paper to the counter, and use enough wax paper to really cover the counter. When your hands are covered in chocolate (yes, they will be), you can't protect the counter if the wax paper slides (which it will).

Do not let the chocolate harden on the pastry brush and expect to use it again. Oops. I was so glad to find that a spoon worked better for the second go-round with the melted chocolate.

Honestly, this was a pretty easy recipe, although it did take some time. I just put on something enjoyable to listen to and went at it.

Barley-Feta Salad with Cranberries and Pecans

 

I had some mishaps in cooking this. I burned my fingers on the oven door, burned the pecans, and then spilled them all over the carpet. Still, it really hit the spot tonight, and barley makes you feel so full! I ate it as a main dish, since it has plenty of protein, but it could serve as a side dish in a low-protein meal.

2 1/4 c. water
3/4 c. barley (I used pearled, but unpearled is more nutritious. Cooking directions are for pearled barley.)

3 oz. feta, crumbled
1/4 c. (or however much you want) dried cranberries
1/3 c. (or however much you want) pecans, chopped
2-4 green onions, chopped

1. Put water and barley in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer 25 minutes until barley is tender and most of the water is absorbed. Remove pan from heat, uncover, and let cool for a couple of hours. When barley is cool, drain remaining water and place in large bowl.
2. Toast chopped pecans in a 350 degree oven for 3-5 minutes or until fragrant, stirring every minute. Watch them closely, because they burn easily.
3. Skip this step if you like your green onions raw. I don't, so I put them in the oven for a couple of minutes after I had taken the pecans out.
4. Add feta, cranberries, and green onions to the bowl of barley. Stir. Add pecans right before serving.

Note: If you think you'll have leftovers, put the nuts in a separate bowl and add them at the table. They lose their flavor when stored as part of the salad.

Further note: This salad might need a little more flavoring. I debated adding sesame oil, but my stomach was feeling queasy and I decided to keep it plain. Comment if you have any other ideas!

Pancake/Waffle Mix

I realized today that I took my mom's copy of the recipe for waffle mix, so I'm posting it here to give it back to her.

Pancake/Waffle Mix
This recipe is adapted from the More-with-Less cookbook.

2 c. white flour
2 c. whole wheat flour
2 c. buckwheat flour
1 T. salt
6 T. baking powder (that's 1/4 c. plus 2 T.)
6 T. sugar
2 c. powdered milk
1 c. wheat germ

Mix well and store in an airtight container in cupboard.

To use:
Combine in a bowl:

1 egg (beaten with fork)
1 c. water
2 T. oil
1 1/2 c. pancake mix

Cook as pancakes or waffles.

On Saving Time and Conserving Dishes

Here are some tips I've discovered to make things easier in a small kitchen without much counter space (or a dishwasher).

• If the plate isn't dirty, use it again. On days I don't cook, I often use just one bowl and one plate in a day (plus about 5 pieces of silverware).
  
  
• When I'm alone, I use plastic water bottles rather than drinking glasses. I keep four water bottles in the fridge and refill them after I drink them (replacing them every few weeks). Then I don't have to make ice and can use my shoebox freezer for other things. I also don't need to wash drinking glasses unless I have company.
  
  
• When chopping vegetables, it's really nice to have a trash bowl (so you don't have to keep opening the trash can), but I don't like to use that much counter space or wash a bowl for that. Instead, I put wax paper on the counter next to my cutting board, and I collect the scraps there. When I'm done cutting, I gather up the wax paper and put it in the trash, and the counter is clean for whatever comes next.
  
  
• I also have saved a couple of jar lids (about 5" diameter, 1" deep) from jars that I threw out. These only serve as trash bowls and don't have to be washed well.
  
  
• Use the microwave rather than the stove. Some examples:
  
  
  • Corn on the cob: Shuck corn. Wet a paper towel, squeeze out most of the water, and wrap the paper towel around the corn. Microwave on high 3 minutes for one ear. I usually microwave one ear as I'm shucking the next one.
    
    
  • Mashed potatoes: Cube potatoes and place in microwave-safe bowl. Add a couple of tablespoons of water and cover. Microwave on high 8 minutes or until potatoes are tender. Mash.
  
  I don't think I'll ever do either of those on the stove again--the microwave is so easy!
  
  
• Use parchment paper on your cookie sheet when baking. Parchment paper is usually sold near the wax paper and aluminum foil, and you put it on the cookie sheet before you put on the cookies/biscuits/whatever. Each piece can be reused a few times. (Warning to bakers: It won't work for spritz cookies, since they need to adhere to the cookie sheet when they come out of the spritz press.)
  
  
• Cookie sheets or baking pans can also be lined with aluminum foil. This is especially good for savory things, so that the grease doesn't get baked onto your pan.