Cranberry Bread - 1

First off my darling readers, I must make a confession. I love cranberries. LOVE them. The day that fresh cranberries hit the supermarket shelves, I am buying bags by the armfuls and throwing them into any and every recipe I can. I'm also freezing them like crazy so I can have cranberries year around. I think one of the reasons the Chief Commentator is so hesitant to buy a deep freeze is because he secretly knows I would devote a solid 1/2 of it to cranberries.

Apparently this obsession of mine with the fruit runs in both sides of the family. Not only do the cook books I've put together have pages upon pages of recipes with the lovely little red berries being showcased, both of my grandmothers fill their books with recipes requiring them.

So for simplicity sake of keeping track of the volumes of Cranberry recipes, I've added Cranberries to my sortable list (on the right side of the blog) and because there are so many Cranberry Bread (and also Cranberry sauces, etc) I am going to number them so not to confuse myself or hopefully you. Many of them do not differ by much, although I am hoping in those small subtle differences, I will find what truely makes one better than the other.

This one comes from a recipe card from my Grandma Melusine's small cardex box. I found it the same day I found the beef bourguigon and made it the following.

3 cups flour

3/4 teaspoon salt

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon soda

1 1/2 cups sugar

2 eggs

3 tablespoons melted butter

juice of 1 lemon , juice of 1 orange plus water for 1 cup total liquid

1 1/2 cups cranberries cut in half

nuts

bake one hour at 325.

Ok - my first kevetch of this recipe... I do not like standing there slicing cranberries in half. Especially for a fruit that when exposed to heat pop on their own.. but I did it (patiently). It's for that reason, the recipe got a Moderate rating rather than easy. It takes a lot of time to cut those suckers. Not that it's necessarily "hard" work.

I also kinda felt like I was wasting the lemon and the orange by not grating the rind into the recipe.. but maybe that is just me.

First off, the bread came out looking beautiful. It had a very nice light color to it, it smelled amazing. The dough consistance had good flavor of oranges, and cranberries, but the texture was a little moist. Cheif commentator wondered if maybe we should have cooked it longer (although the tester came out clean) to make the texture a little firmer. Or perhaps that is just how it was supposed to be?

All in all a good recipe. Little more work than most, but tasty.

Beef Bourguignon

Ok, for all you Julia Child nuts out there, who have ever tried to make her recipe for Beef Bourguignon, you know that if you follow all the steps, the way she makes it, it's not an easy dish to do. This recipe came out of my Grandma Melusine's recipe file box. She claims there are only 156 calories per serving... and my claim to the recipe, aside from the cooking time (hands free) it's "Sunday night taste, with Tuesday night effort"

3lb lean beef
2 tsp oil
1 med onion sliced
1 tablespoon flour
1/2 cup dry red wine
1/4 cup chicken broth
1/8 teaspoon dried oregano crushed
1/8 teaspoon dried thyme
1 small bay leaf
salt
pepper
3 mushrooms

Cut beef into 1/2" cubes. In 2 quart saucepan cook meat, brown, add onion and flour stirring to coat. Add wine, chicken broth, and seasonings. co ver and cook 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours. Add mushrooms 5 minutes before end of cooking time. Remove bay leaf.

Perhaps one of the reasons I love this recipe so much is because it's actually written out in my grandmother's handwriting. She's clearly made it, and it's not just some recipe card that was cut out of a magazine for 'some day maybe I'll do this'... but that's the emotional side of me talking.

So really it's that simple. I have a couple of suggestions of my own for the next time I make it. I would A) double the amount of mushrooms B) Soak the mushrooms in some wine before adding, to amp up the flavor and C) Add them sooner, so they can intergrate into the sauce a little more.

Cheif commentator says that this is a "new favorite" he can't wait to have it again. He loved everything about it - his only complaint is that there wast much left. Between the two of us and the 3 kids, we gobbled it all down. The beef really cooks down, so if you are figuring this for a dinner party, I would guess more like a 1lb per person (precooked) and 2 mushrooms per lb.

Also, we served it with potatoes with rosemary and garlic (yummy) but it would have been equally delicious over rice, so that the rice could absorb some of the gravy. It was a huge hit with all three kids - so yay for a good meal, that is also kid approved.

Coffee Cake - 1973 Pillsbury Bake Off Winner

Hi There.

Forgive the sideways photo. I have no idea why it has decided to do that, but editing the picture to make it go the other way turns it wonky. I promise the photo being sideways does not affect the flavor of the coffee cake.

The Chief Commentator has often mentioned to me his love of coffee cake. There are few things that make him as happy as the idea of having a delicious slice of heavenly cake with his morning cup of joe. Lucky for him, it appears that both my grandmothers also have a thing for breakfast cakes and breads to be enjoyed with their sanka. This recipe is no exception.

This one comes from my grandma melusines cook book - it's a cut out from a Pillsbury flour bag. It is titled "one-step tropical coffee cake" and under it it says $5,000 flour winner in Pillsbury's 1973 Bake-Off"

So the recipe won $5k for someone several years before I was even born... $5k is a lot of money, especially in 1973... so this must be good right?

Oven @ 350 degrees and you are going to need a 8 or 9 inch coffee cake pan.

Using solid shortening, grease the square pan.

1 1/2 cups flour (Pillsbury of course!)

1 cup sugar

2 teaspoons Baking Powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

8 oz plain yogurt or sour cream (I used yogurt)

1/2 cup cooking oil

2 eggs

Lightly spoon flour into measuring cup, level off.

combine all ingredients in large bowl

stir 70-80 strokes until well blended (ugh! my arms!)

pour into greased pan

set batter aside

topping

1 cup coconut or chopped nuts (I used almonds)

1/3 cup sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

combine in small bowl, and sprinkle over batter

bake at 350 for 35-45 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

tip: 3/4 cup well drained crushed or chunk pineapple, fruit cocktail or mandarin oranges maybe spooned over the batter before sprinkling with streusel mixture. Bake 10-15 minutes longer.

High altitude - 5200 feet, bake basic recipe at 375 for 35-45 minutes. if adding fruit, bake 45 to 55 minutes.

Ok, so I didn't "go there" with the fruit cocktail, oranges or pineapple. It just didn't seem right (although it does seem very early 1970's)

Chief commentator liked how the cake wasn't very sweet. He said it stood up well with his coffee, although he would have liked a little butter drizzled into the topping to make it stick better.

Coffee cake isn't my forte, but I did like it, and I think in part, I liked it because it wasn't overly sweet.

Softball Cake

This recipe was not in my original cook books, nor was it in any of my Grandmother's however the time and effort it took me to make this cake, makes it worthy of a post on my blog, with some of the photos of what I went through, getting from point A (an empty pan) to point B the cake you see before you. Also, I realize that Martha Stewart can make a cake, but I'm still giving this recipe the most difficult of ratings, because it's not for the faint of heart, but can be done, if you are a good instruction follower and have heaps of patience.

My original inspiration for the cake. The Chief Commentator's daughter plays softball and loves everything softball... so for her 10th (double digits!) birthday, we decided to do a softball themed cake to celebrate.

I am so proud of myself, I read all the instructions on the cake pan, before starting (i.e. cover pan in shortening, and then flour but NEVER butter then flour before adding batter...) etc etc etc. The instructions also said to use dense cake like a pound cake for the recipe.

Since the kiddo loves lemon, I chose the Barefoot Contessa Lemon Pound Cake by Ina Garten as my base, and then "kidded" it up a bit by adding a cupful of confetti candy to the mix.

Recipe:

(makes 2 8" loaves)

1/2 pound unsalted butter at room temperature

2 1/2 cups granulated sugar

4 extra-large eggs at room temperature

1/3 cup grated lemon zest (6 to 8 large lemons)

3 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon kosher salt

3/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice

3/4 cup buttermilk, at room temperature

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Method (note this is the method per Ina Garten with my changes due to pans in (parenthesis)

preheat oven to 350 (325) grease two 8 1/2 x 4 1/2x 2 1/2 loaf pans (grease pan with shortening and then 2 teaspoons flour rolled around until all surfaces are covered)

Cream the butter and 2 cups granulated sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, for about 5 minutes, or until ight and fluffy. With the mixer on medium speed, add the eggs, one at a time, and the lemon zest

**note - if you can find an easier way to zest 8 lemons, by all means go for it. My hands hurt so much after the zesting, I took a 10 minute break and had to stretch them. I used a microplane to zest, but by all means, if you can find a quicker method go for it.

Sift together the flour, baking power, baking soda, and salt into a bowl. In another bowl, combine 1/4 cup lemon juice, the butterminlk, and vanilla. Add the flour and buttermilk mixtures alternately to the batter, beginning and ending with the flour. Divide the batter evently between the pans, smooth the tops and bake for 45 minutes to an hour until cake tester comes out clean.

(This is where I folded the confetti candy into the mix, to make it more 'kid friendly'.

** I don't normally believe in keeping everything separate and then slowly mixing them in steps, but out of pure fear and supersticion that the cake would come out poorly, I followed along exactly. Also, I followed the baking instructions at 325 per the pan, which is more than an hour, it's more like, a hell of a long time.. I think closer to an hour and a half or so.

I skipped this next step completely, because I was going to frost the cakes, but here you go if you want to know how to finish off the recipe. Combine 1/2 cup granulated sugar with 1/2 cup lemon juice in a small sauce pan, and cook over low heat until the sugar dissolves and makes a syrup. When the cakes are done, let them cook for 10 minutes, then invert them onto a rack set over a tray, and spoon the lemon syrup over the cakes. Allow the cakes to cool completely.

While the cake was baking, I decided I needed something for the softball to sit in, and because I wasn't about to self teach how to make a fondant or gum paste glove, I opted to make the ball sit in some grass. Now what is edible and looks like grass? coconut. Mixing a cup of coconut in a sandwhich baggie with about a teaspoon or so of green food coloring yields a nice looking grass effect. But it's sticky at this point and needs to be dried a little, so I spread it out on some parchment paper and stuck that in the oven (when the cake finally came out) watching it toast slowly. Which means, sitting infront of the oven because the difference between dry, and scorched is about 47 seconds. To make my cake, I used aprox 2 cups of coconut. Granted I did it 3 times before it came out correctly.. but the final product was 2 cups.

Now it's time for the cake to sit and rest. But before it's cooled (consulting my instructions again) I have to trim off the tops of both of the cakes and then flip them onto the racks to cool completely. (this translates to me, as 'done for the day' start again tomorrow with the rest of the project.

Before going to the frosting phase I have to trim one of the cakes, so that it sits flat. I don't want my finshed product rolling all over the table now do I?

So now it's time to make a whole bunch of frosting. In the interest of not having to make a second batch if I ran out and worrying about matching colors, I made a double batch of buttercream frosting (wiltons - basic buttercream) however for this size cake, one batch would have been pleanty with enough to spare the recipe said 1 batch, but erring on the side of caution and trying to skip the "I told you so's"

I pulled out a small amount to turn red, and then made the rest of it "neon nuclear green" then after I got the correct color, I pulled out 3/4 of it, and thinned the remaining 1/4 for smoothing icing (i.e. mix corn syrup into frosting until thinned)

First you flip the bottom half, and smooth it all with flat smoothing icing, then you start to decorate it. Prior to flipping it, I decided I wanted to make sure that the frosting was hard enough incase I touched it, so I shoved it in the fridge for about 10 minutes.

At this point I could have filled the center, and thought about doing a lemon filling, however I was a little worried about it staying together, so instead I used a big glop of the regular butter cream and put the top on, frosting the entire rest of the outside in the smooth frosting.

Next I finished dotting the entire cake with the #16 tip (just like the instructions said!) and whipped up the red (it looks a little pink in the photo, but trust me it's red in person) and attached the #3 tip and went on to making the stitches.

Then I stuck the entire cake back in the fridge to harden again.

finally I added the green coconut around the base of the cake to make it look like grass.

There will be comments (hopefully tomorrow) on what the cake actually tasted like, but the little chunks I cut off the top when leveling were pretty darn tasty.

Here is the finished cake:

and here is the cake sitting in the middle of the set Dinner table for Daughter's "Japanese Themed" party. She requested Sushi, and all the fixin's.

The cake was certainly a learning experience, and now that I've done it, I'm sure I could recreate it faster next time. I was panicked about the cake consistency turning out the way I was hoping it to, and also learned (from reading the directions!) that it's important when frosting a cake like this with so many strange shapes and having to hold it together, that you use a dense cake (packaged cake mix doesn't work well unless you cut the oil down)

French Burger

This one comes out of Better Homes and Gardens, January 1998.

The article is titled Burgers Go Multicultural an the idea is to start with a Basic Burger recipe and then dress it up differently. The choices are: Middle East Burger, Korean Kimchee Burger, French Burger, and Greek Burger.

I made the French Burger tonight

Here is the Basic Burger Recipe:

1 beaten eg

3.4 cup soft bread crumbs

1 lb lean ground beef

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper

Combine all ingredients and shape into four 3/4 inche thick patties. Broil 3 -4 inches from heat for 12-14 minutes.

Now here is the French upgrade:

add 1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese

2 tablespoons drained capers

snipped fresh tarragon

Top with more blue chees if desired, serve on a toasted sour dough bread.

I ended up topping them with a blue cheese chive spread I whipped up and served with sweet potatoe fries with a curry lime dipping sauce.

Chief Commentator: Fantastic. He would skip extra cheese spread on the bread, because (and maybe it was the kind I used) blue cheese in side was strong enough and carried through nicely.

"definately one of the better burgers I've had in a long time, and it's not your ordinary burger" The capers also alleviated the need for pickle, with the tang and salt.

Celery Root Rémoulade

Growing up in Napa, getting deli made salad’s from Vallergas Market was always a special treat to me. I was in love with their celery ‘roulle salad, that I recall once getting my hands on the recipe for when it came in one of their mailers, but I must not have stuck it in my cookbook, as it’s no where to be found. I also clipped along the way, the following recipe it was from a magazine, although I have no idea which one.


Celery Root Rémoulade
(from The Art of Simple Food, by Alice Waters)
1 medium celery root (about 1 lb)
1 tsp white wine vinegar
2 Tbsp crème fraîche
2 tsp Dijon mustard
juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
salt
pepper

Cut away all the brown skin and small roots from the celery root. Rinse. With a sharp knife or mandoline, cut the celery root into 1/8-inch thick slices. Cut the slices into thin matchstick-size pieces. (This is called a julienne of celery root.) Toss with salt and white wine vinegar.Mix remaining ingredients together in a small bowl. Stir well. Pour over the celery root and toss to coat. Taste for salt and acid. The salad can be served right away or refrigerated for up to a day.

Variations
Add other raw julienned root vegetables, such as rutabaga, carrot, or radish, to the salad.
Sprinkle with chopped parsley, chervil, or mint.
Toss together with a rocket salad.
For the crème fraîche, substitute 1 egg yolk and whisk in 3 tablespoons olive oil.

To note – I made one of the variations, instead of the crème fraîche, I did the substitution of yolk and oil.

Chief Commentator said: He liked it, it would go great with fried chicken or fish and chips as a lighter side, and was reminiscent of coleslaw in that aspect to him. He enjoyed the lightness and was easy to eat with a fantastic crunch, although he seems to think most people wouldn’t really like it, because it does have a ‘root veggie’ taste to it.

I have to add, if you are going to make a lot of celery root dishes, buy a mandolin and use that. I love celery root, and I would make it much more often if I had one, because cutting the root up by hand is a royal pain.

Chicken Lime Soup

This one came into my cookbook by way of my co-worker Matt. He brought it for a pot luck, and I love love loved it!!!! He brought me the recipe, and it has sat in my cookbook for at least 3-4 years, never once being made. Until now, when today we had some cool fall weather, and I was looking for something warming, and easy. Well, the soup part is easy, I am giving this recipe a mixed difficulty of easy and medium, because although the soup is easy, the frying of the tortilla strips for topping may be challenging for others who are leery of pans of splattering oil.

Chicken Lime Soup

8 corn tortillas
½ cup vegetable oil
course sea salt
4 chicken breasts
10 cups chicken broth
1 medium onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
6 pepper corns
2 teaspoons salt
½ teaspoon dried oregano
2 jalapeno peppers, seeded and finely chopped
2 large tomatoes , peeled and chopped
5 limes, juiced
½ cup fresh cilantro leaves

Directions

Cut the tortillas into ¼ inch strips. Heat the oil in a medium skillet and when very hot, fry the tortilla strips, in small batches, until lightly golden and crisp. 30 seconds to 1 minute. Transfer to paper towel lined plate to drain. Season with sea salt to taste. Repeat until all tortilla strips have been fried. Set fried strips aside.

Add the chicken, broth, onion, garlic, pepper corns, salt, oregano, jalapenos and tomatoes into a large sauce pan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a slow simmer and cook until the chicken is just cooked through, 20-25 minutes. Remove chicken from the soup and set aside until cool enough to handle. Allow coup to continue simmering.

When the chicken has cooled a bit, shred into bite size pieces and return to the pot along with the lime juice and cilantro leaves. cook for 10 minutes, or until the chicken is heated through and the soup is piping hot. Ladle the soup into wide soup bowls, with a handful of tortilla strips added to each bowl. If desired garnish with additional fresh cilantro and serve immediately.

Before I get to the comments, let me tell you what I did change and what I’d do differently next time, cause there definitely will be a next time.

I skipped the 2 teaspoons of salt, because I figured my broth had enough sodium in it already (and it was the reduced sodium at that) and I think that was a good call. Plus I prefer to sprinkle a little salt on the top when I eat it anyway.

Also – going forward, because the chief commentator loves dark meat rather than breasts, I think I’ll make the recipe with thigh meat, and or a whole chicken.

and finally, I like a little more heat, so I would prolly double or triple the number of jalapeno’s in the recipe.

Comments: Chief commentator said he is going to request this once a week in the winter. He loved the tang of the lime with the chicken and the broth. He specifically loved how un-salty the broth is! (good call on my part to leave out the extra salt)

I love this recipe too. I like how healthy (if you keep the tortillas out of it) that it can be. I love the zip of the lime juice, and the hearty comfort quality of the broth.

Definitely a new favorite.