Baked cinnamon apple chips

I'm missing some east coast fall from out west. Big pumpkin patches. Cider doughnuts at Carter Mountain. Apple-picking in Ipswich. Admittedly, it does seem to be a produce-related problem. 

The solution: apple chips.

Ingredients

Granny Smith, Red Delicious, or Pink Lady apples*
Cinnamon

*One apple fills up an entire baking sheet.



1. Preheat the oven to 200F.

2. On its side, slice each apple as thinly as possible. Apples that are too thick won't bake up crispy.

3. Lay apple slices on a cookie sheet that is either lined with parchment paper or very lightly greased. Do not overlap slices.

4. Sprinkle with cinnamon to taste.

5. Bake apples for 1 hour.

6. Remove apples from oven. Turn each slice over.

7. Bake apples for 1 hour (2 hours in total).

8. Remove from oven. Let cool (and crisp!).

Note: This is not a sugary snack. Surprise: it tastes like apple. 

Frozen yogurt bark

At the very least, this froyo bark is beautiful. At the very best, it provides an excuse to eat breakfast (or dessert?) at any point in the day. 

Ingredients
2 cups of yogurt*
2 tablespoons of honey

*Plain Greek yogurt is ideal, but I used Kefir because it's 99% lactose free

Possible toppings
Fresh figs, mango (any sugary fruit that won't get rock hard when frozen)
Dried fruit
Dried coconut
Chocolate chips
Cacao nibs
Chopped nuts

1. Whisk together yogurt of choice and honey.

2. Spread the mixture into an even layer on a parchment paper-lined cookie sheet. 

3. Top with your choice of toppings.

4. Freeze until set (a few hours). 

5. Break or cut into pieces and store it in an airtight container in the freezer.

One note: When eating, hold the bark with wax or parchment paper. Or feel the frost bite your fingers. Your choice.

All thanks to my Buzzfeed Food addiction.

(Bacon + egg) brussel sprout salad

I'm spending an inordinate amount of time thinking about salad these days. Boring salads—and how not to wind up eating them for five days straight. Non-lettuce salads—and how they won't get sad and wilty when I turn my back. Meaty salads—and how to put all of them directly in my mouth. 

Here is one I came across while googling things like "salad + full + protein" (eyeroll, I know), and that I've been enjoying for lunch this week: 

Soft-boiled eggs, bacon, avocados, and parmesan—all resting on roasted sweet potatoes and raw, shredded brussel sprouts, tossed in olive oil, lemon juice, and honey. What more could you ask for?

Found this at SafeEggs 

Scallion pancakes with ginger dipping sauce

I'm eating this for dinner all week. And I'm pretty happy about it. These mild scallion "pancakes" are complemented well by the soy and rice-wine vinegar based ginger dipping sauce.

Ingredients

2 cups flour (I used cup-for-cup gf flour)

1 cup boiling water

4 teaspoons sesam oil

1 cup scallions, sliced very thinly

1/4 cup vegetable oil

Salt

Dipping Sauce

2 tablespoons soy sauce

2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar

1 teaspoon fresh ginger, grated

2 teaspoons sugar

1 tablespoon scallion greens (for garnish)

1. In a food processor, slowly add boiling water to flour. Pulse in 10 second intervals. A ball of dough should form. 

2. Remove ball of dough from food processor. Wrap in plastic wrap and set aside at room temperature for 30 minutes.

3. Cut dough into 4 equal pieces.

4. For each piece: Roll the piece flat into a disc. Baste lightly with sesame oil. Lightly salt.

5. For each piece: Roll up the dough into a log. Fold log into a spiral. It's OK if it comes apart.

4. For each piece: Roll the piece flat into a disc. Baste lightly with sesame oil. Lightly salt. Evenly sprinkle 1/4 cup scallions onto disc.

5. For each piece: Lightly press scallions into the disc so they stick. Roll up the dough into a log. Fold log into a spiral. Now the sesame oil should be evenly incorporated.

6. For each piece: Roll the piece flat into a disc. Now the scallions should be worked into the dough.

7. For each piece: Add 2 tablespoons of oil to the pan. Cook evenly on both sides until brown and toasted. On medium heat, this should take ~7 minutes.

8. When cool, cut into wedges and serve with dipping sauce.

Thanks, Pantelligent, for helping me branch out!

New tea pot

I'm pretty into tea. And by that I mean I'm very, very into tea.

Ritual included, but leaves alone as well.

That is, in part, why I was so excited to get a new, elegant tea-for-one set:

Thanks, David's Tea, for the pot and the picture.

Caramel apple cider cookies

I love apple picking. In Charlottesville, Virginia during college (with the ever-delicious Carter Mountain cider donuts). In Ipswich, Massachusetts while teaching (with a picnic next to a chilly orchard). I like that it's sunny, but that it's crisp outside. I like those long apple-picking arms that are a pain to carry around. I like that you have to buy your keep in bushels. 

So now, even on the west coast, where it's never very fall, I declare that fall approacheth! And with that, I'm now going to put apples on and in everything.


Ingredients

3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. cinnamon

1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 (7.4 ounce) box spiced apple cider instant drink mix (like hot chocolate packets; don't use the sugar free version)

2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract


1 (14 ounce) bag soft caramels, unwrapped (Kraft, Werther's, etc., just make sure it's not hard candy)

1. Preheat oven to 350° F. 

2. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. (Depending on the thickness of your cookies, the melted caramel may stick to the bottom of the pan.)

3. Pre-mix dry ingredients: In a small bowl whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder and cinnamon. Set aside.

4. Using a mixer, cream together butter, sugar, salt and all packages of apple cider drink mix powder, until light and fluffy. 

5. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Add vanilla and mix well. 

6. Gradually add dry mixture into wet mixture. Mix until just combined.

7. Scoop out a cookie dough ball roughly the size of a large walnut (about 2 tablespoons). Split the ball into two equal pieces and flatten each. Press an unwrapped caramel onto one, cover with the other, and seal the edges of each little raw cookie sandwich.

8. Place cookies on cookie sheet about 2 inches apart. Bake 12-14 minutes, or until very lightly browned around the edges.

9. Once you pull the cookies out, slide the parchment paper off of the baking sheet right out onto a heat-resistant counter or woodblock. When cookies are cool enough to be firm but still slightly warm, carefully twist them off of the parchment paper, flip them, and allow to finish cooling upside down.

I prefer to eat these pretty hot, but they are also good when totally cool or, after reheating for about 3 seconds in the microwave.

Thanks, Gimme some Oven, for the recipe.

Compare to these salted caramel chocolate monstrosities.

Chocolate breakfast pudding

This past week was my first (and final!?) week back at school after a long summer. In an effort to cut down the brain energy I had to devote to food each day without compromising deliciousness, I planned and made much of my breakfast, lunch, and dinner on Sunday before the week began. So adult. Much wow.

This week's breakfast: a [refined-sugar-free] chocolate chia pudding!

Because of it's sweetness and its adaptability, it makes an equally good breakfast, snack, or dinner.

Ingredients

8 dates, pitted (could substitute other sweetener here)
3 cups milk of choice (I used almond milk and it was still perfectly rich)
1 cup fresh strawberries
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup unsweetened cacao powder
Generous pinch of sea salt
1/2 cup chia seeds

Topping ideas
Fruit 
Dried fruit
Nuts
Coconut
Matcha
Raw Oats
Chocolate or cacao nibs

This recipe made enough for five individual breakfasts.

1. Boil water. Add pitted dates and continue to boil for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, discard water and add dates to blender.

2. Except for chia seeds and toppings, add all ingredients to the dates. Blend until very smooth.

3. Add chia seeds. Pulse briefly ten times. Fully incorporate chia seeds by hand with a whisk.

4. Cover and refrigerate for one hour. Stir or shake to prevent clumping.

5. Return to fridge for at least three more hours.

6. Top and serve cold. 

Copied off of Sprouted Routes.

Strawberry basil soda

In the continuing saga of summer strawberries (strawberry jam, strawberry oatmeal, chocolate tort with strawberries, etc.), today I made some homemade strawberry basil soda. And ate it with some fennel, orange shortbread.

Ingredients

4-5 cups (~1 pound) strawberries, washed and trimmed
Juice of 1/2 lemon
3/4 cup loosely packed basil leaves, washed
1 cup sugar
Carbonated water

1. Using a blender, puree strawberries until smooth.

2. Using a cheesecloth or fine sieve, squeeze strawberry juice into a bowl. Discard pulp and seeds. This should yield about 1 - 1 1/2 cups of pure juice.

3. In a sauce pan, add strawberry juice to lemon juice, whole basil, and sugar.

4. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer for 5 minutes. This yields a simple syrup.

5. Remove from heat and let cool for five minutes.

6. Using a sieve or a strainer, strain simple syrup. Discard solids (basil).

7. To serve, add 2 tablespoons of simple syrup to a full (8 oz) glass of carbonated water, taste, and add more syrup according to taste. Garnish with lemon slices and basil.

Adapted slightly from The Kitchn.

No-bake chocolate tort with strawberries

This is intensely chocolatey. I’m into that. That is all.

Ingredients

Crust

32 Oreos cookies (or gluten-free Oreo-like chocolate cookies)

1/2 cup (110g) butter, melted 

Filling

300 grams milk or bittersweet chocolate (or a mix of the two)

7 oz (200 ml) of heavy cream

Topping

Strawberries

chopped nuts (hazelnuts, almonds, pistachios), optional

1. Wash strawberries. Cut tops off. Dry thoroughly.

2. Use a food processor to blend cookies until evenly crumbed.

3. Add melted butter to food processor and blend until smooth.

4. Press cookie mixture into the base and up the sides (3/4”-1”) of a tart pan. Freeze while working.

5. Heat heavy cream on medium until very warm, but not boiling.

6. In a separate bowl, pour heavy cream over chocolate. Let sit for 3 minutes.

7. Using a whisk, mix chocolate and cream until smooth.

8. Retrieve tart pan from freezer. Pour chocolate and cream mixture into tart pan.

9. Press clean, dry strawberries into tart.

10. Sprinkle on chopped nuts, if applicable.

11. Refrigerate at least two hours and until served. Note: Keeping the tort in the refrigerator for longer than a few hours may cause some condensation to form.

Some ideas for variations:

Cut the strawberries.

I like chocolate. Don’t get me wrong. But I if you like the taste of fruit and chocolate together better than you like chocolate (like I do), I recommend revisiting this tort's current strawberry-to-chocolate ratio. In particular, rather than sticking whole strawberries in the pour, I would slice the strawberries and arrange them to cover a significantly larger portion of the surface. [I presented this idea to someone who consumed this tort and was met with, “No. No. This is CHOCOLATE TORT. With some strawberries.”] 

Use white chocolate instead of milk or bittersweet.

Use soy, almond, or cashew milk for less dairy (and admittedly less richness and creaminess).

Pre-dip/cover/decorate strawberries in chocolate before pressing into tort.

Stolen from Home Cooking Adventure. 

Banana bread crusted plum tart

I was walking in the grocery store recently and stumbled on some “French prunes,” which were 1) actually plums rather than prunes, and 2) reminiscent of the little plums used in the German Pflaumenkuchen (plum cake). These are reasonably difficult to find in the U.S., so I bought a pound or two and stared at them for a few days.

I have two images of Pflaumenkuchen that I tend to think about. [Let’s clear this one up quickly: Yes, I think about cake.]

The first: When I was younger (and not gf), there was a time in my life when I could wander into a German bakery, pick up a big 4”x5” hunk of the doughy pastry, and scarf it down before you could say all four syllables. If only for the Pflaumenkuchen, I honestly wish that I was still in that time of my life.

The second: About ten years ago, my Oma died, and my dear Opa began cooking and baking for himself. When I speak with him on the phone, he likes to tell me what he’s baked. One time, he described a huge baking sheet of Pflaumenkuchen. How he’d bake it on Sunday. How he’d eat it the rest of the week. How he’d do the same the next week with some other fresh fruit. You have to understand that this represented—at least I imagine—a huge departure from the norm for my Opa, who had had Kaffee und Kuchen with his wife every day for Xty+ years. And I thought that was really beautiful.

Also, to be clear, it involved a favorite cake of mine.

In homage to Pflaumenkuchen, in an effort to experiment with a new kind of crust, and in the interest of using some of the most excellent, but most crumbled banana bread, I decided to adapt a plum tart recipe. Because the original recipe called for a lemon shortbread, the product was decidedly sweet rather than tart, and a bit softer than a shortbread.

Crust Ingredients

Previously baked banana bread, dried out and crumbed

8 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2" cubes, frozen

Tart Ingredients

1/3 cup + 1/2 tablespoon granulated sugar

1 tablespoon cornstarch

1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

24 small plums ("French prunes"), each pitted and sliced into 4 slender wedges

2 tablespoons tart fruit preserves

Crust - Take One

1. Dry out and crumb banana bread until cookie-crumb-like in texture. This make take a few days on its own, or can be expedited by re-baking the crumbed bread on low heat (200 F) until dry.

Filling - Take One

2. In a medium mixing bowl, whisk the 1/3 cup of sugar, the cornstarch, kosher salt, and lemon zest together. 

3. Add the plums to the bowl and stir with cleans hands to evenly coat. 

4. Cover the plum bowl and put it in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.

Crust - Take Two

5. Preheat oven to 375 F.

6. Butter/grease the bottom and sides of a springform or tart pan (around 9.5" in diameter).

7. Add dried banana bread to food processor and pulse until crumbly. Add the frozen butter cubes to the mixture and pulse until combined and crumbly.

Filling - Take Two

8. Using a colander over a small bowl, drain the plums. 

9. Pour the juice into a saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Reduce the heat to low and simmer for a few (3-4) minutes until the cornstarch is activated and the juice becomes very thick.

10. Scrape back into the small bowl and let cool.

11. Add the preserves to the saucepan. (I used our homemade strawberry, but anything will do.) Heat the preserves until liquid and syrupy.

12. Brush liquid preserves over the bottom and sides of the tart. 

13. Brush plum juice over the preserves on the bottom of the shell.

14. Starting at the edge and working towards the center, arrange the plum slices in tightly overlapping in concentric circles. (I ended up just piling some up at the center.)

15. Sprinkle the remaining 1/2 tablespoon of sugar over the plums.

16. Bake the tart until the plums are tender when poked with a knife and caramelized along their edges, and any juices look syrupy and bubbly, 40 to 50 minutes. 

17. After you remove the tart from the oven, use a pastry brush to brush the unset juices onto any dry plums.

18. Cool the tart for at least 2 hours before unmolding. Slice with a sharp knife.

Adapted from FineCooking.

Garden lemonade

I spent the last two weeks on the eastern coast of the Adriatic sea, taking it what I would call "excessively easy" in many Croatian cafés. In addition to the other delicious foods I encountered as I ate my way across the coast—among them Dalmation pršut, homemade sheep's cheese, local olive oils, fresh sea food, Korculan "amareto" cookies, fresh figs stuffed with salty ricotta and drizzled with crushed nuts and honey, homemade schnaps presented by our hosts at several apartments, and all things truffles—many of the cafés served homemade lemonade. 

This lemonade came in its purest form, often just freshly squeezed lemon juice, sometimes with sugar on the side, and sometimes with mint, basil, or elderflower.

Inspired by my tiny, back-porch garden as I've been recently, I've been searching for new uses of the herbs I'm growing. These lemonades scratched that particular itch, and, conveniently, I returned home to a basil plant that looked like it was going to ask me to feed it, Seymore, and a greedy mint plant with roots physically in other planters. So I had to do something.

Enter: Sparkling brown sugar lemonade with lavender


Ingredients

7.5 lemons, juiced
3/4 cup brown sugar
2+ cups sparkling water (to dilute syrup), cold
Lavender sprigs for garnish

1. On medium heat, bring lemon juice and brown sugar to a simmer. Whisk heartily.

2. Remove from heat and allow syrup to cool. Chill syrup. 

3. Once cold, pour syrup into 2-4 individual glasses (depending on desired sweetness).

4. Dilute with cold sparkling water.

5. Garnish each glass with fresh lavender.

Note: Because it's diluted with sparkling water, it's better to store this syrup and dilute when you pour a glass, rather than all at once. 


Adapted from Simply Recipes. Inspired also by Vesta's awesome lemonade.



Enter also: Basil mint lemonade

Ingredients

7.5 lemons, juiced
3/4 cup granulated white sugar
1/2 cup fresh mint, loose + longer sprigs for garnish
1/2 cup fresh basil, loose + longer sprigs for garnish
2+ cups water (to dilute syrup), cold

1. On medium heat, bring lemon juice and sugar to a simmer. Whisk heartily.

2. Reduce heat to low-medium and add loose mint and basil. Once herbs wilt, let simmer for 2-5 minutes. As the dissolved sugar caramelizes, the color will turn a very light yellow-brown.

3. Remove from heat. Strain out wilted herbs and discard.

4. Dilute with 2-4 cups of water. 

5. Chill until serving.

6. Garnish each glass with fresh mint and basil.

Each of these recipes suffices for an afternoon of lemonade-filled porch-sitting for 2-4 people, depending on how diluted you take it.

 

Banana bread

Cousin F's banana bread has been wowing unsuspecting Germans since 2013. That is to say, Cousins F and E moved to the Heimatland Germany and brought along their ridiculous banana bread recipe, which they then prepared and served to their friends residing in their quaint German city. Having never seen such fine Bananenbrot, the Germans came back over and over again for Kaffee und Kuchen, each time asking coyly for this particular Kuchen, until there was no more Bananenbrot to be had. At least that's how I imagine the dramatic retelling.

The point is that this banana bread is crazy good. It's got fabulous flavor. Even if you mess it up. Which I did.

The other point is that this post is timely because I am on my way to visit Cousins E and F this week.

Ingredients

Dry mix
1 1/2 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

1 stick unsalted butter, soft
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 cup mashed ripe bananas
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

Pecans, chocolate chips as wanted


1. Preheat oven to 350 F / 175 C. Butter and flour the bread pan.

2. Mix dry ingredients together in a separate bowl. Sift. 

3. Beat softened butter until fluffy.

4. Add sugars.

5. Add eggs, one at a time.

6. Add mashed bananas.

7. Add lemon juice and vanilla.

8. Pour 1/3 of the mix into the pan, sprinkle with pecans or chocolate chips. Pour another 1/3. Repeat. Pour the remaining 1/3. Bake loaf for 1 hour and 5 minutes. Bake muffins for 20 minutes.

I'm realizing what I enjoy about baking is that I'm constantly making mistakes that I get immediate feedback about. Texture. Form. Color. Presentation. They are all so easy to mess up, research, and improve. Just a little. But every time. 

Never have I wanted to be better at chemistry than after making this recipe—by all accounts an excellent recipe that was not intended to be gluten-free. Between starting this post and actually publishing, I spent a few hours reading about baking soda and baking powder, xanthan gum, gluten-free flour blending, working with gluten-free flour, baking by weight, and cakes rising and falling. And everything, of course, came down to understanding the underlying chemical reactions. [Admittedly, "understanding" is a strong word for my now adequate, superficial knowledge.]

Don't do that

I used Thomas Keller's cup-for-cup gluten-free flour mix (which, side note, I accidentally ordered in bulk and which now sits in my non-industrial kitchen in an industrial kitchen package). Though I've come to love this mix for its flavor and its gluten-mimicking properties, I've also noticed that it's not appropriate for certain, flatter items (shortbreads, crepes, etc.) in unadapted recipes because it—and I can't believe I'm saying this about gf flour—rises too much. Here, it is the appropriate flour, but the recipe isn't perfectly adapted for it. I didn't adapt at all. Don't do that. Instead, reduce the baking soda and baking powder to 3/4 teaspoon each.

Because gluten-free batters have to have the consistency of thick pancake batter to rise well, they often look too wet or too dry (as here). Assuming these wouldn't rise, I overfilled the muffin tins to 3/4 and watched them go nuts. Don't do that. Fill to 1/2.

I have been collecting ripe bananas for weeks in my freezer. When I pulled the bananas out for this recipe, I let them defrost about 80%. Because of that, two things were off: 1) the moisture in this recipe was both too high and inconsistent across muffins, causing them to rise like an ingenue popover and fall like a jaded souffle. 2) The individual muffins were too tender when cool and would—somewhat deliciously—not hold their own form. Don't do that. Instead, fully defrost the bananas. Drain the bananas. Mash the bananas. Then add to the batter. 

Adapted from Cousin F's recipe.

Coconut macaroons

Three pieces of my universe came together to create these macaroons. 

First, I have this idea that when I was young we baked macaroons. I can't think of why that would be, because it doesn't precisely fit into my cultural cuisine heritage, but for as long as I can remember, I've made them on my own. And my thinking is that that had to have started somewhere. 

Second, and similarly, for as long as I can remember, I've been on an earl grey kick. Earl grey tea. Earl grey truffles. Earl grey macarons (not yet macaroons, mind you). 

Finally, I have this notion about coconut macaroons that they must be made with almond paste (almost marzipan), and not just condensed milk, as many recipes call for. Recently, I was spending way too much time at the grocery store—which, candidly, I always find fascinating—and I noticed that Odense Almond Paste was suddenly labeled gluten-free. [For context, it contains some number of ppm of wheat starch and, as such, had been out of my reach for a long time.]

Thus the origin of these coconutty items.  

Ingredients

1/2 cup egg whites, room temperature
1+ teaspoon pure vanilla bean paste
1-7 oz box of almond paste, grated
2 cups confectioner's sugar
1-14 oz package sweetened flaked coconut

Milk chocolate
Earl grey tea

White chocolate
Lime, zested

1. Preheat oven to 325 F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper. 

2. Using a mixer, beat egg whites together with extracts into soft peaks.

3. Grate the almond paste. In a separate bowl (or, ideally, in a food processor), beat grated almond paste, sugar, and coconut until crummy. 

4. Fold egg whites into almond mixture.

5. Pressing the dough firmly together, shape and drop hefty tablespoons of dough onto the parchment paper.

6. Bake for 18-20 minutes, or until lightly bottoms around the bottom edges. Broil for top color as desired.

7. Cool entirely before embellishing as desired.


Some flavor/decorating ideas (the first two of which I ended up doing)

Mix finely ground earl grey tea into melted chocolate. Dip half of each macaroon into the mixture. 

Melt white chocolate. Stripe melted chocolate on macaroons. Sprinkle with lime zest for a tropical complement to the coconut.

Mix cocoa into batter before baking.

Press an almond into the top of the macaroon before baking. Once cool, stripe with milk or dark chocolate.

Press a craisin into the top of the macaroon before baking. Once cool, stripe with white chocolate.

Dip the base of each macaroon in chocolate.

Don't do that

Not thinking, I used foil instead of parchment paper. Foil is less than ideal for an especially sticky base. Don't do that. Instead, use parchment paper.

I painstakingly grated the almond paste by hand. Only to have it clump together as soon as I manually and then with a stand mixer with the coconut and sugar! Don't do that. Instead, crumb the dry mixture using a food processor to keep the ingredients evenly distributed.

Envisioning massive, bakery-size indulgences, I use a 1/4 cup measure cup to portion my macaroons, ending up with 16 macaroons! Don't do that. If you use a either a heaping tablespoon or an 1/8 cup, you'll yield 30+ macaroons that are significantly less likely to intimidate all the other macaroons around them.



These are great. They are moist and sweet and big and beautiful. And again, on an earl grey kick here, so these really do work for me.

For next time, I'm considering using unsweetened coconut so I can actually eat more than one. Perhaps a great coconut macaroon experiment will be in order.

Adapted from www.odense.com.