Monday, June 27, 2011
The Best Cookbooks Ever
Thursday, January 5, 2023
Useful: Bigger Bolder Bakers' Substitute Corn Syrup & Molasses
PhoPhoto: Bigger Bolder Baker |
There are two baking ingredients I never have in my pantry because I rarely need them. With these substitute recipes, I may never have to buy them. Thanks to Gemma Stafford, a former chef, I can make them at home (with ingredients I always have) for when I get a notion to bake a pastry that calls for one or the other. I love Gemma's recipes, tips, and videos but her website has so many ads and popups it's slowwww to load and murder to scroll, therefore although I'll link her website here I'm reluctant to send readers over there to be frustrated, so I'm reposting her 2 substitute recipes below also:
I) Substitute Corn Syrup
Ingredients:3/4 cup (6floz/170ml) water
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar (there is no substitute for this)
2 teaspoons lemon juice (stops sugar from clumping)
a pinch of salt
Photo: Bigger Bolder Bakers |
II) Substitute Molasses
3/4 cups (6floz/170ml) water
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
2 teaspoons lemon juice freshly squeezed
Friday, September 20, 2019
Pecan Cinnamon Coffee Cake Streusel
Otherwise I could balloon up to 300 pounds, and thus the reason for my rule: I can eat anything I want as long as I'm willing to make it myself! Make sense? Stops mindless eating. Homemade is often better ... and involves more time.
A browse of my blog's cakes and pastry recipes tells you I like sweets containing cinnamon and nuts. So America's Test Kitchen's Pecan Cinnamon Coffee Cake Streusel hits the cinnamon-nuts spot!
Since you can watch the recipe being made for free online by registering, I think I can post the ingredients below, plus mention -- the (1) streusel topping and (2) cake batter are made separately blended in a food processor. It is necessary to mix the ingredients in the exact order listed with 4-5 pulses of a food processor. Do not over pulse, nor add ingredients out-of-order in this recipe, or what should be a light and fluffy coffee cake will form glutton resulting in a tough cake. And nobody wants to eat that!
America's Test Kitchen's Pecan Cinnamon Coffee Cake Streusel
Ingredients for the streusel topping:
Toss into a food processor --
1 cup of toasted pecans
1/3 cup brown sugar
🥮 Pulse 4-5 times in food processor
1/2 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
🥮 Pulse 4-5 times in food processor again. Set aside.
Ingredients for the cake batter:
Toss into a food processor --
1 2/3 cups all purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
🥮 Pulse 4-5 times in food processor
The spring form pan I own. |
7 tablespoons of soften butter
🥮 Pulse 8-10 times in food processor
Directions:
1) Watch America's Test Kitchen's video as a thank you to them for creating the recipe for us!
2) After watching ATK, you can return here to my cheat sheet for the ingredients. I watched and jotted them down for you and me to return to time and again.:)
3) You will see how the bakers of America's Test Kitchen pour the cake batter into a 9'' spring form pan.
4) The topping is added from the outer edges first, followed by pouring it in the middle. That way the middle doesn't sink with streusel leaving uneven topping on the edges.
5) Bake at 350 degrees F for 55 - 60 minutes. Wait for the coffee cake to cool before you cut and eat it.
Undoubtedly, you can make the coffee cake with an electric mixer, but ATK made the job quicker with guaranteed light and fluffiness if you follow their directions exactly.
You can watch AKT for other excellent recipes also!
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Thursday, November 4, 2010
Chili, Mmm, Mmm, Good!
Monday, March 7, 2011
Waste Not Want Not Native American Style
According to editor, Todd Marks, who works for Consumer Reports, we waste 25% of all the products we buy because we can't get them out of their containers. He says the pumps for personal care items like body lotions and face serums are so poorly designed, you end up throwing away about a week's supply of product -- the stuff that gets stuck at the bottom and won't come out. I think it's more like two weeks worth– because oh, how I hate when a favorite cosmetic or conditioner is discontinued. So much so that I'm not above splitting open the container with a utility knife to get to every last drop before it disappears forever! The first time I was forced to do this I was amazed at how much product was left. Lipsticks will last many extra months if applied with a lip brush.
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What Do You Stock In Your Freezer?
Drugstores: Where Value And Convenience Converge
You Are What You Eat
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Tuesday, December 14, 2021
Dried Plum Pudding/Fruit Spread
With 3 pounds of dried plums (don't ask😁) I'm looking at plum recipes. One for prune pudding from Southern Living looks promising. It's more of a topping or fruit spread than a pudding, and I used dried plums, not dried prunes ... but close enough! Prunes are dried Italian plums ... not as juicy or round as regular plums. You see both at the grocery store. Below is the tweaked recipe.
Dried Plum Fruit Spread (or pudding if you will:)
2) Next turn on the heat, bring to a boil and simmer for 8 minutes.
3) Let cool down and transfer to a food processor or blender, add another cup of boiled hot water and pulse a few times to break the plums down, leaving some chunks. Return to the saucepan.
4) Remove 1/3 of the mixture and put it into a separate bowl to make a cornstarch slurry. This step is to avoid cornstarch lumps in the sauce.
5) To 1/3 of the plum mixture, add the juice of one lemon and stir it together. Next add 3 tablespoons of cornstarch and mix until smooth. Set aside.
6) To the main pot of plum mixture in the saucepan add 2/3 cup sugar, cinnamon, cardamom, and star anise. Stir to combine. Turn the heat back on and simmer for 5 minutes.
7) While it's simmering, pour the cornstarch slurry into the main plum mixture in the pot and continue stirring. After it thickens, remove the star anise and let the pudding/fruit spread cool.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
You Are What You Eat
fresh black pepper
2 or 3 mushrooms, sliced and sautéed