Holiday Baking

I had time this holiday season to do some baking.

I played with Bob's Red Mill 1 to 1 Gluten free flour.  Most of the time it behaves just like regular flour. It's a straight replacement and works well for people who must avoid gluten.

I can't eat grains without alarming my auto-immune but gluten-free grains are easier on my system than wheat flour.

This is an amazing flour for Biscotti. I made lemon biscotti and the 1 to 1 flour gave them the perfect dryness.  I just used the first recipe I found online - they are nearly all the same. 

I drizzled mine with dark and white chocolate and they were perfect for dipping in our morning coffee. 

My next cookie is an old Betty Crocker recipe that goes by the name of Cream Wafers. 

My sister discovered this cookie when she was baking for a wedding a long time ago. These are little bite-size cookies that melt in your mouth. The wafers are like a pie crust with frosting between. I will say Bob's red mill 1 to 1 flour made them super melty in your mouth.

You roll them out as thin as you can and then cut with 1 to 1 1/2 inch cookie cutters. Then you sluice them through some granulated sugar and lay them on a cookie sheet. With your biggest fork, prick them like saltine crackers. Bake for just 7 minutes.

However, half of them were so fragile, they broke just moving from the cookie sheet to my counter. I made the frosting as loose as I could but still had some serious airplane disasters. The poor little gingerbread men lost legs and heads at an alarming rate.

I had made a couple of batches of chocolate chip cookies with this gluten free flour and noticed that my cookies were drier than usual. More crumbly after a few days. Someone suggested adding more butter, so I kept this in mind when I made the Cream Wafer dough.

The stars lost their pointy bits

 The pile of broken bits were eaten up anyway. This little cookie is a holiday favorite. I get requests all the time. Next time, I might try half Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free flour and half regular wheat flour and see it this helps keep them less fragile but still delicate to melt in your mouth. The ones that survived were a fantastic texture but too delicate for me being in my usual hurry.

 I also made my traditional Danish Puff Pastry - also from an old Betty Crocker cookbook but lost the taste for playing and used regular flour instead. It's difficult to experiment, especially at holidays where the pressure is on to have the usual tried and true delectable treats.

It was fun to play with Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free 1 to 1  flour with several recipes back to back. I have a good sense of how it works for me now. And it's way better than the old gluten free method of combining four or five different flours to get the texture you want (plus the xanthum gum...).

Both my kids came home. I like to think it's my danish puff that brings them home but it's probably the lottery scratch off tickets that Santa gives out in the Christmas stockings.

 In other news, my dear sewing friend Kyle, made a month by month calendar featuring her bags she has sewn in the last few years. I love this idea and the thoughtfulness of sharing. What better way to acknowledge what we make than to celebrate it.


I'm still working long hours after a co-worker suffered an on-the-job injury that the supervisor is trying to bury under the rug and not do workman's comp paperwork.

 
I'll leave you with a beautiful Oregon coast photo that my son took the day before Christmas.
Both of my kids really enjoy photography and get very creative.

Boring Sewing

On Sunday, I surprised myself with energy to complete several "must do" projects around the house. Usually, on laundry day, I spend some much needed time recovering from the work week, getting myself in shape to go another week at work.
Especially after the last two weeks of copious amounts of overtime.

I finished voting (Oregon is a  Vote-By-Mail state ). Wrote four thank-you letters, readied my Halloween care packages, paid bills - cleaning off my kitchen island counter in the process.

I re-strung my Duette honeycomb blind (hunter douglas) - Thank You Youtube! After 26 years, the strings are starting to give up the ghost due to reefing on the strings and the dratted UV sunlight.

 I couldn't find the 9mm cord locally. I had to order online - found a seller in Florida who included a recipe for Pumpkin bread staple to her packing slip (sweet).


I then made chocolate chip cookies on my cleared off island. I wrapped several bundles for the freezer to go into the aforesaid care packages.

And I sewed.

I did some fun sewing right off the bat - playing with black & white patchwork to make some boring hotpads be spectacular. Then I did the chore sewing.

No photos because swearing was involved. I sewed together some 1/2 inch felt strips to go under the windshield of the Piper J-5. Didn't have to be awesome sewing because a flange seal goes over the top.

The problem lay with the copious amount of spary adhesive used by the hubby and the hissy fit  my sewing machine pitched. That adhesive gummed up everything,. The needle, the thread, me.

My intention was to sew two parallel lines for durability but my sanity won out when I told my hubs that one line of stitching was all he was gonna get.

I printed shipping labels for my packages (four!) and also wrote some other letters (8!).

Between  my split shift on Monday, I finished putting together my care packages.
I was sending trail mix to the nephews and needed halloween chocolate eyeballs to make eyeball stew.


DS camped near Mt. Jefferson this weekend and got these photos for me.

Fresh snow on Mt. Jefferson

Mt. Jefferson

DD is now in Latvia, having given Estonia her best. This is The Armoury Bar.

Bob's Red Mill 1 to 1 Baking Flour

 Chocolate Chip Cookies. 10 dozen.
Made for the drug dealer son and the freezer.

I made them with Bob's Red Mill 1 to 1 Baking Flour - make your recipes gluten free.

By far and away -  the easiest gluten free flour I've ever used.
Exchange it for 1 cup of regular flour. I've used it in several recipes and I can't tell the difference. Cakes are moist, Cookies are crisp and chewy.

The 1 to 1 flour made these with a nice crackle surface. Very pretty.

I have reached that age in my life where I need to store flour in the fridge. I rarely bake - I can't eat what I make as I eat very little grains. My kids are up and out of the house. I can bake for work but things have not been friendly there lately. 

I particularly WISH  ( please!) that Bob's Red Mill would change their packaging to a ziploc-style closure. They are packaged in cellophane bags which have to be closed somehow. I always throw them into a ziploc bag once opened to keep pantry moths out and because I've had that cellophane tear and produce a mess. So - Bob's Red Mill - if you are listening??? Ziploc closure would be very welcome.

 I also made some Daffodil pens for work today. I buy the cheap back-to-school (already?) pens, drill holes in the end and hot glue the flower stem inside and then wrap with floral tape. Easy peasy.
 
 My only rule is extreme cheapness. The daffodils came from an estate sale - marked 25 cents. She threw them in as a bonus.

While I have some customers who will steal even a flower pen, these tend to stay much longer than a naked pen.

Peanut Butter Cookies -- Gluten & Flour Free

These are all that are left. Easy recipe - you can find all sorts of versions online.

Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup fresh peanut butter (not jif or other 'processed')
1 cup granulated sugar (or be daring and do 1/2 cup each white & brown)
1 Egg
1 tsp Baking Soda, optional
1 tsp Vanilla (mine has no alcohol - Cook's Vanilla), optional

Mix. Small balls on baking sheet.
Criss - cross a fork over tops.
Bake 350' about 8 minutes.
Let cool before lifting them off sheet.

A Little Taste of Summer

Blueberry Muffins.

Need I say more?

Well, okay - Here's the recipe.

I've had it over 30 years and I probably took it from The Oregonian's Food Day insert.

Blueberry Yogurt Muffins.

1 3/4 cup Flour
1/2 tsp Salt
1/2 Cup Sugar
2 tsp. Baking Powder
2 Eggs
1/4 cup melted Butter
3/4 cup Plain Yogurt
1 1/2 cup Blueberries.

Mix just until moistened, adding blueberries at the last.
Bake 375' in muffin tin for 20 - 25 minutes.
Makes at least 12 muffins.

Gluten Free White Birthday Cake

Bakery Girl's Gluten Free White Cake

1 cup Butter
1 Cup Sugar
4 Eggs & 1 Yolk
3/4 tsp Hazelnut Extract
1 1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract
1/3 Cup Millet Flour
2/3 Cup Sorghum Flour
1/3 Cup Tapioca or Potato Starch
2 tsp Baking Powder
1/4 tsp  Salt

Preheat oven to 350'.
Grease & Flour cake pans. I used 2x 8" pans.

Mix all flours, bak. pwd. & salt. Set aside.

Beat butter with electric mixer until light & fluffy.

Add sugar, beat again for several minutes until light & fluffy.

Add eggs, one at a time, beating 2 minutes after each egg.

Add extracts.

Fold flour mixture carefully so as to not lose the light softness that you spent several minutes mixing in.

Pour into/ fold into  prepared cake pans and smooth surface as best as you can.

Bake until the top is golden brown and a toothpick comes out shiny but not sticky - around 18 - 20 minutes. (I needed 22 minutes -- 8" pans?)

Remove from pans after about 10 minutes and let cool.

Because of the double extracts, this smells devine out of the oven. Mmm.
Be sure to beat and beat some more. Goal is to incorporate lots of air into this batter.

When queried, the birthday girl requested chocolate frosting. I made a simple buttercream.
Loose measurements are:

1/3 cup softened butter beaten with mixer.
Add two cups of Powdered sugar and beat so butter sticks to sugar.
Add about 1 capful from the jug of milk (~ tbsp)
Add 1 -2 squares of unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled a bit.
Add several Tbsps of powdered cocoa.
Add 1 capful of milk again until it starts looking like frosting.
Add up to two cups more of powdered sugar
Maybe another capful of milk

To spreading consistency. Finger licking is necessary.

And then - because I don't stock birthday candles or other decorations anymore, be creative for the decorations.
I had little valentine colored sprinkles that made the chocolate pop. Cute.
You could also utilize some flag toothpicks by glueing a triangle of paper to the tips as a flag.

And here was the best deal: Gluten-free baking (whatever your reasons) is done well by the combination of select & certain flours. Of which you buy the entire bag from Bob's Red Mill and because you infrequently bake (my health problems go beyond gluten), you are stuck with the remainder - all these bags piled into the fruit drawer of your fridge. I asked for and got nicely, the precise amount of flours direct from bakery girl. Beyond helpful to me.

A moist, light cake.

Technically, the extracts are in an alcohol (grain) base. Feel free to substitute but be mindful of the liquid replacement value.
Those specialty bags of flour store longer in the fridge.
Since the butter has salt in it, I added just a sprinkle.
I had minimal problems eating this cake. Two slices over two days.

Eggs & Chocolate

I decided to dye some easter eggs after seeing this great posy post.  She managed to dye her eggs with onion skins to a fabulous terra cotta color with the flora contrasting so well.

I bought four onions which I never have in my pantry (another food sensitivity of mine).
I peeled skins off the onions, cut sprigs of greenery and flowers from the garden, laid my frondy things onto the egg and wrapped them in sections of old pantyhose. Then, I boiled the funny wrapped eggs amongst the onion skins.

Admittedly, I forgot the vinegar.
More skins are better. My eggs are too light to show the botanicals. I did a zoombrowser contrast trick to get them past a  soft watercolor look.
I think I also read that Martha adheres her frondy things on with egg white.
While the house smelled like onions, the  eggs themselves did not taste onion-y.  We fortunately had yet another sighting of the sun yesterday with temperatures above 60'. Yes, it was prop the doors open and air the house out weather.
The clouds swallowed the sun around 4:30 --about when I finished unwrapping the eggs. I had to delay the photos until Easter Sunday.

The best flowers were the Leopard's Bane (daisy) and Veronica (small, spreading purple flower). They naturally wanted to conform to the egg shape (re-thinking the egg white glue).

Happy Easter everyone.



Drizzling Chocolate on the coconut macaroons.
Recipe here.
I thought about making a nest of the macaroon - the better to put jelly beans in.
In the end, I decided to drizzle the macaroons with chocolate. Spring treat for Easter dinner.
(all of the j.beans were sent off Monday to assorted Easter recipients)

Boring Amazing! chocolate drizzle video taken with my left-hand while drizzling with my right:

Hazelnuts Out My Ears

I was trying to sew yesterday. However my engineering was a tad off and I got smart and put my sewing away until the mojo returns.

I have 65# of cracked hazelnuts to pick the shells off.  I bought them Saturday from Melcher Farms near St. Paul. I've bought from them before and they have a consistent quality dried nut. They have hazelnut recipes on their web site.
We use them in baking and eating raw. The best way is to roast them in the oven and then rub the skins off.

I watched a Hallmark movie - can't remember the name - and separated nearly 20 #'s.

If you want to roast your own nuts, it's pretty simple and imparts a better nut intensity.

Place a single layer of nuts on a cookie sheet and place in a 300' oven for 20 - 30 minutes. For hazelnuts, you will see the skins start to crack. Take an old dishcloth and rub at the nuts. This will take off most of the skins.

I think this year it might have pencilled out to buy already shelled nuts as the shells account for at least 60% of the weight. 2/3 off the nuts will go to my sis in Minnesota.
My dream would be to find someone in Texas who has paper shell pecans who will trade for hazelnuts.

Pecans might be my favorite nut. They are very soft - softer than walnuts.
I used to bake quite a bit until I discovered all of my food allergies. Plus, my kids left home and my son tells me his girlfriend is baking him cookies now (boohoo).
I prefer pecans in carrot cake but I will use whatever nut I have in the house.
I also like to use them when I make cheese balls. They go inside the cream cheese mixture and I roll the balls in a chopped pecan and parsley mixture. Cheese balls still get made for the neighbors for Christmas.

Almonds have shown up on one of my food allergy panels so in order to try and stop a reaction to all nuts, I eat them sparingly. Currently, I make a gorp- aka trail mix of craisins, nuts, dark choc. chips, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds. This is a good take-along lunch for me if I have to work long hours.

So what was I sewing? Microwave Potato Bags. These make great Christmas gifts as well as stocking the bazaar I am  participating in this weekend.

This is a great fabric I picked up at Boersma's in McMinnville this summer. It has various flour mills' labels - one from Portland, Oregon. My little side research did not pull up a Forest Flour Mill in Oregon so maybe this is just a designer's dream.
All I sewed wrong was the envelope flap. Below - you can see it is going to turn up to be on the inside of bag instead of on the outside when I turn it.
The real problem was I did it both times. No learning curve here.

It's an easy fix. Slice through the serger stitches with my seam ripper and line up flap in the correct position and re-serge.  But since I did it twice, I figured I needed to go do something a bit more simple - like sorting nuts instead.

Tiny Pies And Tomatoes

It's been a bit fragmented this week. Putting the dog down on Saturday, getting caught up in the emotions, not eating right - well - it's been interesting.
I feel whiny to boot. My sketchy work situation is coming to a head but I'm tired of waiting for it to get resolved.  Since April, I have been  playing a huge game of poker at work. I feel it coming down to the wire but  I am tired of keeping my cards close to my chest (even though I will win in  the long run).
Rocket's death has made it difficult to focus on any thing in depth and I feel aggravated at the slow computer, my husband, life in general.
I have done yard work, filled in at work when the other employee needed some medical time off, sewed a few gifts which were hurriedly made and then stuffed into their packages. I canned my last batches of tomatoes and my only celebratory moment  was when I ran out of canning jars .
 I feel out-of-sorts in spite of accomplishing quite a few tasks.
Is it the full moon? The rain?

 I think I need some serious chocolate.

My husband had a hankering for apple pie so I made him two small pies which were just the right size for one person. I used a mixture of Granny Smith and Honey Crisp Apples.  I have two of these vintage pyrex personal pie dishes that I picked up at  a garage sale many years ago.

Tiny Blackberry Pies

I have been doing stuff on the computer lately and while I am computerizing I like to have the TV on in the background - literally - it's behind my computer chair. My ears perked up when they (?) mentioned Blackberry cobblers and pies which are so good this time of year.
I swiveled around to watch as the host put together individual Blackberry pies in small ramekins. My sister-in-law gave me some ramekins a few years back and they get a fair bit of use around here as the household size has diminished.
My ears stayed perked up because I had all the ingredients - except the blackberries and surely they would stock them at my grocery store. But no - I had to settle on frozen berries.

Anyway - you take a pre-made pie crust, unroll it and cut one in quarters. I only planned to make two so half of my pie crust went back in it's wrapper and back into the freezer.
You take the quarter pie crust and carefully fill a greased ramekin. Let the sides flop open for now.
Add your blackberries until level with the top- these juice - so don't overfill.

Sprinkle some sugar (1 tsp?) on top, add some orange zest and for a final touch add some Triple Sec or a little OJ.
Bring those floppy folds back over the center and tap down so it sits a tad rough looking.

Brush the tops with melted butter and sprinkle some coarse sugar on top (purely decorative).
I think I bought this bag of coarse sugar quite a few years ago. Either I am not baking enough or it is a really big bag of coarse sugar that takes a long time to use up. It does add a professional flair to your baked goods.

Anyway - throw these into a 350' oven for 35-45 minutes until the tops are browned lightly and the kitchen smells like warm blackberries.
Easy.
Tasty.



I  forgot to take a photo of the results but I think your imagination can get you there.
We've enjoyed these several times this season.

Heart Pops

I have made three batches - so far- of these zippy heart pops.

Unforgettable Kisses

Well- I nearly forgot about this recipe. And it is a cookie that I can eat!

These are very, very easy. You just whip those egg whites to stiff and add some sugar and food coloring and fold in some chocolate chips and then place in a warm oven overnight to set the meringue. They took me about 12 minutes to mix up and next morning, when I got up for work - there they were - all finished.

Our family has made these forever. I have no clue who to credit the recipe to.

Unforgettable Kisses

Preheat oven to 350'
Mix and beat stiff:
2 Egg Whites
1/4 tsp. Cream of Tartar

Add 3/4 cup Sugar - 1 Tbsp. at a time.
Beat stiff after each addition.

Add 2 -3 drops Food Coloring.
Fold in 2 - 3 cups Chocolate Chips (I added less than 2 cups)

Spoon onto cookie sheet, lined with wax paper or parchment paper.
Let sit overnight in oven. TURN-OFF-OVEN.

Makes ~ 3 dozen.

About the only thing I react to is the chocolate chips. You can substitute dark choc. chips for less dairy and soy.

I found a video on youtube if you still don't see how easy these are to make.
Tawnya is kind of a dweeb but in all probability, very famous. She also makes her Unforgettable Cookies slightly different than we do.

Holiday Baking

I'm a big fan of Amy Karol's blog, Angry Chicken. She lives here in Portland and her pre-holiday gift idea is worth borrowing.
She likes to come up with basic recipes and enhance them as she makes the item. One of her spice mixes caught my eye: Pumpkin Pie Spice. The blog entry is here.

 Cook's Vanilla is my favorite brand of vanilla. I started buying it at the grocery store  many years ago and then bit the bullet and now I order it once a year from the web site. I also like their lemon extract, peppermint extract and their vanilla powder. You can use the powder in Orange Julius's and in frosting. It's an off-white powder so it won't add color to whatever you are making.  

 

I thought how fun it would be to get some of this vanilla and make some pumpkin pie spice for friends and family who like to bake. Imagine how lovely it would be to get into the holiday baking spirit with a small package in the mailbox.

The most difficult part of making a quantity of pumpkin spice mix is converting tablespoons into cups, etc. Just to make sure, I hauled out my Betty Crocker cookbook with the cook's glossary. 4Tbsp. = 1/4 cup. Just so you know.

I had some little spice-type bottles but not enough. I finally found some on the bottom shelf at Fred Meyer's where they sell the kitchen gadgets. That was my biggest expense other than the vanilla. I bought the spices in bulk at Winco in their bulk foods department. They constantly turn over their stock so I feel assured of the quality.

For labels, I went very simple as  I really needed to post these to arrive before Thanksgiving. You can be as fancy as you need to be. I printed out these labels (after I changed out my color cartridge). I then hand-wrote the name of the spice, the year, a couple things you could do with the spice. Then I cut them out and glue-sticked them onto the jars.
---Here's another label idea from Martha.

  

Here's a sneak peek at what else I did this weekend.