Tuesdays with Dorie BWD: Whip-It-Up-Quick Cornbread
February 8, 2022 at 1:30 pm | Posted in breakfast things, BWD, groups, other savory, quick breads, savory things, snacks, tuesdays with dorie | 4 CommentsTags: baking, cheese, savory
Seems like I’m always looking for something to go with a pot of chili this time of year, and I think I’ve found it with this Whip-It-Up-Quick Cornbread. A buttermilk cornbread you can bake right in a skillet, this one really does come together in a jiffy, and it has a plush, moist crumb. One of the best I’ve made. You can leave it plain or go wild with your fave add-ins. I used some hot pepper flakes, chives and a bit of white cheddar.
If you don’t have the book Baking with Dorie: Sweet, Salty & Simple by Dorie Greenspan, get it and join us as we bake through it every second and fourth Tuesdays! Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and all the other participation deets over on Tuesdays with Dorie!
Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Swedish Dream Cookies
February 1, 2022 at 6:22 pm | Posted in cookies & bars, DC, groups, sweet things, tuesdays with dorie | 5 CommentsTags: baking, cookies
I do dream of going to Sweden, and I hope one day that will happen, but for now my Scandi fantasies will have to be lived out with Swedish Dream Cookies. These cookies are called drömmar in Sweden, and a quick on-line search showed me there are many ways to make these shortbread-esqe treats, but Dorie’s recipe uses browned butter and cardamom for the dreamiest of flavors. They’re made in the food processor, and I zipped up the cardamom and sugar in the machine first to get a bit of extra spice hit. After scooping out rounds of dough, you can press an almond in the center or add a bit of jam, thumbprint-style, if you want them a bit sweeter. I went with the whole almonds and I like the look, but I’m now dreaming of them with a chocolate button on top, since I think that would be good with the browned butter, too.
For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll!
Everyday Dorie: Cauliflower Tabbouleh
January 28, 2022 at 5:44 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, salads, savory things, veggies | 3 CommentsTags: everyday dorie, salad, savory
Cauliflower– it’s so hot right now. Turns out that something once viewed as boring, pale and bland has the “caulipower” to transform itself into pizza crust, rice, tots, and a cream sauce substitute. No longer do we over-steam and under-season hacked up crumbly florets and toss them in melted butter so we can sadly choke them down; we gleefully and wildly slather cauliflower with every spice and paste we can get our hands on and roast it whole (one of my favorite ways to prepare it, btw) or deep fry it in nugget-form and drench it in delicious sauce. We even eat the leaves, which just a few years ago were generally regarded as trash. And now we make Cauliflower Tabbouleh out of it! I joke. I eat tons of cauliflower, and have nothing but supreme veggie respect for it. In fact, two weeks ago I got my teeth whitened and it sustained me for four days in a row, in the forms of pureed cauliflower-potato soup and cauliflower cheese pasta.
Back to the matter at hand…when I think of tabbouleh, I think of a salad that’s very heavy on the chopped herbs, with a little tomato and bulgur mixed through. An herb salad really, rather than a grain salad. This one of Dorie’s is definitely cauliflower-based– the cauliflower this time standing in for bulgur– but there’s room to mess around with ratios, mix-ins and seasonings if you’d like. I stuck pretty much to Dorie’s suggestion of chickpeas, raisins, almonds, mint and parsley mixed into grated cauliflower and tossed up in a lemony dressing. I made a nice big bowl of the stuff, and it was a good lunch for a couple of days.
Dorie recommends tasting the salad after it’s assembled to adjust the seasoning and then letting the salad sit for an hour or more before plating it up. I tasted mine yet again after it rested, as I find I usually like a little fresh lemon squeeze and olive oil drizzle right before serving.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see what we all thought.
Tuesdays with Dorie BWD: Steph’s Bakewell Tart
January 25, 2022 at 11:22 pm | Posted in breakfast things, BWD, groups, muffins/quick breads, sweet things, tuesdays with dorie | 9 CommentsTags: baking, tart
My name is Steph and this is my tart, but I am not the Steph behind this recipe for Steph’s Bakewell Tart. A Bakewell is a classic British tart (any GBB fans out there?), with a layer of raspberry jam hiding under cakey almond cream, all baked together in a shortcrust pastry case. This particular version comes from Dorie’s friend, Stephanie, in Paris, who got it from her English mum. I’ve made Bakewell tarts before…first here years ago, and several times since, too. I like the combo of almonds and raspberries a lot, but you can use any jam you want. This is a pretty easy tart to put together, as you can make the components ahead of time, and of course you can buy the jam. Once baked, a drizzle of icing on the top is just, well, the icing on the cake (or tart)!
If you don’t have the book Baking with Dorie: Sweet, Salty & Simple by Dorie Greenspan yet, get it and join us as we bake through it every second and fourth Tuesdays! Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and all the other participation deets over on Tuesdays with Dorie!
Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Bruno’s New Year’s Waffles
January 18, 2022 at 12:01 am | Posted in cookies & bars, DC, groups, sweet things, tuesdays with dorie | 6 CommentsTags: baking, cookies
Maybe we are getting to the point in January where we are no longer really celebrating the new year, but I’m giving it one last toast with Bruno’s New Year’s Waffles. I almost skipped these waffles, which are more like thin wafers, because the recipe uses a pizzelle iron to cook them. I don’t have one. In fact, I think that out of the group, Diane is the only one who does…but that didn’t stop Gaye, who used a sandwich press, or Mardi, who used a griddle pan, from getting them done, so I really didn’t have an excuse to sit them out. With two good ways to hack the cooking process explained, I wondered if there could be a third. Made with a stiff dough rather than a loose batter, these thin, crispy waffles sounded a bit like Dutch stroopwafels (which I have only consumed, never made), especially since Dorie recommends sandwiching them with a filling. I spent some time thinking about how I could get them as thin as reasonably possible and decided to try out my tortilla press. I did only a fourth of the recipe and made them larger than Dorie and Bruno do, getting eight cookies in total. I weighed out my dough balls (about 20g each), gave them each a very firm pressing, and then transferred the resulting circles to my comal to crisp up. I did trim the ratty edges with a cutter while the cookies were still hot.
I’m sure they weren’t as delicate as they would have been in a pizzelle iron, but I was pretty happy with how my waffles came out. They cooled caramelized and crisp, and I sandwiched them with some leftover dark chocolate glaze I had in the fridge. I heated up some classic hot chocolate from Dorie’s xoxoDorie newsletter to enjoy them with, for an extra happy new year treat.
For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll!
Everyday Dorie: Stuffed Cabbage
January 14, 2022 at 12:01 am | Posted in breakfast things, cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, savory things, veggies | 2 CommentsTags: everyday dorie, savory, vegetables
Stuffed Cabbage is a recipe that might be more appropriate for a book called All Day Dorie than Everyday Dorie. Never mind the three hours of cooking time (hands-off, in the oven, no big deal), I think I probably spent close to two hours assembling the dish. No joke, I had to take a coffee break in the middle of it. But that’s ok– I did it on a cold, grey weekend day when I didn’t want to leave the house and was up for a kitchen project.
I’d never made stuffed cabbage rolls before. I don’t eat ground beef or pork sausage, so I swapped these filling meats for ground chicken and turkey sausage. I couldn’t see how I could successfully get the cabbage leaves off the head in one untattered piece without blanching the whole head, so I just did that, rather than blanch the individual leaves as Dorie instructs. It was a process of removing a few leaves at a time and re-dipping the head in water to easily peel off the next layer, and I do have some leftover blanched cabbage still on the head, but I’ll use that in a soup or make okonomiyaki with it this week. I was able to fill and roll the leaves pretty easily and I skipped the step of securing them each with a toothpick. They were fine.
For the tomato sauce, I didn’t pay attention (i.e., I totally didn’t tread the instructions first) to the fact that the ingredients were supposed to go into the Dutch oven in layers along with the assembled rolls. Instead, everything for the sauce went into the pot at once and I snuggled all the rolls down into the mix. I was kind of irritated with myself, but figured that the cook time was so long that all would be fine. And it was! These are a delicious winter dinner (or a few dinners–even a half-batch was a big batch). I didn’t really know what to serve the cabbage rolls with, as they’re kind of complete on their own, with a meat and rice filling, veggies and a sauce. I just went with a little cucumber and sour cream salad and sprinkled some crispy fried onions on top. I also meant to sprinkle the rolls with parsley, but after all that time putting them together, I completely forgot.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.
Tuesdays with Dorie BWD: Grain and Seed Muffins
January 11, 2022 at 11:42 pm | Posted in breakfast things, BWD, groups, muffins/quick breads, sweet things, tuesdays with dorie | 9 CommentsTags: baking, muffins
Grain and Seed Muffins are about as healthy as my baking gets around here. These aren’t cake-for-breakfast muffins– they are full of good-for-you stuff, like whole wheat flour, wheat bran, oats and sunflower, sesame and flax seeds. I needed a trip to the bulk bins to get these ones done. Dorie suggests that the sunflower seeds should be raw, but does a raw sunflower seed really even taste like anything? I chose to toast all the seeds, and I even toasted the oats and wheat bran while I was at it. The muffins came together easily and were lightly sweet from maple syrup and brown sugar. I liked them best warm, with a swipe of sweet and salty maple butter. I felt like my grandma, warming my bran muffin and spreading it with butter, but grandmas know best, right?
If you don’t have the book Baking with Dorie: Sweet, Salty & Simple by Dorie Greenspan yet, get it and join us as we bake through it every second and fourth Tuesdays! Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and all the other participation deets over on Tuesdays with Dorie!
Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Portofignos
January 4, 2022 at 9:54 am | Posted in cookies & bars, DC, groups, sweet things, tuesdays with dorie | 3 CommentsTags: baking, cookies
I like a good pun, and calling cookies containing port-plumped dried figs “Portofignos” made me giggle. Dorie points out that the chocolate dough that forms the base of these slice-and-bake cookies is similar to that of her famous World Peace Cookies, but that the bits of toasted walnuts and boozy figs that stud it take things in a new direction. Although I’ve been to Italy zero times and to Portugal only one time more that that, I know Portofino is not even close to where port wine is from…but I’m guessing the direction we are headed is somewhere on the sea, enjoying the good life with a glass of fortified sweet wine and couple of chocolate cookies. I’m very happy to go wherever that is right now, even if it’s just in my imagination.
For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll!
Tuesdays with Dorie BWD: Mokonut’s Rye-Cranberry Chocolate Chunk Cookies
December 28, 2021 at 10:50 pm | Posted in BWD, cookies & bars, groups, sweet things, tuesdays with dorie | 8 CommentsTags: baking, cookies
I remember a couple of years ago when this recipe for Mokonut’s Rye-Cranberry Chocolate Chunk Cookies appeared in Dorie’s NY Times column. They seemed to be popping up, not just at the little Parisian restaurant where Dorie fell in love with them, but in kitchens everywhere, and they always looked so good. They made it onto that mental list I have of things I want to bake and then totally forget about (maybe I should start a notebook for that list??). Thankfully they also made it into Dorie’s new book, and into our TWD rotation…so now they have finally made it into my kitchen.
These cookies have quite the ingredient combo: more rye flour than AP, dried cranberries, chunks of bittersweet chocolate and poppy seeds, so many poppy seeds! They bake up chubby but get flattened down with a tap of a spatula, which makes them really chewy and gives them lots of bumps and crackles. The cookies are golden on the outside, but poppy seed grey on the inside. They hit all types of flavor and texture notes…sweet, tart, salty, earthy, chewy, seedy. Deliciously interesting, for sure!
If you don’t have the book Baking with Dorie: Sweet, Salty & Simple by Dorie Greenspan yet, get it and join us as we bake through it every second and fourth Tuesdays! Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and all the other participation deets over on Tuesdays with Dorie!
Tuesdays with Dorie BWD: Cheese Puffers
December 28, 2021 at 10:25 pm | Posted in breakfast things, BWD, groups, savory things, tuesdays with dorie, yeast breads | 6 CommentsTags: baking, cheese, savory
I’ve never really thought about what would happen if a muffin and a popover had a baby, but apparently it would be a Cheese Puffer. Made like a popover that’s baked in a muffin tin, these are heavy on the cheddar cheese. I guess that cheddar-weight is why they don’t really “popover,” but they are custardy, with melty cheese pockets (I used my favorite Trader Joe’s Unexpected Cheddar) and bits of chopped scallion on the inside, and a beautiful golden brown crust. I scaled back the recipe to just get these four…two were had with chili one night, and the other two with eggs in the morning.
If you don’t have the book Baking with Dorie: Sweet, Salty & Simple by Dorie Greenspan, get it and join us as we bake through it every second and fourth Tuesdays! Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and all the other participation deets over on Tuesdays with Dorie!
Baked Fresh Weekly
Blog at WordPress.com.
Entries and comments feeds.
a whisk and a spoon 