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Not As Good As Pork Cracklins

misadventures in cooking

Saturday, January 26, 2008

Orange & Chocolate Bread Puddings




The aforementioned challah does indeed make excellent french toast. But there was still plenty left for bread pudding, and this recipe from Fine Cooking #62 caught my eye a long time ago. I was too full after dinner last night to eat one for dessert, so I had mine today for breakfast. Coffee and sweets are so good together.

I love the combination of chocolate and orange (oh those dark chocolate crackles!!) but this might have been a little too much chocolate - it overpowered the orange. Still, it's hard to complain about yummy bread pudding for breakfast.

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Challah



This recipe is from Beth Hensperger's Bread Made Easy. About a year ago, I made her Milk Bread, which was excellent.

I had trouble deciding whether the dough was too sticky and I should add more flour. Seems to be my standard dilemma when baking a bread recipe for the first time. And it usually turns out just fine and I wonder why I worried.



This bread is rich with eggs and oil, slightly sweet from honey, and very good warm from the oven. I suspect it will be even better with jam. If it lasts long enough, I plan to make either french toast or bread pudding with it, both of which are classic uses for day-old challah.

Of course if it doesn't last long enough, that's ok. Because I definitely need to practice braiding. I might give RLB's recipe a try for the sake of comparison.

Friday, January 18, 2008

Bite-Size Ginger Cupcakes



Jess & Jon were here for dinner tonight, and for dessert we had Bite-Size Ginger Cupcakes with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting (Fine Cooking #64). Since they've been on my to-do list for a long, long time and since both Jess and I adore ginger, it seemed like a good time to finally bake them. I love them!

Jess seemed to like them too :)

Friday, January 11, 2008

Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day



My friend Sheri over at Pork Cracklins emailed me with a great idea: She received a book as a gift called Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, and asked if I wanted to bake it together (long-distance) as a project. Fun! I knew I was "in" as soon as she suggested it.

She chose the European Peasant Bread for us to begin with. I liked that idea too, because it has a little bit of rye and whole wheat flours in it.

The method really is as easy as the title implies. You pre-mix and refrigerate enough dough for 4 smallish loaves of bread. On the day you want to bake, you pull off a hunk, form a rough boule, let it rest, and bake. Voila. Fresh bread.



For more hints, suggestions and fun reading, check out the authors' blog at www.artisanbreadinfive.com