Irish Soda Bread

I knew, I knew when I signed up for Tuesdays with Dorie 2.0 that my life gets busy, out of control, and that I sometimes work 14 hour days for weeks on end. In moderation is a fascinating phrase to me, one which I'm scarcely acquainted with. When I'm getting ready to go on vacation, I tend to work more than the average (normal) person, and the few weeks leading up to this recipe were no exception. Worse, M. was traveling, so I had absolutely no reason not to show up at work at 6:30 AM, and not go home before 8 or 9 or...worse.

In the middle of this insanity, it was time to make Irish Soda Bread from Baking with Julia. I literally threw this recipe together when I rolled out of bed at 5:15, and was still in my chair at work by 6:30, with warm bread for other lunatics coworkers who might show up around the same time. I used raisins, and I didn't plump them in spite of my better judgment, so they did look a little charred around the edges. No matter, this easy, delicious loaf was spectacular with softened butter and the odd crumbs I spotted on the carpet in our office were telltale evidence that this one was very popular.

If you'd like the recipe for this one, you can find it with either Cathy of My Culinary Mission or Carla of Chocolate Moosey.

Brioche Raisin Snails

When looking through the many recipes in Baking From My Home to Yours, this is the one that scared me the most, with the floating islands a close second. Long after I'd made brioche (several times), pastry cream (many times) and far more complicated desserts in the book, this recipe still intimidated me.

Now that I finally have made it I don't want to suggest that it was easy, but broken up over multiple days it's definitely manageable. How I did it was to make the brioche dough one night, the pastry cream another, roll the brioche out and fill it another day, and slice and bake it on the fourth day. That taught me a good lesson, that breaking baking projects up into manageable pieces makes recipes formerly out of my reach time-wise now eminently doable.

The results were, if not swoon-worthy, quite impressive. I was impressed that I had made something quite delicious that didn't look half bad. Amazing. I wish I didn't skip soaking the raisins (I would have bypassed the alcohol and used apple or orange juice) because it would have plumped them up and helped them withstand the heat of the oven better.

This recipe is another one down in my quest to complete all of the recipes in BFMHTY. Margaret and Nancy are also playing catch up. Please visit and cheer them on in their countdowns to completion.

If you'd like the recipe for these lovely pastries, you can find it on Laurie's post here.

Gingered Carrot Cookies

This week's Tuesdays with Dorie pick is gingered carrot cookies, selected by Natalia of Gatti Fili e Farina. Dorie relates that she was trying to capture the flavors of carrot cake in a cookie. The flavor of the carrots wasn't as prominent as she hoped but she liked the taste of the cookie as is.

These cookies have the flavors of ginger and nutmeg with raisins and toasted pecans added in for extra yumminess. I made these while I had a cold, and wasn't as in love with them as my tasters. My tasters were more enthusiastic about these cookies than practically any other chocolate-free cookie I've made. The texture is similar to a scone, flaky and light, yet chewy and chunky. People who don't usually care about cookies stopped me in the hallway to wax poetic about how fabulous these cookies were.

If you visit the other TWD bakers (you can find them here), you'll learn that the rest of them love Natalia as much as I do. Natalia and I are in several of the same blog groups and she is as talented as she is sweet and funny. She'll have recipe if you want to try these delicious treats.

TWD - Chockablock Cookies

Mary of Popsicles and Sandy Feet chose the last Tuesdays with Dorie recipe for the month of April. I love Mary, her stories, her self deprecating sense of humor, and her excitement when she finds something she's excited about.

I thought these cookies sounded so good (though I did substitute butter for the vegetable shortening) until I got to the part where you add molasses. Molasses, to chocolate chip cookies? Really? There was the sweetness of the chocolate chunks. The sweetness of the sugar. The sweetness from the coconut. And raisins. And Dorie wants me to add molasses, too? But I added it. And the cookies tasted more like toxic waste than cookies. I had to throw them away. I wrote my post, queued it up for today, and moved on.

A few weeks went by. The P&Q was posted and the other TWD bakers liked these cookies. Had I done something wrong? A peek at my bottle of molasses confirmed that I had. Dorie specifically said not to use blackstrap molasses, so I bought unsulphured.  See:

But a closer look at the ingredients revealed this:

No wonder they tasted like toxic waste.

So I bought another bottle of molasses and tried again, this time without the coconut and substituting dried cranberries for the raisins. They turned out less dark, and much tastier. Not my favorite, but definitely edible.

If you'd like the recipe, Mary will have it here. And check out the rest of the TWD bakers here. They used a variety of sweeteners to replace the molasses, some of which sounded very good to me.

Barefoot Bloggers - Raisin Pecan Oatmeal Cookies

Our first Barefoot Bloggers recipe this month is Raisin Pecan Oatmeal Cookies. I'm not a fan of raisins, nor of oatmeal raisin cookies. But I made them anyway. I kinda had to.

They were my pick.

Excuse me? You don't like raisins or oatmeal raisin cookies and you picked an oatmeal raisin cookie??

I know, I know. I had every intention of picking a savory recipe when my turn came. Like many of us, I belong to several baking groups and need recipes that can also double as dinner. But when I saw Ina Garten make these the other day, I couldn't wait to try them. Mine didn't turn out as lovely as hers, but who cares when they taste amazing? I toyed with replacing the raisins with dried cranberries but found an extra bag of raisins in my pantry. I used Vietnamese cinnamon and the flavor was fantastic. Honestly, the cookie dough was almost better than the baked cookie! And yes, they were good enough that I've overcome my dislike of raisins. Now THAT'S a great cookie.

Tips:

1. If you love cinnamon, don't be afraid to increase it a little.
2. I toasted my nuts, chopped them and them combined them (separating any raisins that were stuck together) in a large bowl with the raisins and oatmeal. I find this distributes the mix ins better.
3. If you wanted to reduce the raisins and add chocolate chips it would probably be pretty yummy.
4. I made some cookies flattened as Ina instructs and some unflattened, and thought the flattened ones were not chewy enough. If you prefer a thin, crisp cookie, flattened is the way to go. If you like chewy, don't flatten. They will flatten out some but will be chewier.
5. If you're going for chewy, pull the cookies out when the edge seems set but the middles are still a bit soft. Let them cool on the cookie sheet for a few minutes before transferring them to a cooling rack.

Oatmeal Raisin Pecan Cookies
Printable Recipe

Makes 30-35 cookies

1 1/2 cups pecans
1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup dark brown sugar, lightly packed
1 cup granulated sugar
2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon kosher salt

3 cups old fashioned oatmeal

1 1/2 cups raisins

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Place the pecans on a sheet pan and bake for 5 minutes, until crisp. Set aside to cool. Chop very coarsely.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy. With the mixer on low, add the eggs, one at a time, and the vanilla.

Sift the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt together into a medium bowl. With the mixer on low, slowly add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture. Add the oats, raisins, and pecans and mix just until combined.

Using a small ice-cream scoop or a tablespoon, drop 2-inch mounds of dough onto sheet pans lined with parchment paper. Flatten slightly with a damp hand. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until lightly browned. Transfer the cookies to a baking rack and cool completely.

BBA Rewind - Cinnamon Raisin Bagels

Pinch me, I must be dreaming.

I mean, bagels aren't made at home. They're made at the eponymous bagel shop. Usually they're big and doughy, and after eating one, you feel like you ate your pillow.

Peter Reinhart's bagels from The Bread Baker's Apprentice do not fall in this category. You make them in your own kitchen, no magic or special equipment needed. Nor do you feel like you swallowed a rock.

I know it sounds like science fiction, but it's true.

I made these the day after we lost Allie, and I made them because I thought it would give me something to occupy myself with, something I had looked forward to doing. See, it was the bagels I saw on some of my favorite blogs that made me consider doing something as crazy as buying a book about bread and making the recipes.

I tried to screw up. I was quasi-successful the first time, except I threw in the towel when I realized I had under-hydrated the soaker, tried mixing more water into the dough, and quickly saw it wasn't going to work. The dough went in the trash and I started again.

Even the second time, my brain wasn't completely engaged and I mixed the yeast in with the flour, salt etc. to add to the soaker. I put the soaker in the fridge while we ate a late lunch, but rescued it after a half an hour and proceeded with the recipe, even though the soaker was chilled. I then rested the portioned dough in the barely warm oven for over an hour, enough for the little balls of dough to swell up considerably, making it hard to peel them off the parchment for shaping. I used the rope method, not the hole punch after seeing so many comments about flat bagels when using the hole punching method. But they floated immediately, and off to the fridge to sleep they went.

While drinking my coffee the next morning, I brought a pot of water to a boil, tossed in the baking soda, and boiled the little darlings a few at a time. They looked pathetically scrawny, and I worried that they wouldn't turn out.

After baking, they looked like this:

But I still worried. What if they weren't fully baked?? 10 minutes in the oven doesn't seem like enough time. I needn't have worried. When I cut into one, this is what I saw:

Toasted and spread with butter, it was divine.

I wish I thought to take a beauty shot, but I was too intent on eating it while it was hot. I knew you'd understand.

TWD - Pumpkin Muffins

This week's Tuesdays with Dorie recipe was Pumpkin Muffins, chosen by Kelly of Sounding My Barbaric Gulp! My kitchen remodel started last week, so I baked these before the kitchen was demoed. It was kind of funny because the whole time I was supposed to be packing the kitchen, I was obsessing about how many weeks of TWD I'd have to miss. I'm so happy I fit these in before the excitement began.

The recipe "looks" like it will be one of those good-for-you ones that can't taste yummy because it's too healthy. Not this one. Even though it does have pumpkin, nuts and sunflower seeds, it still tastes like an indulgent treat you can enjoy while feeling smug about consuming something that is healthier than most muffins. I chose to bake the recipe as written, but I loved reading about all of the possible variations (check out the blogroll for what the other TWD bakers dreamed up).  

I baked a double batch so I wouldn't have leftover pumpkin (check out the pumpkin gnocchi Kristen made here). I was tempted not to fill up the muffin cups in case they rose a lot, but they didn't. I was rewarded with big muffins that were subtly flavored and delicious with a cup of coffee. I'm not a huge fan of pumpkin or raisins, but I LOVED these. For a decadent treat, try them with Trader Joe's Pumpkin Butter. They were very popular at work, even with people who don't gravitate to sweets. They were done before the recipe indicated I should check them, but they weren't overly dry. 

These will become a staple in my baking rotation. They're easy to make, delicious, quasi-healthy and offer lots of room for variation. Some variations I'm toying with include adding chocolate chips (big thumbs up from the other bakers), topping with granola instead of sunflower seeds, grated apple in place of the raisins, toasted pecans for the walnuts I used, and subbing crystalized ginger or Craisins for the raisins (Craisins were another hit with the TWD bakers).

If you're interested in the recipe, you'll find it here. Better yet, check out the book that inspired Tuesdays with Dorie, Baking: From My Home to Yours. If you want to join this great group of bakers from around the world, now is the time.  After October 31st, the group won't be open to new members. Here's how to join the fun.