Blackberry Pie

We were given some fresh blackberries. And I like pie. So I made pie. We really enjoyed it. 

Ingredients:

3½ cups (to maybe 4 cups) fresh blackberries

½ cup white sugar, more or less, to taste, divided

½ cup (maybe a little less) all-purpose flour

1 (9 inch) double crust ready-to-use pie crust

2 tablespoons milk

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 425F (220C)

• Load one pie crust onto pie plate. 

• Save out a TBSP of sugar. Combine the rest of the sugar with the flour and the berries. 

• Put the second pie crust on top. Find a fancy way (or at least an efficient way) to seal the edges. 

• Brush the top of the pie with the milk and sprinkle the reserved TBSP of sugar on top. (This would be a good place for fancy large-crystal sugar, wouldn't it?). 

• Cut 3 or 4 modest size vent holes. Be creative with them if you feel like it. 

• Bake 20 minutes at 425F. Reduce to 375F (190C)  until filling is bubbly and crust is golden brown, an additional 25 to 30 minutes. 

• Bring it out and let it cool on a wire rack or such for at least half an hour. 

• Serving suggestion: serve with vanilla ice cream of some sort. 

• In a day or two, it should look like this:

Comment: We really loved this pie. This recipe is absolutely a keeper.

 

Whole Wheat Sourdough Bread

Ingredients

For the Levain

100 grams sourdough starter
15 grams bread flour
15 grams whole wheat flour
5 grams rye flour
35 grams water

For the Autolyse

135 grams whole wheat flour
365 grams bread flour
425 grams water

For the Dough

70 grams of the levain
11 grams kosher salt, sea salt or other pure salt
2 tablespoon rice flour, or as needed for dusting banneton
2 ice cubes

Instructions

Make the levain: Weigh out the levain ingredients in a small bowl or jar (100g sourdough starter, 15g bread flour, 15g whole wheat flour, 5g rye flour, 35g water). Stir together, and leave at room temperature until very bubbly and doubled in size, about 5 hours.

Meanwhile, about 2 hours before the levain will be ready, perform the autolyse: Stir the 135g whole wheat flour, 365g bread flour, and 425g water together in a bowl. Let sit for about 2 hours. If levain is ready to use before the autolyse has gone a full 2 hours, proceed with mixing dough anyway.


Mix the dough: Weigh out 70g levain, and add to the top of the autolyse mixture of flour and water. Sprinkle salt around the edges. With damp hands, pull up and fold dough from edges to the middle, turning the bowl as you fold, until completely mixed. Cover; let rest for 15 minutes. Cover and return the excess levain to the refrigerator to use for a future batch of bread.

Perform first set of folds: Lift dough with wet hands at the edge and flop to the middle; turn the bowl a few inches and continue to flop and turn until dough begins to resist being pulled to the center. Repeat folds twice more, 15 minutes apart, covering dough in between.

Set a timer for 30 minutes. Now turn dough out onto counter, and perform the first stretch and fold. Stretch the dough into a rough 12-inch square. Pull 2 corners and fold the dough into thirds; then fold the top half to the bottom. Roll the dough forward, then form into a ball with a flat bench scraper; return dough to the bowl and cover.

Repeat the stretch and fold process 2 more times, 30 minutes apart. Cover; let dough bulk ferment until very bubbly and doubled in size, 4 to 5 hours.

Turn dough out onto counter, and pre-shape dough into a ball. Dust with flour, and let rest on the counter 30 minutes.

Perform the final shaping: Dust the counter with flour, and gently flop the dough over into the flour with the bench scraper. Again, perform a stretch and fold, but gently, to not deflate the dough. Shape into as high and round a ball as possible using the bench scraper. Dust the top with flour.

Generously dust a banneton with rice flour, Carefully slide the bench scraper under the dough, and turn it over into the banneton. Now, and this is optional, "stitch" the dough by bringing opposite pieces of the dough up, sticking them together in the center. Dust with a little flour.

Cover; proof dough in the refrigerator for 14 hours.

One hour before baking, place the pan you will bake the bread in, or a pizza stone, in the oven. and heat the oven to 500 degrees F (260 degrees C). (I cook it in the barbecue for a full loaf, or in a toaster oven for tiny loaf cooked in the smallest cast iron frying pan.)

After 1 hour of preheating, turn dough out of banneton onto parchment, and score 1/4-inch deep with a razor or sharp thin knife. Place in bread pan, add 2 ice cubes to the pan; cover.

Bake for 20 minutes at 500 degrees F (260 degrees C). Remove cover, lower the heat to 450 degrees F (240 degrees C), and bake an additional 35 minutes, or until desired doneness.

Let cool 1 hour before slicing. 

(Adapted from https://cutt.ly/Tek207wB)

Atholl Brose Oatmeal Cookies

When you make Atholl Brose, you’ll have leftover whiskey-soaked oats. This is something worthwhile you can make with them.  These are really quite good.

 

Ingredients:

½ cup oats, soaked in whiskey, now ¾ cup in volume

3 TBSP salted butter, softened

¼ cup brown sugar, packed

2 TBSP granulated sugar

¼ teaspoon baking soda

1 egg yolk, large

¼ tsp vanilla extract (bourbon vanilla is best)

⅓ cup all purpose flour

¼ tsp cinnamon

healthy pinch of salt

Instructions:

• Pre-heat oven to 325°F (160°C).

• Mix butter and both sugars until well blended.

• Add egg yolk & vanilla. Mix well.

• Add whiskey-soaked oats. Mix it together well.

• Ideally, mix all dry ingredients together separately & add to these wet ingredients. (But I just mixed them all in, and mixed really well.)

• Spoon scoops onto a silicon baking mat on a baking sheet, or use parchment. Space about 2 inches. I got 8 medium sized cookies from this recipe.

• Bake for 6 – 8 minutes. Watch carefully; these will want to spread out a lot.

• Cool on the silicon mat for a few minutes and then on a cooling rack.

Suggestion: Serve with Athol Brose. Or vanilla ice cream.

Lemon Peel Bread

Ingredients:

1 Half-batch no-knead dough

1 fresh lemon, with peel, sliced thinly, then partially dehydrated (just enough to be able to chop it finely without losing juice [flavor] all over), and chopped finely.

1/4 of an orange, peel only, chopped finely. 

1/4 cup pistachio nuts, chopped finely. 

1/3 cup cashew nuts, chopped finely. 

2 tsp monk fruit sweetener. 

2 tsp fresh rosemary, chopped finely. 

Instructions: 

◾ Make the no-knead dough, according to the recipe. Note: make it a little softer or wetter than firm. 

◾ Prove the dough for an hour (until it's doubled).

◾ Mix all of the filling ingredients together and let them soak while the bread proves. 

◾ When the dough is proved, mix the filling in with the dough. Suggested: roll the dough out to a 7" (or so) square; spread filling on that square, roll the dough back up. (At this point, it might be interesting to slice the roll like cinnamon rolls, or to roll the new loaf from the end, mixing the ingredients more evenly, or to just bake it as a filled roll.)

◾ Bake at 350 for 35 or 40 minutes. 

 

Makes one medium-sized loaf.

Note: hot slices just cut off the just-baked loaf with butter: excellent.

 

Source: The idea just occurred to me as I was watering the lemon tree. 

No Knead 4-ingredient Bread

Ingredients:                    Full                      Half                  ¾         
325ml 100º warm water  [11.5 oz]              [6 oz]                [9 oz]
3g yeast                           [1 tsp]                  [½ tsp]              [1 tsp]
425g bread flour              [3 3/8 cups]         [1¾ cups]         [2¾ cups]
   (I used plain flour; worked fine.)
10g salt                            [1 2/3 tsp]            [¾ tsp]              [1 tsp]
Plus a little flour (for dusting)

• My first attempt was with half a batch. I added olives and roasted garlic and olive oil. Worked well. Tasty. 
• Second attempt, also half a batch, but the dough was too firm. Added more warm water and 2 TBSP olive oil. Accidentally gave it more time to prove. Liked it a lot!
• Updated to ¾ size later. Seems to fill a loaf pan better.

Instructions

- Once you’ve added all of the ingredients, use a spatula to bring it together the dough will be quite sticky.

-Cover and allow to rest for an hour in a warm place (on top of an active oven seemed to work).

-After the dough has rested, dip your fingers in water to avoid sticking, and bring the dough together stretching and folding each corner of the dough toward the center.

-Rest the dough for maybe 30 mins in a warm place.

-Make sure you flour the surfaces well. Tip the dough onto your work surface. Cut into 4 or 5 portions. Shape the dough as you like. 

- Free-form loaves on a floured parchment or silicon baking sheet, or in a floured or oiled baking pan.

-I shaped one piece into a small loaf, and slathered the other in oil (oil the bread pan before loading it, oil on top) and pushed some roasted garlic & green olives into the surface before baking. More oil on top.

-Bake in 400 degree (200c) oven until golden brown.

• The basic loaf [left] was fine. The oiled-up loaf with garlic & olives [above] was really nice. 

• Opinion: This dough would likely work pretty well as a pizza dough, or as a wrapping for meat rolls.

-----

Alternative: Split the (half recipe) dough in half, spread out to a rectangle, spread dried tomatoes, roasted garlic (both cubed), and green olives and rolled them up, placing them in an oiled & floured half-size bread pans.

Proved them for maybe 30 minutes and popped them into a 400 degree oven, which I reduced to 350 when I saw how much they were rising. They took 25 minutes to reach golden brown. 

Later filling: 

¾ cups coarsely chopped kalamata olives
6 cloves garlic, roasted & coarsely chopped
½ cup dried tomatoes, coarsely chopped
1 baby red pepper, finely chopped
1 tsp Herb de Provence seasoning
¼ cup chopped parsley
¼ cup chopped cashews
1 TBSP Dukkah mixture
2 TBSP olive oil
Mix it all together & spread across dough, mixing it in. Much better.

 
Next time: half olives & half roasted garlic cloves or chunks of sun-dried tomato? [Tried it. Very nice. Next time add balsamic vinegar and chunks of feta cheese & roll the dough thinner.]

Some time I want to use the same technique, but fill it with meats and roast peppers, fajita style. Add shredded cheese before rolling up. Maybe.

Chicken Turnovers

Ingredients (makes 6 turnovers):

1 Chicken Breast, cubed to ½”, room temperature

2 Sausages, cubed to ½”, room temperature

¼ cup finely chopped onion

1 TBSP fresh garlic, minced

½ cup shredded (or cubed to <¼”) cheddar cheese

1 tsp fresh tarragon, finely minced.

Lemon pepper to taste

Salt to taste

Phyllo dough

An egg (for egg wash)

Instructions:

• Thaw the phyllo dough. Preheat [toaster] oven to 350°.

• Combine filling ingredients in a bowl. Mix thoroughly. Season well (don’t skimp).

• Cut 8” circles out of the dough. Put ½ to ¾ cup of the filling in (be generous). Fold over, and seal the edges using either water and crimping or egg wash.

• Egg wash the top. This makes a big difference.

• Bake at 350° for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.

Comments:

○ This is worth remembering. Also, this is worth refining some more.

○ I made this recipe because I had some phyllo dough to use up, not because phyllo is the best pastry for this. Next time, I might use pie crust or shortcrust pastry. 

 

○ The tarragon was not amazing. Maybe sage? Rosemary? Tomato & basil? Dehydrated lemon might be good with the tarragon, sage or rosemary. 

○ I forgot to put the cheese in. Oops. Needed it.

○ Needs more veggies! Double the onion. Maybe add celery. I considered putting some frozen corn in; that would have been good. Some diced tomatoes might be good too, maybe with basil more than tarragon.

Basic Banana Bread

 
INGREDIENTS

2 large eggs
½ cup granulated sugar
2 TBSP stevia powder (or more sugar)
8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter, melted
1 TBSP buttermilk powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3-4 medium bananas, very ripe
1¼ - 1½ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup shredded coconut or coconut flour
1 tsp baking soda
½ - ¾ cup chopped nuts (I use cashews)
¼ tsp salt (optional if using salted butter)
Cooking spray or parchment paper.

INSTRUCTIONS
• Heat the oven to 350°F. Arrange a rack so top of pans will be in the center of the [toaster] oven.

• Melt the butter in the microwave. (Word to the wise: do not over-melt! Messy!)

• Crack eggs into mixer bowl. Mix on medium for a minute or two. Add sugar, stevia and vanilla and continue mixing until smooth.

• Add the over-ripe bananas piece by piece. Mix aggressively for a while. 

• Add the flour, baking soda, and salt. Keep mixing. Add a TBSP or two of milk only if the batter needs thinning.

• Add the chopped nuts & mix them in. 

• Spray the insides of two 8x4 (medium sized) bread pans with oil, then coat the oil with flour. Or line them with parchment paper. (Parchment is preferred.)

• Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan.

• Bake for 35 to 45 minutes. Bake until the top of the cake is caramelized dark and a toothpick or knife poked into the middle comes out clean. Baking time will vary — start checking around 30 minutes.

• Cool in the pan for 10 minutes.
 
• Remove from pan and cool another 10 minutes on cooling rack.

• Enjoy with friends.

 

Baked Salmon and Herbs

Serves 2

Ingredients:
2 portions salmon (I used Sockeye, 4oz portions), defrosted
1 slice whole grain bread. (Stale is fine.)
2 cloves garlic.
½ tsp roasted garlic powder.
2 TBSP Parmesan cheese.
2 tsp fresh thyme leaves.
1 TBSP fresh rosemary leaves.
¼ tsp salt.
Just a little hot pepper (I used Lemon Drop Lemon Pepper)

Directions:
• Line a baking tray with aluminum foil. Coat with olive oil spray.
• Combine all other ingredients in Bullet blender or small food processor. Blend until it’s not much more than powder.
• Next time: add 1 or 2 TBSP frozen butter patties late in blending.
• Place salmon on the tray. Coat with olive oil spray. Spread bread crumb mixture over the salmon, making sure to cover it all.
• Bake at 350° for 30 minutes until the fish flakes pretty easily. I added a little butter on top, since I didn’t have butter in the bread crumbs.

○ Serve with steamed veggies or roast squash.