WbLL- what boredom looks like...: February 2010

Some cookies for Jalen and Candace

0 Comments Published by WBLL on Friday, February 26, 2010 at 3:44 PM.

I forgot that I hated oatmeal, until I bought a box with the intention of starting a new health food regime. One bite of the sticky grayish white substance, and I was transported back to childhood, when I was being forced every morning to eat it because my parents were sure it was good for me. Needless to say I was so traumatized I almost through out the carton. But then, my sister tells me that she and the kids love oatmeal cookies so the box--and the oatmeal inside--reputation were resurrected.

Ingredients:

½ cup light brown sugar
¼ cup granulated sugar
1 ¼ sticks of butter
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla
½ cup all purpose flour
½ cup wheat flour (I prefer to add wheat flour when I can)

½ tsp baking soda

1 tsp of baking powder
½ tsp salt
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
1 ½ cup Quaker Oats (quick or old fashioned, uncooked)

Preheat oven to 375°F.

Beat together butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla. Combine flour, baking soda, salt and spices; add to butter mixture, mixing well. Stir in oats. Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 8 to 9 minutes for a chewy cookie, 10 to 11 minutes for a crisp cookie. Cool 1 minute on cookie sheet; remove to wire cooling rack. Store in tightly covered container.

*Note for Gaye: If you want the sticky gooey mistake cookie, use only ¼ cup of all purpose flour.

Labels: Sweet

Mishaps: Dominican Fudge? truffles? no, cake...

0 Comments Published by WBLL on Monday, February 15, 2010 at 5:23 PM.

My journey to cake land started with a sack of Dominican cocoa powder someone brought back for me as a souvenir from a trip. While they soaked up the sun, I was in the cold, and they though cocoa would make up for it – they were right. Not sure what to do with it, but sure I wanted to bake something, I scoured the internet for inspiration and came up with fudge. I thought how hard could it be, I will just substitute the Hershey’s cocoa powder for some Dominican goodness and voila. This was the recipe I used:

Ingredients

2 cups sugar

2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa

1 1/2 cups milk

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup butter

1 1/2 vanilla

1 1/2 cups toasted chopped walnuts*

In a heavy 4-quart saucepan over medium heat combine sugar, cocoa, milk, and salt. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Continue cooking, not stirring, until mixture reaches 235° on a candy thermometer. Remove from heat; stir in butter and vanilla. Let stand to cool for about 1 hour, until mixture comes to room temperature. Wit a wooden spoon, beat until fudge thickens and loses its gloss. Stir in toasted walnuts and spoon into a buttered 8-inch square pan. Cool completely then cut into 1-inch squares.

*To toast nuts, spread out in a single layer on a baking sheet. Toast in a 350° oven, stirring occasionally, for 10 to 15 minutes. Or, toast in an ungreased skillet over medium heat, stirring, until golden brown and aromatic.

When I finished this recipe, after impatiently cooling my fudge, I cut into it, and it came out gooey -- and not and in a good way. Common sense should have told me to throw out the batch and start from scratch. But my sense is very rarely common, and I was bored. So I decided to turn my batch of too-soft-fudge into truffles. In retrospect, maybe it wasn’t the best idea, but I got a melon-baller type of contraption, made round balls and rolled them around in some cocoa powder. What I got, was soft balls of fudge coated in cocoa--not what I was going for.

I just refused to give up, and with the wild cackle of a mad scientist, I decided to throw the cocoa coated fudge balls into a microwave at melt them down again (yes with the roasted nuts in tact, do not try this at home). I then took the molten mess, and came up with an on-the-fly recipe:

Added ingredients:

2tbsp butter

1 egg

2 tbsp of baking powder

1 ½ cups of flour

¼ cup of oil

Basically, I added the butter to the hot fudge, whisking away so that it would dissolve. Then after beating an egg to death, I added it to the hot fudge(tempering of course, as if it made much of a difference at this point). In another bowl I sifted the dry ingredients together, and then slowly added them to the bowl of fudge. I threw some vegetable oil in for good measure, figuring it would help to make the cake moist, since I was only sacrificing one egg for this chocolate cake debacle. With the faith of a person who just didn't care anymore, I threw the mixture into a greased and floured loaf pan, and into the oven at 350F degrees it went. After an hour I had a chocolate nut cake.

It came out pretty good for a cake that was thrown together and without a recipe. So what did I learn from this? I need to find a good flourless cake recipe. Stay tuned, this isn't the last of the Dominican cocoa powder.

Labels: Sweet

Savory: The not so easy, yet easy vegan pumpkin soup

0 Comments Published by WBLL on Wednesday, February 3, 2010 at 12:30 PM.

I've made this soup so many times in the past that I normally do not think when I make it. But this last time, when made it with the intent on posting the recipe to this blog, I had an unfortunate mishap (could have been a sign). When on last stage of the recipe, where you throw the hot soup into the blender to make it creamy and smooth, the lid wasn’t on tight enough and I had boiling hot soup splash on my face, and even worst, in my hair. So my precaution is this: use and immersion blender. If you are going to use a standard blender, either a) make sure that you only fill the blender 2/3 of the way, or b) make sure you have a (REALLY) tight lid. With that said, happy soup making!

Easy Pumpkin Soup

2lbs pumpkin

1 large russet potato (or two small red potatoes works well too)

¾ cup diced onions

3 cloves of crushed garlic

2 tbsp butter

3 tbsp of olive oil

2 tsp of Goya adobo

2 cups vegetable stock

3 tbsp coarse salt

Table salt and pepper to taste

Bring salted water (use the coarse salt) to a boil in a 5 ½ quart pot. Cut pumpkin into large chunks and the potato into half , leaving the skin on (unless you feel like peeling). Place the chunks of pumpkin and potato into boiling water. When the pumpkin’s flesh begins to look transparent and the potato is separating from the skin slightly, remove from the heat, and dump into a colander. Rinse the pumpkin and potato with cold water until it is cool enough to handle. Scoop out the flesh, setting it aside in a bowl, and discarding the skins. In the same pot (unless you have another 5 ½ quart pot lying around), melt the butter and olive oil on a medium heat. Add the diced onions and crushed garlic and sweat until transparent. Add the salt and adobo to the sautéing onions, and then add the pumpkin and potato. Stir with a wooden spoon, just until the pumpkin and onion are thoroughly mixed and then add your vegetable stock. Cover the pot and bring to a boil. Once the soup has boiled, take off the heat. Now it is ready to be blended. (This is the point where the immersion blender is the best, because there is less risk of splatter). Blend the mixture until smooth, the potato is going to act like an emulsifier, so you don’t need to add cream. Once it is smooth it is ready to serve. Makes 4 appetizer sized soup portions or 2 extremely large bowls of comfort soup.