Pita bread.

I love Jon's homemade hummus -- the way he makes it, it's more like garlic with a little bit of ground chickpeas, rather than the other way around.  I've tried making it myself, but it just doesn't come out as yummy.

Since my hummus kind of stinks (and not 'cause of the garlic), I figured I'd try making pita bread to go with it.  I found a recipe on this blog that seemed easy enough.  However, in all my baking wisdom, I decided that since I didn't have any whole wheat flour on hand, I'd just use all white flour instead.  Should work, right?  I mean, flour is flour!

Um, no.

Turns out, wheat flour is a lot denser than white, and so by using all white flour, I ended up with a gloppy mess of dough that never came together.  Yuck.  I even kept adding more flour in the hopes that it would form up, but it didn't, and I eventually threw in the towel.  So my first attempt was a bust.

The next time I tried, though, I actually followed the recipe, with much better results.  I still wound up adding a bit extra flour, but it formed a proper dough without much of a struggle.

I wound up making the pitas a bit thick -- they didn't pocket up,  and Jon said he thought they were more like flatbread than actual pita.  He was really adamant they they should have a pocket.  (He got his comeuppance, though, when we went out for Greek food and THEIR pitas didn't have pockets, either. So there.)

I wound up freezing some of the dough, and when I used it, I split the portions in half, so it was smaller and thinner after I rolled it out.  This batch came out a bit crisper, and with pockets!  So I'll probably do this in future -- plus, I'll be able to get twice as many pitas out of a batch of dough.  Win-win-win!

Amish White Bread

Jon picked up some honey on one of his farmers' market expeditions a couple of weeks ago, and had asked me to bake up some bread to eat with it.

First of all, it takes a ridiculous amount of effort to find a recipe that does not require a bread machine.   People.  I have an OVEN.  Aside from a fireplace or something, wouldn't that be the original bread machine?  Anyway.  I digress.

The dough, ready to rise.

I found a recipe on my go-to cooking website for Amish White Bread that seemed easy enough, and I had all the ingredients on hand.  For the record, I have no idea what was particularly Amish about this recipe.  Seems to me that if you're going to throw a qualifier on like that, you need to have some kind of an explanation for it.

This bread was really easy to throw together.  It took awhile to make, just because you had to wait for the yeast to proof, and then for the dough to rise.  But the actual labor time wasn't long at all.

Yum.

The recipe yielded two loaves of golden delicious carb-a-licious goodness.  The bread has a bit of a sweetness to it, almost like a Hawaiian bread.

When she tried it warm out of the oven with a little butter, Ella declared it to be "big yummy!', and I agree with her.  I'd definitely make this recipe again.  It was easy and delicious.

Chocolate Muffins.

More muffins!  Even though Jon had requested me to make lemon poppyseed muffins next, I went for the chocolate muffins.  I already had the recipe and all the ingredients, and frankly, I'm not entirely sure where to get poppyseeds.  Will research that later.

Anyway, I think that technically, these should be called chocolate-chocolate chip muffins, since that's what they really are.   They were tasty, but Jon and I found them to be a little bit drier than I would have liked -- I guess that's due to the cocoa powder.   I'm not sure how to combat that, though, and make them a bit more moist.

I bought a disher at Sur La Table's recent sale, and that made distributing the batter a good deal easier than previously, and the muffins actually came out roughly all the same size -- success!

Recipe forthcoming!

Chocolate Chip Cookies.

Everyone should have a good, solid chocolate chip cookie recipe in their baking arsenal.  I've been using this particular recipe  for around 3 years now, and it's by far the best one I've ever tried -- even better than the Toll House recipe.  One reason I like it is because even though it's called "The Chewy", you can adjust how chewy your cookies actually are just by altering the amount of butter you use.  (I discovered this totally on accident, by the way.)

It's an easy recipe to mix up, and the dough can be portioned out, frozen, and taken out of the freezer to bake as well, if you're into that sort of "rationing" thing....doesn't happen around here, but if you're able to save some for later, more power to you!

For this most recent batch that I made, I was a bit concerned that they weren't going to come out.  The dough was REALLY dense by the time I was done mixing, far more so than usual.  I was following a slight variation of the recipe from the one that is online, so I thought that might account for the difference.

As it turned out, though, these were the best of any of the recent batches I've made!  Really yummy, if I do say so myself. Jon's initial assessment of "Pretty good," was upgraded to "Really good" upon a later taste test.

Buttermilk Pancakes.

Alright, so pancakes aren't *technically* baking, but that's probably the best category for it, I guess.  And I mean, they're called panCAKES, so that should qualify them, if nothing else.

And, really, all I'm going to say is this.  This here recipe makes the best pancakes I've ever had.  Seriously. And the mix will keep for up to 3 months, which is fantastic for us, since we go through spells where we eat pancakes every week, and then it'll be awhile before we want any again.

I don't have any pictures, because my pancakes always cook up hideously ugly, so I'm a little embarrassed of them.  But the ugly 'cakes taste just as good as the (very) few that comes out just perfect.

Strawberry Muffins

*For the bulk of these baking experiments, I'll be using Alton Brown's recipes.  When possible, I'll link directly to the recipe.  If, for whatever reason, I can't find it online, I'll add it here.

Jon has been wanting me to make some muffins for him to have on the way to work in the morning.  So when the first recipe in Alton Brown's I'm Just Here For More Food was a basic muffin recipe, I knew it was the first one I had to tackle.

I was all ready to make them yesterday, only to realize that I didn't have enough flour...or any eggs...or any yogurt.  So actually, I wasn't ready at all.

After a trip to the grocery store this morning, I came home armed to the teeth with flour, etc., and ready to bake.

A quick consult with Jon via email, and I found out that he was most interested in strawberry muffins out of the flavor choices I was offering up (chocolate chip-walnut and blueberry were the others).  The nice thing about AB's recipe is that you can add in whatever fruit, nuts, etc., that you like without having to change the basic recipe.  Of course, that may be the case with ANY muffin recipe...this was the first time I'd ever made them from scratch before.

The batter was easy enough to make, but I did have to be careful not to over-mix.  I tend to do this quite often, and apparently, it's an easy way to turn a muffin into more of a cupcake device.

I figured the easiest way to make strawberry muffins was to add fresh strawberries.  I chopped and added about one cup to the batter.  In retrospect, I'd add about double that next time.  They weren't quite as strawberry-y as I was hoping for.

Anyway, the batter was just enough for 12 muffins, although I didn't do such a swell job dosing them out.  I wound with a couple of whoppers, and some that barely made it over the edge of the tin. 

Despite my sloppy batter distribution, the muffins baked up a gorgeous golden brown in about 20 minutes.  And I have to say, warm out of the oven with a little butter...they were pretty darn good.

Jon's assessment was on par with mine:  more strawberries.  He also thought a little more salt, which was probably pretty accurate, as my "pinch" was on the small side.

Here's the recipe:

• All-purpose flour: 11oz 
• Baking powder: 1/3 oz (10 g)
• Baking soda: 1/4 oz (6 g)
• Sugar: 3 3/4 oz 
• Vegetable oil: 1/2 cup
• Whole egg: 1 large
• Egg yolk: 1 large
• Plain yogurt: 1 cup
• Bits and pieces (berries, chocolate chips, nuts...): 1 to 2 cups

1. Place an oven rack in position C and preheat the oven to 375 F.
2. Prepare a muffin tin and set aside.
3. Assemble the Dry Goods, Wet Works, and Extras.
4. Dish the batter into the prepared tin.  The cups should be full
5. Bake for 18 to 20 minutes, or until the muffin interiors hit 210 F or a toothpick inserted into the bottom of a muffin comes out clean.
6. Remove from the pan and immediately turn the muffins on their side so steam can escape the pan.
7. Serve immediately or store in an airtight container for up to a week.

Another blog? Really?

Yes, really.

I'm getting handier in the kitchen, but what I'm really good at is baking.  And the more I bake, the more I find that I truly enjoy it.  So I want to hone my skills, try out some new recipes, and increase my knowledge.  While I'm doing those things, I figured I might as well share what I'm baking with others -- and if you have any recipes to share with me, I'd love to have 'em!

Happy baking!