A sequel to Pillars of the Earth

Yesterday was a red letter day for me . . . I discovered that Ken Follett has written a sequel to one of my favorite-books-of-all-time, Pillars of the Earth. The book, entitled World Without End, is only in hardback at this point, and is 1014 pages long. I bought it at Barnes & Noble (20% off), but it may be at Costco one day soon. I have no doubt it will be a best seller.

What I'm afraid of is that once I start reading it, I may become a book recluse. My family will be forgotten, my other responsibilities. So I'm just going to stare at it for a few days.

As an aside, last night I listened to a Tivo'd program which contained an interview with Ken Follett. For those of you who read my blog and live in the United States, there is a CBS TV program which airs very early on Sundays, aptly named Sunday Morning. It usually starts at 6 or 6:30 am, but the time varies. (That's why I love Tivo so much . . . I just instruct Tivo to record the program and it knows when it airs.) Mostly, Sunday Morning is about "good news." There's a short quip at the beginning about current news, but it's no more than a minute long. The remainder is a series of short to long segments about esoteric things like inventions, travel here in the U.S., music legends, a good movie, art and artists, photographers, writers (like Follett) and even poets. On every show they end with a one minute segment of nature somewhere in our U.S. of A. Beautiful panoramic views of parks, forests, mountains, streams, rivers, birds. Sound from the location is included, so you hear the katydids, crickets, birds, whatever. I always look forward to that last segment.

Anyway, Ken Follett was interviewed from his London home and office. He talked about how his publisher, Dutton, was very, VERY skeptical about the manuscript for Pillars of the Earth. It was such a divergence for Follett, who had written nothing but [very popular] espionage novels since his first scribblings as a teen. Pillars is mostly a book from the Middle Ages, about a church. Everything you might ever have wanted to know about the concept and building of a church. Follett writes a book similar to Michener, as far as the depth and creativity with the people(s) who inhabit the history. Pillars was wildly popular - has been translated into 51 languages, I believe he said. Some incredible number of the books have been printed.

And, he talked about the folly of trying to write a sequel, and his fear that people will say "oh, it's okay, but not as good as the first one." He wants us to like this one even better. We'll see . . .

Interestingly, Follett's wife is a politician in England, a member of Parliament. She was briefly interviewed too. She rolled in with Tony Blair's Labour Party, and is still in office with the new P.M. Ken got into a squabble with Tony Blair about Blair's proclivity to gossipmongering.

If you haven't read Pillars, I recommend you read it first. I'll try to remember to give an update on the sequel once I've read it.

Anise Pound Cake

What? Pound cake and anise? Well, yes. And you need to know that I don't like licorice. As in licorice candy. Not even one bit. But I like fennel. Which is akin to the anise plant. And I like fennel seed, in moderation, in a few things, like cooked cabbage. And I really like this cake, made with toasted anise seed. Fennel and anise are different plants altogether, although they're related, like first cousins. They both have licorice overtones; I think the anise has more of it than the fennel.

Probably I mentioned in a previous post that in the late 1980's I was quite enamored with the cooking of Mark Miller (Coyote Cafe, Santa Fe, New Mexico). He was the first, or one of the first, to introduce "fine cuisine" to the Southwestern food genre. And he was kind of all-over the foodie scene. When I visited the restaurant (in the 80's) I bought his cookbook, Coyote Cafe. What I found, though, was that most of his dishes are very labor intensive, requiring a sauce for this, a finishing glaze for that, a different marinade, or that most of his dishes needed one or two complicated sides. Everything is made from scratch too, including beans. After making several things, I closed the book and put it on my cookbook shelf, to be opened rarely. But in that interim, I needed a cake for a Southwestern gourmet picnic, and this one fit the bill.

I've made this many, many times. It's a fairly standard pound cake mixture, and the only unusual thing is the toasted anise seed, subsequently ground finely, which is added to the batter. Because it's toasted seed, it's mellows out considerably. There's no harsh licorice flavor, just a little background nuttiness to it. There's a lot of anise seed in it - four tablespoons - but somehow it doesn't seem like anywhere near that much. It peppers the batter, though, so you know it's something different.

A few years ago I altered the recipe - it called for 1 full pound of butter. Somehow that seemed obscene to me to use that much in one cake, even though it served approximately 18 people. The batter is very heavy besides. So, even though I'm not much of an experimenter when it comes to baking (there's too much science attached), I put in much, much less butter, and I separated the eggs to lighten the batter.
Serve this with some fresh summer fruit - either peaches, apricots, or berries. My favorite is strawberries, sliced thinly. And top with either whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

Anise Pound Cake
Recipe: adapted from the Coyote Cafe cookbook (Mark Miller)
Servings: 18
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
14 ounces unsalted butter
2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 tablespoons anise seed -- roasted, ground
5 whole eggs -- separated
2/3 cup sour cream
1. Preheat oven to 350°. Grease and flour a 10-inch tube pan. Sift together flour and salt, then set aside.
2. Cream the butter with sugar, vanilla and anise seed until light. Whip the egg whites and set aside. Add the egg yolks, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Then add dry ingredients alternately with the sour cream. Scrape the bowl well and mix until blended. Then fold in the egg whites until mixed in and there are only a few streaks of white visible. (This is a bit difficult because the batter is thick.)
3. Pour into prepared pan and bake for approximately 50-60 minutes, until the cake is golden brown and springs back to the touch.
4. Serve in small slices with fresh, sliced summer fruit (peaches, strawberries, other berries) and whipped cream or vanilla ice cream on top.
NOTES : This has been adapted slightly from the original - I use less butter, add some baking powder and separate the eggs.
Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 365 Calories; 21g Fat (52.2% calories from fat); 5g Protein; 40g Carbohydrate; 1g Dietary Fiber; 111mg Cholesterol; 138mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 Grain(Starch); 0 Lean Meat; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 4 Fat; 1 1/2 Other Carbohydrates.
To print a PDF recipe only, click title at top.

Drop Biscuits - a new method

It was just a couple of weeks ago I mentioned how FUN it is (for me, anyway) when I discover a new method for making some heretofore ordinary dish. That was the green beans with garlic and olive oil. So, now, I have a great new recipe for you. This one is compliments of Cooks Illustrated, the bi-monthly magazine. I've subscribed to this gem for many years. And I think I've mentioned before (also) that I truly enjoy reading the long treatises on individual subjects. It could be gravy for pork chops, or just the right texture for fudgy brownies. You get the drift.

The subject of this article was : "The Best Drop Biscuit," by Sandra Wu. The writer (food developer) explained the steps and stages she used to refine a favorite, the lowly drop biscuit. I don't make drop biscuits very often. Why? I don't know . . . I think I prefer the kind that you knead just a little bit, then pat out the dough and cut with a biscuit cutter. Plus, they're perhaps a bit easier to break apart without falling apart. And sometimes drop biscuits are unevenly baked because they're not all the same size or shape. An inherent problem with a drop biscuit. But this new method solves most of those problems.

The only thing you need for this recipe is butter (the real stuff) and buttermilk. (Although, to be fair, the recipe does indicate how to make clabbered milk instead of buttermilk.) I try to have buttermilk on hand. Once I've used whatever I needed it for, I freeze it in 1-cup freezer cups. My scones require exactly one cup. So do these biscuits, which will now become part of my regular repertoire. Now, whether this method for drop biscuits would work with defrosted buttermilk, I'm not sure. So, for now I won't recommend that until I try it. Once defrosted, buttermilk gets a bit watery. It works fine for my scones, but, as I explain below, it might not work for these biscuits.

I won't belabor all the explanation the author went through to finally GET to the final product. I found it very interesting. You might not. But, what's unusual is: you pour slightly cooled, but melted butter INTO the one cup of buttermilk before adding that to the dry ingredients. Who woulda thunk that coulda make such a difference? Certainly not me! Here's a picture of the clumpy buttermilk.

The writer is enough of a baking chemist to know that you need to stabilize - or equalize the temperatures of the butter and the usually cold buttermilk. She kept getting this clumpy mass (see picture), and probably threw away countless efforts of that combination. But one time she decided to go ahead and use that clumpy mess in the biscuit anyway. Voila! As you stir the moderately warm/hot butter into the cold buttermilk the little clumps in buttermilk that are there naturally attach themselves to all the little molecules of butter. And you have this heaping cup full of lumps. It's such an incongruous pile of stuff.

But anyway, you pour all that into the dry ingredients, stir just until mixed thoroughly (no kneading) and you're ready to make quick drop biscuits. She recommended using a greased 1/4-cup measuring cup. I used cooking spray, which didn't work all that well, I must say. Keep the waxed paper the butter is wrapped in and grease the measuring cup with that. The 2nd time I made these I used a narrow metal sandwich spreader to kind of scoop out the batter. Buttering the 1/4-cup measure didn't work any better than cooking spray. Whichever method you use, you scoop equal 1/4-cup measures of the batter and drop onto parchment on a baking sheet. Then you gently reshape any that aren't uniform.

Now, there's a side story (a sidebar) in the article about the use of parchment vs. a Silpat. I have bunches of silpats and I use them constantly. In the usual Cooks Illustrated's style, they did a study of these biscuits using both. They far prefer parchment because they believe silicone mats (silpats or others) can impart some off-flavors. Mostly that wouldn't bother me, but since biscuits are such a delicate flavored item, I took their advice and used paper. Then, I straightened all of the biscuits on the sheet - to make sure none were too high, or short, etc. That made a big difference - all the biscuits were perfectly, evenly browned.

Need I say they were a big hit? A BIG hit. These biscuits are so very light and tender. The master recipe is for a plain biscuit, but they also gave variations for both Black Pepper and Bacon Biscuits, and Rosemary and Parmesan Biscuits. I made the bacon and pepper version. We had leftovers of soup last night, and made the biscuits again, but also added some sharp cheddar cheese, at my son-in-law's request. Any way you make them, they're good.

Best Drop Biscuits
Recipe: Sandra Wu, Cooks Illustrated
Servings: 12
2 cups all-purpose flour -- unbleached, if possible
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup buttermilk -- COLD
8 tablespoons unsalted butter -- melted and cooled slightly
2 tablespoons butter -- melted, for brushing tops

Bacon/Pepper Variation: cut 6 slices bacon into small pieces and fry until crisp. Crumble. Add bacon and 1 tsp. coarsely ground pepper to the dry mixture in step 1.

Rosemary/Parmesan Variation: add 3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese and 1/2 tsp. minced rosemary to the flour mixture in step 1.

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 475. Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt in a large bowl. (Or, you can sift it together.)
2. In a medium bowl (at least 1 1/2 cups or larger) combine the cold buttermilk and the melted and slightly cooled butter. Stir until buttermilk forms clumps.
3. Add buttermilk mixture to dry ingredients and stir with rubber spatula until just incorporated and batter pulls away from side of the bowl.
4. Using a greased 1/4-cup measure, scoop level amounts of batter and drop onto a parchment-lined baking sheet, approximately 2 1/4 inches across and 1 1/4 inches high. Repeat with remaining batter, spacing biscuits about 1 1/2 inches apart. Bake until tops are golden brown and crisp, approximately 12-14 minutes.
5. Brush biscuit tops with remaining 2 T. melted butter. Transfer to a wire rack to cool, or serve immediately.
Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 171 Calories; 10g Fat (52.4% calories from fat); 3g Protein; 17g Carbohydrate; 1g Dietary Fiber; 27mg Cholesterol; 309mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 Grain(Starch); 0 Non-Fat Milk; 2 Fat; 0 Other Carbohydrates.
To view a printable PDF Recipe, click title at top.

Tuscan Chicken (not) Soup

Why would you think a soup would be named Tuscan CHICKEN Soup when there isn't any chicken in it? Beats me! But, I'm being true to the original recipe, which called it Tuscan Chicken Soup. Even though it has beef in it.

When the instructor, Patty Padawar, explained this soup, she must have had some kind of explanation, but it's nothing that stuck in my head, nor did I write anything on my notes. The originator of this recipe must have had a reason, right? Oh well. Whether it's chicken or beef, it's just a plain old good soup.

This recipe came from a cooking class at Sur la Table, and was a compilation of some of the cooking school's "favorites." How could I not go to a class that culled through hundreds of cooking class recipes and pulled out the best of the best? Only one of the recipes was one where I'd attended the class (that was Joanne Weir's Sicilian Tuna Salad, which I've already posted here on my blog).

I'm a real sucker for soups. I've loved them always, but over the last 10 years or so I've found them to be such a time saver and they make a very full, tasty and easy meal. We don't eat many bean soups just because neither of us need the packed carbs at our age. But, I love vegetable soups, chicken soups, beef soups, squash soups too.

This one is a mixture of ground beef, escarole, fresh fennel, onions, and orzo pasta. A nice combination. If you don't know if you like fennel, trust me on this - fennel once cooked is very mellow. There isn't even an inkling of anise flavor in this soup once it's been simmered awhile. And, as always, this soup is much better the next day if you can plan ahead!

The soup also has one added touch that I'd never seen done before: just before serving you slice a plank of Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, using a cheese plane, and place it in the bottom of the soup bowl. Then you ladle the hot soup on top and within a minute the cheese is mostly melted, although it doesn't "stir" into the soup at all. It's best when your spoon just lifts a little bit of the cheese with a bite of soup. Be sure to tell guests so they don't scrape the bottom and get an entire mouthful of cheese.

Actually, this time I used some ground chicken (a third) to this soup in addition to ground beef (two thirds). And I added some celery too, just, well, because. The soup is low in calorie, although I don't think this serves as many as the recipe indicates. We eat about 1 & 1/2 cups per serving, and I think the recipe assumes less. I made a double batch so I'd have leftovers. And this soup freezes well to join others in my soup library. That is, if there are any by the time we finish tonight's dinner.

Tuscan Chicken (no, Beef) Soup
Recipe By :Patty Padawar, cooking insructor
Servings: 8
3/4 pound lean ground beef -- or veal
1 small fennel bulb -- chopped
1 medium onion -- chopped
2-3 whole cloves garlic -- minced
4 cups low sodium chicken broth
2 cups low sodium beef broth
2 cups water
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano -- crushed
2 whole bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 cup orzo
4 cups escarole -- shredded
4 ounces Parmesan cheese -- shaved in planks

salt -- to taste

1. In a large saucepan or pot, cook the ground beef, onions, fennel and garlic over high heat, stirring as needed for about 5 minutes, until meat is browned and vegetables are softened. Drain off excess fat.
2. Add broths, water and seasonings and simmer for 10 minutes. Bring up to a gentle boil, add the orzo and cook 10 more minutes, stirring twice.

3. Remove bay leaves, add the escarole and remove from the heat. Taste and add salt if needed, or more pepper. Stir to blend in. Divide the cheese planks into serving bowls, ladle the hot soup on the cheese and serve.
NOTES : To make cheese planks: use a cheese plane or sharp vegetable peeler. If you have leftovers, taste it when you reheat it as you may need to add additional water or broth.
Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 275 Calories; 13g Fat (43.8% calories from fat); 24g Protein; 14g Carbohydrate; 2g Dietary Fiber; 43mg Cholesterol; 586mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1/2 Grain(Starch); 3 Lean Meat; 1/2 Vegetable; 1 1/2 Fat.

To print a PDF recipe only, click on title at top.

Escarole, Belgian Endive and Apple Salad

It's fall. Time for some fall-type salads. Soups. Stews. Pumpkin. If it would just get below 80 degrees here in southern California I'd feel more like it. Soon. But, because it is October, I'm ready. Therefore, I went through my salad recipe collection looking for something different.

I make just regular green salads all the time. Probably all of you do, too. My mother was a great one for incorporating lots of vegies in salads, so I have continued the tradition. Green salads must have some other stuff like radishes, cucumber, tomatoes, celery, bell peppers, carrots, sugar snaps. That kind of thing. Just a way for us to get more of those healthful vegies in our diet. And when you wrap those in silky salad dressing, they sure do go down easier. And I like vegies. Today's salad, though, isn't one of those. It's a pure greens salad but with an opportunity to give the apple a star billing. And escarole, of course.

So, this salad came from one of the cooking classes I took with Joanne Weir. I think I've mentioned before she's probably my very favorite cooking instructor ever. She's just so witty and funny. And bursting with lots of helpful hints. This class was no exception. Remember my adage: if you come home with one recipe you make regularly, the class is worthwhile and money was well spent. This class provided one good recipe AND a very good helpful hint that I've used over and over.

The hint: when making a salad dressing on the spot, once it's mixed up (using a whisk always) take a piece of the lettuce from your already prepared greens and dip it into the dressing. Use it in proportion - you don't want it saturated with dressing, just a bit. Taste it for balance (oil vs. vinegar) and seasonings (salt and pepper). And know that you need it to be saltier than it should be from that one little bite, because once the dressing is tossed all over the salad, the salt will be dispersed.

So now, onto the actual salad. Escarole isn't a green I normally purchase. It's not as bitter as curly endive (which was what I found at the market yesterday and is shown in the photo), and it's easier to eat than curly endive too. Escarole is actually chicory (the green, and also the root that's added to coffee in the south). It is part of the bitter greens family. Belgian Endive is another one of those vegies I purchase occasionally and is in the same family as escarole/chicory. I've learned though, that the longer I hold Belgian Endive, the more bitter it gets. Ever noticed that? So I try to use it up right away.

Some years ago when my DH and I visited France and stayed with a friend in Paris, she made a Belgian Endive salad, just tossed with a little bit of olive oil and lemon juice. It was sweet and oh-so tasty. I'd had B.E. before, but it never tasted as good as I had it there. Once home I determined I'd use it more. I was so disappointed when I bought half a dozen of them to make a similar salad. It was so bitter we couldn't eat it, even though it was fresh from the grocery store.

In looking up the nutritional information about B.E. I learned that it turns bitter as it oxidizes (exposed to light). So, I guess from the moment it's plucked from the ground it begins to turn bitter. No wonder I have such a problem. A little bit of that bitterness goes a long ways. Probably U.S. growers have developed varieties that can have a long shelf life, but the taste is obviously compromised. I wish some of the growers here could taste B.E. in France to see the significant difference.

So, this salad combines bitter greens with a bit of sweet from the apple. The original dressing didn't have any sugar in it, but I find that the dressing is also quite tart, so the addition of just a little bit of sugar helps it a lot. But I've also learned from making this salad several times that the acidity of sherry wine vinegar can vary from brand to brand. So I also have to add, sometimes, a bit more oil to the dressing than it calls for. That's another reason for using the dunk-the-leaf-in-the-dressing technique. I do that once before I add salt and pepper and again after to make sure it's the right chemistry.

This salad may not appeal to everyone. You need to like that spark of bitter. If you want more sweetness, though, try using a sweeter apple, and add a bit more sugar to the dressing. Granny Smith's are certainly on the tart side themselves! But, this is a great way to showcase some wonderful fall apples that are just coming into the markets here. And maybe you'll be lucky to find some escarole too.

Escarole, Apple, Almonds and Shaved Parmigiano Salad
Recipe: adapted from a Joanne Weir recipe
Serving Size : 6
1 head escarole -- in 1 1/2 inch pieces
2 whole Belgian Endive -- leaves separated
2 stalks celery -- sliced thin on the diagonal
1 1/2 tablespoons sherry vinegar -- or white wine vinegar
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1 whole Granny Smith apple -- halves, cored, thinly sliced
1/2 cup almonds -- toasted
1/3 cup Parmesano-Reggiano Cheese -- shaved
1. In a bowl toss together the escarole, endive and celery. Place in the refrigerator until close to serving time.
2. In a small bowl whisk together the vinegar, sugar and olive oil. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Will probably need extra salt as once you add it to the greens, you'll lose the saltiness altogether.
3. Dip one leaf of escarole into the whisked dressing to taste for salt and pepper. Toss the greens, vinaigrette, almonds and Parmigiano Reggiano. Add apple slices and toss again. Place one or two apple slices on the top decoratively. Serve immediately.
Serving Ideas : Instead of a traditional salad bowl, serve this on a large platter.
NOTES : Do not use the outer dark green parts of the escarole.
Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 170 Calories; 15g Fat (78.6% calories from fat); 3g Protein; 7g Carbohydrate; 2g Dietary Fiber; 0mg Cholesterol; 17mg Sodium. Exchanges: 0 Grain(Starch); 1/2 Lean Meat; 0 Vegetable; 0 Fruit; 3 Fat; 0 Other Carbohydrates.

To print the recipe only, click title at top.

Portuguese Sweet Bread

Today's posting is going to involve a bit of history trivia about me. This is a traditional yeast bread recipe. To date I haven't posted any of those to my blog yet. Eventually I'll probably post several yeast breads, but here's the first regular type. I wrote up the No-Knead bread recently, but that hardly counts.

Some cooks get stage fright when the subject of yeast is even mentioned. I guess I was too young or naive to listen to such wives' tales. I just dug in and did it. I started making bread regularly in the mid 60's, when I was in my early 20's. In fact, once I learned the techniques, and found several recipes that I really liked, I began making all of my own bread. Sandwich bread (mostly buttermilk), cornmeal bread (a raised version), and a wheat bread too. At Christmas I made Stollen, and a few times a year I made this Portuguese Sweet Bread.

Growing up, we had a Portuguese family living across the street from us. Point Loma, a peninsula and a suburb in San Diego, is the home to thousands of Portuguese families, most of whom make their living by deep sea fishing. Although we didn't ever know this family well, one year the matriarch brought over a round globe of this bread on Good Friday. Maybe it was a silent peace offering because their dog barked incessantly, hour upon hour morning to night and during the night. Whatever the reason, it was nice that she shared a loaf with us. We enjoyed it.

Portuguese Sweet Bread is traditional only at Easter, apparently. I asked her about the recipe one day when she was chasing her barking dog in the street, but she seemed disinclined to share it. A few years later I saw a Portuguese cookbook at the library and sure enough, there was a recipe!

So in the early 1970's I was a stay-at-home mother of a very young child. Money was tight. So I began baking bread and selling it to friends. Most of my hard-earned money was used for babysitting, so I could get out a little bit. Many of my mother's friends were kind enough to buy bread from me every week. Bless them! My recollection is that I charged about $1.00 a loaf for the buttermilk type. Up to $2.00 for the richer breads and a bit more for Stollen. Every week my kitchen heated up for hours on end as I made what seemed like endless loaves of bread. I bought 100 pound bags of flour through a local bakery and kept it in a special trash can in the garage (lined with a two layers of heavy-duty plastic bags and sealed very tight).

I didn't have a business, a license, or any of that kind of thing; it was just word of mouth. I bought one pound blocks of fresh yeast (the cube, cake kind) from the same bakery and froze it in small batches. And I bought 1000-piece boxes of bread-sized clear plastic bags (the kind bakeries use). I still have what was left of the last box I bought, believe it or not. Those bags are over 40 years old and they're still just fine. Amazing. No wonder we have problems with our landfills and plastic grocery bags.

The buttermilk bread was the hands-down favorite of all my customers. But every few weeks I made this bread too. Usually only a few loaves. These take more time to make (longer rising times) and can be a bit temperamental if not given the right rising environment. But if the signs are right and the gods smile, you'll be blessed with a wonderfully fragrant loaf of soft, eggy bread. It would be ideal for the Pineapple French Toast I posted recently (click here) if you don't have the King's Hawaiian Bread used in that recipe.

In those days of busy bread baking, I combed through lots of bread cookbooks from the library and gathered ideas from anywhere I could find them. In my own recipe archives I have a funny shaped envelope that still contains all of my yeast recipes from those bread-baking days, with notes about costs, all written on 3x5 or 4x6 cards. And in some book - no recollection where - I read a long dissertation about the molecular action of yeast. I've never forgotten those words of advice about how yeast needs to climb, but if it's mixed only in water the molecules are slippery and have a hard time doing their job. So, this book recommended making the first yeast mixture (where you proof the yeast) with a little addition of sugar and ground ginger. I decided to try it, and believed then, as I do now, that that step does a lot for yeast. Now I use dry, granulated yeast, but it's the same process. No change, just dry yeast for cubed, fresh yeast.

A word about proofing. Maybe some of you have never even heard the expression of "proofing the yeast." The goal is to PROVE that the yeast is good, viable, and that it's working; therefore, proof that the yeast is alive and well. You will always want to do that step.

If you use a bread machine, that step is skipped. You don't want the yeast to be dissolved in liquid in a bread machine recipe as the machine process relies on the use of dry, granular yeast which dissolves slowly, and some not at all during the mix and sit, mix and sit series. I have a bread machine that I don't use very often anymore. It was a great timesaver when I was working, but I was never very satisfied with the wheat varieties I made in the machine. We rarely eat white bread anymore, so the machine has been relegated to a shelf in the laundry room.

Don't attempt to make this bread in a bread machine - it won't work because the dough needs longer rising periods. Now if you want to tinker with the yeast (adding more) to make it rise faster, either conventionally, or in the bread machine, by all means try it. Or if you just want to use the bread machine to accomplish the first mixing and kneading, that's fine.

So, back to Portuguese Sweet Bread. This bread is a sweet dough. And if you're a bread novice, you need to know that when you add some sugar to bread, it helps the yeast to grow (rise), but the sweeter the dough, the longer it will take to rise. Don't, under any circumstances, be in a hurry when you make this. This bread needs long, slow rising times (actually two) and if it doesn't rise nearly double in volume it probably wasn't kneaded enough. Because this bread contains so much sugar, the yeast struggles to do its job - to double in volume. That's why it's temperamental and if the yeast molecules aren't dispersed and kneaded well enough in the beginning, it just won't rise sufficiently. Then you'll be left with a kind of heavy, leaden bread. Not tasty at all.

You can try rising it in a slightly higher temperature (turn the oven on for a few minutes, then turn it off and put the dough in the oven to continue to rise). But when it's done and you slice into this, you'll be amazed at the perfume. Glorious. And you don't have to wait until Easter to make it.

Portuguese Sweet Bread
Recipe Source: unknown
Serving Size : 20
1/2 cup evaporated milk
1/4 cup water
4 tablespoons butter

2 packages dry yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 cup warm water

3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
3 whole eggs
5 cups bread (hard wheat) flour

1. In a saucepan, melt the butter with the evaporated milk and water. In a large bowl place the 3/4 cup sugar, salt and eggs. Pour in the milk/butter mixture and stir to dissolve the sugar. Allow to cool while gathering the other ingredients for the bread. In a small, glass measuring cup, combine the warm water, ground ginger, sugar and add the packages of yeast. Stir briefly and set aside for only about 5-10 minutes. (Do not do this step ahead).
2. When the egg and sugar mixture is cool, add about one cup of flour and stir. Add the yeast once it has become bubbly, then stir in additional flour. The mixture may take a bit more flour than the ingredient list shows since adding flour to yeast bread is never an exact science. But, be careful you don't add too much. Sweet breads can sometimes take more flour, but then the bread will be heavy and tough. Only add as much flour as you must to keep the stickiness under control. Roll the dough out onto a floured board and knead until the dough is elastic and smooth. Put into a greased bowl and allow to rise in a warm place until double in bulk. My notes say this takes about 2 hours.
3. Punch the dough down and pour out onto the floured board again and knead until there are no air bubbles in the dough. Cut in half and shape into bread shapes, place in bread pans and allow to rise again. This dough does not rise very fast, so wait until it's nearly ready before you preheat the oven. You can also mold these into rounds - and use round cake pans.
4. Heat oven to 375°. Bake bread for 25 minutes. Remove from oven, cover the pans lightly with foil, then reduce temperature to 350° and bake an additional 8-10 minutes.
5. Remove bread from the oven and IF it's stable enough, set loaves out on a rack to cool. If made correctly, this bread is very tender, so it may require cooling for 10-15 minutes in the pans before you remove them to a rack.
Serving Ideas : In Portuguese homes, this is served on Easter morning as part of a traditional breakfast.
NOTES : You can make this more festive by putting it into a large springform pan (full recipe) and after the second rising, brush with egg white and sprinkle with granulated sugar. Bake for about 45-50 minutes at 350°.
Per Serving : 196 Calories; 4g Fat (19.1% calories from fat); 6g Protein; 34g Carbohydrate; trace Dietary Fiber; 40mg Cholesterol; 149mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 1/2 Grain(Starch); 0 Lean Meat; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 1/2 Fat; 1/2 Other Carbohydrates.
To view a printable recipe, click title at top. (photo from maryssweetbread.com)

Southern Peach Cobbler

Before they're all gone, I wanted to have just a few more peaches. We didn't eat them out of hand in the first couple of days, so I decided to try a new recipe for Peach Cobbler. Now, I like cobbler in nearly every form imaginable. Apple probably is my favorite, but lots of other fruits can stand in and make me happy.

But, it was a week or so ago I was reading one of my favorite blogs, Culinary Concoctions by Peabody, and she wrote up a detailed post about marrying a southern gent, and how she's collected cobbler recipes for a long time. She liked some things about one recipe, but other things about another. Finally, she found one with the right texture, worked with it and subsequently came up with her own version combining all of the recipes from a bunch of "southern ladies," she said. With that write-up (kind of like the home kitchen answer to the Cook's Illustrated treatises on recipes), I had to try it. I don't think I had quite enough peaches, but she mentioned that the recipe is forgiving that way. I've simplified the directions just a little bit and hope I haven't changed the recipe significantly.

Her blog has an error about the amount of cinnamon (one teaspoon vs. one tablespoon), so I just had to improvise and use my best judgment. She doesn't have an email address to contact her, and somebody else posted a comment asking about the error, but she hasn't answered or fixed it yet. So, that's why I had to just make a management decision. That meant using 1 tablespoon of cinnamon. Which is a lot. Plus, I couldn't find the pecans in my freezer, so used walnuts instead. Pecans would certainly be more southern, but there are very few nuts in this dessert anyway.

Peabody mentioned that before she married her southern gent, what she knew about peach cobbler was just peaches, some kind of topping, then bake. But this has a kind of cake to it, and the peach slices slide down into it somewhat. I really liked the edges of the cake - a little bit crunchy, then with the smooth, moist cobber and peaches in the middle. I'd suggest each serving get a little bit of the edges (less peaches there).

Now, I must interject here, that I do like cinnamon. A lot, actually. But I'm very particular about what I use. No store bought for me. (You can, this is just picky me who thinks she knows a lot more about cinnamon than the average cook. I really may not know more, but I know what I like and don't like, that's all.) I buy my cinnamon from Penzey's. Have for years. Cassia cinnamon is what you usually find in the grocery stores. But I'll tell you, Penzey's cassia is one strong cinnamon. I use their Indonesian Korintje Cassia mostly. A few years ago I bought their Vietnamese cinnamon, which I believe Penzey's says is the highest quality and the "best." I didn't care for it at all. I also have Ceylon cinnamon from Penzey's too, which has citrus overtones, but is less strong tasting than cassia. In this cobbler I used the Indonesian Korintje Cassia because I knew the cinnamon taste would be a welcome highlight. If cinnamon is going to be a minor flavor, I use the Ceylon. Otherwise, it's the Korintje type. And because Penzey's cinnamon is so much stronger tasting than store-bought, I reduced the amount called for in the recipe - by about 1/5 I'd guess. If using regular cinnamon, just use the full tablespoon. Oh, and by the way, Penzey's does have some stores around the country. Mostly they're in the northeast, but there's now a store here in California, in Torrance. Thanks to my friend Cathy for that tidbit. Next time I'm driving that direction I'll definitely stop in there.

My recovering foot was so tired by the time I got this made I didn't take time to whip any heavy cream, so I just drizzled it with the heavy cream instead. It was fine. More than fine. Delicious, in fact. I'd make this again, no question.

Southern Peach Cobbler
Recipe: adapted a little from Culinary Concoctions by Peabody (blog)
Servings: 8
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup granulated sugar
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon cinnamon (or less, to suit your taste)
1 tablespoon baking powder
3/4 cup milk
2 1/2 cups peaches -- peeled, sliced
1/3 cup brown sugar -- packed
1/4 cup chopped nuts -- pecans or walnuts
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Place butter in an 8x8 pan and put into the oven until it's completely melted. If it happens to get brown (not burned, mind you) that's fine too. That takes about 4-5 minutes. Remove from oven while you gather the other ingredients.
3. In a medium sized bowl combine the 3 T. of sugar and the cinnamon. Stir until they're thoroughly mixed. Then add: the one cup of sugar, flour, baking powder. Stir until combined, then add the milk. Stir until it's thoroughly mixed with no streaks of flour showing. Spoon the batter on top of the melted better but do NOT stir it in. Just scoop in and make it as even as possible.
4. Place the sliced peaches on top as evenly as possible.
5. Combine the brown sugar and nuts and sprinkle that over the top.
6. Bake for 40 minutes, or until the top turns a golden brown. Serve warm or at room temperature, with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream.
Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 363 Calories; 15g Fat (35.9% calories from fat); 4g Protein; 56g Carbohydrate; 2g Dietary Fiber; 34mg Cholesterol; 199mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 Grain(Starch); 0 Lean Meat; 1/2 Fruit; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 3 Fat; 2 1/2 Other Carbohydrates.

To view a PDF recipe, click on title at top.

Cabbage Patch Stew

Okay, friends. Listen up. I'm sharing today one of my very favorite recipes ever. I've been making this soup/stew since about 1966. That's 40 years. Wow. Even surprises me! So why have I waited 6 months to tell you about it, you ask? Simple. It wasn't soup season. This is one of those dishes that sticks to the ribs. Hearty. Hot. If I had a restaurant, say, Carolyn's Country Kitchen, this would be at the top of the menu as Carolyn's signature soup. Or stew. Or stoup, as Rachel Ray calls these kinds of concoctions.

This is so much of a favorite that it's going onto my Top Fav's listed down the right column. Now, you need to love soup and stew to like this recipe. And vegetables. And cumin (although you could leave that out). To me, the cumin is an important component, however, even though it wasn't in the original recipe; that was one of my additions. And you need to like mashed potatoes.

Many of you know how much I like soups, and that I keep a regular stock of soups in my frozen soup library (see my post about my soup library here). The weather has finally cooled off here in So. California, and my fancy turned to soups right away.

This recipe is very easy. A tad different than the norm. It came from a 1954, small, Betty Crocker cookbook. I even remember when I first made it. In Fallon, Nevada. Why I was there is another story, and why I should remember that, I don't know, other than I fell in l-o-v-e with this soup!

Here it is in the pot, stewing away. Note the thickness to it - I had just added the cabbage. Over the years I've adapted it with my own additions (garlic, cumin, shrooms, some heat, etc.) but the basics are the same. A ground beef (or turkey or chicken) and vegetable soup (cabbage, tomatoes, mushrooms, onions and kidney beans) with a mound of buttermilk-enhanced mashed potatoes on top. As you eat it, the mashed potatoes just begin to kind of melt into the soup. This recipe is very forgiving. You don't like cabbage? Fine, leave it out. Same with mushrooms. Add corn. Or substitute something else or just leave out the things you don't care for. But, when you prepare it, it needs to have a thick consistency - not a lot of liquid, in other words, but mostly vegies. Here, below, it's in the bowl, ready for the mound of mashed potatoes. The soup mixture is not thickened (like a creamed soup where you've added flour), but it's "thick" with vegetables.

I make this in a very large quantity when I do it because it's a real winner for freezing. I make the mashed potatoes too, and pile them into smaller Ziploc freezer bags (doing the same procedure, flattening them out so they freeze and defrost easily), then the soup goes into a larger bag. When I want a quick dinner I just take out one soup and one potato bag to defrost.

Now mashed potatoes become a weird duck when you freeze them. They lose all their form and become mostly a liquid. So just a warning here - don't be alarmed and think the potatoes are ruined. Once you heat them up, the starch firms them right back up again. Amazing, but true. Sometimes I even put the potato bag (smaller) into the larger Ziploc bag, then pour the soup around it. Then it's all contained in one package. But then you can't get so much soup into the larger bag, so I usually separate them.

About 7-8 months ago, before I had my own blog, I was reading Tummy Treasure, Erika's blog. She was trying to make some thrifty meals, so I emailed her this recipe. She liked it so well she wrote up a blog post about it. I was so thrilled! Wow, my recipe in lights! If you'd like to read it, click here.

If soup season has arrived at your house, I highly recommend this one. A lot. Our son-in-law, Todd, is visiting us at the moment, and he ate two full bowls last night and would have licked the bottom if he could. My suggestion: you need to order up a bowl right away.

Cabbage Patch Stew
Recipe: Originally from a Betty Crocker cookbook.
Serving Size : 8
SOUP:

1 pound ground beef (or chicken, turkey or soy protein chunks)
2 medium onions -- sliced thin
1 1/2 c cabbage -- shredded or sliced thinly
1 1/2 c celery -- diced
2 cloves garlic -- minced
2 c kidney beans -- canned, undrained
2 c tomatoes -- canned, undrained
2 c fresh mushrooms -- sliced
2 tsp chili powder -- or more to taste
1 tsp ground cumin - - or more to taste (I usually add about 1 T.)
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1/4 c chicken broth - - or water
1 tsp beef broth concentrate -- diluted in water

salt and pepper to taste
1 1/2 c water

POTATOES:
10 med potatoes
1/2 c buttermilk

salt & pepper to taste
1 tbsp butter

1. Brown ground beef over medium heat. Add onions, garlic, cabbage and celery and cook until vegetables have lost their raw color. Add beans, mushrooms, tomatoes and seasonings (and some water if it appears to be too thick) and continue to simmer for 15-25 minutes. The original recipe called for the addition of 2 cups of water, but I'd recommend about 1 cup, maybe 1-1/2 cups.
2. Meanwhile, boil potatoes until fork tender and mash them using the butter, buttermilk and salt & pepper to taste

3. Serve about 1 to 1-1/2 cups stew per person in large bowls, then add scoops of hot potatoes on top.
Per Serving: 505 Calories; 18g Fat (30.9% calories from fat); 26g Protein; 63g Carbohydrate; 16g Dietary Fiber; 53mg Cholesterol; 155mg Sodium. Exchanges: 3 1/2 Grain(Starch); 2 Lean Meat; 1 Vegetable; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 2 1/2 Fat; 0 Other Carbohydrates.
To view a printable recipe, click on title at top.

Fennel Fritters

Fennel. Fresh fennel, in the bulb. I think I first had it in about 1985, served to me by a friend. She and her husband are Italian, and she shaved thin pieces into a green salad. I was blown away by the taste, asked her about it, and have been using it ever since. I buy a fennel bulb every week or so and usually it's reserved for salads, in small little slivers. I rarely take the time to shave the fennel with a potato peeler to get the paper-thin type I was originally served. I even enjoy munching on raw fennel too. It's like celery, but with more flavor. The hint of anise in fennel is very subtle.

And my friend Joan brought some fabulous Baked Fennel with Parmigiano-Reggiano one time to an Italian meal we shared with travel friends when we were heading for a trip to Tuscany together. I've written up that recipe already - click on the title in the previous sentence to get to it. But, other than that dish, I've not had it cooked. Until now, that is.

I don't remember where I was referred to the blog, Rustic Food, or just "Rustic." But Batul lives in England and uploads some very interesting recipes now and then. A recipe has not been posted since January, however, so Batul must be on hiatus. The recipes are different, with lots of Middle Eastern overtones. This one is no exception. Fennel Fritters. They sounded so unusual. I printed out the recipe nearly a year ago, but just made them to accompany a grilled steak for our dinner. My DH loved them. I loved them.

Here you see what the diced up fennel and onion looked like. I did this by hand, so I could control the size better than in the food processor. But, you might be able to use the processor on this anyway. I didn't have fresh dill, unfortunately, but used some dried (never as good). I had Greek feta on hand, which is a bit less salty than some, so did add a little bit of salt. Taste it before you add the raw egg and make a decision about that yourself. I also added a few grinds of black pepper and about a tablespoon of sour cream to the mixture.

They were very easy to fry - just a little bit of olive oil in a nonstick pan, and the fritters/pancakes took about 2 - 3 minutes per side, I'd say. Maybe less on the 2nd side. They were easy to turn, even though the mixture is quite soft. You don't get little air bubbles to tell you they're ready to turn, like you do with pancakes. Have a heated oven and hot plate standing by, so you can transfer them to keep warm while you do another batch. Fennel, when cooked, turns into this lovely smooth texture and very mellow. But the fennel in these fritters doesn't cook completely - there's still a bit of crunch to it. The pancake reminded me of egg fu yung, something I haven't seen on Chinese restaurant menus since I was a youngster. Eggy. Soft. I'll be making this again. I had some sour cream languishing in the refrigerator, so also put a little dollop on each pancake to serve. Batul's recipe called for a dollop of yogurt on each fritter. But, it really doesn't need it. Really.

The original recipe didn't say how many it served. I thought maybe about 4 (leftovers, thank you), but oh well. They're low in calorie and fat. We ate them all, except for one lone pancake. So plan accordingly. Or maybe you can have more restraint than we did.

Fennel Fritters
Recipe: Rustic Food blog
Servings: 4
1 whole fennel bulb -- finely chopped
1 small onion -- finely chopped
4 tbsp dill -- chopped
4 tbsp feta cheese -- crumbled (or cheddar grated)
3 whole eggs
3 tbsp flour -- (up to 4)

1 tbsp sour cream (my addition)
1 tsp baking powder

salt to taste (you don't need much because of the feta)
Mix all ingredients together in a bowl, drizzle some olive oil in a nonstick frying pan, pour in the mixture, 2 tbsp for each fritter, cook on both sides. Drain on paper towels. Best when it is warm and served with yogurt.
NOTES : Don' t throw away outer leaves of fennel, they are fine with this recipe.
Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 139 Calories; 6g Fat (38.2% calories from fat); 8g Protein; 14g Carbohydrate; 3g Dietary Fiber; 167mg Cholesterol; 317mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1/2 Grain(Starch); 1 Lean Meat; 1 Vegetable; 1/2 Fat; 0 Other Carbohydrates.

To print a PDF recipe only, click title at top.

Proofreading

Did you know that there are people out there who do nothing but proofread? It sounds like a pretty boring job to me, but it's oh-so-very necessary. I think they're now called "copy editors," but I'm not sure since I worked in advertising, not in the publishing world. I bring this up because I wish I'd had one when I hit the "publish" button a few days ago within Blogger (that's the software that Blogspot uses, I use, to write and complete my blog postings).

One nice feature of Blogger is a spell checker. Good thing. Even though I consider myself a very good speller (I even came in 2nd in a spelling bee back in junior high school), when you type and read, and re-read your own copy (the word copy means the text) you often make typing, spelling and grammatical mistakes. And when you go back and re-phrase things, move sentence structure around sometimes, you forget to go look at sentences from beginning to end.

Most of my recipes reside within my own recipe software program. I've mentioned it before, MasterCook. It's a great little program. But, it's only as good as the human (frail as we are) person who types in the ingredients and taps in the instructions. Some years ago I printed out a completed copy of all of my recipes and they live in two huge 3-ring binders here in my kitchen. When I go back and refer to them I sometimes notice little things about the recipes that need fixing. I've done a global spell-check of my complete cookbook, but there are some small errors that need to be fixed. Grammatical errors. Dangling participles. Detached phrases. Incomplete sentences. So I've attached little yellow stickies here and there to remind me to do that. One of these days I'll get to it and fix all of them. The trouble is, as perhaps many of you have noticed yourselves, unless you have a GRAMMAR checker, you don't know when a sentence contains something out of order. Like when you type is instead of it. The spell checker won't notice that because the word is correctly SPELLED.

That's why proofreaders, or copy editors, are so needed in the life of the printed word. To digress momentarily, during all the years I worked in the advertising field, and during the 17 years my business partner Audre and I owned an agency, we spent hours every week proofreading. We didn't have copy editors, or someone who did nothing but that. All account exec reciprocated with one another to proofread everything that went out of the house. Sometimes ads were proofread more than once. Not enjoyable time, but vital. If we ran an ad for a company and misspelled the name of an important piece of equipment used, especially acronyms, or wrote in that the applicant needed 10 years of experience, when in fact they only needed 1, those were glaring errors, and our client wasn't very pleased about paying big bucks when they might get very few applicants or applicants that were not at all qualified for the position.

That particular ad business is called recruitment advertising. There are lots of these firms out there and most people don't even know they exist. Lots of HR departments don't choose to spend time writing up and placing ads in newspapers and professional journals (or on Monster either) as their time is much better spent interviewing people. So recruitment ad agencies do that for them. That's what we used to do. Big ads, splashy ads, color ads, but mostly they were the smaller in-line black and white ads in local papers under the help wanted section. Ads for accountants, clerks, engineers, production people, scientists, nurses. You name it, we'd write up ads for them. Each of the account execs (we had about 7 or so) wrote up the individual ads and then they got proofread with someone else to make sure all the details got included, and that the fine print, like the company's phone number, address, and company name were spelled correctly. We proofread for spelling and completion, but also for grammar too. Although recruitment ads generally use a kind of "help wanted shorthand" too. Lots of incomplete sentences. Lots of words left out, to save space. Space is money.

So, we get to the crux of the matter. When I typed in the recipe for the Bloomin' Bread the other day (thank you again, Karen, for this awesome recipe), I failed to notice that there was no olive oil in the list of ingredients, but it was included in the instructions. I should have noticed. I'm pretty good at that kind of thing, usually. But not that day! Often when I type in a new recipe (here at home anyway) I re-write the instructions. To make them more clear, or in the proper order. Or to elaborate on something too. So my apologies to anybody who had already printed out my recipe for the Bloomin' Bread - it contains a little error. It really is a small error - it's only 1/4 cup (or less) of olive oil. But what's pesto, for goodness' sake, without some olive oil, I ask you?

Fortunately, I think that if any of my readers out there DID try it without the olive oil, it probably tasted just fine. But, to be true to the recipe, the pesto does include a little bit of oil. Perhaps less than a traditional pesto, which is fine because the cream cheese and goat cheese both add fat.

If you want a corrected PDF recipe of the Bloomin' Bread, click HERE.

What's New about Chocolate Chip Cookies

I come from the school of taste that says cookies are supposed to be crisp. I suppose I should qualify that - most cookies are meant to be crisp. Surely there are some that simply can't be crisp by their very nature. My mother loved persimmons, and every year she made persimmon cookies. More like little bite-sized cakes than cookies to me. I like persimmons, but not that kind of soft cookie. My preference, always, is for crisp. Some years ago I read a very in-depth article in Gourmet Magazine about cookie standards, and exactly what makes a cookie come out crisp vs. soft, vs. crisp outside, soft inside. That kind of thing. It was fascinating reading the chemistry of it all. I still have the article, although I rarely refer to it.

One thing I know for sure is that using butter makes for a crisp cookie. I haven't used margarine for anything in many, many years. I used to use Plugra unsalted for all my baking, but have found that it's too HIGH in butterfat, if you can believe that! So I use grocery store types at the high price end because I don't want butter that is watered down. Grocery store brands usually contain less butterfat and added water. So I use Danish Creamery, or something similar. I always keep a pound of butter in the refrigerator and usually one in the freezer. Just in case I feel inspired.

Last night after I'd gone upstairs to go to bed, my DH's blood sugar went a little low, so he rooted in the freezer hoping to find a frozen cookie somewhere. No luck whatsoever. We ate the last of the homemade cookies about 3 months ago. Since my broken foot on July 6th, there's been zip-zero-nada baking going on in this kitchen unless he did it. He's never made cookies in his entire life, so that wasn't about to happen! But, now that I have my walking papers, he said, please make some cookies. As a Type I diabetic, my DH doesn't eat many desserts. Or at least, he's very careful about when and why he eats anything sweet. But he does enjoy an occasional cookie. Some sweets I'm able to incorporate Splenda, so he can have all he wants. I have yet to try chocolate chip cookies using all Splenda. They might be just fine.

Over the years I've collected plenty of cookie recipes and make a variety throughout the year, and enjoy having something stashed in the freezer for the occasional afternoon cup of tea, or a snack now and then. My first choice, though, is always chocolate chip. It used to be the usual back-of-the-bag Nestle's recipe. But, because I've had trouble a time or two with the recipe (the cookies would come out too flat) I've made one significant change to the master recipe: I add approximately one tablespoon of additional flour to the mixing bowl. If I happen to use Plugra butter (remember, more butterfat) I add 2 tablespoons. I'm also a fan of chocolate chip cookies WITH nuts. Any nuts could be okay, but walnuts just float my boat, as they say. So, these cookies are chocolate chocolate chip walnut cookies.

This time I wanted to do something different, so I added 2 heaping tablespoons of Dutch process cocoa to the batter too. And, I used Nestle's relatively new "Chcolatier" chips that are made with bittersweet chocolate, rather than the usual milk chocolate chips in the yellow bag. So these are really chocolate bittersweet chocolate-chip cookies with walnuts, with 1 T. of added flour.

A few months ago I had trouble finding Dutch Process cocoa when I ran out, so since I needed some new spices and herbs anyway, I ordered it through Penzey's. If you don't know about Penzey's, you're missing a real treat. I buy nearly all my herbs and spices from them now. Even though I live in a busy urban area teeming with grocery stores, and my local markets carry just about everything. But nobody had Dutch Process cocoa. This cocoa from Penzey's is fragrant and dark. The label says it has twice as much cocoa in it as grocery store varieties. Good!

I don't know about you, but I always make one pan of cookies to make sure the batter is right. That's what I did here, and they came out just fine. And if you don't have one of these scoops shown above, you should. If you're a cookie baker, this scoop makes short work of putting the dough onto sheets. I use large sheet pans with a Silpat on each one. There are three sizes of scoops - they're made in Britain. This one is the tablespoon size. The larger is more for muffin sized scoops. The smallest, the teaspoon size, I don't know what I'd use for. My scoop came from the Baker's Catalog (the one associated with King Arthur Flour). Click here if you're interested.

If you want the recipe, click here for the original Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookie from Nestle's site. If you use rich butter, just add a T. of extra flour, and about 2 T. of Dutch Process cocoa. Dutched cocoa is processed differently than regular cocoa, a very fine smooth powder that easily dissolves in liquid and disperses in baked goods.

So, DH, these are for you. Look in the freezer in the Ziploc bags in the door. So, excuse me, I need to make a cup of tea.

Lentil Soup a la Jack Orr

Who's he, you ask? Well, Jack Orr was my Dad. And he made an extraordinary soup when the mood struck him. It didn't strike often, and only when he was away from home. This is the only cooked thing my dad ever made except for grilled hamburgers and hot dogs, and an occasional steak. And those were all on the outdoor grill. At home, if he had a hankering for this soup at home, he insisted my mother had to make it. But when he was on a trip visiting relatives or friends, and it was the right season, he'd offer to make "his" lentil soup.

My Dad was an engineer. He liked things to be lined up just so, whether it was transistors on the workbench, ohmeter manuals on the shelf, pencils in his pocket (you know, those little plastic sleeves? yep, he had them) or vegetables on the cutting board. When dicing and mincing for this soup, each vegetable also needed to be cut "just so" in size. And he didn't like to make this alone. He always wanted somebody to be there to fetch things for him. When my parents would come to visit over Christmas, this soup was a fairly standard event one evening for sure. I did my best to have all the ingredients on hand every year. My Dad would pamper this soup for several hours, although once you add the lentils, they do reach a point when the texture of the lentil may go over the hill if it continues to cook.

The first order of business was the bacon. It was minced up fairly small, then allowed to render in a moderately warm pan for awhile. Meanwhile, you began chopping and mincing the onions, celery, carrots and garlic. Part of the fun of making this was the drama my dad made out of it. He really wanted an audience, and because it was my kitchen, that would normally be me as his number one fan club and schlepper. We tasted things often, added this and that, tasted again. Thyme was a necessary addition. I love the herb, so was glad to fetch that. Sometimes a quick trip to the market was required for something - maybe a fresh bag of dried lentils or an additional can of chopped tomatoes. When it was finally done everybody needed to ooh and aah a lot, otherwise my dad's feelings would be hurt. He wanted his efforts to be recognized. And appreciate them we did.

One visit I decided I'd best write down his recipe. Although I will admit that his recipe was not precise in the least. Unlike the engineer in him, this was adaptable to what you had on hand, or from his whim to add something different.

My daughter Dana doesn't like soup. Or stew. Still doesn't particularly like soup or stew, but will eat a few kinds if push comes to shove. When she was young she wouldn't eat this. My Dad simply couldn't understand how anybody wouldn't like his lentil soup. He did everything in his power to cajole Dana to have just a little bit. And maybe she did try a couple of mini-spoons, but she didn't like doing it. But she's come around as an adult. Maybe it's just because it's her grandpa's soup. I don't know, but at least she will eat it now. My Dad has been gone about 11 years now, but his legacy lives on in this recipe. I hope when you make this, somebody will ooh and aah about it. My dad will be smiling from heaven.

Ideally this should be made a day ahead. You know how soups and stews are - they really like to meld their flavors over a 24+ hour period. But most times this was started in the morning and eaten for dinner along with some sourdough rolls. You might want to work this into your fall repertoire so it's ready for cooler weather when it arrives. Here in So. California it's going to be 86 today, so I'm not quite ready to slave over a hot stove. But this will be on my list as soon as it turns cooler. I don't have any left in my freezer, so it needs a new supply.

Lentil Soup a la Jack Orr
Recipe By : John Barron Orr, my dear dad
Servings: 10
1/2 pound bacon -- chopped
2 whole onions -- chopped
3 stalks celery -- with leaves
2 whole carrots -- diced
3 cloves garlic -- minced
1 pound lentils -- washed
2 pounds canned tomatoes -- with juice
8 ounces tomato sauce
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme, or more if you like thyme
1 teaspoon chile pepper flakes
1 tablespoon salt
In a large, heavy pot sauté the bacon over medium heat until the fat is rendered. If you are using grocery store bacon, you may want to pour off some of the fat. If using meaty bacon, leave the fat in the pan. Add onions, celery, carrots and garlic and sauté until the vegetables are semi-transparent. Add the tomatoes, tomato sauce, herbs and chiles and lentils, then add water to about 1-2 inches above the level of the bean mixture in the pot. You may have to add additional water as the lentils cook.
Simmer for about 45 minutes or an hour until the lentils are completely cooked through, adding additional water if needed. Add salt to taste, and add pepper if desired.
Serving Ideas : You can also add ground beef or ham if you would like to, but it certainly isn't necessary. If you don't have the carrots, that's fine too, and one onion will do if that's all you have on hand.

(photo from bbcfooduk.com)
Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 328 Calories; 12g Fat (31.7% calories from fat); 21g Protein; 36g Carbohydrate; 16g Dietary Fiber; 19mg Cholesterol; 1294mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 1/2 Grain(Starch); 2 Lean Meat; 1 1/2 Vegetable; 1 1/2 Fat.
To print a PDF recipe only, click on title at top.

Ba--ck innn the kit--chen a-gain (singing)

Hooray. We're home from our trip. Exhausted, but home. We flew out of Philadelphia at about 5 pm yesterday. Our flight was cancelled, but we were re-booked to Chicago O'Hare, then to L.A. Arrived at LAX at 11:45 pm California time, and made the fastest trip from the airport to home, ever. About 45 minutes from Parking Lot B to the garage. I saw the doctor this morning and I have an okay to do anything reasonable. Still have some pain walking, every step, so need to do some exercises 3x a day to loosen up those tendons that have atrophied during my long sojourn without walking. But, now that I don't have to wear the gosh darned BOOT, I can stand. Made my first grocery store visit (Trader Joe's) this morning.

Bloomin' Sourdough

OMG. This bread. Oh, this bread. It is so out of this world, I can't believe it. While we were visiting with our friends Karen & Phil, where they now live in a town west of Allentown (Bethlehem) Pennsylvania, she showed me her 3-ring binder that has become her "favorite recipes" file. I always enjoy leafing through other people's recipe collections. So, I ran across this recipe for bread, mentioned something about it to Karen and she said, let's have that for dinner.

This picture shows you what it looked like, slathered each direction and ready to be sealed up in foil. You can visualize the concept from the title - like the bloomin' onions from Outback Steakhouse. But this bread, of course, isn't deep fried, but it blooms something like it. It's such a clever idea, why didn't I think of it? You make a batch of fresh pesto, mix it with cream cheese and goat cheese, spread it on the bloomin' style cut of the bread, bake and serve. The cutting of the bread is not difficult, but does require a good bread or serrated knife. You cut the bread almost through, turn the bread 90 degrees and cut again almost through, thus creating these little tall towers or cubes of bread about 3/4 inch or up to 1 inch square and about 2 inches high. Higher if you use a taller loaf, of course. Then you slather the pesto mixture on all 4 sides of the bread. Use a big plastic spatula and spread the cheese mixture down into the bread. Try to cover all sides of each little tower. It does this without working too hard at it if you just do it like you would sliced bread.

Once baked, you grab the very top of each tower and pull. Usually it breaks off right at the base and you have this warm, soft, garlicky mushy bite of unbelievable bread. What was left on the bottom (see picture at top) was cut up into pieces, baked in a hot oven very briefly and became croutons for the Caesar salad we had with dinner.

Get thyself to the grocery store and try this. My only suggestion: Karen decided to use ready-made pesto this time since we were tight on time. But the garlic flavor is much less pronounced, so I'd add more fresh garlic to the cheese mixture in the food processor, then add pesto to your liking.

Pesto-Cheese Bloomin' Sourdough Bread
Recipe: My friend, Karen B, via her friend Erin
1 medium whole sourdough bread
All-purpose pesto:
2 T pine nuts
2-3 cloves garlic,
1 t salt
1 1/2 cups fresh basil

approx. 1/4 cup olive oil
Cheese mixture:
8 ounces goat cheese
4 ounces cream cheese
1. Combine in food processor: nuts, garlic and salt, then add basil. Process until mixed. Slowly add olive oil. You can use less olive oil if you want to - it's just for a binder. If you choose to use ready-made pesto, add additional fresh garlic to the cheese mixture.
2. Cream together, then add pesto mixture and mix thoroughly.
3. Slice bread about one inch apart, not cutting all the way through the bottom crust. Turn loaf 90 degrees and slice bread again, also about 1 inch apart. You'll end up with a cubed effect, but the loaf is still intact.
4. Spread pesto cheese mixture on the bread - going one direction, then turn 90 degrees and spreading again so all the cubes are covered in the pesto cheese mixture. This part can get messy. Wrap bread in foil and bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes at 350. Or, on the barbecue, top rack, for about 15 minutes. Serve on a platter and let guests pull each cube.

To print a PDF recipe, click on title at top.