Tuesdays with Dorie – Rustic Potato Loaves, p138

Bread that contains mashed potatoes? Yes, please.

This bread came together quickly and easily. No long rise times!

I feel like I completely guessed the amount of potatoes to cook, since I don’t have a scale. Does this look like “about 3″ to you?

Combining all the dough ingredients, I started to get worried. This is how it looked before I started (hand) kneading. Dry! :

But my fear only lasted a minute, because it really wasn’t dry at all. After kneading:

The bread was yummy and enjoyed by all.

BUT I don’t think it quite lives up to White Loaves. I’ll likely try experimenting with flavourings next time to kick it up a notch!

For the recipe, see Simply Sweet!

Tuesdays with Dorie – Mocha Chocolate Chip Cookies, p330

I love coffee and I love cookies and I love kittens. This recipe involves 2/3! (I tried getting my cat involved, but he doesn’t like me. It’s like he has no idea that I own him.)

Mocha Chocolate Chips is basically a chocolate chip cookie with the addition of a couple tablespoons of instant coffee powder to give them a mocha kick.

Preparing the cookies is quick and easy. I used 3 Tbsp instant coffee, and a mixture of mini kisses, chocolate chips, and white chocolate for the “chip” component. The book suggests a good quality bar of chocolate, but the queen wasn’t expected so I decided to use the inexpensive stuff.

Of course I tried the raw cookie dough. And it was fabulous. The mocha flavour was prominent, like a sweet coffee drink. I could’ve eaten the whole bowl of dough!

Unfortunately, after baking, the cookies had very little mocha flavour. They were delicious nonetheless, but they tasted like a regular (tasty) chocolate chip cookie.

It’s possible that my instant coffee is not very strong. I’ll certainly be trying this recipe again with more coffee (maybe 4 tablespoons?), and see if that does the trick!

Check out Galettista for this recipe and let me know your thoughts!

Tuesdays with Dorie – Focaccia, p143

Hello. I’m here to talk about focaccia. ”Focaccia” is Italian for “heavenly carb” (I’m a quarter Italian).

The only downsides to this recipe are a long knead-time and rise-time. But, as usual, I kneaded this baby by hand and it wasn’t too much of a problem. The 24-36 hour rise is okay too, as long as as you eat other food in the meantime. I guess you could buy some nice focaccia to tide you over until the focaccia is ready…

After the 36 hour rise…

…you flatten your three dough-balls, slash ‘em, and top with olive oil, rosemary, thyme, and sea salt.

Then you bake on a stone, remove, and eat! Super simple! All joking aside, we really enjoyed this recipe. It’s favourfull and addictive! I will very likely be making this one again.

For the recipe, check out Wandering Through.

 

Tuesdays with Dorie – French Apple Tart, p379

It’s my own fault that I still don’t own a tart pan. I want to have one, but I also kind of don’t. I don’t like having too much stuff. Which is why my poor French Apple Tart isn’t a tart, but a sad pie. (#firstworldproblems)

The French Apple Tart  Pie is different from a regular apple pie in that the filling is made from mashed apples, rather than pieces, then is handsomely crowned in thinly sliced apples. It’s an apple pie with a few extra steps thrown in for fun.

It starts with the crust. (Which is the same recipe used in Blueberry Nectarine  Pie. It’s great!)

This time, the crust is prebaked:

Then you prepare the apple filling. Apples, sugar, flour, cinnamon, and fresh fluffy breadcrumbs (ha) are mixed together and baked until soft and mashable.

I had an issue with my apple filling. Even with an additional 10 minutes in the oven, they were nowhere near mashable with a fork or potato masher. Since I was low on time, I ended up blending them in the blender. The apple mush tasted great, so I wasn’t worried:

Next step, transfer the apple filling to the crust and arrange your apple slices on top:

And bake (again)!

Serve (with French Vanilla ice cream, obviously!):

The French Apple Pie was just as delicious as I expected. I was pleasantly surprised by the consistency of the filling; it sliced up perfectly with less juicy mess than I expect with a regular apple pie.

However, because of the extra steps involved, I’ll probably reserve this recipe for special occasions.

For this fantastic recipe and more on several hundred physical pages (made from trees), pick up Baking with Julia. Or check out Laws of the Kitchen for this complete recipe.

Tuesdays with Dorie – Finnish Pulla, p106

I’m a little late with this one – gah!

The only change I made to this recipe was substituting nutmeg and cinnamon for the cardamon.

It was delicious, pretty easy to put together, and looks pretty. My boyfriend and I attacked it good:

For the recipe, visit The Daily Morsel.

 

Tuesdays with Dorie – Best Ever Brownies, p331

As a human, I love brownies. I believe my dog also loves brownies, but I haven’t tested the theory (maybe someone could invent detoxified chocolate for dogs? like decaf coffee, which I regularly give my dog. Thanks, Science!)

(Just kidding)

Anyway. Best Ever Brownies. I didn’t have high hopes for this recipe after reading some of the feedback from other bakers. Many noted that the brownies took much longer (20-30 minutes longer!) to bake than the recipe indicated, and didn’t turn out “best ever”.

My results were different. Using my regular metal pan (rather than the heavy glass recommended in the book), I baked my brownies only 30 minutes before they looked plenty cooked to me.

They were perfect, fully cooked but still soft. They’re great! Thick, rich, delicious!

I don’t want to say that these are the “best ever brownies”, because a) that’s subjective, and b) who knows when a new brownie will turn up and blow us all away. But, these are definitely the best brownies I’ve ever made.

To weigh in on the “best ever brownie” debate, get the recipe at A Beautiful Mess and try it!
If you have a better “best” brownie, please let me know where I can find the recipe!

Canning! Tomato Apple Chutney

I’ve been a bad blogger lately. Blame it on the a-a-a-a-a-alcohol new job with a long commute.

But, last weekend I did something pretty cool. I got together with my mother and sister, and we did some canning! I’ve never canned before and neither had my sister, but my mom showed us the ropes.

We made Canadian Living’s Tomato Apple Chutney, which is delicious and one that my mom has made many times before. I can eat it on anything.

I store my chutney between the cat food, laundry detergent, and oats. I recommend this placement.

It was a fun afternoon and I’m glad to be on my way toward being a canning master.

And, I can finally update my hardly-ever-used goals list! Hurray!