Fig Preserves

8/30/17 In July, my friend Imogene Clawson's fig tree began to bare. I was able to collect several gallons of figs but no time to preserve them. The figs were frozen and on 8/30, my daughter Mary Margaret  and I preserved 24 half pint jars. The preserves did not set up as would wanted. they were to runny. Seeking advice, we discovered we could remove the preserves from the jars and cook longer until we achieved the correct syrup thickness. We jarred them again and ended up with 19 jars. We made baguettes and spread them with cream cheese and fig preserves. Delish!! The jars will be offered at my church bazaar in October with attached Cedar Island Fig Cake Recipe.

Fig Preserves

7# figs
5# sugar
2 lemons
Pinch salt

Gently wash figs and nip of stem. Layer figs and sugar and let set overnight. Add 2 lemons sliced and seeds removed and salt. Simmer until desired consistency. Stir occasionally and bring figs up from the bottom. Stir gently to retain fruit shape.

Clean and sterilize jars. Fill jars with preserve minus the lemon slices. Cap and store in cool, dry, dark spot.

Shannon Harris’ Fig Preserves Cake

2 cups AP or Cake Flour

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. nutmeg

1 1/2 cup sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp soda

1/2 cup nuts

3 eggs

1 cup buttermilk

1 cup oil

1 cup undrained fig preserves chopped or processed

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Sauce:

1/4 cup buttermilk

1/2 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla

1/4 tsp soda

1 1/2 tablespoon cornstarch

1/2 stick butter

​

Mix all dry ingredients​. Add oil, eggs, milk, figs and nuts. Beat well after each addition. Pour into tube pan and cook for 1 hour and 15 minutes on 325 degrees. Cool

in pan 15 minutes and turn out. Pour sauce over cake.

Sauce: Mix all sauce ingredients and bring to a boil. Pour over cake while still warm.

Fig Preserves

 Baguette Dough

Baguettes preshaped

Final product

Dinner Rolls Again

8/27/17 Brady and Shirley Way (in-laws) are coming for spaghetti and dinner rolls are served. These are lovely! This is my usual Down East Light Roll recipe from the Harkers Island Cookbook.

Making Baguettes in Class

8/22/17 Our Artisan Breads Class making baguettes:
Using a Lean Dough Recipe, we scale, mix, and knead the dough. Now, Bulk Fermentation.

In class:

The dough is rising in the Proofer:

The dough is preshaped, rested, and shaped. The shaped baguettes are proofed at room temperature.

The baguettes slashed are baked:

The Final Product: Hard brown crust, soft chewy center, and a irregular large crumb.

Sometimes dough has a mind of it's own. This loaf decided to become a hockey stick.

Chef Summers cuts and we taste.

Cinnamon Roll Wreath

8/20/17 Cinnamon Roll Wreath
Looking for a sweet bread to take to Prayer Breakfast on Monday morning. Found a visually appealing recipe for a Cinnamon Roll Wreath. This is a reshaping of a pan of Cinnamon Rolls into a wreath. The photo shows a small wreath fitting in a regular sheet pan.

The recipe came together easily, but there was so much dough there was no way it made a small wreath. I twirled it around like a nautilus. This recipe could be divided into 2 wreaths to achieve the appearance of the photo. Icing was drizzled on the wreath before serving.

CCC College Library Culinary Resources

8/1917
Our chefs at Carteret Community College encourage us to check the excellent resources available at the college library. I checked out two resources:

Vintage Cakes is a collection of recipes including origin information. I was interested in Old Vermont Burnt Sugar Cake with Maple Cream Ice Cream. The burnt sugar technique would be interesting to try.
A Baker's Odyssey celebrates recipes from American immigrants from all over the world. A DVD accompanies the book with demos of several of the recipes. I enjoyed watching how to prepare Cannolis, Hungarian Walnut Tart, and Apple Strudel.

Dollywood Cinnamon Bread

8/1317
My friend Anita Hardesty sent this challenge to me:
http://chindeep.com/2017/05/11/dollywood-cinnamon-bread-copycat/
Viewing the video, the recipe calls for frozen prepared dough. The dough is thawed and risen. Next, using a lame, the top of the loaf was slashed 4 times. The dough was rolled in melted butter on all sides and then rolled and coated in cinnamon sugar.

I decided to improve this recipe by making the dough from scratch. I used a rich dough recipe and set it aside to rise. Once doubled in size, the dough was divided and rolled out in 2 rectangles.  With a light brushing of melted butter, the dough was sprinkled with cinnamon sugar. A melted butter bath and a cinnamon sugar dredge was prepared in separate pie pans.

The dough was rolled up to create a log. The seam was sealed and the ends tucked under. Then the top of the loaf was slashed and the loaf was rolled in melted butter and cinnamon sugar. The loaves rose for 45 minutes. The recipe comments stated the loaves may collapsed after baking and this is what happened for me. I repeated the recipe to improve the results. I reduced the size of the loaf by half. the loaves did not collapsed with the smaller loaves. I shared the loaves with my Monday Morning Prayer group and other friends.

The large loaf just out of the oven!

Collapse after cooling

Smaller loaves solved the collapse problem

Birthday Granola

Textbook Granola

My husband's brother has a birthday on June 30 and my birthday is July 14th. This year we celebrated together between the birthday's. Finding a birthday present for Brady is challenging. I didn't want to give him the same old knit shirt this year and I don't know of anything he needs. So, I was thinking what does he like. I know he likes craft beer and I remember he likes granola.

I went to my classroom textbook and found a simple granola recipe and baked it up. Then, I went to our local Mill Whistle Brewery and picked out several kinds of beer to make up a carton. A tote was thrown in with the beer.



The birthday gifts were successful!

Blueberry Danish Rolls

For the August 7th Prayer Breakfast, I found this recipe in a Taste of Home Recipe book:

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               








I change this up and used in season blueberries instead of cherries. I mixed the dough and let it rise twice without overnighting the dough.

Here are the rolls just out of the oven.

And, here they are iced.

This recipe used a rich dough with eggs and butter plus a slight amount of sweetness. This paired well with the sweet blueberries and icing. This recipe made a large amount of dough and I made two batches of the treat. There were many happy recipients!!

Italian Bread 

It's July 22 and friends are coming over for dinner. Two families have visiting granddaughters and both young girls are vegetarians and in addition, one of the Mom's is a vegan. I considered many menu items but decided to simply make spaghetti with marinara with soy crumbles. I found an Italian Bread recipe from Bread-world with no fat added and it was delicious and flavorful. Bread world is the site for Fleischman's yeast. I like the effect the slashes make on the top of the bread.

The Pioneer Woman Cinnamon Roll Recipes

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

Yum!!

On the afternoon of July 16th, I was vegging around the house watching food shows on Food Network and PBS. I caught an episode of The Pioneer Woman. I have tried several recipes form this show and they usually turn out well. The program is usually over staged and poorly acted. The events are over contrived. When the recipes are prepared, there seems to be a lack of technique.

Now, after complaining, I tried Ree Drummonds's Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls and was very pleased with the outcome. This yeast bread used little rising time by adding baking powder and baking soda. Next time I try this recipe, I would definitely reduce the amount of icing and I will increase the rising time for additional yeast flavor.

I made these for my Monday morning Prayer Breakfast and took leftovers to my friend Anita. All were very happy.

With this success, I tried Ree Drummond's Cinnamon Rolls 101. For me this recipe contained to much sugar in the dough, the filling, and the syrup. Too sweet for me.

Biscuits with Charles

Biscuits

Recently, my friend Charles Phillips requested help in learning to make biscuits. Charles remembered his Mom making biscuits many times and wanted to be able to continue this family tradition. We met at his home for our project. First, I complimented the ingredient selection. There was quality Unbleached flour which is my favorite flour for baking. We followed his recipe selection. We refrigerated all ingredients to keep them cold. Then Charles accurately measured our the ingredients. The dry ingredients were added to the bowl and were whisked to incorporation and sift. The cold fat was "cut in" until the mixture resembled small peas. A well was made in the center and liquid added. The dough was barely formed into a ball and turned out on the counter. The dough was kneaded maybe 3-4 times and patted out to 1/2" being careful for the sides to not slope down and be uneven. Charles cut out the biscuits making cuts close together to reduce leftover dough. The leftover dough was re-rolled for additional cutting. Baking directions were followed resulting in lovely biscuits. Charles commented he didn't know there was so much technique involved.

The Fourth of July

Nala at the River in front of our cottage

My husband and I spent the 4th over on the Pamlico River near Belhaven, NC along with our dog Nala! With the holiday in the middle of the week, many of our neighbors needed to return to work. Those of us left joined forces and took turns cooking dinner at night. I decided to bake rolls for the dinners. At our river cottage, ingredients and culinary tools are scarce. Using one of the two cookbooks in house, I found a recipe for Sweet Potato Rolls. There were few measuring tools and I guesstimated most of the ingredients. The sweet potatoes added a lovely golden color, good nutrition, and a deeper richer flavor to the rolls. With the warm humid air, the rolls didn't take very long to rise!!  

King Arthur Flour Bake Along: Chocolate Babka

6/25/17 Babka is a Eastern Europe sweet yeast bread.  The Eastern Europe Jewish version involves twisted ropes of filled dough. The filling can be cinnamon or chocolate. This bread recipe goes together quickly but extra time is required to prepare filling and topping. Find the recipe on the King Arthur Bake Along site and there is also a great recipe from the NY Times with video.
Here is the Babka panned for rising, risen, baked and packaged. One loaf was for my Prayer Group and aother for my brother and sister-in-law.

Babka Panned

Risen Babka

Final Result

King Arthur Bake Along Baguettes

6/23/17 Baguettes from the King Arthur Bake Along again. This recipe includes a poolish. This is a preferment, a fermented dough added to the recipe to increase flavor and add additional leavening. A poolish is made with equal parts water and flour plus yeast. The poolish for this recipe was made last night and included in my dough this morning. Check out the poolish, it has the same appearance as the pic from the King Arthur site.

Perfect Poolish

Here is the final result packaged in bread gabs I purchased from Amazon. Never seem to have packaging for gifting baked goods and this really fits the bill.

Mary Berry's Lemon Drizzle Cake

6/20/17
My absolute most favorite TV Food Show is The Great British Baking Show. Last week a new season was aired on PBS. Great Britain certainly has many talented home bakers. I usually feel I couldn't possibly be successful on this show. But last week one cake caught my attention as a recipe I would like to try: Mary Berry's Lemon Drizzle cake. This is not complicated. Just a quick cake with lemon zest, baked in a loaf pan, and drizzled when out of the oven with a granulated sugar/lemon juice glaze. This glaze forms a kind of crunchy crust. Oh my, sweet lemony goodness. The recipe is available on the show site.

On 6/21/17 I hosted my bridge club at Floyd's in Morehead City, NC and awarded three cakes as prizes. One for high score, second high and low score. Also, one cake for the staff at Floyd's.

Pam

Eleanor

Judy

A Fave TV Food Show

6/19/17 One of my favorite TV shows is the Barefoot Contessa with Ina Garten. This past weekend I watched her prepare a very simple pasta dish. With a 1/2 pound of cooked pasta added to 1 stick of melted butter and the juice of 1 lemon, you have delicious dish of pasta in about 20 minutes. I  sauteed chicken tenderloins and bake asparagus with olive oil and salt and pepper. These components came together for our dinner. Lemon zest garnished this dish. As I am posting, I feel the need to work on presentation! With white pasta and chicken, the dish looks lackluster. How are ways I could improve the look? It needs something red and maybe I would cut the asparagus into bite site pieces. Maybe sun dried tomatoes would perk this up!

Practice, Practice, Practice

6/21/17
Cooking at home. If I don't learn anything else at Culinary School, I know I must practice, practice, practice! This past semester I truly mommicked many eggs trying to make the perfect omelette. Since, I have been working on a better omelette. Here is the latest try. This has come a long way from the class at CCC when I burned and and stuck many in the pan.  This effort needed a better whisking and a little less cooking time. Pretty good fold. Chef Garnett, I am still working on it!!

Nags Head Reunion

6/13/17 Having a wonderful visit at Nags Head, NC with my Plymouth High School friends. Tonight I plan to serve dinner to everyone and everyone helped. As dinner preparations were underway, anyone passing through the kitchen ended up with a job! Here is our Menu:

Appetizer by Kay: Tuna Cucumber Swirls
Dinner: Risotto with Italian Sausage, Spinach and Sun Dried Tomatoes
            Arugula and Radicchio Salad with Vinaigrette
             Crostini

Here is Kay's appetizer. We both learned how to strip cucumbers and found spreading the tuna mixture was easier on dry cucumber.

Kay and the Swirls

The Risotto main dish was an success and I sliced and toasted the baguettes prepared in the previous post. While preparing the Vinaigrette, Emily helped drizzle the oil and the dressing emulsified perfectly. I just wished Chef Clark could have seen it!

Love my childhood friends!!

 

King Arthur Bakealong Challenge: Baguettes

6/11/17 King Arthur is a quality brand of flour. Sometimes at Food Lion, you can catch it on sale. If you are going to go to the trouble to bake, give your product every chance of success by using high quality ingredients.

Recently I found on the King Arthur website a baker's challenge with a different recipe to try each each month. Baguettes are the recipe for June. This is my first experience with a preferment. The preferment was a "poolish." Basically a dryer preferment, this poolish contains water, yeast and flour. Here is the final result: a very crusty bread with a softer interior. My crumb was finer than I would like.

King Arthur Flour June Bake Along Baguettes

Macaroons

6/6/17 Macaroons Not Macarons, O the Difference

Coconut Macaroon Cookies are one of my favorite cookies but they don't seem to be available in the grocery store anymore. These are the cookies made mostly of coconut, not the trendy French multicolored sandwich cookies with multi flavors. Been thinking of making them myself. A good beginning would be check out the bag of coconut at the store.

A simple recipe for Macaroons is on the back of the Baker's coconut bag.`Very easy to do.

Down East Light Rolls

6/3/17 An elderly member of my church died and her funeral was today. I joined a group providing lunch for family and out of town visitors. I prepared Down East Light Rolls for this event.

The dough was wet and rose beautifully. Note the plastic wrap from Costco with the slider for cutting. What a useful product. Rolls and cuts easily. I may win the plastic wrap battle after all.

Risen Dough

Rolls

Traditional Blistered Tops

Baguettes

6/2/17
Monday, 5/29, Elizabeth and Laura are coming by on the way home to Greensboro via the Cedar Island Ferry. Mom can we have dinner? Sure! How about spaghetti? Yeah!  Of course fresh baked bread is a match with spaghetti. Choosing the bread to make became easy when I realize all my Crisco was gone. The perfect solution: French Baguettes. The French and Italians love each other, Right??

Used my classroom textbook for this recipe. I finally figured out how to use a lame to slash the dough. Speed is the key. Slash and run!! French baguettes have 5 to 7 slashes. Chef Lindsay, my baking Chef Professor, would be so proud! One loaf went to Greensboro!

Tres Leches Cake

6/1/17 As I was driving home from school on my way to a luncheon, I called my friend Mary Lee and asked are we playing bridge tonight and where are we playing bridge. May Lee says we are playing and its my turn to host. Oh my! Well it doesn't take much to pull this together. Just need a clean house and bridge set up and then prizes and dessert. What to serve for dessert. It's always a dilemma with so many choices. I decide simple and cool. This is an opportunity to make a Tres Leches Cake. Always wanted to try this.

A plain cake is needed for the basis. There is always a box cake but I decide to make a scratch cake. The filling is 3 milks: Eagle Brand, evaporated and whole milk. When cool, top with real whipping cream. Garnish with macerated strawberries and blueberries. It was a hit with the clean plate Bridge Club!!

This recipe originates from Latin America. In order to promote sales of either evaporated or condensed milk, this cake recipe was on the label of the can.

Tres Leches Cake
1. Prepare plain cake in 13" X 9" pan.
2. When cake is removed from oven, cool slightly
3. Using a fork, perforate the cake
4. Pour a mixture of 2 cups whole milk, 1 can condensed milk, and 1 12 oz can evaporated milk over cake. Refrigerate 4 hours. Top with freshly whipped sweetened heavy whipping cream.
5. Use garnish of your choice.