Tag Archives: Recipes

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe

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pumpkin_cookiesThere it was. Staring at me with sad little orange eyes. Every time I opened the refrigerator, I could hear its insidious whisper:

“Please don’t throw me away.”

But what to do with it? I had about a cup of pumpkin puree leftover from Thanksgiving. Trying to find a savory recipe just seemed like a lot of hard work, and I was suffering a bit of a pumpkin hangover. So there it sat, that lonely container of orange mush. For days. A week almost. Then:

PUMPKIN CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES!

I found a recipe on allrecipes.com and changed it around a bit. I added my own spices (the original recipe called for pumpkin pie spice) and used a combination of brown sugar and white sugar, instead of all white sugar. These cookies are cakey and moist; warm from the oven, they are all but irresistible. I’ve tried the recipe with different kinds of nuts, but my favorite (so far) is chopped, toasted hazelnuts.

Recipe after the jump.

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Fresh Fruit Muffin Recipe

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final_fruit_muffinFinally, I have the recipe for the Fresh Fruit Muffins. I made these one last time last week, just to make sure that I was satisfied. I was.

A couple of notes: First, I found that if I used too much fruit, I couldn’t get the muffins out of the pan. About a cup of frozen blueberries was just about right. If you want to use more fruit in your muffins, I’d recommend using paper liners. Secondly, keep the size of the fruit smallish. If you are using larger fruits, like strawberries, I would cut the fruit into small pieces. Third, I only tested this recipe with blueberries (except for the batch with mixed berries, including huge strawberries and blackberries, hence tip #2) but any fruit, as long as it isn’t too wet, should work well. And finally, I liked the texture that topping the muffins with either a crumb topping or a streusel gives. This step is certainly optional.

Recipe after the jump.

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Raspberry Buttermilk Cake Recipe

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raspberry_buttermilk_cake3This is the perfect little cake. It is quick and easy to make with ingredients that are probably sitting in your kitchen right now. There are no fancy mixing methods, no expensive, hard-to-find ingredients and no decadent frostings. Not too sweet or heavy, this cake is perfect for breakfast or as an afternoon snack. You can use just about any fruit you have on hand, fresh or frozen.

The original recipe appeared in the June 2009 Gourmet magazine. I ran across a variation here. I’ve made the cake twice. The first time I followed the original recipe and used fresh blueberries. That cake was okay. The second time I made several adjustments and used frozen raspberries. That cake was fantastic.

In my version, I cut down on the sugar from 2/3 cup to 1/2 cup. I also cut down on the leavening quite a bit. My version of the recipe is after the jump.

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Banana Oatmeal Muffins Recipe

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oatmeal_banana_muffins4In the bottom of my fridge is a collection of flours, powders and nut meals. Last time I checked, I had spelt flour, wheat bran, almond meal and dried buttermilk powder. I also had a bag of oat flour, so when I saw this recipe, I knew I had to try it.

This was my second attempt at these muffins. The first time I tried them, they came out wet and heavy. This time around, I decreased the amount of milk, oil and bananas, as well as lowering the amount of leavening. I also added some lemon juice. which you could certainly leave out. The only yogurt I had in the fridge was vanilla, so that’s what I used. If you use plain yogurt, I’d add about a half of a teaspoon of vanilla extract. If you don’t have oat flour, you can blitz oatmeal in a food processor to make your own flour.

Besides being gluten free and full of fiber, these muffins are just plain good. They are a bit crumbly, but are tender and moist from the banana. Recipe after the jump. Continue reading →

Ricotta Cookies Recipe

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ricotta_cookiesI came across this recipe while in culinary school. One day, my cooking buddy Jamie came into the kitchens declaring that we had to make these cookies. I think she found the recipe in a mailer from a ricotta cheese manufacturer. At that point, I had never baked with ricotta cheese, and I was skeptical. Besides, I was a ‘serious’ baker and these cookies had sprinkles, for heaven’s sake!

Well, about a thousand batches later, I am comfortable enough in my bakerhood to admit that these are one of my favorite cookies. They are tender and moist with a faintly sweet vanilla flavor. You don’t taste the ricotta cheese; it contributes more to the texture than anything else. These are so good that Bryan recently requested them for his birthday instead of a cake!

I prefer to glaze the cookies while they are still hot, as it makes the glaze more transparent. The glaze sets up pretty fast, so it is easier to have an extra set of hands manning the sprinkler.

Recipe is after the jump. Continue reading →

Chicken in Garam Masala/Red Curry, kinda

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chicken_stew3Currently cooking out of Whole Grains Every Day, Every Way by Lorna Sass.

Somehow, I managed to buy half of the ingredients for this recipe and half the ingredients for another recipe and didn’t realize it until I started cooking. I ended up with a Frankenstein recipe: the head of this recipe with the body of  Sass’ Thai Chicken Soup recipe. Fortunately for our bellies, the results were pretty tasty (cold cereal was the backup dinner). The curry paste gave the stew a gentle heat that went nicely with the coconut milk. Neither flavor was overwhelming and, in fact, it mostly tasted of tomatoes. Next time, I might try using less tomatoes and more of everything else.

I substituted red curry paste for the garam masala (an Indian spice mixture) and served the mixture over brown rice. I kept the unsweetened coconut milk, but ditched the fresh ginger and the pistachio nuts. I also cut my chicken into bite-sized pieces while Sass used whole chicken tenders.

Hmmm. It might be more appropriate to consider Sass’ recipes as inspiration, which, in my opinion, is the earmark of a truly good cookbook.

This is the last recipe out of Whole Grains Every Day, Every Way. Overall, I really enjoyed cooking out of this book, and I’ve got to hand it to Sass who comes up with some really easy ways to incorporate whole grains into one’s diet. I’ve got some new recipes that will go into regular rotation around our house, as well as an appreciation for the flavor that whole grains can add to baked goods (my modified lemon poppyseed muffins with spelt flour are killer).

And, since I really mangled Sass’ original recipes for this stew-like dish, I’m posting my version after the jump. Continue reading →

Lemon-Poppyseed Muffins 2.0 Recipe

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spelt_muffinCurrently cooking out of Whole Grains Every Day, Every Way by Lorna Sass.

Remember this post a couple of weeks ago? Well, ever since then, I’ve been beating my head against a wall called Lemon-Poppyseed Muffins. And the wall has been winning.

From the first time I made these muffins, I thought they had promise, but also some problems. I thought the lemon flavor was overpowered by the other ingredients. I though they weren’t sweet enough, that they didn’t have enough rise and that they were too crumbly. So I made batch after batch, trying different combinations of ingredients. I compared recipes from other cookbooks and consulted one of the best scientific baking tomes of late, Bakewise by Shirley  O. Corriher.

In the end, I got the lemon flavor where I wanted it by increasing the lemon juice and brushing the hot muffins with sweetened lemon juice. The leavening problem was solved by drastically reducing the amount of leavening that the original recipe called for, and using all baking soda. Substituting a half of a cup of all-purpose flour for a half of a cup of spelt flour made the muffins lighter and less crumbly.

Because I made so many changes to the recipe, I’ve decided to go ahead and post my version after the jump. Continue reading →