Spiced Applesauce Breakfast Cake

I'm just starting out honestly, with "breakfast cake."  I know there's a fine line between bread and cake - (banana bread and carrot cake?) and this is a non-dessert cake.  It's not a bread.  It's also not super sweet.  It's breakfast cake, but you can have it for dessert if you want.

I was looking to make applesauce cake for two reasons:
1. I had too many apples, and am not interested in things like crisps, crumbles, pies, tarts; and
2. When I was a teenager, there was this orchard/farm market by the mall and they made amazing applesauce cake.

So working off the idea that cake can be made of applesauce - and not just in the swap-the-oil-for-applesauce-in-the-Duncan-Hines-mix-way - and that I needed to use some apples, I went to work.

Except, it's hard for me with desserts.  I don't like really sweet things.  Also, I have no idea how that applesauce cake I grew up with was made.

But it worked.  A very lightly sweet cake (dust it with powdered sugar and you get a bit more sweet in every bite) that's not really CAKE in the plan-your-other-meals-to-account-for-it way.

Cranberry Rice Pudding

Sure, I try to write about using the fresh, seasonal, local produce bounty to create dinner.  But sometimes, it's about upcycling.

I don't make white rice, but I do sometimes acquire white rice.  Sometimes it comes along with General Tso's Tofu.  And it sits in the fridge.  Sometimes I have the common sense to freeze it and make fried rice with it later, other times it sits until we have to give it the old sniff-n-toss.

Let's face it, not every meal is a home-cooked treasure.  But just like I add spinach or chard to my leftover Chicken Tikka Masala to stretch my takeout into a three day experience, cooked takeout white rice can be turned into a creamy dessert that pretty much comes free with your delivery meal.  Recycled rice = instant dessert. 

Orange Monkey Bread

If you've been playing Saturday's Mouse: The Home Game for any amount of time, you know I don't make desserts.  It's not something I'm interested in and not something I'm good at.  I rarely want dessert.  And that's not some sort of personal restraint thing, I don't have any personal restraint, so I just eat a lot of cheese instead of sweets.  I break even.  

It's hard to cook things you don't care much about.  So dessert just isn't a thing. 

But as I perused the interwebs and the cooking shows and the food magazines over the past year or so, I kept seeing monkey bread.  I've never eaten monkey bread, and I've never seen it in person, but it's been everywhere lately and I'd like to think that the issue is not that I'm following a trend, just that I needed to try this. As soon as possible. 

I read 47 recipes for monkey bread.  Here's the gist: make white bread.  Roll it in balls.  Sugar and butter. Bake.

Most of the recipes I read used canned biscuits, but that's not my style and Cooking Light made their own bread so I made a bread a lot like their bread too.  They also used a cream cheese glaze and that's also not my style, so I just went with the bread. I didn't do it word-for-word, but it was close.  Their bread had OJ in it, and I wanted to take that nine steps further, so I added orange zest and orange extract and orange liqueur (a word I can't spell without Googling). 

Sunday Dinner and Using up the Veg

This is pretty and delicious, but it's all supermarket foods, no CSA foods. 

Whenever we've been in the market for a CSA, and that's been a few times now, we have The Conversation.  The Does-It-Really-Make-Sense-To-Get-A-Full-Share conversation.  And when people ask me about my CSA, they're often surprised that we get a full share.  Most of my friends in two-person households get a half.  A half share means, depending on your CSA, either that you pick up a full haul every two weeks, or that you get a lesser haul weekly.  The every two weeks thing wouldn't work for us; I like having lettuce, always, and lettuce doesn't keep like that.  Neither does the rest of it.  

Sour Cherry Brownies

At least in this part of the country, folks with CSA fruit are getting overloaded with cherries.  Sure, you can make pies and crumbles and tarts, but those are totally not my thing, so I've just been eating sour cherries by the handful.


It got to be too much, and Sous Chef Brian won't touch them, so it was all on me.  We finally resorted to inviting friends over (not that we wouldn't have invited them anyway) because we knew they liked sour cherries. We sent them home with a doggy bag. 


But wait, you know what's better than staging a dinner party to use up fruit?  


Brownies.

Eating Seasonally and Whipped Jello

One of these things is not like the other. 

This is something called whipped Jello.  You take Jello let it set a while, and you whip it, then you let it set longer.  It is not food.

A friend of mine asked about a statement I made about having been eating seasonally for a few years.  We do, generally, eat our produce seasonally.  That means that while I buy tofu and chicken and mustard and couscous and kidney beans year round, I only buy tomatoes when they're here.  "Here" means that someone local (within a state or two) grew them and they're ready now.  

Pear Cakes

This isn't a fail, in that they tasted good.  But they weren't pretty.  So you can improve on my technique or maybe don't serve these to guests. 

In 2001 I had some cookies, and they were awesome.  They were LU Pim's Orchard Pear biscuits.  Here's a conversation on The Kitchn about how awesome they are.   Pim's are around in orange and raspberry flavors, and they're great, but not like the pear ones.  These were very special cookies, with a firm cake base and a fruit jam filling, topped in dark chocolate.  One day, I couldn't find them anymore, and every year or so I check the interwebs and they're just not there.  

Lately, cookies around here are pretty limited.  I get my local fancy oatmeal cookies, because I can't make them worth a damn, and I make a pretty banging chocolate chip cookie, and then once or twice a year I take a photo inside my purse and we see these:

Really, that's the range, and it's a good thing that I don't bake more cookies, because I'm just terrible at it.  I can bake bread.  I can bake bread like it's a hundred years ago and I have to, but sweets are not my forte.    It's fine, because we're not big sweets people.  But I'm haunted by how good these pear biscuits were and once I saw that local pear jam was available all winter, I committed myself to trying to recreate them.

Hot Tip: Scavenging Sugar

When I make cookies, it's because we're having a cookie emergency.  I don't typically just have cookies around, so if I'm making them, it's because someone *needs* a cookie.  


A few days ago, I needed a cookie.   My chocolate chip cookie recipe is quick and easy, and relies on stuff I always have on hand (plus chips, which I try to always have on hand). 


And all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I was out of sugar. 

Amazing Local Ice Cream

Just a note, I don't have any pictures of ice cream.   But it just wouldn't be right to pretend it didn't happen. 

ok, I tried to take a shot of the whole table and really just ended up with a photo of a bowl of cilantro.  

My friends made this awesome dinner the other night.   Chili and cornbread, perfect for snow.  And like fools, they asked me to bring dessert.  Ya'll know I don't make dessert. 

Parmesan Garlic Popcorn

A couple of months ago, I posted that I had no idea how to make popcorn.  It was true.  I grew up with an electric popper, something like this, and then we graduated to microwave popcorn sometime in my teens.  However, microwave popcorn isn't exactly food, and while there are home-made microwavy alternatives, I wanted to do it right, on the stovetop.


I was worried that my pots wouldn't work for it, but that's what The Google* is for.   I actually searched out my particular brand and style of pot, with the word "popcorn," and found enough reviews with folks raving about how awesome these pots were for making popcorn to make me feel comfortable. 

Cinnamon Swirl Bread

I've been lax about making bread.  November - January is so busy anyway, I haven't been making the time.  I very intentionally don't order bread through my buying club, because I'm planning on making it myself, and then I don't and everything is on a tortilla.   Just the other day I went to the supermarket for fruit and a couple of staples and I was drawn in by the bread and bought some sandwich rolls, since I knew I wasn't going to make them this week.  

Well, it's a new year. Let's make some bread.  Not just bread, either, let's make some sweet and warm and cinnamony bread. 

This recipe makes three loaves, which I think is perfect because you get one to freeze, one to give away and one for right now.   If you don't have three loaf pans, do cut down the recipe. 

Norwegian Cookies

Most of the time, that's what we call them.

"Norwegian cookies."
"The cones?"
"Yes."

Frosting fail

It's been a while since I've posted a fail.  I think of that as a personal accomplishment, because it's not like I'm hiding kitchen drama over here and not telling you about it.  Basically, if I make something I haven't made before, you're going to hear about it, success or not.   But this frosting, whoa... this frosting. 

Hot Tip: Unburning cookies

Soft Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies

There are four types of chocolate chip cookies:  Flat n' chewy, hard, soft, and icky.  Everyone has their cookie camp.  I make mine soft.  If you want to make them chewy, use the Tollhouse recipe.  Everyone else does.  It's a good cookie.  I'm all for it.  Also, other people like them hard.  I don't know what's wrong with those people.  And then some cookies are icky.  Like the hard "chocolate chip" cookies made of chalk dust that people get at Italian bakeries.  Ugh.


I was a Soft Batch kid, not a Chips Ahoy kid.  But I had some Soft Batch cookies a couple years back and there is some sort of acidic sweet chemical flavor that is no longer working for me. And they're dusty too.  I don't know what happened.


Either way, I've been working on a whole wheat recipe for a while.  I think whole wheat will only work with the thicker, softer cookies, because they're cakier to start with, and if you think too hard about it, muffin-ier.  So whole wheat works here.


Anyhow, I made you some cookies. 


I buy good chocolate chips, because I'm a spoiled girl.  I don't know, a couple years ago I had a [candy] bar and it was like wax and I asked myself what I was doing eating chocolate.  Sous Chef Brian had never been a chocolate fan, and I started buying "good" chocolate and all of a sudden he was all nomming on my secret stash, so I'm a convert, and I eat a lot less chocolate because I can afford a lot less chocolate.   So start with something you really like.  

Secret Recipes and Shared Recipes

Several months ago, I signed up to do recipe testing for Cook's Illustrated, and quite a few times in the last few weeks I've received recipes to test.   For me, in my particular situation with the blog and all, this is a blessing and a curse.  I need new ideas, all the time, otherwise my blog would be called, "Look, Rose made another pizza."  So, getting a recipe by email is great because now I have direction, I have a goal.

not a pizza.  i promise. 

The flipside is that I can't share the recipe until the magazine comes out, and that could be months away.   So I'm cooking fairly fancy (for me) things and not able to write about it.  I'll tell you all about this tart and these cookies just as soon as I can. 


The other fun thing is that my bestest friend from childhood does it too, and she's been getting the same secret recipes. We live in different parts of the country, and I've seen her only a handful of times since we've been adults.  I remember making chocolate chip cookies with her late in the night at weekend sleepovers, and making french toast together early in the morning when we were teenagers, cooking with her and her friends at her bachelorette party and cooking up pasta sauce together on that rare occasion that we were able to visit.  I love that even through the distance we can cook together.  We can send pictures and advice and chat about how it worked out.


There's something special about cooking together.  For a while, most Sunday nights here were shared with a good friend, cooking together, eating together, (and of course) drinking together and talking into the night.  Sharing both a meal and the experience of preparing it.  Food is just better shared with friends. 

Technology has expanded our opportunities to cook together.  Over on the Google+, where I've been struggling to figure out how this all fits together, others are teaching cooking classes.  A few weeks ago, Kristina from On Blank encouraged her readers to play along with her as she made pizza throughout the week.  People are cooking communally across all sorts of distance. 

Last week, Jennifer Perillo, a blogger who I didn't know, suffered a sudden and horrifying tragedy.  I followed along on Twitter and watched her friends and fans and the many people in the food world come together to all make the same pie in honor of her and her late husband. How's that for the importance of cooking together?  Going through the same steps and following along with the same ingredients and engrossing yourself in the routine of cooking, of measuring and mixing with a common story in mind.  

Here's the recipe.  Brian and I finally made ours tonight.  

Oatmeal Cookie Fail

I say that I don't bake and then take it back when I make bread or crackers.  I can't be trusted with sugar.  That's the thing. Sugar doesn't work for me.  A pinch here or there, sure, but once I'm using a measuring cup, it's all out the window. 


But, I cook all the time, and that gives me this false confidence that I can just handle whatever comes my way in the kitchen.  


So maybe we're on the couch watching the Hulu at 9:30 PM and Sous Chef Brian asks if we have cookies.  No, we don't have cookies because I haven't made any.  I make a pretty mean chocolate chip (I know this is contradicting the above) and I tend to keep the dough in the freezer but there's none on hand.  Sometimes I keep the cookies in the freezer.  But no, nothing.  I offer him frozen blueberries.  


He sighs.  I jump into wife mode.  I will make cookies.  Then he says he doesn't want chocolate chip.  I start rattling off cookie types (none of which do I have a reliable, go-to recipe for).

Raspberry Buttercream Frosting

In 87 posts, not once have I made dessert.  And it's not like I'm whipping up cakes in my free time and not posting about it.  I'm not dessert oriented.  A cookie here or there, and a piece of good chocolate now and again and I'm all set.  I don't care for pastry, and there's something that upsets me about glazed and cream-filled things.  Doughnuts make me queasy.

I'm not opposed to cake, but I don't seek it out.  I tend to make a cake a year, for Sous Chef Brian's birthday.*  It's not good or anything, but it's cake.  I did this six months ago, I'm all set for the year.

But I had reason to make a cake this weekend, and I went with some Internet recipe. I can't find the source, but I do have it written down.  Mine now.  But I'm not here to post how to make a cake.  I can BARELY make a cake.