Seeds: Bread; Boardwalk: Park Place

how did you do on the verbal section of your SATs?


it doesn't matter. you don't need high scores to make these:

and turn them into this:

i love fall. the colors of autumn are inspirational to me and watching death knowing it will bring life once spring comes is a tender reminder of the balance we are all subject to.

i also love fall foods, by which i mean comfort foods. thick, hearty soups, crusty, warm breads, heavy, creamy casseroles, gourds galore... it's a wonderful time.

these are pumpkin seeds leftover from a joint-family pumpkin carving night. we all gutted our pumpkins and split the seeds once they were separated from the pulp. most of our seeds went into a bag for my husband to snack on at work, but i saved some for my own purposes also.

it's something as simple as toasted pumpkin seeds (or any gourd seeds! save them when you take the pulp out of squashes) that can take a loaf of homemade bread from special to extraordinary. what it costs to make a loaf of bread is minimal-- EASILY less than a dollar. what a great gift for all of your fall, winter, and holiday parties. useful, cheap, and tasty. what more could you ask for in this economy!?

here's how we toast seeds:

remove as much pulp as possible. best way i've found? fill up a huge bowl with cool water. a lot of the pulp will sink.

spread the seeds out in more or less a single layer and let them dry out for a while in a warm place-- an hour or two is fine if you've got it pretty thin, but overnight is is also pretty great.

once you're ready, preheat to 400.

mix together about 1/3c olive oil for the amount of seeds you'd get from one medium size pumpkin. you're going to have to eyeball it, honestly. add a little less than a tablespoon of salt and the same amount of pepper. (you could also use old bay, garlic salt, any seasoning you love!!!) toss the seeds and olive oil mixture to coat.

cover a baking sheet with foil (so much easier to clean), grease it, lay out the seeds in a single layer, and roast in the oven. you'll know they're done when you can smell them and they're turning a nice, deep golden brown.

enjoy them alone, or roll them into the top of a loaf of bread. they would also work in trail mixes, granola bars, or crushed up and added to oatmeal for a nice salty crunch.

ENJOY FALL!!!!

Yams? Sweet Potatoes? Huh?

ready for a long blog that appears to be about nothing and ends in a recipe!? here we go!

there is a root plant called a cassava that grows prolifically in a region of africa. it is a basic staple there and their rate of naturally occurring twins is 4 times higher than the rest of the world's numbers. studies have linked that bump in percentage to this cassava, which is a type of wild yam. something in the yam encourages egg release, often 2 eggs at once.

i've read plenty of "trying to conceive" forums over the last two years and women buy canned yams by the cartful in hopes that it will stimulate their systems into giving them the chance for a much desired baby (or two!) when their insurance companies can't foot the bill for more technical procedures.

the thing is, i'm not sure if any of those women were actually buying YAMS. yams and sweet potatoes are not the same thing at all, though american supermarkets have lumped them into the same category. i don't know many people that can distinguish between the two. heck, i don't know for sure that i can. the basic rule for differentiation as far as i know is that true yams are ENORMOUS, pale, and not at all orange. they are very low in beta-carotene, the substance that gives a sweet potato that delightful color. we can't grow yams here in the states, so finding them can be a bit of a challenge.

most of our friends and family know that E and i are hoping to have a second kiddo as soon as possible. twins run in both sides of our families (my dad is a fraternal twin whose twin brother had identical twins, E's brother/sister are twins.) and we've both agreed that we would LOVE to have twins. we appreciate the bond that twins have and i would love to knock two kids out of labor in one sitting. and when they both move out, it's like a double pay raise! HOLLA!!! we've joked quite a bit about wives tales that guarantee the conception of twins and i've told him numerous times that i'm going to eat nothing but yams until we get pregnant.

that will never happen, i love cheese too much to cut it out of my diet ;)

but i sent him out friday night to get me some sweet potatoes because i was really craving one and i needed some more veggies for jp (i always need more veggies for "jp". such a great excuse to get goods at 6pm on a friday!). i got a call from him asking if i wanted sweet potatoes or yams and if it really made any kind of difference. "yams? they have yams at sam's club?" "that's what it says on the box. yams/sweet potatoes" "oh, so they're just falsely advertised sweet potatoes. get 'em anyway, maybe it'll work!". so he got them and came home.

i wasn't listening very well when he called--he told me the weight, it did not register.

he came home with a 10lb box of sweet potatoes.

that should be enough tuber to satisfy my jones....

i baked 5 at once. i ate 2 with hot sauce and butter (don't judge me!), mashed one up for jp, and put the other two into the refrigerator with an internal promise to make sweet potato bread today.

here's where it starts getting.... interesting. i love sweet potato bread, but i'm truly not in the mood for muffins or muffin-like bread. sweet potato bread is generally a southern thing and thus is loaded with butter, sugar, and maple syrup. i wanted a healthy alternative. rather than googling "healthy sweet potato breads", i decided to experiment.

the theory i had was to take one of the breads i really loved the taste of and substitute the sweet potato in for the butter the recipe calls for.

are you baffled? would you like a glimpse into the logic of an overly confident cooking diva?

applesauce is an acceptable sub for butter in baking recipes. sweet potatoes, when mashed, are... almost... not really... but, maybe sort of close... to the texture of applesauce. do you think i've lost my mind? i think i have. so if applesauce can work, maybe sweet potatoes can too! WHO KNOWS?!!? NOT ME!!!

so i made the bread as i usually would. warm water+yeast until foamy, and then the rest of the ingredients. except no butter. mashed sweet potatoes.

it ended up needing significantly more flour than the original recipe, but the dough was the right consistency.

it didn't rise as high as the butter version did, but it's also much cooler in our house right now than it was when i made the original bread.

here's the real kicker. halfway through its bake in the oven, our power went out for the first time in our marriage. ooooooooof course. we located some candles, realized we need to buy a flashlight, and E quickly turned the massive grill on for me and the bread was thrown in.

here's the final result:

it has a really nice crunchy crust and a very slight sweet potato taste. i suppose i could always try it again later with more sweet potato and whole wheat bread for an extra healthy version, but this is pretty good! i'm excited to use it for sandwiches--a little extra nutrition packed into every bite!

here's the recipe

northern sweet potato bread

6 tbsp mashed sweet potatoes
1c warm water
2 packets dry yeast, or 1 1/2 tbsp
1 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
about 4c white flour

put the warm water and yeast into a bowl, let sit until foamy.

add the potatoes, salt, sugar and 3c of flour. add flour 1/2c at a time to the dough until it reaches a smooth, good bread consistency.

knead the dough on a lightly floured surface for a few minutes until it feels uniform. put the dough into a well greased bowl, cover with a towel, and let rise for an hour in a warm place.

preheat to 425

grease a baking sheet. take the dough out. grab 2/3 of the dough and shape it into a ball. lay it on the baking sheet and flatten it out just a tad. roll the other 1/3 into a ball and put it on top of the first one. using a sharp knife, cut slits from the center out toward the bottom all around the bread.

bake until golden brown, about 30-40 minutes

Let Them Eat Cake!

i'm officially into french breads until i can locate some rye flour and do some back work on my basic loaves!

today i made these:

brioche tetes

brie and brioche packages

in the book Paul Hollywood's explanation of brioche says "The immortal line uttered by Marie Antoinette, allegedly, 'Let them eat cake,' is more likely to have been 'Let them eat brioche.'"

after making these, i believe him.

the texture of these "muffins" is unbelievable. between bites i found myself staring at the pores and air pockets, admiring the consistency and the unexpected sweetness. it's not that i expected them to be bland or sour--they have quite a bit of sugar in them after all. it was the nature of sweetness, its flavor... it was so rich and somewhat mellow. it was decadent.

the brie+brioche calls for one entire 9oz wheel of brie. i took some creative liberties and made a few with goat's cheese and a few with small squares of brie instead of an entire wheel. the point of this was 1) to save money because i simply can't see two of us eating an entire wheel of melted brie cheese in one night, and 2) E wasn't even home when i made it, so it would have just been me trying to eat it. bad on soooooo many levels.

i'm going to modify mr. hollywood's recipe just a tad. i don't know how different flour is in the UK, but almost every recipe, this one in particular, has required more flour. fyi, i used a combination of bread flour and all purpose white flour. they cost nearly the same when you buy in bulk (which we do!) and the bread flour definitely adds an element of sweetness and fluff, for lack of a better word, that plain all purpose does not have.

brioche tetes

about 3c, maybe more, flour
1/3c sugar
1 package or 3/4 tbsp yeast
1 tsp salt
1/3c milk
3 eggs, +1 for an eggwash
1 1/2 sticks butter
cupcake liners (about a dozen)

mix everything except the butter and the eggwash egg until smooth. then add the butter, mix until smooth. (don't ask me why you can't add the butter with all the rest, you just can't, and i won't question the method because these were outstanding) cover the bowl and stick it in the refrigerator overnight.

next morning! the dough will be pretty stiff. get out your muffin tins and liners. line 'em up and grease 'em up!

make balls from the dough that are approximately 1.5 inches in diameter. it's not rocket science, just eyeball it. they should fit cozily into the cupcake liners. top each one with a smaller ball-- about 1/2 inch in diameter. do that until you have no more dough!

leave your happy little snowmen out in a warm place to rise for one hour. once time is up, preheat your oven to 400 and brush your little guys (or gals!) with the eggwash.

bake for about 15 minutes, or until golden brown.

you don't need to put anything on these guys. they're amazing. Uh. Maze. Ing.

to make the brie and brioche, do all of the same things the night before. the next day, on a VERY VERY VERY well and evenly floured surface, roll out the dough to about 1/4inch thickness instead of forming it into balls. cut out circles big enough to completely envelope discs or squares of brie or goat's cheese. brush each one with eggwash, refrigerate for 1 hour.

preheat the oven to 400. take the packages out and brush once more with eggwash, bake for about 15 minutes or until golden brown.

eat while warm.

Bad Breath Bread

did ya miss me!?! nothing truly spectacular has happened on the food front here since my last post. my husband did grill us a delicious meal and found a recipe for a goat's cheese sauce that i got to pour over his steak and my giant portobello. it was delicious, but it smelled too good for me to stop and take pictures! whoops! maybe next time?

we made our big monthly grocery trip today (hooray for buying in bulk, don't you think!?!) and got some of the things i need for the more ornate breads, so i'm feeling pretty good about continuing on the bread journey!

we also had a friend over for dinner tonight and because i have 5 (that's right, 5) loaves of bread in our fridge/freezer, he gets to take some bread home!! congrats L, you are the lucky winner of a cheese and onion loaf!!

i'm going to post the recipe to this one because it is OUTRAGEOUSLY easy and would make a great gift for a host or hostess, or a wonderful thank you to that teacher/neighbor/coworker/boss/friend/whatever you've been needing to thank for not failing your child/letting your dogs out/covering your shift/giving you a raise/helping you bury your mother in law/whatever.

bad breath bread

1 1/4c warm water
1.5 tbsp or 2 packets yeast
about 4c flour
2 tsp salt
2/3c butter, cubed
1c shredded cheddar cheese
3/4 onion, well chopped

mix together the yeast and water, let sit until foamy

add the butter, 2c of flour, and the salt. start adding the rest of the flour in, 1/2c at a time. you want the dough just a TAD drier than normal because the onions add a bit of wet. put the dough into a well greased bowl in a warm spot, cover with a towel, let sit for 1 hour or until doubled in size.

once it's ready, take it out and add your chopped onion and cheddar. either knead by hand or mix on the lowest setting of a stand mixer until it seems that you have a uniform distribution of the cheese and onion.

grease a 9x5 loaf pan and throw about 2/3 of the dough into it. use the other 1/3 to make biscuits of some sort, or muffins, or a tiny loaf. i'm not really sure what to do with the extra bit lol. it's too much work to adjust the recipe haha!

let it sit for about 30 minutes in a warm spot, covered.

bake at 400 for about an hour, or until it's a nice dark brown and a toothpick into the center comes out clean.

try to kiss your significant other after eating a piece. you will offend. make up for it by offering them a slice with some butter melted all over it. then you can kiss each other :)

If You're Going to Wing It, You Better Have Feathers.

i love cooking. until recently, the only thing you might catch me baking was cookies and the occasional bread item, but those instances were rare. i believe i've mentioned this before: i hate measuring. i hate being confined by almost anything in life; recipes and measuring cups are no exception. i love the freedom that comes with cooking-- there is no exact science to making a skillet meal or cooking pasta. you can add nearly anything you want to an enchilada or a salad, even a salad dressing. substitutes and eyeballed amounts don't have the tendency to ruin meals the same way they can kill a baked good.

today i made a whole wheat soda bread. some things to note about whole wheat: it soaks in much more water than regular flour and it is STICKY. if you don't put in enough flour, there is no hope for your poor hands. another downside to not adding enough flour: your cook time will increase and you may not realize it, resulting in a deflated, gooey center. and not the good kind of gooey! whole wheat does, however, make delicious breads. and healthy ones! so it's well worth the trial and errors :)

while the whole wheat bread was baking i ventured into scones. the recipe wasn't nearly as difficult as i imagined it had to be given the flavors, textures, and colors you find in scones. 

i spoke too soon.

here's where my cooking instincts got the best of me.

i like substitutions. and i make them relatively freely in my meals. however, if there's one thing i've learned about baking that i SHOULD have remembered here, it's that you shouldn't substitute the first time you make a recipe. the scones called for golden raisins. we don't have golden raisins in the house, but we do have a GIANT bag of frozen berries. i've seen and eaten some delicious berry scones. "why not berry instead of raisin? it can't possibly be that different."

i accounted for the wetness of berries v. the wetness of raisins and let the berries thaw out, squished out some of the juice, and added a little more flour.

what i didn't account for was this:

as i stirred the berries in, ever so gently, i watched my dough turn violet. and i laughed, a lot, at my foolishness and conceit to think i could simply substitute my own ingredients into a recipe that has been tried, tested, and perfected by a professional bread maker. silly, silly me.

but i pressed forward and scooped heaping mounds of awkwardly shaped dough onto a baking sheet. these certainly didn't look like the round, beautifully cut, clean edged scones the book pictures. heck, they weren't even white anymore. 

but i am a diva, and the show must go on. 

so into the oven the scones went. they took a little longer to cook than the recipe called for (i assume because they were a a bit more moist). while they were baking E looked into the oven and casually noted how they looked like giant purple cookies.

scones are supposed to rise and look like biscuits. 

my heart broke just a little, but i simply shook my head and braced for my first major bread failure since the commencement of my yeasty journey.

and then, magic:

the diva wins!!!!

if you're going to wing it, you better have feathers. a boa totally counts.

Le Baguette

we've had a busy few days over here! my baking has caught the attention of some very demanding visitors-- ants. so i've been cleaning and scrubbing like a mad woman! our washing machine was finally repaired after nearly 2 months, so i've been catching up on that also, and E has been at work longer than usual, so our nights have been centered more or less around spending as much time together as we can before we hit the sheets.

i'm about a day behind on bread, but i plan to get back on track (and hopefully even ahead!) tomorrow and saturday between trick or treating and pumpkin carving!

i'm almost done with the basic breads section in the book. there are a handful of recipes that have some ingredients we don't keep on hand that will have to wait! skipping those has propelled me intooooooo

french breads!!!!!! almost every bread in this section requires a day long head start, and the few that don't need the extra time require extra work instead. and then we have croissants that require both work AND time. i'm a bit nervous, but definitely excited. this section will give me a chance to use some of my fresh herbs that are growing proudly out in my garden :)

my first attempt will be the easiest from my estimation-- a baguette. it starts off similar to a sourdough bread, but the wait isn't nearly as long (my sourdough attempt is going on nearly a month in the making so far!!!!). you start the dough the night before

let it sit overnight, when it starts to rise and look like this:

mix in the rest of the ingredients, let it rise, bang the air out (literally, all you do its hit the bowl on the counter, relatively gently, and the whole thing deflates), roll into a log, cut some slits in the top, and bake it!

easy, huh!?! and a great treat to serve up with some marvelous meatloaf and mashed sweet potatoes! yummmmmmmmmmm!

another great treat? adorable hippo babies.

Mo Monay Mo Problems....

i think that song is a total joke. if you have more money and proper money management habits, you will have LESS problems. what you may have more of is relatives coming out of the woodwork trying to get some of your fundage. but that's not a real problem. that's a "get caller id" problem.

every night i make a lunch for my husband to take to work the next day. and every night i sort of groan at the thought of having to get up to do it. i've been cooking, cleaning, crafting, planning, chasing, teaching, learning, and organizing all day. all i want is to relax, but my rest is inevitably broken up by the lunch-making.

i also want to make sure that i'm packing him a variety of nutritious, filling, energy packed foods. sometimes i get a little overwhelmed trying to pick the right combination of things.

that's a little compulsive, i know.

once i finish making his lunch (and i always do. he hasn't had to buy a lunch once in the 2 months i've been here) i feel a sense of relief. it's done, he has a great lunch for the next day, and i know we're saving a boatload of money. in times like these, with student loans like ours, that's so important.

i'm sure what i'm about to post is not new news for a lot of people. in fact, many of you might be able to one up me on money saving tactics. but here are a few of our food things that have worked for us and made it possible to reduce our food bill each month by over 30%.

*we reuse ziploc bags that haven't touched any raw/perishable food--namely we reuse our freezer bags, which i will get to next
*i buy meat in bulk and then wrap appropriate portion sizes individually and then freeze. for us that means 2 chicken breasts or thighs, 3 drumsticks, 1lb of ground meat, and fish gets wrapped individually. we wrap each "set" in saran wrap, then foil, then into large freezer bags. each bag is labeled with the type of meat in it. you can thaw under running water, the microwave, or in your refrigerator 2 days before you need the meat.
*we buy entire chickens. this is probably one of our biggest money savers. one entire chicken can feed us for a week when portions of it are mixed in to other meals and it costs less than $5. shredded chicken can go into enchiladas, pasta dishes, salads, macaroni and cheese, casseroles, soups, you name it. it can also be made into sandwich meat-- chicken salad sandwich, shredded chicken tossed in bbq sauce, dipped in buffalo wing sauce, etc. you can cook the whole in a crock pot, roaster, your oven, a smoker, a rotisserie, you name it.
*for meat, find ways to make use of less common, tougher or cheaper meats. chicken thighs are outrageously cheap. bone-in meat is also cheaper. tougher cuts are cheaper. for all of those things a little extra work (or cutting) leaves them just as delicious as their easier, more processed counterparts. tough beef doesn't even need more work-- it needs less!! find a great crockpot recipe. throw it all in the pot in the am, dinner is ready by the pm. amazing!
*buy in season. people have been talking about this for quite some time. look for fruits and veggies that cost less than $1 a pound. if you aren't sure exactly what produce you're looking at, write it down and go home and google it. find some recipes. expand your repertoire. right now squashed and sweet potatoes are in season. those are DELICIOUS, versatile foods. sweet potatoes can be made into breads and muffins. squash can turn into soup. both can be mixed in and baked with mac and cheese.
*go meatless. find a meatless dish at least once a week. focus your dish on lentils or beans or just pasta and sauce. meat is expensive. beans, especially dried beans, are so cheap it's insane. lentil soup is a great, filling, healthy meal. another plus side to eating less meat: less cholesterol intake. cholesterol comes from meat, so eating less meat could help your health!!
*once every 2 or 3 months, have a "clear the cabinets" month. use up EVERYTHING you possibly can in your pantry, freezer, and refrigerator. you might make it over a week before you have to go for your grocery run. that's a week of food you just bought yourself. for our family that would be about $70 every 2-3 months. that's $3-400 a year. warn your family that the meals might be a bit odd!
*save your discards. healthy veggie ends, peels, skins, and shells make amazing compost or the beginnings of an amazing homemade stock. you can also save meat bones for stock. just keep it all in a ziploc bag. as you cut up and use foods, take your bag, toss them in, and put the bag back in the freezer. when your bag is nice and full, make a 3:1 ratio of water to veggies, put it all in a stock pot, and simmer it down to half of the original water. hello delicious, homemade, low sodium stock.

i know that these things might not work for some people. i certainly don't expect everyone to have an intimate relationship with their kitchen. i kissed my pans as they came out of storage for heaven's sake. that can't be healthy! but if you can use even one or two of these ideas, that's awesome, and i'm glad i could help.

if you have other money saving thoughts about food, throw 'em in here!!!