Tag Archives: baking

August 31, 2011

Sometimes the Classics are Best

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What kind of muffin do you crave when I see stacks of them in bakery windows? For me, it’s blueberry. As much as I love to experiment with different flavors and ingredients, sometimes I have to go with the classics. When there are two over-ripe bananas on the counter and a bag of fresh from the farmers market blueberries in the fridge, what could I make but blueberry banana muffins?

Also, I was hungry and had muffins on the brain. These came together quickly and made a perfect mid-morning snack. I ate my muffin hot, with gooey, scaling blueberries popping in my mouth. It was pure muffin heaven! If you want a moist, sweet, fruity, whole-grain muffin, these hit all those high-points and then some.

I changed the recipe I started with enough to make this one my own. There is no added oil and very little sugar. I doubted that 1/3 cup brown sugar would make these sweet enough but I went with it anyway. Turns out 1/3 cup was plenty of sugar! I guess my bananas were plenty sweet.

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Blueberry Banana Muffins

1 1/2 cup flour, your choice (I used 1 cup graham flour and 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry)
1/2 cup wheat germ
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
3 large or 3 regular-sized bananas, mashed
1 egg
1/3 cup plain yogurt
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup blueberries

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Stir together all dry ingredients in a large bowl.
In a separate bowl, add egg, sugar, an yogurt to mashed bananas, beating until mostly smooth (might be little banana chunks in there)
Stir vanilla into wet ingredients.
Add wet ingredients to dry, stirring until just combined.
Fold blueberries into batter.
Spoon batter into muffin cups and bake at 375 for 20-25 minutes.

Eat HOT from the oven…but don’t burn yourself on a blueberry!

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August 23, 2011

Old-fashioned Nut Loaf

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Here it is, the bread with graham cracker crumbs in it! I considered everyone’s advice about the confusion between graham flour and graham cracker crumbs. I waffled back and forth about which ingredient I would try but finally settled on graham cracker crumbs. It was too unusual an addition (at least for me) to a quick bread not to try.

Once I remembered to get graham crackers at the store (it took a few visits) I was ready to go. The rest of the ingredient list is short an simple. In fact, I almost didn’t notice something rather odd about this recipe: there are no eggs or oil. The only liquid and fat comes from milk. I’d say that makes this an easily veganized treat!

I’ll admit, I was skeptical of the graham cracker crumbs. They looked so insignificant blended into the flour. Could they really add any flavor? I was wrong to doubt, as Joanne pointed out, graham crackers make everything better!

This bread has a unique sweet, nutty flavor that I can only attribute to the crumbs. They probably also contribute to the beautiful golden brown color of this loaf. It borders on too sweet for me but the flavor is lovely and unique. The nuts are almost secondary to the bread in which they’re suspended.

I felt like I’d entered a time warp eating my half-muffin bread tasting, like I was eating something people made during the depression when they were trying to come up with creative ways to use the ingredients they had on hand. That could very well be the era this recipe comes from. Helen’s file seems to include recipes from almost an entire century and from all over the country.

Break out that food processor (or a plastic bag and hands for smashing) and make some graham cracker crumbs for a old-fashioned nut loaf. Then sit down for breakfast or with a cup of tea in the afternoon to enjoy a little time travel.

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I made 2 mini loaves and 3 large muffins…and had a bit of an overflow in the oven.

Nut Loaf
from Helen’s recipe file

2 cups flour
1 cup graham cracker crumbs
1 pinch salt
1 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda stirred in to…
2 cups sour milk (I used buttermilk)
i cup chopped nuts (I used walnuts)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large bowl, combine flour, graham cracker crumbs, baking powder, salt, and sugar, stirring with a whisk to blend completely.
Add baking soda to buttermilk in a separate bowl, stirring until there are no lumps of soda left. (Different method for baking soda. I’ve never seen this before but it works!)
Pour buttermilk into flour mixture. Stir gently until combined.
Fold in nuts.
Pour batter into a greased loaf pan or mini loaf pans/muffin cups.

Bake at 350 F for 35 minutes (mini loaves/muffins) to an hour (large loaf).
Remove when the bread is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Let cool, slice, sit, eat, and wonder if food is the best time machine we have.

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August 19, 2011

“Graham” as in Graham Crackers?

I have a recipe all picked out for my next installation of the Recipe File Project but there’s a bit of a problem: ingredient confusion! This was bound to happen with recipes penciled on scrap paper from at least half a century ago. This one is written on the back of a guarantee for coal from the North Western Fuel Company. Anybody up for Nut Loaf from a coal-fired oven? I know my great-grandmother used to bake pies in the wood stove at the family fishing cabin.

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So here’s the question: In a recipe for Nut Loaf, what does “1 cup graham” mean? Is that graham flour or graham cracker crumbs? First I was leaning towards flour but there’s already 3 cups of flour called for. Graham cracker crumbs kind of make sense and would certainly be a novel addition to a quick bread.

I think I’m going to go with graham cracker crumbs (once I remember to buy graham crackers) unless anyone tells me otherwise. But really, I’m looking for your input!

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August 15, 2011

Baking out of Season

I get annoyed with myself when I make something wintery in the summer or something summery in the winter. Out-of-season ingredients tend to make me cringe and I feel guilty for not making use of the bounty available. Sometimes, though, you just have to have pumpkin pie in July.

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Okay, so I didn’t make pumpkin pie. I made applesauce bread. There was a jar of applesauce in the fridge that needed to be used…and there’s still a little left in that jar. There is also still half a carton of heavy cream left after I tried to use it up in this recipe. Guess I’ll just have to bake more!

I like this recipe. I’m surprised that I like it, actually, since Paula Deen’s style is usually a little too heavy for me. I like that she only calls for 1/4 cup of sugar but, in retrospect, I think that’s because she meant for me to use sweetened applesauce. I don’t remember when I last bought sweetened applesauce.

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With only 1/4 cup of brown sugar this bread is not at all sweet. It’s spicy and fruity, though, and I was happy to find that the heavy cream added plenty of richness. It was a perfectly adequate substitute for butter, and hey, compared to butter, cream is light!

Other than throwing in my needed-to-be-used cream, I also healthified the flour in this recipe. I tried graham flour, something I had only read about until I found it in the bulk bins at my local co-op. Graham flour + wheat germ turned out a grainy bread with a crumby, crunchy crust. I approve! If you don’t have graham flour, whole wheat will make a fine substitute

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Applesauce Bread
Adapted from Paula Deen

1/2 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup brown sugar (add more if you want sweet!)
1 1/2 cups graham flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
2 large eggs
optional: 1 cup raisins, 1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, blend flour, wheat germ, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and spices.
In a separate, larger bowl, beat cream and sugar together until sugar dissolves.
Add eggs, beating well, then add applesauce and vanilla extract. Stir until fully combined.
Pour dry mixture into wet. Stir until well blended but do not over mix.
Fold in nuts and raisins, if using.
Pour into greased and floured 8x4x3 inch loaf pan or some combination of smaller pans (I used 2 mini loaf pans and 2 mini Bundt pans).
Bake at 350 for 60-65 minutes if using larger pan or 30 minutes for smaller pans.

Ahhh, smells like fall!

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