Tuesdays with Dorie and Whole Other Canvases

It must have begun my first year of college. I no longer had to add my name to the long list of students who had used and abused the old textbook before me, scrawling their name in its front cover and admitting ownership and responsibility for that year. Nope, as a freshman I dropped a stomach-sickening amount of money on thick Chemistry, Nutrition, and English Composition books to be able to claim them as my own as well as face the dilemma of getting rid of them (especially after realizing I didn't even want to study sugar's molecular structure; I just wanted to paint).



But along the way I realized that I could highlight and doodle and underline and still get a decent buy-back price from the bookstore. I started wanting to do that in all my books. I even began to hunt through used bookstores for pages with rich texture created by text arrangement and paper surface and they became a whole other canvas.

As an artist, I love the idea of a personal mark, and it's so nice to happen across this in a book someone else has held before me...a little anecdote in the side margin, an exclamation point stuck onto the end of a statement or recipe title.

So maybe one day when I am sorting through my pile of cookbooks or when I am heading overseas and reducing my earthly belongings to a suitcase or two, I'll have to hand off Dorie's cookbook and someone will pick it up and appreciate the yeses and the question marks and the adjusted cooking times and the reminders of fun variations and not just see it all as messy. That's what I like to think, anyway.

This week's recipe is certainly worthy of some black ink because, according to the comments on the TWD site, a lot of us had problems with ratios of rice to milk and achieving a pudding-like consistency. After reading through other people's experiences, I estimated most of my amounts and came up with a very satisfactory result.

You can find the recipe posted on the blog of this week's host for Tuesdays with Dorie, Isabelle, at Les Gourmandises d'Isa (and I would kill to know how to pronounce that with a convincing French accent). She notes her adjustments, but here are mine as well...

Instead of white arborio rice I used brown sweet rice and cooked it to al dente. I halved the amount of milk (it was actually watered down half-and-half; I rarely have milk on hand) and brought it to a boil with only a tablespoon of sugar. Then I added half a cup of rice and stirred it very attentively for about forty minutes. At this point I could push my spatula across the bottom of the pan and see some of the metal before it all sank back together, so I called it good. I distributed the pudding between two cups and stirred a teaspoon of vanilla extract into one (half a teaspoon probably would have been fine) and generously sprinkled cinnamon into the other.



There are no pictures of my finished product of properly thickened pudding because the sun has set, and with it my camera has said goodnight, but I can testify that they both turned out great (not that they're both gone; goodness no, this is one rich little dish). I think the cinnamon flavor is my favorite, though I could easily be won over by chocolate.

This recipe is basically the same idea as my mom's Norwegian rice porridge that we share for Christmas Day breakfast. And I may be a little biased, but nothing will ever ever compare.

Tuesdays with Dorie and Wishing My French Blood Ran Stronger (again)

Usually yeast and I get along quite well. I enjoy the interaction of releasing its sweet, fermenting flecks into a big bowl of warm water or whisked flour and letting it do its thing over the next couple hours. There's always an element of risk, an intrigue of the unknown, and I can get excited about this because rarely do I dislike the final result. It's harder than some think to kill yeast and so, even if my loaf isn't as tight as it could be or as flavorful, I generally get a good rise. Like I said, yeast and I usually get along.

But something went wrong with the Kugelhopf I started on Sunday evening and eventually baked at eight o'clock Monday night. The directions I was following only addressed the use of a dough hook, not the manual method I was using, so maybe I didn't "knead" the dough long enough with my large spatula. I don't know exactly. It rose happily until I put it in the fridge overnight and then it never came back to life very much. Or maybe I was just too ambitious, placing it in a large bundt pan (large as in average size, I believe) and hoping it would climb all the way up the sides when it really only doubled in size and sat stubbornly at a level several inches from the top.

So, presentation was lacking and likely delicacy in the crumb as well, but from the slice I had at breakfast this morning to the one I nibbled on pre-dinner, this cake grew on me quite a bit. Per Dorie's instructions, I stuck my last slice in the toaster and smeared on some marmalade because it had already started to dry out. But it was still delicious.



Three things would encourage me to make this again...

1) It was my first experience with anything resembling brioche (something I've been wanting to try), and I think I like it even better because it's slightly less rich.

2) I boiled my raisins with rum and then let them sit for an hour, and anything that is compatible with rum soaked raisins makes me happy.

3) The yeast got the better of me in this recipe, and I will not be beat. (This is one of only a few areas where my competitive side comes out.)

So, if you're still confused about what on earth a Kugelhopf is anyway, here's a little bit of history.



A big thanks to Yolanda over at The All-purpose Girl for selecting Kugelhopf out of Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours. I'm always glad to try something new in the culinary realm. And thank you as well to the ladies who keep Tuesdays with Dorie running.

You'll find the recipe here:
Kugelhopf

Tuesdays with Dorie: A Dose of Honesty

I sit before you as the same tired girl who was here last week, but I'll refrain from sharing the details of my all-night escapades because 1) "escapades" is a far too exciting word to use -- they're quite boring -- and 2) many of you lead equally crazy lives.

How does life get so crazy? Personally, I have to admit a lot has to do with this laptop resting on my legs. I can't live with it, and I can't live without it. Email and Skype keep me connected with friends too far away to hug, Picasa keeps my photographs stored and organized, and good ol' Microsoft Word keeps words flowing (or stumbling) out of my brain and into typed words that eventually make their way onto crisp white paper in the hands of the professors who, as my graduation date draws closer, seem to hold my future in their all-powerful hands. And, yet, this computer works against me by offering a million less important distractions from the things that I must accomplish before sinking into bed each night.

Tonight I'll be researching the works of illustrators such as Lane Smith, and committing the mood and sway of Glen & Mar's album to memory through iTunes, all from the comfort of a cleared spot at the end of my bed, which as gone unmade for a shameful eight days (not to mention that it is now sheet-less, because I washed them two days ago and haven't put them back on).



Why am I admitting all this to you dear people (who I'm sure have a squeaky clean image of me and are surely quite surprised to learn I'm not perfect)? Well, I tend to be quite honest when I'm tired.

And, along the lines of being honest, I have to counter that I can live without this laptop. People do, and I can learn to, again, if need be. I'm very grateful to the generous friend who gave it to me, but I don't ever want to get so attached to something as fleeting as a computer (which can be killed in a few seconds with water dumped across its screen and keys -- I would know), or convenient as a cell phone, or even as luxurious as $8 New Zealand honey (totally worth it, that once -- I hadn't tasted it since my childhood on our regular visits to the honey shop between Waiwera and Auckland).

But, as long as I have access to a kitchen and the internet, I will likely continue to take pictures and blog about my gastronomic experiences, so thank you so much for joining me tonight.



I have been retracing my steps all evening long, ever since I started scooping this muffin batter into its designated tin and wondering why it was so thick. I can't figure out what I did wrong. Dorie Greenspan presents a lovely sounding pumpkin muffin recipe in Baking: From My Home to Yours, and I have been looking forward to trying it for a couple weeks. But what I pulled out of the oven in no way outshines other pumpkin quick breads or muffins I have made. The most appealing way to describe its appearance was "rustic." The batter was too thick to fill out the muffin liner while baking and remained piled on top.

The only things I changed were that I made a one and a half recipe, switched out 1/3 of the all-purpose flour for whole-wheat, and used a very runny and sour yogurt instead of buttermilk. I do no see how these could have dramatically affected the consistency.

On the bright side, they're pumpkin flavored, so they're hard to hate (who are you crazy people saying you don't like pumpkin?) and loaded with cranberries (another minor alteration) and pecans and coated with crunchy sunflower seeds, but I could easily add these things to one of my preferred pumpkin muffin recipes.



These are my thoughts on Tuesdays With Dorie's recipe this week, but I'm looking forward to finding out how others' baking sessions went (as soon as I find the time). I could have just encountered something weird and only relevant to my kitchen; I'm willing to give Dorie the benefit of the doubt.

The recipe can be found here:
Pumpkin Muffins

Tuesdays with Dorie & Homemade Biscotti: Two New Favorite Things

I often find myself in conflict with the dark, rich brew known as coffee. I straddle a line that was clearly drawn out in my youth. My mother is on one side shaking her head in sadness that this is even a point of argument as she holds out a hot cup of fragrant, floral herbal tea. My dad is on the other, so casually sipping his thick, strong coffee that I am intrigued by its mystery as well as its intense aroma.

Now, you might be wondering why at the age of twenty-two, after being out of my parents' house for four years, I am still trying to keep a foot on both sides of this abyss. Why haven't I made up my mind for myself? I wish the answer was a simple one, but it's not. Ultimately, I am grateful for those who have led the way in living with a love for both tea and coffee. This is where I prefer to place myself. If the coffee is poor (because living with my dad and being in the Pacific Northwest were excellent trainers for knowing when a cup of joe isn't worth swallowing), I'll usually take tea. If biscuits are present, black tea with a spot of cream is preferred. If it's the morning after a depleted night's sleep, thanks to a little bit of procrastination and an additional bit of overlapping class due dates, then it's coffee I want for the extra jolt.

Why all this talk of coffee, when I'm supposed to be talking about two new favorite things: Tuesdays with Dorie and homemade biscotti? Well, I have been loading up on coffee a lot recently, trying to finish assignments, and that's why, when I saw that the recipe for today was Dorie's Lenox Almond Biscotti, I was very pleased. In my opinion, the only thing better than a good cup of coffee is a good cup of coffee with a biscotti.


I had never made my own biscotti before, though not out of fear of difficulty. It has remained on that perpetual list of things to do that I keep stored in my mind but don't stress myself out for not getting to (because I have enough lists elsewhere). If it's really important, it will make its way to the surface and work itself out, or demand my attention enough to get me moving. While biscotti wasn't a particularly dynamic or vocal item on my list, I'm glad our paths finally crossed.

I trust Dorie's recommendation to put cornmeal in the biscotti dough and want to try this on my next batch. For now, I substituted the cornmeal with whole wheat flour because I also two teaspoons of dried lavender to the dough and didn't want too many elements fighting for attention. Additionally, I knew my biscotti would be nubby enough because I chopped up slivered almonds instead of using sliced, wanting the crunchy bites of the nut to serve as a reminder of the biscotti's star ingredient: almond. This also kept me from hesitating when I saw Dorie's instructions for a generous amount of almond extract. I have yet to be displeased by a strong almond flavor.


The lavender was a lovely component, and I am very glad I added it. In the last stage, with the nuts, I scooped in two teaspoons of the dried, edible flower buds and tasted a bit of the dough after shaping two logs on the cookie sheet. The lavender flavor was so strong that I became worried I had overdone it. But, from then until the end of the baking process, somehow the flower's flavor and scent mellowed out and became a pleasing undertone, only reappearing distinctively in the very occasional bite.

Thank you so much to Gretchen of Canela & Comino for choosing this delicious recipe. You helped me check something off my to-do list, and that is always a wonderful thing to experience, even if it's very little.

Dorie's original recipe for these biscotti is located here, and it's basic enough to be wide open to variation. I look forward to exploring these variants in the future.

For blog scanners versus readers (no biases intended; I just know you're out there), here is a set-apart link to the recipe:
Lenox Almond Biscotti


[Sorry if this post is disjointed or lacking in personality. I find my eyelids heavy tonight as my body tells me to give it some rest after spending all of last night in my photography class's photo lab.]