Festive Holiday Baking

Are you a hybrid worker being forced to attend an office potluck? 

Do you need a dessert for your child's Christmas bake sale? 

Feel like baking something new this holiday season? 

If you answered any of those questions in the affirmative, the recipe below is just what you're looking for. Sure, there's no actual eggnog in these, but nothing is stopping you from pouring yourself a mug when you want to have one.

Ingredients

454 g white baking chocolate
115 g cream cheese, softened
60 g confectioners' sugar
1.5 g ground nutmeg, plus additional for sprinkling
1.5 g imitation rum extract

1. Melt 230 grams of the chocolate as directed on the package. Beat the cream cheese, confectioners' sugar, nutmeg, and extract in a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed until it's well blended and smooth. Add the melted chocolate; beat until well mixed. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or until it's firm.
2. Shape into 24 balls. Place on a wax paper-lined tray. Refrigerate again while you make the chocolate dip.
3. Melt half of the remaining chocolate in a small microwavable bowl at 50% power for 1.5 minutes, stirring after 1 minute. Using a fork, dip 1 truffle at a time into the melted chocolate. Tap the back of the fork 2 or 3 times against the edge of the dish to allow any excess chocolate to drip off. Place the truffles on a wax paper-lined tray.
   
   (If there are any "bald" spots on the truffle, cover it with the melted chocolate that remains on the fork).
   
   
4. Coat only 12 truffles at a time. Sprinkle truffles with nutmeg. Repeat with the remaining chocolate and the remaining truffles.
5. Refrigerate for 1 hour or until the chocolate is set. Store the truffles between layers of wax paper in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 1 week.

Bake Yourself Happy - Skuish Cookies

Cookie connaisseurs rejoice - Skuish will change how you think about baking cookies. This Ottawa-Toronto based company sells and delivers (free of charge) raw and frozen cookies. The cookies last up to three months in the freezer and can be baked straight from frozen, allowing you to quickly whip up a batch of cookies better than the ones that come from that chemically enhanced doughboy. 

Skuish cookies don't use eggs, butter, or milk in their cookie dough, which is good news for those allergic to those ingredients, and they have plant-based cookie options as well for vegan and vegetarian tastes. The chocolates used in their signature flavours contain milk, while the plant-based cookie options use chocolate without milk.  Because of their desire to make a positive impact in the communities they sell in, Skuish plans to do their part to end child hunger in Canada by donating five meals for every box sold, so no need to feel guilty for not baking from scratch. 

When the sample I was graciously sent arrived this week, I didn't expect billiard ball-sized cookie dough balls when I opened the box. Weighing in at about a quarter-pound each, I took one from each bag sent, their Classic Chocolate Chunk, White Chocolate Birthday Cake, and Resse Peanut Butter Crumble flavours.  Then it just a matter of following the instructions on the box, and soon I had three giant cookies fresh from the oven. You may have to adjust how long you keep your baked goods in the oven depending on whether you prefer your cookies soft and gooey, or crisp and crunchy, but it will be worth the wait. My favourite was the Resse Peanut Butter Crumble, which I devoured during a coffee break. If you need a last-minute gift idea for that special cookie monster in your life, or if you want to really impress Santa this year, you can't go wrong with Skuish cookies. Just be sure you have something at the ready to dunk them in.

Skuish cookies can be found on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and Tiktok

Better Later Than Never: Beer Bread

2020 is, among other things, the year everyone's inner baker came out.  It may have slowed down a bit now that the province is slowly reopening, but people have been cranking out baked goods nonstop over the past few months even with baking ingredients in short supply during the COVID-19 pandemic. I'm not much of a baker, so I have no patience or desire to get a sourdough starter going. Instead, I went with a beer bread recipe for my baking therapy. It's easy to make because it eliminates the entire process of kneading, rising, and kneading again, as the beer’s yeast content reacts with the other ingredients in the bread mix, causing the dough to rise and start to leaven. So if you can get your hands on some flour, and have some spare beer in the fridge, give this recipe a try for some easy baked goods. Hopefully, you still have some spare time...

Ingredients

410 g flour (sifted)
60 g sugar
15 g baking powder (omit if using self-rising flour)
6 g salt (omit if using self-rising flour)
120 mL melted butter
1 (355 mL) can beer (just about any will work, even non-alcoholic beer, though the taste of your bread will depend on what you use; a stout will impart a stronger flavour than an ale.
NOTE: It is highly recommended adding a packet of dry active yeast or 6 g of bread machine yeast if you use non-alcoholic beer in order to get a proper rise)

1. Preheat oven to 190 °C.
2. Sifting your flour breaks down any clumps in it and makes the flour fluffier by infusing air into it. preventing the bread from turning into something hard and inedible. If you don't have a flour sifter, measure out the flour into a bowl and mix it with either a fork or whisk. Once done, add the remaining dry ingredients and the beer and mix everything together - mix the butter into the batter if you want a more traditional bread with a soft crust.
3. Pour the mixture into a greased loaf pan. For a buttery, crunchy crust, pour the melted butter on top of the batter.
4. Bake for one hour, then remove from the pan and let cool for at least 15 minutes.

Animated Eats: The Upside Down Flint-Rubble Double Bubble Cake

If you lived in Ottawa at any point in the 80s, you saw one of these cartoons on CJOH at noon - the underrated "Rocket Robin Hood", retro "Spider-Man", or the classic Hanna-Barbera creation "The Flintstones". One of my most cherished childhood memories is of me coming home from school and watching Fred and Barney's pre-historic adventures while eating a hot dog my mom made me for lunch.  On this day back in 1961, the episode "In the Dough" featured Fred and Barney posing as their wives in order to win a baking competition. The recipe used was for a dessert their wives dubbed the upside-down Flint-Rubble bubble cake. As the actual recipe for this was just a part of animated lore, one would assume that if it existed, it would show that the cake was baked in a single pan with its toppings (some sort of chopped or sliced fruits) on the bottom of the pan before the batter is poured in to form a baked-on topping after the cake is inverted - hence it being “upside-down”. To pay tribute to this cartoon cake, I decided to post a recipe from another childhood memory of mine - looking through my mom's copy of The all new Purity Cook Book: A Complete Guide of Canadian Cooking. I always loved the picture of the pineapple upside-down cake they used, and I was crushed when I saw they used a black and white photo for the reproduction of the original 1967 edition I have. So yabba-dabba-doo yourself a favour, and celebrate this day in TV food history by making this as a St. Patrick's Day dessert; if you insist on having a wee bit o' the green, you sticklers can use green Maraschino cherries in the recipe below.

Ingredients:

pineapple rings (fresh or canned, your choice)
Maraschino cherries (optional)
1 egg
250 mL milk
5 mL vanilla
200 g white sugar
190 g flour
100 g brown sugar, lightly packed
65 g shortening (butter or margarine can be substitistied as technically any fat that’s used in baking is considered “shortening”)
40 g butter or margarine
10 g baking powder
5 g salt

1. Preheat the oven to 176°C. Melt the 40 g butter/margarine and pour it in a 20 x 20 cm baking pan.
2. Sprinkle the brown sugar on what's in the baking pan, then cover it with the pineapple rings; if desired, place a cherry on the center on the rings.
3. In a bowl, combine the remaining sugar and whatever you are using for shortening, then add the egg and the vanilla. Beat until the mixture is light and fluffy.
4. Blend together the flour, baking powder, and the salt in a separate bowl. Add the contents to the first bowl, then mix everything together. Pour in the milk and then mix again.
5. Pour the batter over the contents of the baking pan. Bake in the oven for 40-50 minutes. Once the cake is done, invert it onto a serving plate immediately. Serve warm.

Un-cola Biscuits - Baking With 7UP

Most people know 7Up as the lemon-lime soda you use as a mixer for cocktails, or as the soft drink you go for when you're not feeling like drinking cola. But as our grandparents have known for years, it can also be used in baking. The carbonation in 7UP helps baked goods rise and gives them an airy, fluffy texture, making it a great substitute for baking soda, but with a hint of sweetness. This recipe for biscuits makes the most of the Un-cola's unique qualities, so you have no excuse for not whipping up a quick batch of them the next time you want something light and tasty with your meal.

Ingredients:

256 g Bisquick^® brand pancake and baking mix
60 g melted butter
125 mL 7Up^®
125 mL sour cream

1. Preheat your oven to 450°F / 232°C. Melt the butter however way you want, and pour it into a casserole dish. Set the casserole dish aside.
2. In a large bowl, mix the sour cream and the Bisquick mix together, then slowly add the 7Up and stir until you get a cohesive and sticky dough.
3. Thoroughly coat a surface with some of the remaining Bisquick, then pour out the dough onto it, and knead it until it's not so sticky. Flatten it out the dough to about a 2.5 centimeters thickness, then cut out some biscuits using a biscuit cutter (an empty soup can or a glass also can be used).
4. Place the raw biscuits in the casserole dish with the melted butter, and bake for 12-15 minutes, or until they are nice and browned on top.
   
   NOTE: You are about to eat something that was baked in a pool of butter - plan accordingly.

7UP Biscuits

Cookies For the Naughty and the Nice

According to my wife, we are in the midst of the cookie-baking party season. In honour of this tasty occasion, I have posted two recipes, one for those who take their baked goods creating seriously, and one for those who wish to speed along to the wine drinking/socializing part of the get-together.

Nice: Vanilla-Almond Sugar Cookies
(recipe found on Bake at 350)

Ingredients

360 g unbleached, all-purpose flour
200 g sugar
10 g baking powder
4 mL vanilla extract
2.5 mL pure almond extract
2 sticks salted butter, cold and cut into chunks
1 egg

1. Preheat oven to 177 °C. Combine the flour and baking powder, set aside. 
2. Cream the sugar and butter. Add the egg and extracts and mix. Gradually add the flour mixture and beat just until combined, scraping down the bowl, especially the bottom. The dough will be crumbly, so knead it together with your hands as you scoop it out of the bowl for rolling.
3. Roll on a floured surface to about 1/4" to 3/8" thick, and cut into shapes. Place on parchment-lined baking sheets (freezing the cut out shape on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before baking is recommended) and bake for 10-12 minutes. Let sit a few minutes on the sheet, then transfer to a cooling rack.
   
   Note: Click the following link if you want a great recipe to make icing from scratch.

Naughty: Drunken Oreos
(recipe found on Foodbeast)

Ingredients

2 packages Jell-O Oreo Cookies 'n Creme pudding mix
1 package of Oreo cookies
milk
vodka

1. Take the pudding mix, the milk, and a mixing bowl and follow the instructions on the box.
2. Add 180 mL (approx. 4 shots) of vodka to the pudding mix. Whisk it in well, and place the bowl in the fridge to allow it to chill.
3. Place the Oreo cookies on a baking sheet, then unscrew them, and remove the frosting. Rebuild the cookie using the pudding as the new filling. Keep refrigerated until ready to serve. 

Science and Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to Soft Matter Science - Baking

As I posted in a previous blog entry, I've enrolled in an on-line course about the relationship between science and cooking.

Here's what went down week 9 .

• To coincide with all the holiday baking going on, this week's lesson explores the basic physics and chemistry involved in baking. Joanne Chang is this week's celebrity instructor.
• Baking involves a lot of the topics already covered in the course. Understanding these concepts won't make you a master baker, but hopefully, it will help you make better sense of the recipes you're using: 
• Elasticity -  the properties of gluten; the elastic network that occurs in proteins, starches, and sugars.
• Viscosity - any time something expands and rises, it involves the flowing of molecules by each other; without it, your breads wouldn't rise, and your cakes and cookies wouldn't expand.   
• Emulsions - baked goods tend to be made of bubbles that are packed together, and those bubbles are the result of gas expansion that occurs during baking.
• Heat transfer - obeys the laws of diffusion.
• Joanne Chang shows us some of the science behind making a birthday cake and a flaky pie dough:
  
  
• Though a birthday cake would work for Christmas baking (think about it), here's the recipe for another cake used in this lesson to try over the holidays, a Coca Cola cake:
  

  Ingredients

  1 cup cola
  1/2 cup buttermilk
  1 cup butter, softened
  1 3/4 cups sugar
  2 large eggs, lightly beaten
  2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  2 cups all-purpose flour
  1/4 cup cocoa
  1 teaspoon baking soda
  1 1/2 cups miniature marshmallows
  3/4 cup chopped pecans, toasted (optional garnish)

  
  
  1. Combine the cola and the buttermilk in a bowl, then set the mixture aside.
  2. Beat the butter at a low speed with an electric mixer until creamy. Gradually add sugar; beat until blended. Add the egg and vanilla, and again beat at low speed until blended.
  3. Combine the flour and cocoa to the cola mixture. Add to the butter mixture alternately with the cola mixture; begin and end with the flour mixture. Beat at low speed just until blended.
  4. Stir in the marshmallows. Pour the batter into a greased and floured pan. Bake at 350° for 30 to 35 minutes. Now is the time to make your frosting.

  1/2 cup butter
  1/3 cup cola
  3 tablespoons cocoa
  1 (16-ounce) package powdered sugar
  1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  2 teaspoons vanilla extract

  5. Combine the butter, cola, and cocoa and bring it to a boil in a large saucepan over medium heat, stirring until the butter melts. Remove from heat, and whisk in the sugar and vanilla.
  6. Remove the cake from the oven, and allow it cool 10 minutes. Pour the frosting over the warm cake. Garnish with the pecans, if desired.

Danny Trejo's Breadanimals

Danny Trejo is a badass. After several stints in prison, and overcoming an addiction to drugs, he has become one of the most prolific actors working today, appearing in "Desperado", "Heat", "Con Air", "Breaking Bad", and my personal favorite, "Machete". But when he's not portraying a criminal or an anti-hero, he apparently likes to make animals out of baked goods. I'll let the man explain it himself.

Easy baking

I don't bake. Like some of the contestants on "Chopped", I freeze up at the thought of having to bake a cake. It's not like I don't like baked goods, it's just that I would rather not try to make any. My wife does the baking in our house, and she does a good job making cookies, muffins, and pies for me and our son. But for whatever reason (not a big dessert guy, still foolishly equating baking as a girlie activity), I've never felt the need to give baking a try until recently. I came across a recipe on Instructables that was so easy and pain-free that even a novice like myself could bake someone happy. And since I needed to bring something to a pot-luck brunch I was invited to over this past long weekend, it was the perfect time to try it out.

Ingredients for Ice Cream Bread

3 cups self-rising flour (Or make your own using this simple equation: for each 1 cup of flour add 1½ teaspoons baking powder, and ½ teaspoon salt)
3 cups of your favorite ice cream (REAL ice cream, no low-fat or lite stuff)

1. Preheat oven to 350℉ (180℃). Grease and flour bread pan, or line with parchment paper.
2. Mix melted ice cream and flour until well combined. Pour into prepared bread pan.
3. Bake for 45-90 minutes; the bread is done when a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. If the top starts to brown too much, cover it with aluminum foil and continue to bake.

St. Patrick's Day with Many Tasty Returns

Special guest blogger: my wife, and the baker of the Franklin household,  Xanklin73

If the way to someone's heart is through their stomach, wouldn't a sample of its special dishes tell you something about the country that it comes from? That was the question that Team Franklin decided to explore in our latest set of informal cooking challenges. Since we're not jetting off on any international culinary expeditions right now, we decided to use our kitchen as a backdrop and source all of our recipes on the Internet. Thinking less about making something "authentic" than making something that's just "fun", we launched into this with gusto last week.

Home cooking -- and especially baking -- have become huge stress-relievers for me lately. As a perfectionist-modern-feminist-turned-web-freelancer-slash-mommy-on-leave-from-her-office-job (you get the idea), there can be too much happening and too little time in which to handle everything. And spare time? Not a chance.  That said, home cooking has offered me an unexpectedly still oasis to creatively problem-solve while getting food on the plate for the people I care most about. It's the very ultimate in mutli-tasking, so I will call that a win. Spending time in my "oasis",  I've loved rediscovering vintage cookbooks that help me learn terms and techniques that used to be considered basic decades ago. And I love the challenge that comes from moving from one project to another and making the tools I have work for me.

Buoyed by such great programming like "Chopped" and "Top Chef", my husband and I have both discovered that we both really like expressing our creativity through cooking. We've discovered that it is infinitely more satisfying to try or improvise a new dish until we can do it well and make it our own than simply selecting the dish from a menu somewhere. And what better incentive to excel than to cook for people that you love?

Last week, I experimented with an eggless recipe for Parkin (a ginger cake or gingerbread from Northern England). My biggest discovery? Team Franklin really, really hates molasses. Though the recipe wasn't a favorite, I really loved the weight of history behind it -- origins of this dessert possibly stretching back into England's "Gunpowder Plot" of 1605 or even earlier into Viking times. A pretty impressive feat for what's essentially a one-bowl dessert. Here's a great Parkin recipe that serves up both the history and the "how-to" , similar to recipe I tried, this version includes one egg.  

In honour of St. Patrick's Day, we've tackled one Irish dish in the morning and planned another for supper. Irish Soda bread was bumped till next year in favour of something with a bit of sweetness. I found a wonderfully understated Irish tea cake recipe  that I baked that morning. I have no idea if it's authentically Irish but I still loved it. It's basically a simple butter cake sprinkled with confectioners sugar. We ate it while it was still warm from the oven, slightly more warm than our breakfast drinks .  What I liked most was that this recipe was not too sweet and presented with a nice delicate crumb. Once this cake made it to the plate, I found it difficult to stop eating -- especially after whipped cream and strawberries were added. 

With many tasty returns,

Mrs. Franklin