Joanna’s World

There are certain things I think everyone keeps in their pantry. Rice. Flour and Sugar. Olive Oil. Chocolate Chips. And when you run out of these staples, you know it has been FAR TOO LONG since your last trip to the grocery store.

That’s the wake-up call I got when I went to make the oatmeal bread that Oven Love selected for Tuesdays with Dorie and found myself short on oats. I used instant low sugar apple cinnamon oatmeal to make up for what I lacked, and it turned out just fine. I used a mix of dried cherries, cranberries, blueberries and golden raisins from Trader Joe’s golden berry mix, which I love.

This was a spectacularly moist breakfast treat that Another Eater and I enjoyed every morning last week on our ways out the door: mine was perched in my lap while I drove to the train station, his came in finger-full bites while he fed PT before daycare (which PT loves).

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Just like the Cookies on Friday blogger who selected this recipe last month,  I love baking bar cookies. It’s a simple way to create a good volume of cookies (whether you are sharing them with others or simple curling up with a glass of milk after a bad day), and there is something unbelievably therapeutic about pressing batter into the corners of a pan and then licking it off your fingers when you have it Just Right.

Picking different flavors to add into the bars is too big a decision for me on most days, so I stuck with Dorie’s recommendations on this one: butterscotch chips, milk chocolate chip, walnuts and coconut. The only on I regret is the coconut, as it was really the only thing I tasted. Maybe it’s me - coconut isn’t my favorite thing - but it didn’t stop me from gobbling these up! The cookie base that carries whatever add-ins you choose is just perfect enough to make these irresistible, regardless.

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I baked Tuesday and then worked late Wednesday, which means that when I got home after dark I found PT asleep and The Other Eater (is he now Another Eater, since there are three of us?) cooling off with a glass of milk and two brrrr-ownies.

And he seemed pleased with his find. I was glad, because they sure were unattractive when I finished slicing them. Dorie wasn’t kidding when she recommended chilling them before slicing, because they are sticky and sweet and the counter-cooled creations stuck to the knife like skin to vinyl upholstery in August. But fresh from the fridge at the end of another humid July day, Another Eater said they were perfect! Gooey but not sticky. Minty. Dense and chocolate-y. I’m looking forward to my snack after work tonight!

If you can see beyond my shotty slicing job, they look good, with the big white chucks peeking through the shiny dark chocolate. They are the perfect picnic treat, but they’d melt on the buffet.  Hmmmmm…too bad I’ll have to hoard them in my own fridge this week! It’s hard being me.

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I wasn’t overly impressed.

But first, an apology: I’ve been away for far too long.  But I have a GREAT excuse.

P.T. was born March 13, and he’s kept me quite busy. Sure he looks cute and serene here, but man does he have lungs! He’s a good baby, and I’m working hard to keep up with him. Baking has been secondary.

But now, back to the cookies. They were good cookies - dunked in milk they were loaded with brown sugar and made a great late-night TV-watching snack. I mixed dark chocolate chips, mini chips and semi-sweet chips in mine (honestly, I was cleaning out the baking drawer and just threw in all my remnants, but my story is that it made for a nice surprise when you bit into a chip). But these are still cookies and thus too crisp for my taste.  I prefer cookie bars because they are softer and more cake-y.  But I can see how they’d be a hit at a picnic this summer or in a room full of kids. Bake away!

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 I took a stand this week, and it did me no good.  I ended up with really dry mini-cakes.  Though they were exceptionally cute.

On principle, I refused to go out in cold and snow just to buy whole milk for the fraction of a cup this recipe called for. I used the skim I had in my fridge. And that was a mistake.

The cake was delicious, but it totally needed a big glass of (skim) milk to wash it down, as well as a plate to catch all the crumbs that came off in big chunks.  I had pieces breaking off around the delicious walnut-cocoa-sugar swirl. I hoped that piping the melted-chocolate-and-corn-syrup glaze over the top would help - and it was delicious - but the cake remains drier than I would like. I think the fat from whole milk would have made a world of difference.

The Other Eater and I split the valentine treat above for breakfast on Sunday, and the rest went to a baby shower I co-hosted Sunday afternoon. I few made it home from that, but they remain uneaten in my beautiful cake dome four days later. That can’t be a good sign.

Thanks to Kristin from I’m Right About Everything for choosing it.

2 Comments | In: Recipe Review, TWD, dessert | tags: cake, choclate, Dorie, milk. | #

I’m pretty darn  sure that this is the is the first cookie I have ever rejected warm from the oven.

Like a good lasagna, however, it was far better the second day.

The batter has (or rather, batters have, since yu have to make the cookie dough and then the chocolate layer) just about everything: oatmeal, peanuts, craisins, chocolate and lots brown sugar. Bakers divide the cookie dough into two parts, spread one in the bottom of the pan, slather with a gooey chocolate mess, and then drop more cookie dough on top.  It’s fun. It’s ok if it’s sloppy. What’s not to like?

Maybe it’s the warm craisins, but these are just not good straight from the oven. Even The Other Eater in this Household said “they’re ok” - a significant rejection, given that his usual criteria for Dorie’s creations include 1) is it good? and 2) did it kill me?

So, I split the tray of cookies in two and took a plate to work with me the next day.  They were a hit!  I didn’t understand it, so I had to try another, and I agreed! Far better than the first day I had baked them.  Who would have guessed?

You can find the recipe here, at Confectiona’s Realm.  They are far easier to put together than the list of ingredients makes them look.

2 Comments | In: Recipe Review, TWD, dessert | tags: chocolate, cookies, craisins, Dorie, oatmeal. | #

  I am so excited to be celebrating Tuesdays with Dorie’s second birthday by posting on time and in synch this week.  Congratulations to our founder, and to those who have kept up faithfully for the last 104 weeks.  You all should be proud of your accomplishments.

I must say, though, that I think the celebration makes this week’s Tarte Tatin selection especially enjoyable.  It was the simplest of recipes (butter, sugar, apples, pastry dough), but I’m just loving it.  Even though mine looks nothing like the photo is the cookbook, I’m loving the clean flavors. It’s really cold in Chicago right now, and warm apples with whip cream are just what the doctor ordered for when I’m snuggled up on the couch trying to stay warm and awake through the 10 p.m. news. Nevertheless, I think I would be equally comfortable serving this dessert for a dinner party in the dining room.  It’s just that nice.

So tonight when I settle in for another slice of Tart, I’ll toast (with my fork) to another 104 weeks of baking with Dorie!

(You can find our host’s analysis and a link to the recipe here)

3 Comments | In: Recipe Review, TWD, dessert, fruit | tags: apple, Dorie, simple, Tarte. | #

Thank goodness it’s over!  I really enjoy baking, but when my one-woman kitchen begins to resemble the Tollhouse Factory assembly line I tend to get a wee bit crabby.  I have to figure out a way to attack things better next year.

I made peppermint bark, and snickerdoodle blossoms, and peanut butter fudge, and Tollhouse pan cookies, and toffee bars (at least, that what we’ve always called them - it’s more of a butter cookie with melted Hershey bars on top), and spiced almonds, and mock turtles, and sour cream cherry coffee cake.  All good, but SO. MANY. DISHES. TO. WASH. And then I had to get it all wrapped up and divvied up and off my dining room table in time to set the table for Christmas Eve dinner.  AACK.

But, dinner was lovely, and ended with Dorie’s All in One Holiday Bundt Cake.  I’ve made this before, but I still loved it just as much the second time around. The cake is surprisingly light considering all the stuff it has to hold (cranberries, nuts and apples), and it absolutely doesn’t need the maple icing Dorie suggests.

We devoured it after a big pasta dinner, and the leftovers were in great demand for Christmas breakfast. Thanks to The Nitty Bitty for picking it back in November!

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These were a treat right around Thanksgiving, and given that I have a whole new bottle of molasses in the pantry now, I’m thinking they might be a treat again someday soon!

These cookies were chewy and dense and certainly spiced well - you must like ginger snaps to like these cookies, because they offer FAR MORE than your grocery store variety spice cookies.  Also, they were a bit of a handful to get into the baking pan, so definitely chill the dough as Dorie recommends before trying to rol them out (I still ended up with a thin layer of dough on each hand after I rolled a dozen or so out). The woman knows her stuff!

I, of course, was drinking them with milk or weak tea, because that’s how I roll these days. But they would also be lovely with the last of the wine after dinner. They certainly are not overly sweet to where they might compete with the wine.  I served them after brunch (french toast, quiche, sausage and cocktails) with friends for the perfect ending to a delightful Sunday morning.

1 Comment | In: Recipe Review, TWD, dessert | tags: cookies, Dorie, ginger. | #

I am proud to report that this week I followed as few of Dorie’s instructions as possible and I STILL came up with a product that made me eat an otherwise undesirable vegetable. I feel like I am making progress.

Contrary to what the cookbook said I put the sweet potatoes and room temperature butter in the food processor and then mixed the puree with he dry ingredients, including pumpkin pie spice from one of my favorite stores. I then dropped the dough onto a cookie sheet in heaping tablespoons, smoothed the shape with my finger and baked them.

The resulting biscuit probably isn’t as light and flaky as Dorie would like, and it certainly wasn’t as well shaped, but they are as delicious with pot roast as they are with apple cider or my morning coffee, and I am darn proud of my low maintenance technique.

I’ve never been a fan of sweet potatoes, you see, and I know they are good for me when prepared appropriately. Here’s why, according to the Louisiana Sweet Potato Commission:

• The Center for Science in the Public Interest ranked the sweet potato at 184 in nutritional value, more than 100 points ahead of the baked Idaho potato, spinach or broccoli.
• Sweet potatoes provide twice the recommended daily allowance of vitamin A
• Sweet potatoes provide more than one-third of the daily requirements of vitamin C.
• Sweet potatoes are an important source of beta-carotene, vitamin B6, iron, potassium and fiber.
• Studies have consistently shown that a high intake of beta carotene-rich vegetables and fruits, like sweet potatoes, can significantly reduce the risks for certain types of cancer.
• Sweet potatoes contain virtually no fat or sodium.

I imagine, however, that this is all negated by the butter in these biscuits or by the deep fryer in the case of sweet potato fries. DRAT.

3 Comments | In: Recipe Review, TWD, sides, veggies | tags: biscuits, Dorie, sweet potato. | #