Eat The Love

Easy Cherry Slab Pie

Thu, 16 Jun 2022 17:00:00 +0200

This easy-to-make cherry slab pie is great for a crowd with a firm, not runny filling, that doesn’t require you to pre-cook anything!

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I’ve been on a massive baking binge lately, more than usual. The reasoning because seasonal fruit is so…seasonal. And when I see cherries pop up, I need to buy bags and bags of them. But as much as I love to eat cherries, I often buy too many! That’s when I start baking with them in the form of a cherry buckle with cocoa cinnamon topping, apricot, sweet cherry and plum vanilla pie, or in my cherry, plum and peach cobbler. But this time instead of mucking about with combining different flavors, I decided I wanted to do something classic with all the cherries. That meant baking up a sweet cherry slab pies!

What is a slab pie?

A slab pie is similar to a standard round pie but made in a sheet pan. It is in a rectangular slab form, thus the name, slab pie. It’s ideal for those who love crust as there’s a higher crust to pie filling ratio. But it’s also a great dessert for large parties, gatherings, and picnics. It’s easier to serve folks, as they can cut small portions for themselves, which is harder to do with a traditional round shaped pie.

This slab pie is made in a short 9 x 13-inch baking sheet that is 1-inch deep. You can also make this in a 9 x 13-inch 2-inch pan (like the kind you bake brownies in) if you that is all you have. But you might want to line the pan with parchment paper, with the edges of the paper overhanging the sides of the pan. This will allow you to grab the paper and lift the entire pie up from the pan, making it easier to serve so you aren’t “digging” into the pan for slices.

How do you make this cherry slab pie?

Like the typical pie, you first start with making pie crust. Combine flour and salt in a large bowl, then add in cold cubed butter. Smash the butter into slivers with your fingers, then drizzle and toss in ice cold water until a dough forms.

Once you have the pie dough, divide it in half and form 5-inch disks, about 1-inch thick. Wrap tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate for a minimum of an hour or overnight.

When the dough has chilled and you’re ready to make the pie, combine 2 pounds of pitted and halved sweet cherries with sugar, cornstarch, vanilla, balsamic vinegar, almond extract, a grated granny smith apple, and salt.

Roll out the dough to fit into a 9 x 13 x 1-inch pan. Pour the filling into the dough, evenly distributing the filling through the pan. Dot the top of the filling with a little extra butter, then roll out the other dough and fit it over the top of the filling.

Brush the edges of the pie crust with an egg wash, then seal the top and the bottom together and decoratively crimp the edges. Brush the top of the crust with egg wash, sprinkle some sugar on top, cut a few steam holes, and then refrigerate the pie while you preheat the oven for 15 to 20 minutes. Once the oven is preheated, bake and then let cool for an hour before serving.

What makes this pie different than other cherry slab pies?

Most cherry slab pie recipes result in a runny filling or have you pre-cook the filling juice to thicken it. This cherry slab pie has a firm filling that isn’t too starchy and skips the pre-cooking stage, making it easier to prepare!

The addition of the grated Granny Smith apple is what keeps the filling from running! Most pie fillings rely on a lot of starch or flour to thicken the fruit filling. This is good solution to prevent runny filling, but can make the pie taste starchy or give the fruit filling an odd “bouncy” texture.

But the Granny Smith apple is filled with pectin, a natural thickener that is what makes fruit jams and jellies thicken. The grated apple helps thicken the filling naturally, without extra starch. Despite the addition of the apple, you don’t taste the apple flavor at all in the filling. Instead, the apple adds a subtle fruit sweetness as well as thickens the filling, resulting in less sugar needed for the filling as well.

There’s also an addition of balsamic vinegar in the filling. This ingredient is optional but highly recommended as it adds a touch of acidity to the filling, balancing the sweetness and bringing out the bright cherry fruit flavors even more. If you don’t have balsamic vinegar, try adding lemon juice instead, which isn’t quite as rich as balsamic but still highlights the bright acidity of the fruit.

Tips and tricks

Cold ingredients for pie crust: When making pie crust, always start with cold ingredients, including cold butter and cold water. Make sure to chill the pie crust for a full hour or make it up to 2 days ahead of time, so the butter in the crust can fully solidify. Cold pie crust equals flakey pie crust!
Use an apple in the filling: As I mentioned above, the addition of the apple sounds odd, but it naturally thickens the pie without extra starch or flour. Don’t skip this ingredient until you want your pie filling to be runny.
Refrigerate the pie after assembling: Refrigerating the pie after assembling means the pie crust can chill again after it’s been rolled out and manipulated at room temperature. Chill the entire pie while you preheat the oven then. That way the crust is still cold when it goes into the oven.
Use store-bought crust: For a shortcut, you can totally use store-bought pie crust. However, you might need to use 2 boxes of the pie crust and cobble together the top and bottom crusts to fit into the pan. Just brush some of the egg wash on the dough and overlap the dough to form a larger crust for the top and bottom. Use the egg wash as a “glue” to hold the dough together.
Use frozen cherries: If cherries are out of season but you still want to make a cherry pie, you can use frozen cherries. Just increase the cornstarch to 5 tablespoons as frozen cherries have more liquid when they thaw.
Split the cherries in half: I often times will just use a paring knife and fingers to pit my cherries but I did write an article for Simply Recipes about the best cherry pitters, and the one I like the most is the OXO cherry pitter (<- affiliate link). But if you plan on pitting a lot of cherries, you might want to invest in a batch “hopper style” cherry pitter (<- affiliate link) which allows you to pit large batches of cherries at once. No matter how you pit your cherries though, split them in half afterwards. This allows you to check to make sure you removed all the pits (even the best cherry pitters will occasionally leave a pit in the cherry). Halving the cherries (I just tear them in half with my fingers) also creates a more even layer of filling in the pie.

Storage

This slab pie is best eaten the day it is baked. But you can store the leftover remaining cherry pie at room temperature in an airtight container for 2 days or in the fridge for up to 4 days.

You can also freeze this pie. Let the pie cool completely then either wrap the entire pie tightly in plastic wrap and place it in a large 2 gallon ziplok bag and freeze as is, or slice first, then place slices in an airtight container or in a freezer bag. Thaw it out overnight in the fridge or take a slice out and thaw on the countertop for about an hour before serving.

If you like this cherry slab pie, check out some of these other pies

Easy Cherry Slab Pie

This cherry slab pie is made in a sheet pan and ideal for serving larger crowds or bring to a picnic. Unlike other cherry slab pie recipes, this filling is not runny and doesn’t require you to precook the filling or the fruit liquid. Instead, it relies on a grated Granny Smith apple to help thicken the filling with the natural pectin in the apple. But don’t worry, you won’t taste the apple in the filling. The natural sweet cherry flavor shines through and the apple only adds a subtle fruit sweetness that also means less sugar is necessary in the fillin

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword cherry, fruit, pie, slab pie

Prep Time 45 minutes

Cook Time 1 hour

Chill time 1 hour 30 minutes

Total Time 3 hours 15 minutes

Servings

Calories 475kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Pie Crust

3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 455 g
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 1/4 cups unsalted butter, cold 285 g
2/3 cup to 3/4 cup ice cold water

Pie Filling

4 1/2 cups cherries about 2 pounds or 910 grams
3/4 cup white sugar 150 g
1/4 cup cornstarch 40 g
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar or lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 Granny Smith apple
2 tablespoons unsalted butter

To assemble

1 large egg yolk
1 tablespoon cold water
2 tablespoon turbinado sugar sparkling sugar or white granulated sugar

Instructions

Make the pie crust dough by placing the flour and salt in a large bowl. Cut the cold butter into 1/2-inch cubes and sprinkle them over the dry ingredients. Using your fingers, toss the cubes in the flour then smash them into flat pieces, roughly the size of a pea.
Once all the butter is flattened and broken up, drizzle 2/3 cup of the ice water over the dough and toss with a fork until a dough starts to form. Using your hands massage the dry ingredients gently into the wet parts. If the dough looks too dry, add more water, a tablespoon at a time, until a solid dough forms.
Divide the dough into two parts and then flatten each part into a disk about 5-inches wide and 1-inch thick. Wrap each dough with plastic wrap and then refrigerate for a minimum of an hour or overnight (or up to 2 days in the fridge).
While the dough is chilling, make the crust by pitting the cherries and halving them into a large bowl. Add the sugar, cornstarch, vinegar, vanilla extract, and salt. Then peel and core the apple, and grate it into the bowl, using the large holes of a box grater. Toss to combine all the ingredients together.
When you’re ready to assemble the pie, if you’re using a 9 x 13-inch baking pan (the kind that you make brownies in), lightly spray it with cooking oil, then line it with parchment paper. If you are using a 9 x 13-inch rimmed baking sheet, skip this step. Flour a clean surface and then roll out a disk of dough into an 11 x 15-inch rectangle.
Fold the dough into quarters. Move the dough carefully to the pan. Unfold and fit the dough into the baking sheet or pan, trying to NOT stretch the dough as much as possible. This will help prevent shrinkage.
Pour the filling into the pastry dough and then distribute the filling evenly throughout the pan. Cut the remaining unsalted butter into small 1/4-inch cubes and sprinkle them all over the top of the filling.
Repeat the rolling out of the dough with the remaining disk, making sure it 11 x 15 as well. Place this dough over the filled pie.
Make the egg wash by beating the egg yolk with the water. Then lift up and brush the bottom crust with some of the egg wash and place the top crust back on top of it, using the egg wash to “glue” and seal the crust together. Trim any excess crust and decoratively pinch and seal the dough all the way around the pie. Place the pie in the refrigerator (uncovered) for 20 to 30 minutes.
While the pie is chilling, preheat the oven to 375°F. Once the pie is done chilling, brush the remaining egg wash over the top of crust (you won’t need to use all of it). Then sprinkle the top crust with turbinado sugar (or sparkling or white sugar) and cut some decorative vent holes into the top.
Place the pie on a large rimmed baking sheet (in case any of the filling bubbles out) and bake the pie for 60 to 70 minutes or until the filling is bubbling through the steam vents in the center of the pie. Let the pie cool on a wire rack for at least 1 hour before serving.

Nutrition

The post Easy Cherry Slab Pie appeared first on Eat The Love.

Rainbow Layer Cake

Thu, 09 Jun 2022 17:00:00 +0200

This fabulous rainbow layer cake is frosted with rich dark chocolate frosting, which makes the bright and vivid cake layers pop out even more.

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Even though I’m gay, I’m a bit late to the rainbow party when it comes to dessert. Perhaps it’s the over-the-top fabulousness that comes with rainbow treats, a fabulous that doesn’t always fit with my everyday ho-hum life. But once I made my rainbow chocolate chip cookies last year, it kind of broke the seal. I ended up developing a rainbow rice krispie treats for my friends over at Simply Recipes. And this year, I decided it was time for me to make a towering rainbow layer cake, one frosted with rich fudgey chocolate frosting and adorned with rainbow sprinkles. Because if I’m going to make a rainbow layer cake, why not go all out?

What makes this different than other rainbow layer cakes?

Most rainbow layer cakes have white frosting, but I really wanted a deep and rich flavored chocolate frosting that made the colors of the layers pop even more. So I adapted the chocolate frosting from my Smith Island Cake that is in my cookbook Marbled, Swirled and Layered (<- affiliate link).

If you really love white vanilla frosting, you can swap out the chocolate frosting with your favorite vanilla frosting. Just make sure to double a typical recipe you might need for a double or triple layer cake. With six layers, this cake needs extra frosting for coverage.

How do you make this cake?

Though it looks complicated, this cake is only slight more difficult to make than a traditional layer cake. The main difficulty is the dividing the cake batter into 6 batches and add food coloring, as well as frosting a few more layers.

Make the cake batter in the typical way, by first creaming the butter and white sugar together, along with some vanilla, baking powder, baking soda and kosher salt. I use imitation clear vanilla because I want to keep the cake batter as white as possible before adding the food coloring, but you can use real vanilla if you’d like.

Once the sugar and butter mixture is fluffy and light colored, add the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the sides of the bowl, then add the egg whites, mixing it in. Add half the flour, all the buttermilk and the remaining flour.

Divide the batter into 6 different bowls and add the food coloring to each. Then pour each into a greased and parchment paper lined 8-inch pan and bake. Once baked, let them cool in the pan for 15 minutes, then release on a cooling rack and let cool completely before frosting.

While it’s baking, make the frosting by softening some chocolate in a microwave, then heating up cream, sugar, and vanilla together in a pan until hot (but not boiling). Stir it into the chocolate until it’s smooth, then add butter to form a fudgy smooth icing. Chill in the fridge until spreadable.

When the frosting is at the right consistency, stack the purple layer on a cake stand or cake plate and frost it. Then add the blue layer on top of it. Continue adding the layers in the order of the rainbow, spreading a thin layer of frosting between each cake layer, and then frost the top and sides. Press some rainbow sprinkles onto the bottom sides and now you have a stunning and gorgeous cake!

What to do if you don’t have six cake pans?

Don’t worry if you don’t have 6 cake pans! Who does? Just bake the cake in batches!

Bake 2 or 3 layers at a time. Then let the cake cool for 15 minutes in the pan. Run a thin knife, spatula or plastic dough scraper around the side of the pan and release the cake layer onto a cooling rack.

Wipe out the cake pan with a paper towel (no need to wash it). Spray the pan with cooking oil and line with a piece of parchment paper on the bottom. Bake the remaining layers.

How do I get the intense colors?

Gel food coloring is key to getting the vivid and striking colors. To get the intense cake layer colors, you need professional gel food coloring. My favorite brand is AmeriColor but any professional gel food coloring will give you better results than the liquid stuff you find at grocery stores. You can find professional grade food coloring at craft stores like Michaels, JoAnn or online (<- affiliate link).

Using liquid food coloring, like the type you can get at a grocery store that comes in the teardrop shape bottles, just won’t get you the same intense color. You need to add a lot more, and that messes with the liquid ratio of the cake. I don’t recommend using that type of food coloring.

The Americolor gel paste food coloring I use includes Regal Purple, Royal Blue, Forest Green, Lemon Yellow, Orange, and Super Red. I also noticed that I wasn’t super happy with the orange colored layer, so I ended up adding just a drop or two of the super red to nudge the cake layer to a more suitable orange. Use your own judgement about that layer. Each layer really only requires about 1/4 teaspoon of the gel food coloring, with the exception of the red, which I used a scant 1/2 teaspoon, because I really wanted it vivid in color.

More Tips and Tricks

8-inch pans: This cake uses 8-inch pans, which are slightly less common than 9-inch pans. I like using the 8-inch pans because the cake has more height, and I can fit three 8-inch pans on a rack in my oven. But if you only have 9-inch pans, you can bake the layers in those. Just check the pan around 12 or 13 minutes to see how it’s baking. The thinner layer of cake batter means it might bake up faster.
Use tall pans: I recommend using 3-inch tall cake pans if you have them. Tall cake pans means the cake layers will bake up more evenly and flat, without the typical center dome. However, the cake will be fine if you use 2-inch tall cake pans. Just expect the cake to dome a little more in the center.
Use cake flour: I use cake flour to create a more tender crumb in the cake. You can use all-purpose flour if that is all you have but keep in mind that the cake will be a little more tough and crumbly. If you find that the cake texture is too much like cornbread, consider buying a box of cake flour and trying that out.
Pick a chocolate you like to eat: This frosting is fairly intensely chocolate, almost a ganache with heavy cream and sugar added in. Pick a chocolate you like to eat out of hand, as that’s what you’ll mostly be tasting when you eat this cake.
Frost thinly: Because there are so many layers, use a thin coating of frosting between layers and the sides and top. Don’t worry though, you will still have a lot of chocolate frosting in an individual slice. The thinner frosting layers just means a better balance of cake and frosting ratio.
The frosting needs the right temperature: Because this frosting is like a ganache, you need to have it the right temperature to use. Too cool and it’s stiff and hard to work with. Too warm and it’s runny. I make the frosting, then cool it in the fridge anywhere from 1 hour to 2 1/2 hours, depending on how cold your fridge is. Stir the frosting halfway through the chill time to get the entire frosting the same temperature. If it gets too cold, just let it sit at room temperature to warm up a bit, or microwave it in 10 second burst, stirring between cook times. It doesn’t take long to warm up again!
Place the cake on a baking sheet before adding sprinkles: I like to press sprinkles onto the bottom edge of the cake for fun but sprinkles bounce everywhere. I place the cake on a rimmed baking sheet, so the sprinkles don’t go all over the table. Once I’m done decorating the cake, I can pour the sprinkles back into the canister to use again.

Make Ahead

You can make the cake layers one day and then assemble and frost the cake the next day if you wish. Wrap the cake layers in a plastic wrap tightly after they have cooled and come to room temperature. Make the frosting the day before, and microwave in 10 second bursts, stirring between cook times, to warm it up to spreadable consistency. Then assemble and frost.

The cake keeps for about 3 days already assembled under a cake dome at room temperature. Keep in mind the longer it sits out, the less fresh it will be.

Storage

Store this cake at room temperature for up to 3 days under a cake dome. You can also freeze this cake if you want. I like to slice the cake into individual pieces, place the slices on a small pieces of parchment paper, and then freeze on a baking sheet. Once solid, I’ll place them all in an air-tight container, layered with the parchment paper, for longer storage. Then I can thaw out a piece individually to eat. The frozen cake will keep in the freezer for up to 2 months.

If you like this Rainbow Layer Cake, check out these other cake recipes

Rainbow Layer Cake

This fabulous rainbow layer cake is a stunning cake for nearly any occasion, from a childhood birthday to a celebratory pride party in June. It’s easier to make than it looks but it does require you to bake 6 different layers. If you don’t have 6 cake pans (and who does?) just bake it in batches. You can see my section above on tips on baking in batches.

To get the vivid layers of color, use gel food coloring a not grocery store liquid food coloring. My favorite brand is AmeriColor, but any professional grade gel food coloring will work. Liquid food coloring just won’t give you the same color. Gel food coloring can be found at the craft stores like Michaels, JoAnn, or online.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Keyword cake, chocolate, chocolate frosting, frosting, layer cake

Prep Time 1 hour 15 minutes

Cook Time 35 minutes

Frosting Chilling Time 1 hour 30 minutes

Servings

Calories 948kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Cake batter

1 1/4 cup unsalted butter at room temperature 285 g or 2 1/2 sticks
2 1/2 cups white sugar 500 g
1 tablespoon clear imitation vanilla or real vanilla
1 1/2 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
4 large eggs
2 large egg whites
3 1/2 cups cake flour 455 g
1 1/2 cups buttermilk well shaken

Coloring

1/4 teaspoon AmeriColor Gel Regal Purple
1/4 teaspoon AmeriColor Gel Royal Blue
1/4 teaspoon AmeriColor Forest Green
1/4 teaspoon AmeriColor Gel Lemon Yellow
1/4 teaspoon AmeriColor Gel Orange plus 1 to 2 drops of Super Red (optional)
1/2 teaspoon AmeriColor Gel Super Red

Frosting

12 ounces chopped dark bittersweet chocolate 340 g
1 1/4 cups heavy cream 290 g
1 1/4 cups white sugar 250 g
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract real or clear
10 tablespoons salted butter if unsalted add 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, 140 g or 1 1/4 sticks

To finish

Rainbow sprinkles optional

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350°F.
Spray six 8-inch cake pans with cooking oil, then line the bottom of the pans with parchment paper. If you don’t have six cake pans, see the section above about baking in batches.
Place the butter, sugar, vanilla, baking powder, salt, and baking soda in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Start the mixer on low, slowly bringing the mixer up to medium speed as the butter becomes more pliable and the sugar is incorporated. Mix for 5 or 6 minutes, or until the butter and sugar are fluffy and light in color. Scrape down the sides of the bowl once or twice while you cream the ingredients.
Scrape down the sides of the bowl then add the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the sides between additions. Add the egg whites beating to incorporate. Don’t worry if the batter looks broken as you add eggs. That’s normal.
Add half the flour and slowly stir it in with the mixer. Scrape down the sides, add the buttermilk, scrape down again, and then add the remaining flour.
Divide the batter into 6 different bowls. This will be about scant 1 1/2 cups of batter, or about 300 grams each if you have a scale. Mix in the food coloring to each bowl with a spoon or spatula. Note that to achieve the right shade orange, I added a drop of red food coloring gel to the orange layer, but you might want to skip that if you like the way the orange gel comes out.
Scrape and pour the batter into the pans, spreading the cake batter evenly into the pan. It will be a thin layer. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean, the top of the cake springs back when you gently press it with your fingers, and the cake starts to pull away from the sides of the pan.
If you don't have 6 pans or you can't fit them all in the oven, see my section above for baking the cake layers in batches.
Let the cakes cool in the pan for 15 minutes, then run a thin knife, spatula or plastic dough scraper around the side of the pan, then carefully release the cake layer onto a cooling rack. Peel away the parchment paper. Let cool completely before frosting.
While the cake layers are baking, make the frosting by placing the chocolate in a large microwave safe bowl. Microwave for 30 seconds, stir, and microwave for an additional 30 seconds. The chocolate will not be melted but the bowl will be warm, and the chocolate touching the bowl will be melty.
Place the cream, sugar and vanilla in a medium pot and heat on the stove on medium heat stirring frequently, until the sugar has dissolved, and the cream is heated. Bubbles should start to form on the side of the pot. Do not let it boil.
Pour into the bowl of chocolate and stir until the chocolate is melted.
Add the butter to the melted chocolate, 1 or 2 tablespoons at a time, stirring until the butter is melted and incorporated.
Cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for 1 to 2 1/2 hours. Stir halfway through chilling the frosting. You want the frosting to be cool enough to be spreadable like peanut butter or Nutella, but not too thick or stiff. If it’s too stiff, stir it and let it sit on the counter at room temperature for 5 to 10 minutes to warm up a bit.
Once the cake layers are cooled, and the frosting is the right thickness, place a small dab of frosting on a cake plate or pedestal and place the purple layer on it. Frost a thin layer of chocolate frosting all over the top of it, then add the blue layer. Repeat this process, frosting the cake layers, adding the green, yellow, orange and then red on top. Frost the sides and top with the remaining frosting.
Press a small amount of rainbow sprinkles around the bottom edge of the cake before serving.

Notes

Frosting recipe adapted from my cookbook Marbled, Swirled, and Layered (<- affiliate link).

Nutrition

The post Rainbow Layer Cake appeared first on Eat The Love.

Grilled Sangria-inspired Marinated Skirt Steak

Wed, 25 May 2022 16:45:00 +0200

This quick and easy grilled skirt steak is steeped overnight in a sangria-inspired honey marinade that infuses it with loads of flavor.

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It’s warming up here in San Francisco and that means I’m firing up the grill! I’m lucky to live in San Francisco, a city with a fairly temperate climate, so I can basically grill all year long. But something about warmer weather makes me want to get out of the kitchen and cook outdoors. When the weather gets nice, I find myself making double cheeseburgers, Korean BBQ chicken wings and, of course skirt steak with my all-purpose steak rub and chimichurri recipe.

But recently I decided to mix it up a bit and make this sangria-inspired marinated skirt steak. It’s just barely adapted from the cookbook Big Love Cooking by Joey Campanaro and Theresa Gambacorta (<- affiliate link). It’s a super easy recipe with the marinade lending tons of flavor to the steak. I often serve it with my crispy oven roasted potato wedges and green beans with thyme, shallots and pistachios or a big salad and dinner is done is less than an hour. Perfect for a weeknight meal.

How do you make this marinated skirt steak?

Making the marinade for this skirt steak requires minimal prep work. Slice up some shallots, coarsely chop some garlic and slice some oranges (I opted for blood oranges but regular Valencia or navel oranges work just as well).

Add them to some red wine, honey, and a few sprigs of fresh thyme.

Then place the skirt steak in a large ziplock bag, pour the marinade over it, and let it sit in the fridge to do its work overnight. Grill for a couple of minutes per side and dinner is done!

What is skirt steak?

Skirt steak is a long piece of beef that is located inside the chest and abdominal cavity of the cow. There’s an inside and outside skirt steak but the most common skirt steak that you find at grocery stores is the outside skirt steak, which is transversus abdominis muscle of the cow. The inside skirt steak, which is the muscle that moves the diaphragm, usually ends up in commercial kitchens.

Because the skirt steak is close to internal organs like the liver, it has more robust flavor, almost offal like. But don’t worry. It doesn’t taste like liver! It just has more meaty “beef-iness” to it.

It’s can be a tough piece of meat, but because it’s thin, it cooks and grills fast and it soaks up marinades well. It also has fat in-between the muscle strands, which keep it from drying out when grilling. I recommend cooking the skirt steak to a medium rare, as anything more done will lead to a dry and tough piece of meat.

Can you substitute skirt steak with flank steak?

You’ll often find recipes that tell you can you substitute flank steak for skirt steak. And you can. But keep in mind that flank steak is a thicker cut and marinades don’t penetrate as quickly. The nature of the skirt steak allows the marinades to really soak in!

If you do choose to use flank steak instead of skirt steak, I’d recommend letting the steak marinade a full 12 hours to let the flavors penetrate. You will also need to cook the steak longer on the grill, as flank steak is a thicker cut of meat that skirt steak.

Can you broil or pan cook this steak?

Yes! Though my preferred method to cooking skirt steak is on the grill as it lends a smoky char to the meat and cooks it super fast, you can cook this indoors using a broiler or a heavy skillet like cast iron.

To broil, move the top oven rack so it’s about 4 to 6 inch from the heat source at the top of the oven. Then place the steak on an aluminum foil lined pan and broil for about 4 minutes. Then flip the steak and broil for an additional 3 minutes. If your broiler has temperature option, pick high. You want the hottest heat possible when cooking skirt steak!

To pan cook it, cut the steak into 2 or 3 pieces, so they fit into the size of your skillet. Choose a heavy skillet if you have one. I like to use my cast iron to pan cook steak. Remove from the marinade and pat it dry with paper towels. Then heat the pan over high heat for about 2 to 3 minutes, until it’s screaming hot. Add about 1 tablespoon of oil, then carefully place the steak in the hot pan with tongs. Press down with the tongs so that the entire steak has contact with the hot pan, and let it cook for about 2 minutes, or until the bottom side of the steak is golden brown and lifts up fairly easily from the pan. Flip the steak and cook for an additional 2 minutes.

How do you cut skirt steak?

Skirt steak is made up of long muscle fibers which soak up the marinade. But when you serve up the steak, you should be careful of cutting the steak because you want to cut against the grain, and not with the grain. This means you are cutting perpendicular to the long fibers, cutting them into short pieces.

If you cut the opposite direction with the grain, you end up with a piece of meat that is one long fiber. Chewing on that will be like chewing on a rubber band! Make sure to cut diagonally against the grain, and you’ll be rewarded with meaty goodness.

What sort of red wine should be used in the marinade?

The old adage of “pick a wine you like to drink” certainly works with this recipe too. But, to be honest, I often will find the cheapest red wine that I’m willing to drink at the grocery store and use that. There’s no need to use an expensive wine, as it just functions as a marinade, and has additional ingredients in it like honey, orange, shallots and garlic. I usually try to find a robust red wine, like an Argentine Malbec or Spanish Tempranillo for under $10 and use that in the recipe.

If you like this skirt steak recipe, check out some side dish recipes to go with it:

Grilled Sangria-inspired Marinated Skirt Steak

This grilled sangria-inspired marinated steak is packed with flavor. Just make sure to get the steak in the marinade early in the day or make it right before you go to bed. A quick cook on the grill and dinner is ready in minutes.

Course dinner, Main Course

Cuisine American

Keyword beef, grilling, marinade, steak

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 5 minutes

Marinade Time 4 hours

Servings

Calories 749kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

3 cups red wine 1 bottle or 750 ml
1/4 cup honey 75 g
1 medium-sized orange Navel, Valencia, or Blood
2 small shallots 60 g
5 medium-sized garlic cloves
5 sprigs fresh thyme
6 tablespoons olive oil 75 g
3 pounds skirt steak about 2 to 3 pieces
Salt and pepper

Instructions

Place the red wine and honey in a large bowl. Slice the oranges and shallots and add it to the marinade. Coarsely chop the garlic and add it as well. Add the thyme and olive oil and mix.
If the skirt steak is long, cut the steak into 2 or 3 manageable sized pieces. Then place them in a 2-gallon resealable freezer bag or a baking pan big enough to hold the steak and the marinade. Pour the marinade carefully into the resealable bag or baking pan. Seal it or cover the pan with plastic wrap and then marinade the meat for a minimum of 4 hours and up to 12 hours in the refrigerator.
Don’t go over 12 hours as the acidity in the wine will start to break down the fibers of the steak.
Take the steak out of the fridge about an hour before you are ready to cook it, to let it come to room temperature. Once you are ready, preheat the grill on high for 10 minutes. Then remove the steak from the marinade, letting any excess marinade drip off. Salt and pepper the steak generously on both sides, then grill the steak for 2 minutes per side on the high heat.
If you forget to take the steak out of the fridge, don’t stress. Just cook it for an additional minute or two per side.
Let the steak rest for 8 to 10 minutes before slicing the steak against the grain diagonally and serving.

Nutrition

The post Grilled Sangria-inspired Marinated Skirt Steak appeared first on Eat The Love.

Chunky Chocolate Chip Shortbread Cookies

Thu, 21 Apr 2022 00:09:24 +0200

These easy-to-make brown butter chunky chocolate chip shortbread cookies have a sprinkling of crunchy sea salt on top.

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Full honesty here, when I want a chocolate chip cookie, I usually want a thick chewy bakery-style chocolate chip cookie. Sometimes I want a variant of that style of cookie, like a sourdough chocolate chip cookie, a cookies and cream cookie, a mint chocolate chip cookie (which I developed to taste like mint chocolate chip ice cream) or even my reverse chocolate chip cookie. But I rarely opt for the chocolate chip shortbread cookie variety.

But every now and then I want something with a little crisper. A little more buttery. A little crumbly-in-the-mouth. And though I’ve tinkered with a bunch of various shortbread recipes, including a couple of super popular viral cookies, nothing really resonated with me until I came across Dorie Greenspan’s caramel chunky chocolate chip cookies from her cookbook Baking with Dorie (<- affiliate link).

Don’t be fooled by the name, there’s no caramel in the cookie. But I took her version as a jumping off point, and cranked it up a notch, using brown butter, more vanilla, more chocolate chunks, removed the nuts, and sprinkling on a bit of crunchy Maldon sea salt on top. Yeah, I was that guy who radically altered the recipe! But most importantly, I changed the preparation method a bit to make it easier to form each cookie as I found the slicing of the cold dough difficult to do. The result is the best and easiest to make chocolate chip shortbread cookie that I’ve found!

How do you make this shortbread cookie?

To make these cookies, start off by browning two sticks of butter in a pan. If you’ve never made brown butter, don’t worry, it’s not tough! I’ve got a section below on tips on tricks on making brown butter.

Once the butter is brown, pour it in the bowl of a stand mixer and add a lot of vanilla to it. Then add white granulated sugar and powdered sugar and some kosher salt, mixing it together. Add in flour and mix on slow speed, until the dry ingredients are absorbed, and it looks a little bit like wet sand or tiny pebbles. You know you’re done when the dough will stick together when you grab some in your fingers. Add the chopped chocolate and mix in.

Now brush two muffin tins with melted butter and press in heaping tablespoons of the dough into each cup, compressing the dough. Each dough ball should be about 30 to 35 grams each if you have a scale and want to get precise. Stick the whole thing in the fridge and let it chill for a minimum of 2 hours or overnight preferably. Once chilled, sprinkle some salt on top and bake!

What makes this shortbread different?

Most shortbread cookies tend to be more on the thin and very crumbly. This cookie is baked in a muffin tin, which keep the shape of the cookie and allows it to be thick and chunky. In addition, the use of the brown butter, as well as the melted butter brushed in the pan, means you get a lot of nutty toffee and caramel flavors in the cookie, something that a lot of pale white shortbread cookies don’t have.

Expect these cookies to also have more substance than a traditional shortbread cookie, with a firmer texture and more crunch than a typical sandy crumbly shortbread or sable cookie. But they still have that signature buttery flavor that shortbread cookie has, just with a little more cookie oomph!

What can you do if you don’t have two muffin tins?

This recipe requires you pack each cookie dough into two buttered 12 cup standard size muffin tins. Some folks don’t have more than one muffin tin. If you only have one muffin tin, butter it like instructed, and press half the dough into the cups. Place the pan in the fridge to chill.

Then take the remaining dough and divide it out into 12 balls. Squeeze each ball of dough tightly together in your hands to get it to form together but don’t worry if they aren’t perfect in size. You basically just want them in lumps so you don’t have to divide them later, after they’ve chilled and hardened. Place the balls in an airtight container and place in the fridge along with the muffin pan.

Once the cookie dough has chilled, take the dough balls out of the fridge and set them on the counter. Preheat the oven, and then bake off the cookies in the pan as directed. Once the cookies are baked, let them cool for 3 minutes in the pan, then move them to a wire rack. Wipe out the pan with a paper towel and brush the pan with more melted butter. Press the cookie dough balls into the pan cups. They might fall apart, but that’s ok. Just press and compact them down into the cups of the muffin tin. They’ll pack down. Then bake the second round as directed.

How to brown butter

Browning butter isn’t difficult to do, but it does require you pay a little bit of attention while making it. I recommend using a silver bottom pan if you have one and you’ve never made brown butter before.

Place the pan on the stove and turn the heat on high, heating the pan and butter until it melts. Stirring with a heatproof wooden spoon or spatula. Once most of the butter has melted, reduce the heat to medium low. Continue to cook the butter, stirring constantly until the milk solids on that have fallen to the bottom of the pan start to turn golden brown.

Make sure to scrape the sides of the pan as you stir. This is where the milk solids often accumulate and cook first. The butter will foam a lot, this is the water in the butter boiling off, so make sure to use your spatula to push the foam aside to check the bottom of the pan to see how the milk solids are looking.

Once you start seeing the milk solids turn brown, and the butter starts to smell fragrant and nutty, remove the pan from the heat. Let the residual heat of the pan continue to cook the milk fats until they have all turned a deep golden brown. If you need to nudge the brown butter further and darker brown, return it to the stove on low heat and just continue stir until you get that brown color you want. Don’t go black though! That’s a sign the butter fat has burnt and there’s no going back from that. You’ll have to start over.

Though I highly recommend using browned butter, if you’ve had difficult making brown butter in the past or want to skip this step, just melt the butter in a pan or in the microwave and use that instead. Expect your cookies to be less nutty and caramel in flavor, but they’ll still be delicious.

Tips and tricks on the making these the best cookies

Though these cookies are pretty foolproof to make, here are a few tips on how to make them the best chunk shortbread chocolate chip cookies you’ve had.

Use chopped chocolate: I prefer to use chopped chocolate in this cookie. The chocolate chips tend to be a little hard and are designed to not melt. I like to use chopped chocolate which is softer in a shortbread cookie. But if you are in a rush or don’t want to chop chocolate, just use your favorite chocolate chips in these cookies. They’ll still be lovely!
Use browned butter: I love the nutty fragrant and slightly caramelized flavor that the browned butter gives these cookies. They almost taste like they have hazelnut or almond flour in them, but they don’t! I have tips on how to make brown butter in a section above, but if you don’t want to make brown butter, feel free to just use melted butter instead. The cookies will be super tasty, just not as complex in flavor.
Use the best ingredients: This goes without saying with all recipes, but because this cookie has very few ingredients, I really recommend using the best ingredients you have on hand. Real vanilla extract, high quality butter, pure cane sugar, and quality chocolate. You’ll taste the results.
Use salt: I like to sprinkle a nice crunchy sea salt, like Maldon salt, on top of my cookies. The salt is a nice contrast to the chunky cookie, as well as elevates and intensifies the flavor of the chocolate and brown butter even more.
Chill the dough: Though you can make these cookies the same day that you make the dough, after chilling the dough in the fridge for a couple of hours, the flavor of the cookie really intensifies and deepens if you let the cookie chill in the fridge overnight or even 2 days. The flour has time to fully hydrate, and the cookies firm up and deeper toffee flavor emerge. If you don’t believe, try baking up half the cookies the day you make them, and then the other half of the cookies the next day and compare. It’s pretty impressive the difference. But if you are impatient, know that the cookies that are made the day of are still pretty great!

Storage

These cookies will keep at room temperature for up to 3 days in an airtight container. You can also freeze them in an airtight container or in a resealable freezer bag. Just thaw on the counter before serving. Keep in mind the salt on top of the cookies will melt and absorb into the cookie the longer you store them.

If you like these chocolate chip shortbread cookies, check out some of these other chocolate cookie recipes

Chunky Chocolate Chip Shortbread Cookies

These chunky shortbread cookies are packed with chopped chocolate and have a sprinkling of crunchy sea salt on top. The addition of the brown butter gives them a rich nutty and caramel depth that regular melted butter doesn’t but if you are short on time or intimidated by brown butter, melted butter will still yield a delightful cookie. Make sure to allow time to chill the cookie dough. I highly recommend making the cookie dough one day and then baking them off the next day for convenience and extra flavor. This recipe does require the use of two standard size muffin tins. If you only have one muffin tin, see my section above about how to bake them with one tin.

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword brown butter, chocolate, chocolate chip, cookies

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 20 minutes

Chilling Time 2 hours

Servings

Calories 153kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Dough

1 cup unsalted butter 225 g or 2 sticks
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup white sugar 100 g
1/2 cup powdered sugar, sifted 60 g
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
2 cups all-purpose flour 280 g
1 1/4 cups chopped dark chocolate 210 g (use something you like to eat out of hand)

To Bake

2 tablespoon unsalted butter melted

To finish

Crunch sea salt like Maldon or Sel de Gris (optional but recommended)

Instructions

Start by first making browned butter. Place the butter in a large saucepan, preferably one with a light silver bottom. Heat the pan on high, stirring constantly, until most of the butter is melted, then reduce the heat on the pan to medium low. Continue to cook the butter, stirring constantly and scrapping down the sides of the pan, until the milk solids have turned golden brown. Remove from the pan and let it cool slightly, about 2 or 3 minutes.
Pour the browned butter into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Make sure to scrape in the browned butter milk fat bits at the bottom of the pan into the bowl as well. Add the vanilla, then the white sugar, powdered sugar, and salt into the bowl. Mix on low speed, increasing to medium for about a minute, or until the ingredients have had time to mix together. It won’t look blended, but don’t worry about that.
Add the flour and mix on low speed until the dry ingredients are absorbed. Then increase the speed to medium and mix for about a 1 to 2 minutes, or until the dough starts to look like small pebbles or large grain sand. Grab some dough and press it together with your fingers. If it sticks together, then the dough good. If it fall aparts, mix for another 30 to 60 seconds.
Add the chopped chocolate and mix on slow speed, until it is evenly distributed.
Take 2 standard 12 cup muffin pans and brush the inside of each cup with some melted butter. Then scoop out a rounded tablespoon of dough from the bowl and smash it into the bottom of one of the buttered muffin cups. Press firmly to pack it in. If you have a scale and want to be precise, the dough should be somewhere between 30 to 35 grams. Repeat this process with the remaining dough, filling up both muffin pans, making 24 cookies.
Place both pans in the refrigerator, and let chill in the fridge for a minimum of 2 hours, or overnight preferably. You can chill the cookies for up to 2 days if you wish.
Once the dough has chilled, preheat the oven to 350°F. One preheated, sprinkle the top of each cookie with a pinch of sea salt, then bake the cookies for 18 to 20 minutes or until the edges and the top of the cookies are golden brown. Rotate the pans halfway through the baking if your oven bakes uneven.
Let the cookies cool in the pan for 3 to 4 minutes, to let them firm up. Then slide a thin butter knife or small metal offset spatula around the cookie to loosen it from pan. I like to slide it into a couple of spots around the cookie to loosen it. Then slide the knife or spatula under the cookie. The cookies should just pop right out. Move the cookie to a wire rack to cool completely.

Notes

Recipe adapted from Dorie Greenspan’s cookbook Baking with Dorie (<-affiliate link)

Nutrition

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Pampushky, Ukrainian Garlic Bread

Thu, 10 Mar 2022 23:27:44 +0200

This pampushky recipe is a classic Ukrainian garlic bread that is typically served with borscht but goes well with almost any soup or stew.

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Lately I’ve been obsessed with baking breads from around the world. These include recipes like my Italian tomato focaccia made with a small boiled potato, traditional Bavarian pretzels dipped in lye, and Swedish cardamom buns to the less conventional mash-ups that I bake like my pretzel shakshuka. So, it’s no surprise that I have Ukraine on my mind and wanted to bake a traditional Ukrainian bread, which led me to making this pampushky recipe, a Ukrainian garlic bread.

It’s not a difficult bread to make, and its garlicky herby spice will have you reaching for another one after you finish your first one. Though it is typically served with a bowl of borscht soup, which is a beet soup, I found this bread goes well with nearly every soup and stew I make, from my easy-to-make chili, to Guinness beef stew to my Italian wedding soup.

What is Pampushky?

Pampushky, sometimes spelled pampuski, is the plural form of pampushka and is the word for a Ukrainian yeast-risen bun or donut. In fact, sweet pampushky are fried, much like American donuts or polish Packzi. But the version of the pampushky I have here are a baked savory Ukraine garlic bread that I discovered in the cookbook Mamushka, recipes from Ukraine and Beyond by Olia Hercules, a Ukrainian-British food writer (<– affiliate link).

Olia Hercules tells how the word pampushky can also be used to describe a beautiful plump woman. And that description also fits these plump gorgeous bread rolls that come out of the oven. Once the bread is done baking, a garlic and parsley infused sunflower oil is brushed over the hot bread. The smell is warm comfort for anyone in the house.

How do you make pampushky?

This pampushky bread starts with making a sponge, which is sort of like a preferment. This sound technical but it’s not. It just requires you to combine the yeast with warm water and a little bit of sugar to feed the yeast. Once the yeast starts to bubble (this is calling proofing, because you are proving that the yeast is still alive) you add in half the flour of the dough. Mix it all up to create a thick batter, cover it with plastic wrap, and refrigerate it overnight.

The sponge will rise overnight, and slowly grow. The purpose of the sponge is to increase the strength of the dough, get a more consistent hydration of the flour, and give you a more complex depth of flavor due to the fermentation and growth of the yeast. The sponge will appear “stringy” and sticky once it’s rested, indicating that the gluten in the flour has grown.

Once the sponge has rested overnight, you knead in the rest of the flour, along with some salt. Then brush some sunflower oil in an ovenproof pan and make 8 balls of dough. Arrange them in a circle, with one in the middle, cover with plastic wrap again, and then let it rise until the dough balls have doubled in size and are touching each other.

Brush with an egg wash and bake! While the bread is baking, make a garlic oil by chopping green garlic (or regular garlic) and flat-leaf parsley and mixing it with sunflower oil. When the bread is done baking, immediately brush the hot bread with the garlic oil, infusing it with the sharp earthy herby oil. Sprinkle some salt on top and serve.

Can you skip the sponge step?

Yes, you can skip the sponge step of this recipe, just keep in mind the resulting bread will not have a complex a flavor. Just proof the yeast in the warm water. Once the water has bubbly foam on top, add all the flour, knead the dough, and let it rise until double in size, about 1 hour. Then proceed with the recipe as directed.

What is green garlic?

Olia Hercules calls for wet garlic in her recipe, which is often called green garlic. It is young garlic that is picked early in the season and can you be found at farmers markets and specialty grocery stores. It looks a bit like thick green onions/scallions or thin skinny leeks. The bottom of green garlic is a little more bulbous. Later season green garlic has an even more bulbous bottom, looking more like small garlic heads. Once you’ve cut and discarded the root end, the entire green garlic, including the green top part, can be used in the recipe.

The taste is a more mild, less harsh garlic flavor, with herbal notes. If you can track it down, I highly recommend it for this recipe (and basically for anything you use garlic in, the season for it is very short). But if you can’t find it, don’t worry. Just use regular fresh garlic cloves and chop more parsley to compensate. I have notes in the recipe on how to substitute out regular garlic cloves for the green garlic.

If you wish, you can also substitute out the parsley for another green herb like dill or use spring onion or green onion/scallions for the green garlic. Obviously the flavor profile will shift and be different if you do, but it will still be delicious.

Why sunflower oil?

You can totally use butter or another neutral-flavored oil in this recipe. But sunflowers are the national Ukrainian flower and symbol of peace for them. So it’s only natural that sunflower oil would be used in this recipe for this Ukrainian garlic bread.

How do you store this bread?

This bread is best served immediately. But you can store this bread in an airtight container or ziplock bag overnight at room temperature. Refresh it in a toaster oven or regular oven at 300°F for 5 to 10 minutes until it is warm.

For longer storage, freeze the bread in a freezer Ziploc bag for up to 3 months. Just thaw by placing the frozen bread directly in a 300°F toaster oven or regular oven for 10 to 15 minutes, or until warm.

If you like this pampushky recipe, check out some of these other yeasted breads:

Pampushky, Ukraine Garlic Bread

Pampushky, sometimes spelled pampushki or known in the singular as pampushka, is a traditional Ukraine garlic bread roll that is served with borscht, a beet soup. It a yeasted bread roll that is brushed with a garlic and parsley infused oil.

Don't be turned off by the length of the recipe as it's actually a fairly easy bread to make. But this recipe does require a sponge to be made the day before so you should plan accordingly. If you are in a hurry and wish to skip the sponge step, just follow my instructions in the section above about skipping the sponge stage.

If you have don’t have green garlic, sometimes called wet garlic, I have a note below the recipe instruction on how to substitute regular garlic.

Course bread, Side Dish

Cuisine European, Ukrainian

Keyword bread, garlic, parsley, ukraine, yeast

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Rest Time 9 hours

Servings Rolls

Calories 248kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Dough

1 cup warm water 90 to 100°F 225 g
1 teaspoon white sugar
2 1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast 7 g or 1 packet
2 3/4 cup all-purpose flour 385 g (plus 1 to 2 tablespoons more if necessary)
1 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
2 tablespoon sunflower oil divided

To Bake

1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon water

Garlic Herb Oil

1 medium green garlic or 3 garlic cloves (see note below recipe instructions)
1 tablespoon chopped flat-leaf parsley or 3 tablespoons if using garlic cloves (see note below recipe instructions)
3 tablespoons sunflower oil

To Finish

Kosher salt

Instructions

Make the sponge by stirring together the water and sugar in a medium-sized bowl. Add the yeast and stir again to dissolve. Set aside to proof for 5 minutes. There should be bubbles and foam on top after 5 minutes. If there is no bubbles, the yeast is dead and you need to start over with fresh live yeast.
Once the yeast has proofed, add 1 1/2 cups of the flour (210 g) and stir to form a thick paste. Cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator overnight. The next day the sponge should have grown and will look "stringy" in texture.
After the sponge has chilled overnight, scoop it out and place it in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook and add the remaining 1 1/4 cups (175 g) of flour and the salt to the bowl. Stir the dough with the hook on low, stopping occasionally to scrape the sides with a spatula to incorporate the dry flour.
Once the flour has been absorbed increase the speed to medium low and knead the dough for 3 to 4 minutes. The final dough should be smooth and slightly tacky but not sticky. If it is sticky, add 1 to 2 tablespoons of flour in the kneading process.
If you don't have a mixer or want to knead the dough by hand, just add the flour and salt directly to the bowl with the sponge and mix with a wooden spoon until the flour is mostly absorbed. Then scrape the dough onto a flour dusted surface and knead the dough by hand for about 4 to 5 minutes, or until the dough is smooth and slightly tacky. If the dough is too sticky, add 1 to 2 tablespoons of flour during the kneading process but try not to add too much as that will dry out the bread.
Once the dough is kneaded and smooth, grease a 9-inch cast iron skillet with 1 tablespoon of the sunflower oil. Divide the dough into 8 even pieces (about 75 grams each if you have a scale) and form round balls with each of them.
Place 7 rounds of dough in a circle, around the perimeter of the pan, and one dough in the middle. Brush the top of the dough with the remaining sunflower oil. Brush any residue oil onto a piece of plastic wrap and cover the pan with the plastic, oil side down. The oil will prevent the dough from sticking to the plastic wrap.
Place the pan in a warm area and let it rise until the balls have doubled in size, and are touch each other, about 45 to 75 minutes depending on how warm or cold the area is where you let the dough rise.
About 15 minutes before the dough is ready, preheat the oven to a very hot 450°F. Once the dough is ready, remove the plastic wrap. Beat the egg yolk and the water together and gently brush the egg wash over the top of the balls of dough. Bake in the oven for 14 to 16 minutes or until the dough is golden brown on top. If you have an instant read thermometer, the inside should register 190 to 200°F.
While the bread is baking make the garlic oil. Cut off the root of the green garlic and discard it. Finely chop the green garlic and the flat-leaf parsley. Place in a bowl and pour the sunflower oil over it, mixing it together.
Once the bread is done, take it out of the oven and immediately brush the top of the bread with the garlic oil, making sure you get as much of the solid green garlic and parsley bits as possible onto the bread. Sprinkle with a couple pinches of kosher salt and serve immediately.

Notes

Substituting Garlic for Green Garlic

If you don’t have green garlic, just use 3 cloves of regular garlic and mince the garlic fine. Increase the parsley to 3 tablespoons

If you don’t have a cast iron skillet

You can use a 9-inch springform pan or a cake pan to make this bread. Just decrease the oven temperature down to 425°F and increase the bake time to 18 to 22 minutes. The cast iron skillet insulates the dough slightly, which is how you can bake the bread at such a high temperature.

Recipe adapted from:

Mamuskha by Olia Hercules (<– affiliate link).

Nutrition

The post Pampushky, Ukrainian Garlic Bread appeared first on Eat The Love.

The Best Easy-to-Make Chili

Tue, 08 Feb 2022 18:30:00 +0200

This easy-to-make chili is the best chili recipe out there, with tips on customizing it to your taste, with suggestions of secret ingredients!

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My partner and I used to serve chili a lot, back when we casually entertained. It was our go-to dish for large gatherings along with homemade olive pizza, fried mac and cheese bites, and Taiwanese popcorn chicken, because you can easily double the recipe, add some cornbread and tons of fixing to it and it’s an automatic party! Even better, leftovers are better the next day! And strangely I realized I have never shared my chili recipe before here. After years of tinkering and playing around with it, this is my go-to recipe for the best and easiest chili, perfect for game day (if that’s your thing) or just for a cold winter day.

How do you make this chili?

This chili is super easy-to-make, because the prepping of the ingredients just includes chopping the onion, bell pepper and garlic. That’s it! Once prepped, cook the vegetables until they start to soften and add the ground beef and Italian sausage and continue to cook until browned.

Then add the spices like chili powder, cumin, oregano, and red pepper flakes along with some chili paste. And like nearly all other chili recipes out there, I like to add some “secret” ingredients that make my chili specific to my taste. This includes a little bit of cinnamon, cloves and cocoa powder, but those are totally optional.

Cook until the spices are fragrant, then add crushed or diced canned tomatoes, and a bottle of beer. Let the chili simmer and then add kidney beans. Cook until the flavors marry and serve.

What to serve with this chili?

You can serve chili with a number of side dishes to make it a complete meal. Here’s a few examples

Cornbread (this is my go-to side dish for chili)
Bread rolls, like my potato rolls, Parker House rolls, wooly bread, or garlic knots
Beer Bread
Elbow Macaroni (my partner claims it’s not chili if macaroni isn’t mixed in)
Spaghetti noodles
Tortilla chips (make sheet pan nachos with it)
Stuffed baked potatoes or baked sweet potatoes
Crispy Oven Roasted Potatoes
French Fries
Cold beer (this seems like a given but I feel like I need to mention it)

Secret Ingredients for Chili

The variety of chili recipes out there are near infinite. It’s why there are “chili off” contests with hundreds of folks who come with their own secret ingredient which they claim makes their chili the best ever. The reality is, there is no BEST chili recipe out there, because everyone’s tastes are different. There’s only the best recipe for YOU. So my advice is always to experiment a bit!

Here’s an (incomplete) list of various “secret ingredients” that you could try adding to your chili. I’ve categories the ingredients into what they mostly do with the chili, though keep in mind that often they do more than one thing. For instance, grated dark chocolate adds complexity as well as sweetness. Chopped mushrooms add texture as well as boosts umami.

Most of the ingredients, with the exception of the fresh chopped peppers (jalapeno, serrano, habanero, or other hot peppers), can be added at the very end of the recipe to taste. Add just a little bit, stir it in, then taste. Add more if you desire. If you want to increase the heat and complexity by adding fresh chopped peppers, add it with bell pepper, onions and garlic, to cook it a bit first.

Complexity

Liquid smoke (use 1/2 teaspoon first, as its strong)
Cumin
Coriander
Dried Oregano
Cocoa Powder
Ground cinnamon
Ground cloves
Ground allspice
Dark chocolate, grated or chopped small
Bottled enchilada sauce
Bottled BBQ sauce
Ketchup
Red Wine (use instead or partially in place of beer)
Beef Broth (use instead or partially in place of beer)
Chicken Stock (use instead or partially in place of beer)
Vegetable stock (use instead or partially in place of beer for vegetarian)

Acidity

Balsamic Vinegar
Red Wine Vinegar
White Wine

Sweetness

Brown Sugar
Coconut Sugar
Molasses
Honey
Agave Nectar
White Sugar

Texture

Ground turkey or chicken instead of ground beef or sausage
Rolled quick oats
Chopped Mushrooms
Cubed Winter Squash
Cornmeal
Chopped firm tofu
Frozen or canned corn
Cubed pork or steak
Shredded roasted chicken or turkey

Umami

Worcestershire Sauce
Soy Sauce
Asian Fish Sauce
Marmite or Vegemite

Heat

Chopped fresh peppers, like jalapeno, serrano, habanero (add and cook with vegetables)
Ground Chipotle Chili Powder
Ground whole dried peppers, like Chipotle, Chile de Arbol, Thai or Ghost
Cayenne powder
Ground red pepper flakes
Ground Sichuan peppers

Toppings for Chili

I’m 100% a maximalist when it comes to my chili. The more toppings the better! But you may want to either streamline your topping offerings or just pick a few select toppings that you like. But if you are planning a chili party or make a chili bar for your gathering, here are a few suggestions and options for topping your chili. But if there is any other toppings that you love, you can leave a comment and I’ll add it to this post!

Chopped red onions
Chopped white or yellow onions
Chopped Green onions
Chopped fresh tomatoes
Chopped avocado
Grated cheese like Cheddar, Monterey jack, or Pepper Jack
Ricotta or Cottage Cheese
Feta or Cotija Mexican cheese
Cilantro leaves (so polarizing, but if you love cilantro, it’s amazing on chili)
Sour cream
Greek Yogurt
Golden raisins
Croutons
Crumbled tortilla chips or strips
Fritos
Saltine crackers or oyster crackers

Make ahead and storing chili

Chili stores easily and actually tastes better the next day. You can make this chili, as well as any toppings you enjoy, ahead of time. Just cook the entire batch and then cool it and refrigerate in an airtight container or in the pot with the lid on. When you’re ready to eat, just heat it back up and serve.

To store leftovers, place in an airtight container and refrigerate for up to 3 days. You can also freeze the chili if you have lots of leftovers. I like to freeze chili in a quart-size freezer ziplock bag. Freeze is flat, then turn it on its side once frozen solid for easy storage. Defrost overnight in a bowl (to collect any condensation) in the fridge. Or microwave it briefly (30 seconds) in the ziplock bag to thaw it slightly if you are pulling it directly from the freezer. Then empty the content of the bag in a microwave safe bowl or into a pot and heat it up in the microwave or on the stovetop.

If you like this chili recipes, check out these other stew and soup recipes

And check out these other recipes that are great for a party or gathering

The Best Easy-to-Make Chili

This easy-to-make chili comes together fast but can be made a day ahead of time if you want. Just cool it and store it in the fridge overnight inside an airtight container or with the lid of the pot on it. Heat it up right before serving. In fact, the chili improves overnight, as the spices and ingredients have time to slowly marry together as it chills.

Course dinner, lunch, Main Course, Side Dish

Cuisine American

Keyword chili, game day, party food

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 45 minutes

Servings

Calories 822kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 large yellow onion chopped
1 red bell pepper chopped, can substitute another colored bell pepper
4 cloves garlic minced
1 1/2 pounds ground beef
3/4 pound Italian-style sausage hot or mild
2 tablespoons chili powder blend look for one that has garlic and other spices blended in
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes more if you like your chili spicy
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper more if you like your chili spicy
2 tablespoons tomato paste
28 ounces crushed canned tomatoes with liquid
12 ounces beer Mexican preferred
15 ounces red kidney beans drained from a can

Additional optional seasonings

1 tablespoon cocoa powder see secret ingredient section above
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon see secret ingredients section above
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves see secret ingredients section above

Instructions

In a large Dutch pan or stock pot add the oil, onions and red bell pepper. Cook over medium heat until the bell pepper starts to soften, and the onion starts to turn translucent. Add the garlic and continue to cook until the garlic is fragrant and softened, about a minute more. Don’t let the onions or garlic brown.
Add the ground beef and the Italian sausage. Continue to cook until the meat browned and is mostly cooked (don’t worry if it’s not fully cooked through just yet).
Add the chili powder, cumin, red pepper flakes, cayenne pepper, and tomato paste. Add the additional optional “secret ingredients” seasonings if you wish. Cook for about 30 seconds or until the spices smell fragrant.
Add canned tomatoes with liquid and beer. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer. Cook uncovered for about 20 minutes or until the liquid has been reduced to about half the amount.
Add the drained kidney beans and cook for an additional 15 minutes uncovered. While the chili is simmering, chop and prepare the toppings for the chili.
Serve immediately with toppings of your choice.

Nutrition

The post The Best Easy-to-Make Chili appeared first on Eat The Love.

Chocolate Banana Bread

Thu, 03 Feb 2022 18:00:00 +0200

This chocolate banana bread with chocolate chips has just the perfect balance of banana and chocolate to complement each other.

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I’ve made sourdough banana bread and mocha swirled banana bread, before. And recently I developed an easy banana bread recipe for a client of mine. But my thoughts are “can you ever have enough banana bread?” especially since I’m the sort of guy that buys bananas with the idea of eating them or making a smoothie…and they just sit there until they are overripe. So, I decided to go all out and make a chocolate banana bread with chocolate chips.

Because sure, you can make banana bread and just throw some chocolate chips in it. But why stop there? You might as well give the banana bread batter some rich chocolate flavor and fold in the chocolate chips for the perfect balance of banana and chocolate!

How do you make chocolate banana bread?

Like all banana bread, you start with ripe bananas, verging on over ripe. Mash the bananas with a fork, then whisk in eggs, a little bit of milk, vanilla and a touch of instant coffee (to help boost the chocolate flavor).

Once blended, whisk in melted butter, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Then gently mix in flour and natural cocoa powder. Fold in the chocolate chips, pour into a loaf pan and then bake! So easy. SO. GOOD.

How ripe do you want the bananas?

You might see a lot of people telling you the blacker and overripe the bananas the better, but I disagree. There’s a fine line between slightly overripe and rotten! I prefer to use bananas that are just past the point of eating, where the peel is yellow with a lot of black freckling. If the banana peel is completely black or you see any mold on it, it’s past the point of no return and you should discard or compost the bananas.

If the bananas have any green at all, the bananas aren’t ripened enough. Bananas start off starchy (which is why they are so firm) and that starch converts to sugar as they ripen. Green bananas are full of starch and need time to ripen. Give them a few more days before making banana bread.

Can you speed up the banana ripening?

If you are really craving banana bread, you can try to ripen the bananas faster by placing them in a paper bag. Bananas give off ethylene gas when they ripen. The paper bag traps the gas, which will encourage the bananas to ripen faster.

But if you are in a rush, you can also roast the bananas to help ripen them. Preheat the oven to 300°F. Use a fork to poke some holes in the bananas peel, to release steam. Then place the bananas (with the peels on) on a rimmed baking sheet and roast for 15 to 20 minutes. Once the peels are completely black, they are done. Once roasted, let the bananas cool until you can handle them, then peel and use.

What type of cocoa should you use?

This recipe uses natural unsweetened cocoa powder not Dutch-processed cocoa, which is sometimes referred to as alkalized cocoa powder. Natural cocoa powder has a sharper acidity that works well with the rich banana flavor. Dutch-processed cocoa powder is mellower in flavor with a smoother chocolate finish. It is also and much darker in color.

If you only have Dutch-processed, you can substitute the same amount of cocoa powder amount. But increase the baking powder to 2 teaspoons to accommodate the change. Expect the bread to look darker, almost midnight brown, and taste slightly different. It will still be delightful though!

Make it your own:

I use classic semi-sweet chocolate chips in this recipe, the kind you can find in nearly every grocery store. But you can swap out the same amount of any sort of chocolate chip or confectionary chip you like. Or add in chopped nuts or cacao nibs! Here are a few suggestions:

Milk chocolate chips, or chopped milk chocolate chunks
Bittersweet chocolate chips, or chopped bittersweet chocolate chunks
White chocolate chips, or chopped white chocolate chunks
Butterscotch chips
Peanut butter chips
Mini peanut butter cups
A mix of any of the above!

Sub out half or all the chocolate chips for chopped nuts. Here are few suggestions

Pistachios,
Macadamia nuts
Walnuts
Pecans
Peanuts
Roasted cacao nibs, which will give a nutty intense chocolate flavor, and are perfect for those who are allergic to nuts but want a nutty flavor and texture

How do you store this banana bread?

Store this chocolate banana bread in an airtight container or under a cake dome for up to 3 days at room temperature.

Or tightly wrap it in plastic wrap, and then slide it into a resealable Ziploc bag and freeze it for up to 2 months.

If you like this chocolate banana bread, check out these other quick bread recipes:

Chocolate Banana Bread

This chocolate banana bread is an easy one bowl recipe that uses cocoa powder in the batter and chocolate chips to punch up the chocolate flavor. The result is a rich but not overwhelmingly chocolate banana bread that you can eat for breakfast or as a snack.

Course bread, Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword banana, banana bread, chocolate, chocolate chip

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 1 hour 15 minutes

Servings Pieces

Calories 305kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

2 to 3 medium ripe bananas about 400 g after peeling
2 large egg
2 tablespoons milk any type
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon espresso powder optional but recommended
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted 115 g or 1 stick
3/4 cup packed brown sugar 165 g
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
2 cups all-purpose flour 280 g
1/4 cup natural cocoa powder unsweetened, not Dutch-process, 30 g (see section above)
3/4 cup chocolate chips 135 g (see section above for other options)

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Spray a 9 x 5-inch loaf pan with cooking oil then line it with a piece of parchment paper.
Mash the bananas with a fork into a large bowl. You should have about 1 3/4 cups of mashed bananas. Add the eggs, milk, vanilla extract, and espresso powder (if using) to the bowl and stir with a whisk to combine.
Stir in the melted butter, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Fold in the flour and cocoa powder until there are just a few spots of dry ingredients that are NOT absorbed.
Add and then gently fold in the chocolate chips, until they are evenly distributed and the dry ingredients are fully mixed in. Try not to overmix.
Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan and spread the batter evenly. Bake in the oven for 65 to 75 minutes or until a toothpick or skewer inserted in the middle of the loaf comes out clean, or an instant read thermometer reaches 200°F.
Let the loaf cool in the pan for 15 minutes before grasping the sides of the parchment paper and lifting straight up to remove it from the pan. Move to the wire cooling rack, peel off the paper and let the banana bread cool another 15 minutes further before serving warm or at room temperature.

Nutrition

The post Chocolate Banana Bread appeared first on Eat The Love.

Orange Miso Glazed Carrots

Wed, 19 Jan 2022 18:00:00 +0200

This orange miso glazed carrots is an easy side dish that is absolutely spectacular served up any time of the year.

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Dana Cowin, former editor-in-chief of Food and Wine magazine once called miso paste the “little black dress” of ingredients in the kitchen. Basically, you can add it to most anything and you’ll get something super sophisticated and delightful. I’m a firm believer that miso paste DOES add a little bit of funky umami salty depth that I absolutely love. I love adding as an unexpected ingredient to cookies like my peanut butter chocolate chip cookies and my funky cranberry cookie, giving it an extra layer and dimension that is super addictive. But I’ve been tinkering a lot with miso spiced dishes and ended up developing this miso orange glazed carrots that are so good they’ll be a main staple on my dinner table as a quick and easy side dish!

How do you make these glazed carrots?

This glaze carrot dish is made on the stovetop. First chop the carrots into 1 1/2-inch pieces. I like to chop them at an angle, to give them more surface area to cook, but you can cut them anyway you want. You can even use baby carrots if you want an easier prep.

Cook the carrots in a pan with some oil, to help caramelize them a bit. Then lower the heat and add chopped ginger, garlic, red onion, honey, orange juice, water and miso paste. Stir to combine and then loosely cover the pan with parchment paper or a lid that is ajar to let the steam out.

Cook slowly on the stove top until a glaze forms and the carrots are cooked to your liking. Taste and season with salt and pepper. Garnish with some chopped chives and serve.

What is miso? What kind should I use in this recipe?

Miso paste is a Japanese fermented soybean paste. It is a salty umami ingredient that adds depth and flavor to dishes. If you’ve ever eaten at a Japanese restaurant, they will often serve you miso soup, which is a soup made with the miso paste, as well as a bonita flake stock.

Miso typically comes in three different types, red, yellow and white. The type of miso is often associated with regional areas of Japan. Red miso is aged the longest and is most assertive in flavor, yellow miso is in the middle and white miso has the lightest most delicate flavor. I used red miso in this recipe, because I like the robust salty umami flavor that it gives, and I can use less of it and still taste the miso flavor. But you can use whatever miso you have on hand. If you use yellow or white miso, I might recommend increasing the amount of miso to 3 tablespoons instead of 2.

Can you make this ahead of time?

Yes! These miso glazed carrots can totally be made ahead of time. Just cook them completely, and then store them in an airtight container in the fridge. You can warm them up on the stove top (just add a couple of tablespoons of water, as the liquid will have absorbed into the vegetables) or warm them up in a microwave.

Keep in mind that the carrots tends to be a little more on the soft side if you are warming them up after you’ve cooked them. So you may want to cook them a little less done if you plan on making them ahead of time.

If you like this Orange Miso Glazed Carrots, check out some of these other side dishes:

Orange Miso Glazed Carrots

This orange miso glazed carrots are a great side dish to any fall or winter meal. The miso adds an allusive depth and umami dimension that accentuates the sweet earthy flavor of the carrots. Because miso is fermented soybean paste, this recipe is also naturally vegetarian and vegan friendly.

Course Side Dish

Cuisine American, vegan, vegetarian

Keyword carrots, miso, vegan, vegetarian

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes

Servings

Calories 144kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

2 pounds carrots
2 tablespoons olive oil
3/4 cup chopped red onion about 1 small red onion
1 tablespoon minced garlic about 3 medium cloves
1 tablespoon minced or grated fresh ginger
1/2 cup orange juice
1/4 cup water
2 tablespoon red miso
1 tablespoon honey use maple syrup if vegan
Salt and pepper to taste
1 tablespoon chopped chives

Instructions

Peel and cut the carrots into 1 1/2-inch pieces.
Place the olive oil and carrots in a large skillet or sauté pan. Cook on high heat, stirring frequently, until the carrots have started to brown on the sides, about 3 minutes.
Reduce the heat to medium and add the red onion, garlic and ginger. Cook for an additional minute or until the mixture starts to smell fragrant.
Add the orange juice, water, miso, and honey to the pan. Stir to dissolve the miso and honey. Cook until the liquid is boiling, then reduce the heat so it is just barely simmering. Cover with a piece of parchment paper or with a lid on top slightly ajar, to let the steam out.
Cook for an additional 15 to 20 minutes, or until the carrots are done to your liking and a glaze has formed. Carrots with some bite will be done at about 15 minutes, while softer carrots will take 20 minutes.
If the carrots are done to your liking but the glaze hasn’t formed, uncover the pan and increase the heat to medium high, stirring frequently until the glaze has formed. If you wish to cook the carrots until they are more tender but a glaze has already formed, add 1 tablespoon of water to the pan and continue to cook until the carrots are done to your liking.
Taste the carrots with the glaze and add salt and pepper to taste. Plate the dish and sprinkle the top with the chopped chives and serve.

Notes

You can use yellow or white miso in place of the red miso. Just increase the miso paste to 3 tablespoons.

Nutrition

The post Orange Miso Glazed Carrots appeared first on Eat The Love.

Striped Chewy Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies (with video)

Tue, 21 Dec 2021 02:34:53 +0200

These fun and whimsical striped chewy peppermint chocolate chip cookies are easier to make than they look with my step-by-step instructions!

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I’ve been tinkering with this idea of revisiting and revising my old white chocolate peppermint cookie with sea salt that uses leftover crushed candy canes for awhile. But honestly, my friend Steven made it recently and had texted me to tell me he loved it immensely. Which made think, why should I mess with a much beloved cookie recipe? Even if it’s much beloved by…one person. And though I adore the combo of chocolate and mint, like in my peppermint Texas sheet cake and in my mint chocolate chip cookies (that are designed to taste like mint chocolate chip ice cream) I knew I wanted to yet another riff on this flavor combo. So before I knew it, I was sketching and brainstorming these striped chewy peppermint chocolate chip cookies. They’re fun and whimsical, with me playing and combining different colored cookie doughs like in my rainbow chocolate chip cookies. And though they look complicated, I have step-by-step instructions and even a video to show you how to make them!

How do you make this cookie?

This cookie looks fairly fancy pants, because I used two different doughs to make the stripes. I have a recipe in my cookbook Marbled, Swirled, and Layered (<- affiliate link) that creates a criss-cross style cookie and I adapted it to make my rainbow chocolate chip cookie. Here I make just two different colored doughs, cut them into strips, and then form the cookie.

First make the cookie dough by creaming together butter, white sugar, brown sugar, vanilla and peppermint extract, salt, baking powder, and baking soda. Then add 2 eggs, one at a time. Add the flour and mix until a dough forms.

Divide the dough in half, adding red food coloring to one half of the dough. Then mix in white or semi-sweet chocolate chips (your preference) to the red dough and mint chip or semi-sweet chocolate chips (again your preference) to the white dough. Wrap the dough up and chill it in the fridge for at least 2 hours or preferably overnight.

Once the dough is chilled, roll out balls of dough and flatten them into disks. Then cut the disks into 5 even strips. Alternate the strips to form a dough disk that has white and red strips. Press together to form a cohesive disk, sprinkle some flaky salt on top and bake!

Watch a video for how to form these cookies

What sort of food coloring should you use?

I designed this cookie to use liquid food coloring, the kind you find at a typical grocery store. Look for in the same place you will find frosting or cake decorating, or near the flavor extracts and spices.

Keep in mind that the red food coloring is an artificial red coloring. I have yet to find a natural red food coloring that holds its color when baked. Most natural food coloring works best at room temperature, tinting frostings and icings. But if you experiment and find a natural based food coloring that will hold its color after baking, leave a comment below! I’d love to find one.

What chocolate chips should use?

I use a combination of white chocolate chips and mint chips in this recipe. But you can use semi-sweet, bittersweet, milk chocolate chips or chopped chocolate chunks in this cookie. You can even chop up mint chocolates like Andes chocolate and use those. But my go-to brand for white chocolate chips and mint chips is Guittard, a family-owned company here in San Francisco.

How do you store these cookies and how long will they last?

Store these cookies in an airtight container or in a heavy-duty resealable Ziploc bag. I found they lasted about 3 days sealed tight at room temperature. I don’t recommend storing these cookies with other cookies, as the mint flavor will migrate to the other cookies. Or, as my partner says…they will mint-aminate them! So store them separate and away from anything that you don’t want smelling and tasting like mint.

You can also freeze these cookies. Store them in a heavy-duty resealable Ziploc bag and freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw to room temperature for about 2 hours before enjoying.

Can you make the dough ahead of time?

Yes! Working with a chilled dough will make it easier to manipulate and form the stripes. I recommend a chilling the dough a minimum of 2 hours but you can make them the night before, or up to 3 days beforehand. Just wrap the dough tightly in plastic wrap and store in the fridge until you are ready to use.

You can also freeze the dough. You can freeze the dough as is, before forming the cookies. Just tightly wrap it in plastic wrap, then slide it into a heavy-duty resealable Ziploc bag. The dough will keep in the freezer for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the fridge before forming the cookies.

Or you can freeze the cookie dough already formed into cookie disks! Just form the cookies, and then place them on a rimmed baking sheet. Place the baking sheet in the freezer, letting them freeze solid. Then store them in a heavy-duty resealable Ziploc bag. Take them out and bake them directly from the freezer, adding an additional 2 to 3 minutes to the bake time to allot for the frozen dough.

If you like these striped chewy peppermint chocolate chip cookies, check out these other chocolate and chocolate chip cookie recipes:

Striped Chewy Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies

These chewy peppermint chocolate chip cookies a festive and whimsical with a built-on red stripe! Don’t be intimidated by how complicated they look. I have step-by-step instructions on how to form the cookie. They’re not as hard as they look! This cookie dough does need to rest in the fridge for at least 2 hours, preferably overnight though because the chilled dough is easy to work with, so plan accordingly.

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword chocolate chip, christmas, cookies, holidays, peppermint

Prep Time 45 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Chilling time 2 hours

Servings

Calories 356kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups unsalted butter, at room temperature 340 g or 3 sticks
1 3/4 cups white sugar 350 g
1/2 cup packed brown sugar 110 g
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 490 g
2 teaspoon liquid red food coloring
1 1/2 cups white chocolate chips or another chocolate chips (see note below, 275 g
1 1/2 cups mint chips or another chocolate chips (see note below), 275 g

To finish

Flaky sea salt like Maldon optional but recommended

Instructions

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, place the butter, white sugar, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, peppermint extract, and vanilla extract. Mix the ingredients together on low speed until the ingredients start to come together. Then increase the speed to medium low and cream until the mixture lightens in color and clings to the side of the bowl, about 1 to 2 minutes.
Scrape down the side of the bowl and then mix in the eggs on slow speed, one at a time, making sure the first egg is incorporated before adding the next one. Again, scrape down the bowl.
Add the flour, mixing slowly or turning the mixer on and off so the flour doesn’t fly all over. Once most of the flour is absorbed, increase the speed to medium low and mix until all the flour is incorporated.
Scoop out half of the dough and place it in a separate bowl. If you have a scale, this should be roughly 600 grams of dough.
Add the food coloring to the dough remaining in the bowl of the stand mixer then mix to incorporate the food coloring. You may need to scrape down the sides a couple of times. But mix until you have a uniform color.
Stir the white chocolate chips into the red dough by hand, making sure the chips are evenly distributed. Stir the mint chips into the white dough in the other bowl by hand, making sure the chips are also evenly distributed.
Scoop out the dough and place it on a large piece of plastic wrap. Push the dough into a disk, about 1-inch thick, wrap tightly with the plastic wrap and repeat with the other dough, in a different piece of plastic wrap. Refrigerate both doughs for a minimum of 2 hours or overnight preferably.
Once the dough has fully chilled and feels firm, preheat the oven to 350°F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicon baking mat.
Break off a chunk of the white dough and roll into a 1 1/2-inch ball. If you have a scale, that’s about 70 grams each. Press down on the ball to form a disk that is about 2-inches wide and 1-inch thick.
Repeat this process with the red dough, rolling the dough into a 1 1/2-inch ball, then pressing it into a disk.
Cut each disks into 5 strips with a sharp chef’s knife.
Now assemble the cookie by taking one piece of the white dough and one piece of the red dough and making alternating strips of dough. Try to fit the edge strips to the edge strips, and the middle strips to the middle strips so you have roughly the same form of disk.
Then use your fingers to squish and form a thick disk with the stripes intact.
Place the dough disk on the lined baking sheet and sprinkle with a pinch of the flaky sea salt if using.
Repeat this process with the remaining dough, placing 4 disks of cookies per baking sheet. You want the disk about 2 to 3 inches apart from each because these cookies spread!
Bake in the oven for 14 to 16 minutes or until the edges of the cookies are wrinkly and golden brown. The center of the cookie will rise dramatically but then fall once they cool. Make sure NOT to overbake them if you want them chewy. If you like them more crisp, you can bake them a minute or two longer.
While the first sheet of cookies is baking, form another batch of cookies to bake.
Let the cookies sit on the baking pan for 5 minutes before moving them to a wire cooling rack to cool further before serving

Video

Notes

I use white chocolate chips and mint chips in this recipe, but you can use whatever chip you prefer, whether it’s milk chocolate, semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate chip. You can also use chopped chocolate or chopped Andes mint candies if you wish.

Nutrition

The post Striped Chewy Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies (with video) appeared first on Eat The Love.

Mini Eggnog Scones with Dried Cranberries

Mon, 13 Dec 2021 23:19:26 +0200

Mini eggnog scones are a great holiday addition to breakfast or brunch, as a treat with coffee or tea, or to use up leftover eggnog!

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Everyone on the internet is excited because it’s Christmastime! And yeah, that’s all fine and dandy, but for me that means it’s EGGNOG time! Though I rarely drink eggnog by itself, I LOVE the flavor of eggnog, with its creamy and nutmeg-y, slightly boozy flavor and I’ve used it in tons of stuff. I’ve made eggnog cinnamon rolls, eggnog cheesecake, eggnog pancakes, eggnog cookies and even made eggnog biscuits for my apple and fig cobbler. But I’m currently obsessed with these little mini eggnog scones with dried cranberries! Though you can totally upscale them into normal size scones (instructions on that below if you want) I prefer them smaller, making them a manageable size to eat with tea or coffee, or as part of a bigger breakfast buffet or meal. But don’t let the tiny size fool you. My partner can easily polish off two or three of them in one sitting!

How do you make eggnog scones?

Making eggnog scones is easy. Combine the dry ingredients of flour, brown sugar, salt, baking powder and nutmeg. Then grate a stick of butter over the dry ingredients and toss them together to coat the butter flakes. Add the dried cranberries and repeat, tossing to coat the cranberries.

Beat together the wet ingredients of eggnog, egg, vanilla and rum extract (if using). Then drizzle the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients and toss and fold the ingredients together until a dough forms. Don’t overmix. A few dry spots are ok.

Then divide the dough into 3 equal parts, form them into a 5-inch wide disk that is about 3/4-inch thick and cut each disk into 6 wedges. Stick it in the fridge while you preheat the oven. Once the oven has preheated and the scones have chilled, brush the top with a little more eggnog, sprinkle with some turbinado sugar and bake until golden brown!

What makes these scones better than others?

My biggest issue with scones is they tend to be very dry. I prefer a more moist and tender scone, and to achieve that I do a couple of things.

I grate the butter into the dough. This allows scones to achieve almost a biscuit flakiness, while still be rich in flavor. If you find the grating of the butter to be persnickety, you can cut the butter into small bits and then smash them flat with your fingers. You want the butter pieces to be roughly the size of peas, but flat disks if possible. Work fast though, as the heat of your hand can melt the butter.

I also use less flour in this recipe than a lot of other scone recipes. This makes the dough a little harder to work with, but I compensate for this by dusting the surface that I’m placing the dough and also dipping my cutting blade/bench scraper with flour so I can cut the dough cleanly. The less flour in the dough means it’s can absorb the surface flour without an issue. And a more moist dough makes a more moist scone.

Finally, I chill the scones while I preheat the oven. Though this may seem fussy, I find the 30 minutes in the fridge makes a difference in solidifying the butter a little and allow the scones to rise more. You can skip this step if you are in a rush and preheat the oven before making the scones and bake them directly, but expect the scones to be more dense and heavier.

How do I make these into normal size scones?

If you don’t want to make mini scones, just divide the dough into 2 parts , roughly 420 grams if you have a scale. Then flatten and pat each half into a disk that is roughly 6 1/2-inch round and 3/4-inch thick. Cut the disks into 6 wedges each and bake for 18 to 20 minutes in a 425°F.

Can I make the dough ahead?

Yes! I actually recommend making this dough ahead of time if you can. Make the dough and shape and form the scones. Then place them on a lined baking sheet and cover tightly with plastic wrap. The next morning preheat the oven and bake them directly from the fridge after removing the plastic wrap.

How do I store these?

Store leftover scones in an airtight container or in a heavy duty Ziplock resealable gallon bag at room temperature. Refresh the scones in a 350°F oven or toaster oven for 5 to 10 minutes before serving. Scones will keep for about 3 days.

You can also freeze the scones, again keeping them in an airtight container or ziplock bag. Just thaw them out at room temperature, then refresh them in the oven or toaster oven in the same manner as above. Frozen scones will keep for up to 3 months in the freezer.

What sort of eggnog should you use?

You can use any store-bought eggnog for this recipe but you can also use homemade eggnog if you wish. Keep in mind that eggnog varies per brand and homemade recipe. Taste the eggnog and if it is on the sweet side, you may want to reduce the sugar in this recipe to accommodate. It. For extra sweet eggnog, I often use 3 tablespoons of brown sugar instead of 1/4 cup.

Variations

I used dried cranberries because the festive red berries taste great with the eggnog flavor. But you can use other dried fruit or even a blend of dried fruit if you wish. Some great alternatives would be:

Dried cherries
Black raisins
Golden raisins
Currants
Dried blueberries
Dried figs, chopped into 1/4-inch pieces
Dried apricots, chopped into 1/4-inch pieces
Crystallized candied ginger, chopped into 1/4-inch pieces

If you like these scones, check out these other breakfast treats:

Mini Eggnog Scones with Dried Cranberries

These mini eggnog scones are studded with festive tart and sweet dried cranberries. Grating the butter and chilling the dough before baking ensures that the scones will rise nicely, leading to a flaky and fluffy scone that isn’t heavy or dense. The slightly moist dough allows you use a little extra flour on the surface, bench scraper or knife, and your hands so you can form the scones without making a dry baked good. Use whatever eggnog you have on hand (storebought or homemade) but keep in mind that sweeter eggnogs will result in a sweeter scone. If the eggnog is very sweet, I reduce the sugar in the dough to 3 tablespoons.

Calories 143kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Dough

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 315 g
1/4 cup packed brown sugar 55 g
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1 tablespoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 cup cold butter 115 g or 1 stick
1 cup dried cranberries 130 g
3/4 cup cold eggnog storebought or homemade
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon rum extract optional but recommended

To finish

All-purpose flour for forming scones dough
2 tablespoons eggnog
2 tablespoons turbinado sugar or white sugar

Instructions

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or with a silicon baking mat.
Vigorously mix together the flour, sugar, salt, baking powder, and nutmeg in a large bowl with a balloon whisk until uniform in color.
Grate the cold butter through the large hole of a box grater or hand grater into the dry ingredients. Toss gently with the dry ingredients to coat the grated butter. Add the dried cranberries and toss again to coat.
Place the eggnog, egg, vanilla extract and rum extract (if using) in a glass measuring cup and beat together with a fork or a small whisk. Drizzle all the eggnog mixture over the dry ingredients and toss gently to combine with a spatula or wooden spoon.
Mix until a moist dough forms, but don’t overmix. Don’t worry if there are a few dry spots here and there. Just mix gently, folding the dough over itself until most of the dry ingredients are absorbed.
Dust a clean surface lightly with flour, then scrape the scone dough out onto the surface. Divide the dough into 3 parts, roughly 275 grams per part if you have a scale.
Dust your hands with flour and take one dough part and gently pat the dough into a 5-inch wide disk, about 3/4-inch thick. Dust with a little more flour if the dough is sticking.
Take a bench scraper or a butter knife, and cut the disk into 6 even wedges. You can coat the bench scraper or knife with flour if the dough is sticking when you cut.
Move the wedges to the lined baking sheet, leaving at least 1 inch of space between each wedge. Repeat with the remaining dough.
Once the scones are formed place the entire baking sheet with the scones on them in the fridge. If you plan on baking the scones the next day, cover the scones tightly with plastic wrap. If you plan on baking them the same day, no need to cover them. Let the scones chill 30 minutes minimum in the fridge.
While the scones are chilling preheat the oven to 425°F.
Once the scones have chilled, pull them out of the fridge and brush the top of the scones with the eggnog and then sprinkle with turbinado or white sugar. Bake in the oven for 13 to 15 minutes or until the top of the scones are golden brown and the sides of the scones look slightly dry. Let the scones cool on the baking sheet for 10 minutes before moving them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Notes

The scones can be shaped and formed the day before, covered tightly on a baking sheet with plastic wrap, and baked the next day directly from the oven. Just brush the eggnog and sprinkle the turbinado sugar on top right before baking.
These scones can be made in a more traditional size. See section above for directions on this.

Nutrition

The post Mini Eggnog Scones with Dried Cranberries appeared first on Eat The Love.

Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread with Orange Zest

Tue, 07 Dec 2021 17:30:00 +0200

This cinnamon pull apart bread is as fun to eat as it is to make, with layers of dough and cinnamon orange filling in between.

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If you’ve never made or had pull apart bread, it’s as fun to eat as it is to make! Layers of dough get sandwiched together between sugar sweet spiced packed filling. It’s a little like classic cinnamon rolls, Swedish cardamom knots, or even a little bit like my pumpkin star bread but easier to make, with a higher filling to dough ratio. If you’re a cinnamon roll fanatic that loves the cinnamon filling, this bread might be the ideal treat for you! I’ve added an optional touch of orange zest to the filling to give it a slight holiday season vibe, but if you’re not a fan of orange or you want a classic cinnamon filling, feel free to omit that!

How to make pull apart bread

Making pull apart bread is fairly easy to make, especially if you are familiar with making cinnamon rolls or other enriched yeasted breads like my apricot yeasted bread or cranberry spiral bread. I use a tangzhou method, similar to the one you find in my wool roll bread, because I know it takes me a few days to work my way through the loaf and the added tangzhou helps keep the loaf from going stale.

Make the tangzhou by placing milk and a small amount of flour in a pan. Whisk and cook the flour and milk until a thick paste forms.

Then place room temperature eggs, honey, melted butter and salt in the mixing bowl of a stand mixer. Add the yeast and stir to dissolve. Add the tangzhou and whisk to bread up. Add the flour and knead for 4 minutes with the dough hook.

Let the dough rise until double in size and then roll it out to large rectangle. Brush melted butter all over the dough, then sprinkle with the filling made of cinnamon, brown and white sugar, orange zest and a pinch of salt. Cut the dough into strips, then stack the strips on top of each other. Then cut the strips into squares and tuck the squares into a loaf pan fitted with parchment paper. Cover and let rise again until puffy and double in size. Then bake!

Once baked, spread a glaze made of powdered sugar, orange juice, melted butter, and vanilla over the still warm loaf, and let cool slightly. Then remove the loaf from the pan with the parchment paper and drizzle and spread the remaining glaze over it.

What is tangzhou and can I skip it?

Tangzhou is an Asian bread making method that has you cooking milk (or water) with a little flour to create a paste. Though it sounds fussy, it’s a great method because it gelatinizes the flour and traps moisture in the dough. This keeps the bread from going stale as fast, resulting in a longer shelf life. I know that it takes me a few days to work my way through a loaf of sweet bread like this, so I opted to add the tangzhou to my loaf.

But if you plan on eating the loaf right away, or you feel like skipping the tangzhou method, you can totally do that! There’s already egg and lots of butter in the bread, so the loaf is an enriched dough that will keep longer than a more traditional loaf.

To skip the tangzhou step, just heat the milk on the stovetop until it is warm to the touch, about 100°F. Then sprinkle the yeast in it to proof. Increase the flour to 3 1/4 cups (455 g) when you add it. That’s it!

Can I knead this bread by hand?

Yes. If you don’t have a stand mixer or if you prefer the meditative process of kneading dough by hand, you can definitely knead this by hand. Follow the steps for this recipe, combining the wet ingredients like eggs, melted butter, yeast and tangzhou (if using) in a large mixing bowl with a whisk. Stir in the flour with a wooden spoon until a rough dough forms.

Then scrape the dough onto a clean surface and start kneading it by hand. Knead the dough for about 6 to 7 minutes or until it is smooth and uniform in consistency. It will be slightly tacky but shouldn’t be sticky. Continue with the recipe as directed, letting it rise and then rolling it out and forming the loaf.

How long does this bread keep?

If you use the tangzhou in the bread, the bread should keep at room temperature for 4 to 5 days. I like to refresh the bread slightly in the toaster oven for 5 to 10 minutes at 250°F before serving. But you can also microwave small individual portions for 5 to 15 seconds if you are feeling rushed. Normally I don’t microwave bread, but this enriched dough stands up to the microwave heat as long as you eat it right away.

If you don’t use the tangzhou in the bread, expect the bread to last 2 to 3 days at room temperature.

Why glaze it when it’s warm?

This bread recipe is adapted from Sarah Kieffer’s book Baking for the Holidays (<- affiliate link). She specifically glazes her bread (and cinnamon rolls) when they are hot! If you glaze the pull-apart bread immediately after it comes out of the oven, the glaze melts and pools into all the crevices of the bread. Then it cools and solidifies, giving you a thin layer of crusty glaze on top and in all the dips and crooks of the bread. Then you glaze it again once it has cooled slightly to get a lovely thicker layer of glaze on top of the bread.

How do I quickly get the eggs to room temperature?

If you’re like me, you probably don’t plan ahead and take your eggs out of the fridge to bring it to room temperature. My easy trick for quick room temperature eggs is to stick the eggs in a bowl of hot water from your faucet!

Don’t use boiling water, as you don’t want to cook the eggs. But run hot water from your faucet into a large bowl and place the eggs in the water before you do anything else for this recipe. Make the tangzhou and then start making the bread dough using the eggs that have been sitting in the warm water for 5 minutes. The time in the water should cut the chill and bring the eggs to room temperature.

If you like this cinnamon pull apart bread, check out these other enriched dough breads and treats

Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread with Orange Zest and Glaze

This pull apart bread is easier to make than a cinnamon roll! It has thin layers of dough sandwiched between a cinnamon sugar and orange zest filling, with a higher filling to dough ratio than a traditional cinnamon roll. The dough uses a tangzhou roux to keep it fresh longer but I have instructions above in a section on how to skip that step if you don’t want to. The dough does need to rise twice, so keep that in mind and plan accordingly.

Course bread, Breakfast, brunch, Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword bread, cinnamon, orange, yeast

Prep Time 45 minutes

Cook Time 55 minutes

Rest Time 2 hours

Servings

Calories 540kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Tangzhou

1/2 cup milk whole preferred but any will work
1/4 cup all-purpose flour 35 g

Dough

3 large eggs, at room temperature (see section above on a quick trick on bringing them to temperature fast)
2 tablespoons honey
1/2 cup melted unsalted butter 1 stick or 115 g
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
2 1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast 7 g or 1 envelope
3 cups all-purpose flour 420 g

Filling

1/2 cup white sugar 100 g
1/4 cup packed brown sugar 55 g
2 tablespoons orange zest optional
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
Pinch of salt
2 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Glaze

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar, sifted 175 g
2 to 4 tablespoons orange juice or milk if preferred
1 tablespoon melted unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions

Make the tangzhou by placing the milk and flour in small pan. Cook on medium heat, for a minute or two until a thick paste forms. Set aside to cool slightly.
Make the dough by placing the eggs, honey, butter, and salt in the bowl of stand mixer. Beat together with a balloon whisk to break up the eggs. Then sprinkle the yeast over the mixture and stir in. Add the tangzhou (it’s OK if it’s still warm, but make sure it’s not hot) to the bowl and use the whisk to break it up. Don’t worry if there are still some small lumps in the mixture. Just break up the tangzhou as much as possible.
Add the flour and then mix the dough with the dough hook. Mix on low, occasionally stopping to scrape down the sides until all the dry ingredients are incorporated, then increasing the speed to medium. Knead the dough for 4 to 5 minutes or until it is smooth and slightly tacky to the touch. It should not be too sticky or wet. If it is, add a tablespoon of flour.
You can also knead this dough by hand. See the section above for instructions.
Spray a bowl with cooking oil and then pull the dough into a smooth ball. Place the rough side down in the bowl and cover with plastic wrap or a damp towel. Put in a warm place and let rise until double in size, about 60 to 90 minutes.
While the dough is rising, lightly coat a loaf pan with cooking oil (preferably a straight sided one like a pullman loaf, but any standard loaf pan will work). Place a piece of parchment paper inside the loaf pan, with about 1-inch of paper overhanging the sides of the pan.
Set pan aside and make the filling by combining the white sugar, brown sugar, orange zest, cinnamon, and salt in a small bowl. Place the melted butter and vanilla in a different bowl and stir to combine.
Once the dough has risen, dump it onto a clean surface. Roll the dough into a 12 by 20-inch rectangle.
Brush the rectangle with the melted butter mixture, then sprinkle the filling all over the dough, going all the way to the edges.
Cut the dough into 5 even strips, about 4-inches wide. Then stack the dough strips on top of each other. The filling might spill off or shift on the strips but just redistribute it as best you can as you stack it, no need to be perfect about it.
Once all the strips are stacked on top of each other, cut through all the dough strips with 6 even distributed cuts, making 4 x 2-inch squares. Stack half the dough squares together.
Place the stacked dough vertically in the loaf pan.. Then repeat and stack the other half and do the same. The dough should fit tightly into the pan but don't worry if there is a little wiggle room. It will rise and expand to fill the space.
Cover the pan with plastic wrap and place in a warm area to rise again. Let rise for 60 minutes or until the dough is puffy and roughly double in size. About 15 minutes before the dough is ready, preheat the oven to 350°F.
Remove the plastic wrap and bake the dough in the oven for 50 to 60 minutes, or until the top is a deep golden brown and the internal temperature of the bread is 195°F. If the top of the bread seems to be browning extra fast, cover the loaf pan with aluminum foil to prevent burning.
While the bread is baking, make the glaze. Sift the powdered sugar into a medium-sized bowl and then add 2 tablespoons of orange juice, melted butter and vanilla. Stir and then add more orange juice until you have a glaze with a consistency that you like. I found 3 tablespoons was perfect for me. Cover the bowl until ready to use.
Once the bread is done, immediately spoon half the glaze over the warm bread still in the pan. Spread the glaze all over, making sure it gets into the nooks and crannies of the top of the loaf.
Then let the loaf cool in the pan for 15 minutes on a wire rack. Run a thin butter knife or offset spatula around the parchment paper and the pan and lift it up and out of the pan using the parchment paper like a sling. Move the loaf onto a wire cooling rack. Carefully remove the parchment paper and then spoon the remaining glaze over the bread.
Serve warm or let cool completely if you wish.

Notes

Adapted by a recipe from Sarah Kieffer’s Baking for the Holidays

Nutrition

The post Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread with Orange Zest appeared first on Eat The Love.

Miso Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies with Crystallized Ginger and Black Sesame Seeds

Tue, 30 Nov 2021 17:00:00 +0200

This miso peanut butter chocolate chip cookies has crystallized ginger and dipped in black sesame seeds for a chewy salty sweet treat!

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Folks, there is SO. MUCH. GOING. ON. in these cookies. But in the best way possible. I’ve got peanut butter, crystallized ginger, and chocolate chips in the dough, with a dash of cinnamon and ground ginger as well to give complexity. Because you know, the flavor profile isn’t complex enough!

Then I roll it in a bit of black sesame to give it crunch as well as to make it all pretty. Sure you can use regular white sesame seeds. But the black sesame seeds is like giving it a tuxedo black tie look! But it’s the secret ingredient of white miso paste that gives them a deep rich and slightly salty flavor in them. The miso brings all the flavors together in an out-of-this-world combo. Don’t be scared of the miso in the cookie. I’ve used it before in my miso cranberry pistachio cookies, and it absolutely works in the best sort of way, binding all the flavors into one chewy, salty, sweet fabulous bite. This is my new favorite cookie for the holidays!

How do I make these miso peanut butter chocolate chip cookies cookies?

Though it sounds complicated, this cookie is as easy to make as my pumpkin snickerdoodles, my chocolate crackle cookies or my butterscotch triple chocolate cookies.

First cream the butter with brown sugar, white sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, ground ginger, as well as the baking soda and the baking powder. Mix all of the ingredients together until creamy, uniform in color, and the sugar butter paste clings to the side of the bowl.

Then add the both the peanut butter and miso to the bowl and mix to incorporate. Add an egg and mix. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, mix in the flour until absorbed, then stir in (by hand) the chocolate chips and the crystallized ginger. I like to stir them in by hand because then I can make sure the mix-ins are evenly distributed throughout the dough.

Scoop out heaping tablespoons of the cookie dough and roll into a 1-inch in diameter ball. Then dip one side in black sesame seeds. Place the cookie dough on a lined baking sheet, making sure the top of the dough is orientated so you see half the black sesame seeds on the dough ball. Repeat with the remaining dough and bake until the cookies are golden brown and have cracks on top.

Where can I find some of these specialty ingredients?

This cookie is pretty easy to make, despite all the various ingredients. But you might need to get some special ingredients for them that aren’t common in a lot of folk’s kitchen pantry. This includes white miso paste, crystallized ginger and black sesame seeds. But most upscale grocery stores will stock them. If not, you can easily find them at an Asian market or you can get the white miso, chopped crystallized ginger and black sesame seeds online (<- affiliate links).

What is miso paste and what type should be used in this recipe?

Miso is fermented soybean paste. It is a traditional Japanese seasoning that often used to add salty umami depth of flavor. Various different types of miso exist, made from different ingredients but miso is often classified into three types, white miso, yellow miso and red miso.

The common rule is that the darker the color of miso, the more assertive the flavor. White miso is often the most delicate and mild in flavor, yellow somewhere in the middle and red miso is the strongest and most assertive. I use white miso in this recipe, as it adds a subtle earthy saltiness that augments the nuttiness in the peanut butter as well as creates a chew in the cookie that has the ideal cookie texture that I adore.

All that said, if you have yellow or red miso on hand, you can use those as well. Just decrease the amount of miso, using 3 tablespoons of yellow miso and 2 tablespoons of red miso if you wish.

How do you store these cookies?

These cookies keep at room temperature for up to 3 days, stored in an airtight container. You can also freeze them. Place them in an airtight container or a freezer Ziploc bag, and freeze for up to a month. Thaw to room temperature before serving.

If you like these miso peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, check out some of these other chocolate chip cookie recipes:

And check out some of these other chocolate cookies I have on the blog:

Miso Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies with Crystallized Ginger and Black Sesame

These peanut butter chocolate chip cookies have a secret ingredient in them, miso paste! The funky fermented white miso adds a deeper earthy salty flavor that amplifies the nuttiness in the peanut butter. As an added bonus, it also gives the cookie a crazy chewy interior and crispy snap on the outside. The crystallized ginger and crunchy sesame seeds on the outside add additional texture and sweet heat, making these cookies a stand out for the holidays or any time of year. Be sure to use regular peanut butter and not natural peanut butter, as the oil separate out and will lead to a dry and dull tasting cookie.

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American, asian, Japanese

Keyword chocolate chip, cookies, ginger, miso, peanut butter, sesame seeds

Prep Time 30 minutes

Cook Time 13 minutes

Servings

Calories 164kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

3/4 cup unsalted butter at room temperature 1 1/2 sticks or 170 g
1 cup packed dark brown sugar 220 g
3/4 cup white sugar 150 g
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter, not natural 145 g
1/4 cup white miso paste 85 g
1 large egg
2 cups all-purpose flour 280 g
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips 240 g
1/4 cup chopped crystallized ginger 50 g
1/2 cup black sesame seeds 75 g

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with silicon baking mats or parchment paper.
Place the butter, brown sugar, white sugar, vanilla, ground ginger, ground cinnamon, baking powder and baking soda in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Mix the ingredients together on low speed until the butter has started to blend, and then increase the speed to medium, creaming the ingredients until they form a uniform colored paste that clings to the side of the bowl.
Scrape down the side of the bowl and add the peanut butter and the miso paste. Mix to incorporate. Scrape down the sides again and add the egg, mixing to incorporate.
Scrape down the sides and add the flour, and slowly stir the ingredients together, toggling and switching the mixer on and off again, to prevent the flour from flying up. Do this until most of the flour has been absorbed, then mix on low speed until the flour is incorporated.
Remove bowl from mixer and add the chocolate chips and crystallized ginger. Stir by hand, using a wooden spatula or spoon, to incorporate the mix-ins.
Place the black sesame seeds in a small shallow bowl. Scoop a heaping tablespoon of cookie dough out and roll it into a 1-inch round ball. Dip the ball of dough in the sesame seeds, making sure to rock it back and forth to adhere the sesame seeds to the dough, and to coat one half of the ball. Place the dough on the lined cookie sheet, making sure the part of the ball facing up is covered with half the sesame seeds and half bare. Repeat with the process, leaving about 2 inches of space between cookie to allow for spreading.
Once the baking sheets are filled, bake in the oven 12 to 15 minutes, or until the top of the cookie is golden brown and cracks have appeared. The cookie will look puffy but it will deflate as it cools. Pull the cookie out the oven and let the cookies sit on the baking sheet for 5 to 10 minutes or until they are firm enough to move to a wire cooling rack. Most the rack and cool completely.

Notes

Adapted from a recipe from Food52.

Nutrition

The post Miso Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies with Crystallized Ginger and Black Sesame Seeds appeared first on Eat The Love.

Loaded Mashed Potatoes

Mon, 22 Nov 2021 17:00:00 +0200

Loaded mashed potatoes take the classic loaded baked potato and turns it into a casserole dish. The perfect holiday or big dinner side dish!

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One of my favorite side items for dinner is mashed potatoes. I’ve shared one of my favorite ways to make them as a garlic and leek mashed potatoes. And I’ve repurposed leftovers as potato croquettes, where I take the cold mashed potatoes and turn them into deep fried and breaded appetizers. But my current favorite go-to mashed potato will leave NO leftovers because they’re THAT. GOOD. These loaded mashed potatoes are inspired by the classic loaded baked potato, with sour cream, cheddar cheese, bacon and green onions mixed in, baked and then sprinkled on top. Better yet, you can easily scale the recipe up by doubling it to feed a crowd if you want!

What are loaded mashed potatoes?

Loaded mashed potatoes are a potato casserole dish that take inspiration from the classic “loaded” baked potato, a side dish that features a baked potato topped with butter, sour cream, cheddar cheese, bacon and green onions. However, instead of a baked potato, boiled potatoes are mashed and mixed with cream, sour cream, butter, cheddar cheese, bacon and green onions, then baked. Once baked they are topped with additional cheddar cheese bacon and green onions.

How do you make loaded mashed potatoes?

Making loaded mashed potatoes is easy. Boil chopped potatoes (with or without the skin, your preference) until the potatoes can easily be pierced with a fork. Then drain them and place the back in the still hot pot to dry out a bit.

Add butter, heavy cream, sour cream and mash to form a puree. Stir in cheddar cheese, bacon and green onions, then place in a casserole dish. Sprinkle the top with more cheddar cheese and bake until the cheese is melted.

Sprinkle the top of the casserole with more bacon and chopped green onions and serve!

What potatoes should I use?

I use Yukon gold potatoes which have a rich, almost buttery, flavor to them. They aren’t too waxy and aren’t too starchy. Plus the skin is thinner, which means I can scrub them clean, cut them up without peeling, and cook them without the skin being too distracting.

But any potato you would use for making mashed potatoes will work! The classic russet potatoes are great for this recipe as well. I would avoid a more waxy potato like red skinned potatoes. They tend to be a little too firm for proper mashed potatoes

Can you make this ahead of time?

Yes! Mashed potatoes are the ideal make ahead food, as they warm up great. Make the mashed potatoes ahead of time, without the toppings, and just store them in a covered container for up to three days in the refrigerator.

The day you are serving them, preheat the oven to 350°F. Stir in 1/4 cup of extra milk or cream to help loosen them up and spoon them into the baking dish. Cover with cheddar cheese and heat up for 30 minutes or until they are thoroughly warmed up and the cheese is melted. Then top with the bacon and green onions.

How do you store leftovers?

You can store leftovers in a covered container in the fridge for up to 3 days. Just reheat as directed above.

If you like these loaded mashed potatoes, check out these other potato recipes:

Loaded Mashed Potatoes

This mashed potato casserole dish is the ideal easy side dish for a crowd. Feel free to double the recipe and bake it in a larger casserole dish for a large group. I also like to crisp up the bacon again (a minute or two in a skillet on high heat) just to give extra crunch to the dish.

Servings 6

Calories 514kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

2 1/2 pounds Yukon or Russet potatoes
1/3 cup sour cream
1/4 cup whole milk
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon fresh ground pepper
1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese divided
1/2 pound bacon
3 green onions
Additional salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

Preheat an oven to 350°F.
Peel the potatoes (or leave scrub them clean and leave the peel on if you wish). Then cut them into 1-inch chunks. Place them in a pot and fill the pot with enough water to cover the potatoes by 1 inch. Bring the pot to a boil and then reduce the heat to a simmer, and cook the potatoes for 15 to 20 minutes, or until they are fork tender. Drain the potatoes, then return them to the empty hot pot. This will keep the potatoes warm and dry them out a bit.
While the potatoes are cooking, chop the bacon into 1/4-inch thick pieces. Chop the green onions, separating the green parts from the white parts. Cook the bacon in a large skillet until crispy, then move the bacon to a bowl lined with a paper towel. Reserve 2 tablespoons of the bacon fat for the potatoes.
Once the potatoes are cooked and drained, add the butter to the hot potatoes and mash until melted in. Then add sour cream, milk, butter, salt, pepper, the reserve bacon fat, half of the shredded cheddar cheese, half of the cooked chopped bacon, and the white part of the green onions. Continue mash the potatoes with a potato masher until you have smooth puree and ingredients are incorporated.
Taste the mashed potatoes and add more salt and pepper if desired.
Spoon the mashed potatoes into a 1 1/2 quart casserole dish. Then sprinkle the remaining cheddar cheese over the top of the mashed potatoes. Place in the oven and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until the cheese is completely melted on top.
Sprinkle the remaining bacon and the green part of the green onions over the casserole and serve.

Notes

This recipe can be easily doubled.

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Savory Corn Pudding

Fri, 19 Nov 2021 17:00:00 +0200

This savory riff on the traditional corn pudding cuts out some of the sugar and adds in sautéed onions and fresh thyme for a great side dish!

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Recently my husband and I became slightly obsessed with the AppleTV show Schmigadoon!, a comedy where a modern couple from NYC gets trapped in a golden-era musical town. It’s rather amusing, especially if you are a fan of musicals from the era, like Sound of Music, Oklahoma or Brigadoon. One of the musical numbers early in the show was “Corn Puddin’” which was absolutely as ridiculous as it sounds. Which, of course, got me hankerin’ for a batch of corn pudding! Of course, I knew I wanted to tinker a bit with the traditional version, and make it more savory, less sweet, but still easy to make. With one bite, my husband declared it the best corn pudding he ever had. He even asked for an extry serving!

What makes this corn pudding different?

Traditional corn pudding is a side dish popular in the South and the Midwest and is often served during the holidays. It’s also a dish that walks the line between savory and sweet, with a lot of added sugar to it. I think of it in the same category as the sweet potato casserole with toasted marshmallows on top. Sure, it’s served as a “side dish” to the main course, but honestly, it’s could almost function like a dessert.

My corn pudding recipe still has some residual sweetness from the use of the canned creamed corn (which has a little added sugar in it) as well as the natural sweetness from the corn itself. But it definitely falls in the savory side of the line with the addition of cooked chopped onion and fresh thyme in the mix. You can up the natural sweetness a little with the use of a sweet onion like Vidalia or Maui sweet onions if you wish. But I opted to just use a regular yellow onion.

How do I make this dish more tradition?

If you’re looking for a more traditional recipe, omit the chopped onion and fresh thyme, and add in 1/4 cup of white sugar to the pudding. Bake as directed.

Can I make this ahead?

Yes! This casserole is easy to make ahead of time. Just bake as directed and let it cool in the casserole dish. Refrigerate for up to 2 days, and then heat up the dish in a 350°F for 15 to 20 minutes or until warm.

Can I use fresh corn or frozen corn?

Yes. This recipe uses canned corn which is easy to find and cuts down on the prep. But if you have fresh corn or frozen corn, you can easily substitute for the canned corn.

For frozen corn, use 3 1/2 pounds of frozen corn. Take 1 1/2 cups of the frozen corn and put it in a blender or food processor and puree it. Use the corn puree with the whole kernels. Increase the flour to 4 tablespoons and add 1 tablespoons of white sugar to the mixture. There’s no need to defrost the corn kernels. Just use them frozen and increase the bake time to 40 to 45 minutes to accommodate the cold corn.

For fresh corn use 8 medium-sized ears of corn. Boil the corn until cooked, then cut off the kernels from 6 ears. Take the remaining 2 ears of corn and partially cut off the kernels, leaving half the kernels ends attached to the ear. Take the back of your knife or a butter knife and scrape the remaining corn milk from the kernels into the bowl. This “creams” the corn. Increase the flour to 4 tablespoons and add 1 tablespoons of white sugar to the mixture. Bake as directed.

If you like this savory corn pudding recipe, try these other holiday side dish:

Savory Corn Pudding

This savory take on the classic corn pudding casserole dish omits the added sugar and ups the savory flavor by adding in cooked onions and fresh thyme. But it still uses canned creamed and whole kernel corn so it comes together quickly! It’s the perfect side dish for a holiday meal or pretty much anytime of year. To naturally increase the sweetness without added sugar, try using a sweet onion like a Vidalia or Maui onion.

Calories 350kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

1 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup chopped yellow onion about 1/2 medium sized onion
2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves divided
2 cups heavy cream
6 large eggs
1/2 cup melted unsalted butter 1 stick or 115 g
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoon kosher salt
3 15-ounce cans whole kernel corn no salt
1 15 ounce cream-style sweet corn

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350°F.
Place the olive oil in a large skillet and add the onions. Cook on medium heat until the onions start to turn slightly translucent. Stir in 1/2 the fresh thyme to the warm skillet and remove from heat.
In a large bowl, mix together the cream, eggs, and melted butter. Beat in the flour, baking powder and salt.
Add the onions and thyme to the mixture. Drain and add in the whole kernel corn, as well as the entire content of the sweet corn. Stir to combine.
Pour the entire mixture into a 3-quart sized casserole dish. Bake in the oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until the top of the casserole is golden brown. Sprinkle with remaining serve thyme and serve.

Notes

You can substitute the fresh thyme with 1 teaspoons of dried thyme in the baked mixture. Just skip garnishing the top of the casserole with thyme.
If you use canned corn with salt, reduce the salt in the recipe to 1/2 teaspoon.
Adapted from a Southern Living recipe

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Herb Parmesan Wool Roll Bread [with video]

Tue, 16 Nov 2021 02:55:29 +0200

This fancy pants herb parmesan wool roll bread looks difficult to make but is quite easy. It’s packed with chopped herbs and parmesan and is pillowy soft.

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Wool roll bread took the internet by storm in early 2021, via a Malaysian vlogger named Apron that posted about on YouTub e. Suddenly I was seeing it all over the place. But I didn’t get around to making my own version until the holiday season snuck up on me later in 2021. And though I adore my classic parker house rolls, my potato rolls, my cornbread, and my garlic knots for my holiday spread, I decided that this fun roll would make a great alternative bread dish for the holidays, or really all year round! It’s fun to make, and surprisingly easy to form. The use of the Japanese tangzhou (water roux) method for the dough, creates a super soft pillow crumb that keeps the bread soft for days.

What is wool roll bread

Wool roll bread is a popular trendy bread that looks like wooly rolls of thread. It is often filled with sweet or savory fillings and is served as a breakfast or snack. But I’ve adapted it here to be a little more like a bread roll, with a parmesan herb filling, so it can work as a side item for a dinner.

How do you make wool roll bread

This wool roll bread starts out with a tangzhou or water roux, which is easy to make. You just cook some flour and water on the stovetop until a thick paste forms.

Once the paste has formed, let it cool while you proof the yest in milk. Then beat in the egg and the cooled tangzhou to loosen it a bit. Add flour, a little sugar, melted butter and salt. Knead until a tacky (but not sticky) dough forms. Let rise until double.

While it’s rising, make the filling by melted butter, parmesan cheese, chopped parsley and sage together.

Once the dough has risen, it’s time for the fun part! Shaping the wool roll! Divide the dough into 5 pieces. Roll one piece out into a rectangle and cut the top part of the rectangle into long thin strips, keeping the bottom part of the rectangle whole.

Now spread 1/5^th of the filling over the rectangle, leaving about 1/2-inch at the bottom and about 1-inch at the top bare. Then roll the dough up into a log, from the uncut bottom part all the way to the top.

You should have a log of dough that is striped!

Move the dough to a prepared oiled round baking pan and repeat with the remaining dough. Cover and let rise again until double, then brush with melted butter and bake. Once fully baked, brush with more butter and serve warm.

A how to video on making wool roll bread

Here’s a video on how to make wool roll bread, so you can see exactly how to make and form it.

What is tangzhou?

Tangzhou is a Chinese method of making bread, where you cook a little bit of flour and water (or sometimes milk) first to make a paste. This paste is then added back to bread dough. By pre-cooking some of the flour with water, you are gelantizing the starches in the flour, which helps trap moisture in the dough and the resulting bread.

Though it take less than 5 minutes to do, it really helps create a tender soft crumb that is pillowy fluffy, ideal for a dinner roll. Because the liquid is bound in the gelatinized starch, it also has an added bonus of keeping the bread soft and tender, preventing it from going stale as fast.

Tangzhou is also similar to the Japanese method of cooking the flour called Yudane. The difference being tangzhous has you cooking the flour with liquid on the stovetop, while the yudane has you pouring boiling water over flour, stirring it and letting it sit to gelatinize. The work fairly similarly, but I find cooking the flour in the tangzhou method a little faster, so I used it in this recipe.

How do you store this bread?

Because of the tangzhou method, you can store this bread at room temperature for up to 3 days or store it in the fridge for up to 5 days without any noticeable staleness. I do recommend reheating it in the oven or toaster at 300°F for 5 to 10 minutes to warm it up first before serving.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I hand knead this dough if I don’t have a stand mixer?

Absolutely! Just follow the instructions up to where you add the flour, salt and melted butter. Then stir with a wooden spoon until a rough dough has formed. Dump it out onto a clean surface and knead the dough with the heel of your hand, folding it over and pushing down, and rotating it as you do it.

Continue to knead the dough for about 5 to 7 minutes or until it is smooth, elastic, and slighty tacky. Let rise and continue with the recipe.

Can I use a different yeast other than active dry yeast?

Yes. You can use rapid rise yeast or instant yeast if you would like. If you use instant yeast, there’s no need to proof it. Just add the yeast in with the flour, salt and melted butter. If you use rapid rise yeast, add it in like you would the active dry yeast.

Keep in mind that both the rapid rise yeast and the instant yeast tend to rise faster than regular active dry yeast. So keep an eye on the dough and check in about 30 to 45 minutes instead of the full 60 to 90 minutes.

Can I substitute a different herb?

Yes! If you don’t like sage, or don’t have it on hand, try using fresh thyme leaves, chopped fresh rosemary, or chopped fresh oregano.

However I do not recommend using dried herbs in this recipe. Fresh herbs works best in this wool roll bread. Dried herbs won’t hydrate enough in the baking and will give a dry dusty flavor in the bread.

If you like this wool roll bread recipe, check out these other bread recipes

Herb Parmesan Wool Roll Bread

This adorable buttery fluffy bread looks like wool rolls of yarn all rolled up and ready to use. But don’t be intimidated by how complicated it looks, it’s quite easy! Rolled with parmesan and chopped herbs, the bread itself stays soft and tender because of the tangzhou water roux that is added in the beginning.

Course bread, Side Dish

Cuisine American

Keyword bread, herb, parmesan, yeast

Prep Time 30 minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes

Rise Time 2 hours

Servings 8

Calories 320kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Tangzhou

1/2 cup water
14 cup all-purpose flour 35 g

Dough

1/2 cup milk
2 1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast
1 large egg
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 350 g
2 tablespoons white sugar
2 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt

Filling

1/4 cup melted unsalted butter
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley
1 tablespoon chopped fresh sage

to Finish

2 tablespoons melted butter

Instructions

Make the tangzhou (water roux) by placing the water and flour in a small pan and whisking until the flour had dissolved. Cook the liquid on the stovetop over medium heat, whisking constantly, until it thickens and become a paste, about 2 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool until it is only warm to the touch, about 5 to 10 minutes.
Heat the milk in a different pan, until it is warm to the touch. Pour into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook. Sprinkle and whisk in the active dry yeast until it is dissolved. Let sit for 5 minutes for the yeast to proof, then add the egg and beat to mix.
Add the tangzhou to the liquid and whisk to break it up and incorporate it. Don't be concerned if there are still some small lumps. Just break it up as much as you can.
Add the flour, sugar, butter, and salt to the bowl and then stir with the hook on slow speed, until a rough dough has formed. Increase the speed to medium low and knead the dough for 4 to 5 minutes, or until it is smooth and elastic. The dough should be slightly tacky but not overly sticky. If it is too sticky, add more flour, a tablespoon at a time.
Place the dough in a well oiled bowl, and cover with plastic wrap. Let rise in a warm place for 60 to 90 minutes, or until doubled in size.
While the dough is rising, make the filling by mixing the butter, parmesan cheese, parsley and sage together in a small bowl. Set aside.
Grease a 10-inch springform or cake pan, then line it with parchment paper.
Once the dough has risen, dump it into a clean surface and divide it into 5 even pieces.
Take one piece and roll it into a 9 x 5 inch rectangle with it orientated landscape.
Using a knife or bench scraper, cut 1/4-inch strips of dough on the top 2/3rds of the dough, leaving the bottom 1/3 of the dough whole and intact. When you’re done, the entire piece of dough will look like a giant hair comb.
Spread 1/5th of the filling (about 2 tablespoons) over the dough, leaving about 1/2-inch at the bottom plain, and 1-inch at the top of the strips plain. The plain dough will help “seal” when you roll it. Now, staring form the bottom of the dough, roll the dough up into a tight cylinder, making sure the seal is on the bottom.
Continue to roll the dough completely up to form a log with stripes. Make sure the seam of the dough is on the bottom.
Move the dough log to the lined and greased pan, placing it around the edge of the pan, with the seal side down. Repeat with the remaining 4 piece placing them in the pan all the way around, in a circle.
Cover the pan with plastic wrap and let rise again for 60 minutes or until puffy and double in size.
About 15 minutes before the dough is finished rising, preheat the oven to 350°F. Once the dough has risen, brush the top of the dough with about 1 tablespoon of melted butter. Bake in the oven for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the top is golden brown. If you have an instant read thermometer, the inside of the dough should read 190°F.
Once the bread is baked, remove from the pan and let cool completely on a wire rack. Brush with remaining melted butter and serve.

Video

The post Herb Parmesan Wool Roll Bread [with video] appeared first on Eat The Love.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins [with video]

Tue, 09 Nov 2021 22:18:59 +0200

These pumpkin cream cheese muffins are inspired by Starbucks’ baked treat but is made from scratch and so much easier on the budget!

Jump to Recipe

I’ll be completely honest with you guys. I rarely go to Starbucks. It’s not that I don’t like coffee. I actually LOVE coffee. But I also happen to live in San Francisco, where there are plenty of small individual coffee shops that sell fantastic coffee drinks. But that doesn’t mean I’m immune to the call of the pumpkin spice latte (which inspired my pumpkin spice latte bread as well as my pumpkin spice frappuccino). Mostly though, I stop by a Starbucks to pick up a muffin or baked good when I’m in a hurry. And when they have them, my go-to choices is their pumpkin cream cheese muffin. Finally, I decided I needed to develop my own version at home. Now, I may never visit that big coffee chain shop again!

How do you make pumpkin muffins?

Inspired by Starbuck’s classic pumpkin cream cheese muffin, this recipe looks complicated to make but isn’t. Preheat an oven to 450°F and grease or spray a 12-muffin tin with cooking oil.

Making the pumpkin muffin batter like any other muffin batter. Whisk together the dry ingredients of flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. In a separate bowl combine the pumpkin puree, brown sugar, white sugar, cooking oil, eggs, pumpkin spice, and vanilla.

Then fold in the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients until just moist. Don’t over mix as this will lead to a tough muffin. Divide the dough into a 12-cup muffin pan.

To get a mimic Starbucks-style muffin, sprinkle the edges around the muffin batter with some chopped pumpkin seeds, turbinado sugar and a touch of salt.

Then combine softened cream cheese with a little bit of sugar, flour and vanilla. Spoon or pipe the cream cheese filling into the middle of each muffin batter.

Place the muffin pan in the oven and immediately lower the heat to 350°F. Bake for 20 to 23 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

Video Tutorial

And if you’re a video person, here’s a short video on how to make the muffins!

Why do preheat the oven so high?

Preheating the oven to a high temperature does two things. The act of opening up the oven to place something in it will drop the temperature, sometimes as much as 50°F. Preheating the oven to a higher temperature compensates for that.

But more importantly, the initial high temperature for a muffin helps with the oven spring, the act of a baked good rising high and fast before it bakes and sets. Oven spring and high initial baking temperature leads to a bakery-style domed top for the muffin. Start the oven out at such a high temperature and then drop it down to make sure the remaining center of the muffin bakes through.

What is pumpkin pie spice? Can I substitute?

Pumpkin pie spice is blend of various warm wintery spices like cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and cloves. You can buy pumpkin pie spice pre-blended at the grocery store, or make your own custom pumpkin pie spice blend using my homemade pumpkin pie spice recipe.

But if you don’t feel like making your own blend, just substitute 1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger, 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg in place of the 2 teaspoons of pumpkin pie spice in this recipe.

What is the best pumpkin puree to use? Can I use homemade pumpkin puree?

I tested this recipe using Libby’s brand pumpkin puree in this recipe because it’s the most common and easiest find brand of pumpkin puree. I have found that other canned pumpkin puree will work but the moisture content of them varies per can. Organic canned pumpkin tends to be more watery than convention canned pumpkin.

However, with this recipe you can use whatever canned pumpkin puree you have on hand. You can even use homemade roasted pumpkin puree if you have it. To make your own pumpkin puree, cut a small sugar or pie pumpkin in half, scoop out the pumpkin seeds and stringy parts. Roast in a 400°F for 45 to 60 minutes then scoop out the flesh and puree it in a food processor or blender. Homemade pumpkin puree will be more watery as well, so you might want to consider cooking the puree down slightly on the stove to remove some of the water and concentrate the flavor.

Do not use pumpkin pie filling in this recipe. Pumpkin pie filling is a premade filling in a can with added sugar and spices. This muffin recipe is designed for pure pumpkin puree and not pumpkin pie filling.

How customize this muffin

There are many ways to customize this muffin. If you want to take the recipe to the next level, make my candied pumpkin seeds and then use those to top the recipe instead of using plain pumpkin seeds. Omit the sugar and salt on top if you do.

Or you can substitute the pumpkin seeds for a different seed like sunflower seeds or flax seeds. Or swap out chopped nuts like pecans, walnuts or pistachios.

Or skip the cream cheese filling and top the muffin with a streusel topping instead. You can use the topping for my pumpkin coffee cake and sprinkle it on top of the muffin before baking.

Try mixing in dried fruit like dried golden raisins, dried cherries, or dried cranberries into the batter. Fold in 1 cup of dried fruit into the batter just before dividing it into the muffin tin.

Or sprinkle some chopped crystallized ginger to the top of the muffin. About 2 to 3 tablespoons of chopped crystallized ginger on top will give a little sweet spice to every bite.

Finally consider mixing in some spices to the cream cheese filling. You can add 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon or pumpkin spice to the filling or add 1 to 2 teaspoons of cocoa powder to go in a chocolate direction. You can even mix in 1 to 2 tablespoons of mini chocolate chips to the cream cheese filling for more chocolate punch!

How do I store these muffins?

You can store these muffins at room temperature for up to 24 hours under a cake dome or in an airtight container. Because of the pumpkin puree, they stay very moist. But after a day, I recommend storing them in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. But I’ve never had leftovers last that long!

These muffins do taste best when they are at room temperature, so leave them out on the counter for 30 minutes if you are pulling them from the refrigerator before serving or microwave them for 10 to 15 seconds to warm them up from the fridge.

I don’t recommend storing them in the freezer though. The cream cheese filling tends to break and become gummy in consistency.

If you like these pumpkin cream cheese muffins, check out these other pumpkin recipes

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins

Inspired by Starbuck’s pumpkin cream cheese muffins, these fluffy and flavor-packed muffins are easy to make, even though they look impressive! Make sure to use 100% pumpkin puree and not pumpkin pie filling. And use room temperature cream cheese for the cream cheese filling, as cold cream cheese will be lumpy. Microwave the cream cheese in 10 second bursts if you want to warm it up quickly from the fridge. Do take note that this muffin starts out with a high bake temperature of 450°F but you immediately lower the temperature to 350°F once you’ve placed the muffins in the oven. For more information about why this is, see the section above.

Course Breakfast, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword copycat, cream cheese, muffin, pumpkin, starbucks

Prep Time 25 minutes

Cook Time 20 minutes

Servings 12

Calories 294kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Muffin batter

2 cups all-purpose flour 280 grams
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
15 ounces pumpkin puree a scant 2 cups
3/4 cup packed brown sugar 165 grams
1/2 cup white sugar 100 grams
1/2 cup neutral cooking oil like corn or canola
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons pumpkin spice see section above for substitutions
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Topping (optional)

2 tablespoon pumpkin seeds
2 teaspoons turbinado sugar or white sugar
1/4 teaspoon flaky salt like Maldon or kosher

Cream cheese filling

4 ounces softened cream cheese 1/2 brick
2 tablespoons white sugar
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 450°F and make a mental note that you will be lowering the temperature of the oven when you place the muffins in the oven. Generously spray or brush a standard 12-tin muffin pan with cooking oil.
Make the muffin batter by placing the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Use a balloon whisk and stir vigorously until the dry ingredients are blended.
Place the pumpkin puree, brown and white sugar, cooking oil, eggs, pumpkin spice and vanilla extract in a different bowl. Whisk together until smooth.
Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl of the dry ingredients. Using a large rubber or silicon spatula fold the ingredients together, bringing the spatula up from the bottom of the bowl and folding over the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Keep doing this until most of the dry ingredients are absorbed. Do not overmix though. A few dry spots are ok.
Evenly divide the batter into the muffin tin. I use a standard ice cream scoop to do this, but you can just spoon them in. The batter should fill and come mostly to the top of each cup.
If you are using them, sprinkle the topping ingredients of the pumpkin seeds, turbinado sugar and salt around the edge of each muffin batter tin, leaving the center empty. Don’t worry too much if you get a few seeds or some sprinkles of salt in the center. Just try to keep most of it on the edge of the circle.
Make the cream cheese filling by combining the cream cheese, sugar, flour and vanilla in a small bowl. Stir with a fork until smooth.
Spoon about a teaspoon of cream cheese filling into the middle of each muffin center, pushing a little bit into the batter to make sure the filling is nestled in. You can also pipe it into the center if you wish with a frosting bag and a plain tip but I’m not fussy so I found a spoon worked for me.
Place the muffin tin in the oven and immediately lower the oven temperature to 350°F. Bake for 20 to 23 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the pumpkin part of the muffin comes out clean. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing them and let them cool completely on a wire rack.

Video

The post Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins [with video] appeared first on Eat The Love.

Pumpkin Star Bread with Dried Cranberries [with video]

Tue, 26 Oct 2021 00:34:14 +0200

This stunning pumpkin star bread has a beautiful golden orange hue from the pumpkin puree in the dough, and is easier to make than it looks!

Jump to Recipe

The weather is finally turning cooler in my hometown of San Francisco and the quality of light has the autumnal color in the air that feels cooler and crisp. All of which means I want to get into the kitchen and bake more than usual. And I usually always want to bake! And like everyone that is obsessed with pumpkin nowadays, I’ve gone through my old favorites like pumpkin spice latte bread, pumpkin chocolate monkey bread, pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and pumpkin snickerdoodle as well as my recent pumpkin bread pudding. But this time I wanted to make something a little more special occasion, so I created a pumpkin star bread with dried cranberries. It’s an impressive looking baking project that is actually much easier to make than it looks. Which, as we all know, is my favorite sort of baking project!

What is a star bread?

A star bread is a star-shaped bread that is often made with an enriched dough and layered with a filling, commonly chocolate or cinnamon. It’s a festive bread that has been cut and shaped into a star.

How do you make this star bread?

Making a star bread is easier than it looks! First you make an enriched bread dough, which involves yeast. Dissolve and proof the yeast in warm milk, then knead in egg, flour, oil, and sugar. My version also has pumpkin puree, pumpkin pie spice and brown sugar. Let the dough rise in a warm place until double in size.

While the dough is rising, make the filling by combining brown sugar, pumpkin pie spice and chopped cranberries. Melt some butter in a small bowl.

Once the dough has risen, divide it into 4 parts. Roll out each piece into a circle. Brush the dough with some of the butter, then sprinkle 1/3 of the filling over it. Place another dough circle over the filling, stacking it on top of the previous dough, and repeat, until you have a stack of dough and filling.

Then place a small cup or cookie cutter in the center and cut the dough into quarter strips. If you are looking at the circle, cut at the 12-o’clock, 3-o’clock, 6-o’clock and 9-o’clock positions. Then cut between each of those strips, making 8 even strips, then cut in the middle again, to cut make 16 even strips.

Take two strips next to each other, twist opposite each other, then press the ends together. Repeat with the remaining strips to form a star. Let rise while you pre-heat the oven, and then brush with an egg wash and bake. Once baked, cool on a wire rack, dust with powdered sugar, and then serve.

If the above process photos are a little confusing for you, feel free to watch this video as well, which shows you how to stack and form the star bread.

Can I use instant or rapid rise yeast instead of active yeast?

This recipe is designed for active dry yeast. But you can substitute instant or rapid rise as well. For instant yeast, just sprinkle it in with the flour. There is no need to add it to the warm milk to dissolve. For rapid rise yeast, just use half the amount of yeast in place of the full amount. Or use the same amount rapid rise yeast and keep an eye on the dough. It will rise in about half the time, so check it after 30-45 minutes.

Can I hand knead the dough if I don’t have a stand mixer?

Yes! If you don’t have a stand mixer with a dough hook, just make the dough by hand like you would a traditional bread dough. Proof the yeast in the milk, stir in the wet ingredients and pumpkin puree with a balloon whisk, then add the dry ingredients, mixing with a stiff wooden spoon until most of the flour is absorbed.

Dump the mixture on a clean floured surface and start kneading the dough by hand. Knead the dough for 6 to 7 minutes, or until the dough is smooth and elastic. Continue with the recipe as directed.

Can I swap out the dried cranberries for something else?

Yes! I used dried cranberries because they’re a sweet and tart compliment to the pumpkin flavor and they look festive for the upcoming holidays. But feel free to substitute the same amount of any chopped fine dried fruit or nuts that you like or have on hand. Some of my favorite swaps include:

Golden raisins
Dried cherries
Dried blueberries
Dried currants
Black raisins
Dried figs
Prunes
Pistachios
Pecans
Walnuts
Hazelnuts
Almonds
Crystallized ginger

Can I swap out the filling?

Yes! If you don’t want to use this filling, you can make this will a different filling all together. Use about 2 to 3 tablespoons of filling spreading it thin to the edges of the dough between layers. Try not to go too heavy with the filling, as it might burn or make the bread heavy and soggy. A thin layer is all you need. Here are a few suggestions:

Cinnamon sugar
Dulce de leche
Nutella
Cocoa and sugar blend, with chopped chocolate chunks
Mocha blend with cocoa powder, instant espresso and sugar
Pumpkin butter or apple butter
Jam or preserves
Compound butter with fresh chopped herbs and or garlic
Shredded cheese, like Cheddar or Mozarella
Pesto or pizza sauce (try sprinkling the top with parmesan cheese as well after the egg wash)

What is pumpkin puree? Can I make my own?

Pumpkin puree is cooked pumpkin that comes in a can. When buying pumpkin puree, be sure to look for pure pumpkin puree and not pumpkin pie filling. Do not use pumpkin pie filling, it has sugar and spices already added to it and this recipe is not designed for it.

You can also make your own pumpkin puree by roasting a small sugar or pie pumpkin in the oven. Cut the pumpkin in half, scoop out the seeds and stringy bits, then roast in a 400°F oven for 45 to 60 minutes. Let it cool and then scoop out the flesh and puree it in the food processor or blender until smooth.

Don’t use a large pumpkin when you make pumpkin puree. Those are designed for decoration and jack-o-lanterns and are very watery and don’t have any taste. Look for a small 4 to 5 pound pumpkin that is labeled pie pumpkin or sugar pumpkin.

Keep in mind that homemade pumpkin puree will often be more watery than canned puree. And some canned puree has more water than others. I tested this recipe using Libby’s canned pumpkin puree because it is the most common pumpkin puree found in grocery stores. If you find your puree is soft or liquidy (from my experience, often organic brand pumpkin purees have more water in it) try cooking down the puree on the stove to drive off some of the water. Or if you have already added it to the dough and it seems too sticky, compensate by adding more flour to the dough, a tablespoon at a time.

What is pumpkin pie spice? Can I substitute?

Pumpkin pie spice is a popular spice blend that is dominantly cinnamon, with secondary spices like nutmeg, ginger, allspice or cloves blended in. It’s used in a lot of baked goods and is the dominant flavor in pumpkin spice lattes. You can buy pumpkin pie spice blend at the grocery store or you can make your own using my homemade pumpkin pie spice blend recipe here on my blog! But if you don’t feel like blending your own batch of spice, feel free to substitute in 3/4 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg and 1/8 teaspoon ground ginger in place of the pumpkin pie spice blend for the dough and the filling.How do you store pumpkin star bread?

Like all enriched dough, this bread is best eaten the day it is baked. But you wish to make this ahead of time or you have leftovers, cool it completely and then store in an airtight container or under a cake dome for up to 2 days at room temperature. Keep in mind that it will progressively get stale, but you can refresh it a bit by heating it up in a toaster oven or in the oven at 350°F for 5 minutes. You should dust it with fresh powdered sugar before serving again, as powdered sugar gets absorbed into the bread.

If you like this pumpkin star bread, check out some of these other sweet yeasted breads

Pumpkin Star Bread with Dried Cranberries

This beautiful, golden orange bread hits all the autumnal notes, with pumpkin puree in the dough itself, along with a touch of pumpkin pie spice blend. Don’t be scared of the long recipe below or the form of this bread. I’ve given lots of tips and tricks on how to make it, and it’s significantly easier than it looks. I’ve even included a video to show you how to form the dough if you wish to watch it. Feel free to swap out a different dried fruit for the dried cranberries or use one of the alternative filling suggestions above.

Course bread

Cuisine American

Keyword bread, pumpkin, yeast

Prep Time 45 minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes

Resting Time 1 hour 30 minutes

Servings 8

Calories 281kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

Dough

1/4 cup milk any kind
2 1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast (see section above for substitutions)
3/4 cup pumpkin puree 190 grams, not pumpkin pie filling (see section above for substitutions)
1/4 cup packed golden brown sugar 55 grams
1 large egg
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice blend homemade or store bought (see section above for substitutions)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 to 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 420 grams (more if necessary, see section about pumpkin puree for more info)
1 teaspoon kosher salt

Filling

3 tablespoon dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice blend homemade or store bought (see section above for substitutions)
1/4 cup dried cranberries chopped fine (see section above for subsitutions and customizations)
3 tablespoon unsalted butter melted

To Finish

1 large egg yolk
Powdered sugar

Instructions

Make the dough by heating the milk on the stove briefly until warm, this should only take 15 to 20 seconds or so, depending on your stovetop. Sprinkle the yeast over the milk and stir with a fork to dissolve.
Pour the yeasty milk into the bowl of a stand. Add in the pumpkin puree, brown sugar, egg, oil, pumpkin pie spice, and vanilla. Using a balloon whisk, stir the ingredients together, breaking up any pumpkin or brown sugar clumps.
Add 3 cups of flour and salt to the dough. Using the dough hook attachment, slowly stir together with the mixer until the dough starts to form together. Increase the speed to medium low and knead the dough until it is smooth and elastic, about 4 to 5 minutes.
If you notice the dough is very sticky, this might be because the pumpkin puree has more liquid in it. Add more flour, 1 tablespoon at a time to compensate. But don’t do this until the dough has been kneading for about 1 to 2 minutes. Often times all the flour hasn’t been incorporated yet, and dough that seems sticky will smooth out and absorb more flour, becoming less sticky in the kneading process. The final dough should be ever-so-slightly tacky but not sticky.
Once the dough has been kneaded, lightly coat a large bowl with cooking oil, then gather the dough into a smooth ball by pulling the edges of the dough down. Place the rough side of the ball of dough into the bottom of the oil bowl, cover with plastic wrap or a damp cloth, and then place in a warm area to rise. Let the dough rise until double in size, about 60 to 90 minutes.
While the dough is rising, make the filling by combining the brown sugar, pumpkin pie spice blend, and chopped cranberries into a bowl.
Once the dough has risen, dump it onto a clean surface and divide it into 4 parts. Cover three parts of the dough with plastic wrap to keep them drying out. Take the fourth dough and gently form it into a ball. This seems fussy, but making it into a ball will help form a more round disk when you roll it out.
Place the ball on a silicon baking mat or piece of parchment paper, then roll it out into a thin 10-inch circle. I found the silicon baking mat is easier because it doesn’t slide around on the countertop. But you can use the parchment paper, just be aware of it as you roll the dough out.
Once the thin circle is formed (use your fingers to help stretch it to form a circle if there are uneven edges), brush about 1 tablespoon of the melted butter over the circle, then sprinkle about 1/3 of the filling over the butter. It will look pretty thin, barely covering the surface. That’s to be expected. Resist the temptation to add more filling, as it will make forming the bread harder.
Take another piece of dough, form a ball, then roll it out into another thin 10-inch circle of dough on a clean surface. I don’t bother to flour my surface, as I want a little bit of “grip” on the surface to help me roll it out, but if you find your dough too sticky, you can add a little flour. Move the dough to the top of the first circle, stretching out any edges to help cover the first dough and form a better circle. Gently use a rolling pin to press the dough down onto the first disk of dough, pushing out any air bubbles.
Repeat the process, brushing the dough with melted butter and sprinkling the filling over the butter. Roll out the third and fourth dough pieces in the same manner, creating a 10-inch stack with 4 layers of dough, and 3 layers of filling sandwiched between. Do not put any filling on the top layer.
Lift and slide the silicon mat or parchment paper onto a rimmed baking sheet.
Gently place a 2 1/2 or 3 inch round cookie cutter in the middle of the dough circle. You can use a cup if you don’t have a cookie cutter, you just need something round to guide your cuts. If your bread is on a silicon mat use a dull butter knife or plastic dough scrape to cut down into the circle, from the edge of the dough to the edge of the cookie cutter. Do this at the top, bottom and sides (12-o’clock, 6-o’clock, 3-o’clock, and 9-o’clock positions if you pretend the circle is a clock).
Now cut between each division again, making 8 pieces. Then cut each piece one more time in the middle, making 16 even strips.
If your dough is on parchment paper, you can use a sharper knife or a pizza cutter if you wish. But use a dull knife or plastic scraper on the silicon mat, so as not to damage it.
Remove the cookie cutter and take two adjacent strips next to each other and twist them away from each other making one or two full twists. Then press the tips of the strips together to form a point. Repeat around the bread, continuing to twist and form points. You should have 8 points, and the center of the bread will look like a star.
Cover the bread with plastic wrap, and preheat the oven to 350°F. Let it preheat for about 20 minutes while the bread rests again.
After the 20 minutes, the bread will be a little puffy but won’t rise a huge amount. Press together any ends that may have pulled apart after the rest. Beat the egg yolk with one tablespoons of water, then brush the bread with the egg wash. Bake the bread for 24 to 27 minutes, or until the bread looks golden brown on top. If you have an instant read thermometer, the center of the bread should read about 190°F.
Let the bread rest on the baking sheet for 10 minutes before loosening it from the parchment paper or silicon mat with a spatula. Move the bread carefully to a wire rack to let it cool. Dust with powdered sugar and serve.

Video

The post Pumpkin Star Bread with Dried Cranberries [with video] appeared first on Eat The Love.

Pumpkin Bread Pudding with Brown Butter and Dried Cranberries [Sponsored Post]

Mon, 04 Oct 2021 14:00:00 +0200

This rich and easy-to-make pumpkin bread pudding is the perfect autumnal dessert, elevated with the addition of brown butter and dried cranberries.

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This post was sponsored by Real California Milk. I was compensated for this post and developing this recipe. However, all opinions below are my own. To find more recipe inspiration visit the Real California Milk website.

Things are cooling off here in San Francisco and I’m getting snuggly cozy in my woolen socks and comfy sweater. And with cooler weather, that also means comfy baking projects with pumpkin! I’ve made various pumpkin recipes in the past like pumpkin snickerdoodles, pumpkin chocolate chip cookies with streusel topping, pumpkin spice latte bread, and pumpkin coffee cake. But lately I’ve been craving an easy-to-make yet rich and decadent dessert. That’s when I came up with this pumpkin bread pudding made with brown butter and dried cranberries! It hits all the right autumnal notes, with warm spices from the pumpkin pie spice blend, as well as the tart dried cranberries and earthy pumpkin. Using Real California butter, melted and cooked into a nutty and fragrant brown butter, just takes this fast and easy sweet treat up a notch!

What is bread pudding?

Bread pudding is simple dessert made from dried bread that has been soaked in a custard mixture of eggs, milk, sugar and (in this particular recipe) brown butter, pumpkin puree and spices, then baked. Often there is also an addition of dried fruit like raisins or dried cranberries. The result is a rich custardy dessert similar to French toast but more with a dessert twist, equal parts luxury and comfort.

How to make pumpkin bread pudding with brown butter

Most bread pudding starts out with stale or dried bread. Cut the bread into cubes, and soak it in a custard mixture of milk, eggs and sugar. This particular bread pudding ups the flavor factor by first making brown butter then tossing the bread pudding with the brown butter to infuse it with toasty nutty richness.

Once the bread has absorbed the brown butter, you soak the bread in a custard made with pumpkin puree, spices, egg, milk and sugar. Let the bread soak overnight if you want a more silky and soft bread pudding. Sprinkle with a little bit of turbinado coarse sugar and bake until set.

What is brown butter and how do you make it?

Brown butter, sometimes referred to by its French name “beurre noisette” which literally translates to hazelnut butter, is exactly what it sounds like: butter that has been cooked until the milk fat has caramelized and browned. I always use Real California butter for my baked goods, which is sustainably sourced and comes from California family farms. The French name comes from the nutty smell that occurs when you make brown butter.

To make brown butter, place the butter in a large skillet, preferably one that is silver or light colored, so you can see the color of the butter as it melts. Cook the butter on high heat, stirring constantly, until the butter is completely melted. Then reduce the heat to medium low and continue to cook, stirring constantly, until the solid milk fat has started to turn golden brown and the butter smells nutty and fragrant.

I like to turn the heat off when I start seeing some brown form, letting the residual heat of the pan continue to cook the butter. If you need to turn the heat back on to nudge the butter a little more to brown, that’s much easier than burning the fat, which means you have to start all over! Once you have brown butter, just pour it directly into the cubed bread, making sure to scrape and add any brown bits as well, which is additional flavor!

Can I use different dried fruit?

I use dried cranberries in this recipe, but you omit the crabercan substitute the same amount of dried fruit (or even a blend) of your choice. Some of my favorite other dried fruits that go well with pumpkin include:

black raisins
golden raisins
dried cherries
dried blueberries
dried currants
dried figs, chopped into 1/2-inch chunks
dried prunes, chopped into 1/2-inch chunks
dried dates

Can I substitute pumpkin pie spice blend?

If you don’t have a ready-made pumpkin pie spice blend in your cabinet, you use my pumpkin pie spice blend recipe to make your own. But if you don’t feel like making up an entire batch of pumpkin spice, feel free to use 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger and 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg in place of the spice blend in the recipe.

Customizing the recipe:

Different add-ins: I already mentioned above how to swap out different dried fruit. But you can further customize the recipe and putting your own spin on it by adding in up to a cup of chopped chocolate, chopped nuts like pecans, walnuts or hazelnuts, or adding different spices like black pepper, cloves, cardamom, or mace. You can also add up to 3 tablespoons of chopped crystallized ginger to give the bread pudding some sweet spicy kick.
Fresh fruit: Try omitting the dried fruit and adding in 1 apple that has been peeled, cored, and chopped into 1/2-inch chunks. Or use the same amount of fresh cranberries or blackberries in place of the dried cranberries.
Swap out sugar: Try using maple sugar instead of the brown sugar to punch up the autumnal flavor even more.
Extracts and flavors: Reduce the vanilla extract to 1 teaspoon and add in an additional 1 teaspoon of rum extract, almond extract, or orange extract. Or add in an additional 2 to 3 tablespoons of golden rum, bourbon, whiskey, or kahlua to the custard along with the vanilla to give the dessert an adult twist.

Tips and tricks for the best bread pudding

Use the right bread: I prefer to use a thick and crusty bread for this recipe, as it will soak up the custard more. A rustic country loaf, ciabatta, baguette, French or Italian loaf will all work well. You can also make it more luxurious by using challah bread which has egg in it. Or go all the way and use stale croissants! Just don’t use a soft bread like sandwich bread, or milk bread. It has too much initial moisture and will lead to a soggy and mushy bread pudding.
Prep the bread: The bread should be dry before making the bread pudding. The easiest way to do this is to cut the bread into cubes and leave it out on a baking sheet to dry out overnight. But if you don’t have time or wish to make the recipe on the same day with fresh bread, just cube the bread and place it in a preheated oven at 250°F for 8 to 10 minutes, or until the bread feels dry to the touch but still light in color. Don’t toast the bread until it’s brown, you want it dry, not crispy.
Soak the bread in custard overnight: This isn’t a requirement, but I prefer to soak my bread overnight in the fridge. This means I can make the recipe ahead of time, and also it allows the bread cubes to absorb the custard, which gives more flavor with every bite. If you don’t have time to soak the custard overnight, cut the bread into small cubes (1/2-inch cubes instead of 1-inch cubes). The smaller size bread pieces will soak up the custard faster.

Make ahead and storage

You can make this recipe ahead of time and store it in the fridge up to 24 hours. Just bake it directly from the fridge if your baking vessel is metal or explicitly says can handle the extreme temperature change (from cold fridge to hot oven) and add an additional 5 to 10 minutes to accommodate the cool bread pudding. If you’re unsure about your baking pan’s ability to withstand thermal shock (if it’s ceramic or glass) just set the pan on the counter for an hour to warm up a bit first.

Be sure to sprinkle the turbinado sugar over the top of the bread pudding right before you bake it.

If you have leftovers, store the bread pudding in an airtight container and refrigerate for up to 5 days. You can reheat in the oven or in the microwave.

I don’t recommend freezing this bread pudding. The pumpkin puree and the custard base will lead to a watery and mushy thawed dessert. Best to eat it while it’s fresh.

If you like this bread pudding recipe, check out some of these other fall desserts:

Pumpkin Bread Pudding with Brown Butter and Dried Cranberries

This rich and luscious bread pudding is a notch above other bread puddings with the addition of brown butter. The dried cranberries can be swapped out for other dried fruit, just see my note above for recommendations. I also recommend preparing the dish first and letting it sit covered overnight in the fridge, so the custard can be fully absorbed by the bread. But if you don’t have time, cut the bread into 1/2-inch cubes instead, and just let the bread soak for 15 minutes while the oven preheats, then bake it.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Keyword bread pudding, custard, dried cranberries, pumpkin

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 45 minutes

Resting time 15 minutes

Servings 6

Calories 410kcal

Author Irvin

Ingredients

1/2 cup Real California unsalted butter 1 stick or 115 g
8 ounces day old crusty bread cut into 1-inch cubes 227 g
1/2 cup dried cranberries 60 g
1 cup Real California heavy cream
1 cup Real California milk
1 cup canned pumpkin puree not pumpkin pie filling, 227 g
1/4 cup packed brown sugar 55 g
1/4 cup white sugar 50 g
3 large eggs
2 teaspoon vanilla
2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice blend
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
2 tablespoons turbinado sugar or additional white sugar

Instructions

Place the butter in a medium-sized skillet (preferably one with a silver bottom) and turn the heat to medium high. Cook the butter, stirring constantly, until it completely melts, then reduce the heat to low. Continue to cook the melted butter gently, until the milk solid particles start to turn golden brown and smell nutty and fragrant. Turn the heat off and continue to stir, letting the pan’s residual heat continue to brown the butter.
Place the crusty bread cubes in a large bowl and pour the butter over bread. Add the dried cranberries and then toss together to coat the bread completely. Pour the mixture into an 8 x 8-inch pan (coated pan with additional butter if desired) , scraping out any remaining butter in the bowl onto the bread. Evenly spreading the bread in the pan.
Place the heavy cream, milk, pumpkin puree, brown sugar, white sugar, eggs, vanilla, pumpkin pie spice, and salt together in the used bowl (no need to clean it out). Whisk together to combine.
Pour over the custard bread, making sure all the bread is covered. Dunk the bread in the custard with a fork or spatula to make sure all the bread is coated.
If you are baking the same day, turn the oven to 350°F and let the custard absorb into the bread for 15 minutes. Then sprinkle the turbinado sugar (or additional white sugar) over the top of the bread pudding and bake in the oven for 40 to 45 minutes. The top of the bread pudding should be golden brown, and a butter knife inserted in the middle of the pudding should come out clean.
If you are baking the bread pudding the next day, cover the pan with plastic wrap and let it sit in the refrigerator overnight for the bread to absorb the custard. The next day preheat the oven to 350°F and sprinkle the turbinado sugar (or additional white sugar) over the top of the pudding. If your pan is metal, or can go from refrigerator to oven, put it in the oven directly and bake for 65 to 75 minutes. If the pan is glass or ceramic, put the bread pudding on the countertop for an hour to warm up a bit, then bake in the oven for 55 to 65 minutes. Let cool for 15 minutes before serving warm.

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