Archive | Baking RSS feed for this section

Peach and Pear Crumble

10 Nov

I was reading TheKitchn blog and stumbled on this post, which led me to this recipe.  I had a whole bunch of peaches and pears to use up so I decided this was a perfect opportunity to bake up what sounded like a great recipe.

I first cut up all the fruit (I think it wound up being 2 large peaches and 3 large pears).  I mixed all that with 1 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, two tablespoons of brown sugar, a teaspoon of cinnamon, and a dash of freshly-ground nutmeg (just as the blog told me) and put it into the bottom of a pie plate.  It said not to grease it, but that always makes me nervous… so I sprayed it with Pam Butter Spray before I loaded it all in there.

Then I made the crumble by combining sugar, flour, cinnamon, baking powder and salt.  This was then mixed with the egg.  If you mix it by hand (and I literally mean squeezing the mixture between your fingers), you will get little nuggets of crumble.

I then put that right over the fruit.

And poured the melted butter over top.

And put it in the oven at 375 for about 45 minutes until it was nicely browned on top.  (My oven takes a bit longer for most recipes, so I would check it after 30 minutes)

It wound up more liquidy inside than I expected.

And it certainly needed to be served in a bowl to look pretty since it had no form.  But I wasn’t impressing anyone.

And it was perfectly paired with some whipped cream.

As far as recipes go, this was a damn good one.  But I would at least one tweak.  Mainly… there wasn’t enough BROWN SUGAR!  Now yes… I do like my desserts sweet, but the best part of a crumble, in my opinion, is the fruit paired with the buttery crumbly top and the bit of molasses stuff you get from the combo of brown sugar and fruit juice.  Also, the original recipe called for crystallized ginger, which I didn’t have… so I went without.  Perhaps that was the missing piece to send it over the edge.

Here is the original plum recipe: http://orangette.blogspot.com/2009/09/what-i-do-now.html

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Proud to “Blog with Substance”

28 Oct

I was honored when Amy (from Amy Shops the Web) gave me “A Blog With Substance” award.  I think it’s a fantastic way to honor the incredible blogging that goes on around the web.  I’m sure there are a lot of bloggers just like me who do this entirely for fun, but secretly wish for a bit of notoriety for all the hard work.  Then there are those very popular and “famous” bloggers that we love and inspire us to keep on blogging. And who better to judge bloggers than fellow bloggers?

As for Amy, she started a blog to get her thoughts out there and found herself blogging about a few passions.  As time went on, she realized that the passion she could really sink her teeth into best was fashion.  And I am sure glad she did! I also had the opportunity to guest blog for Amy while she was finding her direction.  

As a relative newbie to online shopping, Amy has given me advice and suggested sales to check out that have been invaluable.  I always know when ideeli or gilt has Badgley Mischka on sale and Amy is the entire reason that I love the site modcloth.com.  Her intro to other shopping sites has also given me the opportunity to find a 2 hour special for pampering at a spa for $99 and some awesome wine glasses that are a hit at every dinner party.  Not only is she savvy about the space, she has great taste.  It’s an honor to be nominated by Amy.  

This award has 3 great rules:

1) Thank the person who gave me the award:
It appears that everyone who writes this award doesn’t want to be thanked in return, including Amy.  I think thanking people for the things they do, big or small, is incredibly important.  So Miss Amy… I will not ignore this rule.  THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!  

2) Sum up my blogging philosophy, motivation, and experience using five words:
Fun. Honest. Informational. Me. Nommy! 🙂 

 
3) Pass it on to 5 other blogs that I feel have real substance:

Stuff I Ate: Lori is the best foodie friend one could ask for.  Not only is she a great cook with fantastic recipes that make me want to run out to try them RIGHT NOW, but she is a fantastic Nomming partner who fully embraces the concept of sharing to enhance enjoyment! We have fully enjoyed our journey through food together and I always look forward to reading her latest posts (and to our next meal together!)  She inspires me every day.

Feisty Foodie:  Even though I do not know Yvo personally, I would be completely remiss to not nominate her for this award.  She has inspired me as a successful food blogger and I am so impressed (ok… and maybe a little jealous) by the fact that she quit her 9-5 to go back to school to do this food thing full time.  I first found her through Lori, and then I was hooked when I realized she was a fellow Mets fan.  One of my all-time favorite posting events she did was her exploration of Banh Mi around the city that she titled “On a Banh Mi Bender.”  

WinedAndDined:  Continuing on the awesome food bloggers that I don’t know personally, I have to give it up to Wined and Dined.  They curate some of the best food deals and events around the city and I have explored quite a few fun opportunities because of their advice.  It is so hard to find this information scattered across the web, so I never miss a posting where they put it all in one place and make some recommendations.  They also have aggregated their posts into great topics including NYC Happy Hour Deals, Free Food, and a place to get your own personal recommendation.  They get it.

Confessions of a Pioneer Woman: Ree is a new find of mine who I only started reading after I saw her speak about food blogging at the LA Times Food Festival.  Her personality was both charismatic and humble and I just found myself immediately drawn in by her blog.   Her lifestyle could not be more different than my city living.  She lives on a ranch with her husband (who she calls Marlboro Man) and children.  She writes about food, but also about home schooling her kids, vocabulary lessons, photography, and her life on the ranch.  I love her photos and she really does a beautiful job of photographing every step of her recipes.  She inspires me to take better, more intimate photos of my cooking.  She wrote about what she has learned from blogging and seriously has more followers than most national website.  She’s kind of my blog hero.

Single Infertile Female: My final nomination goes to someone who has absolutely nothing to do with food (shocking I know!)  To go even farther removed from my life, SIF moved to Alaska to settle down after partying it up in San Diego for a number of years.  Her life plan flew off course when she found out she had an insanely aggressive form of endometriosis and set upon a quest to become a mom, even if a man was not even on the horizon.  I am inspired by her bravery.  Not only for posting to the entire (judgmental) world about becoming a single mom through IVF (it still upsets me that these are both such controversial topics), but also for going through one round of IVF that didn’t work and picking herself up by her bootstraps to try again.  She is painfully and hysterically honest.  I enjoy reading her entries and I can’t help but root for her.  I hope this next round works, but even if it doesn’t, I can tell just by reading SIF that she will be okay… and be an inspiration moving forward.  

Thanks again to Amy.  This was fun!

And, as always, Happy Nomming!

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Easy as Key Lime Pie

13 Oct

Another birthday… another baked good.  This time it was a new adventure with Key Lime Pie.

I wanted to make sure I had a good graham cracker crust, and after much searching, I opted for one that sounded a bit different on my favorite recipe site, AllRecipes.com.

I happen to love that they sell Graham Cracker Crumbs already all crumbled in a box.  I never can get the consistency exactly right when I chop it myself.  I’ll pay a little more for that (and the convenience).  Unfortunately, it’s very hard to find (when stores have it, it’s by the bread crumbs usually).  I haven’t yet found myself ordering a CASE on Amazon… but I wouldn’t put it past me.

So first you mix together the 1.5 cups of graham cracker crumbs, 1/3 cup melted butter, and 3 Tablespoons of granulated sugar.

Then you press it into the bottom of a pie pan and spread egg yolk on it.  After reading the feedback on the recipe, I soon realized this was the tough part… and they were right.  First of all, I used more like 3 yolks to have enough to go around.  And second, it was NOT easy to spread.  I wound up kind of dolloping it on and pressing it down with the back of a spoon until it was coated.  No real spreading involved.  But it wasn’t too bad.

I then baked it for 10 minutes at 350 to brown it a little.

After that, I was ready to add the key lime pie filling.  I got the recipe, again, from AllRecipes.com.  This was also as easy as… pie.

Mix 3 cups sweetened condensed milk with 1/2 cup sour cream, 3/4 cup key lime juice (I couldn’t find key limes so I used regular limes… much to my hesitation… but it worked out just fine), and 1 Tablespoon of grated lime zest.  Mixed it well and poured it on in.

As I baked the pie for about 8 minutes at 350 degrees, I realized that it looked kinda… boring.  So I had some limes left and decided to candy them.

I sliced them thin and put them in some sugar and water to soften and sweeten.

They did soften, but BOY were these tart!  Not for the faint of heart by any means.  I actually scooped these off my piece…

But they sure added a touch of flair to the pie itself.

I let it bake until I saw tiny bubbles come up the surface (the key is not to brown it).

I then chilled it overnight and brought it in the next day.

It was DELICIOUS!  I’m not sure if I would add this to my repertoire, but for a first time key lime pie, I think it was damn good.

Tags: , , ,

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →