To avoid confusion...

I've set up a mirror site here:

http://samvskitchen.blogspot.com/

(This way the blog name and the domain name match). This site isn't going to be deleted, but I will use the other address for further updates. Please update your bookmarks accordingly, and sorry for any confusion. I figured it was best to address it earlier rather than later!

Sam

Maple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cookies

I was recently commissioned by a friend to make cookies for a meeting to which he was supposed to bring refreshments. The only difficulty was that it was a morning meeting, and he wanted more breakfast-themed cookies. We chatted about it and came up with a few ideas, which I will be posting individually.

The first, most obvious, idea was oatmeal cookies... oatmeal is a breakfast food, and therefore so are oatmeal cookies. This is my logic, and it has served me well all my life. I threw in maple syrup for good measure. The caveat is that these are not super maple-y. If you want a stronger maple flavor you could probably throw in 1/2 tsp maple extract. I didn't simply because I don't have it on hand.

Please do use real maple syrup. I'm not generally fanatical about foods, but there are a few things I absolutely detest: hydrogenated margarine, artificial vanilla and fake maple syrup. This unholy triumvirate may well lead to the decline and fall of Western civilization, if you ask me.

Maple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cookies

Beat together until totally mixed:
1/2 C (1 stick) butter
1/2 C brown sugar

Add in and beat until mixed:
1 egg/egg replacer*
2 tbsp maple syrup (preferably grade B for more maple flavor)

In separate bowl combine:
1 C flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda

Add flour mixture to butter/sugar mixture, stir until mixed.

Add:
1/2 C oats
1/2 C cinnamon chips (sold by Hershey's)
1/4 C raisins (optional)

Stir until blended.

Roll dough into 1-2" balls. Because of the raisins and chips the balls might not be perfectly circular, that's fine.

Squish the balls a little with a fork or your fingers so that they are flat on top, then bake at 350F for ten minutes.

Nom cookies. Not to be arrogant or anything, but I honestly believe this is one of the finest recipes I've ever developed. They really are good.


*Note: I used egg replacer powder and omitted the water. If you're using a real egg you may have to add just a couple of tablespoons of flour to make up for the extra liquid. Only do this if the dough seems really sticky.

Lemon bars

I am a huge fan of lemon bars, so much so that I can only make them if I have an opportunity to give them away. Otherwise I am entirely capable of eating an entire pan by myself. So when a friend came to visit last week I was pretty excited when she said that she liked lemon bars.

I always use this recipe, with (of course) modifications. Because, seriously? Two full cups of sugar in the lemon layer? I don't think so.

Recipe:
Preheat oven to 325F

Line a 9x13" pan in aluminum foil, then spray foil with pam (you can skip the foil if you really want to, but it makes removing the cookies later a heck of a lot easier).

In a blender, food processor or with a pastry cutter, blend:

1 C (two sticks) butter
2 C white flour
1/2 C confectioner's sugar (aka 10x sugar or powdered sugar. Normal sugar really won't work.)

This works best if the butter is cold; taking it straight out of the fridge works best. While I have used my stand mixer for this step, the texture is better if the dough isn't really blended together. You're looking for something that appears to be crumbs, rather than a smooth dough:



Dump the dough into the pan, spread it out as evenly as possible, and press down firmly. You want it to be about even thickness across the pan, but since it's going to be covered up by lemony goodness it doesn't have to be beautiful:



Stick this in the oven for 18-20 minutes, or until it is just *barely* beginning to turn a little bit brown at the edges.

While the crust is baking, blend the following until completely mixed:

1 1/2 C sugar
1/4 C flour
4 eggs (not egg replacer)
1/3 C lemon juice (about what you get from one large lemon. I sometimes add in a little extra since I have lemon juice in my fridge at all times
~1 tbsp lemon zest (about what you get from one large lemon).

Notes:

1. If you mix the sugar and flour together before adding anything else you're less likely to get clumps of flour in the batter.
2. I use a microplane zester to zest the lemon. Basically you grate off all of the yellow part of the lemon skin, leaving the white part underneath untouched. The best way to deal with the lemon is to do this first, then cut the lemon in two and squeeze the juice out.

Once this is completely blended, pour it over the prepared crust. It's ok if the crust hasn't totally cooled.



Bake for 20 more minutes, or until the lemon mixture is set. Again, you should only see the faintest of browning on the top of the bars when you take it out. If you leave it in too long the bars are kind of dry and have a funny texture. Here's how it should look when you pull it out of the oven:



Add lots of powdered sugar with a sifter (I've also used a tea ball for this. Open the tea ball, spoon in some powdered sugar, close the tea ball, then shake it over the cookies. This works really well, actually).

Finished cookies:


Wait until the bars are completely cooled before cutting, or you will make a mess. As a side note for those allergic to milk: I have personally made these using Earth Balance sticks instead of butter and it works just fine.

COMMON ABBREVIATIONS

I generally use imperial (volumetric) measurements because most cookbooks in the States still use this system for reasons I cannot fathom. For those unfamiliar with these measurements (which I firmly believe were invented by chipmunks on crack), here are a few useful conversions and abbreviations:

C: Cup
tsp: teaspoon
tbsp: tablespoon
g: gram
oz: ounce

Good to know:
1. There are 3 teaspoons in 1 tablespoon
2. There are 16 tablespoons in 1 Cup
3. There are 8 fluid ounces in 1 Cup
4. There are 2 Cups in 1 pint
5. There are 4 Cups in 1 quart (which is roughly equal to 1 liter)

Mom's Neutron Torte

This is my mother's (in)famous chocolate torte recipe (also known as "neutron torte" or "instant heart attack inducer torte"). She has kindly given me permission to post this recipe. For those people in my department, this is what I brought to the MMG department party two months ago.

I've adjusted mom's recipe to make only one torte. She always makes two and freezes one if she doesn't need the second one immediately; I simply don't have the freezer space to do so. I've also added hazelnut to the glaze, which I quite like.

Recipe:

Snap out the bottoms of an 8" springform pan (flat bottomed preferred). Cover bottom of pan with foil, snap it back in, butter the sides and the foil-covered bottom (or spray with pam, that's what I do).



CAKE:

Separate 3 eggs (save both whites and yolks).


Mix together:
2 melted sticks butter
1.5 C sugar
1 tsp bourbon vanilla
1/8 tsp salt

Add in and beat together until totally blended:
1/4 C cream
3 egg yolks.

Mix together in a separate bowl:
1 C flour
2/3 C cocoa powder (NOT hot chocolate mix). Either dutch processed or normal cocoa will work, they'll just give slightly different flavors. I use whatever I have on hand.



Add to butter mixture and mix until till smooth.



Beat separately:
3 egg whites
1/8 tsp. cream of tartar. Underbeating is better than overbeating.



Side note: do you have any idea how hard it is to photograph white whipped egg whites in a white bowl sitting on a white stove? Yeesh.

Fold egg whites into chocolate mixture:



You really don't want to over-mix, or you'll lose all that air that you so carefully beat into the egg whites. Here's what it should look like shortly before you put it in the pan:



And here's what it looks like before baking:




Put in the pan and bake at 350 for 45 minutes. Center will not be solid, and cracking should appear. Run a knife carefully around outer edges; cake will fall.

Cool at least an hour. Loosen springform sides and remove. Put a plate on bottom of cake and flip over. Peel off bottoms of pans, then the foil. Glaze when fully cooled.



GLAZE:

Chop:
1/2 lb (250 g) bittersweet chocolate (we use Trader Joe's pound plus bars)

Add:
2/3 to 3/4 C cream
1 tsp hazelnut extract (this is what I do, mom has done mint before, which is also very good. My next plan is to try raspberry extract).

Melt chocolate in cream using a double boiler or microwave (I use a microwave). Try not to incorporate extra air in as you stir or you'll get bubbles, which are annoying. Also, it is important that every edge of every piece of chocolate be dunked in the cream before heating or that piece of chocolate may seize into a hardened, unmeltable lump.

When glazing, mom makes a backwards J from the center, turns the cake slightly, and repeats all the way around. If you use the smaller amount of cream the indentations will be clearer. When I make these I then stick the glazed torte in the fridge until the glaze sets. Once it has set you can run a knife around the bottom, insert a spatula under the torte and lift the whole thing to a new (clean) plate, which is prettier than leaving it on the plate you used while glazing the torte.

Note: my mom uses manufactoring cream for this recipe, which has a higher saturated fat content, so it holds shape better. I just use regular heavy cream, and I think it works just fine.

Mom-safe chocolate raspberry cookies

I made these for a meeting this week and they went over very well. In fairness, I suspect that anything with chocolate would probably go over well at any meeting that starts at seven on a busy Tuesday evening, but I still think it's a good recipe.

As usual, I'm only getting around to actually updating this blog because someone(s) asked for the recipe. I like to think that I'm not so much "lazy" as "insanely busy." But that may be denial; it's probably a little of column A, a little of column B.

Anyway.

Mom-friendly Chocolate Raspberry Cookies: (The last recipe I designed wasn't something my mom could try because of health constraints, so I made sure this one is. This means it can't have any nuts or seeds, hence the use of raspberry extract rather than preserves, jam, etc.)

Blend together until completely mixed:

1/2 C butter
1/2 C brown sugar (white sugar would work, I just happened to be out of it).



You really want the butter and sugar to be well mixed. I wait for it to look light and almost fluffy.

Add in:

1 egg/1 egg replacer equivalent (I used the replacer).

Mix well, then add:

1 tsp raspberry extract
1/2 tsp vanilla extract (use the real stuff, vanillin fake stuff is vile).

In a separate bowl mix: (candor compels me to admit that I don't bother with the "separate bowl" thing, but that's because I have a stand mixer so everything gets mixed fast. If you're mixing by hand you really should mix dry ingredients separately).

1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 Cup cocoa powder (NOT hot chocolate mix)
1 Cup flour

Mix until blended, then add to butter mixture, and mix until flour is just barely incorporated. Then add roughly a cup of chocolate pieces of some variety. Here's what I used:





1. About 1/2 C chopped milk chocolate (Trader Joe's Pound Plus bar, thanks Mom for supplying it since I still live in this forsaken state that has no TJ store!)

2. 1/4 C dark chocolate (an extra half of a 85% dark lindt chocolate bar I had sitting around).

3. 1/4-1/2 dark chocolate truffles, chopped. A kind friend gave me a ton of these when I was sick last year, and I haven't been able to get through all of them, so I threw them in-- definitely a good move.

For those (like one of my siblings) who are allergic to milk, it would totally work with all dark chocolate. The chopped truffles are a nice addition, though, so if you happen to have dairy-free truffles on hand (don't laugh, many people in my family would have random truffles lying around) do chop a few and throw them in.

Mix in the chocolate pieces (this can be done with a stand mixer turned to low or just with a spatula).

At this point I rolled the cookie dough into balls (1-2" in diameter), stuck them on a cookie sheet and froze them. This is the best way to plan ahead for cookies when you know you won't have much time during the week. If you want cookies right away, obviously don't freeze the cookie dough.

Bake at ~350F* for 8-10 minutes (may take a couple minutes longer if dough is frozen). You want these cookies to look just barely undercooked when you take them out of the oven.




Directly after taking out of the oven sift powdered sugar on top of them. The first layer may melt a bit, that's ok. Just keep adding sugar until they look thoroughly dusted.




Let cool on the pan for about ten minutes, then loosen with a spatula. Add more powdered sugar if necessary. Note: it's not a great idea to package the cookies into a tupperware container before they are totally cool, or they'll kind of melt together. Nobody will be terribly bothered by this, but it is a bit of a pain.


*sorry about the iffy temperature. I live in a craptacular student apartment whose oven takes a somewhat stochastic approach to temperature regulation, so I have to guess what temperature it really is at any given moment.

Deep thoughts on egg replacer...

Because I've had questions on the subject, here are a few scattered thoughts about egg replacer. You may have noticed that I use it in most of my cookies. I know I've mentioned it before, but thought it was worth doing a single entry on the subject.

For a while I experimented with being vegan. It was interesting, from a culinary perspective, to be forced to cook without any animal products. And it turned out to be very valuable, since one of my relatives developed a severe allergy to milk; I've learned many tricks and substitutions that come in very handy.

Since I'm no longer vegan, why do I bother with the egg replacer? There are several reasons reasons:

1. Ener-G egg replacer (the kind I use) is cheaper than eggs. Pretty self-explanatory, really. I'm a grad student, therefore I'm poor.

2. Ener-G can be kept indefinitely in a cupboard. It takes up very little space, and does not go off. So no checking of expiration dates, etc. is ever required.

3. To the best of my knowledge, egg replacer has never been linked to salmonella or any other food-borne pathogen. So I can eat cookie dough (which I generally prefer to cookies) without any worry about food poisoning.

4. To use Ener-G egg replacer, you add 1.5 tsp powdered egg replacer and 2 tbsp water... but I've learned that "water" can be interpreted as "any liquid I like." So by using egg replacer I suddenly have the ability to add different liquids without screwing up the liquid/dry ingredient ratio. This comes in very handy for things like rum cookies, the recipe for which I will post one of these days. I've also, as I've mentioned before, often used flavored coffee creamer in place of the water as a way of changing the flavor of cookies without having to invest in a ton of different extracts. Cheap, convenient, tasty.

5. Health. No eggs in a recipe = lower saturated fat, cholesterol, etc. Plus some people are allergic to eggs, so it's nice to be able to offer them something they can eat.

When do I not use egg replacer?

1. Anytime eggs are a structurally essential part of what I'm cooking (cream puffs/eclairs, for example, to say nothing of angel food cake and the like). I know that the Ener-G people would like us to believe that it will always work as a substitute, but it's simply not true.

2. Brownies. I don't know why, but it never works for me.

3. For most cakes I use at most 50/50 egg replacer/egg. Many cakes need the extra richness provided by eggs, so I don't like to totally swap out the eggs unless I am really sure it's going to work.

4. Any really rich dessert (chocolate torte, cheesecake, etc). Again, the dessert often requires the richness of the eggs to really work.

As a good rule of thumb with a new recipe, try a 50/50 swap, then go from there. If it totally fails, the recipe is probably not amenable to egg replacement. If it works justs fine, you can probably try a total replacement, preferably not when you're pressed for time (so if it fails you won't freak out).

So those are my thoughts... I recommend giving egg replacer a go for those who bake a lot. It's convenient, cheap and easy to use.

Almond Cookies

Many apologies for the delay in posting, as usual someone requested the recipe a while ago, but I haven't had time to actually write it down. Now that Tae Kwon Do winter camp is over (exhibit A in the "Things I Do to Support My Eating Habit" display), however, I can actually get back to being a semi-normal human being.

Or so I hope.

Anyway, here is the newest and greatest in the Sam Recipe File. For fellow Hydes, I'll comment that the almondness of these cookies always reminds me of the Spritz cookies we make every Christmas, but without the suspicious green food colouring. For everyone else, I'll just say that this is a d*@! fine cookie recipe.

The inspiration:



Now I live in a poor benighted state that does not have a single (I know this is shocking) Trader Joe's store anywhere within the state boundaries. The nearest TJs is about four hours away in Massachusetts. One of the things I really enjoy from TJ is their very tasty chocolate almonds, so when I saw that Costco was selling them I was a pretty happy bunny. Unfortunately, Costco's almonds aren't as good as TJ chocolate almonds, but they are pretty tasty nonetheless, and there were an awful lot of them. I quickly realized I probably could (but definitely should not) eat the whole lot by myself. So I decided to cookify them...you know, for health reasons. (This made sense at the time. Really.)

Step 1:

Pulverize the heck out of the almonds. I used a blender for this. A food processor would also work. The only thing to watch out for is that you don't want to make almond butter here, so short quick pulses are better than turning the blender on and walking out of the room. You want small but not necessarily uniform pieces.




Step 2:

Make the cookie dough.

Blend well:

1/2 Cup (one stick) butter
2/3 Cup sugar (light brown sugar also works, or a mix of the two.)

Once this is completely blended together, add:

1 egg (or 1 egg worth of egg replacer, which is what I use).

Mix until completely blended together. Then add 1.5 teaspoons almond extract (anywhere between 1 and 2 is fine, I've settled on 1.5 as a happy medium, having tried 1, 1.5 and 2).

In separate bowl, combine:

1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/3 Cup all-purpose flour

Add flour mixture to butter/sugar mixture, mix until incorporated (but stop mixing once this occurs, you don't want to overmix it). Then add whatever chopped up almonds you haven't snitched. Roll the cookies into balls, stick on a sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes at 350F. You may need to add a tablespoon or two of flour if the cookie dough is sticky. If you're unsure, bake just one or two cookies. If they spread out too much, add a little more flour to the rest of the dough before baking.

Cookie dough before baking:




Cookies after I got all ambitious in a Martha Stewartesque fashion and added a chocolate almond to the top of each cookie before baking them:



As you can see, the cookies should look just barely done when you pull them out of the oven. Leave them to cool on the pan for about five minutes, then loosen with a spatula.

As a side note: it works really well if you roll the cookies out, stick them on a pan and freeze the dough. Once the dough is frozen you can stick it in a tupperware in your freezer and just pull it out whenever you need cookies in a hurry. This will add 2-5 minutes to your baking time, but otherwise nothing changes.

Nigella Lawson's White Bread Recipe

Although I'm embarrassed to even own a cookbook by this title, it really is a fantastic baking cookbook. As requested by Ashley, here are basic instructions for a very basic loaf of white bread. I've borrowed heavily from Nigella, but most of the more, er... technical... terms are my own. :)

Total Ingredient list:

~3.5 C white bread flour
1 tbsp/package yeast
1 tbsp salt
~ 1 1/3 C warm water (NOT hot... if it feels hot to your hand it will probably kill the yeast, and then you'll have, essentially, matzah. Which is fine if you like unleavened bread, but probably not what you're going for here).



Put the following in a bowl:

3.5 Cups white bread flour

1 package yeast OR 1 tbsp yeast (rapid rise is nice, but the other is cheaper so I usually use the standard stuff Costco sells).

1 tbsp salt

3/4 C water

Mix until it's a homogenous mess. You may have to add additional water.

Add 1 tbsp melted butter (oil will also work)

Start kneeding... I use a stand mixer, but if you don't have one basically mix in as much flour as you need to keep it from completely sticking to your hands, then start working the dough with your hands. I generally hit the bread dough with the heel of my hand, squoosh it down, then pick up the dough, turn it on its side and do the same thing. This should take roughly ten minutes if you're doing it by hand. My sister swears this is very therapeutic. :) If the bread is sticky wet add a little more flour. If it's so dry that it's not staying together, add water. As you can tell it's not a super exact science. You'll know that you're done kneeding when the dough looks smoother and more elastic-y.

Through the dough into an oiled bowl. Cover top of the bowl and stick it somewhere warm for an hour or two. It should double in size during this first rise. Note: This is also the time when you can stick it in the fridge overnight if you want to actually bake it the next day.

Punch down the dough. (Yes, literally). You want to deflate it, basically. Then form it into a roughly bread-shaped ball, and plop it into a greased 9x5" bread pan (this is just the standard size bread pan. I've had great luck with ceramic ones, but they can be pricey. Glass works ok. The aluminum non-stick ones can be ok, but I've had problems with their burning the bottom of the bread).

Cover loosly and leave until doubled again. Stick it in a preheated 425F oven for approximately 35 minutes. The loaf should be slightly browned all over and have a hollow sound if you knock the bottom gently with your knuckles (if it doesn't sound hollow, stick it on a cookie sheet and throw it back in the oven for a few minutes). Turn out of pan and cool on a cooling rack (if you don't do this the bottom can get pretty soggy).

Minty Brownies

Nom nom nom nom...

I am quickly discovering that the unifying force behind food blogs is laziness... the only time I am not too lazy to update this page is when people ask me for a recipe. It is at that point that I realize it that it is easier for me to post the recipe once than to have to write it out for multiple people... so here goes, with apologies to my sister, who may have asked me for this recipe about a month ago.

As anyone who has ever cooked with me knows, I am constitutionally incapable of following a recipe exactly. That being said, the King Arthur Flour Brownie Recipe is by far the best brownie recipe I've ever found. I've even been known to follow it exactly. The only changes I made this time were as follows:

1. I decreased the sugar from 2.25 to 2 Cups (just because I really prefer less sweet desserts, 2.25 isn't overly sweet)

2. I used Hershey's Super Dark cocoa (although the regular stuff works fine, I've used it in the past, this results in a VERY dark brownie)

3. I decreased the vanilla from 1 tablespoon to two teaspoons because I didn't want it to fight with the mint icing.

Other than that, follow the recipe as the wonderful folks at King Arthur Flour have designed it. Make sure you give yourself enough time for the brownies to cool completely before trying to ice it, or you shall have a crumbly mess.

Icing:

I really don't use a recipe for buttercream frosting, which is essentially what this icing is. But basically it is as follows:

Whip the heck out of the following (I use a stand mixer. You can also use a hand-held electric mixture. I suppose it may be technically possible to do this entirely by hand, but I certainly wouldn't try it):

* 8 tbsp/one stick butter (at room temp) (Earth Balance sticks also work. If you ever try Crisco or some equivalent nastiness I may have to hunt you down and beat you with a stick)

* ~3 cups powdered sugar
*1-2 tsp mint extract. I use ~2 tsp, but unless you really like a lot of mint I would recommend using 1 tsp and then add more later if you want it mintier.

Once this has reached a uniform texture and is really, really blended together, add milk until it reaches desired consistency. I add about a tablespoon at a time and then whip it again until it's all incorporated. It should take ~1/4 cup. If you overshoot you'll have a goopy mess. Not to worry; you can add more powdered sugar and fix it. However, with both the milk and the powdered sugar it's a really good idea to only add a little at a time or you'll keep overshooting and end up with a huge bowl of frosting which you will then feel that you have to use/eat. And then your bathroom scale will scream in agony.

Once you have the right texture, taste it to see if you want to add more mint, do so if necessary, and then frost the cooled brownies. I do this by adding about half of the frosting in a thin layer over the top of the brownies, then letting it sit for a minute. I then take a clean knife/spatula and add a second layer. This helps prevent crumbs from getting mixed in the frosting, which doesn't look nice. I have to admit, though, I have a hard time making it look totally even, so don't worry about it if it's not perfect.

Edit: for a variation my family won't make but other people might enjoy, add 1 tsp instant coffee to brownie batter. Then use Bailey's Irish Cream in place of milk in the frosting (and omit the mint extract). You'll need about 2 tbsp, maybe, then switch to milk. This will add an almost negligable amount of alcohol, but it's really good. Basically you'll have created Irish Coffee Brownies. You may have to fend people off with a baseball bat, if my experience bringing these to a potluck is any indication.