Posts Tagged ‘baking’

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Pumpkin Gingerbread

November 28th, 2009, posted in Food & Drink

What do you do when you find two extra cans of pumpkin in your cupboard and you don't feel like pumpkin pie?

Oh wow. Totally ignore those pumpkin bars I wrote about a few days ago. I mean, they are OK…. but this, this is amazing. Pumpkin Gingerbread. It’s a quickbread loaf and it is totally scrumptious. You don’t even need butter on it, at least not when it is freshly cooled.

So if you have a can of pumpkin in the cupboard and don’t feel like making a pie…try this, if you don’t have a can of pumpkin….go buy one!!

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Spiced Pumpkin Gingerbread


2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
1 cup granulated sugar
¾ cup wheat germ
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground allspice
1.4 tsp ground cloves
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup canned pumpkin puree
1 can (12 fl. oz.) Evaporated Milk
5 tablespoons butter or margarine, melted
1 large egg

Preheat the oven to 350° F. Lightly grease bottom of 9×5-inch loaf pan.

Combine dry ingredients in large bowl and mix well with a whisk.

Combine pumpkin, evaporated milk, butter and egg in medium bowl; mix well.

Add pumpkin mixture to dry mixture; stir just until moistened (think “muffins”).

Pour into prepared pan.

Bake for 60 to 70 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in centre comes out clean. Cool in pan on wire rack for 10 minutes; remove to wire rack to cool completely.
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Working Through the Pumpkin….

November 24th, 2009, posted in Food & Drink

OK, three cans of pumpkin and three cans of evaporated milk from the depths of the cupboard. Plus a can of pumpkin pie filling (stupid mistake at the grocery store) and another tiny can of evaporated milk. And then there are those three cans of condensed milk to deal with too.

One thing at a time though. First up is a recipe I found online. Pumpkin Squares!

Here goes!
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Pumpkin Squares

Crust

1 cup all-purpose flour
½ cup quick-cooking oats
½ cup packed brown sugar
½ cup butter, softened

Filling

1 can (15 oz.) canned pumpkin
1 can (12 oz.) evaporated Milk
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground ginger
¼ teaspoon ground cloves

Topping

½ cup packed brown sugar
½ cup chopped pecans

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350° F.

Crust:

Beat flour, oats, brown sugar and butter in a small mixer until crumbly. Press onto bottom of an un-greased 13 x 9-inch baking pan. Bake for 15 minutes.

Filling:

Beat pumpkin, evaporated milk, sugar, eggs, cinnamon, salt, ginger and cloves in a large mixer bowl. until smooth. Pour over crust. Bake for an additional 20 minutes.

Topping:

Combine brown sugar and nuts in small bowl; sprinkle over filling. Bake for an additional 15 to 25 minutes or until knife inserted in centre comes out clean. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Pile on the whipped cream!

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Basically, I think this is pumpkin pie in a rectangular pan over an oatmeal brown sugar shortbread crust…sounds good to me!

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Muffin Mistake

October 27th, 2009, posted in Food & Drink

I tried another batch of muffins today and screwed up when i was reading my scribbles and revisions…and in doing so, I think I actually nailed them!

I had changed my recipe to half buttermilk and half sour cream…but I messed up and added too much buttermilk… so then I just tossed in a couple more tablespoons of flour to sop it up…and they worked perfectly!

Moist, chewy, fairly dense, mild tasting…. yes, I think I finally have my cottage cheese muffin recipe perfected at long last.

Cottage Cheese Muffins

3/4 cup cottage cheese
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup sour cream
1/4 tsp vanilla
2 tablespoons oil
2 large eggs
1 1/4 cup all purpose flour
about 2 tablespoons parmesan cheese finely grated
3 or 4 tablespoons grated cheddar cheese (I used a lightly aged orange cheddar, not something I usually buy though) (Note: might need less as the oil might weigh them down a bit, play with it and the cheese you are using)
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
2 tablespoons white sugar

Mix all the wet ingredients in one bowl, mix the dry stuff in another.

Pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture and blend with a spatula until barely moistened through. DON’T OVERMIX!

Pile into 6 jumbo muffin cups and bake at 375F until done. My oven is temperamental so it takes about 25 minutes. Set the timer for 15 minutes and check them, they are done when they are a lovely golden brown on top (probably about 20 minutes).

Turn out of the muffin tin and allow to cool.

YUM!

That’s it, that’s the last recipe modification. I’m happy with them and they compared pretty favourably with the ones from the bakery. And amazingly, they are so good that I’m actually not sick of them.

Took about 20 batches, but here they are finally!

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Recap -

Muffins …. Round…I Lost Track

The Continuing Sage of the Search for the Perfect Cottage Cheese Muffin

Damn F$$#@!!ng Muffins!

Muffin Mania – In Other Words, Round Four

Muffins – Round 3

Muffin Mission Round 2

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Muffins…Round…. I Lost Track

October 1st, 2009, posted in Food & Drink

After a few more tries and some resounding failures I’ve come back a few steps and tried again. I’ve added a bit of sour cream this time to try and find that “tang”. I also bought a few more muffins from the bakery since it had been some time since I’ve had a comparison.

After nibbling away at one on the drive home and analysing bits of them I am certain that there is shredded cheddar cheese in them because I could see little orange bits in the dough. So here’s one small thing, we don’t buy orange cheddar, only aged white cheddar because we like its snap. So with that in mind, I’ll never hit the bakery ones exactly and that’s OK from a cheese perspective…I just want to get as close as I can using the cheese that I buy.
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3/4 cottage cheese
1/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup sour cream
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
2 large eggs
1 cup + 2 Tablespoons flour
1 Tbsp parmesan cheese, grated
2 Tbsp grated aged cheddar cheese
1+1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 Tbsp sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
pinch of salt

mix dry stuff in one bowl, wet stuff in another, mix together until just moistened through. Pile into 6 greased muffin cups.

Bake at 375 for 20 minutes

I am now certain that they take several hours before they hit the really moist state that Solly’s sells them in so if they come out of the oven seeming too light and airy, just wait until they cool completely and they will be nice and moist.

However, I think the sour cream changed the texture and made them a little too wet. But they are very, very yummy. We did a side by side taste test with the ones from the bakery and Kirk said that the Solly’s are saltier. I agree and the missing salt and associated flavour comes from cheddar cheese. So. Hopefully one last batch might get us there!

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The Continuing Saga of the Search for the Perfect Cottage Cheese Muffin

September 17th, 2009, posted in Food & Drink

Darn, I thought I had it. I thought that dry curd cottage cheese might be the missing ingredient. And after they cooled down they were great. Soft nuggets of cottage cheese. They just needed a bit more flour to thicken them up and I thought I was there.

Unfortunately, after they sat for a day, those moist little nuggets turned into hard little nobs of dry cottage cheese.

So, dry curd cottage cheese is not the magic ingredient. And now I have half a container of dry curd cottage cheese in the fridge. Not sure what to do with that!

Anyway, here was the latest (failed) attempt.

3/4 dry curd cottage cheese
1/2 cup yogurt
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
3 (medium) eggs (I usually use 2 large but the grocery store was out of my usual eggs)
1 cup flour
1 Tbsp parmesan cheese, grated
2 Tbsp grated aged cheddar cheese
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 Tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp lemon juice
1/4 tsp vanilla
pinch of salt

mix dry stuff in one bowl, wet stuff in another, mix together until just moistened through. Pile into 6 greased muffin cups.

Bake at 375 for 20 minutes

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