Bake 52: Week 13

Not sure how to explain how excited I was when I saw that this week we would be making

CREME BRULLE!

Excited for a few reasons:
First of all, this is my husband's all-time favorite dessert.  Anytime there is a chance to go to a nice restaurant and order this, he takes full advantage.
Secondly, this is something I would never have thought I could actually make (again, this is for ordering at nice restaurants) so I was excited to try it!
Third, I love Creme Brulle!

It was honestly easier than I thought it would be, and my amazing fried, Talesha, let me borrow her kitchen torch to caramelize the sugar.  I know she's a true fried because she let me use it before she had even tried it! I am definitely ordering one of those for myself now!

 

  Each week I am more and more impressed by this cookbook.  It has "test kitchen" in the title, and these recipes truly are tested and perfected!

So my review of this is that it was absolutely delicious!

My husband's review?  He was expecting "homemade tasting Creme Brulle" but was pleasantly surprised at how good this was! He said it is as good as, if not better than, any he has ever eaten!

Yeah!! A success!  I felt so proud of myself all night and am so excited to be able to make this now!  

Visit Jen's blog to see the recipe!

Crispy Coconut Chicken Fingers

I had a really rough "mom" day last week.  All I wanted was 10 minutes of quiet, alone time.  When my hubby came home I put myself in a time-out in my room.  Although it was anything but quiet in my house, I was alone.  I knew that if I didn't do something to keep myself busy, I would have fallen asleep immediately!  So I started flipping through recipe books, which is such a stress reliever for me.  This time proved to be productive, as I planned out dinner for the night.  I made these Chicken Fingers with the Seasoned Potato Bites and it was a huge hit with the whole family!  My 8 year old that hates chicken ate several pieces of this and my 6 year old had 4 servings of the potatoes.  My husband always loves anything like a chicken nugget (one of the things he really misses with the gluten allergy) and this was super easy to make gluten free!

Crispy Coconut Chicken Fingers (Adapted From Our Best Bites)
1 1/2 lbs. chicken, cut into bite sized pieces
2 eggs
1 cup cornstarch
1 cup sweetened coconut flakes
1 cup gluten-free bread crumbs (you can make these from your bread, buy them at The Good Earth)
1 1/2 tsp garlic powder
3/4 tsp salt
3/4 tsp curry powder
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Chop coconut and mix with bread crumbs and spices.  Place in shallow dish.  Beat the egg and place in another shallow dish, and put the cornstarch in a 3rd dish.  Roll each piece of chicken in the cornstarch, then in the egg, then in the bread crumb mixture until coated.  Place on a cookie sheet lined with sprayed foil. Bake until cooked through, about 20-25 minutes.

Seasoned Potato Bites

Seasoned Potato Bites  (Recipe adapted From Our Best Bites Steak Fries)
10 small red potatoes, washed and cut into bite-sized pieces
2 Tbs olive oil
1/2 tsp cumin
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp garlic powder
Toss potatoes in a bowl with the olive oil and spices.  Spray a piece of aluminum foil with non-stick spray and place on cookie sheet.  Spread potatoes out on foil and bake at 400 degrees until tender.  Start checking after 20 minutes.

Easy GF Peanut Butter Cookies

 Luckily Kris really likes peanut butter cookies because they turn out really well without flour! We have a few recipes we use all of the time, but here is one that is just a little bit different that I found on Pinterest.  They were really yummy - I have never added nuts to them and it really made them stand out.

Peanut Butter Cookies (from Kill.The.Gluten)
1 cup peanut butter

3/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup crushed peanuts (I had pecans and used them and loved it!)

Stir peanut butter, sugar, egg, baking soda, salt until combined.  Add in chocolate chips and nuts.  Roll into small balls and bake on an ungreased cookie sheet at 350 for 12-14 minutes.

Cheesy Garlic Bread Swirls

 I was trying to find an easy bread stick recipe last Sunday and when I came across this one I could not pass up giving it a shot!  What is not to love here?  Garlicy...Cheesy...all rolled up like a cinnamon roll.  Heaven.  Seriously one of the best things I've eaten (especially right out of the oven!)

And surprisingly fairly easy to make! 

Cheesy Garlic Swirls (Our Best Bites)
1 Tbs yeast
1 1/2 cups warm water

1 1/2 Tbs sugar

1 tsp salt

3 Tbs vegetable oil

1 egg yolk  (I was out of eggs, so omitted this and it turned out great!)
4-5 1/2 cups flour, divided

1/2 cup real butter

1 1/2 Tbs garlic bread seasoning (recipe below)

1 1/2 cups mozzarella cheese

1. Combine the yeast, water, and sugar in large mixing bowl and allow to stand 10 minutes or until bubbly.
2. Add salt, vegetable oil and egg yolk and combine.  Add 3 cups flour and mix well until combined.  Add enough remaining flour to make a soft dough that barely sticks to your finer.  Knead, either by hand or in mixer for another 2-3 minutes.  Cover and allow to rise 1 hour.

3. Roll the dough into an 18 X 6 inch rectangle on a surface lightly sprayed with nonstick cooking spray or sprinkled with flour.  Mix softened butter and garlic bread seasoning together. Smear garlic butter over the entire surface of the dough and then sprinkle with cheese.

4. Roll up the dough jelly-roll style and then cut into 12 equal slices.  Place each slice in a muffin tin cup that has been sprayed with nonstick cooking spray.  Cover with a clean cloth.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees and allow rolls to rise while the oven is heating. 

5. When the oven is ready, bake for 18-22 minutes.  Be sure to keep a close eye on these during the last 10 minutes or so - once you notice the cheese getting brown, place a sheet of aluminum foil over the rolls.  This will keep the cheese from burning.  Although it will get pretty brown on top, the insides will be perfectly melted.

Of course I had to double the recipe but they are pretty filling so one recipe actually would have been enough.

Garlic Bread Seasoning (Our Best Bites)

1/2 cup powdered parmesan cheese

2 tsp kosher salt

2 Tbs garlic powder

2 tsp oregano

2 tsp basil

2 tsp marjoram

2 tsp parsley

Shake ingredients together in an airtight container.  Store in the refrigerator for up to 3 months.

Bake 52: Week 12

Palmiers!

When I saw this was the pick this week, I had no clue whatsoever we would be making, but quickly opened my book to take a peek.  Cookies.  Without chocolate.  Not sure how I felt about that.

Until I ate one....Mmmmmmm

How could anything with 3 sticks of butter not be good?!?  There were only a few ingredients, but because of the many times of rolling and folding, a perfect, flaky pastry crust was created.  Then rolled in sugar. Again I say Mmmmmm.  Then baked til just crispy.

The dough all ready to cut for cookies.  So pretty and fun!

 I thought I could just eat one.  Didn't happen.  Ate the rest for breakfast the next morning. 
Even better the next day!  

It was so fun to try something new, and something so different!  This was a great recipe! 

  Visit Rebekah's Blog for all the details!

Bake 52: Week 11

The recipe for this week was Ciabatta Bread!

  I am pretty sure that if this baking club voted someone out of the club each week, this would DEFINITELY be my week to get kicked out! (If I had made it this long, that is.)  How unappetizing does this look? Seriously?!? This bread took a really long time.  The thing I liked is that it used just a few, simple ingredients.  But there was a lot of rising time.  It was cooked on a baking stone.  The only one I have is a round pizza stone.  So I cut my loaf in half so that both halves would fit on the stone.  Rather than rising up (for the last rise) it rose out...making a very wide, short loaf.  Halfway through baking you take the parchment paper out from under it and flip the bread over to bake on the other side.  I don't know if it was my stone or what, but it burned the bread on the stone side, making a very unpleasant flavor and smell to the bread.  I did manage to eat most of one piece, and the inside was actually quite good.

 The outside was awful though.  I was feeling pretty good that I could finally make the other bread recipes in this book so far, but this one I totally bombed.  I really believe that it was user error. 
If you want to see how the bread should be, and get the recipe, visit Emily's Blog!

Bake 52: Week 10

This week's pick was LUNCHBOX BROWNIES!

I knew I would love these because I've never met a brownie I didn't like love! This recipe was unlike any I've baked though because it used unsweetened chocolate, so I was a little worried about them being too bitter.  Once again, this book never leads astray because they were fantastic! The recipe had several variations, I chose the frosted ones - the frosting recipe was just chocolate chips (I opted to use milk chocolate rather than semi-sweet) and a little oil.  It was perfect. 2 ingredients - so simple and so delicious!

And have I mentioned how much I love the foil slings? They came out beautifully!

 

 I always feel like I am torturing my poor husband when I bake something that smells as irresistible as brownies!  When I noticed that this recipe only called for 2/3 cups of flour, I decided to try to make them gluten-free.  I did a mixture of rice flour and cornstarch (I normally would have blended rice flour and garbanzo bean flour because I love the way that bakes, but uncooked it makes for a very disgusting batter and I NEEDED some yummy brownie batter that day!).  I also added about 1 tsp. of unflavored gelatin and 1Tbs. of light mayo (this really helps the texture to be less crumbly and more moist).  They turned out perfect! I couldn't even tell that they were gluten-free.  SO delicious! And Kris loved them!

 To get the full recipe, visit LIZ'S BLOG!