This week, I'm relishing a vacation with my husband. We're not traveling far. In fact, we're enjoying the sights (and restaurants) in our own backyard. When I'm "Stay-cationing", Craig and I will dine out more often than usual. We prefer a having a leisurely lunch in places like Big Sur, Carmel Valley or Pebble Beach. We'll make a pit stop, or two, that are errand driven.
Yesterday, we had a busy day, and I was happy to arrive home by late afternoon so that I could catch up on reading magazines and new cookbooks. Before I knew it, my stomach was telling me that it was 6:00 and I needed to think about making something for dinner.
I had some chicken breasts in the fridge, so I looked for inspiration on Pinterest! If you haven't come aboard on the Pinterest craze, be warned that it's an addicting website. I have discovered all kinds of new blogs, and it's fun to see what my other blogger friends are pinning. Thanks to my blogger friend Cathy, at Wives With Knives, she had pinned a recipe for Coconut Chicken (from Pennies on a Platter) that looked easy and appetizing.
The recipe had simple ingredients, that I had on hand-- my chicken breasts were quite plump and large. So I cut them in half, because I didn't want to wait 30-40 minutes for the chicken to be ready. NOTE: You could easily cut the chicken into bite-size bits, as appetizers
I had a bag (of rather outdated, to be honest) sweetened coconut, flour, salt & pepper and garlic powder.
I had one last jar of my homemade apricot-pineapple jam. The recipe listed apricot jam, but my absolute favorite jam is apricot-pineapple. I must make more, this summer. Anyway, I added two tablespoons of Dijon mustard, to 1/4 cup of jam. I felt that was just a little too much Dijon for my liking as it overpowered the delicious flavor of the jam. I simply added another 1/4 cup of jam, and all was good. To be honest, I think just pure jam would have been just fine-- more on that later. I set it in the fridge to chill.
Preheat the oven to 400F.
I beat two eggs (the recipe called for one, but I didn't want to run out) and then dip the chicken into the dry ingredients.
Coat each piece of chicken, and gently press the coconut mixture.
Place the chicken on either parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
The instructions said to melt 1/2 cup of unsalted butter. Necessity is the other of invention, because to my horror, I realized I was almost out of butter! I melted my last 1/4 cup of unsalted butter and added 1/4 cup of extra-virgin olive oil. (I think that could be reduced.)
Then drizzle over each piece of chicken..
Done!
A little messy, but it's ready to go into the oven. I set the timer for 15 minutes.
...then flipped them over.
They were lightly golden. Can I leave well enough alone? No!
I wanted extra-crunch, so I turned on the broiler and placed the rack on the highest position. Coconut can burn fast, so I watched the chicken closely-- after 2 minutes, I flipped them over.
I present to you extra-crispy coconut chicken. In less than 45 minutes from start to finish-- including photographing, and wiping off flour and egg from my camera.
This is family friendly. Kids would love it, too.
TASTING NOTES: I dedicate this recipe to my BFF of 35 years. Patty loves coconut, and I am absolutely sure that she would love this dinner. This dinner is really fast and easy to make. I loved the crunchy texture of the coconut. The apricot-pineapple jam was perfect with each bite. Craig loved it, too. For a moment, I thought that shrimp would be a great substitute, but I'd be afraid of overcooking it. There's nothing worse than rubbery over-cooked shrimp. I'll stick to chicken, and I will definitely make this again. Make this. Seriously. It's lip-smacking good with plain white or coconut rice.
Thanks "Pennies on a Platter" for sharing this recipe. I love Nikki's blog, with her beautiful photographs and mouth-watering recipes. Had it not been for Pinterest, I might not have found her.
A printable recipe card is at the very end of this post. If you can't view it (on Internet Explorer), click here to be directed to Key Ingredient.
Who doesn't love a fresh doughnut? I recall the first time I walked inside a Krispy Kreme doughnut shop. It was the late 90's and we were in Southern California. My son's eyes grew as big as doughnuts as he watched freshly baked doughnuts coming out of vats of oil, and then roll down a conveyor belt and into a glaze "jacuzzi". As we both bit into a warm doughnut, we were in sugar heaven. I don't want to think about how many fat grams we indulged in, but they sure were good! It's a very good thing that we don't have a Krispy Kreme store anywhere less than a 90-minute drive away. There is a local doughnut shop (Red's Doughnuts) where we live that makes some of the tastiest assortment of doughnuts I've ever had. I avoid that place, because I wouldn't be able to decide between their custard-filled bar with chocolate glaze, applesauce, devil's food or glazed old-fashioned doughnuts. By sheer willpower, I've avoided doughnut shops for a few years, because I don't need the guilt of over-indulging. I love baked goods far more than I should. I have another weakness, however. It's called "Cost Plus/World Market" stores. We have two within 15 minutes of where I live and work. They send me coupons, and I can't let them go to waste.
At World Market, I spotted a Mini-Doughnut pan for about $10.00. I must have picked it up and set it back down several times. King Arthur Flour sells them for $15.95, plus shipping...and I had a coupon. I gave in, and it came home with me. This is the time of year when many of us try to lose those extra Thanksgiving and Christmas pounds. Still, a baked treat can't be all that bad. Can it? I settled on making a recipe for baked doughnuts that I found on the King Arthur Flour Recipe Website. I carefully read the reviews, many of which were positive. Whenever someone writes a negative review, I try to figure out what might have gone wrong and what can I do to improve it. I have a bag of Arrow Mills Organic Pastry Flour, so I decided to use that instead of cake flour. According to their website site, "it is made from soft wheat berries grown each Spring in the fertile San Luis Valley of Colorado, Arrowhead Mills Pastry Flour provides a finer texture and lighter consistency with low gluten content. It's perfect for flaky and delicate pastries and cakes." I keep 1% buttermilk on hand, so I decided not to use buttermilk powder.
Since the doughnuts won't be deep-fried, I read that it's important to heavily grease use a non-stick spray-- even though the pan is non-stick. Done.
The pastry flour is unbleached (and I never buy bleached flour). Though it has whole grain, it's milled very fine.
So, here are the dry ingredients-- pastry flour (you can use unbleached all-purpose, but pastry flour is supposed to yield a tender cake), nutmeg, cinnamon, baking powder and sugar. For the wet ingredients, I used 3 Tablespoons of 1% Buttermilk, and 3 Tablespoons ofcanola oil (instead of vegetable oil).
I believe I've mentioned my addiction to the King Arthur Shopping Website, and I'm not paid to say so. I've also touted my fondness for their Buttery Sweet Dough Bakery Emulsion. I can best describe the aroma as smelling like yellow cake batter. Trust me, you want to drink it, but I add a teaspoon of this to most of my baked goods. (Otherwise, I recommend adding 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract.) I've been using their Cake Enhancer with great success. I don't fully understand the chemistry behind why it works, but it does-- it makes my cakes stay extra-moist, for several days. Pour the liquid ingredients all at once into the dry ingredients and stir just until combined.
I gently folded the batter, but didn't work up the gluten. (That makes for tough pastries, ya know). You can see the wheat in the flour, because of the dark brown color. There is pastry flour that has less wheat it in it, so use that if you prefer. Some reviewers suggested pouring the batter into a ziploc bag (I was too lazy busy to dig out my pastry bags).
I was cautioned not to overfill each well, or the "whole" would fuse together and it won't look like a doughnut. I think you could spoon these in just as well.
Bake the doughnuts in a preheated 375°F oven for 10 to 12 minutes. When done, they’ll spring back when touched lightly, and will be quite brown on the top. (Mine took about 9 minutes.)
Remove the doughnuts from the oven, remove them from the pan, and allow them to cool on rack. To me, they looked like flat muffins. I wasn't sure if I was impressed. I could have dipped them in melted chocolate and called it a day. I could have sprinkled them, and that would have been lovely. But, I'm trying to make these as guilt-free as possible.
I decided to go with cinnamon-sugar. Since the doughnuts weren't fried in oil, I decided to spritz them, lightly, with some water (rather than melted butter).
That did the trick! I brewed a cup of coffee and decided to give these a taste test.
VERDICT: At first bite, I thought the doughnut was less than exciting. I questioned my wisdom in using a whole wheat pastry flour. They were tender, yes, but I wasn't digging the wheatiness of the flavor. I was underwhelmed, as was my husband. But, wait! The very next morning, something magical happened when I tried them again. The doughnuts were stored in an air-tight container, the night before. The flavor had changed, and to the better! In all honesty, these baked doughnuts won't fool any kind of doughnut connoisseur. But, with a cup of hot coffee these remind me a bit of Mexican Churros (without the grease).
I see possibilities with this recipe, and I'll try them again. Next tie, I'll use regular pastry flour, or a mixture of whole wheat and all-purpose. Rather than glazing these, or dipping them in melted chocolate-- I'll just make the real thing if I'm going to spring for a fat and sugar-rush of that caliber. Sometimes, you just have to indulge in a traditional doughnut and I plan to make traditional doughnuts, in the future-- just so I can say I learned how to do it. This recipe is certainly quick to put together, and a lot less messier than heating oil. They're also easier on the arteries and waistline, and that's a good thing. On a scale of 1-5 for flavor, I give these 3 1/2 stars. With some tweaking, next time, I think these could earn an extra star or two.
What a wild week it's been with my hectic work schedule! Next Tuesday, I begin my vacation until January 3rd. Today, I managed to get the tree and house decorated. I was feeling a time crunch to write a review for Artisan Bakeware and for Tate's Bake Shop. Last week, I received a lovely small unglazed loaf pan from Artisan Bakeware.
I have only a few pieces of stoneware, and I have to say that I liked the feel of this American hand-painted baking product.
Right after Thanksgiving, I received this lovely package in the mail, from Tate's Bakery:
...and I also received:
...a copy of Tate's Bake Shop owner, Kathleen King's, cookbook. I bookmarked a dozen recipes. It's a lovely cookbook, indeed.
Alas, the cookies are all gone and I didn't have time to blog my own giveaway as quickly as I had hoped (as so many of my fellow food bloggers have). I ate two each of the chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal raisin and macadamia nut (in a three-day period). I'm going to talk more about which cookies we liked best when I do post a Tates Bake Shop giveaway (my next post, I promise) and that is when I will give one lucky reader a chance to win the same cookie package, and cookbook, for your own home. Today, I want to be fair to Artisan Bakeware, by focusing on reviewing how their product worked . Fortunately, I found a recipe for Double Berry Crumb Muffins on page 14 of the Tate's Bake Shop Cookbook. I decided to double the recipe so that I could bake a "tea loaf".
Since I live in California, we grown our own olallieberries in our backyard. I also buy extra from a local farm stand, and then freeze them in 2 cup increments. Chinese take-out style boxes are perfect for this:
I do a quick thaw with running water...
(There will be a printable recipe at the bottom of this post.)
Here are the dry ingredients: unbleached flour, sugar, salt and baking powder. I reserved some of the flour and sprinkled them over the berries. I do this so that the berries won't sink to the bottom of each muffin.
Melt 1/2 cup of butter. (You see two sticks, because I'm doubling the recipe.)
The streusel has chopped pecans, brown sugar, flour, butter and fresh orange zest. Set that aside.
The wet ingredients are milk, eggs and the melted butter. Whisk them together, and add to the dry ingredients.
Mix the wet and dry just until combined; don't over mix. Gently fold the berries in. You can grease a muffin tin, but I decided to use muffin liners. This is my large muffin tin, which makes six at a time.
Top each muffin with the streusel. NOTE: Next time, I'll add double the amount of streusel.
Bake at 400F for 20-24 minutes. My muffins were extra-large, so they took a little extra time. A tip I learned from King Arthur Flour-- tip the muffins to one side so that they don't become soggy on the bottom. After a few minutes, move them to a cooling rack.
... and here's the muffin recipe as a sweet loaf of goodness.
Taking a deep breath, I rotated the pan and the loaf slipped right out! For the final test, I wondered how easy this unglazed loaf pan would be to clean...
Effortless! Just like new!
POTTERY REVIEW: I strive to be respectful to my planet, my country and my health. Emmerson Creek Pottery is American made. Their products are lead-free and they're hand-painted. This loaf pan retails for $11.00 on their website. My wish list-- and that means I'd love to own more of this product-- would be the larger loaf pan, that retails for $19.00. If wishes were fishes, I'd want the unglazed deep dish pizza pan, retail price $23.00. I spent some time perusing their website, and I took a particular liking to their lavender hand painted design. I think that any of these pieces would make a beautiful heirloom that will last for many years to come.
Recipe Review: I love to bake homemade muffins for breakfast. I was able to make this batter in 15 minutes, plus take photographs. This recipe is easy enough for beginner bakers. The texture of the muffins were moist and very tender. There were a LOT of berries, so decrease the amount if you prefer more muffin to berry ratio. My husband adores berries, so he was very happy with the way I made them. The cinnamon is very subtle, and the sweetness was just right. I would definitely layer more streusel on top (which explains why I had some leftover), and maybe chop my pecans not quite as small as I did this time (I cheated and used a mini-chopper). I loved the orange zest, which complimented the cinnamon and berries perfectly. The "tea loaf" was equally moist. On a five star rating, this earned a 4 1/2 by my husband, son and me. I ate one, thank you very much. How's that for willpower? The boys will devour the rest, no doubt.
I'm baking another Tate's Bake Shop recipe, as I type this post. I will queue that post, next, and tell you how you could win an assortment of Tate's Bake Shop Cookies and a cookbook of your own. So, if you didn't win on the multitude of other bloggers who had this giveaway-- maybe this is your lucky chance!
Here's the recipe, and I hope you try these!
I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255 Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. Tomoson Product review & giveaway Disclosure.
