King Arthur Flour , and Baked Doughnuts -- The Non "Krispy Kreme"

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.

 

Healthy Healthier Baking!

Cheese & Rosemary Shortbread Crackers

Today's post is one of the simplest and quickest savory snack crackers that were a lovely complement to the Roasted Butternut Squash & Apple Soup that I made last weekend.  I discovered this recipe on Style at Home.com,  The only change I made to the original recipe was that I used a Quattro Formaggio blend of shredded cheese, instead of white cheddar.  If there had been white cheddar in my fridge, I would have used it. The four-cheese blend, that I buy at Trader Joe's has Fontina, Asiago, Parmesan and Mild Provolone cheese.

Fortunately, we have a healthy rosemary bush in our yard. I chopped a couple of sprigs of rosemary to equal about two teaspoons.  Thyme would be a nice substitute, too.

In a bowl, I measured about 1-1/4 cups of shredded cheese. To that I added 3/4 cup of unbleached flour, 1/2 teaspoon cracked black pepper and 1/4 teaspoon of coarse salt.

...and 1/2 teaspoon of dry mustard

I also decided to kick up the flavor with a pinch of Cayenne....

...and then the finely chopped rosemary.

You need a stick of softened unsalted butter. Yes, one stick. (That's why homemade crackers taste so good).  You can use a hand-mixer, your own hands if you wish. I use my stand mixer, because it makes my life a little easier. I need that, because of my crazy work schedule!

Begin, by beating the butter until smooth.  Now add the dry ingredients to the creamed butter...

..and gently blend until combined.   You don't want to overbeat it!

 That's good...

Next, tear a large piece of plastic wrap....

Dump the dough onto the plastic wrap and pat the dough together...

...and start to shape the dough into a log.  I'm going for an oblong shape. Round is good, too.

Chill this for at least two hours, but you can make these a few days ahead.  I took a shortcut and popped the dough into the freezer for an hour. Preheat the oven to 325F. 

 

Slice the log into 1/4-inch rounds (or oblongs.. or squares) and place rounds 2 inches apart on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. 

 Bake on the middle rack of oven until cookies are lightly golden around the edges, about 20 to 22 minutes.

Be prepared for the aroma of cheese, and savory goodness!

Allow them to cool completely. If you can.

VERDICT:  These are super easy to make.  If you hoard cheeses as much as I do, you can switch around different blends to create your own combination that you like best.  The crackers are very tender, though. They're not as dense as other crackers I've tried.  I'd describe these are resembling Parmesan Crisps.  In other words, I'm not 100% sure that these crackers are dense enough to support slathering cream cheese and red pepper jelly on them-- which is one of my biggest indulgences.  Still, these disappeared very fast. They're addicting, I promise you.  They are buttery, and the cheese gave a nutty and salty flavor.  The rosemary was subtle and the cayenne added a subtle heat. My family kept filching them, include Yours Truly.  My co-workers enjoyed them.  

...and they are kind of cute as a soup garnish.

The printable recipe is at the bottom of this post.  I'm making this short and sweet, because I'm feeling as though a cold might be trying to get the better of me.  Hopefully, with some rest, I can get started with my own Thanksgiving prep work-- and I hope to upload some more recipes I made last week.

One more week until Turkey and all the fixin's. Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

 

Bread and Butter Pickles, Made Easy

"Learn how to make pickles" has been on my recipe Bucket List for a long time.  It's somewhere between "Learn how to make sourdough bread" and "Learn if there is such a thing as non-fat Puff Pastry".  Me thinks I'll never find the answer to the last thing on my list, but one can only hope.   While shopping at my local farm stand, I asked "Sarah" if I still had more time for their organic fresh-picked strawberries.  I have learned how to make my own jam, and I want to be sure my cupboards are stocked with Olallieberry Jam, Strawberry Jam, Apricot-Pineapple jam and-- my personal favorite-- Raspberry Jam.   Sarah didn't hear me say "strawberries" so she blurted out that if I wanted pickling cucumbers that I'd better get them now!

So the moment had arrived.  It was time to kick the bucket... the list, that is! So, I grabbed some cucumbers, hoping that I had enough.  When I arrived home, I went to my most trusted source of  recipe sources...Food Blogs!  There are a lot of ways to make Bread & Butter Pickles, but I wanted something easy.  Smitten Kitten provided the perfect recipe for me! So, here are the six ingredients I needed, most of which I had on hand. Well, one onion could count for seven, but I count that as a vegetable.

These are a pound of picking cucumbers...

I have a cute little crinkle cutter,  so I decided to put it to good use. These are about 1/4" thickness.  You could use a mandoline, or a sharp knife. I used a mandoline to slice the onion very thin...

Well, now my math is off!  You need salt, so that makes eight ingredients!  I used kosher salt. I've heard of picking salt, but I didn't want to invest in too many ingredients, in case my first attempt at pickle making was a flop.

Give this all a nice "mix" and...

...cover with ice and relax for two hours. 

Now, drain the the cucumbers and, then, put them in a pot. Grab a smaller pot and turn the stove to medium-high heat...

...and add the coriander seeds, mustard seeds, tumeric, and celery seed. Bring to a boil, and pour over the cucumbers.  Bring the pickles and juice back, just to a boil, and remove from heat. 

NOTE: When I first tasted the pickles, I thought that I misunderstood, and should have rinsed the salt. They were salty!  I later realized there was no need to panic. These didn't taste like what I had hoped until a few hours later.

 I decided to boil some water, and do the water bath method for canning.  I could hear the lids "ping" as the cooling of the jars sealed the pickles.  I left one jar, unopened, because I made "Sliders" and I thought the pickles would be a perfect test drive with these:

VERDICT: So, how were the pickles?  Craig loved them.  I have to admit that I'm not a fan of dill pickles. If pickles are mistakenly put on my burgers, I confess that I will quickly remove the offending condiment.  But these pickles are very different.  My son, who has inherited my dislike of dill pickles refused to try one. I gave him those "Mama Guilty-Puppy Eyes".  He ate one. Then another.  These are sweet, but not overly sweet. Many recipes I saw use a lot more sugar. Increase or decrease, according to your taste. Just keep two things in mind-- the saltiness mellowed by the next day. The sweetness increased by the next day.  There's a nice bonus to eating these pickles-- I love it when I bite into a coriander seed. Mmmmm!

This weekend, I hope that Sarah still has some cucumbers for me. I'm making more.  If you're on my Christmas list, please pretend you didn't see this post.  It might be in your gift basket.

The printable recipe is at the bottom of this post.  So, what's on your Recipe Bucket List?

Enjoy!