Pumpernickel Bagels

During one of my library's recent cookbook book club meetings, we all made recipes out of the Smitten Kitchen.  I decided to make the pumpernickel grissini for no other reason than I wanted an excuse to use the word grissini.  It's just the Italian word for breadstick, but it's fancy!  It was also an excuse to work with a type of flour that I never use - rye.  

However, it was more economical to purchase the five pound bag of rye flour.  However, I only need to 1/4 cup for the recipe.  What do these howevers equal?  It equals me needing to find other things to make with rye flour.  Enter pumpernickel bagels.

Bagels are a breakfast treat in my world.  I think college Sunday hangovers, stumbling to the coffee shop or diner to for greasy hangover-cure-food.  There is still something so devilishly wonderful about butter dripping off of eggs and sausage on a toasted bagel.  But...bagels are not something I ever considered making at home.  It just seemed like too much of a bother when I can just walk to the coffee shop and get a bagel.  With nearly five pounds of rye flour in the pantry though, my thoughts on bagels made the necessary shift to being my next culinary adventure.

Pumpernickel Bagels

Ingredients:

1 1/4 c. warm water
1 c. whole-wheat flour
4 tsp. active dry yeast
1 c. rye flour
1/2 c. molasses
1/3 c. unsweetened cocoa powder
1 Tbsp vegetable oil
2 Tbsp caraway seeds
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/4 c. all-purpose flour

Directions:

Mix warm water, whole-wheat flour, and yeast together in a small bowl. Let stand until the yeast softens and begins to froth and bubble, about 10 minutes. 

Look at those bubbles!

Mix rye flour, molasses, cocoa powder, vegetable oil, caraway seeds, and salt in a large bowl. Add the yeast mixture and all-purpose flour.  Mix until it becomes a gummy dough then turn out onto a floured surface. 

 Knead until smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. Transfer dough to greased bowl.

Cover with warm damp towel or plastic wrap. Let rise in a warm area until doubled in size, about 1 hour. It was a pretty cool day so my apartment reflected that temp.  I let my oven heat at the lowest temp while I was making the dough, then when it was time for it to proof, I turned the oven off and put in my dough.

Once the dough has risen, preheat an oven to 450F and grease a baking sheet. Bring water to a boil in a large pot. 

Divide dough into 13 pieces and shape into balls. Using your thumb, press a hole into the center of each dough ball.  Pull the dough a bit to form a 1-inch hole in the center, keeping dough about 1/2-inch thick. 

Drop dough circles into boiling water, 3 or 4 at a time, and boil for 45 seconds. Remove with a slotted spoon and drain for about 1 minute. Arrange boiled bagels on prepared baking sheet. 

Bake bagels in the preheated oven until just starting to brown on the bottom, 8 to 10 minutes.

The bagels came out a lot smaller than I expected them too.  I really thought they would grow in the oven, but they didn't.  I'm not complaining though.  They baked up beautifully.  The outside was nice and chewy and they were completely cooked.  Because they were smaller, two made for a perfect breakfast with a little jam.

White Bean Hash with Eggs

Breakfast is not a very sexy meal.  It's functional.  We wake up and eat eggs or oatmeal.  Sometimes it's cereal or a little fruit and yogurt.  None of these are the most inspiring dishes.  Though, I will give oatmeal and eggs some credit.  They can get pretty fancy.  Ever baked an egg inside an avocado?  Fancy.  But, in general, we eat breakfast to get our day started right and we go for as much bang for as little effort as possible. 

For the few times we might want a little more effort put into our breakfast, but not necessarily wanting to do it ourselves, there is the diner.  I love going to diners for breakfast.  I want pancakes. I want oversized omelets with a ton of ingredients.  I want eggs benedict over an English muffin. I want home fries. I want corned beef hash.  Hmmm.  I seem to want a lot of things, but everything always tastes so good at the diner!

The hash thing is something I've only recently come around to.  The idea of hash - random things thrown together - didn't really appeal to me.  Which, honestly, is pretty strange.  I have never shied away from weird things all thrown together in one pot.  However, I have always been in control of the weird choices, maybe that was the difference.  I need to be the arbiter of weird, not some anonymous diner chef.

So here we are.  This is my offering to the breakfast gods - a very unsexy and a little weird, kitchen and pantry throw together hash.

White Bean Hash with Eggs

 

Ingredients:

 

1 onion  - chopped
2 medium carrots - chopped
1 tomatoes - diced
1 can cannellini beans - rinsed and drained
Eggs - fried

Directions:

Heat some oil in a large skillet and cook onions until they are soft, about 7 minutes.  Add the carrots and cook another 7 minutes.

 

 

Add the diced tomatoes and cover.  Cook for about 10 minutes.  You want the tomatoes to soften up and almost create a sauce.

 

 

 

Add the cannellini beans, cover, and cook for an additional 10 minutes.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Now come the eggs.

 

 

I decided to cook the eggs with the hash still in the skillet.  If you wanted, you could transfer the hash to a bowl and then cook your eggs.  This hash is enough for 4 servings.

 

 

See...not sexy.  But... it made for a great weekend breakfast.  The combination of the beans and the eggs made this dish quite filling. It was a nice break from my typical fruit and oatmeal.

 



Blood Orange and Cardamom Scones

I had not quite gotten my fill of scones after last week and decided I should get a bit more creative with my next batch.  Cardamom is a spice that I had only heard of fairly recently, thanks to my Great British Bake Off obsession.  Based on what had been said about the spice, I was not really chomping at the bit to use it.  It sounded like something that needed to be treated with care and that is not generally my style.  But, I decided it was time to put on my big girl pants and use an adult level spice.

The choice to use blood oranges was entirely last minute.  I was in the grocery store staring at the orange display.  On my left were the regular oranges, in the center were the organic oranges, and to my right the blood oranges.  I love blood oranges, mainly because of the color.  So there I am in the store looking at the options, looking at the prices, looking back at the options.  There is only the slightest difference in cost...that does it.  I throw caution to the wind and into my cart go the blood oranges.

I write "caution" with only the slightest bit of sarcasm.  It's not like I went from wanting to use an orange to instead choosing garlic.  We are still solidly inside the citrus category and remaining under the subheading orange.  I realize this, but I still felt a little like a rebel choosing to use the blood orange.

Thankfully, they did not disappoint me and hopefully they do not disappoint you either.

Blood Orange and Cardamom Scones

Ingredients:

2 c. flour

1/4 c. sugar

1 Tbsp baking powder

5 Tbsp unsalted butter - cold
1 tsp. cardamom 

Grated peel from 1 blood orange

Juice of  1/2 a blood orange (should be about 1 tablespoon)

1/2 c. whole milk

1 egg

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Sift flour, sugar, and baking powder together.  Gently stir in the cardamom and grated blood orange.

Using a pastry cutter, cut in the butter until it forms coarse crumbles.  Add egg, milk, and blood orange juice.  Stir until liquid is just incorporated.

Look at that color, I love it!

You should notice that this batter will quickly absorb the liquids while still appearing on the dry side.  Do not fear and do not add more milk.  At this point you are going to turn out the dough onto a well floured surface.  Briefly knead dough (I counted to 15 to keep myself from over kneading) and form into a ball.

Squish the dough down a bit and cut into the desired shapes.  I went with triangles because that just how my scone game rolls.

Bake for about 15 minutes, until the scones are a nice and brown.  Cool on a wire rack.

These came out better than I could have imagined.  They had subtle hints of citrus and cardamom, nothing was over powering.  The best part?  The smell when they are warm.

I don't know how you all feel about the microwave, but I could not survive without mine.  Since I decided to be selfish and keep these all to myself, I was able to have scones for breakfast for a few days.  I microwaved them for about 20 seconds so that they would be just warm enough for butter to melt on top.  The smell was amazing and basically made the whole week for me.

Lemon Basil Scones

How can you not love a scone?  It's a biscuit, but fancy!  What's even better is that you most likely already have all the necessary ingredients sitting in your pantry and refrigerator.  Flour, sugar, baking powder, butter, and milk - those are the essentials.  Everything after that is the proverbial gravy and turns your average biscuit into a scone, like magic.

For this initial foray into the world of scones, I wanted something fresh and perfect for breakfast.  I did decide to go a bit non-traditional and made these with more milk.  This turned them into drop scones as opposed to a regular scone that would be kneaded, rolled out, and then cut into your desired shape.

Lemon Basil Scones

Ingredients:

2 c. flour

3 Tbsp sugar

1/2 tsp. salt

2 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. baking soda

5 Tbsp unsalted butter - cold

1/2 c. fresh basil - chopped

Grated lemon peel from 2 lemons

Juice of 1 lemon

3/4 c. whole milk

1 egg

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Sift flour, sugar, salt, baking powder, and baking soda together.  Gently stir in the basil and grated lemon.  

Using a pastry cutter, cut in the butter until it forms coarse crumbles.  Add egg, milk, and lemon juice.

This is a actually a very wet dough, so turning it out onto a table, well floured or not, is a very bad idea.  Don't be like me.  What you see above was a real pain to clean up.  Instead, you will want to drop batter onto the baking sheet in amounts the approximate size you would like your scones.

Mmmmm, look at all the lovely fresh basil!

Bake for about 15 minutes, until the scones are nice and brown.  Cool on a wire rack.

They had a wonderful fresh citrus flavor with just a hint of sweetness.  Adding the lemon juice aids in creating an even lemon flavor throughout the scones with just a bit of additional zing from the lemon peel.  This was a great way to start my morning!

Breakfast Croquettes

I took a couple of weeks off from work to enjoy the holidays and visit with family.  One evening, I'm sitting at the kitchen table with one of my brothers and we are discussing food.  The topic turns to food stuffed inside of other food, something I find to be pretty magical.  A particular favorite of mine happens to be cheese stuffed tater tots.  Tater tots are already on my guilty pleasures food list and then you up the ante by stuffing it with cheese.  There is an upscale burger bar in Providence that serves gorgonzola stuffed tater tots.  Does anyone else hear angels singing?

Sorry, I watched Sherlock (the Cumberbatch Incarnation) last night.  Now I have a mind palace and it's stuffed with all things food.  Ha, stuffed!  Sorry, back to business. 

My brain started contemplating all the things I could stuff inside a tater tot and somewhere along the way breakfast hops onto the thought cloud. Then, voilà, the magic mashed potato breakfast croquette is born!

This recipe is not for the faint of heart, however.  Mainly because it is time intensive.  It doesn't really work if you try and stuff a raw egg inside of mashed potatoes.  Eeeewww, even my imagination can't make the idea less gross.  Therefore, first comes the mashed potatoes, then the egg muffins, and then you get to put it all together in food stuffed inside food amazingness.  It may take some time, but it is so worth it.

See...WORTH IT!

Mashed Potato Breakfast Croquette

Ingredients:

 

1/3 c. bell pepper - chopped (I used an orange bell pepper to add some color)

1/4 c. mushrooms - chopped

1 small onion - chopped

1 clove garlic - minced

4 eggs - beaten

6 good sized potatoes

2 Tbsp butter

2 c. shredded cheddar cheese

Enough milk to cut the eggs and make the mashed potatoes (Sorry, I never measure when I make eggs or mashed potatoes, I just add until I'm satisfied with the consistency.)

Salt and pepper to taste

 

Directions:

 

Step 1 - the mashed potatoes.  I chose 6 all purpose white potatoes, the largest in the 5 lb bag.  I peeled and cut them into cubes to boil them faster.  Once they were cooked through, I drained and transferred them to a large bowl.  I mashed them with butter and milk and a little salt and pepper.  My recommendation is to make them the way you would normally make mashed potatoes.  Once they are prepped, cover and put in the refrigerator to cool.

 

Step 2 - the egg muffins.    Preheat oven to 375F.  Heat oil in a sauté pan over medium heat and cook onions for about 5 minutes, enough to soften them.  Add garlic and saute for 30 seconds then add the peppers and mushrooms. 

 

 

 

Continue to cook for an additional 5 minutes.  Add salt and pepper to taste, then remove from heat.  Using a slotted spoon, remove the mixture from the oil and set aside to cool a bit.

 

In a large bowl, beat eggs with a bit of milk.  Add the sauted vegetables and mix well.  Fill muffin tins about halfway and bake for 25 minutes.

 

 

Step 3 - the fun bit.  Crank up the oven to 425F.  Take the cooled mashed potatoes and mix them with the shredded cheese.  Take the egg muffins and cut them into quarters.  Take a spoonful of mashed potatoes and flatten it into a disc,

 

place an egg quarter in the center,

and then cover with more mashed potatoes.  Finish by shaping it into a ball.

Mmmmm, I'm excited already!

Place them onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and then brush with olive oil.

 

 

Bake for 30 minutes.  If you are not satisfied with the color (I wasn't), then pop them under the broiler for an additional 5 minutes.  Now, full disclosure, 2 cups of cheese to 6 potatoes is a pretty high ratio, so the croquettes did not really hold their shape.  I, however, am perfectly fine with this.  They were still amazing.

 

 

Putting them under the broiler for a bit added the nice golden color and ensured they were crisp on the outside as you bit in.  They were perfect.  Crisp on the outside, soft inside, and you could taste all the parts - potatoes, eggs, vegetables, and cheese.  They held their own, but worked perfectly together.  Additional seasoning was unnecessary, the small amounts of salt and pepper during cooking brought out their natural flavors.  These would be a fantastic addition to your next brunch buffet.





Eggs Florentine

I learned a new skill over the weekend - how to poach an egg.  Poaching an egg is no easy task; it is  incredibly fussy.  Of course that means I did not bother to practice awhile and get my technique down before taking on a recipe that required me to poach six eggs.  "Who practices?" She asks while she rolls her eyes at herself knowing full well that smart people practice.  Nope, you will be witnessing my first ever poaching attempt.  I warn you now, they were tasty but a few look pretty darn ugly. On the bright side, I officially knocked out two more of Maria Luisa's recipes and none of the yolks broke prematurely.

However, no Italian Cookbook Challenge posting would be complete without some sort of complaint.  Don't roll your eyes at me, you know you find my unnecessary anger hilarious.  There are 420 recipes in The Italian Cookbook.  I'm fine with that because I wholeheartedly believe that not only are there 420 Italian recipes worthy of being in a cookbook, there are likely a half dozen other recipes not included for every one that makes it in.  Therefore, I find it more than a little annoying that she gave space to a recipe entitled "Spinach in Butter."  Why?  Why must "Spinach in Butter" take up page space in this book?  Why couldn't she just include "saute spinach in butter" as part of the directions for all the recipes that required buttered spinach?  I love spinach, but this recipe does not deserve the two inches of real estate it took up on a 7 1/2 inch page. [Yes, I measured.]  That being said, you will still find the recipe below.  At this point, it would be plain unfair to not include it after ranting about it.

Spinach in Butter

Spinaci al Burro

[Disclaimer first...I am only giving you the Spinach in Butter recipe first because it is required as part of the first sentence in the Eggs Florentine directions.  These recipes are listed in order of necessity not importance.]

Ingredients:

1 1/2 lbs spinach

6 Tbsp butter

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Fill a large sauce pot with about an inch or two of water and add some salt.  Bring to a boil and then add the spinach.  Cover and cook for about 10 minutes.  Drain well.  Melt butter in a large saute pan and add cooked spinach.  Sprinkle on some salt and pepper.  Stirring occasionally, cook for about 5 minutes.  You want some of the excessive moisture to evaporate off.

Eggs Florentine

Uova alla Fiorentina

Ingredients:

6 lightly poached eggs

1 recipe Spinach in Butter

1/2 recipe Mornay Sauce

3 Tbsp Parmesan cheese - grated

pepper to taste

Directions:

Take the previously prepared spinach and place in a 9 x 9 baking dish.  Level the top with the back of a spoon and place the poached eggs on top.  I poached my eggs for 3 minutes each in simmering water.

Pour the Mornay Sauce on top and sprinkle with cheese.  At no point in these directions does she ever mention the "pepper to taste" ingredient.  I'm going to tell you to add some pepper here or maybe add it prior to the addition of the cheese and sauce.  You could also wait and crack some pepper on top after it's baked...whatever rocks you culinary world.

Bake for 15 minutes in an oven preheated to 350F.

I was a little worried that baking the eggs would cook the yolk completely, but they were still wonderfully runny when I finally pierced them with my fork.  While the poaching process was a little stressful, it was worth it in the end.  The next time I make breakfast for friends they might just find themselves feasting on this recipe.

Banana Spice Muffins

I was walking down the hallway at work the other day trying to convince myself that stopping at the market on the way home to purchase quick oats was not the worst errand ever.  My normal work day breakfast is 1/2 c. quick oats, 1/2 c. milk, and 1 banana shaken together and left in the fridge overnight.  For me, it's perfect.  I feel full and ready for the day.  However, I was out of oats, so if I wanted my regular b-fast I was going to need to make a stop at the store.  But then a case of extreme laziness set in.  And when I say extreme, I mean extreme.  There is a grocery store lit-er-ah-ly on the way home.  I would not have to take a detour.  To make a right into the store parking lot, walk into the store, walk over to aisle 4, walk to the self check out, feed my 2 singles into the machine, get my 9 cents change, walk back to my car, and make a right back onto the street would add a whopping 6 minutes to my ride home.  Yes, extremely lazy that day.

So, honestly, the fight going on in my head is me saying I need oats so I can make my breakfast and the other me saying I don't want to take the extra effort to stop at the store.  My answer is the mentally sort through the items in my fridge and pantry, an exercise that reveals I have everything I need for banana muffins.  And folks, we now have our winner.  So instead of spending 6 minutes to buy quick oats, I spend 45 minutes prepping and baking banana spice muffins.  Though, let's be real...muffins were the obvious choice.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda  
1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

3 large bananas, mashed

3/4 c. white sugar

1 egg

1/3 c. butter, melted

1 tsp. vanilla

Directions

Preheat oven to 350F and prep muffin tray with liners.

In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

 
In another large bowl, melt butter.  Then add bananas and smash.

Add sugar, egg, vanilla, nutmeg, and cinnamon, then mix.  

Stir in the flour mixture.  Once thoroughly combined, scoop into  muffin tray.

Back for 25 to 30 minutes.

This recipe will make 12 muffins and about 10 minutes from being done your kitchen will begin to smell like spicy banana heaven.  These will come out having a distinct spice cake flavor.  If that's not something you enjoy, take out or reduce the nutmeg.

Cooking with Dad

I definitely get my foundational cooking skills from my mother but, my comfort with just throwing things together and seeing what happens should be attributed to my father.  Most nights mom would be home with enough time to cook dinner or she would put something in the crock pot for us. However, every once in a while, we would be left to our own devices.

Coming from a family in which all of us cook, that was never an issue.  But, the results, that's where it gets interesting.  I remember two such instances where dad and I got experimental with the contents of the fridge and pantry.  One experiment turned out pretty great.  We aimed for meat sauce, we got something more along the lines of American Chop Suey.  Not surprising since we used about 2 pounds of ground meat to only one can of crushed tomatoes.  We threw in a few vegetables, shook in a few herbs, tossed it on top of some elbow macaroni, and called it complete.  I do remember getting the eyebrow from my father, the eyebrow that said "what will your mom think?"  We would not have been to high up on her list of favorite people if she found out we used 2 pounds of meat for an inedible dinner.  Luckily, that meal actually tasted good.  Experiment number two was a different story.

The take-away from Experiment 2?  Do not put orange juice into a hot saute pan.  All you get is an ugly sticky mess.  That mess was supposed to be sauce for the chicken breasts.  We started with the best of intentions and, if I remember correctly: orange juice, maple syrup, soy sauce, and some random spices.  I think we started off with the desire for something citrus with Asian flair.  The maple syrup comes in because maple syrup flows like water in that house and if it tastes good on kielbasa, why wouldn't it taste good on chicken.  It does taste good on chicken, just not when it's been added directly over the chicken while it's in a hot pan.  I also walked away with a health respect for pre-planning and marinades.  Oh, was that meal gross, edible, but gross.  We ate it though, we made it so we ate it.

Today's recipe is an homage to the throw together recipes of my youth and the way I cook for myself on a regular basis.



Step 1: Look in the fridge
Step 2: Look in the pantry
Step 3: Go back to the fridge and pull stuff out
Step 4: Go back to the pantry and pull other stuff out
Step 5: Put it all together
Step 6: Cross your fingers

Breakfast Lasagna

Get in the kitchen and get creative!

Breakfast for Dinner

One of the most fun meals we would get growing up was corn pancakes for dinner.  Corn pancakes do not exactly scream circus parade but, there is something inherently fun about flipping the script on dinner.  And, as a kid and adult, there is something deliciously wrong about being allowed to pour maple syrup all over your evening meal.

For corn pancakes, all you do is add a can of corn, end of story.  That simple addition makes a few pancakes much heartier and more appropriate for dinner.  Though, it definitely takes pancakes from carb overload to carb universe. 

The one thing to be mindful of is the moisture content.  Make sure the can is drained completely.  Additions also can change the cooking time.  In this case, the corn makes the cakes a bit thicker and could increase cooking time.  You might be tempted to increase the griddle heat but that means you risk browning the cakes before the middle is cooked through.

Now, on to the good stuff...

Ingredients:

1/2 c. milk + 3 Tbsp
2 Tbsp melted butter
1 egg
1 c. flour
2 tsp. baking powder
2 Tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp. salt

Directions:

Combine the milk, butter, and egg.  Beat lightly.  Into a separate bowl, sift the dry ingredients.  Add the dry mixture to the milk mixture all at once and stir just enough to dampen flour.  Then add corn.

Add small amounts of milk until the mixture resembles the consistency of heavy cream.  This should be approximately 3 Tbsp of milk.

 



Heat electric griddle to 350F.  This should only take a couple of minutes.  Spoon mixture onto griddle.  They're ready for flipping when bubbles form.  I used a 1/4 c. measure as my spoon.

Use the corner of a spatula to test if the pancakes are cooked through.  Each side should take approximately 3 minutes.  I was able to make 10 pancakes.