Cooking with Alicia & Annie: Homemade Italian Bread

Yay!! An Italian Bread recipe that tastes wonderful and is easy to make :) I'm so happy! I will be making this bread every week with our spaghetti dinner. Mmmmmm!

The recipe for this delicious Italian bread can be found here. This post is an entry into the January Cooking with Alicia & Annie blog event. Anyone can join and there's always a bonus prize!

Italian Bread

1 package active dry yeast
1 1/2 c. warm water
1 T. shortening, melted or oil
1 T. sugar
1 1/2 t. salt
4 c. flour (I used bread flour)

Sprinkle yeast on water in large bowl. Stir to dissolve. Add sugar, salt, and half of flour. Stir to combine.

Add melted shortening and rest of flour. Mix well. Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead about 5 minutes.

Place dough into a greased bowl in warm place and cover with towel. Let rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour.

Punch down and knead for one minute. Divide in half and shape in loaves (roll up and pinch very tightly).

Place on greased cookie sheet, seam side down, slice top with white sharp knife, then cover with a towel. Let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about an hour.

Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes or until it sounds hollow when tapped. Can be brushed with butter afterwards or brushed with egg white before and sprinkle with sesame or poppy seeds.

Allow to cool on a rack for at least 5-10 minutes before slicing.

Homemade Ice Cream Recipes: Oreo & Butter Pecan

I recently tried two ice cream recipes. Both were wonderful, though the butter pecan's texture was more than of ice milk. However, that could have been because I didn't let the pecan mixture cool down enough first? Who knows, they were both yummy!

First - Oreo Ice Cream

This recipe comes from my blogging friend, Culinary Cory. Check out his blog, he's always cooking up soemthing fabulous! While he kept his Oreos in much larger chunks, I chopped mine small as my hubby has trouble eating the larger pieces. I loved the smell of this recipe as I was making it, it reminded me of my childhood. It smelled like English custard that my mother and grandmother used to make. :) I was a little surprised by the very dark color after adding the chopped cookies, but it was truly delicious and everyone here loved it! Thanks Cory!

Homemade Oreo Ice Cream

3 cups half-and-half
6 egg yolks (I saved the whites for egg white omelets the next morning)
2/3 cup sugar
2 tsp. vanilla extract
12 – 15 Double Stuffed Oreo Cookies, roughly chopped (I chopped mine small and used 15)

Heat the half-and-half in a sauce pan, over medium heat, until bubbles forms around the edges. Beat the egg yolks and sugar, on medium high speed, until combined and forms yellow ribbons. Reduce the mixer to low speed. Slowly add the hot half-and-half to the egg mixture until well combined. It is important to pour slowly to prevent the eggs from curdling.

Pour the combined liquid back into the sauce pan and cook over medium-low heat. Stir constantly for about 5 – 8 minutes until thickened and coats the back of the spoon. Pour the liquid through a fine-meshed sleeve into a bowl. (This took a while to get through the sieve, but well worth the effort)  Add the vanilla and chill in the refrigerator until completely cooled.

Pour the cream into the ice-cream machine and freeze according to the manufacturer’s directions. In the last 15 minutes of the churning process, add the chopped Oreos. Spoon into a lidded container and freeze until completely hardened. The freezing should take about 2 hours. Makes about 1 quart.

Second - Butter Pecan Ice Cream

I found this recipe at Alicia's Recipes and will be entering it into the Cooking With Alicia & Annie blog event. Very tasty but has LOTS of pecans. You could probably cut these down to almost half and still be happy with it. If you like a lot, keep it the same, you'll get pecans in every bite :) 

Butter Pecan Ice Cream

2 tbsp. butter
1 c. chopped pecans
3/4 c. honey
2 c. milk
2 c. heavy cream
1-1/2 tbsp. vanilla
Instructions

Saute pecans in butter until lightly brown. Cool. Warm honey in saucepan. Mix all ingredients together except pecans, then stir in pecans. Pour into freezer and freeze.

I'm always on the lookout for good ice cream recipes, so if you have one, pass it on!

Announcement: Annie has a new blog!

As you may already know, I am the host of the Cooking with Alicia and Annie blog event where you choose recipes from Annie's Recipes and Alicia's Recipes websites and enter to win prizes. While the event's blog will remain where it is, I've started a new blog for both Alicia's and Annie's site newsletters! Alicia's is still under construction, but Annie's has made its debut today. Please stop by and take a look!

The new blog for Annie's Recipes will serve as the website's newsletter. So if you would like to be kept up to date on new recipes, articles, cooking tips and more, be sure to subscribe by email or in your favorite reader by visiting the blog now.

Remember, to check out the monthly blog event that earns you great prizes, but to receive updates on new recipes and other goodies, be sure to keep track of Annie's new blog as well.

Thanks!

TWD: Berry Surprise Cake

Well, I'm not having much luck with Dorie's recipes this month. Not sure why, but it's just not working out. :( I made this cake, and not sure if I overwhipped the eggs or overfolded the ingredients or what, but the cake fell while in the oven and tasted awful. It may have been my husband and oldest son horsing around near the oven and they may have caused it to fall, but it definitely wasn't spongy!

The filling was blah, and the whipped topping even more blah. It just wasn't sweet enough for me. I actually had some prettier pictures of this cake but accidentally deleted them (see the LOSER post below).

It sure did come out pretty though! The Berry Surprise Cake was chosen by Mary Ann of Meet Me in the Kitchen and hers look lovely :) 

Old Farmer's Oatmeal Bread

As I said before, I am trying to make more bread instead of buying it. We love having bread with dinner, so I have started trying different recipes I have. Just like the Herb Cheese Bread, this recipe also comes from The Old Farmer's Almanac Everyday Cookbook.

I'll admit, when I it came to the step that called for adding the molasses I was skeptical. I was very worried that the taste of the bread would be "weird" and that my family would turn their noses up. The molasses also gave this bread a deep brown color. Despite my concerns I carried on and finished the recipe. 

Much to my surprise this bread was delicious AND my family all liked it! It actually had a bit of a nutty flavor, even though there were not nuts. This bread would be wonderful with some sunflower seeds thrown in!

Here's the recipe, please let me know if you try it :)

The Old Farmer's Favorite Oatmeal Bread

(makes 3 loaves, I froze two)

2 packages active dry yeast (4 1/2 teaspoons)

3 cups quick cooking rolled oats

4 cups boiling water

7 1/2 - 8 cups bread flour, divided (I actually had to add an additional cup)

1 tablespoon salt

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1/2 cup molasses

Grease three 9x5 loaf pans. Dissolve or proof the yeast in 1/4 cup lukewarm water in a small bowl. Place the oats in a large bowl and pour the boiling water over them (make sure all the oats are covered but don't stir). Cool to lukewarm.

Stir in two cups of flour and the yeast mixture. Cover, put in a warm place, and allow to rise until doubled in bulk. 

Punch down (this was so wet that punching down was a mess LOL) and add the salt, oil, molasses and enough remaining flour (I added all the remaining flour plus one cup) to make a firm dough. Knead on a floured board until the dough is smooth and pliable.

Divide and shape into three loaves, then place each in a loaf pan (this is where I wrapped the other two loaves and put them in the freezer). Cover and allow to rise until nearly doubled. 

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Bake for 40 minutes, or until the bread is well browned and sounds hollow when tapped. Cool on racks before slicing.

I'm always looking for bread recipes, so if you have a favorite please share! :)

Herb Cheese Bread

I've really been trying to make homemade bread lately instead of buying biscuits in a can and loaves from the bakery. I've had yeastafobia in the past but am finally getting away from that the more and more recipes I try.

The other day I pulled out The Old Farmer's Almanac Everyday Cookbook and went to a page I had bookmarked when I got it. This recipe is delicious. Though I will admit that I had to make it over again because I tried to adapt it to my breadmaker and screwed up the first time as it was just too big.



The second time I halved the recipe and it fit just fine, but I did have to add a bit more water to make it work. All in all it came out great! My husband doesn't really care for the taste of rosemary, so I made another batch (this time my hand following the recipe instructions) without the rosemary. I split that into two loaves prior to the step where they rise in the loaf pan, then wrapped them in plastic wrap and put them in the freezer. So we'll see how those work out later. I will include notes for my bread machine adjustments below the actual recipe.

This is a delicious bread served warm with butter or toasted the next day! Be sure to let me know if you try it!

Herb Cheese Bread

1 package (2 1/4 teaspoons) active dry yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
5-6 cups all purpose flour (I used bread flour)
1 tablespoon salt
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, softened
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
3/4 cup finely shredded sharp cheddar cheese (mine was just shredded, not finely shredded)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
1 tsp finely ground dried rosemary (hmmm JUST noticed the finely ground part, I just put the rosemary leaves in)

Grease two 8x4 inch loaf pans. Dissolve the yeast in 1/4 cup of lukewarm water and sprinkle with the sugar. Let it dissolve, or proof.

In a large bowl, mix 5 cups of flour with 1 1/2 cups warm water, salt, and butter. Add the yeast and continue mixing until the dough is well blended.

Turn the dough out onto a floured board and knead for at least ten minutes, until the dough is smooth and pliable, adding flour as needed to prevent sticking. Place the dough in a greased bowl and turn to coat on all sides. Cover the dough with a towel and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size (about two hours).

Punch down the dough and turn it out onto a lightly floured board. Knead in the cheeses and herbs. Divide the dough in half and place each half in a loaf pan. Cover and let rise until the bread is slightly higher than the sides of the pans. Preheat oven to 375 F. Bake for 30 minutes, or until the bread sounds hollow when tapped.

Makes 2 loaves.

My Bread Machine Adjustments

Refer to your bread machine instructions for proper layering of ingredients. Mine calls for adding the dry yeast first in the corner of the cylinder, then add the dry ingredients on top of the yeast. Add wet ingredients except for add ins (for this recipe add the water and butter but not the cheeses and herbs). Set machine to the knead only setting (mine is called Manual). I watched mine and added more water because it was just too thick. Once the consistency looked right I left it alone and waited for the first set of beeps, this is when I added the cheeses and herbs. Then I just waited for it to be done and then placed it in the greased loaf pan. I was running out of time so I didn't let it rise over the lip of the pan, just to almost the top. But as you can see from the photos it worked out great!

Yum!

TWD: Savory Corn and Pepper Muffins

Rebecca of Ezra Pound Cake chose Savory Corn and Pepper Muffins for this week's Tuesdays with Dorie.

I made them, they were really beautiful, so colorful! But no one liked them. :-/ I thought they were ok, but we ended up tossing the rest. My husband and daughter took a bite and spit it out LOL So I guess it's not a total loss that I accidentally deleted all the photos! I like my corn muffins sweet and even increased the sugar, but the equal amounts of corn meal and flour was far too grainy for me.

Oh well, they can't all be winners I guess. I see that many of the other TWD bloggers had success, be sure to stop by their blogs and see how theirs turned out!

Cooking with Alicia & Annie - Angel Food Cake

My daughter has been begging me to make an angel food cake. I'm embarrassed to admit I've never whipped eggs into stiff peaks. :-o Shocking! So I am very pleased at my first attempt, everything was perfect! This delicious Angel Food Cake from Annie's Recipes came out beautiful. I even uploaded my photos to their site as it's a new feature they have. :)

It's perfect plain, with fruit or a sauce. Above a warmed a little lemon curd and it was lovely!



This cake is my first entry for January into the Cooking With Alicia & Annie blog event!

Fun Thrift Store Kitchen Finds: Part Two

I posted before about some great thrift store goodies I found while out perusing. Well I've been saving them up, but decided to post a few more. What have you found at the thrift store lately??

A wok for $2.00! How great is that? It's a wonderful find, but the doo-hickey (pardon the technical terms, try to keep up) that the wok rests on to hold it above the flame doesn't quite work with my stove set up. It does, but it's awkward. Oh well, still looking. I think I'll keep this one in my RV!
Oh you have already seen my ice cream maker in action. I paid $3.00 for this at the Salvation Army thrift store. I've used it 3 times now, 2 recipes are already posted (there's a post coming for Whopper Malted Milk Ice Cream) and it works like a charm. I looked it up and this model sells for $70.00 retail, so I think I did pretty good! It is missing a little piece in the handle, but it still works great and I have no complaints.

Here's a hodge podge of items that cost less than $2.00 combined. There's a glass pie plate that I haven't used yet, 4 glass condiment cups that I use ALL THE TIME, measuring spoons I also use all the time and a rubber spatula. 

Looks like it's time for me to make another trip! :)

Join the fun with Alicia & Annie!

This is just a quickie post to remind everyone about the blog event that I host on the Cooking with Alicia & Annie blog. The basic idea is that you find a recipe (or recipes, entries are unlimited) from one of their two websites (Annie's Recipes and Alicia's Recipes), make it, take a pic, and blog about it. Then you post the link to your blog post in the comments of the blog event and you will be entered into a bonus drawing for fun kitchen prizes!

Take a look here

Hope to see you enter, we've had three winners and can't wait to give away more prizes!

Chocolate Chip Cookies and Fudge Puddles

I had printed off several recipes from different blogs prior to Christmas. You see I kept stocking up on different types of chocolate chips when they were on sale and ended up with tons of them. I'm so baked out I can't even tell you :-P So I thought I better get these posts up and decided to just combine them. Thank you to the blog owners below for the yummy recipes! Since there are so many, if you would like the recipe for any of these just click over to their blogs :)



First up is the Andes Crème de Menthe Chunk Cookies that I found on Avesta's Check It Out. I think these were probably my favorite! I couldn't find the mint chips she has pictured on her blog, so I bought a bag of Andes mints, unwrapped and coarsely chopped them all. These were delicious!



Next I tried the Ny Times Chocolate Chip Cookies that were posted by Kim on Lovin' From the Oven. These were delicious, though I made them as regular sized cookies. Kim's post calls for making them as large cookies. Very yummy!!

Then there was the recipe for Outrageous Chocolate Cookies that I also discovered on Kim's blog, Lovin' From the Oven. Also a big hit here, these brownie-like cookies were a favorite of my 11 year old.

Shocked that there is yet another recipe, all these were baked in the same day mind you! I came across a recipe for Pudding Cookies on Tanya's Sunday Baker blog. Absolutely delish!!

Well by now, I was exhausted and tired of being in my kitchen.



So I waited a week or so before baking the last one I had printed out, Fudge Puddles, also found on Tanya's Sunday Baker blog. OMG these are good!






So thank you to all of you wonderful bloggers for making this holiday season so sweet. I have tons more bookmarked as you can see, but for now I think I better make some recipes that take OFF the weight instead. ;)

Dominic's Lemon Bars

Yesterday my 10 year old announced that he wanted to make something. He stated that he didn't want me to help unless he needed it, he wanted to do everything himself. So we picked out a recipe for Lemon Bars of off some recipe cards I found at the thrift store.

He actually ended up making two different recipes, the one from the recipe card yesterday and one from the Farmer's Almanac Cookbook today. They were both good, but the second batch was too sweet for me. He measured everything right, so if I had to pick, I would say the recipe card one. However, the lemon layer wasn't very thick on the first one, so I would probably recommend whipping the eggs first to make it thicker. We may try them again as their flavor was really great :)

All in all it was a fun experience and Dominic did really well! He learned a lot about measuring, how to use the mixer, and even the food processor! I'll have him cooking us dinner in no time :)

Recipe # 1 - I preferred this one, more tangy, good flavor, though filling not thick enough.

Luscious Lemon Bars
from Grandma's Kitchen recipe cards

2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup butter
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar, plus additional sifted confectioner's sugar for garnish
4 teaspoons grated lemon zest, divided
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup granulated sugar
3 large eggs
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice



Preheat oven to 350 F. Lightly grease 13x9 baking pan; set aside. Place flour, butter, 1/2 cup confectioner's sugar, 1 teaspoon lemon zest and the salt in bowl of food processor. Process until mixture forms coarse crumbs.



Press crumb mixture evenly into the prepared baking pan. bake until golden, about 18-20 minutes.



Beat granulated sugar, eggs, lemon juice and remaining 3 teaspoons lemon zest in medium bowl with an electric mixer set at medium speed until ingredients are well blended.



Pour mixture evenly over warm crust. Return to oven; bake until center is set and edges are golden, about 18-20 minutes. Remove pan to wire rack; cool completely.

Sprinkle sifted confectioners' sugar over top. Cut into 2 x 1.5 inch bars.

Store lemon bars tightly covered at room temperature.


Recipe #2 - These are good, but too sweet for me

Lemon Squares
from The Old Farmer's Almanac Everyday Cookbook

Crust:
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1 cup (2 sticks) margarine

Filling:
4 large eggs, beaten
2 cups sugar
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
confectioners' sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 350 F.

For crust: Put the flour and confectioners' sugar into a large bowl and mix. Cut in the margarine. Press the crust into a 13x9 baking pan. Bake for 25 minutes.

For filling: Put all ingredients into a large bowl and stir to combine. Pour the filling onto the baked crust. Return the pan to the oven and bake 25 minutes more. Sprinkle with confectioners' sugar, if desired. Cut into squares when cool.

Make 24 squares.

See the powdered sugar on his lip? Hee hee.

Do YOU have a favorite lemon bar recipe? Please share it with me, I'm trying to find one that I love!! :)