Italian Bread Bowls

I have other dishes in my queue to blog about, but I have been dying to share this with you (consider this post part one of two).

Every September, I seem to have an urge for fall soups even while the weather outside still looks exactly like summer. Last year, I made creamy pumpkin soup. This year, I was looking for something cheesy.

This urge happened to correspond with an urge to dye my hair red. I am aware that that makes no sense whatsoever. Anyway, I invited my sister-in-law over to color my hair and offered to make lunch for us (hubby was out of town, drilling in Albany for the weekend). Somehow, the idea of sharing food with someone inspired me to make it a little more special.

So I made bread bowls. Because that’s a totally normal response for someone who just started a new quarter of school and has tons of reading and homework to get to.

I began by dissolving some yeast in warm water. I added a bit of sugar, too, since I had read that this helps to activate the yeast.

After about 10 minutes, it was starting to look creamy.

My baking skills were better than my photography at this point, since I evidently didn’t document the addition of salt and vegetable oil. But I added salt and vegetable oil. Then I put the yeast mixture in a large mixing bowl and started adding flour. I started with a cup of whole wheat, though the recipe called for all-purpose.

I used all-purpose for the rest of it.

Then I just started beating the dough.

This was my very first time using the bread hook and electric beater to make bread. Fun times.

After the first couple cups of the flour, I added it a little bit at a time.

When the flour was all added and the dough was pulling together, I turned it out onto a floured countertop.

And then I kneaded it for 7 or 8 minutes. The dough started off goopy and inconsistent, but it got to be elastic and consistent throughout. It was very fun to play with. Apparently I didn’t take pictures of what it looked like after I kneaded it, probably because my hands were covered in dough and flour. But here’s a picture of it after I dropped it in an oiled bowl and turned it to coat the surface of the dough in oil.

Okay, pay attention. This is my favorite part. I read about a technique to make bread rise better. Remember how I put my pizza dough outside on the deck so that it would be warm enough? I couldn’t do that this time around because it was after dark. So, I put it in a cold oven next to a pot of boiling water. The steam created a good environment for it.

Are you prepared to see how much it rose? So cool. Probably would have been even more if that cloth hadn’t kept the dough in the bowl!

I divided the dough into six bowls and put them on a greased cooking sheet that had been sprinkled with corn meal.

And did my awesome rising technique again!

Okay, this time I was less pleased with the result.

I decided to remove three of the blobs and put them on another sheet. This led to a dilemma. They were flat disks at this point. If I baked them as-is, my bread bowls would be flat. But if I re-shaped them, would I lose all the benefit of having them rise again? I was afraid that manipulating them would release all the build up gas and lead to hard, dense bread.

So I ended up leaving three alone…

And reshaping the other three.

I brushed each one with a bit of egg white mixed with water.

And finally, I sprinkled them with some Italian seasoning and a bit of coarse kosher salt. Then I took a blurry picture of it.

At this point, I was both hopeful and skeptical. I was less than optimistic about how they would turn out.

Oh! But check it out! Turns out, the reshaped bowls were the awesome ones. The flatter ones stayed flat, as I thought they might. I should have reshaped all of them. An interesting experiment, though.

Seriously. So amazing.

I tried to resist them, saving them all for the next day, but I had to give in.

Fresh baked bread is simply amazing. That’s all I really have to say about that.

Stay tuned for a post about cheddar-broccoli soup!

Black-Bottom Cupcakes

This is one of those desserts I make extremely infrequently, yet I still consider it in my inner circle of favorite desserts. Until recently, I can’t remember the last time I made these cupcakes myself, but I do remember each instance in which I got to taste someone else’s rendition over the past few years. Most recently, my little brother made them for our big brothers’ 30th birthday party. I’ve been dreaming of them ever since. I meant to make them for a birthday at work, but I was dumb and mixed up the days. I ended up purchasing a dozen florescent frosted cupcakes from the grocery store at 6am instead. Not cool.

But then hubby and I decided to entertain recently, and it was the perfect opportunity to finally make them.

The best part of these cupcakes, by far, is the cream cheese filling. I sure love cream cheese. Just start off with some cream cheese, an egg, some sugar, and just a hint of salt.

And beat it until it’s creamy.

The recipe calls for 6 ounces of chocolate chips. I just squeeze a 12-ounce bag in half and play it by ear.

And stir them in the cream cheese mixture.

Now for the chocolate batter!

See that? It’s about 3/4 cup of flour. I was so angry at myself for having run out. I thought there was another pound of flour in a bag at the back of my cabinet, but turns out I had 2 pounds of bread flour and 1 pound of whole wheat flour waiting to be opened, but no more all-purpose flour. This is the first time I’ve EVER run out of flour. Grr.

I’d already made 2 trips out that day – once to the grocery store, and once to the beer/ wine store. And it was raining. I really, really, really didn’t want to go out again for another 3/4 cup of flour, so I worked on the nerve to knock on my neighbor’s door (I can’t wait until I live somewhere that I can do that comfortably). No one answered, though. So, cautiously, I filled the rest of that measuring cup with whole wheat flour.

And for the last 1/2 cup of flour, I couldn’t decide which would be worse, whole wheat (grainy) or bread flour (doughy), so I used a mixture of the two.

Also, some more sugar (not pictured because I wasn’t thinking) and unsweetened cocoa powder.

Plus, some salt

And baking soda.

Blend these together, and then add some water, oil (I used vegetable oil), vanilla extract, and vinegar. And if you’re like me, have some dyslexia issues and get the amounts of vanilla and vinegar mixed up because the words look the same. Ah well. At least I did too much vanilla, not too much vinegar. Not a bad thing in the long run.

Spoon the batter into your muffin cups. I was really glad that I sprung for the fancy foil liners, since the batter was pretty runny. I’m used to creamier, thicker batters, so I wasn’t too sure about this. I remember thinking to myself that I’d be tempted to add more flour if I had any. Ah well. It was an experiment. For all I knew, it was supposed to be like this.

Finally, revisit that cream cheese filling and just plop it on top of the chocolate. I was trying to keep it from touching the foil, but I don’t know if there’s a legitimate reason for that.

And then bake! I’m not a big chocolate lover, but even I had to admit that they smelled pretty amazing.

Hubby had the foresight to stick these back in a warm oven for a few minutes before serving them. This left the the cupcakes warm, fudgey, and scrumptious.

Scrumptious, I tell you.

When I can I make these again?

Dog Treats

It’s common knowledge that I have two dogs that I love and dote on. Here they are, gnawing on bones under the coffee table.

They’re my babies, but with all the time I spend in the kitchen, I’ve never made them anything more special than a hardboiled egg. I have had a recipe for dog treats for a while but decided to finally give it a try. I could tell from the directions that it would be as time consuming as making sugar cut-out cookies at Christmastime, but I bought smaller cookie cutters and figured it would make a lot of treats, so I was willing to give it a shot.

First, start off with some oats.

Add some butter and boiling water, and let it sit for 10 minutes.

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Meanwhile, prepare the following: shredded cheddar cheese…

A beaten egg…

And milk (I poured it in with the egg)…

The recipe says to include cornmeal, but some reviewers opted for wheat germ instead, since cornmeal isn’t the best thing to be giving dogs. I wasn’t sure how that would change the consistency, so I went with a mixture of both cornmeal and wheat germ, in addition to a touch of sugar and some beef bouillon granules. I figured that I wouldn’t be feeding these treats in large quantities, so a little bit of cornmeal wouldn’t be the end of the world.

Mix all of that (the cheese, egg, milk, and dry ingredients) in with the oatmeal mixture.

Next, start beating in whole wheat flour.

As it gets stickier and more stiff, curse yourself for doing it by hand instead of in your Kitchenaid mixer like a normal person would have done.

Finally, it should be a big, smooth lump.

Roll it out on the counter with a rolling pin and start cutting. The recipe said to leave it a 1/2 inch thick. That seemed pretty thick and I tried to go with it, though my second batch was thinner.

They baked for a lot longer than sugar cookies, about 40 minutes. I did two trays worth, both as packed as the one shown here.

Luckily they didn’t expand. I didn’t think they would, since they didn’t have much butter or oil or anything that would help them spread out, but I was glad nonetheless.

These treats won’t last nearly as long as regular milkbones that you’d buy, since they’re not full of preservatives, so I have mine in a big zip lock bag in the fridge. I suppose I should move some to the freezer.

More importantly, the verdict?

The dogs LOVE them. I do break them into much smaller pieces, but the dogs do really like them. This is significant, as they’re picky. Max has been known to reject most of the treats that the people at the store thought he might like, actually spitting out pieces of beef and venison and looking at the staff like, “Why would you give me that? It tastes like crap!” But he and his little sister, Kaya, both really like these. In fact, when I bring them on walks, both dogs are absolute angels. Wonderful!

P.S. Yes, I tasted them. Not bad. But not good either