Hooray for Pizza Day

Homemade pizza is incredibly easy to make, yet pizza-focused restaurants are still a multi-billion dollar industry. While not everyone has 800 degree ovens at home, the pizza that comes out of a standard household kitchen is still a cut above the mass-produced variety.

Making pizza dough is pretty simple, especially with an upright mixer. What's even more simple is that to make a double batch every time--That means every other time you make pizza, all you have to do is remember to take a ball of dough out of the freezer to defrost in time for dinner! In our household, we've found homemade dough to be a lot tastier (not to mention cheaper!) than the crusts you can buy in the grocery store.

When you make your own pizza, your choices for toppings are unlimited! In college, when I would buy frozen pizza, I usually added my own toppings to plain cheese pie to customize to my own tastes. Homemade pizza is like having a blank canvas in front of you! It's easy to accommodate multiple tastes--pineapple and light cheese on one side, mushrooms only one slice... whatever combination/s you can think of can be created at home!

I also find that homemade pizza can be healthier than the store- or restaurant-bought varieties. It's no more difficult to make a whole wheat crust, you don't have to explain to a server that you only want half cheese, can buy better quality ingredients for less, and you can put as many veggies or other healthy toppings on top without the extra fees for each one. I'm not saying homemade pizza is like spa food, but it can certainly be lower in the bad stuff than the processed kind you may otherwise be consuming.

And since some of you were wondering, my homemade pizza pictured above had a base of (veggie) sausage in marinara sauce topped with a layer of sauteed spinach then several dollops of goat cheese and caramelized onions for the finishing touch.

Related Links:

• The Simple Dollar's Guide to Making Inexpensive & Delicious Homemade Pizza
  
• Wikipedia History of Pizza
  
• Michael Ruhlman on Homemade Pizza Including detailed instructions/tips for pizza & dough-making, and a recipe for his fabulous "Spring Is In the Air Breakfast Pizza" (Homemade Pizza with Bacon, Egg and Asparagus)
  
• Asylum's list of Ten Weirdest Pizza Toppings Some are weirder than others...
  
• TLC's Favorite Pizza Toppings, by Country Eel, anyone?
  
• LA Times list of Gourmet Pizza Topping Combinations They probably wouldn't like my topping-dense pizza, but I could go for some of these.
  
• Serious Eats' Grilled Pizza Guide Perfect for outdoor eating this summer!
  

What's a Dutch Baby?

It seems like a self-explanatory question, but who knew that a Dutch Baby is also baked deliciousness?

I was lucky enough to find out thanks to Gourmet magazine and J's impulsive cooking. Usually, I get up with barely enough time to get ready and make it to work on time, so I'm certainly not one who eats hearty breakfasts on weekdays. After discovering the Dutch Baby in Gourmet, J decided he needed to try it, and I got to partake in the goodness. Someone making you a fresh breakfast is indeed a fantastic thing to wake up and discover.

So, what is a Dutch Baby, anyway? Gourmet describes it as "a crossover between a pancake and a popover", and I think they pretty much hit the mark with that description. The crust is hearty, slightly crispy, and sortof durable like a good popover. The center of the Dutch Baby is the pancake portion, but a very dense pancake that's a close cousin to a custard tart or even some cheese pies. The Dutch Baby in question had a wonderfully refreshing lemon flavor, and just the right amount of sugar. And in addition to its tastiness, this breakfast treat is a sight to see as it expands in the oven!

If you haven't experienced a Dutch Baby first hand, now's a good time to spice up your breakfast routine and try something new!

Related Links:

• The Recipe in questionfrom Gourmet
  
• Dutch Baby Wiki
  
• Dutch Baby Pan(Comes with free Dutch Baby mix, for those of you who prefer convenience)
  

One a penny, two a penny, hot cross buns!

As I've mentioned before, I love eating my way through London. On almost every visit, I manage to procure Hot Cross Buns from the grocery store. While this is not gourmet by any means, they're something I enjoy thoroughly for breakfast or a snack or just because. I can easily justify this layman's indulgence to myself with knowledge that even the grocery store variety of Hot Cross Buns in England is far better than any I've had in the States. Furthermore, in the US, these flavorful delights are only available a few weeks in the year (which might actually be part of the problem).

Since it has been two years (gasp!) from my last trip across the Atlantic, I have been eager for Hot Cross Buns to start showing up in my local grocery stores for Easter.

I try to have a grounded perspective on my expectations of US Hot Cross Buns by having clear memories of previous disappointments. However, I do get sad when I eat Hot Cross Buns in the States, and they simply don't taste as good as their name implies they should.


Central Market has a great bakery and is also my Houston source for many hard-to-find grocery items. Unfortunately, I don't think their bakery makes their Hot Cross Buns because they certainly don't live up to Central Market's usual tasty standards. While I will admit, they did satisfy my Hot Cross Bun craving to some degree, I found them lacking. The texture was dry, and there weren't enough pieces of fruit. It was disappointing that the only fruit were raisins, especially because they were also overly dry. While non-traditional (and not necessary for well-made Hot Cross Buns), the icing was the only saving grace. The iced crosses provided a nice level of sweetness and needed moisture to the buns.

Will I buy them again next year? Chances say that I will. But maybe I'll grow enough courage to try making my own instead. Only time will tell...

Related Links:

• Hot Cross Buns Wiki
  
• History & Symbolism of Hot Cross Buns & other Easter traditions
  

Homemade Tortillas: Simple!

For the past week I've been hosting two very welcomed, yet somewhat unexpected out-of-town guests. G & R were two of my college roommates and are still two of my favorite people. We have similar interests in food. Cooking and eating together have always been two of our common pastimes.

One of the simple, but amazingly yummy things we made this week was a "Mexican" feast. Homemade tortillas & guacamole made it even better.


It's amazing how simple tortillas are to make. I confess that they are something I made for the first time only recently. In addition to being easy to make, homemade tortillas taste superior to practically any store-bought kind, and cost substantially less, other than a bit of time and elbow grease. I wonder why I hadn't try to make tortillas sooner!

Easy as Pie Tortillas Recipe

• 2 c. AP flour
  
• 1 tsp. baking powder
  
• 1/4 tsp. salt
  
• 2 T. non-hydrogenated shortening
  
• 3/4 c. water
  
  Directions
  Mix dry ingredients, then cut the shortening into the mixture with your fingers until smooth. Add water slowly till a non-sticky dough is formed by kneading. Let dough rest for at least ten minutes, then divide into balls the size of large gum balls (about an inch in diameter). Flatten dough balls with your hands, then roll out with your rolling pin. Let dough rest another ten minutes, then roll a second time.
  
  To cook, simply place dough on your pre-heated cast iron pan for about 30 seconds on each side.

Ode to Alton

This weekend turned into somewhat of an ode to Alton Brown. Earlier in the week, Alton whet my appetite for cookies in Good Eats episode "Chips for Sister Marsha". For the remainder of the work week, the thought of homemade cookies occupied more space in my mind than I care to admit. When the weekend finally arrived, I knew it was time to do something about it.

Naturally, my initial thought was to make the Chewy. After reviewing the recipe, however, I still had wanderlust to find a cookie recipe that called my name.

Flipping through old pages of recipe notes, I did find the cookie I was looking for. It was scribbled on the back of an envelope, with no name, no source, and not even a cooking time. But it sure sounded tasty!

In addition to good ole chocolate chips, this recipe called for pecans and finely chopped milk chocolate. What a delightful combination. I crushed the pecans as finely as the milk chocolate, and the two of them combine like enjoyable and serene background music in a movie. In other words, they combine to create something delicious in the background of the smorgasboard of chocolate chips. You notice them if your senses are on guard, and the rest of the time, you simply enjoy them with a satisfied smile and contented belly.

Close up of the results:


Since Alton inspired the cookie-making and was later shamed by me not following his recipe, I decided to increase my AB fan points by making his Southern Biscuits.

These biscuits are buttery, soft in the middle, and with just the right amount of golden crispiness on the top. My only complaint is that the recipe said to use a 2-inch biscuit cutter. Biscuits of a 2-inch diameter don't sound like they're that small, but they turned out much smaller than I envisioned before cutting shapes out from the dough! You can almost pop a whole biscuit in your mouth at one time. And even if you bite into a polite sized mouthful of biscuity goodness, you'll want to go back for more than your fair share. Morale of the story: bigger = better in biscuitland.

= before









after =





Aren't they gorgeous!!

Knead Practice!

To my dismay, I haven't had much success as a baker recently. Much of the blame can be attributed toward my stubbornness that leads me to believe I can get away without using a recipe, even when I'm dealing with chemical reactions of trying to get foodstuffs to rise.

My recent crumpet experiment did not turn out horribly, though I can't really say that crumpets were the actual end-product of the baking event.

And what is a crumpet you ask? The simplest way to describe it is as the bread product that would result if an English muffin and a regular ol' pancake were to get together one night and produce offspring. The crumpet inherits its dense holey goodness from its English side, and its soft & flat characteristics from its pancake side. And from both its parents, the crumpet gets its desire to be topped with additional yummy goodness and served at breakfast, or just about any other time of day.

So anyway, I think I killed the yeast in soymilk that was too warm, but I didn't want to waste the liquid, so I went on with the experiment. What resulted is a product that was a bit too dense and chewy, without the lovely holes that are the perfect crevices for such substances like butter.

Luckily they tasted okay, crumpets or not. They were all gone by the morning, eaten mostly underneath jam piles and in the form of "mini pizzas" and breakfast sandwiches. I can't decide if I want to try again or attempt a different dough-product first, but I will certainly post when I make something that resembles a crumpet a little more closely.

And while I obviously did not master the task, I'll post my recipe for those who want to have a go at it yourselves!



Ingredients:
1 c. soymilk
2 tsp. yeast
1 tsp. brown sugar
1 c. plain flour
2 T. gluten
1 tsp. salt

Directions:
Warm the soymilk, then mix in yeast and brown sugar. Let this sit for a couple minutes to let the yeast do its thing. Sift the remaining ingredients together, then add the liquid and stir well. Let the batter sit in a warm place for about an hour.

After resting, spoon the mixture onto a preheated pan into 3-4 inch circles. Let cook on low for about 10 minutes. Bubbles should form and the top will appear holey. For the last minute or so, flip your crumpets so the other side can turn golden.

Related Links:

• Crumpet Wiki
  
• Crumpet History
  

Homemade Bread

For many years, my dad baked bread on a near daily basis. With the help of his trusty bread machine, we had delicious and fresh bread for our daily sandwiches. My dad's whole wheat bread was really soft and tender on the inside, but still had some spring-yness to it. The crust was perfect--crispy, but thin enough to bite into with ease. At lunch, my sandwiches were the envy of my friends, who had no choice but to eat the plain old flavorless store bought white bread their parents procured or -worse- the cafeteria food.

When I went to college, I did not often have the luxury of fresh bread. It was nice to come home occasionally on the weekends and be able to eat my dad's bread. For breakfast, I'd have it was homemade bread with Nutella. For lunch, I'd eat it in jaffel/jaffle-form. It was a treat to be able to go home and enjoy homemade bread.

During my senior year, a good friend of mine started making his own bread. I was roommates with his girlfriend, and we lived across the street from each other therefore we ended up cooking and eating together frequently. It was always fun to go over and make fresh bread together. It would be devoured almost as soon as it came out of the oven.

I have a container of active dry yeast sitting in my fridge, hardly used. Thinking back to the days of my fond homemade bread memories, I decided I needed to make my own bread and put that yeast to use.

My bread was incredibly easy to make. No fancy equipment (i.e. bread machines or KitchenAid stand mixers) required.

Ingredients:
1.5 tsp active dry yeast
1 cup warm water
2 T. honey
1.5 cups Whole Wheat flour
1.5 cups All Purpose flour
2 T. wheat gluten
1.5 tsp. kosher salt
2 T. olive oil

Directions:
Mix the honey and warm water, then add the yeast. Stir until bubbly and yeast is mixed in.

Mix all dry ingredients into a bowl, then add the water-honey-yeast mixture. Next, add the olive oil.

When mixture starts to stick, remove from bowl and knead on a flat surface for up to ten minutes, or until it comes together well.

Place dough ball in a greased bowl (if using the same bowl, you may need to wash first in order to get any remaining dough/flour clumps off the sides). Cover with a tea towel and let sit in a warm spot for about half an hour, or until dough doubles in size.

Once doubled in size, remove dough from bowl and need a few more times, shaping dough into desired form. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, letting dough rest during this time.

When oven is heated, bake your bread for 40 minutes.

Next, enjoy how simple it is to make your own bread and how much more flavor your bread has compared to the store-bought kind.

I think this bread would be great with some Italian herbs for added flavor. Perhaps next time, I'll try being more creative!