"The Cookie Jar" - a series

I'm reading Joanne Fluke's - Hannah Swensen Mystery series.  Hannah owns/operates The Cookie Jar, a local bakery in small town Minnesota, where she melts pounds and pounds of butter and occasionally finds 'bodies.'  On occasion, there are parallels to Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum; however, both female sleuths are 'ladies on the pages' you should meet.  Oh yes, and the guys - there are always two guys to complicate matters...

Throughout the pages of each novel Hannah shares her bakery recipes.  I've been testing a sampling.  Delicious, absolutely delicious!

The books are a fun read - the cookies are simple and quite tasty.  I encourage you to undertake the adventure...

**pictured above, left to right**

Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder page 226

Old Fashioned Sugar Cookies

Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder page 91

Regency Ginger Crisps

Strawberry Shortcake Murder  page 134

Oatmeal Raisin Crisps

Watch for future posts as I continue to read and bake.
     Here's the link to 'black and white' cookies.
       Here's the link to 'Swedish Oatmeal Cookies.'

espresso coffee cake muffins

I'm not a coffee drinker - give me my espresso in these muffins!  They are moist and flavorful and delicious.  And, they are very pretty, presented on a white dish/plate.

The recipe is from Cinnamon Spice & Everything Nice (blog link here).  I followed the recipe exactly as printed on her blog.  Add these to your relaxing - morning - life of luxury, or to your normal, hectic, everyday morning.

This display dish was custom made by "My Friend A."  Here's a link to her on line store.  She makes wonderful glass display pieces for my baking/food photography.

Delicious!!!

strawberry granola bars

In an attempt to develop healthier eating habits, I'm baking with oats at least once per week. There are oats in these strawberry bars; however, there is also enough butter in the curst to make you say - ahhh....butter!

This recipe is adapted from a recipe for raspberry granola bars from Delicious Dishings (here's the link.)

Rather than using the raspberry filling, I used strawberry jam made from Ina's recipe (here's my blog link.)

Though these bars are not exactly low fat, they do contain the healthy oat.  I'm going to try these with a fig filling next.

Delicious!!!

benne wafers

A trip to Charleston, SC last fall peaked my interest in benne wafers.  I first attempted to replicate the  famous cookies a few months ago; here's the link.

For this attempt, I followed a recipe from "Lost Recipes," a magazine publication by Cook's Country - page 46.

These cookies were thin, although, not as thin as those pictured with the recipe.  Regardless of thickness, the cookies were delicious!  And, the baked cookies freeze very well.

eggs

My Grandmother Easterwood raised chickens, so I'm not exactly a novice; however, I've never seen blue and green chicken eggs - until Saturday.  The Memphis Farmers Market continues to grow, and one of the current vendors is Donnell Century Farm (www.DonnellCenturyFarm.com).  They were selling farm fresh eggs; among the eggs were brown, white, green, and blue eggs.  Here's one link discussing the shell color of eggs.

The eggs (shells only) in the wire chicken basket are about 20 years old.  My Great Aunt Hazel pierced the eggs, and blew out the contents.  I've kept the egg shells for years.  She is no longer with us, but I remember her fondly.

These eggs are almost too pretty to use...almost...

vanilla bean loaves

...from "Cooking for Mr. Latte" by Amanda Hesser (page 189)  Here's the link to her blog. 

This pound cake is moist, moist, moist.  The loaves are made with vanilla sugar, and soaked with simple syrup containing vanilla bean seeds.  It's a good cake, and would be a great base for fruit, or chocolate, or just about anything.

pretty, just pretty

The picture may be pretty, but the muffin was dry and tasteless. The recipe contained expresso powder and chocolate chips.  Though that sounds good, the end result was bad  -  just bad.


Pottery is from Peter's Pottery in Mound Bayou, MS and McCarty's Pottery in Merigold, MS.

liquid gold

sugar....

roast chicken

Oh my goodness!!!

The best roast chicken ever, and I just threw it in the oven!   What did I do?  What ingredients and measures? Can I do this again?

And worse yet, I didn't take a picture of the beautiful, golden brown bird.  I ate a large piece of the juicy, white meat and then went to grab the camera.

Juicy - flavorful - just good...really good...

Preheat oven to 350 degrees farenheit

Remove parts inside the bird (and lay them on the roasting tray - to be used in making chicken stock tomorrow)
Rinse the bird and pat it dry with paper towels.
Place on foil lined baking tray.

Chicken breast side up
Tuck the wings under the bird
Tie the two legs together close to the body (after stuffing as listed below)

About 10 cloves peeled garlic - some placed under skin - some placed inside cavity of bird
One large lemon, washed and sliced into thirds - place inside cavity of chicken
Drizzle bird well with olive oil (I probably used 2 to 4 tablespoons)
Corse grain Kosher Salt - I used about 1 teaspoon on the inside of the bird and about 1 to 2 teaspoons on the outside (actually I just liberally sprinkled it over the outside)
Penzey's ground black pepper - about 1 teaspoon sprinkled over all
Penzey's Herb de Provance - 1 heaping teaspoon sprinkled partly in cavity and partly on outside of chicken  (here's another wonderful use for Herb de Provance)

Place meat thermometer in chicken.  I put the probe in the chicken thigh first, but it seemed to reach 170 degrees too quickly.  I moved the probe and placed it deep inside the white meat breast.  When the thermometer reached 170 degrees, I removed the chicken from the oven, and covered well with 2 pieces of aluminum foil.  Total roasting time was between 1 and 1 1/2 hours.

I let the roasted chicken rest about 30 minutes.

When I went to taste the chicken, the leg bones easily twisted out (...ready for the stock pot tomorrow).

Peel the skin back and cut a juicy slice of the white meat......ahhhh......delicious

And if you want delicious +1, dip the white breast meat in the juices and then glaze over the salt/herbs on the outside of the skin.

Enjoy.  I did.

maple breakfast

This maple flavored breakfast casserole was intended for the ladies in the office at work.  Notice the background - out the window.  Snow in Tennessee.  This doesn't happen often in Tennessee, but today there were no 'ladies in the office' to enjoy the casserole.

Behind the maple flavored Jimmy Dean sausage, the maple flavor of this dish is quite evident.  There is a sweetness to this breakfast casserole.  It is good, but I'm just not a fan of the puffy/egg/milk texture of this type overnight dish.

Will this be flavorful after it's reheated?  I don't know.

Did you notice the waffles?  Frozen waffles rather than day old bread formed the base for this dish.  The recipe can be found here.

vanilla makes me smile

In the kitchen, these things just happen.  I couldn't have planned this.

As I drizzled dulce de leche over an iced cake, both containing more DDL, a 'smile' appeared.  Actually, I didn't see this smile until I edited the images.

The vanilla beans positioned themselves in the dulce de leche drizzle in the form of two eyes and a  nose.  It was my kitchen smile of the day!

it shines alone

dulce de leche

A couple of days ago, I followed Alton Brown's recipe and made dulce de leche.  After several hours, milk and sugar reduced to a thick, rich, brown, creamy sauce (blog post link).  The consistency of my DDL is not exactly correct; it's probably too thin.  But, the flavor is excellent.

With about 3 cups of DDL in the refrigerator, I began searching for cake and cookie recipes containing this molten goodness.

The cake and the cookies posted below are good.  But, after tasting dulce de leche off the end of my finger, or from a spoon, it seems a shame to hide the marvelous flavor in baked goods.  The baked items did not allow the flavor to shine.  Those who sample the cake and cookies will know that there is 'something different' in the mix, but the flavor of the DDL is not intense enough to gain the appreciation it deserves.

My personal conclusion is to use the DDL as a garnish over ice cream or pound cake or tarts or fruit or cookies or your finger - or anything.  The true goodness of dulce de leche shines when it's allowed to stand on it's own - not hidden behind other ingredients.

dulce de leche cookie recipe found here:

The cookies are soft and chewy.

dulce de leche cake recipe found here:

I used a butter/ powdered sugar/ dulce de leche icing.  The icing is very good, but the cake is somewhat dry.  As the recipe states, there are no eggs in the cake.

snow dayS

In Tennessee, we are far enough south that we don't usually get very much snow.  This year, 2010, we have seen snow twice in the last two weeks.

There's no food in this blog post, but, there is food in the oven behind the scenes.

ice storm Jan 29-31:

snow Feb 8:

shot from the warm side of the window screen:

milk + sugar + heat = DDL

dulce de leche

I followed Alton Brown's recipe (found here.)  My electric range low temperature is obviously not the same low temperature used while testing this recipe.  I cooked the mixture for about 6 hours, and decided my DDL was DONE.

Mine is not nearly as thick as it should be; HOWEVER, the taste is amazing.  One lick of the spoon is just encouragement to dip and lick the spoon over and over and over.

This does not taste like caramel; it has a flavor all its own.  Alton describes the flavor as 'less sweet' & 'has more depth' than caramel.  Addictive doesn't help you understand the flavor, but that's what this is - addictive.

I'll try this again another day, and start the mixture at a higher temperature.  The extended time I cooked the mixture allowed it to reach a deep, dark, chocolate brown.  I think higher cooking temperatures and a shorter cooking time will yield a lighter color ddl.

whole milk; notice the 'milky' white color:

granulated sugar:

vanilla bean seeds:

..again:

all ingredients mixed and heating:

a slight hint of color:

more color:

heat and time yields a deeper brown:

notice the boiling points; water is evaporating (finally!):

the bottom of the pan after I strained the mixture into a bowl;  finally!, it was time to taste:

notice all the vanilla bean seeds floating in this gooey, rich dulce de leche:

It's really not as thick as it should be - but it is delicious.  It didn't thicken very much after chilling.

I've used this ddl in a cake and some cookies.  Watch for the blog posts.