What are you baking? July 2023

Right there is my weak spot! Chocolate cake~!

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MiG, it’s difficult to estimate for sure the size of your fruit pieces, but I think the recipe recommends 1/2 “ dice. When I made it in the party Bundt, I recommended layering the fruit with a layer of plain batter a 1/2” to3/4” amount on the bottom of the mold. With this method, my fruit stayed suspended, perhaps this would be helpful in the loaf pan. Thin slices of fruit on top generally will stay suspended depending on the thickness of the batter… but…nothing is foolproof!

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Do try it!:joy: It was even better after it had cooled down all the way, second slice for quality control.

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Oh good… I’m never sure if my descriptions make sense to other people :sweat_smile:

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And some more blueberries, this is a six inch galette that I’ll most likely cut into four pieces, so it won’t be around very long. As opposed to the lovely lattice work upthread, this is quick to put together if not as beautiful ! I used close to three cups of blueberries, lemon, and a 1/16t of cinnamon. No vanilla ice cream in the house, so a dab of crème fraîche or sour cream will be the accompaniment.

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I baked… Orange olive oil cake (hahaha). First time making this at my mom’s, actually (but excluding her from partaking because I used an egg as well as white sugar for the oleosaccharum, going to think about how to make eggless next).

I blended the zest with the eggs and sugar, and used 3/4 whole wheat (chapati atta) and 1/4 AP flour, plus scaled down to 1 egg, which made a small loaf.

We sampled a small piece, but I’m waiting till tomorrow as it’s always so much better day 2 onwards. It’s a bit nutty from the whole wheat, and wonderfully orange-y in flavor.

I didn’t have any orange juice in it as this was made from the zest of an orange I saved before cutting up the orange for mom to eat :joy: – but the oils that leached into the sugar must have been intense!

Quote of the day: “if it only takes you half an hour to make this cake, why did you order cake from the bakery when your cousins visited the other day?” :rofl:

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Part 2 of today’s bake was the tiniest focaccia I have ever attempted: all of 1/2 cup of flour, just for mom’s dinner (plus a bit left for breakfast).

It turned out remarkably well even though I bungled the pan (I had the twin mini loaf tins out because one was getting prepped for the cake… and instead of using the mini springform I had taken out for the foccacia, I dumped olive oil into the other loaf tin, at which point it seemed like a waste to switch pans. Sigh.)

Anyway, texture and flavor was fine, it was just visually a very skinny focaccia :joy:

3/4 ww (chapati atta), 1/4 AP, 1/4 T gluten. Flavored with rosemary and olives (which are apparently more to mom’s taste than my caramelized onions of last time).

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Kudos to you for laughing this off!! :smile:

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Nah, it was a compliment. Mom loves the cousins and great nephew who visited, and she planned the tea menu and picked the cakes to be ordered :smiley:

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Tempting enough to dive into the screen, as always!

Do you use your pie crust recipe for galettes? (I have it saved from the last time I asked you for it :rofl:)

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Today I used 150 g pastry flour, 75/80g frozen unsalted butter, salt, a little more than 1 t. sugar. Processed 100 g of flour mixture , added about 2/3 thirds of frozen butter broken up. Processed, pulse chopped, added balance of flour (50g.) and remaining large chunks of frozen butter. Pulsed a bit, added close to 3T sour cream. pulse chopped to shaggy. Used silpat to squeeze together. Did a couple of envelope turns, cut in half for two crusts. That was rolled to about 11”, used the top edge of a 10” tart tin to cut off excess.
DH has been bugging me since I took it out of oven :joy:, will probably cut it now.

And thank you!

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My annual bake of fresh blueberry tarts. I wait for this one all year!

For the crust I use Erin Jeanne McDowell’s press-in cookie pie crust. For the filling, Rose Levy Barenbaum’s fresh blueberry pie filling.

And, while I was making the tarts: French bread in a bread machine.

I’d been toying with the idea of purchasing a bread machine as back-up to my own baking activities, when during Prime Week Amazon offered 25% off the model I’d been ogling: the Zojirushi Maestro 1-Pound Breadmaker.

I followed a recipe for French Bread which came with the machine. Modifications included swapping out 25 grams each of flour and water for 50 grams sourdough discard, and using ¾ t. instant yeast instead of 1 t. ADY.

The machine does what it’s supposed to do, and I’m pleased with the results. It makes decent bread with very little effort, and a loaf is small enough for the two of us to handle before it goes stale. The machine will be handy for those times when we’re wanting bread, but I don’t have it in me to pull off slow-fermented loaves.

I’ve since purchased a copy of Beth Hensperger’s Bread Machine Cookbook. If you have any favorite bread machine recipes, I’m all ears.

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What perfect pleating! Very pretty.

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In the ‘3 favorite cakes’ thread, I mentioned this as something I hadn’t made, but was about to try.

Well, I did try. My round cake pans were only 8", and she calls for 9. I was worried it would be too voluminous for an 8" round and it would have too thick of a layer of almonds at the top. Thankfully, some good ol’ fashioned high school geometry reminded me that an 8" square pan is about the same area as a 9" round, so I used that. I ended up baking it for 50 minutes (10 longer than the recipe suggests) since at 40 min. I was still getting a very wet toothpick. I think I could probably cut it by 5 minutes. The corners, especially, seem a touch overbaked. But I’m actually ok with a little extra carmelization.

The cake is tender, and the top layer is sweet and crunchy as advertised, with a lovely almond / amaretto flavor. And for reference, I used di Amore amaretto:
image

which all my internet research told me is not the best amaretto for drinking, but it IS the one everyone’s Italian nonna used to make amaretto biscuits and such. I will be having some of this cake every day for breakfast with tea 'til it’s gone.


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The best part! Lovely cake!

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Gorgeous tarts!

I can’t access the crust recipe without signing up for an account.

Found it on Food 52!!

Looks luscious.

Grrrr… I hate it when that happens! Sorry about that! I haven’t been able to find a link to the recipe anywhere else. The recipe is from her book The Book On Pie.

Here’s a paraphrase for one 9" tart or eight 4" tarts:

1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
50 g. granulated sugar
1 large egg yolk
1 t. vanilla extract
218 grams all-purpose flour
1/2 t. granulated salt
1 tablespoon water

I use a food processor, which is not ideal unless your doing a double batch. The on-line recipe calls for a stand mixer:

Beat the butter and sugar on medium-low speed until smooth, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the egg yolk and vanilla and mix to combine. Scrape the bowl down thoroughly. Add the flour and salt and mix until fully incorporated, 45 seconds to 1 minute. Add the water and mix just until the dough is smooth - about 1 minute more.

Turn-out dough. Make a disc. Wrap and chill the dough for 30 minutes before using (or freeze for another day).

Press into your pan. For the blueberry tarts above, blind bake at 350 'til golden brown around the edges and firm in the middle (about 22-24 minutes for the 4" tarts).

Brush the cooled tart(s) with egg white before filling.

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So, I finally served this: friends loved it but I just was not that impressed. Somehow, I think I was impressed by the image or something.

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It pays to know how to sew😂

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