Homemade Soft Pretzels

I found this recipe in the Penzey’s catalogue and thought, well that is just cruel.  This is so simple and oh so good.  It is terrifying for me to know how to make such addictive foods quickly, easily, and with ingredients I usually always have on hand.

1 ¼ cup warm water (105-115 degrees)
1 Tbs rapid rise yeast
¼ cup brown sugar, packed
2 cups bread flour
1 ½ - 2 cups all purpose flour
4 cups water
4 Tbs baking soda
Pretzel Seasonings: Flake salt, garlic powder, cinnamon and sugar, etc.

Dissolve the yeast in the warm water and let sit for a few minutes, until it is frothy.  Add the sugar and 2 cups of bread flour, stirring well.  Add the first cup of the all purpose flour and stir to combine again.  Turn the dough out onto the kitchen table and add as much of the remaining all purpose flour as needed to make a soft dough.  Add a sprinkle of flour at a time while kneading, as soon as the dough starts to stick.  Knead for about 10 minutes or until you have a nice smooth elastic dough ball.  Form a ball and place in a bowl.  Cover and let rise in a warm place for 30 minutes.  It doesn’t have to double in size but it should be substantially bigger.

Preheat oven to 500 degrees.  Divide the dough into 12-18 pieces.  Bring the 4 cups of water to a low boil and dissolve the 4 Tbs baking soda.

Roll each piece of dough in a “snake” about 18” in length.  Twist into pretzels and pinch the ends into the turns they cross over to hold in place.  Dip each pretzel one at a time into the water for 5-10 seconds, making sure to get the water over the top of the pretzel.  I hold the pretzel on a slotted spoon and this seems to work well.  Shake off most of the excess water and place on baking sheets greased or lined with parchment paper.  Sprinkle with your seasoning of choice and bake for 6-8 minutes.

The pretzels will look done on the top before they are brown on the bottom so lift them with a spatula to check they are done on the bottom before taking out.  Remove quickly to a cooling rack to cool.

Try and tell me you don't want to eat your screen right now. Yeah, I don't believe you.

Upside Down Pear Cake

I am now about to start week 5 of my 7-day meal planning and I think we are doing pretty well sticking to it.  We have deviated a couple times, but not many.  J has already lost a couple pounds, and I am back to my pre-Christmas/Thanksgiving weight, but that’s about it.  I will say that my plan every day is 1500-1700 calories for me and most days I am actually not hungry in between meals and I’m satisfied after eating the food we’re eating, so that right there means a lot for me.  I am also not starving my husband, which this is actually a first time we have done some kind of structured “diet” and he has not felt hungry all the time.   So having a well made plan seems to be working well for us.

But last night we did make a rather significant unaccounted for addition to our calorie intake for the day, but as this turned out so well I think it was kind of worth it.   I worked a little harder on the elliptical this morning and probably made up for about ¼ of what I consumed last night.

For the topping
3 tbs butter
¾ cup brown sugar
Fruit of your choice – I used 2 pears cut in chunky slices with a handful of blackberries – You could do pears, apricots, apples, plums plus any berry you like to fill in the wholes

For the cake
½ cup butter, softened
¾ cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 large eggs
1 ½ cup all purpose flour
1 ½ tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
½ cup milk
1 ½ tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
½ cup milk

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
In a 10-inch cast iron skillet over medium-high heat melt the 3 tbs butter.  Add the brown sugar and stir until the sugar is melted and begins to bubble.  Remove from heat and let cool.
Once cool, arrange the fruit in a pinwheel design, add berries if desired.

To make the cake, beat  ½ cup butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add the vanilla, then the eggs one at a time.  Beat until smooth.  Whisk the flour, baking powder and salt together then add half to the egg mixture and stir to incorporate.  Add the milk, stir to incorporate, then finish with the remaining flour mixture.  Stir the batter just until the flour is incorporated, do not overmix the batter.

Spread the batter over the fruit and bake for 45-60 mins.  The cake is ready when it begins to pull away from the sides of the pan and the center feels just set.

Let cool for 20 minutes then place a cake plate on top and flip the cake out of the skillet.  Be careful because it will still be hot, especially the caramel.

I of course didn’t bother with that nonsense because I wanted to eat it as soon as the caramel was no longer scalding and I didn’t care enough to get the whole cake out of the skillet for anyone to see it whole.  Sorry no pretty picture of the whole cake, it was too tempting, couldn’t wait the 20 mins.

Serves 8, 405 calories, 17 g fat, worth it, especially since I haven’t had much sweets in the past month

Morrocan Bread, Kbohz

For New Year’s Day my MIL made a Morrocan stew and I was asked to make some bread, so after a bit of research I found a recipe for Morrocan bread, kbohz, that you are supposed to eat with stew.  Apparently they don’t use utensils, they just eat it with this bread.  We didn’t do that, that would be a carb-overload, but I wanted to try the bread anyway.

White Bread

4 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp salt
2 tsp sugar

1 tbs yeat
2 tbs vegetable oil
1 ¼ cup warm water, 105-110 degrees F
Additional flour for kneading
Cornmeal, semolina or oil for the pan

Prepare 2 9” round cake pans by oiling or dusting the pans with a little cornmeal or semolina.
Mix the flour, sugar, and salt in a bowl.  Make a large well in the center of the flour mixture and add the yeast.  Add the oil and water to the well, mixing to dissolve the yeast first, and then stirring the entire contents of the bowl to incorporate the water into the flour.
Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and begin kneading.  If necessary, add flour in small amounts if the dough is very sticky, or water in small amounts if it is not coming together. Continue kneading for 10 minutes, or until the dough is very smooth and elastic.
Divide the dough in half and shape each portion in a smooth circular mound.  Place onto the prepared pans and cover with a towel.  Allow to rest for 10 minutes.
After the dough has rested, use the palm of your hand to flatten the dough into circles about ¼” thick.  Cover with a towel and leave to rise about 1 hour or until the dough springs back when pressed lightly with a finger.

Preheat oven to 435 degrees.

Score the top of the bread with a very sharp knife or poke the dough with a fork in several places. Bake the bread for about 20 minutes.  Rotate the pans about halfway through the baking time.  The loaves should be nicely colored and sound hollow when tapped.  Transfer the bread to a rack or towel-lined basket to cool.

I also made a wheat-cumin bread which I liked more than the white.  Replace 2 cups of the white flour with wheat flour and replace the sugar with 2 tbs honey and add 2 tsp cumin seeds to the flour mixture.  Prepare the bread the same as above.

Each recipe makes 2 loaves of bread and each loaf serves 6-8 people if you just eat bread with your meal, if you plan to use the bread in place of utensils a loaf will probably serve 4 people.

As far as bread goes this was really pretty easy, and tasted pretty good.  The outside was crusty but not too hard and the inside was soft.  It did have a smaller crumb than I was anticipating, but it wasn’t dense by any means. All in all a good flavored bread without a whole lot of effort.

Almond Butter Cookies

After dinner the other night J decided he wanted dessert.  I didn’t really have a lot in the pantry for baking so I was pretty limited on what I could make.  Peanut butter cookies is usually his first suggestion, and I have recently stopped buying peanut butter because too frequently was I just eating it straight out of the jar for no reason.  I did in fact have a rather large bag of almonds because I am never a good judge of volume when I buy things from the bulk section, so I thought I would try to make almond butter cookies, and I was really quite pleased with the result.

1 cup almonds
½ cup butter, softened
½ cup sugar
½ cup brown sugar, packed
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 ¼ cup flour
½ tsp baking powder
¾ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
In a food processer blend the almonds until a creamy paste forms, about 6-8 minutes, scraping down the sides periodically.
In a large bowl, blend almond butter and butter together, then add the sugars and blend well.  Add egg and vanilla and blend well.

In a separate medium bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Add the dry ingredients to the almond butter mixture in 3 additions until just mixed.

Roll the dough into 1” balls and place a few inches apart on a greased cookie sheet.  Bake for 10-12 minutes, until set but not hard.
Remove the cookies immediately from the hot cookie sheet to a wire rack to cool, they will dry out if they continue to cook on the cookie sheet.

Makes 24 cookies, 100 calories each

These cookies had crispy edges and chewy centers and had more the flavor of a rich, buttery sugar cookie than a peanut butter cookie.  I enjoyed them quite a bit, I will definitely be making them again.
I didn’t take any pictures because I was too busy eating them.

Pumpkin Creme Brulee

I bought myself a few pie pumpkins before Thanksgiving, so inspired to make a fresh pumpkin pie, and I just never got around to it.  I actually cooked the pumpkins and scooped out all the meat, put it in the refrigerator and still didn’t make the dang pie. I did the hard part and then never followed through.  So for a week or so I had this fresh pumpkin puree that I knew I had to use up quick and pumpkin pie just never sounded good again.  So one day I made pumpkin pancakes, which were a little more boring than I was anticipating so I haven’t even bothered writing it up, but a few days after that I made pumpkin creme brulee which I thoroughly enjoyed.  They actually tasted more like mini crustless pumpkin pies than they did creme brulee, but were very easy to make.  Actually it may have been easier than making the pie, which is why I was ok with making it, because I didn’t have to make a crust.  I don’t want to hear it about frozen crusts, it’s not the same I’m sorry.

8 oz pumpkin puree, or can pumpkin (not pie filling)
¼ cup sugar
¼ cup packed golden brown sugar
3 large egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp ground allspice
¼ tsp ground cloves
1/8 tsp salt
1 ½ cups heavy whipping cream
4 tbs golden brown sugar


Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
Whisk pumpkin, ¼ cup sugar and ¼ cup brown sugar in a bowl.  Whisk in egg yolks and vanilla, then spices and salt, set aside.  Bring cream just to a boil in a saucepan.  Gradually whisk hot cream into pumpkin mixture.
Divide mixture between 4 ramekins.  Place ramekins in a roasting pan and add enough hot water to pans to come halfway up sides of ramekins.  Bake until custards are just set in center, about 35 minutes for 5x1 inch ramekins or 50 minutes for 3x1 ¼ inch ramekins.

You can make this 2 hours ahead of time and stop here, cover them and keep in refrigerator.   When you are ready to eat, sprinkle 1 tbs brown sugar on each one and melt with a kitchen torch or put in the oven under the broiler until the sugar is a deep amber.

Some people like their creme brulee cold, and if you do, put it back in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes to chill and let the sugar harden, but I like it hot, so I just try to let it sit for a few minutes to allow the sugar to harden and keep it from scalding my tongue because I have a hard time controlling myself.

This was super simple, well if you already had the pumpkin puree or if you used a can, but was very flavorful and had a nice thick and creamy consistency.  I made 4 and we had 2 one night and then the other 2 the next, but you could easily double this recipe for a dinner party and use 1 15-oz can pumpkin puree and I think I would use 5 egg yolks but double everything else.  That would be really easy to throw together without much time or effort, and you could do it ahead of time before you even start cooking so you don’t occupy the oven.

No-Rise Bread

I have discovered the absolute most dangerous recipe ever.  I absolutely love bread, so I have to limit myself because it is just so calorie dense.  Since I found this recipe a few weeks ago I will admit I have made it quite a few times.  It is just so easy to make and you can cut it back to make just a few rolls so you don’t actually have to have a ton of bread lying around the house all week.  That is a big reason why I usually don’t buy bread.  I usually just want one piece of bread to go with one meal for the week, but when I have to buy a whole loaf I end up eating a piece of bread every night until it’s gone.  But with this recipe you can really easily scale it back so you don’t have that problem.  I have cut it down to 4 rolls but I haven’t tried 2 yet so I cannot verify if they will still turn out the same for that small of a batch, I don't really think it would work but I could be wrong, let me know if you try it.

2 ½ cup warm water (105-115 degrees)

6 Tbs sugar

3 Tbs yeast

2 Tbs oil

6 cup flour

2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Stir together water, sugar, yeast, and oil.  Allow to sit for about 5 minutes or until it is frothy on the top  Add flour, salt and baking powder and mix well.  Once you stir in the dry ingredients and they are pretty well incorporated, turn it out onto a clean work surface and start to knead.  Knead the dough, it should still be a little sticky but well mixed.  This can be made into rolls, a bread loaf, or even a pizza crust, so roll out or drop onto a baking sheet and bake for 10-15 minutes. 

Serves 16, 210 calories, 2 g fat

I have cut this in half for 8 rolls and by 4 for 4 rolls and both turned out fine.  This bread is super simple, very fluffy and has a nice yeasty flavor.  How can you beat homemade bread that you can have mixed and baked in under 30 minutes?

Sweet Cornbread

This cornbread is more like corncake.  O will admit the day after I made this we actually ate it for dessert.  It has a really light and fluffy crumb and is very sweet.  This was probably the best cornbread I have ever had, definitely the best I’ve ever made.  It’s very quick and easy to make and for a low cal main dish like chili you can easily include these calories, especially if you make this 12 servings.  Just be careful, it’s so good you will have a hard time not eating a second piece!

1 cup corn meal
1 cup milk
1 cup flour
2/3 cup white sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tbs and ½ tsp baking powder
1 egg, beaten
1/3 cup melted butter

Preheat oven to 400 F.
Soak the cornmeal in the milk for 10 minutes.  Mix in the remaining ingredients then pour into a cast iron skillet or a greased muffin tin.  Bake for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

If you bake this in a muffin tin you can easily make it 12 servings, but if it’s baked in a cake pan or cast iron skillet I have a much easier time cutting 8 servings than I do 12 and calorie wise you really should strive for 12.

12 Servings, 182 calories, 6 g fat
8 Servings, 272 calories, 10 g fat

Banana Nut Bread

When I was in college I experimented with a number of different banana bread recipes, looking for my favorite.  This recipe to me is the one and I have stopped my search.  For me the texture is key for these types of breads.  I want a large crumb, something fluffy but moist, not like a muffin or a bread crumb.  The way to create the crumb you want is through the creaming style, and the moistness is dictated by the fat and the sugar.  To me the combination of all of it is perfect, but you may like a different crumb and that’s ok.

2 ½ cups sugar
1 cup shortening
3 eggs
1 ½ cup mashed bananas
3 cups flour
1 ¼ cup buttermilk
1 ½ tsp baking soda
1 ½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup chopped pecans

Preheat oven to 350 F.
Cream the sugar and shortening until the shortening is no longer in chunks.  Add the eggs one at a time and mix well.   Mix in the bananas, buttermilk, and vanilla.  Mix in flour, baking powder, and baking soda and mix until just combined.  Stir in the nuts if desired.  Pour batter into 2 greased 9x5 loaf pans and bake 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Banana bread is another one of my weaknesses, so I will give you some ideas of calories and you decide on portion sizes, I’m not telling you how much I ate.


1 loaf, 3195 calories, 151 g fat
8 servings/loaf, 400 calories, 19 g fat
12 servings/loaf, 266 calories, 13 g fat

I usually end up making the 2 loaves and taking one to work because I cannot have 2 loaves of banana bread in the house, I must get rid of that temptation pretty quickly.  Most everyone likes banana bread so it is always appreciated when you show up with some.
I typically stay away from shortening, but I have tried banana bread with different types of fats, and this produces by far my favorite.  Since I make this only once or twice a year I feel that it’s ok to splurge.  Just make sure you aren’t splurging more often than not, we are trying to keep trim here!

Classic Chocolate Buttercream

When I try to think of my “signature dish” the first thing that always comes to mind is my chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream.  I absolutely love chocolate cake and I have developed what I think is the most perfect chocolate cake imaginable.  It’s light, fluffy, and moist with a really good flavor.   The “crack cake” is what one of my girlfriends calls it because it’s so addictive.  A coworker asked me for the cake and buttercream recipe so I thought I would make it.  Now I am sorry I am not going to divulge my secrets to the interwebs for the cake but I will tell you how to make the buttercream.

I use Rose Levy Beranbaum’s Classic buttercream recipe from the Cake Bible.  This buttercream does take some work, and would be a pain without a stand mixer, but it is totally worth it.  It is very light and fluffy and not overly sweet.  A lot of people have the idea that the so sweet your teeth hurt icing on a grocery store cake is buttercream, but they are oh so wrong, and as soon as they have this they realize what they’ve been missing.  This is uber fattening, because well it’s basically just butter and sugar, but just ignore that for a minute.  Go ahead and add an extra mile to your run tomorrow just from reading this recipe.

6 large egg yolks

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup water

2 cups unsalted butter, must be softened

6 oz bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled

Have ready a greased 1-cup heatproof glass measuring cup.

In a bowl beat the yolks with an electric mixer until light in color.  Meanwhile, combine the sugar and water in a small saucepan (preferably nonstick) and heat, stirring constantly, until the sugar dissolves and the syrup is boiling.  Stop stirring and boil to the soft-ball stage (238 F).  Immediately transfer the syrup to the glass measuring cup to stop the cooking.

If using an electric hand-held mixer, beat the syrup into the yolks in a steady stream.  Don't allow the syrup to fall on the beaters or they will spin onto the sides of the bowl.  If using a stand mixer, pour a small amount of syrup over the yolks with the mixer turned off.  Immediately beat at high speed for 5 seconds.  Continue with the remaining syrup.  For the last addition, use a rubber scraper to remove the syrup clinging on the measuring cup.  Continue beating until competely cool.

Gradually beat in the butter followed by the cooled melted chocolate.  

A few tips

• The butter must be softened so let it sit on the counter for about an hour, do not put it in the microwave, melted butter and softened butter are not the same thing.  If the butter needs a little help softening and you are in a rush, hold it in your hands to soften it with your body heat. 
• Do not stir the sugar after the syrup comes to a boil or it will crystallize.
• This can be stored in an airtight container for 6 hours at room temperature, 1 week refrigerated, and 8 months frozen.
• If you store it let it come back to room temperature before using.  You can rebeat if necessary to restore the texture but do not rebeat chilled buttercream or it will curdle.
• When you separate the egg yolks and whites you can freeze the whites in a plastic bag for later.  Use in an omelet or in an egg white chocolate buttercream for a more airy and richer chocolate buttercream, I'll tell you how to make that another day.

You can use the basic recipe to make any flavored buttercream.  Instead of chocolate add 2-4 tbs vanilla extract for vanilla buttercream, 1/2 cup raspberry sauce for raspberry buttercream, or replace the water with freshly squeezed lemon juice and finish with 1/4 tsp lemon extract for a lemon buttercream.  Once you get the technique down you can do pretty much anything with this.

Snickerdoodles

I wasn’t really planning on making a desert tonight since I decided to forego my cannoli plan, but after dinner J wanted something and if I have eggs then I usually don’t mind baking, so I did.  He had yet another interesting request today.  Sometimes he really shocks me in what foods come to his mind.  Chocolate is always on my brain so I suggested brownies but he vetoed that and suggested “those cinnamon cookies”.   Being a Yankee I don’t think he had ever had snickerdoodles until I made them for him and I’ve only made them for him a couple of times, so I thought it was odd that he thought of them.

¼ cup butter, softened

¼ cup shortening

¾ cup sugar

1 egg

2 tsp vanilla

1 1/3 cup and 1 tbs flour

1 tsp cream of tartar

½ tsp baking soda

1/8 tsp salt

¼ tsp cinnamon

2 tbs sugar

2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.  Cream together the butter, shortening, ¾ cup sugar, egg and vanilla until fluffy and the butter and shortening are not clumpy.  Blend in the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, salt, and ¼ tsp cinnamon.  Roll 1” balls of dough in the sugar and cinnamon mixture and place 2 inches apart on an ungreased baking sheet.

Bake 8-10 minutes or until set but not hard, the tops should look cracked from where they spread.  Remove immediately from the pan and allow to cool on a rack.

24 cookies, 95 calories, 4 g fat each

I was able to make this batter and was just starting to load my cookie sheet when the oven had finished preheating, so I have a real hard time understanding why people use mixes.  Making things from scratch always taste better and don’t always take more effort or time, so no excuses.

Lemon Blueberry Poppyseed Mini Muffins

Last night was our Bible study, so it was leftovers, no time to cook dinner.  I did make some mini muffins to take with us though.  I found this recipe a few months ago and have been wanting to try it but haven’t had anything to do with a batch of muffins other than eat them myself.   They turned out really well I think, and I assume everyone else agreed as they were all eaten.  Okay I may have eaten 4 of them before we even left, but hey that’s beside the point.

1 cup all purpose flour

½ tsp baking powder

1/8 tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

½ cup milk

1 tbs lemon juice

½ cup sugar

¼ cup unsalted butter, room temperature

Zest from 1 lemon

1 large egg

1/8 cup poppy seeds

18 blueberries, frozen is fine

Position rack in the center of the oven and preheat to 350.  Grease a mini muffin pan or line with paper liners.

Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl.  Whisk the milk and lemon juice in a bowl and set aside to curdle (this makes buttermilk just in case anyone was unaware).  Using an electric mixer, beat sugar, butter and lemon peel until light and fluffy, occasionally scraping down the sides of the bowl.  Beat dry ingredients in 3 additions alternating with the buttermilk in 2 additions.  Mix just until blended.  Mix in the poppy seeds.

Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin tin in heaping tablespoons.  Add a blueberry to the center of each muffin and smooth the hole over so the blueberry is covered.

Bake until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.  The recipe said 22-24 minutes, but mine were done in 16.  They also didn’t add blueberries so I guess that cut back on the time quite a bit.

Makes 18 mini muffins, each muffin is 85 calories and 3 g fat