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Look! More homemade bread - this time in the form of bread sticks - to go with my nearly homemade lasagne dinner. If you're in the Westport area, I highly recommend going to Villarina's Pasta in the CVS shopping center. They have the best fresh pasta. It's absolutely delicious! Even my boys raved. That's a rare thing.
Oh, and the boys approved of the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. They just have one request. "Mom, when are you going to make the cinnamon rolls?"
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Boys and Girls,
I take great pride in presenting to you my first loaf of bread
I made an individual sized loaf - somewhere between a large roll and a small loaf. It was quite tasty. And guess what? It really did take just 5 minutes a day. Run out and get your copy of this book today and start baking - Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day
I mixed up a batch of dough from the book Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. It smells so good.
I'm following the recommendation to refrigerate the dough overnight before shaping it into loaves. I have enough dough here to make 4 loaves. I can hardly wait. It has such a wonderful yeasty smell that it's pure punishment to wait.
Now that I've found this book, will I give up knitting entirely? Marcia swears by it. My copy just arrived in the mail and I'm going to give it a try. I'll tell you how it goes.
Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois. Apparently you make a batch of dough and store it in your refrigerator for up to 2 weeks - taking only the amount of dough you need to make that meal's bread, rolls or pizza crust. Quick and easy. That sounds like my kind of baking. If you want to be truly convinced - check out this video. You can almost smell the bread baking on your computer screen.
I have a recipe to share with you. This is what I served for dinner the other night. OK - not too many secrets here. Sweet peas. Chicken Teriyaki shish kebabs from Whole Foods. Mixed spring greens with roasted pine nuts, cranberries, crumbled bleu cheese and cooked beets. The piece de resistance is the puree.
Here's the secret to my favorite puree:
It's Potato and Parsnip Puree. The special tool is the potato ricer. It makes the puree so smooth and creamy. When these were boiled and soft, I drained them, passed them through the ricer, then added 1/3 cup butter, 1/4 milk, and salt and pepper to taste.
It's a favorite in my household. Yummy!
Kay made me do it. When I saw her recipe box, it brought back wonderful memories. The sense of taste is one of the strongest and it elicits many wonderful memories. Isn't that why we all love the holiday cookies?
My own mother died when I was 28 years old and I realized that there were many things I never got to do, like gather her recipes. I could always call her in the past. So I spent about 6 months in 1995 begging my brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, cousins and even great aunts and uncles for family recipes. I received so many wonderful family treasures - my great uncle even had transcribed my great grandmother's recipes from "a pinch of this and a handful of that" into standardized measurements. I typed all the recipes into a cookbook during every free moment I had. I typed recipes into my laptop on the R train during my evening commute from Midtown to the end of the line in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn every night. I typed at home. I typed on the morning commute back to Midtown. I typed on the weekends. I typed on my lunch hour. I managed to take the family recipe box and create the Huffman Family Cookbook, making the family treasures available to the entire family. Every one of my brothers and sisters and extended family received a copy of the cook book. It's still my favorite to date. The cookbook I put together is pictured above with the recipe box. That's a picture of Grandma Lois and Grandpa Charlie during their wedding day on the cover of the cookbook. Almost all of the recipes in my Recipe Photo Album are from the Huffman Family Cookbook. Here are some pictures of the handwritten recipes
The top left is in my great-grandmother's handwriting. The middle left recipe was my Mom's favorite cookie - The Uncooked Cookie. The other two were Grandma Lois' recipes on cute cards from the 1970s.
I'll never forget the first time I made Mom's Sunday Roast Beef Dinner. It was spring 1995. I was eating and started bawling at the table. "This tastes so good. I miss my Mommy". I've never made it since... but at least I know I can, if I want to.
Speaking of family recipes, here's a picture of my Grandma Grace's Krumkake Iron which I inherited. I've never made them before, except the year Grandma showed me how to make them.
I made them on New Year's Eve as our dessert. They were a huge hit and they were a very happy visit with Grandma Grace (She's the one who taught me to knit). Even though my Grandma was Irish, she was fond of these Norgwegian Christmas cookies which Wikipedia says "are popular in Norway and the Midwest"
Krumkakes
Beat eggs and sugar. Add melted butter, vanilla and nutmeg. Add flour. In a separate bowl, whip cream. Fold whipped cream into batter. Drop by teaspoonful onto greased Krumkake iron over medium heat for about 5-7 minutes. Remove from iron. Roll on Krumkake stick to shape. Cool.
It's not quite the same as Stollen Day, but today was my Chocolate Toffee Cracker Day. I love to bake for the holidays and this year I decided to make homemade toffee.
Ingredients
Arrange the club crackers on a cookie sheet (with edges!)
In a saucepan, mix the butter and brown sugar and cook on low heat.
Pour butter/brown sugar mixture over Club Crackers and bake at 400 degrees for 5 minutes. Remove from oven and let sit a few minutes until sugar mixture stops bubbling.
Sprinkle the top of the crackers with the chocolate chips. Wait a few minutes until the chocolate chips start to melt.
Once the chips have melted, spread them evenly over the top of the toffee.
If you like, sprinkle the top with finely chopped nuts. I used pecans. BF prefers slivered almonds (something I did not know until after I had already put the pecans on top). Since some people don't like nuts, I usually make part with nuts and part with just chocolate.
Cool in the refrigerator for at least one hour. Be sure to put hot pads underneath the pan.
Once the toffee has cooled, remove it from the refrigerator and break into pieces. Store the toffee in the refrigerator.
These make great gifts - so package them in little gift bags and share the joy!
Secundogeniture asked to purchase a Wilton Gingerbread House kit at the store the other day. So tonight we decided to put it together as a family and serve it as dessert. I like the way this boy thinks! Here's a little view of our holiday festivities.
Here are some shots of the gingerbread house in varying stages of completion and even demolition.
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Yum. Best "tear down" house I've ever tasted. Secundogeniture was quite pleased with himself.
Our friends Adam and Erika have so many wonderful recipes in their families. I love to sample people's homemade favorite family recipes. I was thrilled last year when I went to their wedding in England to see that Adam had asked his mother to make her famous Nusskuchen as the wedding cakes. She, of course, obliged. I fell in love with her apple, hazelnut, chocolate cake. It is simply one of the most delicious cakes I've ever tried.
I recently begged Adam for the family recipe. He confessed that it doesn't work in the U.S. The flour just isn't the same. I've had this problem with recipes before, so I mentioned that Softasilk flour is often the solution. So he sent me the recipe and I gave it a try. NOPE. It's not the solution. The recipe calls for only 1/2 cup of self rising flour (which Softasilk is NOT). Of course, I added 1 teaspoon of baking powder, hoping it would do the trick. Still no luck. I felt that I needed more leavening agents in this recipe and also a double batch to make it big enough to get the full effect. What are your thoughts? Has anyone else had problems with the London-New York baking conversion of self-rising flour? What would you recommend? Once I get the solution, I will likely share my version of this scrumptious cake. I hope you'll all want to serve it at your family affairs.
Angel and Erik are staying with us for a bit and recently treated us to a wonderful dinner. Well, actually, the appetizers were so delicious, that we never got past them to start the main course. We went straight from appetizers to dessert. I'm not sure a nutritionist would approve, but it just seemed the right thing to do given the overindulgence of Angel's amazing parsnip potato latkes. Yum.
The recipe can be found here. We served them with sour cream and homemade applesauce. When the homemade applesauce ran out, we got out some store bought applesauce (shown here). It just wasn't the same, so we tried some homemade apple butter. It was delicious indeed. Well worth foregoing the rest of the dinner to indulge ourselves in these scrumptious latkes with the parnip twist. If you make them, tell me what you think.
Here's one of my favorite cakes to bake, when I'm not in the mood for chocolate, that is.
I recently made this for the Teacher Appreciation luncheon at Secundogeniture's school. It's usually the kind of cake I crave in autumn since it's filled with fall flavors - pumpkin, walnuts, spices and maple syrup. Yum! Click HERE for the recipe.
BF and I went to Brooklyn to visit our friends tonight. They took us to Franny's for pizza and we were impressed. If you are in Prospect Heights - heck - even if you're not - get your fanny over to Franny's for some great wood-burning oven organic/local produce pizza. It's amazing.
If you happen to be a passenger in the car (or on the subway) you might even get some knitting done.
There should be a comma in there somplace. Or an ampersand. It's really Bird Nests and Soup. I made my Mom's favorite Uncooked Cookies today - and since Easter is just around the corner, I added the three miniature jelly beans (which I admit I stole from Secundogeniture's stash) in the center to turn each cookie into a Bird Nest. I guess I must be missing my Mom, because it's about the only time I get nostalgic for these cookies. Want to try a bit? Click here for the recipe.
I also had the ladies over for lunch today - so I made some wild rice and mushroom soup. It's partially homemade and partially store bought. It's from Frontier Soups and I bought several packages at the Westport Young Woman's League's Creative Arts Festival. The soup mixes are delicious. If you haven't tried any before I highly recommend them. You start with a mix, add the chicken stock and some other fresh ingredients and have your own homemade soup. Instead of chicken and wine - I added mushrooms to my wild rice soup. For the standard recipe, click here. I really love home made soup. I could have it for lunch just about every day. The only problem with that is that I'm about the only one who likes soup in my house. So, I reserve soup for the girls.
Speaking of The Girls - that's the name of the book I just finished reading for Book Club. It was a fascinating book about conjoined twins Ruby and Rose Darlen. If you're looking for your next book - I highly recommend this one.
After the Ladies Who Lunch finished lunching, we got down to business. In the meantime, I grabbed my second skein of TOFUtsies and US Size 0 needles and cast on 72 sts and began the K2, P2 ribbing for the second sock. I got carried away with the first one, and I generally like to knit both at the same time to avoid the Second Sock Syndrome (and also to allow for any variances in the pattern being carried out on both socks simultaneously). I managed to finish the cuff and then it was time to end my ME time and go pick up Primogeniture from school. It was a very nice day. I hope yours was, too.
Whenever Primogeniture or I are sick, we always love homemade Chicken Dumpling Soup. My Grandma Grace - who taught me to knit - always used to make chicken dumpling soup. Granted she made a powdered package of Lipton Chicken Noodle Soup and added the dumplings, but nonetheless, it was a family staple in the Jackson family.
It was a cold November day in Connecticut today and I was in need of some warmth and comfort food. I did the only logical thing a girl could do - I made some Brazilian warm chocolate pudding called "mingau" and had it ready just as the boys got home from school.
My new next door neighbor, Janine, brought this amazing dessert to our neighborhood pool party. It was such a hit with everyone, young and old alike, that I felt compelled to share the recipe with you. It's Paula Deen's Not Yo' Mama's Banana Pudding from the Food Network. Get your mixing bowl out!
BF and I hosted the annual end of summer pool party for our neighborhood yesterday. It was a great day with a miraculous showing of Mr. Sun (despite many fears of a rained out event). My neighbors and new friends Maureen and Mel brought this great bottle of wine called Dyed-in-the Wool. Isn't it just perfect?
I just want to publicly share with everyone that Bethany's delectable chocolate marshmallow goodness was poorly named. In fact, Angel, Bethany and I renamed it "Mississippi Mid-Thigh Pie". You get the idea.
In case you were wondering, it is all gone. Thus, the reason for the demand for a new name. D'uh.
Talk about a sugar rush... this is it.
Bethany made this wonderful chocolate concoction to share with us. Let me just tell you - what happens when you get a sugar rush from too much Mississippi Mud Cake stays here. That's all I'm saying. (But I do have video clips as proof). Click here for the recipe.
I love to bake. It's true. So today I baked Monster Cookies, or rather, miniature Monster Cookies. They're really just oatmeal cookies with chocolate chips and M&Ms. They happen to be one of my very favorite cookies. Yum.
I'll be serving these at tomorrow morning's Saturday kNit Live ("SNL"). Want to come join us for some knitting and Monster cookies?
Yesterday afternoon was Madison's Cookie Bake Party. She had 5 friends over for an afternoon of baking and decorating. Her mom, Darcy, enlisted my help with this endeavor. I got this cool t-shirt, designed by Madison, for my efforts.
We mixed, cookied, stirred, rolled, baked, frosted, decorated and ate these wonderful cookies
We have sugar cookies, shortbread surprises (the surprise is a Hershey's Kiss), Brazilian fudge balls called "brigadeiro" rolled in holiday themed sprinkles), sugar cookies, chocolate chip cookies and gingersnaps. They were delicious, trust me. Here is the tin that Darcy and Madison sent us home with:
This morning while I was supposed to be taking it easy, I decided to use up some apples and I created this recipe for Almond Apple Crumb Cake. It turned out perfectly and I wanted to share it with everyone. I hope you like it. Download almond_apple_crumb_cake.doc
Mom. Are these healthy?" That's what my youngest asked me as he was eating the top off of one of these muffins. Hmmm. Tough question. I guess it has less sugar than cereal or Pop Tarts...
Here the recipe if you want to try them - Download banana_chocolate_chip_muffins.doc
Tonight the boys surprised me by deciding that they wanted to be 100% in charge of dinner. What a delight. My oldest son chose the menu - grilled steaks and macaroni & cheese. With my supervision and guidance he made the entire dinner by himself. YEAH! Life is good.
Trust me, these steaks were delicious.
And my youngest son was in charge of the homemade ice cream we made for dessert. We followed the recipe for the vanilla ice cream that came with the ice cream maker. Then when it was almost ready, we added miniature M&Ms and cut up Bis candy bars (Bis is a Brazilian candy bar that is something akin to a KitKat bar). It was pretty good.
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We had some friends over today to go for a swim, so I baked a double batch of Nestle's Toll House Cookies (minus the chopped nuts). When it came time to add the chocolate chips, I added one bag of Nestle Chocolate Chips and one bag of Mini M&Ms to make some Monster Cookies.
I have three sets of old fashion ice cream scoops (or melon ball scoops) which I use for quick, easy and uniform round cookies. Today I decided to use the largest scoop to make these 4-inch diameter cookies. Wow!
We're heading out to a friend's house for dinner tonight and I'm bringing a child-friendly dessert called Candy Bar Brownies. It's as sinful as it sounds and not too difficult to make. Just make your favorite package of brownies, sprinkle a bag of chocolate chips on the brownies as soon as you pull them out of the oven. While the brownies are in the oven, cut up any chocolate candy bars you happen to have. This is great to do with leftover Halloween candy. I happened to have some Grand Bars, Three Musketeers, and Mini Hershey Bars which I chopped into pieces and sprinkled on top of the melted chocolate chips. Chill in the refrigerator until the candy hardens once again. Serve. Yum!
Oh! Aren't those flowers beautiful? They were a thank you gift from Ana Maria of the Button Band Cap fame for taking care of her son last week during his lasik eye surgery. What? You don't see the box of truffles? That's because they didn't last long.
that for this morning's SNL I served up homemade (not out of a box) pancakes to everyone. It was just one of those mornings. I love pancakes!
Feast your eyes on this creation! OK, I really didn't make chocolate mousse at 0400 this morning. I made it yesterday with Andrew. He thought it might make him feel better. This is probably my favorite dessert to make for guests. Do you have a special ingredient you add to your chocolate mousse? I add lots of love and sprinkle chocolate chips on the top. Generally, I use the miniature chocolate chips, but in a pinch (like yesterday) I use whatever I have in the house. Check out the recipe here. Let me know how yours turns out.
Isn't this the cutest little box? Guess what's inside the little box?
If you guessed the batch of sugar cookies from below, you're right. These boxes with my monogram, recipe cards, the gorgeous iridescent ribbon and an embosser "From the Kitchen of Jennifer Jackson-Martins" were a gift several Christmases ago from Gary.
He's always known just what to get me. Isn't he the best?
As I bite into this crumbly sugar cookie, I think back to those days when I'd go visit Grandma Grace in her apartment and play a game of Royalty, chat or knit with her. It was such a wonderful time and I loved her dearly. She had a sweet tooth despite the fact that she was always a petite woman and Grandma Grace could always be counted on for delicious homemade cookies when I stopped for a visit. Would you like a bite?
Yum. I just love to bake cookies. The boys were with me last night and so I baked a batch of chocolate chip cookies. I decided at the last minute to make them extra large, so I took out the big ice cream scoop - the kind with the little metal bar that pushes the ice cream out of the scoop - and dropped 12 large mounds of cookie dough onto just 2 cookie sheets. Imagine that - an entire batch of cookie dough only made 12 cookies. Yum! Yum!
Well, last night I finished a batch of apple butter. This time I made just one recipe and there were no incidents that required running for the First Aid Kit. I managed to fill 11 pint size jars and make some cute Christmas labels "From the Kitchen of Jennifer Jackson" to give to a select few family and friends as Christmas gifts.
I updated the recipe to include the different way I make the apple butter from my Aunt Bev's original recipe (I add cloves and allspice). I hope you like it. My recipe made 11 pints. Yum! Download apple_butter_recipe.doc
Well, it's been a long time since the Major Knitter has submitted any recipes, so you've probably forgotten that I used to post recipes. This is one of my personal favorites. These cookies quickly disappear in my household. I hope you like them as much as we do.
If you're going to make homemade applebutter, do not TRIPLE the recipe unless you have an industrial sized kitchen with gigantic pots and pans. I managed to burn my thumb something fierce and am wearing an awkward bandage. So that it won't fall off, I am wearing a white cloth glove to protect the bandage. I look like Michael Jackson and feel like I should be doing the moon walk dance right now. It makes knitting a little tough. The worst part is that after cooking the apple butter for 9 hours and 15 minutes... it burned!
: (
I'll try it again soon. Wish me luck.
When I was a little girl, my Grandpa Charlie and Grandma Lois had several apple trees in their yard. My mother always made cooked apples with cinnamon and sugar which she called "applesauce". My Aunt Bev always made the best apple butter out of the apples. It was so delicious. I used to spend a few weeks each summer with her and my Uncle Joe in Harrisburg, South Dakota on the same farm that my mother grew up on. It was a great way to pass the summer. I just started making Aunt Bev's homemade Apple Butter last year. Tonight I decided to make a triple batch for Christmas gifts. It was a great idea until I realized that the recipe says to cook the applebutter for 3 hours. With a triple batch, it looks like it's going to take 9 hours! E-gads. I'm ready to go to sleep. Want to try some? Here's the recipe.Download apple_butter.doc It says to use 16 cups of applesauce. As you can see from the picture above, I make my own applesauce out of apples which are sliced and boiled before being passed through the foley food mill. I just love homemade applesauce. Yum. My kitchen smells so good right now. Yum. Yum. My son Michael loves to eat apple butter on graham crackers as a snack. I hope he's happy with this surprise. We'll see tomorrow.
Justine is hanging out with us this holiday and she treated us to her wonderfully delicious apple pie. Here she is posing with her blue ribbon winning (at least at our household) apple pie. Don't you wish you were here? Trust me. It was delicious. Not a crumb was left on anyone's plate.
Why Apple Pi you ask? Well in Justine's Pre-Calculus class this spring they had Pi Day. When is Pi Day you ask? Well, I'm glad you asked. Pi Day is on 3.14, otherwise known as March 14. You get the picture? Any way you cut it, this recipe is delicious. Here's the recipe that Justine shared with us. Download apple_pi_by_justine_pruss.doc
It's that time of year again. The fresh blueberries are in. So, of course, I bought 2 packages at the store this week. Looks like blueberry muffins and maybe even pancakes this weekend. I got a little creative this morning and decided to make up my own recipe for blueberry muffins. They're baking as we speak, so I don't even know how they'll turn out. Keep your fingers crossed. If you can't wait, go ahead and get started on your own batch. Here's the recipe.Download blueberry_muffins.doc
You'll have to wait for a picture.
FAST FORWARD 25 MINUTES...
I love my Saturday morning knitting bee. I get up early and put the house in order, bake some sort of cake or bread, make coffee, and get ready for my friends to arrive. I usually sleep in until 0600 or 0700 on Saturday, which is still plenty of time to get things ready. Most of the ladies show up from 0900-1100. Some early birds come before. It's such a fun way to spend a Saturday morning. My family benefits, too, by having a continental breakfast all set up. Yum!
Today I made a repeat of the Banana Cake (one plain and one with chocolate chips). The recipe also calls for walnuts, but due to a serious nut allergy, I don't put any in for Saturday morning. It's a large recipe which allows for a 9x13 cake and a 8x8 cake. Enjoy! Here is the recipe and a shot of the set-up for the Saturday morning knitting bee. Download banana_cake_with_chocolate_chips.doc
Wanna come knit with us?
Well, the good news is that I'm almost done with the blue socks. I'm on the toe shaping now, which I believe is truly the home stretch. Yeah! But the real reason I took this picture is to show off my Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies. I've been home this week and last (thus the overblogging) with the kids while we wait for our new sitter to get here on Sunday. It's been going quite well, actually. My husband was so impressed with the shiny bathroom that he promised me a raise. Hahaha! I've truly enjoyed the time with my boys, my knitting, my blogging, and my baking. The best part is that I've been documenting all my knitting through the ages. I've meant to do that for ages, but never actually got moving on it.
If you like to bake as much as I do, try out these yummy cookies. Enjoy! Download chocolate_chocolate_chip_cookies.doc
Today we had a farewell luncheon for our kindergarten teacher, Bobbi Hauer, who retired after 22 years. I offered to make potato salad and decided to try something new, so I made this one. Yum yum! Here's the recipe in case you want to try it yourself. It was quite tasty, if I do say so myself. Please note that I made a double recipe - enough to feed two dozen people. You might want to make a half recipe or less for your house Download red_skinned_potato_salad.doc
This is a new feature of my website. I always bake for my Saturday morning knitting bee and now I'm going to post my recipes on my website in order to share them with others. Here's the first recipe:
Download buttermilk_brownies.doc
At today's knitting bee, I served homemade buttermilk brownies with chocolate buttermilk frosting with pecans. The recipe calls for walnuts, but I was fresh out of walnuts, so I used pecans instead. I hope you like the recipe. Enjoy!
