French Bread - Made in under an hour!!!

I have been craving bread all day, but didn't feel like spending all day making fresh bread. If you had told me yesterday that French Bread could be made, including baking and rising time, in under an hour I would have thought you were crazy. But, it's true, AMAZING French Bread can be made in under an hour. This is by far the best bread I have ever made, and no crazy kneading or waiting for it to rise and rise again.

All you need is:

• 1 1/2 cups warm water
• 1 Tbs honey
• 1/2 Tbs salt
• 1 1/2 Tbs active dry yeast or 1 packet
• 3 to 4 cups flour

Pour water into a medium mixing bowl and add the salt, honey, and yeast.
Gently mix just to slightly dissolve the yeast and let the mixture rest for 10 minutes.
Slowly knead in most of the flour. I ended up only needing 3 1/2 cups of flour. Your dough should be moist but not sticky.
Shape one large or two small loaves, place them on a cookie sheet and let rise 20 minutes.
Use a knife to slash the tops diagonally.
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees and bake for 20 minutes or until golden brown.
Another way to tell when your bread is done is to knock on it, the bread should sound hollow.
Let the bread cool 10 minutes before serving.
Because this bread doesn't contain any preservatives it will go stale faster than store-bought bread.
Enjoy!

Microwave Hot Fudge Cake

I forgot to take a photo! Here's a photo of Bellingham, WA instead.
It comes out looking like this if you are curious.

I stumbled upon this recipe today and had to try it. The cake was good, the sauce came out a little like pudding. My only caution is that you need someone to split this with! I split it with my dad and still had a stomach ache from all the sugar.

• 1/4 cup flour
• 3 Tbsp. granulated sugar
• 2 tsp. baking cocoa
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/8 tsp. salt
• 2 Tbsp. milk
• 2 tsp. vegetable oil
• 1/4 tsp. vanilla
• 2 Tbsp. chopped nuts (I used Pecans... yum!)
  
• 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 Tbsp. baking cocoa
• 1/2 cup hot water

1. Mix flour, granulated sugar, 2 teaspoons cocoa, the baking powder and salt in 24-ounce microwavable casserole. Stir in milk, oil and vanilla until smooth. Stir in 2 tablespoons nuts. Sprinkle with brown sugar and 1 tablespoon cocoa.
2. Place water in 1-cup microwavable measure. Microwave uncovered on High 1 minute to 1 minute 30 seconds or until boiling. Pour over batter.
3. Microwave uncovered on High 2 minutes 30 seconds to 3 minutes, rotating casserole 1/4 turn after 1 minute, until cake is set but still glossy. Serve warm topped with ice cream. Garnish with sliced bananas, additional nuts and cherries.

Apple Applesauce Cake

• 2 cups peeled & diced baking apples (I used yellow transparent apples that were given to me by The Harwell's.)
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 cup flour
• ¾ tsp. baking soda
• ½ tsp. salt
• 1-1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 1 dollop of sour cream (or 1 egg replacer equivalent)
• ½ cup apple sauce
• 1tsp. vanilla

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
In a small bowl combine peeled and diced apples with sugar.
In a medium bowl mix the sour cream (or egg replacer), applesauce and vanilla.
Add flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon and mix well.
Fold in diced apples.
Spread the batter in a greased 8 or 9 inch round cake pan.
Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Dinner Rolls

Mmmmmm bread!

I make these whenever I have a little time. They go great with almost any meal, and we eat them as snacks or use them to make mini-sandwiches for lunch. They are BY FAR the best dinner rolls I have ever had.

• 1 1/8 tsp. yeast
• ½ cup warm water
• ¼ cup sugar
• 1 ½ tsp. egg replacer + 1 ½ tbs water (equivalent to half an egg)
• 1 tsp. salt
• ½ cup milk, scalded and cooled to warm
• 4 Tbsp. melted butter + 1 Tbsp. for basting
• 3 cups flour
  

Dissolve yeast in warm water and let stand 5 minutes. The yeast should look bubbly, similar to this:
Add the sugar, egg replacer, salt, warm milk, and melted butter, mix well.
Slowly add the flour, mix well and knead for 5 minutes or until dough doesn't stick to bowl. The dough will still be pretty wet feeling.
Place dough in greased bowl, cover, and let rise 1 hour until doubled in size. To tell if a dough has doubled press on it with your finger and the indention shouldn't immediately bounce back.
Punch down dough and form into 1 ½ inch balls.
Place balls in greased and floured 9 inch round pan and let rise 20-30 minutes.
Brush with 1 Tbsp. butter.
Bake at 425° for 15 minutes or until golden brown.
Serve warm or store in the fridge for later.

Almond Cookies

One of my mom's favorite cookies. These cookies have a nice mild almond flavor, and aren't overly sweet.

• 1/2 cup butter softened
• 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 dollop sour cream or 1 egg replacer equivalent
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. almond extract
• Milk
• 1/2 cup sliced almonds
  

In an electric mixer cream butter and sugar for 30 seconds.
Add 3/4 cup of flour, sugar, sour cream or egg replacer, baking powder, and almond extract and mix until combined.
Mix in remaining 1 cup of flour.
Divide dough into 4 equal parts.
Shape each part into an 8 inch roll.
Place two rolls lengthwise on a cookie sheet and flatten each until they are approximately 3 inches wide.
Brush with a little milk and sprinkle with the almonds.
Bake at 325 degrees for 13 to 15 minutes, or just until the edges are lightly browned.
Cut the warm cookies diagonally into 1 inch strips.
Cool cookies on a wire rack and drizzle with icing.
Makes approx. 2 dozen cookies.

For Icing:

• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
  
• 2 Tbsp. milk

Combine sugar, vanilla and milk in a bowl and mix until the icing runs nicely of the spoon. Add more milk a teaspoon at a time to thin if necessary.

Blueberry Glaze

We made blueberry glazed donuts this morning! The glaze is awesome, and the donuts were yummy but the recipe needs some work.

Here's the glaze recipe and I will post the donut recipe once it is perfected!

• 2 Tbsp. blueberry juice
• 3/4 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 Tbsp. softened butter

To make the blueberry juice we just microwaved 20 blueberries for 30 seconds, smashed them with a fork and removed the pulp.

Mix all the ingredients until the glaze will run off a spoon, but isn't super runny.

Once the donuts had cooled a little, we just dipped the donuts in the glaze and let them finish cooling on a wire rack with a cookie sheet under it.

Lasagna

Lasagna is one of the easiest comfort foods to make!
All you need is a box of lasagna noodles, some tomato sauce, a little bit of parsley and lots of cheese! I added spinach to mine this time.

• 1/2 pound lasagna noodles (9 noodles)
  
• 1 1/2 cups pasta sauce (I used my standard pasta sauce recipe which makes more than enough sauce for this recipe, but I like extra sauce when I am serving),
• an entire tub (32 oz.) of ricotta cheese
• 1 1/2 cups of grated mozzarella cheese
  
• a little grated parmesan cheese
  
• 1 Tbsp. parsley finely chopped (Fresh flat leaf Italian is the best if you can find it.)

Cook the lasagna noodles following the instructions on the box, or until aldente.
Strain the noodles gently so that they do not break, and run some cool water over them.

Mix the entire tub of ricotta with approx. 1 cup of shredded mozzarella cheese and 1 Tbsp. parsley. The remaining 1/2 cup of mozzarella cheese will be used on the top.

In a 9x13 baking dish layer as follows:

• 1/4 cup sauce
• 3 noodles
• 1/2 cheese mixture
• 3 noodles
• 1/2 cup sauce
• Remaining cheese mixture
• 3 noodles
• 1/2 cup sauce
• 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella
• a sprinkle of grated parmesan

Bake covered at 350 degrees for 35 minutes. Remove the covering and bake for an additional 10 minutes, or just until brown on top.

Let cool 15 minutes and serve warm.