Yams with a sauce

This past Thanksgiving part of our donation to the dinner was yams.  And the wife did this little guys.  The wife got the recipe from the Foodnetwork.  and Paula Dean as the cook.  Being the kind of guy that I am, and the guy making the sauce,  I had to change something on the recipe.  I took the booze out. Two reasons, one I don't drink and the grandkids.  I know the deal you cook all the booze out and you are left with the flavor only.  Oh the other reason was I didn't have any Jack Daniels for the sauce.  

This recipe is scaled for 4 serving and it takes about 2 hours or less.  

It's easy to do,  The hardest part was transporting the dish.  

Anyway,

The INGREDIENTS:

4          large sweet potatoes

3          cups water

1-1/2    cups brown sugar

4          Tbs butter

1          Cinnamon stick

1/4        teasp. nutmeg

1          long strip orange peel 

1/3       cup bourbon,  Best to use Jack Daniels

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 400F


2. Wash and dry the sweet potatoes and bake for 1 hour or until potatoes are soft to the touch.  


3. Remove from the oven and let cool and then remove the skin.  Reduce the oven temp to 350F. 


4. While the potatoes are baking, combine remaining ingredients in a saucepan.  Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 30-45 minutes or until sauce is slightly thickened.  


5. Slice the potatoes 1/2 inch thick into a medium casserole dish, Pour syrup over them and return to the oven and bake for approximately 30 minutes.  

Fast Drop Biscuits

COPYRIGHT 2011 by Michael Long

If you get overwhelmed needing a biscuit with lets say honey, or jam, or your biscuit and gravy fix,  Try this recipe.  it takes longer for the oven to heat up than it does to mix these little guys up. 

Ingredients:

•  2   cups               AP Flour


•  1    Tablespoon     Baking Powder


•  2    tsp            Sugar


•  1/4 tsp             Salt


•  1/2 cup               Melted butter


•  1    cup               Milk

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450F (230 C)


2. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder,sugar, and salt.  Stir in butter and milk until    moist.  Drop the biscuits on to a lined baking sheet.  I used tablespoon size for mine. 


3. Bake those puppies until golden brown around the edges.  This will take about 10 minutes or so.  


4. Pull those hot little guys our when done,  dig out the honey and chow down. 

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You'll have about a half an hour on these little guys,  This recipe will make about a dozen biscuits. 

Double Brownie Chocolate Cookie

These little guys are flour-less, with a chocolate chips.  Way over the top.  And they're made in one bowl. And fast!!!  These little guys have to be eaten with Brain freeze milk, since the intensity of the chocolate is so great.  But there's nothing wrong with that. 

I changed the original recipe some,  not a lot,  but some,  in place of the vanilla extract I used 3 vanilla beans,  and I used Ghirardelli cocoa powder.  You can use something else, but I had this on hand,  and I love this chocolate. 

Ingredients:

• 3 cups        Powdered sugar


• 2/3 cup      Cocoa Powder


• 1/8 tsp       Salt


• 2-4 eggs     Whites only (@ Room Temperature)


• 1 Tbs         Vanilla extract


• 1-1/2 cup   Chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Gotta preheat the oven to 350F.  But you knew that!


2. Line two baking sheets with either Parchment paper with spray or two Slip-pat mats.


3. In a large bowl add your sugar, cocoa powder and salt, and whisk till completely mixed. 


4. Add your vanilla and two egg whites, to the mix and mix till well incorporated  It's going to start to look like a brownie mix,  if it's too thick add another egg white.  Your looking for a brownie/fudge consistency  to the mix.  If need be add another egg white to get to the right consistency. If you go over, not to worry,  add some more sugar to bring it back.  Just a spoonful at a time.  You'll get there,  Trust me on that!


5. Caution DON'T OVER WORK THE BATTER, just mix till incorporated.


6. Stir in the chocolate chips.  I know your going to think hey, that's too much,  But there no such thing, too many chips. 


7. Scoop the batter out on to your mats about a Tablespoon size.  I over did it on mine.  But I'm into chocolate.


8. leave about a two inch gap between the cookies so that they can spread out.


9. Put those little guys in the oven for about 15 minutes.  You want a slight crust on the bottom. Your oven temp my vary some, so keep an eye on those guys.


10. I rotate my pans so they bake evenly,  But my oven has some hot spots in it. So I have to work mine a little more than some. 


11. When they are done, let them cool to room temp or close too, and get the milk out of the freezer and go for it.  These should last about 3 days in an airtight container.  Here they lasted about 2 days. 

You should be able to get about 30 or so cookies out of this.  

I got this recipe from the internet,  from a blog called "Chocolate and Carrots"  and this lady got it from another blog called "Keep it sweet"

http://designsbygollum.blogspot.com

OLD-FASHIONED YELLOW CAKE

Photography by Michael Long

    This is the first recipe that I made out the book Small Batch Baking. This is going to be a first in a series of recipes that I'll do.

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    As Debby Maugans Nakos (author) called her Old-Fashioned Yellow Cake.  pp42. This makes two cakes and uses two 14- or 14.5 oz cans, To bake in.  I had some small cake pans that I used.  

 INGREDIENTS:

• Unsalted butter, at room temperature, for greasing the cans/pans. 


• 1/2 cup A-P flour, sifted, plus more for flouring the cans.


• 3 tablespoons buttermilk


• 1/8 teaspoon baking soda


• 1 egg Yolk (large egg)


• 1/5 teaspoon pure Vanilla extract


• 3 Tablespoon unsalted butter melted and cooled


• 1/3 cup sugar


• 1/4 teaspoon salt

DIRECTIONS:

1. Place oven rack in middle of oven and preheat oven to 350F 


2. Grease the insides of the cans and lightly dust with flour, tapping out the excess.  Place the cans on a baking sheet for easier handling and set aside. 


3. Place the buttermilk and baking soda in a small bowl, and whisk until the baking soda is dissolved.  Add the egg yolk, vanilla, and melted butter.


4. Place the flour, sugar, and salt in a medium size bowl and whisk to blend well.  Add the buttermilk mixture and whisk just until blended and smooth.


5. Spoon the batter into the prepared cans, dividing the batter evenly between the cans. Bake the cakes until a toothpick comes out dry.  (about 25minutes)


6. Remove the cakes and cool for about 15 minutes then De-can the cakes.  You may have to use a knife around the edges to loosen the cakes from the cans.  

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And that's all there is to it.......Poof you have cakes for dessert....... Is that cool or what.... and they taste pretty darn good too. 

BAKING FOR 2

I just got a book on Small-Batch Baking. By Debby Maugans Nakos. A super book. In the book Debby talks about Desserts for 2.  I made a yellow cake for tonights dinner and It came out fantastic.  I was very impressed.  She hit right on with the recipe. Time, Temp Measurements were right on.  It looks like most of the cakes are made in a 14.5 oz cans.  The cans that beans etc come in. I used very small cake pans for the cake below.  She goes into how to prep the cans to use for you baking molds. I made the yellow cake in just a few minutes, with 1 small bowl,  and one 3 qt bowl. and a wire whip.  The baking took right at 25 minutes. Ovens my vary on temp and time.

Photography by Michael Long

Here is what the Publisher had to say about the book.

Even the most enthusiastic home bakers may admit there are times when they really only need a few muffins for breakfast or a couple of cream puffs for a dinner party—not a dozen or more of each. When standard recipes won't reduce neatly (how do you halve an egg, for example?), frustration ensues. Nakos, a Shape, Southern Living and Cooking Light contributor, takes more than 250 classic cakes, pies, cookies, cobblers, puddings and breads and downsizes their proportions to yield just the right number of goodies for small families, singles, newlyweds, empty-nesters or the leftovers-averse (do such people exist?). Nakos certainly is creative: she uses tin cans to bake two-layer coconut cakes and chocolate cakes, jumbo muffin tins for Peach Pie and Pineapple Upside-Down Cake, and small loaf pans for Moist Fudgy Brownies. Meanwhile, a full-size loaf pan turns out Mississippi Mud Cake or Gingerbread Roulade, and one regular baking sheet does the job for Cinnamon Hazelnut Biscotti. Small-batch baking as formulated by Nakos is liberating: with quick mixing, baking and clean-up times, the whole process of producing, say, eight Pecan Snowball Cookies for tea time, or two Honey Apple Oatmeal Crisps for a sweet breakfast, is less overwhelming.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

I give this book a 4.5 star rating.  There are no pictures in the book. or at least none in the paper back edition.  I will be posting recipes from this book very shortly.

THE WONDERFUL CHOCOLATE WAFER

Always being a big fan of the Vanilla Wafer,  I have never found a good chocolate wafer.  But now I have one.. And it's way way over the top.  This thing is so good,  It makes your eyes tear up.  The only true way to enjoy these is with Brain Freeze COLD MILK or with Ice cream... However, these little guys can be eaten straight up also... But the Brain Freeze is so much better... 

    Alice Medrich wrote this recipe and it's from her book Cookies and Brownies, A Warner Books, Inc.  New York: 1999  Which I've adapted this recipe from.







Ingredients:

• 1 cup (130g)  AP Flour


• 1/2 cup (50)  unsweetened DUTCH-Processed cocoa powder


• 1/4 tsp           salt (kosher)


• 1/4 tsp           baking soda


• 3 TBS (45g)    unsalted butter, room temp.


• 3 TBS (45g)    margarine (NOTE!!!) 


• 2/3cup(140g) packed light brown sugar


• 1/2cup(100g) granulated white sugar


• 1 tsp               pure vanilla extract.  or 3 vanilla beans split and scrapped out I changed out the extract to vanilla bean.  Made big difference!


• 1 large            egg

Note the addition of the margarine!!!!

 Directions:

1. In a bowl whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.


2. In your mixer bowl cream the butter and margarine until well blended.  Add the sugars (both the white and brown).  And the vanilla to the mix.  Beat on high speed for (1 minute).  Stop the mixer and scrap down the sides And beat in the eggs, one at a time. Then add the flour mixture. and beat until (JUST INCORPORATED)


3. Take the dough out of the bowl, and onto parchment paper form the dough into a log.  About 1-11/2 in dia.  And warp the dough you just logged with parchment paper.   Try NOT to Flatten the log too much.  And place the log in the frig. for at least 1 hour, but better if longer.  Like overnight.


4. Preheat the oven to 350F. and place your racks in the center of the oven.  Your only going to be able to do 1 half sheet pan at a time.   


5. Using a very sharp knife cut the log into quarter inch slices and space them about one inch apart on your cookie sheets.  OH FORGOT USE SLIPATS OR PARCHMENT PAPER TO LINE YOUR SHEETS WITH. 


6. Bake for about 10-12 minutes or until the cookies are puffy and tops have small crackles or ripples.  


7. Remove from the oven and let the cookies cool  on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes or so.  Then you can move those little guys over to a cooling rack. 


8. You can store this little guys in an airtight bag or container for about 10days or so.

This will yield about 36 cookies.   

The local testers for this recipe have been at least 4 stars, all the way up to a 5 star.

So you know these little guys are good... 

VANILLA BEAN SUGAR COOKIES

   HEY, Look at the picture above... Pretty cool huh!!!!  Those are VANILLA BEAN SUGAR COOKIES.  I found the recipe in Alice Medrich newest cookbook. CHEWY GOOEY CRISPY CRUNCHY COOKIES On page 38-40.  I ordered this book and didn't tell my wife about it.  So when she got home, she saw it... So to cover my tail I told her I would bake anything in the book for her... And she picked out this along with 50 or so other recipes...

    After making these little puppies,  I was hooked on them... Hey, the baker here has to test everything...!!!

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INGREDIENTS:

• 18 oz       (4cups) AP Flour


• 1   tsp      baking powder


• 1/2 tsp      salt


• 1/2 lbs      unsalted butter/slightly softened


• 14  oz       sugar


• 2  ea         eggs


• 1 Tlb         Vanilla extract or seeds from 3 beans

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DIRECTIONS:

1. Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl and mix together thoroughly with a fork or whisk.


2. Beat the butter and sugar in bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy, (3-4) minutes. Add eggs one at a time and then the Vanilla bean seeds.  On low speed, beat in the flour (only until it's just incorporated)  Scrape the dough into a mass and knead it with your hands a few times until smooth. Divide the dough into 4 pieces and form each into a flat patty.  Wrap those guys up in plastic wrap and refrigerate the patties until firm enough to roll,  preferably several hours or overnight.


3. Preheat the oven to 350F and position the racks one at a third down and one a third up.


4. TO ROLL AND CUT THE COOKIES:  Remove 1 patty from the frig. and let it sit at room temp until supple enough to roll but still firm.  It will continue to soften as you work.  Roll the dough between two sheets of wax-paper. To a thickness of 1/8 of an inch.  Turn the dough over once or twice while you are rolling in out to check for deep wrinkles; if necessary, peel off and smooth the paper over the dough before continuing to roll it out.  


5. When the dough is thin enough, slide it (still between the sheets of wax-paper. On to a sheet pan and put back in the frig.  Remove the bottom (coldest) sheet form the frig.  Peel off the top sheet of paper and set it on the counter.  Invert the dough onto it and peel off the second sheet.


6. Cut cookie shapes as close together as possible to minimize scrapes, dipping the edges on the cookie cutters in flour as necessary to prevent sticking. Place the cut out cookies on a greased cookie sheet or parchment paper cookie sheet, or slipmat lined cookie sheet.  (IF THE DOUGH GETS TOO SOFT ANYTIME, SLIDE THE DOUGH INTO THE FRIG TO COOL.).


7. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until golden brown at the edges. 

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This recipe will yield about 90 cookies with a 2-1/2" cutter