Category: Food

Tonight we went to have dinner with some friends.  We decided to do a dutch oven dinner, and it turned out great.  We had chicken and rice, corn on the cob, apple cinnamon bread, and peach cobbler.  I made the apple cinnamon pull-apart bread.  I've been enjoying creating yeast breads in my dutch oven lately.

When I was checking the "doneness" of the bread, I did what I usually do when I make rolls in the dutch oven.  I tapped the top of a roll to see if it would spring back.

Mistake.

The apple cinnamon pull-apart bread had hot, carmelized brown sugar on it that instantly stuck to my finger.  OUCH!!!

Now I have a little blister on the tip of my left index finger.  It's hard to type.  Hopefully, it will start feeling better in the morning.  Ugh.

I'll have to be more careful in the future.

For Mothers Day yesterday, my wife decided that she wanted grilled steak, some sort of potatoes, and apple crisp for dessert.

I cooked it all outdoors.

I love cooking in dutch ovens. The more I cook with them, the more I'm convinced that if you can cook it indoors, I can cook it better outdoors. I made potatoes with bacon and onions and cheese. They turned out perfectly, which was a happy surprise, because every time I've ever had someone else cook this particular side dish for me, some of the potatoes were overcooked.

The apple crisp was excellent! The top was brown and crunchy and the apples were soft and spiced perfectly. I believe that it's better in a dutch oven because there's too much air in a regular oven and the crumbly topping dries out too much. We topped the apple crisp with homemade vanilla ice cream. Delicious!

And of course, the steak was grilled to perfection. It was a good cut of ribeye, so it was tender and juicy.

All-in-all, it was a perfect meal, and the house stayed cool because I didn't need to turn on a single cooking appliance.

Fortunately, there are plenty of leftovers!

Well, the new range is pretty well broken in. I found a recipe that I wanted to try on foodnetwork.com. It's a Lemon Layer Cake. Here's the recipe:

Lemon Cake
2 1/2 cups cake flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, slightly softened
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 large whole eggs, at room temperature
3 large egg yolks, at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup whole milk

To make the lemon cake, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter the bottom and sides of two 9-inch round cake pans. Dust the pans with flour and tap out the excess.
In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Stir together the dry ingredients with a whisk. Set aside.
In an electric stand mixer, using the paddle attachment or beaters, beat the butter on medium speed for about 30 seconds, or until creamy. Gradually add the sugar, increase the speed to medium-high, and continue to beat until the mixture is light, about 3 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.
Add the whole eggs and egg yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the vanilla and lemon zest. Reduce the speed to low and gradually beat in he lemon juice (the batter will appear curdled at this point smooth out after you add the dry ingredients). Beat in the dry ingredients in 3 additions alternately with milk in 2 additions. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and beat for another 10 seconds. Scrape the batter into the prepared pans.
Bake the cakes for 20 to 25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of each cake comes out clean. Cool the cakes in the pans on wire racks for 20 minutes. Invert the cakes onto the rakcs and cool completely.

Lemon Filling
2 large egg yolks
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, slightly softened
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1/2 cup heavy cream

To make the lemon filling, in a medium nonreactive saucepan, whisk together the yolks and sugar until combined. Whisk in the lemon juice, butter, and salt. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, for 5 to 6 minutes, or until the mixture turns opaque, thickens, and coats the back of the spoon. Do not let the filling boil, or it will curdle. Pour the mixture through a fine mesh sieve into a medium bowl. Stir in the lemon zest and allow the filling to cool.
Cover with plastic wrap, pressing directly onto the surface, and refrigerate for 1 hour, or until chilled.
In a clean bowl of the electric mixer, using the whisk attachment or beaters, beat the heavy cream on high speed until soft peaks form. Remove the lemon filling from the refrigerator and whisk until smooth. Using a rubber spatula, gently fold the whipped cream into the filling. Cover the bowl and refrigerate the filling until ready to assemble the cake.

Lemon Frosting:
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
3 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
2 tablespoons heavy cream
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

To make the lemon frosting, in the large bowl of the electric mixer, using the paddle attachment or beaters, beat the butter on medium speed until creamy, about 30 seconds. Gradually beat in the confectioners' sugar on low speed. Add the cream, lemon juice, vanilla, and lemon zest. Increase the speed to medium-high, and beat for about 3 minutes, or until the frosting is light and fluffy.

To assemble the cake, place 1 cake layer on a serving plate. Pile the lemon filling onto the center using a small offset metal spatula, and spread it into an even layer, leaving a 1-inch border around the edge of the cake layer. Top with the second cake layer. Frost the top and sides of the cake with the lemon frosting. (If some of the filling oozes out from the middle, just blend it with the frosting around the sides of the cake.) Serve the cake immediately, or refrigerate and bring to room temperature before serving.

When I made it, the cake fell a little. I think I had it too low in the oven and after buying an oven thermometer, I also know that the oven was 5 to 10 degrees too low. So I calibrated the oven and we tried it again today. My wife's banana bread came out perfectly.

I also made one of my very favorite recipes of all time today. I guess I've been cooking more, because it didn't seem as hard today as it did last time I made it.

Lasagna Deliciosa
8 oz lasagna noodles
1 lb hot italian sausage
1/2 lb ground beef
1 cup chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp sugar
1 Tbsp salt
1 1/2 tsp basil leaves
1/2 tsp fennel seed
1/4 tsp pepper
1 28-oz can tomatoes, broken up
2 6-oz cans tomato paste
1 egg, beaten
1 15-oz container ricotta cheese
1 Tbsp dried parsley flakes
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup olives, sliced
1 lb. mozarella cheese, grated
3/4 cup parmesan cheese wedge, grated

Prepare lasagna noodles according to directions. Drain. Cook sausage and ground beef. Drain. Add onion and garlic. Stir and cook 5 minutes. Add next 7 ingredients (sugar through tomato paste) and simmer 20 minutes. Combine egg, ricotta, parsley, and 1/2 tsp salt. In bottom of a 9x13 dish, spoon about 1 1/2 cups meat sauce. Layer 1/3 of the lasagna noodles, 1/3 of the meat sauce, 1/3 of the ricotta, 1/3 of the sliced olives, 1/3 of the mozarella, and 1/3 of the parmesan. Repeat the layering. Cover with foil and bake at 375 degrees for 25 minutes. Uncover and bake 25 minutes longer. Let stand 10 minutes before cutting.

I installed the new range last night. It wasn't a big deal. It was as simple as attaching the power cord (basically, tightening 6 screws) plugging it in, and sliding it back into place.

It's pretty nice, actually. The oven heats up faster than the old one. I turned the oven on to about 425 degrees for a half hour last night, just to burn off the initial smell. Ovens are stinky when you first use them. I don't know exactly what it is that stinks so much, but it'll be nice to have that gone.

My son didn't want eggs this morning, or I would have actually cooked on the new cooktop. I'm going to have to find a good recipe and bake something tonight. I'm off to foodnetwork.com to see what I can find!

Of course, if anyone reading this has a favorite recipe, please post it in a comment. Maybe I'll break in the new oven with YOUR recipe!

Last night I made a pound cake. I'd never made a pound cake before. It was interesting.

Useless trivia: A pound cake is called a pound cake because originally, the recipe called for a pound each of butter, sugar, eggs, and flour.

Why was it interesting? Well, this is a blog. If you don't want to know WHY it was interesting, you're going to have to stop reading now.

When you make a pound cake, you beat and beat and beat the wet ingredients. You beat the room-temperature butter until it's light and fluffy. Then you add the sugar, a couple of tablespoons at a time, beating and beating and beating the batter all the time. When the sugar is all in, it's extremely light and fluffy. Then you add vanilla and then eggs, one at a time, beating a full minute after each egg addition. By the time I was done with that, the mixture had the texture of that white fluffy frosting you get on store-bought wedding sheet cakes.

After that, you stir in the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, and any spices you might want) until it's just barely moistened. The resulting cake batter is light and airy and NOT pourable at all. I basically had to spread the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Then you bake it for a full hour at a lower temperature than most cakes.

I've made lots of cakes, boxed and from scratch, but I've never made one QUITE like the pound cake.

The result was *burp* delicious! A rich, buttery, flavorful, dense pound cake.

Great. Now I'm craving another piece!