Version #1: for Meghan and other dark chocolate lovers
Apparently, it’s going to be a week of revelations. I baked my go-to Chocolate and Fruit Oatmeal Cookies yesterday, using cranberries, split the batch, added white chocolate (Zephyr 34% Cacao Barry) to one half for Michael and dark chocolate (Tanzanie 75% Cacao Barry) to the other half for me, then posted a photo on my Instagram. Prepared to be asked for the recipe, I popped over to my blog (i.e. here) for a link only to realize I never posted it. I only sent it out in a newsletter (May 2017!!).
So here it is, if only just so I can link back to it myself.
In lieu of the 2nd Baking with the Director episode (which we decided to not shoot so we could launch episode 2 of SiftingRealities) here is the recipe for the cookies that are featured in episode one: MAN IN MY BED (more details in previous post). Of ALL the cookies I bake these are my absolute favourite. This is my go to recipe, for every occasion (except maybe Christmas):
At the beginning of March, we treated ourselves to a trip to the Wick Inn in Tofino for Michael’s birthday and, there, Sunday morning, I indulged in a fresh baked croissant with house made strawberry jam. SO GOOD! Now, I can’t actually digest white flour, so this was a huge, but tasty, risk for me and, though it sat in my stomach like a heavy blob of play dough afterwards, I very much enjoyed the eating of it!
So, of course, I decide I should attempt to make some whole wheat croissants of my own. To that end, yesterday, late afternoon, and not at all daunted with what looks to add up to about 5 hours of work, I set the yeast to proof, sift three cups of whole wheat pastry flour, and pull the butter out of the fridge… hmm, there seems to only be about ¾ of a cup of butter in the fridge… no matter I always have backup in the freezer… except I don’t this time.
I fuss around for a bit, and call Michael to complain about my lack of butter. He offers to pick up as much butter as I would like, but I don’t want to wait the hour or so it will take for him to finish work and get home. (Yes, he IS lovely and supportive while I am crazy impatient and almost always impossible to help). Then, done complaining, I try to figure out what I can actually make, seeing as I don’t want to waste the yeast which has now proofed so nicely. I settle on butter horns, but only have enough butter for half a recipe, so I halve the recipe… except I use the full amount of yeast and declare it an experiment, knowing full well I am NEVER happy when I experiment bake.
In the spirit of this (doomed?) experimentation, I decide I actually want a Danish of sorts, so, while the pastry is rising, I start hunting down possible fillings… I settle on a vanilla cream filling… the kind you would use if you were making a boston cream pie.
Here is the result… the pastry is actually lovely, a feat I have never obtained, to my personal liking, with whole wheat pastry flour (I guess doubling the yeast is the trick!!).
Vanilla cream (whole wheat) butter horns with powdered sugar icing
Seems sometimes an experiment does actually have tasty results!
