Pro Bono Baker

Baked and Fried Stale Breads (IMBB #25)

IMBB#25 is hosted this month by An Obsession With Food.  Head over to the Is My Blog Burning? website to learn more about this and other food events.  Derrick chose the excellent theme of stale bread.  As a home bread baker and a bread addict, I tend to have a fair amount of the stuff around.  Once in a while a baguette, or more rarely some delectable levain, will end up fairly stale.  Panzanella, pain perdu, croutons, and bread pudding are all excellent and frequent uses, but for this IMBB I chose to mimic a cooking technique that I recently saw a friend in Moscow use. 

I tried both a fried and baked version.

Fried Stale Bread with Pseudo-Coddled Eggs

The moistened bread, coddled eggs, and butter created a lovely creamy texture and taste.

Serves 2

Ingredients

4 slices of stale French or Italian style bread (I used D'Amato's Home Style Filone)
1 C hot water
1 tsp salt
4 Tbl butter
4 eggs
1 Tbl shredded cheese (I used mozzarella)
1 Tbl grated Parmesan
1 tsp dried rosemary
2 Tbl greens or julienned vegetables
salt and pepper to taste.

Cut the bread into 1 inch slices.  Make a small depression in the center of each with your thumb.  Mix the hot water and salt in a bowl and dip each side of the bread slices into the water -- do not soak.  Place on a paper towel to get rid of the excess moisture.

Butter the sides without the depressions liberally and place into a frying pan over medium heat.  Break an egg into the depression of each slice.  The egg will spill over the sides.  Sprinkle on the rosemary. Cover and let cook for about 5 minutes.  In the last minute add a bit of each type of cheese to the tops.  The eggs are ready when the whites are opaque.  (You may cook them longer if you prefer more solid whites, though it is best to leave the yolks runny.)  Season to taste, top with greens or vegetables and serve warm.

Stale Bread Baked with Eggs and Tomato Chutney

Serves 2

Ingredients

4 slices of stale French or Italian style bread (I used D'Amato's Home Style Filone)
2 eggs
4 Tbl butter
2 Tbl shredded Cheddar
4 Tbl homemade tomato sauce or tomato chutney.
Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat over to 350F

Slice the bread into 1 inch sections.  Remove the very center from two of the slices.  Liberally butter one side of the intact slices.  Place buttered side down on a baking sheet, top each with one of the remaining slices, and break an egg into the holes in the top slices.

Bake for about 10 minutes, watching carefully.  When the whites are just set add the cheese and chutney to the tops of each.  Bake a further 3 or 4 minutes until toppings are warmed.  Season to taste.

IMBB #22: Rice Noodles in Beijing

We have arrived at our final destination before returning home --Beijing.  This city is full of friendly people, mind-boggling cultural sites, and of course-- delicious food.  One restaurant that we have been to twice so far is Chuannriver Restaurant.

I will post one day soon about the extent of our meals at this establishment.  Though, for now I will simply post about our Sichuan Style Rice Noodle dish in the spirit of IMBB, which I have been a lousy participant in of late.  But how could I be in China and not submit an entry to the noodle theme?

These noodles were not as spicy as we thought the double chili pepper image on the menu might entail, but they had a bit of a kick.  They had a very strange texture, though that is not to say they weren't delicious.  The noodles were served cool, seasoned with a wonderful combination of spices, and bathed in a savory broth.  They were also beautifully garnished with spring onions and minced garlic.

If you are ever near the main Beijing railway station and looking for a bite to eat, I would heartily recommend this restaurant.

Thanks to Cooking with Amy for hosting this event!

Cookie Swap SHF/IMBB: Sesame-Butter and Oatmeal No Bake Cookies

The SHF and IMBB events have teamed up to bring us a cookie-swap.  This event should leave everyone with plenty of sweet ideas for the holiday season.

Sadly, our place in Kraków has no oven.  I have been at more of a loss with cooking that I expected.  The bright side is that I am learning new recipes (though I would really love an oven all the same. . .).

For this event I made sesame-butter and oatmeal no-bake cookies.  These take a matter of minutes to create.  While I have to admit that I would rather a just-baked cookie any day, for those of us without an oven these are a delicious option.

Sesame-Butter and Oatmeal No-Bake Cookies

In a medium sized pot bring to boil 1 1/2 C of sugar, 3 Tbl good cocoa powder, 1/2 C of milk, and 1/4 of butter.  Cook 1 minute at a boil.  It should bubble and froth. 

Remove from the heat and immediately add 3 C of quick-cook oatmeal, 1/2 C of sesame-butter (or peanut-butter), 1 tsp vanilla, a dash of cinnamon, and 1/2 C of hazelnuts.

Drop by large spoonfuls onto wax or parchment paper.  Let stand a half hour or until cool.

IMBB #18: Fried Eggplant

Linda from At Our Table is hosting this month's IMBB and the theme is "Summer's Flying, Let's Get Frying!" Our garden produced a lovely little eggplant this past week and I decided that this event would be the perfect excuse to use it.

Peel the eggplant and cut it into rounds. Then sprinkle each side of each piece with coarse sea salt and arrange the rounds in layers with paper towels between them and a weight (like a heavy pot) on top of the stack to leach some of the moisture out. Leave about 30 min.

Meanwhile mix three bowls of ingredients. In the first put about half a cup of flour and season with salt and pepper. In the second mix an egg or two with a tablespoon of water. In the third mix half a cup of bread crumbs a teaspoon of dried basil, a teaspoon of dried oregano, and a teaspoon of parmesan.

Coat each piece of eggplant in the flour mix, then the egg mixture, then the bread crumb mixture. Lay on a piece of wax paper as you coat the other eggplant rounds.

In a large pan heat enough oil over low-moderate heat to coat the bottom of the pan with a bit of excess. Proceed to lay a few pieces of eggplant into the pan carefully, without letting them touch each other. Fry for a few minutes on each side, flipping and removing with tongs. Lay the fried pieces onto a paper towel to drain. Repeat with the remaining pieces.

Stack and top with tomato sauce (John made a delicous tomato sauce with tomatoes and hot peppers from our garden).

IMBB #17: tasteTea: Matcha Pancakes with Matcha Yogurt Sauce & Matcha Soda Biscuits with Matcha-Ginger Butter

A La Cuisine is hosting this month's IMBB and the theme is tasteTea. I am quite a fan of using tea in cooking and was very pleased to see this theme.

Due to the events of late, I was expecting to have to miss this IMBB and was quite disappointed. However, my lovely friend Aviva has lent me her camera for the day so I am back in the game. (Thank you Aviva!).

I became a bit over-zealous when I expected to be unable to participate and therefore have made two items. I hope this does not annoy my fellow IMBB participants.

First, I decided to make matcha pancakes with matcha yogurt sauce. I based my recipe largely on Kate Habershon's Simple Pancake Stack recipe from her cookbook Pancakes and Waffles. I tried a crumpet recipe from this book a while back with mediocre results. The results of this pancake recipe were fantastic, however.

I added matcha powder, ground ginger, and a pinch of cinnamon to Habeshon's recipe. I then cooked the pancakes in a well buttered skillet on low heat and employed crumpet rings to produce the desired height and shape.

Meanwhile I combined a dash of vanilla extract and a bit of matcha powder with plain yogurt to create the sauce. These pancakes were a welcome departure from the Saturday morning pancake routine while still being full-fledged comfort food.

For my second item I made Irish soda biscuits with matcha powder based on a Martha Stewart recipe. In addition I also made matcha and ginger butter (by simply bringing unsalted butter to room temperature, incorporating the ginger and matcha to taste and chilling in waxed paper) and used this in the place of the butter called for in the recipe.

The butter was nice. I think I will experiment more with flavored butters. However, I could take or leave this soda biscuit recipe.

I would like to thank Molly, a fabulous woman from the LTH Forums, for sending me this high quality matcha powder. It was a generous and well-timed gift!

IMBB #15: Avocado Mousse

Elise at Simply Recipes is hosting this months Is My Blog Burning. The theme is gelatin. I have to admit, I'm not a big gelatin fan, but I thought I should give a nod to my midwestern roots and try something. I made Avocado Mousse.

I was hoping to find a recipe for avocado panna cotta, but no luck. If you have one, let me know. This was pretty good. The orange flavors cover up much of the avocado and if I were to make this again, I think I would cut down on the orange quite a bit.

I had a fair bit of difficulty getting it out of the mold. I followed the instructions and rested the mold in a hot water bath for a few seconds, but then the mousse just melted and lost any shape it had received from the mold. (Hence the use of the pretty strawberries). Otherwise, this was quite an easy recipe.

I don't know that I would make this again. It was tasty, but mainly I (and my roommates) aren't that into to jello-mold-types-of-things. . .

A very interesting topic for the IMBB though!  All of the other excellent submissions can be found here on Elise's site.

IMBB #14: Cheese (Wisconsin Odyssey Part I)

Ok, so I clearly did not make this cheese (nor are any but the middle cheese especially orange. . .). I regret that my aspirations to make carrot soup for my second IMBB submission did not pan out with my time this weekend. (Though I am geared up to make it soon). This weekend was John's birthday and today Aviva, Molly, Friel, Harold and I kidnapped him and took him to Wisconsin where we went to the Mustard Museum in Mt. Horeb and the New Glarus Brewery in New Glarus. On the way home we stopped at a "Cheese and Fireworks" store to buy this lovely cheese above. Here are the details of each cheese below. We also consumed many a cheese curd in the car on the way home. If you have never had Wisconsin cheeses you are missing out.

(top to bottom)
Simply labeled "cow".
Great Midwest: Morel & Leek Jack Cheese (Mayville, WI).
Jim's Cheese Pantry: Garlic Cheddar Cheese (Waterloo, WI).
Jim's Cheese Pantry: Tomato & Basil Cheddar Cheese (Waterloo, WI).
Denmark's Finest: Dill Havarti (Viby J, Denmark).
Landhaus: Butterkase (Monroe, WI).

banana muffins (IMBB13)

John and I went to Trader Joe's this morning and bought $lots$ of delicious stuff. Upon our return home some major kitchen reorganization was in order. While cleaning out our freezer we noticed a bulk of frozen over-ripe bananas. I used Clotide's Banana Pecan Muffin recipe---with 2 little changes. I omitted the pecans because I didn't have any on hand and I used 4 egg whites instead of regular eggs because I had some left over that needed to be used up.

This yielded a light and airy interior that I was quite pleased with.