Cinnamon Date Pecan Swirl Bread

Since I came back from my trip, I haven't been baking much. I think I was still exhausted from the holiday baking and just sick of sweets and chocolate. Any baking I have done has been breakfast foods. Some bluberry scones and white chocolate cherry scones for my sister and nephew when they came to visit one weekend in January and loaf of cinnamon swirl bread with dates and pecans.

I came back from Vietnam with kilos and kilos of candy and some dried fruit. Why the dried fruit? They were all natural and tasted so much better than the packaged dried fruits you get in the states. And oh so cheap which was a bonus. The original recipe for the cinnamon swirl bread is from The King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion. I modified it ever so slighly by adding chopped dates and pecans. I have never made any breads with dates since they are not my favorite but I was quite happy with this loaf. The dates added a nice moistness to the bread and tasted great with the pecans. I pretty much love anything with strudel so this bread is a winner. I used potato flakes rather than potato flour which works just fine. I usually have to add a couple of tablespoons of water to the 1 C. the recipe calls for.

Cinnamon Date Pecan Swirl Bread

Dough
3 C. unbleached all-purpose flour
1/4 C. potato flour or 1/3 c. potato flakes
1/4 C. nonfat dried milk
1 1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
3 tbsp. sugar
2 1/4 tsp. instant yeast
4 tbsp. butter
1 C. water

Filling
1/4 C. sugar
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 C. dates
2 tsp. unbleached all-purpose flour
Egg wash, made form1 large egg beaten with 1 tbsp. water

Topping
2 tbsp. butter
2 tbsp. sugar
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 C. unbleached all-purpose flour

Dough: In a large bowl, combine all the dough ingredients, mixing until the dough begins to come away from the sides of the bowl. Knead for ~10 minutes until the dough is smooth and satiny. Transfer the dough to a lightly oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap and set aside to rise for 1 to 1 1/2 hrs.

Filling: Pulse filling ingredients except the egg wash in a food processor.

Topping: In small bowl or mini food processor, combine all the ingredients until the mixture is crumbly. Don't over process if you use a food processor or you end up wiht a lumpy mass.

When the dough is ready, roll the dough into a 16 x 8 inch rectangle on a lightly oiled work surface. Brush the dough with some of the egg wash (save rest for later) and pat the filling gently onto the dough. The original recipe says to roll the dough starting from the short edge into a log, pinch the side seams and ends close. I split the rectangle into 3 parts and roll them into small logs and form a braided loaf. Place the log in a slightly greased 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 inch loaf pan (I used 9 x 5 inch loaf pan). Cover with lightly greased plastic wrap adn allow to rise at room temperature for 1 hr or until it's crowned about 1 inch over the rim of the pan. Preheat the oven to 350 F during the last few mintues of rising time. When the dough has risen, brush the top of the loaf with some of the egg wash and gently press on the topping. Bake for about 45 minutes. For the 9 x 5 inch pan, I baked the loaf for 40 minutes. Cool in the pan for 5 minutes than remove the loaf from the pan. Best eaten warm.

All things Cinnamon

I am back! Well, at least for the time being until things get hectic again. It has been one ultra stressful semester. I am barely treading water at work and school. All the commuting back and forth is killing me and my poor Honda. It has been a while since I posted so I figured I better break my hiatus. I've been lazy about posting more than anything. Still baking, once a week or every other week.

I've been on a huge cinnamon kick since my trip to Pittsburgh in August. I picked up a couple of bags of Hershey's cinnamon chips (can't get them around here) and have been baking all sorts of goodies with cinnamon (not necessarily with cinnamon chips). Right now I am on a big cinnamon roll kick. I baked pecan sticky buns too but have more of a hankering for cinnamon rolls. I tried the Cinnamon Buns recipe from The King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion and Peter Reinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice. The recipe from BBA is better. The rolls were not too rich but not too bread like tasting either. Very satisfying. The dough is very similar to a recipe for sticky cinnamon rolls from Farm Journal's Homemade Breads. I have yet to try the recipe from the Farm Journal but will have to do so to compare. Both use shortening which I have never seen in a recipe for cinnamon rolls, but no worries the shortening obviously works since the rolls were terrific. I won't bother posting the BBA recipe here since it is all over the Internet. It was September's Daring Bakers Challenge (I haven't joined yet but may once the semester is over). Check out Pip in the City for the recipe. I will post the recipe from the Farm Journal when I try it. Maybe this weekend. The pics below are BBA cinnamon rolls. Yes, I like icing. I use ~2 C. powder sugar with about 4-5 tbsp of milk. Use more or less milk depending on the consistency you want for the icing.

Banana Bread

I had some very brown bananas in my fridge that my mother left when she visited over the Memorial Day weekend. Reading my Runner's World magazine on route to Halifax, I came across a recipe for banana bread from Joanne Chang, the pastry chef and owner of the Flour Bakery and Cafe in Boston. It is the best recipe that I have tried yet. For a while I've been making the banana bread from The King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion cookbook, but I like this much more. The high ratio of bananas to flour makes a very moist bread. I made the low fat version of the recipe which was also provided. I used my Pampered Chef stoneware loaf pan which usually results in a longer baking time. I had to bake it 10 minutes longer than directed. Since I've been on a strudel kick, I made a strudel topping taken from Robin Hood Flour's recipe for Banana Crunch Bread. I substituted the coconut with chopped walnuts. Thank goodness I run! Otherwise, I would not be baking all these goodies.

Flour's Famous Banana Bread

1 2/3 C. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1 C. plus 2 tbsp. sugar
2 eggs
1/2 C. vegetable oil (or 1/4 C. vegetable oil and 1/4 C. unsweetened applesauce)
3 1/2 bananas, very ripe, mashed
2 tbsp low-fat sour cream
1 tsp vanilla
2/3 C. walnuts, toasted and chopped

Strudel Topping

1/4 C. chopped walnuts
1/4 C. brown sugar, packed
1 tbsp. all-purpose flour
1 tbsp butter

Preheat oven to 350 F. Mix all the ingredients for the strudel topping and set aside. Sift together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Beat the sugar and eggs with a whisk until light and fluffy. Drizzle in the oil (and add the applesauce for low fat version). Add the bananas, sour cream, and vanilla. Fold in the flour mixture and nuts. Pour batter into a buttered 9 x 4 inch loaf pan and sprinkle with the strudel topping. Bake for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Lemon Curd Muffins

I had some lemon curd left over that I bought so I was looking for a recipe to use it in. I settled on lemon curd muffins using a basic muffin recipe, "All-Star Muffins" from The King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion. The muffins looked better than then tasted. I thought the muffins were too dense and somewhat dried. The recipe calls for sour cream but next time I think I will try buttermilk. The muffin recipe says it makes 16, but I only made 12. Here is the recipe.

All-Star Muffins with Lemon Curd

3 1/2 C. unbleached all purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1/2 C. butter

1 C. sugar

3 large eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 C. sour cream

1 1/2 C. lemon curd

Preheat the oven to 400 F and lightly grease 12 muffin cups.

Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside

In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar with a handheld mixer until light and fluffy, add the eggs one at time. Add the vanilla and sour cream. Add the flour mixture, mix on low speed until smooth. Fill the muffin cups ~1/2 full with batter. Add 1 tbsp of lemon curd then top will more batter. Bake 20 to 24 minutes until tooth pick comes out clean. Cool the muffins in the pan for 5 minutes, then cool on a rack.

Weekend of Baking

Free at Last! I finished my last final on Tuesday so now I can resume a semi-normal life. I told David, my significant other, that I am going to bake (and cook) up a storm the next couple of months (taking a summer class in July). I have a number of recipes from my cookbooks and recipes that I found on the Internet that I want to make.

My baking this weekend started out on the wrong note. David said he missed dessert the other night so I said I would bake him a cake. I decided to bake the "Wacky Cake" as I have been meaning to try it. The "Wacky Cake" is an eggless cake, leavened with baking soda and distilled vinegar. What a disaster! I baked the cake in my new bundt pan that bought a couple of months ago off of Ebay. I mentioned to David after I took the cake out of the oven that it didn't look like it rose much. I made a chocolate ganche frosting for the cake anyway. Later that evening, we had the cake for dessert. Yuck! It was so incredibly dry. We ate the chocolate ganche and tossed the pieces of cake. David ended up eating ice cream for dessert.

I googled "Wacky Cake" this morning and think I know where I went wrong after browsing different versions of the cake. Too much flour, not enough vinegar, or water. I found a recipe on www.epicurious.com that I am going to try next weekend. In the mean time, I cheated and made a Duncan Hines yellow cake with chocolate frosting. No time to make a cake from scratch this morning.

However, I did make a loaf of peanut butter and jelly bread for breakfast. I made the dough in my bread machine. Threw all the ingredients in my bread maker and went out for my morning run. I shaped the bread after my run, allowed it to rise a second time, and bake it. In between I stretched and took a took shower too! This recipe is from Bread Baking with Father Dominic, a PBS show. I don't think it is around anymore (at least not in the DC area). I printed the recipe for the dough off of his website a few years ago. The website doesn't exist anymore either. I modified the recipe slightly by adding jelly and peanut butter chips.

Peanut Butter and Jelly Bread

3/4 C. luke warm milk
1/4 C. luke warm water (may need a 1 or 2 teaspoons of additional water)
1/3 C. peanut Butter
1 tsp salt
3 C. all-purpose flour 1/3 C. sugar
2 tsp. instant yeast
1/2 C. grape jelly or jam
1/2 C. peanut butter chips

To make the dough:
Bread machine instructions: add the flour, salt, sugar, yeast. Allow to mix for a couple of minutes, add the peanut butter, milk, and water.

By hand: Sprinkle yeast over warm water in a bowl. Let stand for 5 to 10 minutes, or until foamy. Stir in the warm milk. Add the sugar, salt, and flour. Stir until you get a soft manageable dough. Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead 6 to 8 minutes, or until the dough is smooth and elastic. Place in a bowl, cover with a clean cloth, and allow to rise for 1 hour.

After the first rising, roll out the dough into a large rectangle, about 18 X 12 inches. Spread the grape jelly on the dough. Sprinkle with peanut butter chips. Roll the dough tightly until you have a jelly roll shape. Pinch the ends to seal the dough, place the dough seam side down in an oiled 9 x 5 inch pan. I usually roll the dough into 3 small rectangles, roll the rectangles, and form a braided loaf. Cover with a clean cloth and allow to rise for 30 minutes in a warm, draft free spot or until double in size. Bake the bread in preheated oven at 350F for 40 minutes.

It is best to allow the loaf to cool before slicing into it.