Happy Hour: Blue Cheese Bacon Bread

Ah my darlings, Friday is nearly complete. The work week is done and soon the feet will be clad in fuzzy socks and propped up on the footstool. My baby and I will finally have the chance to sit down together and unwind.

Getting back to work after the holidays was especially hard this year as the bad weather hit just as we were starting to get back to the normal daily grind. Even though it was January, we were previously having 70 degree days so ice storms and snow fall took everyone by surprise. It also delayed projects, rescheduled appointments and a host of other things. For both of us this week was all about catching up and getting things back on track. We both had a lot of late nights this week.

Which makes the Friday wind down extra special. Tonight’s treat is Blue Cheese Bacon Bread. Each week I make a loaf of regular bread to be used for sandwiches throughout the week. This week I doubled the recipe used one half to make the regular loaf and the other to make the blue cheese bacon one. The recipe list is the single one with the ingredients for one loaf. This bread does freeze really well though. Just let it cool completely, wrap it in plastic wrap and then add a layer of tin foil and it will keep well in the freezer. when you want to use it take it out and let it thaw completely before using. We tend to take the loaves out in the morning before work and then they are ready by dinnertime.

What I like about the recipe is that it is easy to do when working from home. There is about ten minutes of activity, then a forty five minute waiting period. Then another five minutes of activity, with another forty five minute rest followed by a forty five minute bake. I like to use it to focus on activities. For example i had a couple of tasks I was putting off so I took one forty five minute wait and one task and tried to finish it before I had to go back to the kitchen. Then when I returned I took down another task I’d been putting off. It is kind of a nice way to clear off things i’d been putting off doing. Plus I get a delicious treat at the end of it.

pulling away from the sides in the mixer

Ingredients

3 cups AP flour + pinch

1 Tablespoon unsalted butter, melted

1 Tablespoon yeast

3/4 cup warm water

1/2 cup milk, room temp (I like to put it in the microwave for 15 seconds to take the fridge chill off rather than leaving it out)

1/2 tsp sugar + pinch

1 Tablespoon Honey

1 Table spoon salt

half a cup of cooked bacon crumbled (you can use store bought bacon bits if you don’ want to cook bacon, just get the ones that look like real pieces of bacon (mostly for texture)

half a cup of blue cheese crumbles

Steps:

stir the yeast together with the 3/4 cup of water and add the pinch of sugar and pinch of salt to the mix (to feed the yeast) Set it in a warm place until it is foamy (10-15 min)
If using a stand mixer, using the dough hook: Add the flour, salt and sugar to the bowl of the mixer. When the yeast is foamy add the entire bowl of yeast mix to the flour, then add the milk, melted butter and honey. Turn the mixer on the lowest speed for 3 minutes while the dry and wet ingredients come together. When it no longer looks like flour will fly everywhere, increase the speed just a little bit (for mind it is no higher than three lines and well below medium speed. You are bringing your dough together not beating it into submission). When it forms a ball and pulls away from the sides, turn the mixer off.
If mixing by hand, once your yeast is foamy combine everything except the blue cheese and the bacon into a bowl and bring it together to form a ball.
If your dough ball is sticky, regardless of mixer or no mixer mixing, dust it with a little bit of flour and knead it just until it comes together to form a smooth ball.
Lightly grease a bowl (I tend to just use a spray bottle of oil on the bowl from my stand mixer) and put the dough in the bowl. Cover and let sit for 45 minutes.
After 45 min, come back, take your ball of dough out of the mixer (If making regular bread with no flavorings (i.e. bacon and blue cheese) then just put the dough into a well greased bread pan, cover and let sit for 45 min.) For the blue cheese and bacon bread. put the risen dough on a floured work surface and stretch it out as though you were making a pizza (don’t throw it in the air, just stretch on the table and try not to press too much air out. put the blue cheese and bacon crumbles in the center. fold the sides over the fillings, covering them completely. Knead the dough a few times to work the blue cheese and bacon into the dough. Then you can either put it in a loaf pan or make a free formed size on a greased sheet pan. Cover and let sit for 45 min.
Just before the 45 min rest is over, preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Make sure the rack is in the middle of the oven.
When the 45 minute rest is done, put the loaf in the oven and bake for 45 minutes. When it sounds hollow as out tap it with a knife, it is ready to be removed.

all rolled up, slashes in the top so it looks nice when it comes out

Without fillings, this makes a really good white sandwich bread. The fillings are of course your own choice. Try to go for fillings that don’t have a lot of moisture in them and you can’t go wrong. we often turn this loaf into cheddar and jalapeno bread or walnut and fig. It also makes great cinnamon and raisin bread. If you are going to start adding wet ingredients, reduce the amount of water you use with the yeast to keep it from getting soggy or cook out some of the moisturize from the ingredients. When I use this bread recipe for a mushroom, sage and onion bread, I cook both the mushrooms and onions ahead of time to reduce the moisture so that i can leave the recipe as it is.

Tonight I used blue cheese and bacon and I will pair it with a nice crisp hard apple cider. I find it pairs well with the blue cheese and cuts through the fattiness of the bacon. Sometimes I will even serve this bread with crisp slices on granny smith apple on top. It makes a great snack as well as a happy hour treat. Whatever you do tonight, I hope you take some time to rest and regroup and just allow yourself the space to breath. Have a great weekend.

The Daily: November 23rd, 2021

Ah my darlings, another day, another bake. Today is kind of interesting. While I am making pies tomorrow, today I am making pound cake. It is kind of interesting and something I didn’t realize until this year. While my family has many really good cooks, we only have a few bakers. All of the other bakers in the family are older than me and have sadly died off.

Which leaves me.

Last year we didn’t go back for Thanksgiving. Well we didn’t actually go anywhere actually. Apparently there were no deserts at the table. At Christmas someone remembered to pick up a pie from the store, but at Thanksgiving the baking wasn’t on anyone’s to do list, since i wasn’t coming. I think that might be why there was such a request this year. And not just bakes. I made the rum balls yesterday and this afternoon while I the cake is baking, I will be making Chocolate espresso truffles. I’ll post the recipe down below for anyone interested. I know it is kind of strange adding the recipes where the makeup usually goes, but at this time of year I find that having a few quick and easy recipes you can make ahead of time and just have out for guests when they arrive makes entertaining so much easier. with these, you can make them a few days ahead and keep them in the fridge. They actually taste better if they have been allowed to sit and have the flavors mingle and meld a bit better, so getting them done early, not only clears them out of the way, but it is better for the flavor. Don’t you love when things like that work out?

Chocolate Espresso Truffles

Makes 50 truffles

12 oz fine quality bittersweet chocolate chopped

1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter, cut into pieces

1/4 cup heavy cream

1 T instant espresso powder dissolved in 1T boiling water

(Optional – 2 T Sambuca)

1 cup cocoa powder for coating

In a double boiler melt the chocolate with the butter cream and coffee. Stir until smooth. Remove from the heat. If adding stir in the Sambuca. Cool and chill in a covered bowl for at least three hours. Scoop out and form rounded balls. Roll the balls in cocoa powder.

What I like about this is that you can easily play around with flavors. If you decide chocolate and coffee isn’t your thing, take out the expresso and replace it with maraschino cherry liquid instead. You can add alcohol in or not as is your preference. When we have parties, I often end up using the tail ends of flavored liquors in the truffles. Fruit, nut or coffee flavored liquors work well but so do Bourbons and whiskeys. what is important isn’t if they are alcoholic or not, but that you pay attention to your ratios. If you add too much liquid, whether it is Irish whiskey or orange juice, it will throw off the texture. So take the measurements and play around with flavors. A word about fruit juices though. The flavor tends to dull down in the chocolate, so if you are using orange juice as your liquid, grate in some orange zest as well to punch up the flavor. Since it isn’t a liquid it won’t throw off the ratios and it will really make the flavor pop.

And it is easy to make different flavors at the same time, just split the mix and melt the chocolate separately with the individual flavors. If you don’t have a double boiler, just put a bowl over a pot of boiling water, just make certain the bowl is bigger than the pot (but not a huge amount bigger) You don’t want the bowl floating in the boiling water and you don’t want the pot so small that only a small part of the bottom curve gets heated. Or you could just pick up a double boiler. For a long time my only stove top pots were a set that was part of a double boiler set. The bottom could be used as a regular pot, he top pot could either be used separately or as the double boiler and there was a steamer basket for veg as well. So even though it sounded fancy, it ended up being really versatile. I think 360 Cookware has a set like it in their cookware section.

I know having one saved me a lot of space with cookware because it was not only versatile but it stored stacked up in one easy tower. I’ve lived in some rather small apartments in my life. It was practical for cooking and saved space. It has long since worn out though. I really need to replace it. It is on the list. We’ve reached the stage in cookware with a lot of items needing replacement. But that is a new year’s goal this year. For now, we use what we have. And possibly take advantage of sales.

Save 15% Off All Cookware & Bakeware use code: COOKWARE15

Happy Hour: Grape Focaccia and a Bramble

Welcome to Happy Hour my darlings! Kick off those shoes and get yourself into something comfy. Personally I’ve chosen a pair of pajama pants that are old enough that the black fabric has a distinct greenish look to it. The color doesn’t bother me when hanging out at home, but taking them out of the drawer I noticed a small hole on the leg. It is tiny still, but it means a replacement is needed soon. I’ll have to look into that this weekend. But for now, the comfy pajama pants remain.

The Bramble has made an appearance before and as I very much enjoy it will probably make many returns. As a recipe refresher my version of a Bramble is:

Bramble

Ingredients:

1 ½ oz Gin

½ oz Chambord

1 oz lemon juice

½ oz simple syrup

You put everything into a cocktail shaker add a bit of ice and shake for all you are worth before pouring it into the glass of your choice. I went with a coupe glass. I think this one might have actually come as a promotional glass with a bottle of Bombay Sapphire at some point. It is a nice shape and holds enough liquid inside that one glass is plenty.

I felt the raspberry and lemon notes would pair well with the grape focaccia today. I thought about picking up a wine to go with it, but the grapes were very sweet tart on their own and I kind of didn’t want anything competing with them. I think if I had chosen mellower grapes I would have gone with a wine. As it is the Bramble seemed to have enough of a fruitiness to pair well without really being competition, flavor wise.

I know some of you saw the title and were lifting some eyebrows at the sound of grape focaccia. That’s okay, my baby doll did as well, but then it baked up so sweet and salty that he decided it was okay in the end. And while I had the Bramble listed above, he ended up having a beer with it because he wanted something earthy to go with it while I wanted something to pair with the fruitiness of the grapes.

There is a lot of wait time, but overall this focaccia recipe is really simple. It just takes time. You will need a stand mixer for this. I’ve written out the recipe for those with stand mixers. If you don’t have one can always knead the dough by hand. If you are making this, check your times! While not a lot of this is active time, there is a lot of resting and rising so I generally make this when I know I’m going to be in the house for a while. It does actually provide some nice breaks to the day if you are working from home.

Grape Focaccia

Ingredients:

6 tsp dry yeast

Pinch of sugar

2 cups warm water

¼ cup (or so) olive oil

5 cups of flour, plus more for dusting

2 tsp kosher salt (more for sprinkling)

12 ounces red seedless grapes (make sure they are seedless)

Parchment paper

Put the yeast, water and sugar in a bowl. Stir to mix and then let sit to get foamy (5 min)
Into the bowl of a stand mixer place the flour, salt and foamy yeast mix. Mix with a dough hook until a sticky dough forms and pulls away from the sides (3-5 min)
Line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper.
Liberally flour your counter top and transfer the dough to it. It will be stiff to work with but try to form it into a rectangle (ish) shape that is about twice the size as you start it with.
Fold the dough in threes like a letter so that your dough forms a rectangle. Brush the top with olive oil and transfer it to the center of your parchment covered cookie sheet oiled side down onto the parchment.
Brush olive oil onto the top of the dough Cover loosely with cling film and let it sit 1 hour.
(don’t worry if your rectangle is a little wonky.
After one hour come back to the dough and push it out until it fills the cookie sheet in a flat even surface. Once flattened. Lightly press the grapes into the top of the dough.
Leave to sit uncovered 1 hour.
Preheat oven to 500.
After the dough has rested for an hour, brush olive oil over the dough and grapes and sprinkle with salt.
Just before you put the dough into the oven, turn the temperature down to 450 degrees.
Bake for 10 minutes, turn the pan in the oven and bake for an additional 15 minutes or until the dough is a light golden brown.
Cool 20 minutes before slicing and serving.

While we used grapes in this one for a sweet and savory play, this is my standard focaccia recipe. I forget where I picked it up, but I have adjusted it with rosemary and garlic to go along with roast lamb, mixed it with a variety of peppers and served it with chili, and used it plain as a base for all sorts of toppings. It is a good basic recipe that really takes well to whatever flavors you want to throw at it. Just remember not to be stingy with the olive oil. It may look like a lot, but this bread needs it. It is the only fat this bread has in it. Once you have the basics down, go crazy with the flavors and make it your own.

So that my darlings is our happy hour. Personally, I like how it turned out. It also suits the weather this week. It is surprisingly cool tonight, but I didn’t want anything very heavy. This has the weight of bread that I like in cooler temperatures, but it is lifted by the roasted grapes into feeling like early spring rather than the middle of winter. And I have to confess, I really do like baking bread.

I hope you enjoy whatever it is you have planned for your Friday night and the weekend beyond.

Shop the 5-Piece Bakeware Set! Take advantage of our best value by bringing home the complete Stainless Steel Bakeware Set. The set includes 2 – 9” Round Cake Pans, Pie Pan, 9” x 13” Bake & Roast Pan and Large Cookie Sheet.

Happy Hour: Carrot Cake

I know normally this is where we talk about a delightful cocktail, a bottle of wine or even my babydoll’s home brew. Then we add in a delightful delectable. This week however was a bit much on the body, so tonight in a continuing effort to clear out the freezer before the garden starts producing veg that needs to be processed and stocked, we are taking out a container of beef stroganoff (the egg noodles will be fresh) and just having carrot cake and a big glass of milk afterwards.

Given the post vaccination fever and sickness, I think it is a much safer option than trying a new, untested cocktail variation. I’ll get back to experimenting next week.

Each spring we go through the strange freezer purge. You see my baby doll has a weakness when it comes to the grocery store’s meat department. It doesn’t matter what the grocery list says, if he sees a roast or chops or any cut he particularly likes on sale, he will scoop it up to add to the freezer. He likes having a meat stash. The problem is that the freezer fills up quickly with large odd shaped packages. So when it looks like it is getting full I make large batches of dishes.

Like beef stroganoff. Without the noodles it freezes really well and because left over portions are in smaller stackable regularly shaped containers, it takes up less space. (plus we’ve eaten some as well, usually for Friday night but some left overs on Saturday as well). His massive meat buying tends to be in the fall so we have an assortment of heavy Friday night meat centric meals for the winter. In the spring and summer we eat lighter so we clear them up. Plus we need the freezer space for frozen veg. So we are in the clear out phase of the season. Hence the heavier dinner and why I’m not making a happy hour appetizer. Plus we have a mostly untouched carrot cake to eat.

I love carrot cake, but I didn’t get to eat much of it this week so I will revel in it for my end of the week treat. It is super easy to make so if you are scared of cake baking it is a really easy one to start with. The icing makes exactly enough to give you a thin layer of frosting between the two cakes and then to coat the rest of the cake. At best there will be maybe a spoonful left.

Carrot Cake

2 cups All Purpose (250 g plain flour – UK) Flour

1 ½ tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 ½ tsp ground cinnamon

½ tsp ground ginger

½ tsp nutmeg (grate it fresh please)

½ tsp salt

¾ cup vegetable oil (like Canola)

4 large eggs (room temperature)

1 ½ cup packed brown sugar (330 g)

½ cup granulated sugar (100 g caster sugar)

½ cup applesauce

1 tsp vanilla extract

3 cups grated carrots

ICING

1 (8oz) package of plain cream cheese (room temp)

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter softened

1 tsp vanilla

2 cups powdered sugar (250 g icing sugar)

To make the cake:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees (while I weigh certain ingredients like flour and brown sugar when I bake because it is more accurate than a cups measurement so I know the measurements and baking with my Gran gave me the different names for the same ingredients and will happily include them, I don’t know UK oven settings, sorry)
spray and flour two 9 inch round cake pans and set aside.
Grate your carrots and set aside (how many you need to get three cups depends on the size of your carrots. Mine were all about eight inches long but varied in width and I needed about five this time)
In a bowl mix together: flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and salt (make this your larger mixing bowl as you add wet to the dry later)
In a separate bowl whisk together eggs, oil, brown sugar, granulated sugar, apple sauce and vanilla until combined. Once they are thoroughly mixed, add your carrots. (while you can use a mixer to bend the earlier ingredients, when you get to the add the carrots stage, switch to a spoon or spatula. Trust me it saves a lot of heartache. Carrot strands can just get twisted around the mixer blades. Sometimes low tech works best. While I may use my Hamilton Beach food processor to grate the carrots in an instant, I use a silicone spatula to mix them in.)
Once mixed, pout wet ingredients into the bowl of dry ones (the flour mix – see I told you to use the bigger bowl for that one). Mix them together with a spatula until just combined. Don’t over mix. (it will make your cake stodgy)
Pour batter evenly into the two previously prepared cake pans.
Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes or until the top sets and a toothpick comes out of the center cleanly.
Remove from pans and let cool completely on a wire rack before attempting to ice them.

And now To the ICING!

I use a hand mixer instead of a stand mixer for this because I find it comes out better for me. It you use a stand mixer make sure your cream cheese and butte are really soft and go with a whisk attachment if possible. I have both a stand and a hand mixer but I always use the hand mixer for this frosting because I find it easier to see the butter and cream cheese combining evenly.

So into the bowl place the unwrapped cream cheese/ beat until smooth
Add the butter and mix until smooth and combined with the cream cheese
Add powdered sugar and vanilla and beat until smooth scraping down the sides as needed.

As I mentioned I like using the hand mixer. What I like to do with the powdered sugar so less flies up, is to pour it in small doses a little bit at a time. After each addition I use the spatula to put a little of the butter cream cheese mix over it before turning on the hand mixer again. The mix helps wets the sugar enough that it doesn’t fly up in a dust cloud. Plus if you keep scooping from the bottom with each addition you won’t end up with a sugar pocket in the base of the bowl.

This icing will make a thin layer between the cakes and then ice the top and sides. There is no left over for decoration. If you want to use it for decoration, you can make a second batch. I like to add a little more sugar to the second batch if I am going to do this to make it a little stiffer. I also add colorings to that as well. Usually orange and green for carrot designs. This year it was just us and the sugar already on the cake was more than enough so I didn’t add more with decorations.

This is one of my favorite cakes but I only tend to make it twice a year, One at Easter and once in the fall when the carrots are still coming out of the garden and my taste buds start craving the warming spices that go into this cake. It is rich so I generally have it with coffee or a big glass of milk.

Either way it is the treat my babydoll and I will be enjoying after dinner in lieu of a happy hour treat. Don’t worry, next week will feature a new cocktail and something fun to nibble on.

Shop 360 Cookware’s 5-Piece Bakeware Set!