A baking thread

[rjharris]

So, I've been baking at least since grad school, which has been about 10 years ago, but I've recently gotten into it super hard. I think it's because I've been binging on the Great British Baking Show and wanting to emulate Paul Hollywood IRL. Last week I made an approximation of this:

https://thegreatbritishbakeoff.co.uk/pa ... challenge/

The taste was amazing even though the texture was a little off. I used active dry yeast as opposed to the fast acting yeast without realizing it, so the first rise was slow and the second rise was weird. Anyway, it *tasted* good, even if the texture was different than it was supposed to have been.

This weeks bake was this: http://www.pbs.org/food/recipes/mary-be ... se-whirls/

I will say: these were fucking delightful. The only criticism I have is that the ratio of buttercream to raspberry is off (too high) for my taste. And if one reduces the amount of buttercream, then you have to use a different nozzle for the piping bag, which reduces the ~~aesthetic~~ effect.

Anyway, post your or others' baking ideas here, and I'm going to steal them.

[omaniphil]

My friend's wife bakes a lot, and she takes, a somewhat, well, thorough (you'll see what I mean when you click through to the link), approach to determining the best ingredients, techniques, etc. She made some pretty delicious Kouign Amann, which were also featured on the Great British Baking Show.

http://www.alwaysmakingthings.com/homem ... -like-pro/

[Chebass88]

I've been baking sourdough and pizza every week for almost a year, with decent results. The recipes for both are almost the same, with the only difference being the type of flour used. I make the sourdough into rolls, and eat one per day as breakfast.

The recipe I use is a modification of the "sourdough with yeast" from the King Arthur Flour cookbook.

Starter:
1c sourdough mix
1TBS dry yeast
1.5c water
3c flour (when making rolls I use KAF whole wheat flour, when making pizza I use KAF bread flour)

Mix together and let it sit in a sealed bowl for a while (at room temperature). I usually mix it around 7-8AM, and begin making dough around 430PM, or as late as 8PM.

After you've decided it is time to bake, add the following:
1TBS salt
3c KAF bread flour

Mix the flour in, kneading for ~5 minutes or until the dough is nice and together and not too wet. Might not need 3 cups of flour - it depends on the humidity.

For rolls, let the dough rise in the sealed bowl. I carefully dump out the risen dough onto a baking sheet (being careful not to remove too much air from it), and separate it into 8 equal shapes using the dough scraper (they look like wedges). Bake at 450°F for 35 minutes, with water in a second pan underneath the pan with the rolls.

For pizza, divide the dough equally into 2 batches and make a nice round dough balls out of them. Let them rise on two baking sheets, spread them to desired thicknesses, cover with toppings, and bake at 425°F for 2x13 minute batches (I need to rotate them in my oven, otherwise one gets burned).

I made the sourdough mix from a wild-caught yeast in my kitchen. The recipe is in the KAF cookbook, but it is effectively flour & water, left out on the counter for a few days, covered only by a clean kitchen towel. I use whole wheat flour to start the mixture, and also to feed it. Whenever I use any sourdough mix, I replace it with 1c flour/1c water.

The dough I described for pizza works AWESOME as a loaf of bread, especially when made into French toast. Yowza!

[Mahendra]

A baking thread!

I love me some baked goods! My sponge (Pound?) cake is the only cake I'd actually let others who don't love me try.

Recipe is simple

1lbs of unsalted butter
1lbs of sugar
10 eggs
15 ounces of flour
1 tbsp of baking powder
2 tsp of rum
1 tsp of vanilla extract

Beat butter and sugar together until creamy. (This takes longer than expected)...

Beat all eggs together until very fluffy.

Add beaten eggs to the sugar & butter slowly. Then add in rum and vanilla extract

Add in flour slowly

Then add in baking powder

Bake in oven at 350F for ~ 60 minutes.



I need to learn how to make cookies. I suck at making them but recently bought a baking book that might be helpful.

I also baked pizza from scratch for the 1st time this weekend and I loved it. I'll likely make this a weekly staple going forward

[rjharris]

*furiously copies things down*

Thanks, guys. This looks pretty good so far. I think I've planned the next couple weeks of baking courtesy of you all.

Either today or sometime this weekend, I'm going to get down on this: https://www.thekitchn.com/recipe-sticky ... chn-111307

Also, my shitty hand mixer died making the cookies I originally posted, and my friends pitched in and bought me a fuckin' KitchenAid! So, most of the next week weeks of bakes is going to them...

[Mahendra]

I did some baking on the weekend, as well as Monday night. I baked a banana, chocolate chip & walnut bread; carrot cake with walnuts, and chocolate chip muffins.

I'm most proud of the banana bread, but I think the other 2 came out decently well. Here are the recipe's I used:

Banana Chocolate Chip Walnut Bread

1.5 cups (~215 grams) All Purpose Flour
100 grams dark brown packed sugar
50 grams granulated sugar
2 eggs
3 very ripe (medium'ish) bananas.
56 grams of walnuts
56 grams of dark chocolate chips (I used regular sized ones and cut them up smaller)
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 stick (half cup) of butter
1/2 Cup sour cream

4x8 baking pan
pre-heat oven to 350F

- I mixed the dry ingredients together (flour, sugar, baking soda, etc)
- Lightly beat both eggs and added in the vanilla extract to the beaten eggs

- Melted the butter

Added all wet ingredients into dry ingredients and mixed together (without over mixing)
I then added in the walnuts & chocolate chips

Added mixture to pan and baked for about ~55 minutes at 350F

Notes

- The recipe originally asks to use room temperature butter & eggs, and to mix the butter and sugar together, but I decided against it
- You can add in plain Greek Yogurt (I didn't in this recipe)

I baked it for the lady and her parents, and they all liked it. And yes, even though she "loves" me, she's quite honest about anything I make... which leads to STRESS.


Carrot Cake

I sort of took the banana bread recipe and translated it into carrot cake, and it turned out pretty good (I think).

1.5 cups (~215 grams) All Purpose Flour
100 grams dark brown packed sugar
50 grams granulated sugar
2 eggs
3 medium sized / large carrots
56 grams of walnuts
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 stick (half cup) of butter

- Grate carrots and set aside
- whisk both eggs together and add vanilla

- Mix all dry ingredients together (flour sugar, etc)

- melt butter

- Add in eggs & butter to dry mix and mix together
- Add in carrots & walnuts to mix

Add mixture to 4x8 pan (buttered/oiled whatever) and bake at 350F for about 50-60 minutes

Chocolate Chip Muffin Recipe

Again, I'm boring and sort of did the same thing with the muffins (borrowing from earlier recipes)

1.5 cups (~215 grams) all-purpose flour
1 stick (half cup) unsalted butter
100 grams (half cup) packed brown sugar (You can likely sub out for white sugar)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tbsp pure vanilla extract
2 large eggs
50 grams dark chocolate chips, (mini preferred, or chop up regular sized ones)
½ cup (150grams) 5% Greek yogurt (I think you can use 0% Greek yogurt instead)

Mix all dry ingredients together (ensure sugar isn’t clump if using brown sugar)

Whisk eggs together and add vanilla

Melt butter

Stir in the whisked eggs, melted butter, and Greek yogurt into the dry ingredients.
Mix in the chocolate chips

Bake at 350F for about ~20-25 minutes (if it’s mini muffins - 12); likely 30 minutes for regular sized muffins - (6 muffins)
(I checked for “doneness” at 20 minutes via wooden pick)

Notes

I baked these for work and people seemed to like it. The lady also seemed to enjoy it as well. I thought it could be a bit more "fluffy" or "airy" and I asked about that repeatedly, but everyone kept insisting it was fine. Of course they could have just been "nice" to not hurt my feelings LOL.

[Hamburgerfan]

I like to bake banana bread. Settled on this recipe after some experimenting.
Mash 2 bananas
3/4 cups sugar
1/3 cup melted butter
1tsp baking soda
Pinch some salt
Add some cinnamon
Add a ton of nutmeg
Add 1 tsp vanilla extract
Add about a half shot of whiskey (usually something flavored)
1.5 cups flour
Add dark walnuts if I have them.

Back for an hour at 350.

[Mahendra]

@Hamburgerfan Nice recipe - I'll try it with whiskey next time.

On another note, I tried making "healthier" banana muffins yesterday (read: lower calorie), and it was a disaster. I won't try that shit again.

Essentially, I replaced butter with 5% Greek Yogurt.

Horrible. Utterly horrible. And a waste of some really good, ripe bananas. C'est la vie.

[rjharris]

Essentially, I replaced butter with 5% Greek Yogurt.

Did you replace all of it or only part of it? I think the rule of thumb is that you can replace <= half of the butter / oil in a recipe with yogurt and be fine. Any more and it gets dicey.

I made some fondant icing yesterday for some mokatines I'm going to make maybe tonight. Shit's weird. Basically, melt marshmallows and add icing sugar in a ~1:2 ratio by weight, add a tiny bit of water, and just knead it all to hell. But God help you if you add even 1 teaspoon too much water and it turns into a gloopy fucking mess.

[Mahendra]

Essentially, I replaced butter with 5% Greek Yogurt.

Did you replace all of it or only part of it? I think the rule of thumb is that you can replace <= half of the butter / oil in a recipe with yogurt and be fine. Any more and it gets dicey.

I replaced all, unfortunately, which was a mistake.

I'll just go back to baking with good ol' butter.

[rjharris]

Time to revive this.

I made a pecan loaf. The flours in the dough comprised about 300 g whole wheat flour, 100 g each of white bread flour and rye flour, and about 250 g of pecans. It was very nutty and very delicious. I'll post the whole recipe when I get home.

[hsilman]

Can't believe I hadn't seen this before. I bake on average about every other week. Recent creations:

German sour cherry cake
orange loaf(like banana bread)
orange and rosemary bread
orange shortbread cookies dipped in dark chocolate
ginger snaps
buttermilk biscuits
berry scones
apple cinnamon rolls

[mouse]

The only thing I've been able to consistently and successfully bake is banana bread (and chocolate chip cookies once...)

My recipe is pretty much the same as everyone else's except for in place of chocolate chips or something throw in a spoon or two of peanut butter... because that makes everything better...

[Allentown]

Can't believe I hadn't seen this before. I bake on average about every other week. Recent creations:

German sour cherry cake
orange loaf(like banana bread)
orange and rosemary bread
orange shortbread cookies dipped in dark chocolate
ginger snaps
buttermilk biscuits
berry scones
apple cinnamon rolls

Live with me.

[rjharris]

orange and rosemary bread

I am extremely interested in trying new fruit + herb combinations. I'm having a bit of trouble visualizing this one, but I'll have to try it. Allegedly apple and tarragon is really good?

[GrizzlyAdam]

Allegedly apple and tarragon is really good?

Absolutely. Lemon and basil is even better.

[Fzt]

One thing I have learned in my time baking is that if you care about your baking results, switch to measuring your ingredients by weight, in grams

[rjharris]

Absolutely. Lemon and basil is even better.

I've done lemon/rosemary and strawberry/basil, each of which are amazing. Never tried this though.

One thing I have learned in my time baking is that if you care about your baking results, switch to measuring your ingredients by weight, in grams

Yuuuuup. Flour and brown sugar density can vary a lot depending on how packed it is.

I made some sourdough starter the other day for the first time. It's one of the first things in baking that kind of blew me away. Like, wtf, this thing is alive. I've fed it yesterday, and the issue is that the starter seems to be *too* active. It's already doubled in a kitchen at ~68 F and the jar lid is bent. The recipe I have says to keep it in an airtight container, and I'm wondering if that's appropriate. I put it in the fridge this morning to slow it down.

[omaniphil]

Made Beet Cake last night for some friends. Tried to get it as close as possible to an old restaurant that closed down here in Cleveland Heights about 6 years ago. I think it's a pretty close simalcrum.

Blend together well
1 cup of oil
1.5 cups of sugar
3 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla

Then stir in
2 cups of pureed beets (boil them for 1hr before pureeing)

Then stir in
1.75 cups of flour
2 tsp of baking soda
10tbsp of cocoa
1tsp of cinnamon
1tsp of nutmeg

Cook at 350 until knife inserted in middle comes out clean.

Once cooled, top with hot fudge sauce:
1 cup of sugar
2 TBSP Flour
1/2cup of cocoa
1 stick of butter
1 cup of milk

Mix dry ingredients together in saucepan, and then add milk. heat and stir constantly until dry ingredients dissolved and then add butter. Still until thickens and then pour over beet cake.

[cgeorg]

The girl I'm dating seems to enjoy baking and while I've never had much of a sweet tooth good god can she do things with apples. Sorry, no recipes/input, just apple bread and apple pie are wonderful things.