01.27.10

Nanaimo Bars

Posted in Baby Food, Chocolate, Cookies & Candies, Dessert, Foodblog Events, Snacks at 1:28 pm by julie

The January 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Lauren of Celiac Teen. Lauren chose Gluten-Free Graham Wafers and Nanaimo Bars as the challenge for the month. The sources she based her recipe on are 101 Cookbooks and www.nanaimo.ca. I’d never actually eaten a nanaimo bar before, but I was familiar with them from the Willamette University Bistro’s offerings, so I was very curious to see what they were like. I make simple graham crackers all the time for my son, and have actually made the Nancy Silverton grahams before as well, so those weren’t new to me.

The graham cracker recipe used for this recipe is definitely sweeter than my basic one, but it also has more flavor (not that my son minds one way or the other). Since we don’t have dietary restrictions at our house, I just used some flour I already had on hand: 1 C AP flour, 1 C whole wheat flour, and as a nod to gluten-free baking flours, 1/2 C oat flour ground from rolled oats and 2 T buckwheat flour. I made the full batch of crackers so as to have extras for snacking.

My dough came out quite sticky, but I’m told that was pretty common, and some flour on the board and rolling pin made it perfectly workable. My crackers took a few minutes longer than the suggested time to bake, but maybe that was because of my choice of flours.

As you can see, my taste tester approves! They are especially good for teething 2-year molars.

The crust for these cookies is a bit unusual, cooked briefly on the stovetop, then patted into the pan. It stays soft and chewy, and the nuts and coconut give it some crunch. I used a 9″ pan instead of the 8″ called for, so my bars came out a little thinner than intended.

I didn’t have access to custard powder, so I flavored the middle layer, essentially an American buttercream, with vanilla paste. I had some trouble getting my chocolate melted and cooled to a good consistency for spreading over the buttercream, so it wasn’t as smooth or shiny as I might have liked, but it served its purpose well. The finished bars were incredibly sweet, but we ate them all in about two days, so apparently we didn’t mind a bit. There were enough graham crackers not only for snacking, but for several pies with graham cracker crusts, so I also made a coconut cream pie (it did not cut neatly enough for photos!).

All in all, this month’s challenge was interesting and very tasty, but not so much what I would term “daring.” That doesn’t mean I won’t be making nanaimo bars again; in fact, I’m fully planning on taking inspiration from all the amazing variations that our Daring Bakers came up with. Maybe one day I’ll even come across some custard powder and try the real thing.

Nanaimo Bars

Bottom Layer
1/2 C (4 ounces) unsalted butter
1/4 C granulated sugar
5 T unsweetened cocoa
1 large egg, beaten
1 1/4 C graham cracker crumbs (store-bought or homemade)
1/2 C almonds, finely chopped
1 C coconut, shredded (sweetened or unsweetened)

Middle Layer
1/2 C (4 ounces) unsalted butter
2 T plus 2 tsp heavy cream
2 T vanilla custard powder (such as Bird’s), or other flavoring (vanilla, coconut, mint, peanut butter, fruit—sky’s the limit)
2 C powdered sugar

Top Layer
4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate
2 T unsalted butter

For bottom layer: Melt unsalted butter, sugar and cocoa in top of a double boiler. Add egg and stir to cook and thicken. Remove from heat. Stir in crumbs, nuts and coconut. Press firmly into an ungreased 8 by 8 inch pan.

For middle layer: Cream butter, cream, flavoring, and powdered sugar together well. Beat until light in colour. Spread over bottom layer, and chill.

For top layer: Melt chocolate and unsalted butter over low heat. Cool. Once cool, pour over middle layer and allow to set.

I am a member of the Theta Class of Daring Bakers, inducted in July 2007. Below is a list of previous challenges:
Strawberry Mirror Cake – July 2007
Milk Chocolate and Caramel Tart – August 2007
Cinnamon Rolls and Sticky Buns – September 2007
Bostini Cream Pies – October 2007
Tender Potato Bread – November 2007
Traditional Buche de Noel – December 2007
Lemon Meringue Pie – January 2008
French Bread – February 2008
Perfect Party Cake – March 2008
Opéra Cake – May 2008
Danish Braid – June 2008
Filbert Gateau – July 2008
Chocolate Éclairs – August 2008
Lavash Crackers and Dip – September 2008
French Yule Log – December 2008
Tuiles – January 2009
Chocolate Valentino and Ice Cream – February 2009
Lasagne of Emilia-Romana – March 2009
Abbey’s Infamous Cheesecake – April 2009
Apple Strudel – May 2009
Bakewell Tart and Homemade Jam – June 2009
Chocolate Marshmallow Cookies – July 2009
Dobos Torte – August 2009
Vols-au-Vent – September 2009
Macarons – October 2009
Cannoli – November 2009

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06.02.09

Nolan’s Graham Crackers

Posted in Baby Food, Cookies & Candies, Dessert, Snacks at 11:48 am by julie

Nolan is teething something fierce right now. His first set of molars should be emerging at any moment—or at least I hope they will, because his gums are incredibly swollen and he has a scary-looking purple hemotoma on one side. Fortunately, he is a little trooper and tolerates the discomfort with very little fussing, but it really helps to have something to chew on. What does all this have to with my food blog? I’ve started making homemade teething biscuits of a sort for Nolan.

It all started back in April when we bought a box of graham crackers for my Daring Bakers cheesecake. I gave Nolan some to snack on while I was working, and he loved them. But after using some for the crust (and giving half the box to Jeremy for snacking at work), there weren’t many crackers leftover for Nolan. And anyway, store-bought graham crackers, for some reason, are full of hydrogenated fat and high fructose corn syrup, ironic since their inventor, Sylvester Graham, was firmly against the use of additives and highly refined ingredients. I’ve made homemade graham crackers once before, but they were more a grown-up cookie, for making into s’mores, ice cream sandwiches, or other desserts, and I wanted more of an everyday snack cracker, so I turned to The Petit Appetit Cookbook: Easy, Organic Recipes to Nurture Your Baby and Toddler, one of my few “baby food” cookbooks, which contains a very simple graham cracker recipe. It turns out crackers that are pretty darn bland by grown-up standards, but Nolan seems to love them, and they are great for those swollen gums. Baby biscotti is next on the list to try out!

Greatest Graham Crackers

I adapted this recipe for the food processor, and added some cinnamon for flavor. I use all sorts of small cookie cutter shapes to make these a little more fun, and have seriously considered adding a sprinkle of sucanat or turbinado sugar to the tops for a little more interest (but I know it would just drop off and get everywhere as Nolan eats them).

1 C AP flour
1 C whole wheat flour
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 C unsalted butter
1/2 C honey
1/4 C whole milk

Preheat oven to 400F. In a food processor, combine the flours, cinnamon and baking powder, and pulse once to blend. Add butter, cut into chunks, and pulse until it disappears. Add the honey and pulse until incorporated; dough will be damp. Finally, add the milk and pulse just until dough forms a ball. (Alternatively, you could cut the butter in by hand and just stir the dough together with a spoon.)

Flour your work surface and roll out the dough as thin as you like, 1/8″ to 1/4″ thick. Cut into squares or use cookie cutters to shape dough, and place on an ungreased baking sheet. Prick with a fork if desired and brush with a little extra milk. Bake at 400F for 10 minutes if 1/8″ thick, or 12-15 minutes if 1/4″ thick, until cookies are set and golden brown around the edges. Cool completely on a wire rack before serving.

Source: Adapted from The Petit Appetit Cookbook: Easy, Organic Recipes to Nurture Your Baby and Toddler, by Lisa Barnes.

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09.08.07

Yogurt Made from What?

Posted in Dairy, Snacks at 10:53 am by julie

When we were first exploring Whole Foods in the spring, we decided to try a bunch of different types of yogurt. Jeremy tried out Greek Gods and Fage Greek-style yogurts, and I picked out a variety including goats-milk and water-buffalo yogurts. The Greek-style yogurts were winners: we can find Greek Gods locally, and now use that frequently as a snack drizzled with honey, or in various sorts of recipes. Fage makes a better Greek yogurt, though, and we always get some when we visit Whole Foods.

I thought the goats-milk yogurt was alright, but it was too thin for my tastes, and on the gamey side. After that I didn’t have high hopes for the water buffalo yogurt, but I had purchased several containers of it and Jeremy wouldn’t touch it, so I gave it a shot. It was a revelation: naturally thick and creamy as cheesecake, and brilliantly white because any carotene is processed into vitamin A by the buffalo. It’s also naturally much higher in protein and calcium, and lower in cholesterol than cows-milk yogurt. It’s made in Vermont by Woodstock Water Buffalo, and the line of flavors is locally inspired. Our Whole Foods doesn’t carry the full range of flavors (I’d love to try chai, honey, strawberry, and black currant), so I’ve been sticking with vanilla and maple, and they’re both delicious, just sweet enough to balance that yogurt tang without tasting like pudding.

So be sure to try some of this yogurt if you see it in the store! I picked mine up as a novelty, but I’d always keep some in the fridge now if we didn’t have drive so far to get it.

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