Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Baked Caramel French Toast

This is not a healthy breakfast but its fucking good. 

French Toast:
3 eggs
1/2 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
8 slices of french bread or thick slices of bread

Topping:
1 cup of brown sugar
6 Tablespoons butter
1/3 cup heavy whipping cream
1 Tablespoon light corn syrup

Spray a baking dish with cooking spray.

Mix topping ingredients. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until smooth.
Do not let it boil. Spread topping in baking dish.

In a bowl, beat eggs with whisk. Whisk in milk, vanilla, and salt. 

Dip bread slices into egg mixture, making sure all mixture is absorbed. Arrange evenly over topping mixture. 

Cover and refrigerate at least 8 hours, preferably overnight.

When ready to bake, heat oven to 400*. Uncover baking dish, bake for 20-25 minutes or until bubbly and toast is golden brown. 

Remove from oven and let stand for about 5 minutes.

Place upside down onto serving tray or large plate. Scrape any extra caramel onto toast. Serve immediately.

You can serve with a little whipped cream, ice cream, fruit, or just by itself. It needs NO SYRUP.

Then take a nap.

Blueberry Muffins

This is for Jav.  

Muffins are one of the easiest things to make. You dont need a mixing bowl. You can just use your hands, which is my favorite way to make them.

1 stick of butter, room temperature
2 cups of flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups blueberries (i prefer using frozen)
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 cup whole milk

set oven to 375*

butter a standard 12 cup muffin pan and dust with flour or you can use the muffin wrappers.

In a bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt. 

In a separate bowl, toss the blueberries with a little bit of flour(about 1 1/2 teaspoons). It helps keep the blueberries from sinking to the bottom while baking. 

In a bowl with paddle attachment or if you have a hand mixer, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time until combined. Mix in the vanilla.

Now you can do the rest by hand if you want. 

Add the flour mixture until combined. If you are doing it by hand, add a little at at time. 

Add milk, just until combined. Do not overmix.

Using a spatula, fold in the blueberries. 

Drop batter into prepared muffin pan or cups.

Bake 10-15 minutes and rotate pan. Bake for another 10-15 minutes until the toothpick comes out clean.  

Cool for 10 minutes and then take the muffins out of the pan. 

*TO ADD A LITTLE MORE FLAVOR, SPRINKLE THE TOPS WITH SUGAR IN THE RAW(PREFERRED) OR JUST GRANULATED SUGAR. 

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Snickerdoodles

Ive found this to be the best snickerdoodle recipe. They melt in your mouth. I like to make them bite size, that way you get more servings. 

8 oz unsalted butter
10 oz sugar
2 eggs

13 oz flour 
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon salt

cream the first three ingredients together

combine all dry ingredients in separate bowl and add to butter mixture. 

Cinnamon Sugar Mixture
1 1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup cinnamon

mix together

Roll into balls and roll in cinnamon sugar mixture before baking.

Preheat oven to 300* and bake for 9-10 minutes. 
Turn trays half way thru baking time.

Cookies will be light brown at edge and will be slightly collapsed. 

If you want to make peanut butter sandwiches with these cookies, they are awesome. Heres a little peanut butter buttercream recipe to make these fancy sandwich cookies

Peanut Butter Buttercream

5 oz natural peanut butter
1/3 stick of butter, softened
1/4 cup confectioners sugar

Mix first two ingredients together and blend well. Once blended, slowly add sugar to mixture. Mix until combined. 

Guinness Milk Chocolate Gelato

I love using alcohol to make different gelatos and sorbets. This is one of the first ones that i made and the customers seemed to love it. I find you can use all milk and omit the cream if you like. I use Valhrona 40% chocolate but if you dont have that on hand, just use a good milk chocolate if you can. 



This recipe is for about 2 quarts of gelato

14 oz milk chocolate, chopped
2 cups whole milk
1 cup sugar
1 pinch salt
8 egg yolks
2 cups heavy cream
12 oz Guinness
1/2 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract

Put chopped chocolate in large stainless steel bowl. Set aside

Warm, milk, sugar, and salt

In separate bowl, whisk egg yolks together

Temper mixture into eggs and add back into milk to make Creme Anglaise

Pour mixture over chocolate and stir until chocolate is completely melted

Once mixture is smooth, whisk in cream, then guinness, and vanilla.

Chill, add salt, and then either churn in ice cream machine or freeze until ready to use.



Pancakes

I love my pancake recipe. If you like fluffy pancakes, this recipe is for you

1 1/2 cups flour
1 Tablespoon sugar
3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
---------------------
1 egg
1 1/4 cup milk
3 Tablespoons melted butter

In a bowl, combine all dry ingredients. Make a well in the middle of the bowl, add wet ingredients.
Stir well. Batter will be slightly lumpy. Do not mix until smooth.
Cook on hot griddle (slightly oil or butter pan with brush or paper towel)

Makes about 8-10 pancakes 

Serve with syrup or they're really good with butter and honey also. YUMMY!