Sunday, April 30, 2006

Oatmeal Cookies with Almonds and Mangoes

I did a version of my cranberry oatmeal cookies with almonds and apricots and my Turkish friends really liked them a lot.

For the May Mango event, I did a little tweaking in the recipe and added dried mangoes instead of apricots. Pistachios would also work. These are really good, give it a try...

The recipe is from William's and Sonoma Baking book, p. 120.

1 1/2 cups of flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temp.
1 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups rolled oats
1 cup of diced dried mangoes
1 cup of chopped almonds

Makes about 24 cookies

Preheat oven to 350.
Mix the dry ingredients and set aside.
Cream butter and sugars and once combined mix in the dry ingredients and then the oats.
Finally combine the almonds and mangoes.

Bake until brown on the edges, 12-15 minutes.

Enjoy!

Saturday, April 22, 2006

Happy Birthday!


PICT0143.JPG
Originally uploaded by Baking Fairy.
It's my mom's birthday today! Annecim seni ben ciceklerden bocekten, sari sacli bebekten, canimdan cok severim!!!! Iyi ki dogdum- yani sen dogdun!

This is a sugarfree cake for you! It is my first trial and the recipe is not ready to post yet. It needs lots of improvements....Of course the powdered sugar on top is for decoration only:)

Have a great weeekend!

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Turkish Apple Walnut Cookies (Elmali)

I first read about these traditional Turkish cookies on Portakal Agaci and I've been looking for a reason to bake them since then. My sister and mom tried them last weekend and sent me pictures and emails saying how wonderful they turned out, bla, bla bla... I hate that they bake together. But, they don't have a Kitchen Aid! La la la:)

So, I got into their trap of trying to duplicate these cookies. I had a reason already. Last weekend, Agnes asked me to bake something traditional and Sean said he's never tasted anything Turkish, so blink blink! It is tough to bake for your boss when she is owns a bakery! You can cut the dough into two and freeze one part. It makes so many. I took some to poker party, some to the bakery, some to work, some to the Turkish gang. So far so good and they are all gone!

Here is my sister's version, quite something huh??


This is a very common Turkish recipe, with the “classic” vague flour measurement”: as much as it would take!! @!@!@!@!@! That kills me! A random touch/feel measurement...It is against the whole idea of baking. How do I know what it is supposed to feel? I guess experience helps...Now that I've done so many cookies and cakes, I kinda got what it meant with that, and used about 5 cups of flour and thought it was fine. It could as well take one more cup, next time I will try it like that...

Try it, let me know how you like them…


Dough:

2 sticks of butter, room temperature
1/3 cups of plain, non-fat yogurt
1/3 cups of canola oil
9 tablespoons of sugar
1 teaspoon of baking soda
3-4 drops of lemon
and here we go:
flour, as much as it could take...

Apple Filling:
3-4 grated apples, I used Golden Delicious and Pink Lady
3 tablespoons of sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup hazelnuts, I used walnuts

Steps:
Mix all the ingredients and cook under medium heat for about 10 minutes or until the apples get soft and your kitchen smells cinnamony, (is that a word?). Wait until the mixture cools and mix in the walnuts.

Steps:

1. Mix the baking soda with the lemon juice.
2. Combine all the ingredients until it feels not sticky to the touch.
3. Form the dough into discs and wrap in plastic.
4. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes or overnight.
5. Roll the dough 1/4 inch thick and use cookie cutters, preferably round
6. Fill the cookies with a teaspoon of the filling.

Now, you have two options on the size. For a larger cookie, you can stack two rounds on top of each other or for a smaller bite, you can fold the rounds into half, creating a crescent shape. I liked the smaller versions better.

8. Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes and cool on racks.
9. Once cooled, dust the cookies with powdered sugar with lots and lots of it.

Don't count how many you've eaten and just pack all that is left and leave the house!

More pictures on Flickr!

Friday, April 14, 2006

Happy Birthday Rod and Rye Bread!


Rye Bread
Originally uploaded by Baking Fairy.
It was Rod's 36th birthday last Tuesday and I surprised him with this long lost recipe from his friend Chuba. It is very easy and tasty. If you slice them thin and bake in the oven for 20 minutes or so, they make good crackers too!

Enjoy!

Rye Bread

Ingredients

6 tsp active dry yeast

7 tsp salt

2 cups mixed grains (or rye grains if available)

1 cup sunflower seeds

1 cup pumpkin seeds, (I didn't use this)

6 cups rye flour

4 cups whole wheat flour

Approx 7 cups lukewarm water

Makes 3 loaves

Dissolve yeast in 2 cups lukewarm water, add remaining ingredients, mix well, cover with dishcloth and keep it in a warm place to rise for about an hour. Mix the dough thoroughly, spoon it into greased baking tins, cut it with a knife in the middle (longitudinally) and punch holes with a fork (for the gasses to leave.) Sprinkle Rosemary and/or sunflower seeds and a little water on top.

Bake it in preheated oven at 400F (200C) for 45 minutes. Turn oven off, leave loaves in the oven for a while (30 -60 min) then take them out, put a wet kitchen towel and a couple dry towels on the top and leave them to cool down.

Friday, April 07, 2006

My Hall of Fame at Trader Joe's

I hate grocery shopping but I hate online grocery shopping even more. The only good thing about grocery shopping is either going to a treasure hunt at Trader Joe's or getting a gift card from Whole Foods (or Whole Pay Check) or begging friends to take you to Rainbow; and for some reason I am not very lucky with the last two reasons! So, let's stick to Trader Joe's. I read Amy's Hall of Fame list on her blog and wanted to share my own baking list..This is not one of those tagging events, so there are no action items for you, unless you want to share...

BakingFairy's Hall of Fame:


1) Unsalted butter, lots and lots of it...
2) Rolled Oats
3) Cranberry/Raisin Mix
4) Almong and Hazelnut Meal (best value)
5) Medjool Dates
6) Vanilla Paste (best value)
7) Non-fat yogurt
8) Kalamata Olives (even though they are Greek)

Everyday Hall of Fame:


1) Hearts of Palm
2) Spicy Flaxseed Chips
3) Spicy Papadums
4) Mango-Papaya Salsa ( I can't buy enough, they are expensive- it sounds bad but I am really not that cheap)
5) Pre-cut and washed Rainbow Chard
6) Turkish Olive Oil (the one with a woman's picture on)
7) Armenian String Cheese ( probably mislabeled)
8) Vegetarian Thai Potstickers

My honorable mentions go to the Belgian Profiteroles and the Green Tea Mochi Ice cream, they are the best ever and just be careful not to finish the whole boxes... I am hungry:)

There is even a blog and a fan club!

That's all...I will be at the the bakery this weekend, stop by to say hello!

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Double Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies

I made these cookies a while ago for Brett and Chad's party. They were gone in a few minutes and people asked me for the recipe so here you go!

These aren't chewy though, they are crisp and great with coffee too!

The recipe from everybody likes sandwiches and see my notes below...

1) I had mini M&M's at home so I used those to add color.
2) I also added some dried cranberries but I will skip that next time, oatmeal and chocolate are happy together...

More pictures...

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Cafe Fernando


Cenk is finally blogging! I love his blog, so sleek...WordPress...I wonder how painful it would be to switch from Blogger...I don't have the time to do it anyways...

Add CafeFernando to your Reader!!!

Shopping Alert - KitchenAid Blender

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Monday, April 03, 2006

Walnut-Rosemary Bread and Southbeach


Since I've started to help Agnes at the Teacake Bake Shop over the weekends, I have been so busy, I barely have time to bake at home, let alone blogging...Then I read other blogs almost daily like Kelli's or Hatice's and they post very frequently; giving me inspiration to continue sharing. Hence; the Walnut Rosemary Bread!

We got fresh rosemary from Farm Fresh and I've been using it on my roasted veggies but still, it would have been a waste if it wasn't baked into something:) I decided on the Walnut Rosemary Bread recipe that Joe did a while ago. It is a very easy recipe considering bread usually takes a good day or so to prep, this one took me a couple hours to bake from start to finish, and it turned out good, especially toasted, per Eric and John. It also makes huge two rounds so I will probably cut the recipe by half.

Update on SouthBeach:
Thanks to Sutter and Lane, Minako ended the misery. I have forgotten how amazing rice tastes, well their rice is also quite extra ordinary, too:) I guess my friends were a little concerned that I will be losing my magic if this diet thing went too long and I don't blame them, especially after my disaster with a SouthBeach cheesecake! I will never talk about it though, not now or not even in the future - think cottage cheese cheesecake and this is 20 times worse than that:)

On Saturday and Sunday, I also tasted some of the cookies and cupcakes we made at the bakery. My favorite so far is the Raspberry-Chocolate cookie, it is absolutely divine and worth every single calorie.

Well, today is Monday and I am on it again, till next weekend:)