Dilly Bread

Delys, Elin, and I have all been watching old seasons of "The Great British Baking Show." Laurel, are you a fan as well? In any case, it has inspired me to share one of my favorite bread recipes. This is a recipe that my mother used to make, and we all loved it. I'm not sure where she got it, but I haven't ever run across it anywhere else. It's unusual, delicious, easy to make, and it goes beautifully with soups, stews, salads, pasta, and, well, just about everything.

Here are the three ingredients that give the bread its unique flavor and texture:

Cottage cheese, dill seed, and dried onion.

The recipe:

1 pkg yeast     

1/4 c warm water

1 c cottage cheese

2 T butter

2 T sugar

1/4 t soda

1 egg, beaten

1 T instant onion

2 t dill seeds

2 1/2 c flour

Dissorlve yeast in warm water. Set aside. In the microwave, heat cottage cheese to lukewarm. Combine all ingredients. Beat. Let dough rise for about 30 minutes until about double in size. Punch down and knead. Grease a 2 qt glass casserole dish. Round dough in dish and let rise again for 30 minutes:

Bake at 350 for 30 minutes. Bread is done when it sounds hollow when the crust is tapped. Brush the top with butter and a dash of salt. 

(Mine sank a bit during the bake, but it didn't affect the taste or texture.) Let it cool slightly, remove from bowl, and invert it onto a cooling rack:

This bread tastes great cold or hot, but I love it best warm from the oven and topped with butter:

So good!

Country Cinnamon Swirl Bread

I can't remember where I first discovered this recipe. I'm pretty sure it was during the baking frenzy of my high school days. (Remember the Barbie Cakes, anyone?) The point is, this recipe has been a staple in my repertoire for over a decade, because it's just that good and wonderfully simple to make. The secret ingredient? Buttermilk. Buttermilk makes everything it touches better, you know? Pancakes, biscuits, syrup, and bread.... mmm...

So without further ado:

Ingredients:

1/4 cup butter at room temperature

1 1/3 cups sugar, divided

1 egg

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup buttermilk

1 TB cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350. In a large bowl, beat butter, 1 cup sugar, and the egg until blended. Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add the flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk to the large bowl and stir until just combined. In a small bowl, combine the remaining 1/3 cup sugar and cinnamon.

Grease a 8x4x2 inch loaf pan and add 1/3rd of the batter to the bottom, smoothing it out to form the bottom layer. Sprinkle 1/3rd of the cinnamon sugar mixture on top of the batter in the pan. Repeat the layers twice. Bake at 350 degrees for 45 to 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool.

Homemade Wheat (or White!) Bread

Oh my goodness, this bread is good. Remember Wendy, my awesome nurse-mentor when I worked in the NICU? Twas she brought the delicious Butternut Squash Harvest Soup to the weekly Sunday potluck at work. Part of the reason that soup stole my heart, though is that it was paired with this amazing homemade bread.

I feel inadequate to fully describe the deliciousness of it. It's soft but not crumbly. The texture and taste are amazing. Also, I love that it calls for 100% wheat flour and still delicious. (Don't you sometimes feel like fractioning out part-wheat, part-white is missing the point? I want it either completely whole grain or completely fluffy and light. Then again, I'm new to bread making; ask me again in a few years.)

I knew I needed to share this recipe with my mom (and the world), but when I went to make it a few days ago, I could not find my wheat flour. I could have sworn I had a quarter bag left... Yet it turns out, this oversight was destiny. I already had the rest of my ingredients in my mixer and didn't want them to go to waste, so I added white flour instead, and the result was another amazing loaf.  My husband fell completely in love, and our family ate the entire loaf in an embarrassingly short amount of time. I'm not going to even tell you how short. It was that good.

So I'm set: whether I need a white or wheat loaf, this recipe is gold! (And if I want a crusty, artisan bread, mom's No-knead, Overnight Bread is another no-fail winner. I typically make it without any mix-ins, and it's delish.)

1 1/4 cups warm water (very warm to touch)

1/2 Tbs yeast

1/2 Tbs salt

1/4 cup honey

2 1/2 Tbs canola oil

3 cups wheat (or white) flour

Mix water, yeast, salt, honey, oil and flour together until well mixed.  Knead for 10 minutes.  Let rise, covered in greased bowl for 1 hr.  Form into a loaf and transfer into a greased loaf pan.  Cover with a clean dishcloth and let it rise for 1 hr. Bake in 350 degree oven for 25-30 minutes.

Strawberry Freezer Jam

The distressing thing about being a mother is the realization that mothers are supposed to know everything. I know this because my mother knew everything when I was growing up, especially all things relating to food. My mother-in-law knows everything, too: how to make the perfect roast, the perfect gravy, the perfect chocolate drop cookies, and the perfect strawberry-peach jam.

In fact, my hubbie and I have had a few conversations about our mothers' jams. I'd talk about how wonderful my mother's strawberry jam was, and he'd add that his mother's strawberry-peach jam was the best jam ever (which implies it is superior to the peach-less jam of my childhood). We'd carry on about the sweet, flavorful, deliciousness of these jams for a while, trying to one-up each other in our profuse praise.

Then a few weeks ago, as I was bragging to my mother about the cartons of strawberries on sale for $1, she immediately asked if I got enough to make jam. Shoot. I blew it. Mothers should know that $1/lb strawberries mean that it's time to make jam, and I totally missed my chance. I was pretty chagrined.

Nonetheless, the very next week, these sweet berries were on sale at a different store for the very same price, and I promptly bought 4 lbs! As I know nothing about jam making, I called up the source of wisdom to ask her to share her secret recipe, and now I'm going to share it with all of you.

Our phone conversation went something like this:

Me: Great news! I found some more cheap strawberries and am going to make some of your fabulous jam!

Mom: Oh good! I'm glad you were able to find another great sale.

Me: Me too. Would you mind sending me your recipe when you have the chance?

Mom: Oh, just look on the back of the pectin box, dear. It will tell you what you need to do.

Me: No, you don't understand. I want to make your special version of strawberry jam.

Mom: Yes, yes. Just follow the directions on the back of the pectin box like I always do. It will be delicious.

Me: (stunned silence.)

Are you serious?!? All this time, all that arguing with my husband, and your recipe is from the box??? I couldn't believe it. Yet now that I've made the jam, I can. And you know what? It is still incredibly good. Amazingly delicious and ridiculously easy. So this is a post to demonstrate that you, too, can make absurdly easy strawberry jam.

Here's what you need:

Something to hold five cups worth of finished product. Plastic containers are great for freezer jam, but I already had these glass jars on hand and wanted to make this jam experience as inexpensive as possible. I sanitized my jars by boiling them (or you can rinse your plastic containers in boiling water).

One box of pectin. Actually, I wished I'd purchased 2 boxes, but this was my first time and I had no idea what I was doing. As promised, the box has instructions for both freezer jams/jellies and cooked jams/jellies. My mom always made strawberry freezer jam. It has a softer set than cooked jam and is prepared in half the time. It is also crazy-good. Win-win-win.

One box of pectin needs 4 cups of strawberries or 2 cups of crushed strawberries. I basically bought twice as many strawberries as I needed (or half as much pectin, really; we're going through this jam super-fast!) 2 lbs of strawberries was ample.

So, remove the stems, thoroughly wash, and crush your strawberries!

My parents-in-law bought me this beautiful Cuisinart food processor which I used for the crushing.

Next, you need 4 cups of sugar. That's right, jam has twice as much sugar as fruit. Let's not dwell on that fact. Stir sugar into fruit and let stand 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Then, stir your pectin and 3/4 cup of water together in a saucepan. Bring to a boil on high heat, stirring constantly. Let boil one minute while you continue to stir. Then, remove from heat.

Add the pectin mixture to the fruit mixture and stir for 3 minutes until the sugar is dissolved and the jam is not grainy. Except a few sugar crystals will remain, which sounds like a few "grains" to me. Whatever.

Fill containers immediately, leaving 1/2 inch at the top for it to expand when frozen.

Cover and let stand for 24 hours or until set.

Oh-my-yum, that was easy. Slather onto delicious homemade bread like mama's artisan hazelnut bread.