Strawberry Shortcake

One of my favorite places to get dessert recipes is Southern Living magazine. Those southerners really know desserts. If only I could read and bake at the same time. The shortcakes would have tasted like little airy cakes if I had remembered to mix in the baking powder. Alas, these little pucks are a bit dense but still edible and presentable.

TheFoodening Blog - Strawberry Shortcake

Strawberry Layer Ingredients

a pint of strawberries, de-stemmed and quartered

1 tsp almond extract

up to 1/2 c organic granulated sugar

Shortcake Ingredients

2 3/4 c all purpose flour

4 tsp baking powder

1/4 c organic granulated sugar

3/4 c cold butter, diced

2 eggs

8 oz sour cream

1 tsp vanilla extract 

a batch of whipped cream

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 F

1. Combine strawberries, almond extract, and sugar (depending on sweetness of the berries) in a container. Shake covered until mixed and set aside for at least an hour.

2. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together eggs, sour cream, and vanilla extract. 

3. In a food processor, pulse flour, baking powder, sugar, and butter together until the mixture resembles crumbs with bits of butter.

4. Gradually stir dry ingredients into wet ingredients. Dough will be sticky.

5. Use a 1/3 cup measure to form little cakes. Place cakes 2" apart on a baking sheet.

6. Bake for 15-18 minutes, or until tops are light golden brown.

7. Remove from oven and let cool on a rack.

8. To make the shortcakes:

Cut the shortcake in half. On the bottom half, spoon 2 tablespoons of the strawberry mixture, followed by a dollop of whipped cream, and cover with the top half of the shortcake.

You can also make these shortcakes more adult by adding a tablespoon of a sweet wine or hard alcohol to the bottom half before you add the strawberries. I used the peach wine that I made earlier in the summer; though other alcohols that would be nice are muscat wine, bourbon, sake, gin, or rum.

Oven Broiled Chicken Thighs

Fire + Meat = Good

I would like to believe that adding fire to the cooking of meat somehow brings us back to our more primal nature of being apex predators with intelligence. Plus, I love a meat that bastes in its own fat.

The Foodening Blog - Broiled Chicken Thighs

A woman's alternative to not having a grill is using the oven broiler to achieve a similar effect. Charred meat (and peppers). Some nutritionists out there would have you believe that a single serving of meat is less than 4 ounces, without the skin. I suppose I should save the bones from this in the freezer to make broth later.

My simple gas stove/oven allows you to set the temperature of the broiler. Since I already roast chicken at 425 F it seemed like a good temperature to broil chicken at which is how I got to using that temperature for broiled chicken parts.

The most basic preparation is as follows:

sea salt and black pepper on both sides
squeeze of fresh lemon or lime (optional)

Broil bone side up for 10 minutes. Flip chicken over. Broil skin side up for 15 minutes. Let rest 5 minutes. Internal temp should be at least 160 F.

Kimchi Fried Rice

At least this time around I took a photo of the dish before devouring it. You could call it a two-ingredient recipe, even though it is really three if you count the butter I used to fry the rice with; or more if you include all the vegetables that make up kimchi. If you have made everything beforehand, this recipe comes together in less than 10 minutes.

The rice blend I use is of my own making. It's a 1:1 ratio of Trader Joe's Wild Rice (though, I suppose any wild rice will do) and Trader Joe's Brown Jasmine Rice; both of which apparently have naturally occurring inorganic arsenic in it. Who knew? Apparently, Consumer Reports did a study on the amount of arsenic in rice and it doesn't matter if it is organic rice or conventionally grown rice. I don't eat a lot of rice, but when I do eat it, I usually only cook a cup of rice at a time.

The Foodening Blog - Kimchi Fried Rice

Ingredients

1/2 c cooked rice, per serving
1/2 c homemade kimchi, per serving
1/2 tbsp unsalted butter or olive oil, for frying

Directions

Heat frying pan over medium-high heat until butter melts but does not start to turn brown. Add rice and mash around in pan until the grains have separated from each other. Add kimchi. Stir rice and kimchi around in the pan until evenly distributed. Remove from heat after 5 minutes, or until everything is about the same temperature; if your ingredients came from the refrigerator.

Serve hot.

Malted Milk Powder

This post has been brought to you by nostalgia. I grew up drinking malted milk as Olvaltine, and I enjoyed foods with malt in it such as the Whoppers candy and malted milk shakes. As an adult I consume a lot less sugar and as such, needed to figure out how this stuff was made in order to make it from scratch. Why make it from scratch? Because there are so many additives to today's malted milk powders. Just look at the ingredient list for Nestle's Carnation or Olvaltine. King Arthur has a cleaner ingredient list but it costs $10/lb.

I'm not terribly inclined to add wheat flour since it is primarily used as a thickener. This is just malted barley (whole barley berries that have been sprouted, dried, then ground into a powder) and dry milk powder. Also, this is not for making beer.

I got my organic barley grains Whole Foods's bulk aisle; though, you can certainly procure whole grains at any feed store or brewing supply shop.

How to Make Malted Milk Powder

This can be made from whole wheat or barley berries. For this experiment, I am using barley berries. You'll want to find unhulled berries because you want these to sprout. Do not use cracked, pearled, or hulled berries.

Sprout. Take 1 cup of dry grain and rinse it thoroughly in clean pure water. Soak it over night, or about 8 hours, in a 1 quart mason jar with a loose lid. Place a clean mesh lid on the top of the jar and strain out the soak water. Fill the jar again with pure water, stir and strain again. Drain. Rinse your jar of grains once a day. Watch for sprouting hairs after day one, it usually takes between 1-2 days depending on the room temperature.

Ferment. As the barley germinates, it starts to break down the starch into sugars. This is what gives malt powder its natural sweetness. If wild yeast is introduced as the barley is fermenting, the yeast will eat the sugar and convert the liquid to alcohol. You don't want the latter to occur.

Dry. Three possible methods of drying. Air/sun drying (requires 90+ degree temperatures for a few days), food dehydrator, or oven drying. This is to stop the fermenting process.

Air drying - spread moist, freshly sprouted grains on sheet pans in an even layer. Place pans in a dry, well-ventilated area. Dry for 18-48 hours depending on the humidity/temperature. If you are drying this outside, cover your grains with cheesecloth or food-safety screens to keep bugs/birds from eating it.

Food dehydrator - Set dehydrator to 115 F and dehydrate grains for 12-24 hours, or until the grains are dry.

Oven drying - Set oven to its lowest setting, between 150-170 F. Check for dryness in 8-12 hours.

When fully dry, the grains should weigh about the same as what it weighed before sprouting.

Grind. A this point, you are essentially making barley flour from sprouted, dried barley grains. You can grind these in a grain mill, food processor, or blender. You want it to a fine powder, with the granular consistency of say.. cocoa powder.

Storage. Store sprouted flour in an airtight container in the freezer or refrigerator. If using in baking, this can substitute regular flour at a 1:1 ratio.

Now that you have barley malt powder, you can blend it with dry powdered milk!

Here are some sweetened and unsweetened powder ratios.

Depression Era Malted Milk (ratio comes from backtobasicsgal blog):

6 tbsp barley malt powder
1/4 c granulated sugar
2 c powdered milk

Unsweetened Plain:

2 c instant dry milk, whole or nonfat
6 tbsp malt powder

Unsweetened Chocolate:

2 c instant dry milk powder, whole or nonfat
6 tbsp malt powder
6 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder

To make one cup: add 1/3 c dry mix to 8 oz cold milk. Blend or whisk together. Sweeten to taste with sugar, honey, or stevia.

Fresh Peach Scones

I am using the last of the tree-ripened peaches that I got from a couple weeks ago. You might wonder, how did I get these to stay fresh? For starters, put the ripe ready-to-eat peaches into the crisper drawer in the refrigerator. My crisper drawers have two types of vents on them, a larger vent for apples and a smaller vent for vegetables. I put these into the drawer I have apples in. I should also say that whatever nitrogen the apples give off don't affect each other since I have the apples in plastic bags. On a side note, apples kept this way in the refrigerator will keep for a few months before they start to desiccate and shrivel. Also, you should eat damaged or bruised apples as quickly as you can since they will be the first to go bad.

TheFoodening Blog - peach scones fresh from the oven

This recipe ratio comes from King Arthur's recipe website.

These don't look anything like a classic buttermilk or heavy cream scone. They are certainly not really a scone with a fluffy crumb texture that's for sure. I forgot to add the granulated sugar and I used 6-ish tablespoons of Trader Joe's Apricot-Mango Greek yogurt. Whoops!

Ingredients

2 c unbleached all purpose flour
1/4 c organic granulated sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
sprinkling of ground nutmeg

6 tbsp cold unsalted butter, diced

2 large eggs
6 tbsp Greek yogurt, vanilla yogurt, or sour cream
1/2 tsp almond extract

1 c diced fresh peaches, skins removed

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 F.

1. Sift dry ingredients together, then cut in the butter using a pastry knife, couple of forks, or a food processor.

2. Whisk the wet ingredients together. Stir in dry ingredients. Fold in peaches.

3. Use a 1/4 cup measure to drop the batter onto a prepared baking sheet.

4. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until golden brown.