Homemade Vanilla

If you're a baker, you probably have a large bottle of vanilla extract in your cupboard. If you're a serious baker, you've learned that not all vanilla is created equal, and journeyed away from the imitation stuff in search of the best 'real' extract. Unfortunately, that real stuff doesn't come cheap. That's what I found at least. During one fateful trip to Philadelphia, though, I stopped at a Penzy's Spices, and learned from the cashier that you can actually make your OWN vanilla extract - and for cheap! It makes a fabulous Christmas/Holiday gift, but you have to get started now to allow the extraction process enough time. I guest blogged about the process on my BFF's blog "Annie Get Your Glue Gun." So, check it out now, buy your beans, take a trip to the liquor store, and be prepared to take your baking up a notch. : )

PS - I highly suggest Southern Comfort as your extracting liquor.

The Best Brownie Recipe - Seriously

If there's one thing you should absolutely know about me, it's that I love brownies. There's nothing better than their chocolately, sweet, soft, gooeyness. I can easily eat a whole pan myself, although I generally try to give most of them away before I do that. In college, I always had a box of brownie mix in the dorm room or apartment so I could whip up a box when I felt the craving. As I got more into baking, though, I tried to wean myself from my dependency on the box. So, I tried a bunch of 'delicious' brownie recipes, which ended up cakey, dry, crumbly, gross. Seriously, if I wanted cake, I would make CAKE! When I want a brownie, I want gooey! The love-hate relationship with the box continued, until one fateful day in med school when a fellow baker-friend introduced me to her brownie recipe, and quite honestly, life has not been the same since. So, I can't take credit from her, but I can spread the tasty news: This recipe makes the PERFECT brownie. The chocolate glaze adds a certain pizazz, but it is by no means necessary (and if you're like me, you can't wait for that once you start to smell delicious brownies cooking in your oven). Enjoy!!

All the ingredients you need (plus baking powder and salt):

Ooey gooey good.

Although you can put the batter into a 9x9 or 9x13 pan, I think an 8x11 works the best.

Ingredients and recipe here!

Perfect Pizza Pie

So sorry that it's been so long since I blogged!!! I baked so many delicious things for Easter, but in the craziness, I totally forgot to take pictures and notes... So, that was a waste. Then, it was a two week road trip around the western United States. (I know, such a hard life...)

Finally, I got back home and wanted to start baking. I found some new recipes to try, but I didn't find them pleasing - definitely not blog-worthy. So, there's been a dry spell, but today I have one of my favorite recipes for you: pizza dough and the recipe to make a perfect pizza! With the hubby being vegan, it's sometimes hard for us to find recipes that we can mutually enjoy. Making pizza, though, is perfect because we get to customize our own pies. I prefer a 'plain pizza' topped with homemade sauce, fresh mozzarella, basil, and a few scattered onions. The hubs enjoys any assortment of veggies. Hawaiian pizza with sauce, ham, and crushed pineapple is also delicious. (Believe it or not). It's a fun way to make dinner and great when friends are over, too. Enjoy!

Pizza Dough Recipe

1 2/3 cups warm (but not hot) water

2 Tablespoons olive oil

2 Tablespoons raw sugar (or white if that's all you have)

2 teaspoons salt

4 1/2 cups bread flour

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

1.) Combine water, oil, sugar, and salt in a large bowl. Add in flour and yeast and knead until smooth (about 10 minutes).

2.) Cover bowl, place in warm area, and let dough rest until it doubles in size (approximately 1 hour).

Alternatively, you can put the ingredients into your bread machine and place it on the 'dough' cycle (which is what I do :) ).

Perfect Homemade Pizza Sauce

1 large can crushed organic tomatoes (I prefer the Tree of Life brand)

1 1/2 teaspoon Italian seasonings (a mixture of oregano, marjoram, thyme, rosemary, and sweet basil)

1 teaspoon (or more!) fresh chopped or granulated garlic

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1.) Place all ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a simmer. Taste and adjust spices accordingly. (Sometimes adding a little sugar helps with the acidity).

Crust Enhancing Oil

1/4 cup olive oil

1 teaspoon fresh chopped or granulated garlic

1/2 teaspoon Italian seasonings (a mixture of oregano, marjoram, thyme, rosemary, and sweet basil)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1.) Place all in a small bowl and mix. Let sit for at least 10 minutes to allow oil to soak up the flavors.

Making The Pizza

1.) Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. If you are using a pizza stone, place the stone in the oven (or work according to its instructions).

2.) Now that the dough has risen, transfer it to a large surface where you can easily roll it out - a counter top or board works well. Gently separate the dough into 4 pieces. Lightly flour your surface and roll out each piece into a circle, roughly 1/4" thick. (I highly recommend a French rolling pin for this task). You want the dough to be thin, but not so thin that it will rip as you transfer it to your pizza pan or stone.

3.) Transfer one of your rolled out pieces of dough to your pizza pan or pizza stone. We use Martha Stewart's 13" pizza pan and love it, but some people swear by pizza stones. Fold over any excess dough to create the crust. I like very little crust, so I try to make a smaller circle than my pan, and then only fold over about 1/2".

4.) Place the dough in the oven for five minutes. This first baking allows the dough to bake enough so that when you add the sauce it doesn't make the dough all soupy/soggy.

5.) Take the pie out of the oven. Brush the Crust Enhancing Oil along the crust edge. Take roughly 3/4 cup of pizza sauce and fill the center of the pizza pie with it. (More or less to your liking). Top with your favorite toppings!

6.) Place the pizza back in the oven for about 7-8 minutes until the crust starts to become golden and your cheese (if you're using it) is melted. The bottom of the crust should be crispy.

7.) Similarly bake the other 3 pizza dough crusts.

8.) Enjoy!

Curried Spinach Side or Snack

The hubs and I treated ourselves to delicious sushi at Origami a few weekends ago up in the Twin Cities. It was so yummy and made me miss living in a bigger town where I can get sushi regularly. One of the appetizers we had, Spinach Goma Ae, was a surprisingly sweet cooked spinach dish with sesame and soy flavors. It was absolutely delicious. Chris and I bought some spinach in order to try to recreate the dish ourselves, but when he decided to attempt it, he became inspired with more Indian curry flavorings. The result is a mild dish with subtle but deep flavors that is super healthy! I definitely enjoyed it, and hope you will, too!

Recipe here!

Chocolate Pudding Cake

My girlfriends and I had a virtual dinner this past weekend. It's so nice to share meals together despite being far away. We had cream of tomato soup, 'wedding' salad, grilled cheese, and pudding cake. All were delicious, but this particular post will focus on dessert.

I'm a big cake lover, but unless I've set aside the time to do it, I hate spending time making frosting and then frosting the actual cake. Although it's fun to spend time decorating, I just think its a lot of work for not that much taste reward, and I'm all about taste rewards. That's why I love this chocolate pudding cake. When it comes out of the oven, it's ready to be eaten! No frosting or other work necessary to perk up this cake. Plus, I really think this cake is magical: before going into the oven, you pour chocolate chips, brown sugar + cocoa powder, and boiling water on top of the cake batter, and after it bakes, the pudding is on the bottom. Magic!

Whisk together all the dry ingredients.

Add in the dry and whisk until smooth. The batter is almost a frosting-like consistency.

Pour the batter into a 9-inch pan.

Layer on the chocolate chips and then the brown sugar + cocoa powder mix.

Unlike this picture indicates, the next best move would be to put the cake on the oven rack and then pour in the boiling water just before you close the oven door. Otherwise, you're going to have to carefully carry a very full pan topped with boiling water to your oven, which is not a fun task.

After baking, magic! Cake on the top!

Once you cut into the cake, though, you discover the delicious warm chocolate pudding hiding. It's definitely not the prettiest cake ever, but I promise you that it's tasty.

Recipe can be found on cookingfriend: right here.

Chocolate Bread

The best grocery store in the world, Wegman's, started to make chocolate bread around Valentine's Day a few years ago, and I got hooked. It just smelled, looked, and tasted delicious. They paired with a coffee infused marscapone cheese, and the combination was just *wow.* Anyway, I sadly moved away from the land of Wegman's, but this past week, came across the coffee marscapone cheese in Minnesota! Unfortunately, there is no amazing bakery that offers chocolate bread here, so I had to resort to my own skills to make it. The recipe that I used for this bread was adapted from one online by NPR. The final result is just wonderful!

This bread is not a sweet bread, like banana or zucchini, but rather more of a classic doughier bread, flavored with chocolate.

So, here's how I made it.

I truly hate sifting things, so to get around that little 'problem' I simply whisk together all the dry ingredients when I am baking before adding any liquids. Here, I am whisking together the flour, sugars, cocoa, and salt.

Meanwhile, the yeasts were happy sitting atop some sugar water and doing their thing, aka creating some foam.

Yeast and coffee were then combined with the dry ingredients, and the dough was kneaded. Butter was added tablespoon by tablespoon into the dough until it was glistening.

Then, I added in the chocolate chunks!

The dough had to sit overnight in the fridge, but today after work, I rolled out the dough into balls and arranged them in the bread pan.

After rising and then being baked, here's the final result. Mmm.

Coffee flavored marscapone cheese is the perfect spread to pair with this bread!

Full ingredients and recipe here!

Swoon!!

So, I have a med school semi-formal coming up, and I went to the mall here in Minnesota attempting to find something that would look fabulous. As I learned, shopping here is less than stimulating. How can that be?!! Why are the no cute dresses that make me swoon here?! Anyway, to remedy this, I went on etsy to look at some of my faves. Aww, to have $400 to donate to a dress...

Look at these beauties from Timeless Vixen Vintage. Mega swoon.

Love love love.