Onion Souffle Dip

 I was reminiscing about a place I loved in Elizabethtown KY called the Back Home Restaurant that started out 40 years ago as a crafts and antique emporium, and then they added a cafe so the husbands could have something to do while their wives shopped.   The cuisine is homestyle comfort food, and I was hoping they wrote a cookbook I could get.   I didn't find one, but noticed they had something called "Sweet Onion Souffle Dip", which sounded really interesting.    A quick googling resulted in my learning that the original came from a Memphis Junior League Cookbook, and it sounded so delicious, I had to try it!  I found a recipe in a food blog I like, but I tweaked it a bit to my taste.   I forgot to take a picture of it, so I will borrow this one from that food blog and include the link to it

photo courtesy of White on Rice Couple blog

  

This dip tastes just like French onion soup.   So delicious!  The traditional southern treatment is to serve it with Fritos, but since I always have homemade sourdough on hand, I served it with thin slices of bread like the WoR couple suggested.   Here's how I made it:

Sweet Onion Souffle Dip

8 ounces cream cheese 

1/2 cup mayo (I only use Helmans) 

1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese 

1 1/2  cup diced sweet onion like Vidalia or Walla Walla

2 teaspoons  freshly cracked black pepper 

Preheat the oven to 350°F 

In a bowl, mix together the cream cheese, mayonnaise, Parmesan, onion, and black pepper and until everything is thoroughly combined. Pour and gently spread the mixture into a 8" cast iron fry pan 

Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 50 minutes to one hour, or until everything is melted together the crust is a deep brown. When the top crust is brown and almost burnt-looking, the dip is ready. The darker brown the crust becomes, the better the flavors are.

They also suggested make big batches, and then just dish out the un-baked dip into baking containers and then bake it whenever you need to serve it, so this would be a great idea to whip up a big batch during the holiday season and it can be your dish to pass wherever you go.   I think that is a great idea! 

Sloppy Joes

 

Just getting caught up on some recipes I wanted to save.   Here is a great recipe I got for sloppy joes from a friend.   It's even better than Manwich!

Sloppy Joes

serves 10-12 

2 lb ground beef
1 onion, minced
12 oz. ketchup
6 oz chili sauce
1/4 c. brown sugar

1 T. dry mustard

Brown and drain ground beef.   Add onion and saute until soft.   Add remaining ingredients and simmer for 30 mins. 

Strawberry Jam 2024

 

I've barely posted anything this year, but I wanted to remember a few things about my jam making this year.  First of all, the Ferber method of jam making once again didn't work for me.  I am never going to try one of her recipes ever again.   I am going to stick to my tried and true method for making it.   Just for record keeping's sake, 1 flat of strawberries were 24 c halved and hulled berries.     I paid $48 for a flat.   The yield was 18 half pints of strawberry jam.    I haven't made any other jams yet but am freezing berries for fall canning. 

Adventures in Sourdough Bread Making

I haven't made sourdough since the pandemic, and even back then, I wasn't particularly good at it.   My friend Alex is a master and he wanted me to test out his sourdough starter method, but I killed my starter after about a month of trying.   So, I just started another one in the typical fashion, where you use water and flour and then throw half of it away everyday and feed it more.  I started it with whole wheat flour and then fed it AP flour. I kept it warm by using a smaller version of one of the cherry pit pads I sell in my etsy shop by heating it up for 2 minutes in the microwave and tucking it around a weck jar covered loosely in saran wrap that I set in a bowl in my pantry.  I also stirred it up at each feeding with a fork just to make sure it got a lot of air.  I think what killed my last starter was that it wasn't warm enough and didn't get enough air.   It took about 2 weeks to get a starter that was ready to bake.   

I think too much attention was made about precise weighing of ingredients when making starter.   After I weighed things, I just used measuring cups after that first time.   In my opinion, the flour and water weight isn't going to change that much day to day.  Besides, I feed my starter every morning when I wake up, pre coffee.   I don't need any added complications.    I have always wanted a bread lame and a dough whisk, so I decided to get myself this sourdough baking set for my birthday present to myself this year.  I needed the bannetons, so it was a good deal.   

I followed Alex's excellent bread recipe using my starter.   The beauty of this recipe is that it doesn't make too much bread.   Here is how I make it - note I use King Arthur flour and Redmond sea salt.    KAF is high in protein and makes an excellent loaf.   You can make it with AP flour as well. 

Sourdough Bread

60g starter

180g water

240g bread flour

30g whole wheat flour

6g sea salt

Make a note of the time when you start.   Mix all but the salt. Cover with saran wrap and allow to rest for 30 minutes. Just a shaggy mass of unprocessed dough.  After 30 minutes, add the salt and mix it in by folding the dough over itself repeatedly until the salt is well-incorporated. Cover again and let rest for 30 minutes. 

Now, for the next 2-3 hours or so, you've got to stretch and fold your dough.  It's how sourdough bread is kneaded.  I recommend this video to show you how to do it. Some days, my dough is stiffer than this.   “Stretch and fold” is the way we build up the gluten structure.  At this point, the dough has been in process for about 3-4 hours. You can really take your time with developing the dough’s structure. Just keep track of your starting time.  So keep in mind, you are stuck at the house during this time.   Plan your dough accordingly.  

Next, it's time for what they call bulk fermentation. Let it rise at room temp for about 5 hours. Your total time since mixing the dough should be 8-9 hours at this point. The dough should be puffy and airy. 

The dough is now ready to shape. I make both round and oval shapes.  Watch these videos to see how to do it - round  and oval, or boule and batard, if you want to get all fancy French like.   Place the shaped dough in a banneton and let it proof at room temp for an hour or two before baking.  I prefer to let the dough cold-proof in the fridge for 12-48 hours. Longer sour flavor. When you’re ready to bake, take the dough out of the fridge for an hour for maximum oven-spring.   That way, I can bake it whenever I want. 

I take the dough out and set it on the counter and then place your empty Dutch oven in a cold oven and heat to 450° for 1 hour.   I put my pizza stone on a rack under it to make sure the bottom doesn't burn.   

Upend the dough into a piece of parchment paper, carefully score the top with your lame, and place it in the Dutch oven, cover, then bake for 25 minutes. I have this 7 qt. Martha Stewart one that works for both the boule and batard shapes of this size 

Remove the lid of the Dutch oven and control bake until your crust is a deep golden brown.   For my oven,. it's usually another 10 minutes.   Allow to cool fully before slicing. 2 hours is best

This is enough bread for Andy and me for a couple days.    It's so much better than any bread I can buy up here.    There's one family that sells sourdough bread in the summer at Calumet Farmer's Market, and they sell out pretty much immediately.   I have this fantasy that maybe this summer, I will have a little farm stand in the driveway, selling bread and pie to the local tourists camping at McLain or looking for agates at Calumet Waterworks.      

Six Inch Cakes

 

my hubby's 58th birthday cake

Since I am going to become a grandma this year, I figure I need to level up my cake making game.   It's just that unless you are serving 12 people, a layer cake is just way too much for us.  After reading a blog post on Sally's Baking Addiction about making 6" cakes,  I determined this might be the solution to the problem.   

I needed to invest in a trio of 6" baking pans, so I followed Sally's suggestion of the Fat Daddio brand, and I tried to buy them locally at Swift's Hardware, which has an excellent cooking section, but they only had 1 pan in stock, and I needed 3.  So, Amazon to the rescue!    Sally's tip is that any recipe that is scaled for 12-14 cupcakes will work for 3 6" cake layers, so I opted for her chocolate cupcake recipe, except I didn't use natural cocoa, I used the cocoa powder I had.   I was halfway through the dry ingredients when I discovered I was out of baking soda!  I had forgotten when I cleaned out my pantry, I threw away the ancient box I had here which I think was here from when my son was still in college, (he graduated in 2019) but forgot to restock.  Off to the store I went!  I prepared the pans by cutting out parchment circles for the bottoms of the pans, and then I used Bake Klean ZT spray to coat the pans and then the parchment after it was placed.  It worked very well, the cakes were easy to get out of the pans. 

I knew I wanted to make ermine frosting, which is a super light buttercream that isn't too sweet.  I had made it before using a different recipe, probably the NYT one, but this time, I opted for Stella Park's version.  It is different as she has you add the sugar to the cooked milk and flour mixture, and I also like how she has troubleshooting tips, which I needed to use.   My butter was not at room temperature, so the frosting wouldn't whip right.  I followed her tip to set the mixing bowl over some hot water and that fixed it fine.  I like her approach that it's not a "fail" if this happens.  She says, "However precise a recipe may be in terms of target temperatures (for both the ingredients and the finished product), the ideal working temperature of a buttercream can vary from batch to batch, depending on environmental conditions and the time of year, as well as variations in equipment and ingredients.  So, rather than rely on a thermometer alone, evaluate the texture and consistency of the frosting. If it's heavy and dense, if it has a greasy texture, or if it seems curdled, it will need to be warmed and re-whipped. If it's too soft or loose to hang from a spoon without dropping, it will need to be cooled and re-whipped. These are routine adjustments, not a sign of failure." 

I love Stella's great cookbook BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts that she wrote with Kenji Lopez-Alt.  I need to make some recipes from that book - I bought it back in 2017 when I was doing a lot of work in Kentucky and she used to work at many Lexington area restaurants early in her career.   One I really love is the Wallace Station.  It's way out in the bluegrass horse country of Versailles (in KY, you pronounce that Ver-SELLS).  Their pimento cheese is tres bien!  I moved that cookbook from our old house in Ann Arbor to our rental house to our lake house.  It survived my great cookbook purge.  But I have yet to make anything from it, or the other sweets cookbook I have that survived the move north, the Zingerman's Bakehouse Cookbook.  I am going to have to dust these off if I am going to be the grandma that always has baked goods on hand.  

I wasn't sure how much frosting I was going to need, and I had this grand plan of making a rose cake piping on the sides with sprinkles on top.  Alas, one batch of Stella's ermine was not enough, so I made another and that wasn't enough to do all the roses I wanted so I just did some on the top.  Next time, I'd recommend tripling this recipe to make enough frosting for rose cake decor on a 6" cake.   Sally recommends you need 2.5 - 3 cups frosting for a 6 inch cake.  Stella's ermine recipe makes 2 cups.   The roses use a lot of frosting, so I'd triple it next time.  

I am looking forward to making more cakes this year.   Stay tuned! 

New Year, New Baby

 

We had a baby shower for my daughter in law Olivia yesterday.   My first grandbaby!  The food was delicious, many of the ladies brought yummy food to pass.  I made some mini cheese balls (shown above) from my favorite cheeseball recipe formed in half inch balls that  I rolled in ground pecans.   This is so much more convenient than a whole cheeseball for a large crowd.  I made a great recipe for Mediterranean Turkey Pinwheels I found on the interwebs that was delicious and easy.   I made them a day ahead and wrapped them in waxed paper tightly.   I cut them with a serrated knife and secured them with a toothpick.   I also made an old favorite appetizer recipe for mini pasties that my friend Leah reminded me about.   Years ago, I clipped this recipe out of the late great Ann Arbor News Food section, but I misplaced it.  She shared it in our fb group.  I tweaked it a little to match our tastebuds, but it was just as good as I remembered. 

Little Pasties

Dough

1 cup butter
8 oz cream cheese
¼ cup evaporated milk
2 ½ cups flour
1 t salt

In a stand mixer, cream butter and cream cheese and beat in milk. Add flour and salt. Chill dough well.

Filling

2 lbs ground beef
1 large onion, diced very fine

2 t thyme

2 T Tabasco sauce
3 slices bread

1/4 c. evaporated milk

Egg wash

1 egg

1 t. water. 

Brown meat and onion, breaking meat into small crumbles and drain excess fat. Soak bread slices in milk, gently squeeze out excess water and then add to meat. Add thyme and Tabasco. Mix well (best to use a potato masher to blend in the bread into the meat). Set aside to cool.

Roll out dough to 1/8” thick and cut out 2” or 2 ½” circles using a biscuit cutter. Mix 1 egg with 1 t water and use wash on edge of dough circles, add meat mixture and use a fork to seal edges. Brush finished pasty with egg wash.

Freeze uncooked. Bake at 400F for 20 minutes or until golden brown.

It was a delicious spread!  I am looking forward to more cooking in the New Year!