Banana Bread

Used this recipe:
http://joyofbaking.com/breakfast/BananaBread.html
1 cup (115 grams) walnuts or pecans, toasted and coarsely chopped (optional)

1 3/4 cups (230 grams) all-purpose flour 1 cup white, 3/4 cup white whole wheat

3/4 cup (150 grams) granulated white sugar half brown, half white

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cardamom

dash nutmeg

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, melted and cooled

3 ripe large bananas (approximately 1 pound or 454 grams), mashed well (about 1-1/2 cups)

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease & flour a 9x5x3 loaf pan OR 9x9 cake pan.
Place the nuts on a baking sheet and bake for about 8 to 10 minutes or until lightly toasted. Let cool and then chop coarsely. 
In a large bowl combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nuts. (Dry ingredients.)
In a medium-sized bowl combine the mashed bananas, eggs, melted butter, and vanilla. With a rubber spatula or wooden spoon, lightly fold the wet ingredients (banana mixture) into the dry ingredients just until combined and the batter is thick and chunky. (The important thing is not to over mix the batter. You do not want it smooth. Over mixing the batter will yield tough, rubbery bread.) Scrape batter into prepared pan. Bake until bread is golden brown and a  toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 55 to 60 minutes for loaf pan or 25-30 for cake pan. Place on a wire rack to cool and then remove the bread from the pan.

Changes from original recipe:
1) used 3/4 cup white whole wheat flour
2) used about half brown sugar (what I had)
3) added maybe 1/4+tsp cardamom and a bit of nutmeg in addition to cinnamon
4) maybe added some extra sugar?
5) baked in a 9x9 pan for 25-30 minutes
6) omitted the nuts
7) did the following in lieu of mashing: bananas in food processor, blended. added other wet ingredients and pulsed to blend. I'm not sure if this might have made things tougher. I doubt it since it was just the bananas and not bananas+dry ingredients at all, but who knows.

I think it was pretty good.

Solo Almond Bundt Cake

From http://www.solofoods.com/recipes/almond-bundt-cake
This cake requires a can of Solo brand "Almond Cake and Pastry Filling" and the recipe is generally printed on the back side of the can's label.This stuff has ground almonds in it but it's NOT equivalent to marzipan. It's kind of hard to find; in the San Francisco Bay area I've only seen it at Andronico's, even though I've seen Solo products advertised in Lucky's circulars occasionally. At some point I'd like to figure out how to replicate it without the canned stuff, both 'cause it's pricey ($5/can) and because it has corn syrup in it (which I'm not terribly against in moderation, but if I'm baking, why not use real sugar?)  In the meantime I make it anyway, because it's more almondy than the other almond bundt recipe I tried.

ANYWAY. I don't really modify this recipe at all:

1 cup butter (or margarine), softened

2 1⁄4 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup sugar

2 teaspoon baking powder

3 eggs

1⁄2 teaspoon salt

1 can Solo Almond Cake and Pastry Filling (protip: open one end of the can, the flip it over the bowl and start opening the other end. That will break the suction/vacuum and it'll all fall out of the can neatly in one chunk.)

1⁄4 cup milk

Preheat oven to 350° F. Grease and flour 10-inch tube pan or 12-cup Bundt pan and set aside. Beat butter and granulated sugar in large bowl with electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in almond filling until blended. Stir flour, baking powder, and salt until mixed. Add to almond mixture alternately with milk, beginning and ending with dry ingredients.  Beat until blended. Spread batter evenly in prepared pan.Bake 50 to 55 minutes or until cake tester inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan on wire rack 10 minutes. Remove from pan and cool completely on rack.

Chocolate Bundt Cake

Modified from here

Ingredients:

• 8 ounces butter (2 sticks)
• 1/2 3/4?-1 cup Dutch process cocoa (I used regular, TJ's)
• 3/4 cup water
• 2 cups granulated sugar (I used slightly less, maybe 2-3 tbs less?)
• 1 cup sour cream I used the top of TJ's French Cream Line yogurt
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• 2 cups all-purpose flour, stir before measuring
• 1 teaspoon baking soda (+ 1/2 tsp, + 1/8 to every 3 TBS of extra non-Dutched cocoa)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Preparation:

Grease and flour a 10- to 12-cup Bundt pan with Baker's Joy or another flour+grease spray. (Seriously, that stuff is magic for bundt cakes.) Heat oven to 350°. Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium-low heat; add cocoa, stirring until smooth. Whisk in the water and remove from heat. To the warm cocoa mixture, add the sugar, sour cream, 1 tablespoon vanilla, and eggs; whisk until smooth. In another bowl combine the flour, soda, and salt. Add all at once to the first mixture, whisking until well blended.
Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, or until it feels firm to the touch and has slightly pulled away from the sides of the pan. Cool in pan on a rack for 20 minutes. Carefully loosen the cake with a knife and invert onto a large plate.

NOTES: the extra cocoa was good. The yogurt seems fine, it seems moist enough. I wasn't sure it was mixed all the way at the end--it felt like there were what were either bubbles or tiny lumps of flour, but it was fine. I think I actually cooked it for close to 45 minutes and it was fine, not dry.)


*If you're using a standard baking cocoa (not Dutch-process or high-quality) add 1/2 teaspoon more of baking soda to the dry ingredients.

Pickled Cauliflower

I just made some pickled cauliflower with this recipe. Changes: I used a 24-oz jar (2 quarts would be 32 oz) so I scaled things back: 3/4 cup of vinegar, 3/4 cup of water, 1.5 tsp of salt. I used about 3 slices of a very large (but pithy) lemon, the whole clove of garlic, and the whole 1/4 tsp of black peppercorns. I don't think I used anywhere near 2 lbs of cauliflower--I just cut slices and stuck them in the jar to see what would fit, and then I blanched those. I used white vinegar instead of apple cider vinegar, more because that's what I had than out of any taste preference, though I'm not a big fan of apple cider vinegar. I've seen lots of pickle recipes that use white vinegar anyway. So. I'll report back in 12+ hours.

Aaaand...months later, actually:
this was OK, but not amazing. I didn't let it sit all that long, but mostly--it's a lot of work for something that's not all that much better (to me) or exciting (to me) than plain cauliflower (which I will eat raw.) Perhaps if it had pickled for weeks it might be more interesting. 

Pesto! (Arugula & Walnut)

I used this recipe:
http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/arugula_pesto/

2 cups of packed arugula leaves, stems removed
1/2 cup of shelled walnuts
1/2 cup fresh Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
6 garlic cloves, unpeeled
1/2 garlic clove peeled and minced
1/2 teaspoon salt

1 Brown 6 garlic cloves with their peels on in a skillet over medium high heat until the garlic is lightly browned in places, about 10 minutes. Remove the garlic from the pan, cool, and remove the skins.

2 Toast the nuts in a pan over medium heat until lightly brown, or heat in a microwave on high heat for a minute or two until you get that roasted flavor. In our microwave it takes 2 minutes.

3a Food processor method (the fast way): Combine the arugula, salt, walnuts, roasted and raw garlic into a food processor. Pulse while drizzling the olive oil into the processor. Remove the mixture from the processor and put it into a bowl. Stir in the Parmesan cheese.

NOTES: Browning garlic and walnuts on the stove is weird. I think next time I'll do both in the oven.
Too much garlic (!) Not sure if that was because my stovetop-browned garlic wasn't as cooked as it should be--it was almost burnt in places but it wasn't soft like roasted garlic is--or just a matter of amount. I'd say 4 cloves would be about right.
I added about 3/4 of a small lemon's worth of juice, and probably used a bit more Parmesan than called for. I also added it in in hte food processor instead of stirring it in the bowl.
I did not remove stems from the (packaged, Trader Joe's) arugula. I think removing the stems is more for less tender stuff.

Overall--very tasty and good.

[Spicy, Indian-food-inspired] garbanzos + kale

1 can of chickpeas
half an onion, chopped relatively small
6ish leaves of kale, sliced fine
splotches of marinara sauce (1/2 cup?)
shitload of paprika
salt
powdered ginger
garam masala
cumin
curry powder
yogurt

Sauteed onion in oil for a bit, added chickpeas and spices and fried a bit, dumped in marinara sauce and cooked a bit more,then dumped in kale and a little bit of water and stirred a bit and then put the lid on and cooked til the kale was wilted. Stirred a few spoonfuls of yogurt into my bowl before eating.

I do variations on this all the time, and I always forget what I do. (Tomatoes? No tomatoes? Garlic? Etc.) I usually do fresh ginger, but I think the powdered ginger might be even better. This has a nice hotness to it and it's evenly dispersed through the dish.

Moroccan roasted tomato and chickpea stew

Haven't used this recipe yet, but I want to:
http://vegrecipes.livejournal.com/1746376.html