Challah Recipe

Remember forever ago when I told you I'd share an amazing challah recipe? Well here it is!

I originally got this recipe for a brioche dough from my pastry chef friend Stacy. I adjusted it several times until it eventually came to this.

Ingredients:

4 cups bread flour
1 cup 2 tbs milk (I have used vanilla almond milk and it's worked, but regular milk is preferred)
6 tbs butter
1.5 tsp dry active yeast
3 tbs sugar
2 tbs honey
1 egg
3/4 tbs salt (or you can just do two teaspoons if you are lazy)
egg wash (1 egg with about a tbs milk)

Directions.
1. If you have a bread machine like I do, dump everything except the egg wash in a bread machine, and let it run through the "dough" cycle. If you do not have a bread machine, dump everything in a stand mixer (or a big bowl and a hand mixer, although that is really not preferred). Most people have all sorts of rules when it comes to yeast and the order you put things in, but honestly, I have made this so many times, and it works if you just dump it all in!

If using a mixer, let it run with the dough hook for 20 minutes, then let it rise for about 45 minutes, and knead it again with the dough hook for 20 minutes.

2. After your dough has been kneaded and risen etc, shape it into three equal parts, and roll out into "logs". 

If you want to be creative and add things (like raisins - gross, or white chocolate chips - yum!), you can roll it out with a rolling pin, sprinkle your fun secret ingredient, and roll back up into a log. Shape the logs into a braid, making sure to pinch the two ends so they don't separate.

3. Let the braided dough rise for about an hour (you can cover with a moist paper towel). While it's rising, preheat the oven to 375.

Not sure if you can tell how much it rose in the picture. But about an hour is good. 

4. Cover with egg wash using a pastry brush, making sure to get in between the braided parts.

5. Bake for 35 minutes. Let cool for as long as your patience will let you before digging into it. 

And it's a fact, ripping challah bread makes it taste a LOT better than slicing it.


Enjoy!

Flourless fudge cookies (gluten free)

One of our good friends, Hila, has Celiac's, so I am always looking for gf recipes for her. (the "our" in this is actually me and my mom - she works with my mom but is closer to my age and has two little ones). Okay moving on. It was her birthday and my mom asked if I could make her something. I told her that I can't really imitate any regular recipe to make it gf - it just wouldn't work right (like a bread or my cookies). I could either buy a mix or find something flour-less. Flour-less does not necessarily mean gluten free, but generally other ingredients are safe. I think that there may be like, certain vanilla extracts with gluten, but I don't think the organic one I buy has it.

The cookie were super yummy! I ended up making another batch for my friend Sara's birthday, even though she's not gf at all!

Ingredients:
2 1/4 cups powdered sugar

1 cup cocoa powder

2 tsp vanilla

1/2 tsp salt

3 eggs whites

Preheat oven to 350.
1. Stir until combined - order doesn't matter. 
2. Use a tbs scoop and space them on greased sheets. They'll spread so make sure there's enough space between them.
3. Bake for 8 min (I always rotate halfway).

They'll get kinda glossy and crack a little.

I didn't take pictures during the process, but my friend Ali who also has celiac's decided to make them, so I asked her to take a pic for the blog.

Unfortunately, they spread kinda funky due to the use of spoon. I HIGHLY recommend using this scoop - I have it in 3 sizes and it's amazing. It's my go to gift for a baking-savvy friend.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0001MSEXW

The one I use most frequently is the yellow one. I use it alllll the time. I would actually grease it before serving because this batter is so sticky. 

The final product. 

Enjoy!

Salted Honey Butter Bars

I saw a recipe on pinterest for salted caramel butter bars. I initially wondered - could I make salted honey ones for Rosh Hashanah? The answer? YES! Yes I can. And they are addicting.

Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of the baking process because I wasn't sure how they would turn out. But here we go anyway.

Dough:

-4 sticks of softened butter

-1 cup sugar

-1.5 cups powdered sugar

-1 tbs vanilla

-4 cups flour

Preheat oven to 325

1. Cream your butter and sugars on low and then medium speed.

2. Add vanilla, and then gradually add the flour, and mix until combined.

3. Spoon half the dough into a baking dish and press it down. Bake for 15 minutes (325). 

While your dough base is baking, refrigerate the rest of the dough, and make your salted honey-caramel.

Salted Honey-Caramel

Okay - this was the issue. My friend Stacy (my pastry chef guru) told me I couldn't' just use honey, caramel is much denser. So I decided to try to thicken up honey. It worked!

-1 stick of butter

-1 cup of honey (I spray my measuring cup with pam or vegetable oil before pouring honey)

-2 tbs brown sugar

-1 tsp vanilla

-1 tbs cream

-1 tsp sea salt

1. Melt your butter, honey, and sugar over medium low heat, and constantly whisk for 20 minutes (yes it's work but it's worth it).

2. Add vanilla, cream and salt, and whisk for another few minutes. You want it to be thickened up quite a bit.

Okay, now here's what you do. I don't know what step we're on because I broke it up. So I'll start with one again.

1. Spread your honey-caramel over the baked dough base with a spatula.

2. Crumble the rest of the dough on top of the honey. It needs to be pretty chilled for this, so if it isn't cold enough yet, just put it back in the fridge and wait - your dough/honey base is fine waiting on the counter.

3. Bake for 25-30 minutes.

Let cool and then refrigerate. It should come out looking like this:

You should taste it to make sure it's okay. And then try to only taste one. Can you believe I managed to only taste one before snapping a picture? So so so so yummy!

Israeli style cheesecake

I love cheesecake. It's one of my go to desserts. It actually was one of my go to desserts before I really became a baker (which believe it or not, I didn't use to be!). I always have loved cooking, but wasn't really into baking because I didn't have the patience for following instructions. Lauren (my mommy) says I just don't follow directions. Pshhhh.

Anyway, Israeli cheesecake is much lighter and tarter than what we consider cheesecake. It also uses tea biscuits instead of graham crackers as a base (and a topping). You can use nilla wafers if you can't find tea biscuits. The recipe I used called for heavy whipping cream (unwrapped) and I would omit it next time. I think it made it thicker and the whole point of this cheesecake is to be super light and airy.

Here's the trick. Israeli cream cheese isn't what we consider cream cheese. The consistency is more like that of yogurt - maybe a mix of yogurt and greek yogurt in terms of thickness. If you have a kosher section in your supermarket, you can find it. I used the 5% kind (yes, 5% fat, as opposed to the normal 3% fat, don't judge).


Right, so I realize most of you don't read Hebrew. So, if you don't feel like braving this and buying this type of cream cheese, I would recommend buying a combination of plain yogurt, greek yogurt, and sour cream. Yes, sour cream. You could probably use all sour cream if you wanted!

Okay ingredients list:

Crust
Half a sleeve of tea biscuits, crushed up (or vanilla wafers)
1/2 stick (1/4 cup) of butter
2 tbs brown sugar

Filling
2.5 cups of "Israeli cream cheese", or if you can't find it, full fat plain greek yogurt or sour cream
1 cup of full fat sour cream
1.25 cups of sugar
2 eggs plus 1 egg white
juice of one lemon
vanilla (I don't measure, so as much as you want - 1 tsp to 1 tbs I guess?)
2 tbs flour
*note - the recipe I used called for 1/2 cup of whipping cream. I would omit this if you want the light fluffy texture*

Topping
1 cup of sour cream
Vanilla (ugh measuring again - maybe a teaspoon?)
1 tbs sugar
1/2 sleeve crushed tea biscuits or vanilla wafers

Instructions:
(preheat oven to 350 before beginning)
1. Crush up your tea biscuits or nilla wafers in a zip lock bag. This is the brand I use:


And I crush them like so:




Yes, I use my fist.

But I can also use a big serving spoon or ladle:


Wrap a spring form pan with tinfoil to avoid leaks, and spray with non stick spray.


I like to pour my biscuits right into the pan, and then pour the sugar and batter on top and mold it with my finger tips or a fork. Like so:


(note, they aren't crushed perfectly or uniformly - nobody can tell!)

Note in the next picture that the brown sugar has been dumped in:




Okay, on to step 2.

2. In a big bowl of a stand mixer (or any big bowl if you're using a hand mixer), pour in your "cream cheese" or yogurt or sour cream, and add the sugar. Mix until combined. Add the eggs one at a time while mixing. Add the vanilla and lemon juice. Add the flour. Did I forget anything? I don't think so. If I did, add that too.

3. Pour the filling mixture over the tea biscuits:


4. Bake for 55-60 minutes. While it's baking, prepare your topping. This is what my dog decided to do while this was baking:




(yes, he's on the other side of the pool. Ugh).

5. Prep your topping. Combine the sour cream, vanilla, and sugar, and crush up your next round of biscuits. don't combine!

6. After 55 minutes, check the cheesecake. It should be slightly loose in the middle, but set around the sides. This is what mine looked like:


Add the sour cream topping and carefully spread all the way around, and then spread the biscuit topping on top of that.








Use your finger tips to spread the biscuit crumbs over the sour cream topping - be careful! You can press them in a little, but you don't want them to "mix in".


7. Bake the cake for another 10 minutes. Let it cool completely before refrigerating overnight.

Here is the end result:






Enjoy!

Sufganiyot - fried jelly donuts recipe

I have a confession to make - this may come as a surprise.

I used to hate baking.

I know. I KNOW!

I always said I was a cook because you could really use your instincts, read a recipe, and then go along as you do it to make it your own. I know a lot of people, like my very dear friend Jaren, who is an excellent cook, have different approaches and follow recipes. I just can't do it.

Well, I would always say I hated baking because I didn't like following the instructions. But I slowly transitioned, and learned to love it. Now yeast is an every day ingredient for me, and I can make OMG cookies in any variation with my eyes closed.

So with this newfound love of baking, I decided to take on several things at once I never would have all in one "recipe" - fried jelly donuts!
Yeast!
Deep frying!
Stuffing with Jelly!

Challege Accepted.

I made these during Chanukah - food fried in oil is a tradition because the Maccabees found enough oil for one night, and it miraculously lasted for 8.

I looked at recipes and decided to go off of this one from food.com.

I adjusted a bit by adding some whole wheat flour (not that I was trying to healthify something so unhealthy, I'm not delusional, I was just low on a/p flour).

I also used butter instead of margarine. In a lot of Jewish recipes, you will see the use of margarine or oil - this is because it makes the recipe "parve" aka, not meat or dairy. Therefore, you can eat them with most meals and it would still be kosher. Since I am 0% kosher, I used butter.

Also, I don't buy yeast packets, I just buy a jar and measure it.

1 package of yeast is usually a 1/4 ounce, which is 2 and a quarter teaspoons of yeast. Viola!

So with adjustments here are the ingredients:
4.5 teaspoons of dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water (I use a meat thermometer to make sure it's around 100 degrees)
3/4 cup sugar (when I adjusted I used 1 cup and it was better)
1 tsp salt
2 eggs
6 tbs softened or melted (but not hot) butter (unsalted)
2 cups whole wheat flour
3 cups a/p flour (when I adjusted I used all ap flour and it was better)
lots of vegetable oil to deep fry
fruit jelly
powdered sugar for sprinkling on top

Directions:
1. Sprinkle your yeast into the water, and let sit for about 5 minutes.
2. In order, add sugar, eggs, and butter, and mix.
3. Mix your flours and salt in a separate dish, and add in to your dough.
4. Knead your dough using your dough hook for about 5 minutes. Let sit about an hour.
5. Roll out your dough, and use anything with a circular edge (cookie scoop, small cup, etc) to form circles of it. Place them on lined cookie sheets, cover with a towel, and let rise for another 30 minutes.
I used pam to make sure it didn't stick.



(I used a cookie scoop because I wanted to make small donuts for a bunch of people, but really any size will do).

Here is where I messed up the first batch, and fixed it on the second batch.
What you SHOULD do it this:
6. Bake your donuts at 350 for about 20 minutes.
7. Take them out of your oven, and THEN deep fry them for about 1-2 minutes on each side.
8. Once you take all the donuts out to cool on your lined cookie sheets, either use a food injector (this is how you do it in israel!!) or slice a small crevice with a knife. Fill with good quality jelly.

Let me talk for a second about a good quality jelly. You can buy an amazing fried donut, and if it's artificial, yucky, lazy cheap style jelly, and not good quality preserves, it will just not be authentic. It will be good, but not great. Get some good preserves, and it makes a huge difference.

9. Once they are all stuffed, I use one of those fine metal strainers that you can use for sifting to tap powdered sugar all over the donuts.



These were pretty good, but the next batch I made I used a bit more sugar and all ap flour - much better!

By the way, the next morning I could smell the fried oil from my bedroom (with the door closed), so you may want to open your windows and use some air freshener if that smell grosses you out. It reminded me of the parking garage at my college, which was over a McDonalds!

Guest Blogger: Eden Sherman Attempts Cakepops

Hi all,
My best friend Eden was deliberating buying a cake for a birthday dinner. I told her to bake one and she laughed at me. I then realized she could make cake pops, as they are truly not that difficult! I wrote her an "idiot-proof cake pops for my bff" word document, and was excited to see the results. Below is Eden's post about her cake pop making journey. Enjoy!


(me and eden in the limo home from my wedding - I was already in my change-out dress)

Cake Pops 101: For the baking-challenged.

Yesterday, I decided to take a stab at making some cake pops, at the suggestion of my BFF Avigail (aka Aggy) for a special someone's birthday.  Who makes boring cakes these days anyway? Armed with mental images of the beautiful (and probably professional) examples I found on Pinterest and my How-To Guide that Avigail wrote especially for me, I was ready to go.

I went to Michael's after work to pick up the supplies. I must know myself pretty well because I went back in after I made my initial purchase to grab another bag of candy melts, just in case. (these became necessary later on as you will soon read)

Here are the ingredients I used:

1 box of Betty Crocker Triple Fudge cake mix

1/2 container of Betty Crocker Whipped Buttercream Frosting

3 bags of Wilton's Candy Melts

1 vial of Wilton's tinting nonsense in "royal blue" 

1 bag of Cookie Sticks (aka lollipop sticks- I didn't do their marketing, trust me)

Take a good look at this nice and neat picture, because it's about to get really messy really fast...

First, I baked the cake according to the directions on the back of the box. Simple enough, right? Not so much...turns out we only had JUMBO eggs in my house, and I'm pretty sure at least one of the 3 I used was a double-yoker. Oh well...in the oven it goes! After a solid 35 minutes at 325F and a brief scare that the cake was going to outgrow its pan, I did the old toothpick test. Let's just say the cake failed miserably. After another 15 minutes, it was finally done. Avigail had suggested that I take it out of the pan to let it cool, so I loosened it, and then flipped it upside down onto foil on the counter since I don't have any fancy cookie racks. (love you BFF) As Avigail pointed out, there was a nice chunk missing. Thank you non-stick spray!

At this point, I'm already beginning to doubt my baking abilities. Brody agrees with this doubt and thinks I should just quit before I even really get started. Doesn't he look like he's thinking, " are you sure this is a good idea?"

Meanwhile, Kona is more interested in the toys that I packed up for their weekend getaway at Best Friends. He's a smart boy, that Koki!

Back in the kitchen, I let the cake cool while I showered. I came back downstairs and broke the cake up into pieces, put them in a mixing bowl and then added about half of the container of frosting to the bowl. Good thing I remembered to take off my rings first because I would have been picking chocolate cake and frosting out of them for the next year. I mixed the cake and frosting with my hands until it achieved a dough consistency. I would tell you what it resembled, but I will let you use your imagination because I'm supportive like that ;)

After I let the dough harden in the fridge for an hour, I formed balls and put them onto a foil-lined cookie sheet and put them in the freezer to harden for another hour. When they had hardened, I inserted the sticks. 

What happened next was a bit too messy for pictures, and my iPhone thanks me for not covering her in goo. I carefully read the instructions on the back of the bag of the candy melts, making sure I used a glass bowl to melt them in the microwave. Once the candy was completely melted, I attempted to darken the blue coloring of the candy by slowly adding in this highly concentrated gel. I figured the gel would be intense but I didn't think it would stain my fingers and cause some weird chemical reaction when mixed with the melts, to the point where the melted candy quickly hardened and became unusable. At this point, I was grateful for that extra bag I decided to get last minute. I realized that I would have to abandon my goal of creating a nice deep blue colored pop and instead settle for a shade of blue that bares a strong resemblance to baby shower decorations. Oh well...

I repeated the melting process of the candy and made sure to steer clear of the mutant gel. I then dipped the pops into the melted candy as best I could. I even tried to get a little fancy and added some sprinkles to a few. What resulted was some unfortunate-looking cake pops...

Don't they look delicious? ;)

At this point, I was running low on the blue melts. But I still had a few cake pops to go, so I opened the last bag of candy melts (this one was white).  I melted the white candy per the instructions, but for some reason the white melts didn't want to cooperate and began to harden as soon as I took the bowl out of the microwave. This resulted in me speedily trying to dip the pops and smear the coating on them before it became unusable once again (fun times). 

Here's the second batch!

I finally finished my creations at 12:30 am ( I started at 7pm). After wreaking havoc in the kitchen for a solid 5 hours, you would think I'd have these beautiful cake pops to present at tonight's birthday celebration. If anyone has a heart, they will still try one because after all, it's the thought that counts, right?!

Savta Brownies, aka the best brownies you will ever have

Cravings: some cooler weather, enough August!

Hi all,
I thought maybe I would bookend the month of August with some blog posts seeing as I went from posting once or twice a day to 0. I got some inspiration today though.

While in Alabama, I got to spend some great time with lots of Charlie's family. Uncle Jim is his mom's youngest brother, and I got especially close to his two daughters Jessica and Samantha. We even have a  picture up on our fridge right now that Samantha drew for us (she is 6 years old, despite Charlie thinking she's 2). This has led to many jokes of walking toddlers being "2 weeks old" etc. Funnier if you're there for it.

Anyway, while visiting them in Auburn one weekend back in July, I asked Jessie if she wanted to bake some brownies. She ran to get a box mix and I told her she didn't know me well enough yet. After making this batch a couple of times over a few visits (sometimes with butter and sometimes with vegetable oil), I hope Jessie will never make boxed brownies again!!

My grandma is one of the best cooks I know, and she is famous for her "oogiot savta" (grandma cookies, little hard round butter cookies with ground almonds as their base), and her decadent brownies. She used to put walnuts in them but stopped a few years ago when one of my cousin's husband disclosed he was allergic. I like them both ways.

Now the debate: My grandma eats these freezing cold. Literally - she freezes them, and lets them sit out just long enough to thaw so they don't break your teeth. I'll take my beer cold, but my brownies hot, thank you very much!


Ingredients:

-4 eggs
-2 cups sugar
-4 ounces butter
-4 tbs cocoa powder
-1 cup flour
-2 tsp vanilla
-1 tsp instant coffee
- tbs liquer (originally the recipe called for brandy but in auburn alabama at 9 pm we only found some baileys - it worked)

Jessie really wanted to crack the eggs separately (which is a smart thing to do to ensure no shell gets in the batter).


Directions.
1. Melt your butter and cocoa together in the microwave

2. Measure your sugar and eggs and put in a stand mixer (hand mixer would work find too)

Beat sugar and eggs together and add in the butter/cocoa mixture:

3. Add in the baileys, vanilla, and coffee - mix until combined.

4. Slowly add the flour in and mix until combined.
5. Pour into a baking dish, and let settle for about 10 minutes before baking.
6. Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes. Let cool (if you can resist), cut them into squares, and enjoy.

The brownies come out fudgy, almost as if they are slightly under-cooked.


Yummmmmm. I want some now.

By the way, after you make them, refrigerate in an airtight container, and they last for a really long time. You can freeze them as well, but unlike my grandma, I recommend you nuke them before eating them from the freezer.