Hot Cross Buns (a little late, I know)

Unfortunately, this photo is significantly less lovely than my photo of the beef and broccoli.  I assure you, however that these hot cross buns are no less delicious.  They are, perhaps, a little out of season, but they are too yummy to relegate to Lent.  I think they should enjoy a prominent place in breakfast menus year round.

Before we get to the recipe, I'm going to emphasize that I use rapid rise yeast in all yeast bread that I bake.  This means that the temperatures of liquids can be a bit higher than usual, and that there's no tempering process, most of the ingredients are just mixed right away.

I never used to like hot cross buns, when Matt would buy them at the grocery store.  Then, the spring before we got married, we were in Maine for wedding planning purposes shortly before Easter.  We stopped at Matt's favorite bakery in Brunswick (Wild Oats), where they had the most phenomenal hot cross buns.  They were lemon-ey and cardomom-ey and completely delicious.  I then set out on a crusade to learn to make them that way myself.  Here's the recipe I came up with (based loosely on the recipe in the Joy of Cooking). 

Hot Cross Buns

Ingredients:

3 1/2-4 c. flour

1 packet of yeast

3 Tbsp. sugar

1 c. + 3 Tbsp. milk (125-135 degrees)

5 Tbsp. melted butter

1 egg

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. cardamom

1 tsp. salt

1/2 c. currants

zest of one lemon

squeeze of lemon juice

For glaze and crosses:

juice of one lemon

powdered sugar

Directions:

Boil some water.  Put the currants in a small bowl and pour the boiling water over them.  Cover and set aside for around thirty minutes.

In the bowl of a stand mixer (with the bread hook attached), combine 2 cups of flour, yeast, spices, lemon zest, sugar, egg, melted butter and milk.  Mix with bread hook.  I recommend using bread flour for these two cups.

Add more flour (I usually add all-purpose here, and this time I used 1/2 c. of white whole wheat, with absolutely no ill effects).  When you've added the better part of the remaining 1.5-2 cups, drain and add the currents.  I recommend adding them in small groups and then adding more flour, since the addition of the currents will make the dough wetter. I usually add a quick squeeze of lemon juice (not too much--you don't want to mess up the chemistry). In the end,  the dough should be well worked, elastic and not too sticky (and deliciously currant-studded).

Place the dough in an oiled bowl and leave in a warm place to rise.  When the dough has doubled, roll it into balls (depending on my mood I make between 13 and 18 rolls) and place them on a cookie sheet (leave some space since they're going to rise again, but I think it's nice if they touch after rising).  Cover with oiled plastic-wrap.  Leave to rise until double again.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Brush the rolls lightly with a beaten egg.  Place them in the oven.  Let bake for around 15 minutes.  The rolls should sound hollow if you knock on them.  While the rolls bake, juice the lemon.  Strain the juice into a bowl and mix with powdered sugar to create a glaze.  Brush the glaze onto the warm rolls after removing them from the oven.  Cover all available surfaces.  Mix in more powdered sugar until you form a stiff paste.  Once the rolls have cooled, use this paste (and I usually use a fork as my drawing implement), to draw crosses on the rolls.  Enjoy.

My poor little spruce

Last fall, Matt and I created a new flower bed and planted two evergreen trees (a type of cedar and a colorado spruce) near the corner of our lot.  We did this for several reasons: to break up the huge expanse of grass on that side, to give a little winter color, to eventually have more privacy and to create an additional barrier (since apparently, the rocks around the edge of our lot are to stop stupid kids from cutting across the corner in their cars).

Last weekend, much to my chagrin, this is what I found:

That's right.  Someone drove into our yard and OVER our tree.  I will admit to having been extremely angry about this.  Luckily, my wonderful Step-Mother-in-Law and my Father-in-Law came over to help me right the poor thing.  It's currently tied to keep it upright and I hope it'll be ok.  It's hard to tell from the angle from which I took that picture, but it's also missing about a thirty degree angle's worth of branches in the direction from which it was run over.

On a more hopeful note:

Sadly, it snowed last night but it really isn't supposed to last, so hopefully I'll have actual flowers too.

Mom's Beef and Broccoli (partially from the freezer)

I hope that makes you hungry.  I've been playing around with trying to learn good food photography techniques, and while this is far from perfect, I feel like it's a decent start.

Anyway, this dish is easy, makes great leftovers, tastes very much like a restaurant version of beef and broccoli and is a prime candidate for freezer cooking.  In fact, in this particular version pictured above, I prepared the beef and marinade at least a month ago and stuck it in the freezer.    I simply thawed it this morning, chopped the veggies, made the rice and cooked that sucker.  To save even more time, you could definitely chop the veggies ahead and freeze them in a separate bag from the meat.  Then you'd have your own home-made stir fry pack.  If you do that you might want to attach the two bags somehow (put them both in a larger bag?).

Although the recipe that I got from my mom is labeled oyster beef (due to the oyster sauce), here we shall call this:

Mom's Beef and Broccoli

Ingredients:

1/2 lb. steak, sliced very thin (I usually use strip steak, this time I used sirloin)

1 lb. bite size veggies (I probably do about half broccoli and the rest carrots, onions and bell peppers--you could certainly use any veggies that appeal to you)

peanut oil, sesame oil, red pepper flakes

2 Tbsp. lite soy sauce

2 Tbsp. water

1 Tbsp. corn starch

3 Tbsp. oyster sauce (I recommend the spicy version)

Directions:

Using a ziploc baggie, marinate the beef in a sauce made from the last four ingredients for at least 15 minutes.  As mentioned above, the bag could just be labeled and tossed in the freezer at this point.  I always end up making too much, so I usually need 1.5-2 times the sauce.

Heat (about 1.5-2 Tbsp.) peanut oil (with dash of sesame oil and pepper flakes as desired) in a wok or large saute pan.  Dump the veggies in and stir fry to desired crispness (mom's version says about 3 min.--since I make to much this always takes me somewhat longer).  Remove veggies from pan and set aside.  

Heat another 1.5-2 Tbsp. oil mixture in the wok/pan.  Add the beef (thawed, if previously frozen) and cook until pink.  Add the veggies back to pot and complete cooking the beef.  Sauce can be thinned with additional water.

Serve over rice.

Strata

Once again, I have to apologize for not writing.  I've been a trifle busy of late. 

I made a lovely strata the other week though, that I've wanted to discuss for some time, and I think I'll just make this a general discussion of strata.

In case you are a member of my family (or one like mine) where we never ate strata, I'll first define it.  A strata is kind of like a cross between a bread pudding and baked French toast, and can contain a wide variety of ingredients other than the bread and the egg custard.  It's characterized by several layers of slices bread (and whatever else you're putting in) and then you cover it with the egg custard, let it sit (preferably overnight) and then bake.  It's pretty easy.  It's yummy and it heats up well for leftovers.

I made my first strata this August for our housewarming (spinach and mediterranean spiced feta), which was a brunch event.  I made another intended for breakfast [with roasted peppers, onions and cheddar (or swiss or jack)] some time later, and then two weeks ago, I made a distinctly dinner (although obviously brunch would work--just not straight-up breakfast) strata with roquefort and pears (inspired by The Best of Cooking Light--the combo is theirs--but I never quite follow strata recipes because they never seem to have enough eggs/liquid).

Basic Strata

Ingredients:

1 8 oz. carton eggs whites

2 eggs

1-2 c. milk

loaf of italian bread, sliced

type of cheese

other stuff

Directions:

Cover the bottom of a large (and deep) casserole dish with slices of bread (which can be slightly stale if you want).  Make a layer of your cheese and other stuff.  Make another layer of bread, and then toppings, and possibly, depending on the depth of your casserole dish and the height of your slices, make another layer of bread (and put just a touch of cheese on top in this case).

In a bowl, mix together the egg whites, the eggs and the milk.  Pour over the layered bread/stuff.  Cover and stick in the fridge for 3 -24 hours.  Bake at 375 for around an hour.

Notes:  The pear and roquefort strata recipe in cooking light  called for white wine (a couple of cups to be poured over the bread).  This is generally available for other recipes as well.  Even with a relatively sweet strata like pear and roquefort, I don't strictly recommend making do with the moscato you opened for your birthday, as the bubbles create a some strange foaminess.