Dessert Tea

15 Wednesday Oct 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, baking, birthday, family, food, party, projects, tea time

Tags

All Sparkled Up, baking, dessert, dessert table, food, party, Rosanna, tablescape, tea time

The timing was right… It was Rosanna’s 8th Annual Tablescape Contest, my daughter-in-law’s birthday, and I was finally healed enough to tackle an ambitious baking event. What better way to celebrate all three than with a Dessert Tea!

Dessert Tea table setting

Here is the table before I started adding all the desserts. I made the tablecloth from an old bedspread with fringed edge. (You can see scraps from that old tattered bedspread in the photos of Tea by the Sea. Crafters don’t waste any scrap. Ha!)

I adore Rosanna’s style and was hoping to enter her 2013 tablescape contest last summer. But we didn’t get the remodel done in time and I wasn’t very mobile back then. The china cabinet was emptied so we could move it around and all the china was stacked on two tables in the living room. That’s when I got the idea for a blue and white and yellow theme for a table.

This year, I thought about the Dessert Table theme for weeks. Each time I got an idea, I added it to my notes.

Four elegant mugs on a dessert pedestal hold the floral centerpiece.

After I decided on the serving dishes, I wrote a list of tasks, desserts and a tentative baking schedule.

There were two main focal points for the table, Rosanna’s elegant Luxe Moderne mugs for the centerpiece, and her La Mode fashion plates.
I used four of Rosanna’s mugs on a vintage dessert pedestal to make the centerpiece. I was so excited about this design. It has a lot of potential and I plan on using four mugs as a centerpiece base for other tablescapes.

Sugar cookies were painted following Rosanna’s designs on her mugs. I wrote about the cookies here. It was challenging to paint the designs! I have new respect for Rosanna’s design skill.

The fashion plates are so pretty!

These are not dresses, they are napkins! Small squares of fabric folded are diagonally and draped over a miniature hanger. A bit of ribbon and trim… and you have sweet petite dresses!

This server was made to accommodate round plates. But rectangle platters made for more interest.

This tiered server used to be bright red, yellow and blue but I painted it all white with acrylic paint. Instead of using round plates on the server, I used two rectangle trays on the bottom. It looked great!

Dessert Tea – Layered Desserts with Vanilla Bean Cake, Raspberry Mousse and Orange Gelatin with Raspberry and Mandarin Orange Slice.

To continue the fashion theme, I cut 6″ to 8″ squares of fabric for petite tea napkins and fringed the edges. Each napkin was folded and draped over hangers to look like dresses. Most were folded diagonally. Each was tied at the “waist” with ribbon, a little flower tucked in the waist and a small piece of trim was draped over the top to look like a collar.

I made the miniature hangers from pieces of coat hanger cut with wire cutters. One coat hanger made three miniature hangers. The metal cake stand was perfect from which to hang the napkin dresses.

The tea service was on the back of the table, behind the desserts. I wrote how I made the Sugar Bonnets here.

On the tiered server, top to bottom: Spritz, squares of Fudge and Shortbread, Butter Cookie Dresses.

I experimented with a new baking pan to make the Layered Desserts. They were delicious and so pretty! I will post the recipe some time.

The Layered Desserts looked perfect on the long rectangular tray.

I also made a Lemon Orange Cheesecake topped with Pineapple and a Marmalade Glaze. So delicious!

Dessert Tea – I didn’t have time to make round pastry shells. It was quick and easy to cut squares with a pizza cutter and place the pie pastry in the tart pan.

Dessert Tea – a table set with a delicious assortment of desserts: Layered Desserts, White Chocolate Praline Cake, Pineapple Marmalade Cheesecake, Cherry Tarts, Spritz Cookies, Fudge, Scottish Shortbread, Butter Dress Cookies, Chocolate Cupcakes with Caramel Macadamia Frosting, Honeydew Melon Balls with Blueberries and a bowl of Cherries.

20 Fabric napkin folded to look like a dress on a hanger

Dessert Tea – napkins folded diagonally and hung on a miniature hanger, tied with ribbon and draped with lace.

Two bowls held Honeydew Melon balls and Blueberries and Cherries, garnished with fresh mint.

Cherry Tarts were on a glass dish.

I only had four covered glass dishes but that was enough to place four Chocolate Cupcakes with Caramel and Macadamia Frosting.

The birthday cake was a White Chocolate Praline Cake with homemade Strawberry Raspberry Jam topping.

All together, the table looked lovely and the event was a huge success!

I submitted my photos and won an honorable mention in the tablescape contest… happy face! =)
My daughter-in-law was thrilled with her birthday, the girls loved the dress napkins and all our guests enjoyed the delicious desserts.
And it was the perfect event to celebrate the return of my health and stamina after such a long recovery. A sweet day indeed!

Meringue Breakfast Buns

31 Sunday Aug 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in baking, food, recipe

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

baking, breakfast, eggs, food, meringue, Meringue Breakfast Buns, recipe

So much has happened since I last posted. I’m sorry for the long delay. Please accept my apologies. Some bloggers have trouble coming up with topics to write about but my problem is I’ve got too much.

One thing I’ve been busy with is cooking and baking. I didn’t cook or bake much for almost three years so I’m thrilled to be back in the kitchen again!

My mom was visiting and I didn’t have anything special for breakfast except for day old buns and eggs. So I whipped up these Meringue Breakfast Buns. They were delicious and perfect for guests.

Meringue Breakfast Buns – an egg yolk in a bun topped with cheesy meringue, served with Balsamic Cucumber Raspberry relish and sour cream.

You can make any quantity you want, but I like to make a dozen at a time and refrigerate the leftovers to eat cold for lunch the next day. The cheese won’t be crisp anymore but they are still delicious. They’re great for breakfast on the run too.

MERINGUE BREAKFAST BUNS

Ingredients:

~ 12 small rolls, about the size of a small muffin or cupcake. This is a good time to use day-old rolls too.
~ 12 egg yolks
~ 3 or 4 egg whites (reserve the remaining egg whites for some other recipe)
~ 1/8 tsp cream of tartar
~ Olive oil (optional)
~ About 1 cup grated cheese, any kind
~ Salt and pepper
~ Dried or fresh herbs of your choice
~ Herb dipping oil (optional)

Start by preparing the rolls. This can be done the night before if you want to save time in the morning. Use a small paring knife to cut a piece out of the bottom of the rolls or buns. The portion I cut out looks like a shallow little cone. You don’t need to cut much out, just enough for an egg yolk with a little cheese. Place the rolls cut side up in a muffin tin. Brush the inside with olive oil if you want. I’ve used olive oil or softened butter or nothing and they’re all good.

Slip one egg yolk in each bun.

Sprinkle the egg yolk with a little grated cheese and herbs of your choice.

To make a dozen Meringue Breakfast Buns, you’ll need a dozen egg yolks but only 3 or 4 egg whites. [Note: Save the rest of the egg whites for another recipe or cook them in a skillet to make Roulades, shown further down this post.]
Beat 3 or 4 egg whites with 1/8 tsp cream of tartar until fluffy. The meringue won’t look the same or peak the same as a dessert meringue that has added sugar. Don’t worry, it will still bake nicely on top of the buns.

Sprinkle grated cheese on top of the meringues.

Sprinkle a little grated cheese on top of each egg yolk. Add a little sprinkle of herbs over each yolk.

Use a spoon to spread meringue over each egg yolk. Cover the top completely.

Sprinkle more cheese and salt and pepper over the top of each meringue.

Sprinkle grated cheese on top of the meringues.

Here you can see I left some meringues without cheese.

Cheddar cheese is great but I’m partial to asiago.

Grated asiago and dried herbs sprinkled over the egg yolk in the bun.

Look at all that fluffy meringue!

Brush the leftover cutouts from the rolls with herb dipping oil and place them on a cookie sheet to bake at the same time as the Meringue Buns.

The little cutouts from the rolls are brushed with herb dipping oil and baked in on a separate pan.

When picking buns to use, make sure they are small enough to be placed in the muffin tin. For this batch, the buns were bigger so they touched and barely fit in the pan.

If the buns are a tight squeeze, try not to let the meringues touch when you spread the tops.

Try not to let the meringues touch so they can be separated easy after baking.

Both Meringue topped buns and the small roll cutouts are baked at the same time at 375 degrees. The cutouts will be done after about 10 minutes but the buns stay in longer. (In this photo, I baked the cutouts and slices of leftover buns to make croutons for a future use.)
All ovens are different. In my oven, a LIQUID center egg yolk takes 15 minutes, a SOFT BOILED egg yolk takes 16 minutes, and a HARD BOILED egg yolk takes 17 minutes. If you’re going to eat these cold the next day, bake 16 or 17 minutes.

Bake brushed roll pieces for 10 minutes at 375. Bake Meringue Buns for 15 minutes for a liquid center yolk, 16 minutes for a soft-boiled yolk and 17 minutes for a hard-boiled yolk.

The cheesy topping on these is amazing! It forms a delicious crispy shell on top of the meringue!

Fun to eat and Yummy!

Egg White Roulade
I spread the leftover, fluffy beaten egg whites in a medium hot skillet, lightly greased with olive oil, about 1″ thick and sprinkled herbs and pepper over the surface. When the bottom was golden, I flipped the egg white over till it was golden brown. The hot baked egg white was sprinkled with cheese and rolled up.

The cooked egg white rolled up.

Meringue Breakfast Buns, with crisp cheese-topped meringue and hot, liquid egg yolk inside.

To make the Cucumber Raspberry Relish, I simply diced a cucumber with raspberries and tossed the mixture with balsamic vinegar, boiled apple cider and a little salt and pepper. It was so good with the eggs!

Meringue Breakfast Buns, hot from the oven, served with Cucumber Raspberry Relish and Sour Cream.

On my worktable – Dress Cookies

25 Friday Jul 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, baking, food, On my Worktable

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

cookie, cookies, dessert, flow icing, food, painted cookies

Today I have cookies on my worktable. This is the second time I’ve topped a cookie with flow icing. It’s not too hard if you get the Royal Icing consistency right. Fortunately, we were glad some cookies didn’t turn out so we could eat them. This is the first time painting on a cookie. Easier than I thought and quite fun.
In the little dish – kirsch mixed with edible gold dust. In the shot glass – more kirsch that needed stirring into the mixture as it evaporated.

Painting the cookie with gold dust mixed with kirsch.

The designs were inspired by Rosanna’s beautiful white and gold Luxe Moderne mugs.

Sourdough Breadstick Cobras

19 Thursday Jun 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in baking, food, recipe, tutorial

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

bread, bread dough, breadsticks, food, meal, recipe, salad, sourdough bread dough, Sourdough Breadstick Cobras, sourdough starter, summer supper, supper, tutorial

We were scraping the bottom of the barrel for supper tonight. Things went from bad to worse when he forgot to put the yeast in the bread dough. He forgot to add the honey too and I forgot to check the dough, so much later we found the forlorn little lump in the bottom of the bread machine bowl. I was going to throw it out but decided to try breadsticks and called him out to help.

“What are we doing?” he called from the other room.

“Making bread sticks,” I called back. “Help me roll all these snakes.”

And so he did. I watched as he coiled up his snake like a … snake.

So then I figured we might as well make a bunch of snakes, cobras, actually, with little flat heads and perky tails. They were delicious and adorable!

The recipe is my Sourdough Grain Bread recipe, found here, but WITHOUT adding yeast or honey and using the starter cold, straight from the refrigerator unfed.
These chewy breadsticks need a tiny little rise so it’s essential to use a good sourdough starter in the recipe.

SOURDOUGH BREADSTICK COBRAS

Prepare a shallow muffin tin by greasing the muffin cups. Place a tart tin upside down as shown next to each muffin cup. Roll a small piece of tin foil into a ball and place in each muffin cup.
Roll a piece of sourdough bread dough, about the size of a small egg, 16″ long, with a little taper at one end for the tail.

Lift the long piece of dough and place the tail over the muffin cup edge. Slowly lower the long piece of dough into the muffin cup, around the foil ball twice and then back up out of the muffin cup, draping the end over the tart tin. Pinch the end flat to form the cobra head. Ours puffed up more than I thought in the oven so next time I will flatten them even more.

The sourdough “snakes” are formed into snakes and positioned over a foil ball and tart tin.

Beat one egg white and use a small brush to brush the cobras. Sprinkle with sea salt.
Bake at 375 degrees for about 15 minutes. (NOTE: Ours seemed barely underdone so next time I will quickly remove the foil balls and pop them back in the oven for another minute.)

Bake at 375 for 15 or so minutes.

Remove from oven and remove from the muffin cups. Pull out the foil balls. Ours didn’t stick, even though they weren’t greased.

Aren’t they adorable?

Who could complain about a sorry-lettuce salad, canned beans and fried egg yolk supper when there were Sourdough Breadstick Cobras?

Salad with beans and Fried Egg Yolk and a Sourdough Breadstick Cobra

Perfect for a warm summer evening. So what started as a recipe fail ended up as an Oh my goodness “play with your food” meal!

He liked the cutting board!

05 Thursday Jun 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in baking, birthday, crafts, family, food, projects, woodwork

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

21st birthday, bread board, carving, cutting board, food, woodwork, wrapping paper

It was a happy 21st Birthday! Twenty-one is a big birthday and the “toys” will never be the same again. We got our son 4 items: a big hunk of awesome steak wrapped in meat paper, a loaf of hearty homemade bread wrapped in brown paper and tied with string, a bottle of champagne, and a bread board.

He was amused at the loaf of bread and had not yet opened the steak wrapped in meat paper and cutting board wrapped in cutting board paper.

The meat and cutting board wrapping paper were great! I got them from a kickstarter project. The wrapping paper is available here from Gift Couture.
I took a discarded but still functional breadboard, sanded down the scruffy top and carved words in the sides. It was comforting using my dad’s old carving tools again.

He’s an awesome cook and appreciated the gifts.

Thank you, God, for good bread, for good meat, for good wine.
Life doesn’t have to be complicated.
Enjoy the people you love!

Free Idea – Books & Eats Restaurant

04 Sunday May 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, baking, books, food, Free Idea, Inspirational

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

books, Books & Eats, food, free idea, inspiration, reading, restaurant, Steven Pressfield, The War of Art

Oh I wish there was such a thing!!!!!!!!!
Restaurants are great for socializing. Food and friends go together perfectly.
But sometimes, you just want to eat something amazing and READ something great at the same time.
Thus, the perfect restaurant would be eat & read, or Books & Eats.
Picture this…

Bohemian decor with super comfy chairs and customizable lighting at every table.
Great, knowledgeable staff, all lovers of books and food.
Shelves of books on every wall.
Once seated… snippets of possible conversation…

White shirt bowtie waiter: “Good evening! Would you like fiction or non-fiction this fine evening?”

“Non-fiction,” you say, a bit tired, brushing at the paint stains on your jeans. “Perhaps something inspiring. Can you recommend a good book?”

“Family or Business?”

“Business,” you respond. “Well, perhaps both. I’ve reached an impasse with a new venture and need inspiration.”

“Why certainly!” says the waiter. “We have a very fine non-fiction, vintage 2002, by Steven Pressfield. The War of Art, Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles.”

“That sounds perfect!” The book title sounds intriguing and you’re already encouraged. It just feels good to have someone want to help, even if their help is hit or miss. “What do you recommend to go with it? I’m in the mood for a good dessert.”

“If you want to go citrus, I highly recommend a slice of Lemon Orange Cheesecake with Vanilla Bean Kumquat topping. The mixture of sweet and tang is inspiring and the touch of bittersweet is the perfect finish. It’s the kind of dessert that you enjoy leisurely, savoring each bite and letting the flavor sink in.”

“And how long do I have?” you ask.

“For this particular all-together-yum, we allow 30 minutes. But you are welcome to purchase the book when you leave.”

“Great!” you say, as you lean back in the padded chair and check your watch. The food and book show up within two minutes so you get a full 28 minutes to enjoy the exquisite dessert and inspiring read.

Yeah, I’m there. Today.

Books & Eats, The War of Art by Steven Pressfield and Lemon Orange Cheesecake with Vanilla Bean Kumquat topping. #alltogetheryum

Oh I wish!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

14 Friday Feb 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in American Girl Dolls, baking, dolls, food, Uncategorized, Valentine's Day

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

American Girl dolls, baking, cookies, dolls, Valentine's Day

American Girl dolls, Kit, Nellie and Josefina, bake Valentine cookies together.

Last year we made shortbread hearts. You can see that post with the recipe here.

We finished off the Valentine’s Day cookies…

Today I’m baking cherry raspberry tarts. It was Valentine’s Day 1974 and I arrived home from school to a wonderful surprise. My mom had made heart-shaped tarts filled with a pink fluffy cherry filling of cherry jello and cool whip. Ever since then, my must-have Valentine’s dessert is tarts… but I’ve never made them. I was always too busy or didn’t have the ingredients. I’ve made cherry tarts just a handful of times all these years but never on Valentine’s Day. Today will be the day!

Happy Valentine’s Day to you all! May your day be full of sweetness that lingers in the most pleasant way.

BFN Day – To the Third Neighbor I gave Sourdough Grain Bread

07 Tuesday Jan 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in baking, Baking for Neighbors, BFN, community, food, recipe

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Baking for Neighbors, BFN, bread, bread machine, bread machine recipe, food, recipe, sourdough, Sourdough Grain Bread, sourdough starter

I was determined to get in a third Baking For Neighbors day, despite the cold, the rain, the busy holiday and especially my pain.
So I set my will and did it before anything could stop me.
I took Sourdough Grain Bread, a beautiful crackly-topped loaf, hot from my oven to the third neighbor.

Sourdough Grain Bread

The process is simple but time consuming. It takes 1 hour 50 minutes to make the dough in the bread machine, another 45 to raise and another 50 minutes to bake, plus other minutes for prep. So to make this bread, I have to start the loaf 4 hours before giving or serving. It’s an amazing bread and well worth the effort.

I made up this recipe. It took trial and error to get the texture just right. The crust is awesome, crisp and crackly. The interior is the perfect combination of hearty and soft and makes great slices for sandwiches or french toast. It keeps very well too and is good even two days after baking, although the crust will be more chewy than crisp at that point.

There are two specialty items needed to make the bread – a good sourdough starter and a baking cloche. These are explained further down this post.

The recipe:
SOURDOUGH GRAIN BREAD
1 cup water
1/4 cup good aged sourdough starter
2 tsp yeast
1/2 Tablespoon honey
2 1/2 cup bread flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup oatmeal
1 1/4 tsp salt
2 Tablespoons olive oil

The process:
Place all ingredients in the order listed in a bread machine.
I use a sourdough starter from King Arthur Flour. I can’t remember when we got it, perhaps 4 years ago? 5? It stays in a stoneware crock in the refrigerator door all the time. It’s an excellent starter. I’ve forgotten to feed it for over 10 months but it stays great, even with neglect.

Sourdough starter

Use the standard dough setting to make dough. We use a Zojirushi Bread Machine that takes 1 hour 50 minutes to make the dough on a standard setting. We’ve had this machine for over six years and use it three or four times a week. Best bread machine we’ve ever had!

When the machine beeps at the end of the cycle, the dough is ready. It fills the bread machine pan.

The dough is smooth on top but rough on the bottom when it is turned out of the pan.

I fold it over a couple times on a floured surface.

Cornmeal is sprinkled in the bottom of the cloche and then the smooth, floured ball of dough is placed in the center of the cloche. There are a variety of cloches available for bread baking. I picked this one for the size and good reviews. You’re not supposed to soak it before using or it may crack in the oven. It is to be used dry. After baking the bread, all I have to do is wipe out any remaining dry corn meal with a paper towel and the cloche is ready for another loaf.

The cloche lid is placed on top.

The cloche is placed in a cold oven and the oven door shut.
I turn on the oven light to provide a small amount of warmth in the oven and set the timer for 45 minutes for the dough to raise.

And then… without opening the cloche or removing it from the oven, I turn the oven to 400 degrees.
That is right, the cloche goes from raising the dough in the oven, straight to baking in the oven and the cloche is never moved! As the dough is baked, it makes steam inside the cloche, emulating a professional steam-injected oven. That’s what makes the crust so amazing!

I watch the oven temp and as soon as it reaches 400 degrees, set the timer to bake the bread for 40 minutes.
When the timer goes off at 40 minutes, the cloche lid is removed from the oven and the bread continues to bake for 10 more minutes to crisp the crust.
Here is a finished loaf.

My favorite way to enjoy the bread is hot, with butter and honey and cinnamon powder straight from the spice jar.

I’ve made mistakes with this dough, forgetting it was in the bread machine, raising it too long, forgetting to set the timer when the oven reached temperature, and still the bread turns out. Here is a loaf where I did everything wrong. I love the cragginess of the crust.

Here is the loaf torn open, steam arising.

I don’t have a photo of the loaf I took to Neighbor 3. My back hurt so bad that night that I didn’t want to carry a camera. As soon as the loaf came out of the oven, I wrapped it in paper towels and then foil and walked down the street. Neighbor 3 came to the door in a wheel chair and I handed him the still-hot loaf. He held the warm bundle as he thanked me. I was so very glad I went to the effort to take the loaf to my third neighbor. May he and his household be blessed!

The first BFN Day… To the First Neighbor, I took Butterflake Herb Rolls

04 Monday Nov 2013

Posted by Julia Monroe in baking, Baking for Neighbors, BFN, community, food, Inspirational, recipe, Uncategorized

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

baking, Baking for Neighbors, BFN, bread, community, food, neighborhood, neighbors, recipe

And also to the Second Neighbor!

It started several weeks ago. I don’t like admitting this, especially to myself, but my recovery seems sooooo s. l. o. w.! sigh. (I actually sighed after typing that sentence.) I broke my back on July 16th, 2012 and got scoliosis surgery in October. It’s been over a year. So come on, what’s with this tedious recovery? Alas, my research proves that I’m normal and doing well. But it still takes me days to recover from a simple outing because riding in a vehicle is just not friendly to my concrete spine. Not yet.

On the plus side, my stamina is better than it’s been in years. I’m tackling long overdue tasks, such as sorting through bins of old papers and organizing shelves. I’m rearranging rooms and overseeing remodeling. And I’m back in the kitchen cooking and baking. But I want to do more. I want to be involved in Community.

Since I can’t get out easy, I’ve decided to serve my own neighborhood. I call the service …

BFN – Baking for Neighbors.

Instead of bye for now, my BFN is Baking for Neighbors. I think there are 71 houses in my neighborhood. I barely know four of them so just one or two at a time, I’m going to bake something for all my neighbors. Baking for Neighbors will give me an excuse to bake, encouragement to walk outside (which is still slow and painful), and I’ll get to meet new people. It’s a win-win situation!

Several days ago I declared my first BFN Day. I took Butterflake Herb Rolls. This recipe has been in my family for decades. It was from an old Pillsbury Bake-Off cookbook my mom had. I wrote up the recipe on a blank card, which is now all stained from use.

Butterflake Herb Loaf recipe

Herb Butter Recipe

I rarely make these rolls so I’m not sure why I started with them. It just seemed like the right recipe and I was at peace. And they are delicious! With each recipe I pick, I’m going to pray that it will be ok with the neighbor and perhaps even be just what they need.

Butterflake Herb Rolls

Most yeasts no longer needs proofed but I did it anyway. 4 1/2 tsp (two packets) of yeast are softened in 1/4 cup warm water.

Dry yeast is sprinkled on warm water.

In a large mixing bowl, place 1/3 cup shortening, 1/4 cup sugar, 1 tbsp salt and 1 cup hot scalded milk. Cool to lukewarm.

Blend in 2 eggs and the softened yeast. I also mix in two cups of the flour at this point and beat till the batter is smooth. Gradually add 2 1/2 to 3 more cups of flour.

The first two cups of flour are beaten in, making a nice smooth batter.

On a floured surface…. And here I pause. I wonder if all bakers enjoy sprinkling a surface with flour. There’s just something magical about scattering that soft powder over the counter and then spreading and smoothing it out with your bare hands. I love the dusty flour on my hands.

Knead the dough on a floured surface till smooth and satiny. This was the first time in over two years that I kneaded dough so I ran out of steam fast. I wasn’t able to get it to “smooth and satiny” but it still turned out.

I put the dough in a greased bowl and place it in the cold oven. Then I turn on the oven light. The light from the lightbulb is enough heat for the dough to rise. While the dough is raising, I make the herb butter. I usually leave out the onion and just used fresh or dried garlic. Sometimes I add a little more of everything if I want a stronger herb roll.

We were out of Cayenne Pepper so I scraped the last little bit of Chipotle Pepper from the jar. There was about 1/8 tsp. We were out of fresh garlic too so I ground up dried garlic with a mortar and pestle.

I used to use a saucer and cut around the rolled-out dough with a sharp knife to make nice tidy circles. But it’s a lot faster to just use a bench knife to divide the dough up into little pieces. I cut the dough in half, then half again, etc until the lumps of dough are about the size of a small egg, about 32 rolls.

Each piece of dough is rolled out flat. It doesn’t matter if the piece is perfectly round or not. Herb butter is spread on half the dough piece and then it is folded in half.

Herb butter is again spread on the top each folded roll and then they are slightly overlapped on a parchment covered baking sheet.

The loaf is left to raise. Again, I put them back in the oven and let it stay warm with just the oven light on.

After they raised about double in size, the loaves are taken out of the warm oven and the oven is preheated to 350F. Then they are baked for 20 to 25 minutes.

For giving, I placed a hot loaf, fresh from the oven, on a paper napkin on a sturdy paper plate and wrapped it in foil. And then I carried it next door. :)

I asked the first neighbor if I could take a picture of her holding the plate and she didn’t mind. The reason the foil is left on is because the rolls are keeping warm. But most important of all, it’s NOT about the rolls, it’s about the neighbor. The hands in this photo are more important than what’s on the plate. I want to keep it that way.

Blessings to you, Neighbor 1!
And here is the second neighbor. Blessing to you too, Neighbor 2!

I don’t know if they’ll ever see this blog. But I was so happy to finally be able to do something for my neighbors.

I shall be posting all my BFN days. 2 down, 69 to go.

Wine & Cheese Tasting

18 Friday Oct 2013

Posted by Julia Monroe in baking, food, party, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Abbaye de Belloc, cheese, cheese tasting, culinary, food, food photography, foodie, menu, party, photo, photography, Wine & Cheese Tasting, wine and cheese

The very day after we placed the last dish in the china cabinet, we threw a Wine & Cheese Tasting party for eight. It was splendid!
We let the cheese monger at Southern Season recommend five cheeses and I picked out a sixth. I put the cheeses on fig leaves picked from our trees. The cheese selection was perfect!
The cheeses:
Appalachian, a firm cheese made from raw cow’s milk
Abbaye de Belloc, a semi-hard cheese made from unpasteurized sheep’s milk, still made by Benedictine Monks in France following a recipe centuries old
Rogue River Blue, a gorgeous semi soft blue cheese, wrapped in grape leaves (oh my goodness, this was amazing!)
Capricho de Cabra with Pepper, one of the best goat cheeses I’ve ever had, tangy and melt-in-your mouth creamy
Morbier AOC, a semi-soft cow’s milk cheese from France with a distinct vein of ash running through the middle
Fromager d’Affinois, a soft, double-cream cheese. This one was a favorite and we finished it off the next day.

With a tight budget, we picked wine from our own rack. Unfortunately, we were out of all our favorite dry whites and these were on the sweet side. They still went beautifully with the cheeses.
The whites: Lillet, Riesling
The red: Cabernet Sauvignon
The non-alcoholic: Sparkling Cider

Even though there was no cooking, it still took well over an hour to plate everything because we chose the serving ware as we went. I’ll remember that the next time and plan ahead. And of course the cheese was set out at least an hour before to come to room temperature for best flavor. We used fig leaves from our trees in the back yard for the cheese trays.
I had printed up tasting note sheets for everyone to fill out but we didn’t use them. We just ate and talked and had a jolly good time commenting about favorite combinations of cheese with wine and accompaniments.

It was early afternoon and the party was a success. After having plenty of cheese and wine, we looked over the table and calculated that all we needed was another bottle or two of wine and there would have been plenty for a party of 12. Well, we’d need at least another pound of bacon too.
I’m glad I documented the party so it will be easy to duplicate again.

We made the baguette and bread sticks from scratch. I’ll post the recipes with photos next time we make them. The bread sticks made a great centerpiece!
We finished with a selection of chocolates. I could only afford a couple artisan chocolates so we carefully sliced them for sharing. The Vanilla Lavender and Cinnamon Mocha were delicious! The next time I go back to Southern Seasons, I’ll get more of those and post proper credit.

It was an excellent meal with excellent company. Cheers to all!