General – orangeparade

Not exactly as planned

sheri — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 22:12:45 +0000

What I thought I’d do today: get up, get dresssed, go to shul, go to work, blah blah blah.
What really happened: I got up, got dressed, and as I was leaving the house I saw it was snowing. Here’s where it all went downhill.
I went to shul, though the drive took twice as long as it usually does. It was slippery, but not crazy. I left shul, got on the Merritt Parkway to go to work and traffic was moving along at about 2 miles/hour. The parkway was a unique combination of parking lot and skating rink. Between Den Road and Long Ridge Road I was rear-ended (I’m fine) and between Long Ridge Road and High Ridge Road I almost spun out trying to drive up a hill. At that point I decided to give up and I got off the Merritt at High Ridge. Snow was still falling and even fancy AWD cars were having trouble. I parked myself at Starbucks and worked there for a couple of hours, until my laptop battery died. By that time traffic had thinned out and the city had started to plow and salt the roads, so I was able to drive home ok. Whew.

I made a crustless pumpkin pie to console myself. It’s delicious. I think if I wanted to serve something like this to company, I’d bake it in custard cups rather than a pie plate, since without the crust it doesn’t cut up “pretty” but for just myself and the husband it’s perfectly fine.

Crustless Pumpkin Pie
1 15 oz can pumpkin
1 14 oz can sweetened condensed milk
2 eggs
1 tsp ground cinnamon
3/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp nutmeg
3/4 C sugar
1/4 tsp salt

Grease a 9-inch pie dish or some number of custard cups/ramekins. In a large bowl, beat two eggs with a whisk. Whisk in pumpkin, then add the sugar, salt, and spices. Slowly whisk in sweetened condensed milk. Pour mixture in to prepared pie dish.

Baking: I baked this in my countertop convection oven at 300F for 40 minutes. If you’re going to do this in a regular oven, try 325F and see how it goes. It will probably take 40-50 minutes.

Tarte Tatin

sheri — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 14:07:23 +0000

My brain just exploded in excitement.

I need to make this Tarte Tatin this weekend.

so here’s what happened

sheri — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 14:05:04 +0000

I had a batch of rye bread dough rising at the same time as the sourdough and I decided to bake the rye off first. For some reason, the rye bread took over 15 minutes longer than it should have, but it looked fine so I didn’t think much of it. Since I was feeling lazy, I decided to bake the sourdough in a lecreuset instead of on the baking stone. I preheated the pot for 30 minutes, then plopped the dough in and let it bake for 20 minutes. At the 20 minute mark I removed the lid to let the bread crisp up a bit more, expecting to see the usual golden lovely loaf inside. Imagine my dismay when what was there instead was a dense golden puddle.
Miss Clavel, something is not right.
I put my little oven thermometer on the rack and let it sit for 10 minutes in the oven. The oven was set for 450F but lo and behold, the thermometer wasn’t budging above 335 or so.
Ugh.
I tried to salvage the sourdough and managed to cut off a couple of slivers before calling it quits. I don’t think I’ve ever had to through out a loaf of bread before.
I started looking at new ranges but the whole thing is so overwhelming, as is the cost of getting someone out to look at it and possibly repair it. For now, it seems that the problem might have gone away. I’ve baked a couple of times since then and the oven appears to be back at it’s usual only-25-degrees-off, which is fine when I can count on that.

Since then, I haven’t re-fed my sourdough and that’s something I clearly need to remedy. Must try again!

Sourdough starter is forgiving (I hope)

sheri — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 20:05:08 +0000

Sourdough starter is surprisingly resilient to neglect. Kind of like Orangeparade! I can’t remember the last time I fed my starter. I can say with certainty that I haven’t fed it since June. I may not have touched the sourdough since before Passover. Crazy! I know.

It was with some trepidation that I decided to attempt to revive my starter. When I took off the cover there was about 3/4 inch of black liquid on top, but that’s perfectly normal for starter that’s been sitting around for awhile. It didn’t have a pink or orange tint or any of the “off” smells you’re supposed to watch out for. I poured off the liquid, scraped the top in to the trash, and put about a cup of clean-looking old starter in a glass bowl. I added 4 oz of water and 4 oz of KA AP flour, mixed well and let it sit for a few hours on the counter. Lo and behold, it bubbled (a little). I stirred the bowl & tossed half of the starter mixture, then fed it again with 4 oz of water and 4 oz of flour and let it sit for a few more hours. That time it bubbled even more, so I considered the experiment a success.

I took out 9 oz of starter to make some sourdough bread (dough is rising in the fridge, will report back later) and fed the remaining starter with 4 & 4, mixed & popped in the fridge. Fingers crossed.

September 24

sheri — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 02:25:05 +0000

Today is my mom’s birthday.

Anyone who knows me well, knows that I love my Mom. My mom is the best mom in the whole wide world and I told her that, frequently. She was amazing, talented, generous, and just fun to be around. Mom and I loved to travel together, especially to Paris. We had a lovely week in Paris together earlier this spring, just walking around, talking and eating.

My mom died August 16, thirteen months after finding out she had pancreatic cancer. The past few weeks and months have been indescribably difficult.

Happy birthday, Mommy. I miss you tons.