Monthly Archives: April 2011

Irish Soda Bread

I came across this recipe on one of the blogs I read, Mommie Cooks. She also happens to be a Tasty Kitchen member, and her recipe box is full of delicious and quick things to make. I love a good quickbread recipe, and the fact that this one takes only about 5 minutes to throw together is a huge plus. All the magic happens in the oven, with hardly any effort on your part. And who doesn’t love a loaf of freshly baked bread? It just screams ‘home’ to me. I made this bread for our Bible study group, and I could almost swear more bread was eaten than the main dish that I prepared to go with it.

Ingredients

(Serves 6)

4 ¾ cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

1 tsp caraway seeds

3 TBS honey

1 egg

1 ½ cups buttermilk

3 TBS butter, melted

Only 4 dry ingredients need to be assembled: flour, salt, baking soda, and caraway seeds.

Mix the dry ingredients together.

I love the flavor that the caraway seeds give this bread. They are nice and strong, so even though the recipe only calls for a teaspoon, that’s exactly the right amount.

And I love, love, love my new flour canister. It’s from WalMart.

It makes the flour-measuring experience so much cleaner than when I measured it straight out of the paper bag and flour poofed all over my countertops, floor, and clothing.

Now gather the remaining ingredients:

No, that’s not a mug of tea or coffee–it’s the melted butter. And don’t tempt me to drink it straight outta that mug, because I won’t!

Unless it’s a double-dog dare.

I’ve never been double-dog-dared before, so I have no idea what would happen were I confronted with a choice. Swallow my pride . . . or drink the butter. Humble myself . . . or drink the golden greasy stuff.

Ah, the mental dilemmas that rage in my mind throughout the day.

Add the egg and honey. . .

. . . pour in the buttermilk (I never have buttermilk on hand, so I used a handy substitution: 2% milk mixed with 1 1/2 TBS of lemon juice) . . .

. . . and stir everything around until the dough is just starting to come together (about 1 minute).

Add in the melted butter . . .

. . . and knead very briefly on a floured countertop, just until the dough holds its shape.

Make sure not to overknead! This step only took me (literally) 15 seconds.

Form a ball, and cut two slits in the top of the ball in the shape of a cross.

Put the dough on an ungreased baking sheet and bake at 350 F for 50-60 minutes.

When you remove it from the oven, test the bread with a toothpick in its thickest part to make sure it’s done.

If the toothpick comes out sticky or has a little dough on it, put the bread back in the oven for another 5-7 minutes and then probe its depths again.

I didn’t test my bread very carefully, so upon cutting it open I encountered a large lump of uncooked dough in the middle. Mercifully, I just popped it back in the oven and all was well–thank heavens for low-maintenance baking recipes such as this one.

Let it cool for a few minutes before cutting and serving.

Slather with butter, if desired.

I desire.

Would you look at that beautiful crust?

I need to put this on the menu again asap.

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Gouda Stovetop Mac and Cheese

In my quest for the perfect stovetop mac and cheese, I absolutely had to try Tracy’s recipe from Tasty Kitchen as soon as I saw it. I’ve never tried using Gouda in my mac and cheese, and was very interested to see how it went down. So after adjusting the recipe to add more onion, more cheese and more cream, here’s how it went down:

Oh baby oh.

Look no further.

Let me break it down for you: I’ve made stovetop mac and cheese at least 4 times in the past few months. I photographed all my efforts so that I could share the recipes with you in the event of success, but none of them made the cut. Until this recipe. Point #2: my husband normally doesn’t even like mac and cheese unless it’s baked. But he loved this recipe. Need I say more?

Ingredients

(Serves 5)

1 lb campanelle pasta (or any other kind)

5 slices bacon

1 whole sweet onion, chopped finely

1 cup heavy cream

1 cup shredded Gouda cheese

Salt and pepper, to taste

First, boil some salted water and cook the pasta until al dente.

Set it aside.

You can really use any shape of pasta–elbow macaroni, penne, farfalle, etc.–but I love the campanelle because the little shell-shaped swirls are perfect for capturing the sauce inside. Check it out:

I shall rename this pasta shape “Ye Horne of Plenty.”

While the pasta is cooking, you can focus on the very simple sauce–it all starts with the bacon.

Fry the bacon slices until they’re starting to get crispy, then remove them to a paper towel and pad off the grease. Roughly chop them and set them aside.

As you can see, I used my trusty kitchen scissors for this task.

While the pasta is cooking and the bacon is frying, there’s plenty of time to mince up the onion. First I halve it, then I slice each half like so:

Then I cut in the opposite direction like so:

Thank you photography for saving me from a confusing verbal description of what just happened to that onion.

These little morsels of sweet onion are going to be perfect in that cheesy sauce. Yup.

Take a piece of Gouda . . .

. . . and grate up 1 cup. Or grate up more and eat the extra; the choice is yours.

Can you tell that I grated significantly more than I needed? On purpose? It’s called ‘the cook’s prerogative,’ and I claim that authority. Plus, the packaging says “Great for Entertaining,” and I was in sore need of entertainment after a frustrating day at work.

Nothing like melted cheese to make the stresses of the day melt away. Hmmm–that rhymes. I think I’ll write a song about that. The chorus will go “The stress is melting like cheese in fondue/with this kind of goodness, who could feel blue?/Give me that mac and cheese any old day/cause baby my worries are falling away.” And it will top the charts.

Remove most of the bacon grease from the pot (leaving about 1 TBS) and fry the sweet onion in the bacon grease over medium heat for about 5 minutes, until translucent and slightly soft.

Season the onion with salt and pepper as it cooks.

Add the bacon back into the pot along with the heavy cream.

Simmer over medium-high heat for a few minutes, until the mixture has reduced and thickened a little.

Mmmm!

Turn off the heat and stir in the Gouda cheese.

As soon as it has melted into the sauce (this will only take a minute), it will look something like this:

Add in the cooked pasta and stir the whole mess around until each and every Ye Horne of Plenty is coated in the sauce.

Taste and re-season, adding salt and pepper as needed. I added a healthy pinch of salt.

Voilà!

Quickly gather the troops, because this is best served hot.

A word to the wise–like most mac and cheese type dishes, this doesn’t reheat extraordinarily well, so chow down! And then thank the Dutch for the miracle of Gouda.

The next experiment: how would it taste if I used smoked Gouda?

Though I don’t know if I want to experiment–it’s so perfect just as it is.

If you need a little more protein, you can always grab that piece of salmon that’s been skulking around in your fridge and give it a quick fry.

Flake it up a little with a fork or two . . .

. . . and toss it in the bowl right along with the creamy pasta goodness.

Also quite choice. Either way, this recipe is fabulous. If you’re a lover of mac and cheese, you will not be disappointed.

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