Caramel Monkey Bread

So sometimes I get totally ridiculous and make things like monkey bread, which is ridiculous enough already, and I add things like swirls of homemade sticky caramel. In other words, one of the best things I've made this year.

If you, like me, find yourself in the position of having made a batch of too-soft, too-sticky caramel candy, consider making some monkey bread and drizzling layers of this caramel in between layers of cinnamon-sugar-crusted biscuit pieces.

  (And yes, I do use canned biscuit dough to make monkey bread. Eventually, perhaps, I will make "real" monkey bread, with yeast and everything. But for now, this stuff does the trick.)

 

And if you, like me, decide that this is not ridiculous enough, consider drizzling the leftover melted butter and cinnamon-sugar on top of all of your cinnamon-sugar-crusted, caramel-layered biscuit pieces. Then stick it in the oven for about 30 minutes.

Take it out of the oven, then flip it over onto a plate.

What happens next is up to you.

Epic Sandwich

I haven't felt much like cooking lately, so I've been eating a lot of sandwiches. I tend to go on sandwich kicks for a few weeks, then I get sick of them and don't eat them for months. This epic sandwich was really fun to make (and to eat).

Step 1: Gather your ingredients. Clockwise from top left: hummus, multigrain bread (with nuts and seeds!), sharp cheddar cheese, sundried tomatoes, clover sprouts, and an egg.

Step 2: Fry the egg in some butter, and toast the bread.

Step 3: Spread one piece of toast with cream cheese (whoops, left that out of the picture) and the other with hummus.

Step 4: Put the cheese on top of the egg so it gets all melty.

Step 5: Slide the egg onto one of the pieces of bread.

Step 6: Add sprouts and chopped sundried tomatoes.

Step 7: Put the second piece of bread on top.

Step 8: Cut the sandwich in half, diagonally please.

Step 9: Dig in.

What's your favorite epic sandwich?

Double Apple Oat Muffins

These hearty muffins have both diced fresh apples and a dollop of homemade apple-pear butter in each one. I also tried putting the apple-pear butter on top rather than in the middle - but the surprise is kind of fun. They contain a bunch of healthy ingredients - whole grain flour, wheat germ, walnuts, and being full of apples and buttermilk they are very moist and tender too. No cardboard-y whole grain pastries here!

Dollop!

Ready to bake.

Next time I might cut the apples a bit smaller, but I do like having apple chunks rather than grated apple as I've done previously.


Double Apple Oat Muffins
Adapted from Vegetarian Times, 2006.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups peeled, finely diced apples - I used one giant Jonagold apple(seriously, this thing was like 6" in diameter)
• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 2/3 cup wheat germ
• 1 cup rolled oats
• 2/3 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 1/4 cup buttermilk (or 1/4 cup yogurt plus 1 cup milk, stirred together)
• 2 tablespoons walnut oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts 
• About 1/4 cup apple or apple-pear butter, divided

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 400F. Spray muffin tin with cooking spray or use paper liners. 
2. Peel and dice the apple(s) and place on a paper towel-lined plate. Set aside.
3. In a medium bowl, mix together the flour, wheat germ, oats, brown sugar, baking powder and soda, salt, and cinnamon.
4. In a small bowl, whisk together the egg, buttermilk, walnut oil, and vanilla.
5. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the buttermilk mixture. Stir gently until just mixed, then stir in the apples and walnuts. 
6. For apple-pear butter centers: spoon batter to fill muffin cups 1/3 full, then dollop 1 tsp apple-pear butter in the center. Add more batter to fill muffin cups 3/4 full. Alternatively, fill muffin cups 3/4 full, then create a small well in the center. Dollop apple-pear butter into the well.
7. Sprinkle a few oats on top if you wish.
8. Bake for 20 minutes or until tops are golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the middle of a muffin comes out clean.

Kale Salad

Kale salads are all over the place these days. There are so many ways to make them, I'm looking forward to trying a few different recipes. Here are a few I've been looking at:

• 101 Cookbooks has a classic recipe with pecorino and breadcrumbs
• Not Eating Out In NY  adds honey mustard and pomegranate arils.
• I don't know about the "tabouli" part but Steamy Kitchen's cauliflower tabouli with kale sounds delish.
• This version in Saveur has an orange-soy sauce dressing, avocado and hemp seeds.

For my kale salad, I used dinosaur (lacinato) kale, the juice of one lemon, 2-3 tablespoons olive oil, a couple handfuls of chopped and toasted almonds, about 1 oz. crumbled feta cheese, and a bit of salt and pepper. It is really fun to massage the kale to get it all coated in lemon juice and olive oil!

I let the salad sit for about 20 minutes before serving it (alongside a simple pan-seared chicken breast), but the leftovers were even better the next day.

Anyone else have a favorite kale salad recipe?

Weekly Lunch: Delicata Squash and Barley Salad

Salad on a plate looks so much nicer than salad in a plastic container, don't you think? 

This is another salad with a lot of possibilities for variations. Based on this Farro and Roasted Butternut Squash Salad from 101 Cookbooks, I swapped hazelnuts for walnuts, delicata for butternut squash, hulled barley for farro, feta for goat cheese, added some chickpeas and baby greens and left out the fresh thyme. Yum!


Evidence of my love for this salad: here's another version I made last month.

Apple-Pear Butter

A couple of weeks ago we went out and picked a bunch of apples and pears. They were at varying stages of ripeness, from rock-hard Flemish Beauty pears to the perfectly ripe Bartletts and Gingergold apples shown below. So, with the ripest fruits, I made Apple-Pear Butter! I looked at a dozen different recipes, considering the equipment I planned to use/not use, and my personal preferences for spices and sugar content. I am too scared of canning for now (I want to try it at some point in the future!) so I divided it into three containers, two of which went into the freezer.

I used a total of about 5lbs of fruit (about 3 lbs of Bartlett pears and 2 lbs Gingergold apples), which yielded about 2 1/2 cups of butter.

Here's what I did: peel and core the fruit, then cut it into 1" chunks. Place in a large pot and add 1 cup of apple cider and 1 cup of water. Liquid will not come above the level of the fruit. Simmer, uncovered, until very tender, about 45 minutes.

Put the mixture in a blender or food processor until very smooth. Pass the fruit puree through a sieve back into the pot, in batches. This step alone took me about half an hour, so if you have a food mill, now is the time to use it!

Add 1 cup of brown sugar (you may need more sugar if you are actually canning, to help discourage bacterial growth - please make sure to consult a recipe for this), a cinnamon stick and a lump of peeled fresh ginger. And some ground cardamom (1/2 tsp) as well.

Cook on low for a very very long time, about 2-3 hours, stirring frequently. Better put on some music and get a tasty beverage for this one. When it tastes and looks right, remove the cinnamon and ginger and pour into as many containers as you wish.

This was a lot of work, but the final product is totally worth it. Thick, sweet, almost honey-like. So far I have just been eating it by the spoonful, or on top of yogurt with some of my favorite homemade granola (yes I will share, soon!). But I kind of want to try making some muffins or scones with little dollops of this apple-pear butter inside or on top... I will have to experiment.

Autumn's Finest

Aren't these just the most beautiful leaves? I am amazed at all of the colors.