This is a super easy, basic, but delicious biscuit recipe. The directions seem lengthy, but only because I added hints and comments to it. If you are an experienced baker, you won't even need the instructions. The key to awesome biscuits here is to handle them as little as humanly possible to produce the most tender and flaky product. That's right, no kneading!
No-Touch Biscuits
5 cups all-purpose (plain) flour
1/3 cup granulated (white) sugar
5 heaping teaspoons baking powder (HEAPING, don't worry, it won't be too much)
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup margarine (soft tub margarine works fine and is lower in calories & fat)
1 cup milk
1 cup water
Preheat oven to 425◦F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a large mixing bowl, stir together the first four dry ingredients Cut in the margarine until blended in, using a pastry blender, fork, two knives, or your hands. Add the milk and water and gently stir in until dough is just moistened, but still dry in spots.
Dump the mixture onto a clean counter or board. Mix together with your hands, adding a little more water if necessary. Dough should be sticky. Pat into a rough rectangle, about 1/2 inch thick. Do not use a rolling pin. Dough will look scrappy, and not smooth, but it's meant to. Do not knead this dough.
Cut the dough with a biscuit cutter, glass, or just into squares using a knife. Place on prepared baking sheet. They may touch, but place them far apart (bake in two batches) if you want crispy sides. If you cut them into squares, placing the biscuits close together will result in almost a "pan biscuit". The biscuits will form together and need to be pulled apart gently. These are delicious!
Bake for 15-20 minutes until risen and golden. Enjoy warm with any spread you like, or reheated later.
Large square biscuits are good for sandwich building.
Tonight we had popovers with our omelettes for supper. Popovers have been on my list of things I want to make for quite a while now, and apparently my mother also wanted to try them. She decided tonight would be a good night to try them. We compared a few different popover recipes to find the best technique, ingredient amount, and cooking method. The recipe we used follows. Popovers are difficult to describe. They are a simple mixture of eggs, milk, flour, and salt. They are baked at a high temperature, and rise very high without a leavening agent. They are crispy on the outside and light and fluffy on the inside. They are a nice side dish served with breakfast or brunch, or even with soup. They are good plain, or with butter, jam, or honey.
Popovers
2 large eggs
1 cup milk
1 cup all-purpose (plain) flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
Preheat oven to 450◦F. Generously spray eight muffin cups (or a popover pan if you have it) with cooking spray, or grease with butter or shortening.
In a mixing bowl, whisk the eggs for about a minute, just until they are a uniform color and not yet fluffy. Whisk in the milk. Dump in the flour and salt all at once, and stir with a wooden spoon until incorporated. Batter will be lumpy.
Pour the batter into the muffin cups, filling them almost to the top. Fill the extra cups with water. Bake for exactly 30 minutes. Do not open the oven during baking!
Place pan on a wire rack, and gently pierce the top of each popover with a sharp knife to let steam escape. Cool for a minute or two, and gently turn the popovers on to a serving dish. Serve immediately, while they are warm and before they deflate.
A few notes: 450◦F for exactly 30 minutes is the perfect oven temperature to achieve a crisp exterior and fluffy interior texture. Ensure the pans are greased well so your popovers will pop right out. This recipe made eight.
Today I made some whole wheat bread again, a different recipe I have never tried before of course. Although the bread did not rise as much as I had hoped it would, it still turned out very well. The lack of rise may be due to the little mini crisis situation I had. I had already started mixing up the bread dough when I realized that there was absolutely no yeast left in the house. Oops, poor planning and inventory checks, and especially unfortunate because a trip to the grocery store had been made earlier today. Oh well, good thing the store isn't too far away, so a quick trip was made. Meanwhile, I hoped the warm water wasn't getting too cold. The closest store only carried traditional yeast, not rapid rise yeast like I usually use, but I din't think that would be a problem, as I have used traditional yeast before. It wasn't until after I had arrived home and added the yeast to my now only lukewarm water that I realized the bread recipe actually called for instant yeast. To my knowledge, the only difference between traditional yeast and instant yeast is that instant yeast does not require a separate proofing and can just be added to the dry ingredients. Since the recipe called for the yeast to be added to the warm water anyway, I simply let it sit for 10 minutes to activate. After 10 minutes, the mixture seemed to be quite bubbly, so I continued on with the recipe. After the first rising of the dough, the dough seemed to be quite high, so I figured it would all work out. After the second rising, the dough was not quite as high as it probably should have been, and it did not rise much in the oven. Oh well, still tasty. However, take a few lessons from this fiasco: always check to make sure you have the ingredients you need, preferably before you go out, but definitely before you begin your baking. Also read the recipe carefully before beginning. Luckily this bread recipe is fairly forgiving.
Now, to the actual bread recipe. It is fairly simple, with not many ingredients. Just water, sugar, salt, yeast, butter, and flour. Of course I spruced it up a little to suit my liking. I added some ground flax seed and some sunflower seeds and used all whole wheat flour to make the bread more hearty and nutritious. The recipe simply calls for one large amount of all-purpose flour, but this could easily be varied with any variety of grains to suit your tastes. As I mentioned before, this is a very forgiving and versatile recipe. It is also fairly basic, and could probably be changed up by the addition of molasses, honey or brown sugar, and eggs and milk. The amounts of sugar, butter, and salt could also be varied to suit personal tastes.
For my enchilada bake yesterday, I made my own homemade tortillas. I have tried to make tortillas before, but due to time constraints, they ended up being more like flat breads, as they were not rolled as thinly as they should have been. They still turned out very nice and tasty though, the only trouble I had was a bit of sticking to the pan, so this time I knew to make sure my pan was well oiled. This requires adding a splash of oil for every new tortilla you add. They need oil to cook and sizzle properly, but they don't end up greasy after cooking. Watch them carefully - they only need 30-60 seconds per side. Homemade flour tortillas aren't particularly difficult to make, although the technique of rolling and frying does take practice. The trick is to stretch them as thinly a possible - they should be almost transparent. I have discovered that if you accidentally rip them in spots, once cooked, the hole will tend to patch itself up, so you don't need to worry about minor tears. The dough is very smooth, and easy to work with. Tortillas are very simple - most recipes contain just flour, water, baking powder, salt, and a little fat. The dough requires a short kneading time, and sometimes a short resting time. Then it is divided into pieces, rolled out very thinly, and cooked in a hot frying pan for a very short time on both sides, until some dark spots appear. There are many different recipes for tortillas out there, although they all use the same basic concept. The internet is a good place to look, you can easily find a recipe to suit the amount of servings you need. Tortillas are excellent for burritos, tacos, enchiladas, fajitas, wraps, and even homemade nachos. They keep well, and can be frozen for prolonged storage.
Breaded Chicken Breasts: A simple, quick, easy, and relatively safe option for supper. They go well with a variety of different side dishes, almost anything goes. Serve them with any kind of vegetables, and pasta, rice, potatoes, or simply bread. Breaded chicken breasts can be baked, pan-fried, deep-fried, sauteed, or broiled. Simply choose the cooking techniques that suits the amount of time you have and the other dishes you are preparing. For a dish this simple, there are actually a surprisingly high number of different recipes for the coating. How many layers should it have? What is the best type of breadcrumbs to use? What else should I add? The way we do our chicken breasts is fairly simple: dip them in a little beaten egg, and roll them in seasoned, dry breadcrumbs. Place them in a casserole dish and bake. That's it! No extra spices, coatings, or preparation techniques.
Common Dredges (the "glue" for the coating) are: egg, water, milk, buttermilk, ketchup, mustard, sauces.
Common Coatings: flour, breadcrumbs, Panko, cracker crumbs, cereal crumbs, chip crumbs.
Common Seasonings (to add to the dredge or the coating): salt, pepper, paprika, garlic, chili powder, basil, chives, mustard, vinegar.Common Toppings: tomato sauce, cheese, ratatouille, salsa.
Some people swear by the three-coating technique ;flour, then egg, the breadcrumbs. We have tried this and found that yes, it does produce a crispier coating, but the coating does not stick to the chicken as well. Some people say to spray the chicken with cooking spray or drizzle with melted butter for a crispier coating, but this does not improve the crispness significantly and increases the fat content in a relatively nutritious dish.
1. Flour: The base for the majority of baked goods, you can't do much without flour.
2. Sugar: Can you imagine eating a cake (and frosting) without sugar? Neither can I!
3. Baking Powder: Your baked items won't look very impressive if they are as flat as a pancake.
4. Vanilla: Even though most recipes only call for a teaspoon or so of this flavouring, it goes a long way and really enhances the flavour of those goodies.
5. Chocolate Chips: Many of the recipes I make have chocolate chips. We have some real chocolate lovers at this house and chocolate just makes everything so much better.
6. Sweetened Condensed Milk: A fabulous, conveinent base for many baked goods, especially squares, you will never find a proper substitute for this.
7. Rolled Oats: Add texture and heartiness to many baked goods, especially muffins, squares, and cookies, oats are also good for breakfast.
8. Oil: When butter or margarine just wont do, oil is the way to go. Makes excellent stir-frys and extra moist cakes.
9. Cereal: You'd be surprised how many recipes include cereal, no matter what kind! Even savoury dishes and dinners use cereal from time to time.
10. Pasta: A great base for any dish when you just don't know what to cook. Pasta is so versatile and comes in so many different shapes and sizes.
