Madhu Knits and Cooks

Same Day Neapolitan Style Pizza - Good for Pizza in a Pinch

With lots of King Arthur Flour's 00 equivalent flour in my cupboard, and my homemade pasta-making efforts long-stalled, what to do?  This was a question I asked myself for many months without resolution.  Well, sometime the answer is the most obvious - go to the King Arthur Flour website for suggestions.  

I opened several tabs on my browser for KAF-recommended options, and ultimately settled on the Thin-Crust Pizza recipe because it largely had the ingredients available in my pantry and it fit my fancy for what I wanted that day.

While this pizza dough can largely be made in the time it takes to pre-heat a pizza stone, I ended up doing two slightly longer rises for the dough - about 75 minutes for the first rise and about 1 hour for the second, covered rise.

I had a bit of a tough time rolling out the dough between a sheet of parchment and wax paper as I completely ignored the instructions to grease the sheets first.  Oops!  And I omitted the suggested KAF easy-roll dough improver, which also probably had an effect. But thankfully the dough sticking was rectified by slow peeling and scraping it from the wax paper.

For the second covered rise of the dough, because I didn't grease the wax paper and was worried about re-sticking, I decided to just flip over the dough mixing bowl to cover the dough.  It actually worked totally fine!

I baked the dough for approx. 7 minutes on a pizza stone in a 450 degree oven, then added toppings before baking an additional 5 minutes or so.

The baked pizza definitely tasted like an olive oil bread, like a focaccia.  That felt evident in the dry and airy texture, as well as the flavor.  The bottom of the pizza was nicely browned, but as I was eating it, I continued to feel like I was eating a dressed up focaccia rather than a pizza. 

While that experience was fine, I think it ultimately means this won't be a go-to pizza recipe, rather a go-to-quick-fix pizza recipe.

My First Olive Oil Cake - Very Easy, Very Dense and Very Subtle Sweet Flavors

My first olive oil cake (inspired by my friend Tessie - thank you!) was very easy to make, forgiving with my ingredient substitutions, and even survived my slight over-baking (46 minutes) to be a hit at the party it was served.

I have been attracted to this type of cake because I have some wonderful flavored Williams Sonoma olive oils from my friends Michael and Sahar.  One of the flavors, blood orange, seemed like it would be perfect in this citrus-scented cake, and thankfully it was.  The infused olive oil didn't overwhelm the cake at all, instead left a slight pleasant orange flavor.

My substitution of brown sugar for 1.65 oz of the white sugar (I ran out) and for sprinkling on top also didn't affect the cake in any sort of noticeable way (except for the brown specks on top of the cake), which was great. 

Finally, I substituted 2% milk for whole milk, also fine as the cake wasn't overly dry and still felt moist, dense and rich.

And the cake was easy to prepare, a standard wet ingredient / dry ingredient approach, with a mixer thrown in for more emulsification I assume?

Jim Lahey's Pizza Dough - Very Good, But Doesn't Displace My Favorite Recipe

I loved Jim Lahey's pizza restaurant Co. when it was open in NYC, and was so sad when it closed.  It was a regular go-to whenever I was anywhere near that side of town.  And so when I saw that Jim Lahey had a pizza recipe book while browsing my local library stacks, I grabbed it with high excitement.  

The resulting two pizzas I made from the half portion of his no-knead dough recipe were very good with nice salty and yeasty flavors in every bite.  I didn't follow any of his pizza topping recipes, rather just the dough and baking method.

The dough required an 18-hour room temperature rise, which led to a slightly sticky dough that was hard to stretch out nicely.  I imagine my lack of experience shaping pizzas by hand v. rolling probably contributed to this difficulty though.  

What I most liked about Lahey's pizza approach is that he calls for pre-heating a pizza stone 8 inches from the top of the oven at 500 degrees before then turning on the broiler to bake the pizza.  That high heat leads to a nicely cooked pizza in just a few minutes. 

Moving forward, to really make use of this technique, I should pre-heat the broiler for longer before putting in the shaped pizza and leave the dough in the oven slightly longer until there are more black spots across the pizza.  I will probably continue to pre-cook the dough, which I generally do, before adding toppings to avoid the toppings overwhelming the thin dough.  

What I least liked about this pizza was the relatively small pizzas that his portions led to.  One Lahey pie is enough for slightly more than one person, but not quite enough for two.  As a result, for the slightly higher effort of an 18-hour room rise instead of a forget-about-it fridge rise, I think I'll probably continue to default to my standard pizza dough recipe, but now coupling it with Lahey's broiler bake approach.

My First Deviled Eggs - Not a Bad Inaugural Attempt

As dedicated Madhuknitsandcooks.com readers know, I've had a slow introduction to the world of eggs.  I only just started making frittatas and hardboiled eggs a year ago, and I made my first scrambled eggs a few months ago.  But now the dam has broke, and I find myself increasing turning to eggs for more than just baking.  

My latest egg recipe was definitely the most complex - deviled eggs.  I decided to go with the pros at Cook's Illustrated for this recipe because even though their approach was the most complicated, I thought it would probably not only yield the best results, but also help inform my egg-cooking techniques moving forward.

Thankfully, I was right on the second point - their approach of boiling eggs and then letting them cool in a ice bath produced a great hard-boiled egg.  Unfortunately though, that didn't make peeling the shells off the eggs easier than the traditional, non-ice bath approach, but that's fine.

I ended up doing that under running water in the sink, and I covered the eggs by approx. 1 inch of water while bringing them to a boil.

After the eggs cooled, I sliced them in half.  As instructed, I discarded (into my mouth) the two egg white halves that didn't look the best so that the remaining 12 half-whites would be overflowing with filling.

I then mixed together the egg yolks with the remaining ingredients - cider vinegar, (vegan) Worcestershire sauce, mayonnaise and mustard.  Instead of using a grainy mustard though, I used dijon mustard which I had in my fridge.

When I tasted the mixture, I thought it has too much mayonnaise flavor so moving forward I will probably reduce the mayonnaise amount by 1 tablespoon.  For this attempt though, I tried to offset that flavor by adding in more Worcestershire. 

That seemed to do the trick as the result was very good - tangy, slightly sweet, smooth, and a bit of umami flavor from the Worcestershire.  I look forward to make these eggs again!

Crisped Edge Buttery Chocolate Chip Cookies - Easy Weeknight Treat

Hankering for some homemade chocolate chip cookies, but not quite settled on re-making one of my go-to recipes, I decided to try King Arthur Flour's "favorite" chocolate chip cookie recipe.  The recipe combines shortening with butter to produce crisped edge cookies with somewhat pliable interiors.  

And the unexpected bonus of these cookies was how buttery their flavor was - yum!  I don't know why they turned out this way, given the use of shortening (and not the butter-flavored version), but I look forward to remaking these over and over again.

I halved the recipe and used my trusty scale to measure the ingredients.  The only slight inadvertent change I made from the original recipe was that I poured out a little too much egg from my container, so used approx. 21g of a lightly beaten egg instead of 27g (which would have been half of the large egg I used).  

Otherwise, just followed the standard cream wet ingredients together, mix in dry approach, and then ready for the oven!

Super Soft and Moist Almond Flavored Cake

Cake flour, cake flour, did I truly bake wonderful cakes before you?  It's hard to believe that I did given how consistently great my cake flour cakes have been. 

This simple almond-flavored cake was no exception, producing an incredibly soft, moist and dense cake that could be enjoyed by adults and children alike with its smooth, simple flavors.  

I halved the recipe because I didn't have a particular occasion to make it for, and I also substituted low-fat milk, which didn't seem to have a large impact on the outcome of the cake.  I also increased the amount of almond extract to 1 tsp. to get a stronger almond flavor. 

The only thing I would change in the future is to reduce the baking time.  I baked the cake in a 9-inch cake pan for approximately 23 minutes, whereas 21 or 22 probably would have been enough (note how much the sides of the cake pulled in from the tin post-baking).

The recipe utilized the "paste" method of adding in the butter to the dry ingredients to form a sand or paste-like texture, and then adding in the other wet ingredients in thirds.

I don't know if I have done this method before, so it was an interesting approach for me to try.  Not sure if this is what led to the super moist cake?  More research and experimentation is clearly warranted!

Almond Shortbread Cookies - A Subtlety Sweet, Lightly Flavored Cookie

With leftover almond flour in my fridge from the wonderful Chocolate Orange Tart, I have had the opportunity to experiment with new almond flour-based recipes.  A recent attempt focused on the deceptively simple Almond Flour Shortbread Cookies, the dough for which can be made while your oven is pre-heating.

These cookies were sweet, but not sugary at all.  They were very lightly flavored from the almond flour and had the texture of a soft butter cookie, rather than a crisper traditional shortbread.  

I ended up baking the cookies for longer than the recipe time - about 14 - 15 minutes over 8 - 10 minutes - because of how long it was taking for the cookies to lightly brown. In hindsight, I think 13 minutes would have been enough.

These cookies ultimately didn't wow me, but I think they would be good to serve with an assortment of other cookies during a tea time or when I am looking for some sort of easy weeknight or afterthought of a dinner party dessert.

Easy, Different and Healthy Party Dip - Spiced Yogurt

Milk Street is quickly becoming one of my top recipe websites.  Chris Kimball has really captured lightning in a bottle the second time with this post-Cook's Illustrated venture.  My latest Milk Street recipe was their Spiced Yogurt Dip, which I made for a recent dinner party we attended.  

This healthy Greek-yogurt based dip had really interesting and unexpected spicy and sweet flavors, from a mixture of ingredients that included honey, coriander, turmeric, cumin, and red wine vinegar (I know - how did they come up with this list?!).  The recipe, somewhat unsurprisingly, was inspired by a Madhur Jaffrey Indian-dip, but the honey and vinegar definitely unique enough for repeated dips and discussion about what the underlying ingredients could be.

The dip also has the benefit of taking nearly no time to prepare, and it uses ingredients that are always in my pantry, including 2% Greek yogurt which I used in place of whole-milk yogurt.

The only downside of this dip was that its flavor profile wasn't quite to my taste.  The coriander in particular I found a bit overpowering (which I generally do with anything requiring more than a bit of this dried powder), but the others who had the dip really loved it.  And coupled with some sliced cucumbers and carrots, this really can be a fast, guilt-free addition to any gathering!

Chewy Cinnamon Chip Oatmeal Cookies - An Unexpected Children's Treat

For a child's birthday party recently, I decided to bake simple, partly improvised cookies.  My target eaters were the party's adults who I thought would be more attracted to the multiple, deep cinnamon flavors of the cookies than the children.  Instead, these cookies were not only all devoured by young children, but I also received multiple recipe queries from them as well!

In hindsight, cinnamon-infused snickerdoodles are a childhood favorite, so I guess I shouldn't have been that surprised.  In any case, their reaction means that these simple cookies will be a feature at future child-attended events.

The substitutions that I made to the recipe were: used butter exclusively instead of a butter / shortening mixture, substituted Vietnamese cinnamon for regular cinnamon, and added in cinnamon chips (from King Arthur Flour), which I eyeballed when mixing into the dough.

I formed cookies that were slightly larger than the recipe called for because I ended up with 17 dough balls instead of 22 - 24.

Correspondingly, I baked for these cookies for 14 - 15 minutes to accommodate their larger size.  The cookies burst with deep cinnamon flavors, and the texture was otherwise a standard, thin oatmeal chewy cookie.  I look forward to wowing children again with these!

The Lightest, Most Delicious Chocolate Cake - Cake Flour Forever!

With a recent King Arthur Flour online order, I reached the point that so many of us do of needing to add one more item to my cart to get free shipping.  Just a few dollars to avoid a much higher shipping fee.  I decided to try something different, so I added a box of cake flour to my cart. 

I've actually bought cake flour in the past, but it's always expired before I've had the chance to use it.  So fresh cake flour entering my apartment, what to do, what to use it in during its prime?

As you can tell from the above image, I didn't end up looking too far - just as far as the back of the box.  And what an endorsement of box recipes this cake ended up being.  It really was the simplest, lightest, fluffiest, and most delicious chocolate cake (ok, maybe not the most delicious, but felt like among the best light cakes I've made in some time).

And the best part?  The cake was a cinch to prepare - mix together dry ingredients, then wet, and then mix together.  No special instruments needed.  In fact, when I re-made the cake today, I used a simple spoon to do all of the mixing.  I also ended up not brewing coffee for the recipe, instead using 1.5 teaspoons of the KAF instant espresso powder mixed with water in the wet ingredients.  The extra dark color comes from Hersey's Special Dark Cocoa, which is a mix of dutched and non-dutched cocoa.

After about 33 minutes or so, this cake (1/2 of the recipe, baked in one 9-inch round cake pan) was done.  After several more minutes of cooling, it was ready to eat!  I really liked not only its light texture, but also the lightness of the chocolate flavor.  It was just slightly bitter, not too sweet, and was made complete with the addition of some vanilla gelato.