In the Kitchen – Page 4 – Kristin Eldridge

Oct

Peanut Butter and Jelly Bars: After school Snack [In the Kitchen]

Sweet and salty is where my tastebuds want to live. You just can’t have one with out the other. This is the perfect marriage of flavors.

These bars have become a go-to after school snack at our house. I can make them on Sunday night and they last all week. They are hearty enough to fill up bellies and the flavors are basic enough that everyone loves them! Of course, you should never serve these without a glass of milk. Like, ever.

I found the recipe while googling images for peanut butter and jelly bars. I love that it calls for soft white flour. I feel like it kind of balances out all that butter. My mother-in-law gives me freshly ground soft white flour (lucky!) but if you don’t have an awesome mother-in-law, you can either buy it here or use all-purpose flour.

1 c (2 sticks) butter, room temperature

1 1/2 c sugar

2 eggs

2 1/2 c peanut butter

3 c soft white whole wheat flour

1 1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 c strawberry jam (another flavor is just fine)

2/3 c salted peanuts, roughly chopped (optional, we didn’t use these)

Directions: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9×13 pan, then line with parchment paper. Grease and flour the parchment paper, set aside. Cream together the butter and sugar on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Gradually add the eggs and peanut butter; beat until combined, about 2 minutes. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the bowl of the mixer on low. Add the vanilla extract. Spread two-thirds of the dough into the 9×13. Spread the jam on top of the peanut butter dough. Then sprinkle the remainder of the dough over the jam.

The recipe I found on Joseph’s Grainery (copied and pasted here) didn’t have a baking time. I have found that 45-50 minutes at 350 degrees was about right. It was slightly browned on the top and not dried out in the middle.

Here’s what it looks like when you take it out of the 9×13 pan lined with parchment paper. A big hunk of yummy!

Sep

Raspberry Shortbread Tart [In the Kitchen]

I picked up a copy of Fine Cooking the last time I was at Sprouts. There are so many recipes in the Oct/Nov issue that I want to try, but I started with a tart. Tarts are just so fancy. The article in the magazine talked about how this tart is a bar cookie in disguise. I like that. The same ingredients but wrapped up in a different package. A fancy package.

The original recipe called for cranberries, but I’m just obsessed with raspberries and I know they won’t be around for too much longer. So, I changed up the recipe and tiny bit and I love the way it turned out!

Raspberry Shortbread Tart

(adapted from Fine Cooking’s Cranberry Almond Shortbread Tart)

For the filling
1 cup granulated sugar
2 Tbs. fresh lemon juice
16 oz. fresh raspberries
3 Tbs. blackberry jam (I think any type of jam will do)

For the shortbread
3-1/2 oz. (1 cup) sliced almonds
9 oz. (2 cups) unbleached all-purpose flour
1-3/4 oz. (1/4 cup plus 2 Tbs.) fine yellow cornmeal
3/4 tsp. kosher salt
8 oz. (1 cup) unsalted butter, cut into 16 pieces and softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 Tbs. packed finely grated lemon zest (from 1 large lemon)
3/4 tsp. pure vanilla extract
1/4 tsp. pure almond extract
1 large egg yolk
Cooking spray
Confectioners’ sugar, for garnish (optional)

Make the fillingCombine the sugar, lemon juice, and 1/2 cup water in a 3-quart saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring occasionally to dissolve the sugar, about 2 minutes. Ad the berries and lower the heat to medium-low. Simmer for 10 minutes. Stir in the jam and simmer until the jam melts, about 1 minute more. Remove from the heat and let cool completely.

Make the shortbreadPosition a rack in the center of the oven and heat the oven to 325°F. Spread the almonds on a rimmed baking sheet and toast until warm and fragrant but not yet brown, about 5 minutes; let cool completely.

In a food processor (with at least a 10-cup capacity), combine the nuts with 2 Tbs. of the flour. Pulse until very fine but not powdery, 20 to 25 short pulses. Transfer to a large bowl and stir in the remaining flour, the cornmeal, and salt.

In the food processor, combine the butter, sugar, lemon zest, vanilla, and almond extract.

Pulse until creamy, 10 to 20 short pulses. Add the egg yolk and pulse a few times to combine. Add the dry ingredients and pulse, scraping down the sides as necessary, just until a soft dough forms, 30 to 40 short pulses. Turn the dough out onto a piece of plastic and divide.

Lightly coat a round 91/2 x1-inch fluted metal tart pan with a removable bottom with cooking spray. Press half of the dough evenly onto the bottom and up the sides of the pan. Cover with plastic wrap. Form the remaining dough into a disk and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate the dough and the tart shell until very firm, at least 30 minutes.

Prick the bottom of the tart shell all over with a fork and bake on a heavy-duty baking sheet until firm, dry, and just starting to turn golden brown around the edges, 30 to 35 minutes. The shortbread will have puffed up during baking, so use the back of a spoon to gently press down the bottom of the crust to create enough space for the berry filling. Spoon the filling into the tart and spread evenly.

Crumble the remaining shortbread dough over the berries in pebble-like pieces, covering the filling. Bake until the topping is firm and golden-brown, 30 to 35 minutes. Cool completely on a wire rack.

Carefully remove the tart rim. Slide a long, flat spatula between the pastry and the pan bottom and transfer the tart to a serving platter.

Sep

Butternut Squash Ravioli with Sage & Brown Butter [In the Kitchen]

We live in anticipation. Pumpkin spice lattes start arriving at Starbucks, Halloween decorations sit on all the end caps and Anthropologie is showing us the coziest sweaters. When is it going to get cold? Or at least chilly? Okay, anything other than sweltering will do.

I’m trying to channel fall with my cooking. Yesterday I made a stew and last week this butternut ravioli hit our table. Butternut squash is one of my favorite seasonal foods. It can be dressed up or down. It goes sweet or savory. It’s just the best. I’ve cooked with the squash before, but I hadn’t incorporated it into pasta yet. Turns out sage is a good compliment for our humble squash. Also, sage cooked in lots of butter until crispy is pretty much heaven. I found this recipe online and I was ready to go!

I made the pasta for this recipe, but you can just as easily buy sheets of pasta. It was the first time I had made pasta from scratch. In the past, I had used the pasta mix from Williams-Sonoma. Cheater, cheater ~~pumpkin~~ butternut squash eater.

Here’s how it all goes down…2 cups of flour and 3 eggs go on to the cutting board. Make a well for your eggs. It’s less messy. Use a fork to slowly incorporate it together and then start kneading it until it looks like this. At this point, you need to let it rest for 20 minutes and then it will be ready to be rolled. I did it by hand and I would not recommend it. It was an arm work out to say the least. And I never got it very thin. I mean no one complained about my thicker pasta 🙂 but thinner would have been better. So, if you have a pasta roller, use it!

After making my pasta, I started the filling. It was so easy! Chopped butternut squash can be purchased at Trader Joe’s, so make your life easier and buy it pre-cut. I also made my life easier by mixing in the other ingredients right on the baking sheet. One less dish to wash!

If you want to be fancy, use a ravioli pan (pictured above). If you don’t need fancy, just use a rotary cutter to make squares.

Here’s the full recipe as copied from Jenny Steffens Hobick’s website. See the link at the top of the page to her site.

Butternut Squash Ravioli

1 pound of Butternut Squash
Olive Oil
1/4 cup of parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 teaspoon of nutmeg
salt & pepper
1 recipe of Homemade Pasta, rolled into sheets

1 stick of butter
10-12 sage leaves

Begin by cutting the squash into cubes and placing them on a baking sheet. Coat them with olive oil, salt & pepper. Roast the squash at 425 degrees for 25 minutes until it is tender. Put it in a bowl and mash it with a fork. Add parmesan cheese, nutmeg and salt & pepper, if needed.

Place tablespoons of the filling down the center of the pasta dough that has been rolled into long sheets. Brush the dough around the filling with water, then fold the dough over lengthwise (making the filling of each ravioli be on one side, surrounded by dough on three sides. Cut the ravioli apart.

Heat a large pot of water for the ravioli.

For the sauce, melt the butter in a sauce pan. Add sage leaves. Cook on medium-low for 2-3 minutes, just until the butter starts to brown. Remove from the heat and set aside.

Cook the ravioli in the boiling water for 2 minutes, until it is floating. Remove from water and add directly to butter sauce.

Sep

Chèvre with apricot and honey appetizers [In the Kitchen]

Today’s recipe isn’t much of an exact recipe as it is a suggestion for an appetizer. Got love the easy ones, right!? The inspiration comes from a local restaurant called Simmzy’s. It’s always packed, so one day we decided to try going add an off time, mid-afternoon. I wasn’t especially hungry, so I ordered an appetizer as my meal. It was chèvre with apricot and local honey, served with homemade crackers.

The combination of salty, savory and sweet was perfect. I decided to try making it at home and it turned out pretty fantastic!

Let’s start with the cheese. Chèvre is goat cheese. I bought a little 4 ounce package from Trader Joe’s and brought it to room temp. Chop up 3 dried apricots and mix in, along with 1-2 tablespoons of honey. I made it easy on myself and served it in the bowl I made it, but you could mold it back into a ball and put it on a mini serving platter, drizzling it with more honey.

The crackers are something I make a lot. Especially if I have bread that’s going stale! This time, I used a baguette from Trader Joe’s. Thinly slice it and place it on a baking sheet. Brush with olive oil and sprinkle with coarse salt. Bake it at 425 degrees for about 8 minutes or until golden brown.

Aug

Fruit Infused Ice Water [In the Kitchen]

Five. That’s how many days we have before school starts. We are still sleeping in and thinking about all the adventures the next day will bring. Our pool has seen it’s share of action and my kids have a white outline that proves they’ve been living more hours outside than inside. Don’t worry, sunscreen was applied.
We’ve been living it up this summer! And that includes eating our weight in frozen yogurt. Have you seen the jugs of fruit infused water at Yogurtland or Tutti Frutti? Big tanks that normally hold some kind of brightly colored slurpy are churning with water and big chunks of fruit. It’s spa-like without the snobbery. So, our favorite has been strawberry water. And I decided to create my own at home. You can head over to Modern Parents Messy Kids to read all about it. I’m excited to be contributing every couple weeks to this fun website!

Aug

Bucatini all’ Amatriciana [In the Kitchen]

I was feeling rather ambitious last night. Instead of letting the heat squelch me, I let it inspire me. And by inspire, I mean make pasta. Brent just bought me the pasta making attachment for my kitchen aid mixer, so I looked online for the perfect sauce to accompany the pasta. I stumbled on The Italian Dish and tested the Bucatini all’ Amatriciana. It’s like a classier version of spaghetti and meat sauce. A version that stands up to 90 something degree heat.

If you don’t want to make pasta, and I don’t blame you…it’s a lot of work! just use regular thick spaghetti from the package. If you love food as much as I do, you’ll find it worth the effort and you should make bucatini. It’s basically a thick tube of spaghetti.

Here’s the recipe copy and pasted from The Italian Dish website:

Ingredients:

3 ounces pancetta, cubed
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1/3 cup finely chopped onion
1/4 teaspoon red hot chili pepper (or to taste – mine was very fresh and hot)
1/4 cup of dry white wine
1 cup canned whole tomatoes and juice, crushed (use San Marzano if you can)*
8 ounces Bucatini pasta (or spaghetti)
1/2 cup freshly grated Pecorino cheese
salt to taste

Instructions:

Bring a large pot of well salted water to a boil.

In a large fry pan, cook the pancetta over medium heat for several minutes until crisp but not brown. Remove the pancetta with a slotted spoon and reserve, but leave the fat in the pan. Add the olive oil, onions and chili pepper and cook for several minutes until the onions are just soft but not browning.

Add the white wine and cook for one minute. Add the tomatoes (I just use my hand to crush them) and the juice and reserved cooked pancetta and cook over medium low heat, uncovered, for 15 minutes. You want most of the liquid to cook off.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta until still a little firm. With tongs, remove the pasta from the boiling water and place right into the tomato mixture. Thoroughly coat the pasta with the tomato mixture. Turn off heat and add the cheese, tossing well. Taste for salt and add if needed. Serve immediately and pass extra Pecorino around.

Aug

Homemade Cherry Almond Pie [In the Kitchen]

One of the more idyllic things I did this summer was pick cherries in Montana and promptly make a pie. My mom’s neighbor has a cherry orchard. Just beautiful rows of cherry trees right next to her house. No big deal. Expect, yeah, that would be pretty stinkin’ awesome. Something to write home about. With a huckleberry pie under my belt, I was feeling the flow and ready to go for a cherry pie. We walked down to the cherry orchard and an hour later walked home with full bags ready to be pitted. If you haven’t pitted cherries before, it’s a labor of love. Knowing there’s a cherry pie at the end makes the whole process a little more bearable.

A month prior to visiting Montana, I was at The Pie Hole in Los Angeles with a friend. The cherry pie I ate there had such a unique almond flavor with a graham cracker crust, that I wanted to somehow incorporate almond into my pie. Here’s the recipe I used (slightly adapted to include fresh cherries) from Taste of Home. Instead of a graham cracker crust, it had a tradition lattice top crust. It was quite homey and just perfect for this experience!

Ingredients

6 cups pitted tart cherries
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon red food coloring, optional
Pastry for double-crust pie (9 inches)
1 egg yolk, lightly beaten
Additional sugar

Directions

In a large saucepan, combine the sugar, cornstarch and salt; gradually stir in cherries and their juice. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened. Remove from the heat; stir in the butter, extracts and food coloring if desired. Cool slightly.
Line a 9-in. pie plate with bottom crust; trim pastry even with edge. Pour filling into crust. Roll out remaining pastry; make a lattice crust. Trim, seal and flute edges. Brush lattice top with egg yolk. Sprinkle with additional sugar.
Cover edges loosely with foil. Bake at 425° for 15 minutes. Remove foil. Bake 20-25 minutes longer or until crust is golden brown and filling is bubbly. Cool on wire rack.

Aug

Huckleberry Pie [In the Kitchen]

If you know me well, you know I go for it. Recover my patio furniture- sure, rehab a 200 year old sofa- why not?, make a pie from scratch- let’s do this. I definitely have a history of failures, but I also have successes under my belt, so I’m not afraid to try. As in, not afraid to try a new crust recipe that my veteran-pie-making-mom wasn’t so sure about. But, guess what? It turned out pretty fantastic. A bit of a weepy pie, but a delicious one. One that you might just have eaten for breakfast the next day.

Let me tell you a bit more about this pie. The story starts in Blodgett Canyon outside of Hamilton, Montana. We were hiking and fishing with the kids. It took a few hours for the kids to get the hang of fishing and my dad wanted them to be able to catch their own. The go-for-it-girl decides to collect some huckleberries while we were hiking around. Let’s make enough for some pancakes, was my first thought. When that was accomplished I moved on to an ice cream topping and as my back was aching from all the foraging, I decided we would not go home until we had 5 cups. Enough for a pie. Well, we couldn’t remember if it was 5 cups or 6, so we went with 6 cups. Which also meant that we had enough for pie AND pancakes.

Huckleberries are most like a blueberry, but smaller. So, you can imagine how long it took us to collect that many huckleberries. Thanks mom and dad for putting up with the obsessive-ness about making this pie!

The recipe we used was from Saveur…and as I said, very tasty! If you don’t live in an area where you can get huckleberries, either buy frozen or use blueberries. Click here for the original recipe.

FOR THE PASTRY:
2 1/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp. salt
8 tbsp. butter, chilled and cut into pieces
8 tbsp. vegetable shortening
11/2 tsp. cider vinegar

FOR THE FILLING:
1 cup plus 1 tbsp. sugar
4 tbsp. quick-cooking tapioca
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. freshly grated
nutmeg
Pinch salt
5 cups fresh or partially thawed frozen huckleberries stemmed
2 tbsp. fresh lemon juice
2 tbsp. butter, chilled and cut into pieces

1. For the pastry: Sift together flour and salt into a large bowl. Using a pastry cutter or 2 table knives, work butter into flour until mixture is flecked with pea-size pieces of butter. Add shortening and work into flour mixture until it is flecked with pea-size pieces of shortening. Combine vinegar and 6 tbsp. ice water in a bowl, then stir into flour mixture 1 tbsp. at a time, mixing until dough holds together. Form into a rough ball, then divide dough into 2 balls, one slightly larger than the other, wrap each in plastic, and refrigerate for 2 hours.

2. For the filling: Combine 1 cup of the sugar, tapioca, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt in a large bowl. Add huckleberries and lemon juice, gently toss, and set aside for 15 minutes.

3. Put a baking sheet on oven rack in lower third of oven. Position another oven rack in middle of oven. Preheat oven to 450º. Roll out larger dough ball onto a lightly floured surface into a 12″ round and fit into a 9″ pie plate. Fill with huckleberry filling and scatter with butter. Roll smaller dough ball into a 10″ circle, place on top of filling, then fold edge under and crimp. Brush pastry with water, make 5 slits in top pastry for steam to escape, and sprinkle with remaining 1 tbsp. sugar. Bake pie on baking sheet until pastry begins to brown, 20-25 minutes. Transfer pie to middle rack, reduce oven temperature to 350º, and bake until pastry is deep golden brown, about 50 minutes more. Set pie aside to cool completely.

Jul

Chicken Soup with Orzo [In the Kitchen]

Gazpacho isn’t the only summer soup. I like a chicken soup, pretty much any time of the year. It’s hearty enough to fill you up, but the broth gives it a light feel. When you serve it with a biscuit, and possibly a local honey or jam…it’s so very summery. I make a very simple chicken soup and this time I tried to change it up a bit by adding orzo. Orzo is a pasta that masquerades as rice. It soaks up the savory liquid, but isn’t as cumbersome as your typical noodle. I’m a fan!

This recipe has a case of ‘no specific measurements.’ Here’s how it all goes down. I buy a roasted chicken at Costco (or the local market.) I roughly chop the meat after it’s been taken off the bone. Take what’s left and through it in a big pot. Add water to cover it. Boil it for a little as an hour or as long as 4. See, NO specifics! But, the beauty of it is…you can’t mess it up! I don’t add any flavoring or vegetables. The seasoned skin is enough. I strain the broth into another bowl and set it aside. Using the same pot, I chop whatever vegetables happen to be lingering in the fridge. In this case, I used 1/2 an onion, a few celery stalks and a handful of baby carrots. Add a little bit of olive oil to the pot and saute the vegetables. Add the broth and chopped chicken back into the pot. You may not need all the broth, depending on how much chicken and vegetables you are using. Simmer the soup until 10 minutes before you are ready to serve and then add a handful of orzo. Again, the amount is going to depend on: A) how much of the soup you made B) how much you love orzo and C) how much leftover orzo you have in your pantry. In the 10 minutes it takes the orzo to cook, you can pop some biscuits in the oven, because this soup shouldn’t be served without them!

Jul

Strawberry Shortcake [In the Kitchen]

You cannot let summer escape without making strawberry shortcake. It’s one of those things you crave as the temperatures rise. Sweet berries, rustic cakes and smooth whipped cream is where it’s at. I’ve tried many different variations from angel food cake to a dense pound cake. Biscuits are best in my opinion. You want something to stand up to all those berries! I found this recipe years ago on Food.com when it used to be called Recipezaar.com. How’s that for dating myself! It’s my hands-down favorite….here’s the link if you want to check out the original: http://www.food.com/recipe/strawberry-shortcake-a-la-treebeards-41156

Shortcake

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons packed brown sugar
1/2 cup butter
4 teaspoons granulated sugar, divided
3/4 cup milk

Filling

1 quart ripe strawberry, washed,hulled and sliced
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Whipped Cream

1 cup heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup sour cream

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450 degrees; grease a cookie sheet.
To make Shortcake, with knife blade attachment on food processor, process flour, baking powder, salt, brown sugar, butter and 2 teaspoons granulated sugar until mixture resembles coarse meal.
Pour mixture into medium bowl.
With wooden spoon of paddle attachment on electric mixer, add milk and mix just until it forms a smooth dough.
Scoop dough onto cookie sheet in 6 equal mounds.
Dust top of shortcakes with remaining 2 teaspoons granulated sugar.
Bake 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown.
Remove from oven; transfer to wire rack and cool.
To make Filling, in a medium bowl, mash one-half of berries.
Mix with granulated sugar and vanilla.
Refrigerate 1 hour.
To make Whipped Cream, in a chilled mixing bowl, beat cream with confectioners’ sugar, granulated sugar and vanilla until it just holds soft peaks.
Add sour cream; beat until stiff peaks form.
Cut off tops of shortcakes; set aside.
Spoon Filling onto bottom of each shortcake.
Cover with Whipped Cream and remaining sliced strawberries; replace tops.
Garnish with a dollop of whipped cream, a strawberry half and a sprig of mint.

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