Late Night at the Table with Ginger-Root

TableBread: Welcome everyone to our first edition of Late Night at the Table. This is where we will interview some of our favorite and unique ingredients in and around the kitchen. First up tonight is Mr. Ginger-Root. Welcome Mr. Ginger-Root and thank you for joining us tonight.

Ginger-Root: Oh please just call me Ginger my father’s name is Mr. Ginger-Root.

TableBread: No problem, Ginger. So tell us a little about yourself.

Ginger-Root: Well, I like to travel. I have cousins all over the world! My cousin in Greece, Ziggiberis, is funny and loves to talk philosophy. My other cousin in Jamaica is super hyper and perky, people usually like him the best out of all my other family members. I was born in Southern Asia and I look absolutely FABULOUS beside sushi!

TableBread: Wait a minute, hold the ladle! I thought you were just a dry spice, what is all this world travel and how does all this end up in a cookie?!?

Ginger-Root: {shaking head} I am not surprised that you feel this way but don’t feel bad a lot of people believe that we are so one-dimensional. I wish I knew the root that started all of this I would LOVE to rebury him!

Here’s the thing, we can spice up almost any dish but since you love baking we’ll focus on that. I know I learn better when you show me something so let’s do that. You can just call me the “Show me Root” {snicker} here is a breakfast treat that your family will surely enjoy:

Gingerbread Scones:

1 ¾ cups all purpose flour
¾ cup old fashioned rolled oats
1/3 cup light brown sugar
2 tsp ground ginger
1 ½ tsp ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground cloves
¼ tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ cup cold unsalted butter
Zest of 1 lemon
1/3 cup dried cranberries or cherries
½ cup buttermilk
2 ½ tablespoons unsulphured molasses
1 tsp pure vanilla extract Egg wash: 1 large egg
1 tablespoon milk or cream
Maple Glaze:½ cup sifted confectioners sugar
1 ½ tablespoons pure maple syrup
1 – 2 teaspoons milk or cream

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C) and place rack in middle of oven. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, oats, sugar, spices, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Cut the butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. The mixture should look like coarse crumbs. Stir in the lemon zest and dried cranberries, if using. In a separate bowl mix together the buttermilk, molasses and vanilla and then add the buttermilk mixture to the flour mixture. Mix just until the dough comes together. Do not overmix the dough.

Transfer to a lightly floured surface and knead dough gently four or five times and then pat the dough into a circle that is about 7 inches (18 cm) round and about 11/2 inches (3.75 cm) thick. Cut this circle in half, then cut each half into 3 pie-shaped wedges (triangles). Place the scones on the baking sheet. Make an egg wash of one well-beaten egg mixed with 1 tablespoon milk and brush the tops of the scones with this mixture. Sprinkle the tops of the scones with some rolled oats.

Place the baking sheet inside another baking sheet to prevent the bottoms of the scones from over browning. Bake for about 20 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

To Glaze: Mix together the glaze ingredients, adding more sugar or milk until you get the desired consistency. It needs to be thin enough that it can be drizzled over the tops of the cooled scones. With a spoon drizzle the glaze over the tops of the scones and let dry.

Makes 6 scones.

TableBread: WOW! Those tasted GREAT! Those cranberries really added a kick to the rolled oats!

Ginger-Root: Hey pal don’t forget the main star of that recipe! Jeez, but I’m glad you liked them. So you see, that is just one example. Do you like cakes?

TableBread: Do we like cakes?!? Of course, we love cakes! We enjoy them especially around the holidays when we’re searching for something quick to bring to party's or get-together.

Ginger-Root: Well, if you want something quick that looks great and tastes amazing then check out this cake recipe:

Gingerbread Cake:

2 cups (280 grams) all purpose flour
1 teaspoon (5 grams) baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 cup 113 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup (108 grams) light brown sugar
2 large eggs
Zest of 1 lemon
1/2 cup (120 ml) unsulphured molasses
1 cup (240 ml) milk

Lemon Icing:

1 1/2 cups (150 grams) sifted confectioners' (powdered or icing) sugar
2 - 2 1/2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Garnish: (optional)

Whole toasted walnuts

Note: To prevent the molasses from sticking to the measuring cup, first spray the cup with a non stick vegetable spray (like Pam).

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C) and place rack in center of oven. Butter and flour a 9 inch (23 cm) cake pan with 2 inch (5 cm) sides. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, salt, ground cinnamon, ginger and cloves). Set aside.

In bowl of electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (about 3 minutes). Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the lemon zest and molasses and beat to combine. Add the dry ingredients and milk, alternately, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Beat just until incorporated.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top with an offset spatula.

Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes before removing cake from pan. Let cool completely and frost with Lemon Icing. Garnish with whole toasted walnuts, if desired.

Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes before removing cake from pan.
(Tip: I use a springform pan when I can. This gives me the flexibility to get most of the cake out of the hot pan quickly so the cake doesn't steam itself on the sides and bottom and make it soggy. Using a springform pan also cools the cake faster in case you're in a hurry.)

Let cool completely and frost with Lemon Icing. Garnish with whole toasted walnuts, if desired.

For Lemon Icing: Mix together the confectioners' sugar and lemon juice until smooth. (The icing should be thick but still spreadable.) Pour the icing onto the center of the cake and spread with an offset spatula. Some of the icing will drip down the sides of the cake.

This cake will keep for several days at room temperature. Can serve with softly whipped cream, lemon curd, or sauteed apples

Makes one - 9 inch (23 cm) cake.

TableBread: WOW AGAIN!!! Ginger you are just blowing us away with the complexities of the flavors. This cake is amazing and it looks like it took us a long time but really only about 30 minutes (not including cooking time of course).

Ginger-Root: Are you starting to understand now? We Ginger-Roots’ are about more than just little gingerbread men once a year. We can be used for breakfast, lunch, dinner, or just to have a nice spicy treat. I haven’t even scratched the surface of everything that’s available, I highly suggest you explore my family tree and see what you find.

TableBread: Ginger-Root thank you for joining us today and really educating us on your other family members and the versatility of your capabilities.

Ginger-Root: No problem I enjoyed being here but I know you all have one more question and your just afraid to ask so I will just give it to you. Here is a recipe for gingerbread men, check it out:

Gingerbread Men:

3 cups (420 grams) all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoons salt
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated white sugar
1 large egg
2/3 cup (160 ml) unsulphured molasses

Note: To prevent the molasses from sticking to the measuring cup, first spray the cup with a non stick vegetable spray (like Pam).

Confectioners Frosting:

2 cups (230 grams) confectioners sugar (icing or powdered sugar), sifted
1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 tablespoons milk or light cream
Assorted food colors (if desired)

Gingerbread Men: In a large bowl, sift or whisk together the flour, salt, baking soda, and spices. Set aside.

In the bowl of your electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the egg and molasses and beat until well combined. Gradually add the flour mixture beating until incorporated.

Divide the dough in half, and wrap each half in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least two hours or overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C) and place rack in center of oven. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside while you roll out the dough.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to a thickness of about 1/4 inch. Use a gingerbread cutter to cut out the cookies. With an offset spatula lift the cut out cookies onto the baking sheet, placing the cookies about 1 inch (2.54 cm) apart. If you are hanging the cookies or using as gift tags, make a hole at the top of the cookies with a straw or end of a wooden skewer.

Bake for about 8 - 12 minutes depending on the size of the cookies. Small ones will take about 8 minutes, larger cookies will take about 12 minutes. They are done when they are firm and the edges are just beginning to brown.

Remove the cookies from the oven and cool on the baking sheet for about 1 minutes. When they are firm enough to move, transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

If desired, you can press raisins, currants, or candies into the dough for eyes and buttons while the cookies are still warm. Otherwise, confectioners frosting can be used to decorate the cookies. You can also use the icing as a glue to attach candies, raisins, and sprinkles.

Confectioners Frosting: In an electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), cream the butter until smooth and well blended. Add the vanilla extract. With the mixer on low speed, gradually beat in the sugar. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and beater. Add the milk and beat on high speed until frosting is light and fluffy (about 3-4 minutes). Add a little more milk if too dry. Place the frosting in a pastry bag fitted with a decorative tip and decorate the gingerbread men as desired.

Tint portions of frosting with desired food color (I use the paste food coloring that is available at cake decorating stores and party stores).

Makes about 3 dozen cookies depending on the size of cookie cutter used.

Store in an airtight container.

TableBread: We are sold, you are truly amazing and generous! My kids will love decorating these with different colored icings and we even cut some of them up into little trees. You know we are just going to HAVE to try to make a house with this.

Ginger-Root: Well, you’re on your own with the house, I was never really the organized architect, and I prefer just growing anyway that feels right.

TableBread: Ok, again Ginger thanks for joining us, and to our audience we thank you for stopping by and listening to our conversation with Ginger and seeing many of the versatile recipes that you too can make in a jiffy or with a little time on your hands. If you would like to see more recipes like these or explore more baking recipes in general pop on over to Joy of Baking.com and see what you can discover. Be sure to stop by and let us know how your experience with Ginger goes and join us next time where we will interview another commonly misunderstood kitchen resident.

Good night and good baking!

Scones for breakfast

If you are anything like my family breakfast time seems like a trip down the autobahn. Fast, fast, and fast. Time for breakfast? Heck, we barely have time for coffee! Kids need to be awaken, dressed, “No, put that down”, hair combed, “We have to get the tangles out!”, and into the car, "SIT DOWN!". So breakfast quickly becomes a banana for one, an apple for the other, and a coffee in a to go cup for everyone else.

Add to that my desire to get more whole wheat and fiber into my family’s diet and the challenge can quickly become overwhelming.

My attempt to create a solution was to pick up a copy of King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking: Delicious Recipes Using Nutritious Whole Grains. This is an amazing book of whole grain recipes. The volume includes cakes, pancakes, waffles, scones (presented here), and many other delicious recipes. In a lot of the recipes the author actually warns you if the end result is going to have a heavy grain taste to it. These tips are helpful in deciding what to make for the adults and what to make for the kids. So if you are struggling with getting the required fiber and whole grains into your busy family’s belly, I suggest you grab a copy of this book and a bag of whole grain flour and get ready to change the way you do baking!

Are you ready to change your morning routine?

These scones are so easy to make. I assembled them the night before and put them in the oven while I was still half asleep the next morning. One of the changes I made was instead of raisins or currants I used craisins, which are dried cranberries. My beautiful wife doesn't really care for raisins and this was a sweet/tart compromise.

Oat and Craisin Scones

Ingredients:

Yield: 1 dozen scones
Baking Temperature: 375 F
Baking time: 22 to 25 minutes
¾ cup (3 ounces) whole wheat flour, traditional or white whole wheat
¾ cup (3 1/8 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour
½ cup (1 5/8 ounces) oat flour
¼ cup (1 ¾ ounces) sugar
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup (1 stick, 4 ounces) cold unsalted butter
1/3 cup (1 ¾ ounces) currants or raisins (Lewis note: I used Craisins)
1/3 cup (1 1/8 ounces) old-fashioned rolled oats
1 large egg
½ cup (4 ounces) buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Milk or cream for brushing the tops
Coarse sugar for sprinkling

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 375F. Lightly grease a baking sheet or line it with parchment paper.

(Lewis note: If you haven’t yet made the jump to silicon liners you’re missing out. These things will save you a mountain of money in parchment paper. Although they aren’t meant for high temp bread baking – where temperatures regularly go above 450 – 500 degrees F, they are perfect for this kind of thing.)

Whisk together the flours, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl. Using a fork or pastry blender, cut the butter into the dry ingredients until it resembles bread crumbs.

(Separation of salt and yeast - VERY IMPORTANT!!!!)

Add the currants (raisins or Craisins for a twist) and oats, and stir with a fork just to mix them in: you don’t want to crush them more than necessary.

Whisk together the egg, buttermilk and vanilla in a separate bowl or large measuring cup. Add, all at once, to the dry ingredients, and stir lightly and quickly with a fork until the dough is evenly moistened.

Turn the dough out onto a floured work surface, and knead two or three times. Divide the dough in half, and pat each half into a circle about ½ inch thick and 6 inches in diameter. Use a baker’s knife to divide each circle into 6 wedges.

Transfer the scones to a baking sheet, leaving an inch of space bwtween them. Brush the tops with milk (or cream) and sprinkle the tops with coarse sugar. Bake until the scones are puffed and golden brown, 22 to 25 minutes.

Serve warm.

Variations:

Maple-Walnut scones: Substitute maple sugar for the granulated sugar in the recipe, and replace the currants with chopped walnuts. Add ¼ teaspoon maple flavoring with the vanilla, and sprinkle the tops with maple sugar.

Cinnamon-Pecan Scones: Substitute chopped toasted pecans for the currants in the recipe, and add 1/3 cup cinnamon-flavored chips to the dry ingredients. Sprinkle the tops of the scones with cinnamon-sugar before baking.

Cherry-Almond Scones: Substitute 1/3 cup dried cherries for currants in the recipe, and add ¼ teaspoon almond extract with the vanilla. Add 1/3 cup slivered almonds to the dough before cutting.

Pineapple-orange Scones: Substitute 1/3 cup diced dried pineapple for the currants in the recipe. Replace ¼ cup of the buttermilk with ¼ cup of the buttermilk with ¼ cup orange juice; add 1 tablespoon grated orange zest with the vanilla.

Time Saver Note:

You can freeze these scones up to a month! Just make the batch like normal and after you have cut the slices put them between two pieces of saran wrap and freeze. Then when you want to have scones just pull them out preheat the oven and go. Now don’t worry about the scones being frozen – they will defrost enough while the oven is preheating to cook thoroughly.

I will tell on myself. I have never actually had a scone before making them. Because of that I was a little unsure of how to portion them - this is a common theme for me here in the kitchen for all of you who remember my homemade oreos. My beautiful wife informed me that if I made scones of this size in London I would be the talk of the town!

I hope you give these a try for something new at breakfast time and don't forget to let all of us know how it goes!

The Sweeter Side of Life

This week I have been exploring the breakfast side of bread. I just bought a copy of a wonderful book: “The Breadbaker’s Apprentice”

I can't say enough about how much I LOVE this book. Peter Reinhart wants not just to teach you how to bake bread but also how to understand what baking bread is really about. As he puts it in the text, Peter wishes to turn you in to a “spiritual baker” not a “technical baker”. Now, if you missed the hippie wagon like I did this may put you off at first. What he is actually saying is that his intent is not for you to MEMORIZE recipes for good artisan bread, but to understand what is going on so you can play with the recipes and make them your own.

…But I digress…

The two recipes I baked this week came from this amazing book.

Cinnamon rolls were the favorite of the family. The bread is just sweet enough and the icing and the walnuts top off what is a fluffy and cinnamony roll. These cinnamon rolls were amazingly easy to make, took about three hours to fully ferment and about 30 to bake.

English muffins were the favorite of my beautiful wife for her eggs benedict. These English muffins are actually fried in a pan and then baked to completion. Again, you couldn’t ask for an easier experience for such amazing results. The only thing I will do different next time is allow the yeast to grow a little longer. This was an amateur mistake I made. I was using active dry yeast and mixed the yeast (per instructions) into the flour and kneaded the dough. After I sat down to let the dough ferment I realized the next chapter in the book was “Yeast and Fermenting”, my mistake was obvious in seconds. The recipe called for instant yeast which can gain enough moisture from the dough to grow, however (and the book mentions this specifically) that active dry yeast has to have a lot more water and time to ferment on it’s own…. they still came out pretty darn good.

Well gang, that’s it for this amateur pastry chef this week. We will see you next week with more goodies, burnt pans, and smiling faces.

As always I look forward to your culinary stories with bread and pastries and pictures are always fun.

The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread