Many of you have heard the saying that "Lemon is my Chocolate". I like chocolate, but lemon is what makes my taste buds very happy. When I think of lemon, I think of a clean and refreshing taste. Plus, I think lemon is one of those universal fruits that makes perks up the flavor in otherwise bland dishes, such as creamed soups and steamed vegetables. My fondness for Greek food is because lemon is found in so many Greek recipes. Our garden has both a Eureka and a Meyer lemon tree. For those of you who aren't familiar with Meyer lemons, they are a hybrid that traces back to Mandarins. The skins are much smoother than the more common Eureka lemon, and the flavor does have a sweet note of mandarin.
The first recipe I made with this year's harvest of these lemons was a Meyer Limoncello Sorbet. (My husband has been hinting for more of this refreshing treat.) I decided to make one of my favorite lemon dessert recipes, from Ina Garten; it's a popular in blogosphere, as I've seen it on several blogs. I found the recipe in my Ina Garten cookbook library, "Barefoot Contessa at Home: Everyday Recipes You'll Make Over and Over Again." The first time I posted this recipe, I named it "Guilt-Less Lemon Yogurt Cake". This time, I used Meyer lemons, instead of Eureka lemons-- but either lemon works very well. You can see step-by-step photos on how to make this right here.
This time, I used a bundt pan and I made two changes-- I added pure lemon extract into the batter, for more flavor. I also used low-fat vanilla yogurt since I didn't have Greek yogurt on hand. The cake took about 45 minutes to be ready, but I always say it's safer to check your cakes before the suggested time (Ina says 50 minutes).
Thanks to Baker's Joy, I can easily spray my bundt pan and the cake slips right out! Allow the cake to cook for about 5 minutes, on a cooling rack.
While the cake is almost finished baking, I made a simple syrup of lemon juice and sugar. Pour it on the warm cake, and allow it to absorb.
Once the cake has cooled, I made a quick glaze of powdered sugar and fresh lemon juice.
... and I spooned the glaze over the top, and allowed it to pour down the sides. Nice!
To me, bundt cakes are so effortless to make. There's no fussing with making icing (I never buy canned icing... bleccccccccccch!) There's no need to slice the cake and frost them.
Once sliced, they also transport well in lunch boxes. They also taste great with a fresh cup of coffee or tea. My family loves this cake. It's fool-proof and it disappears really fast.
You can view a printable recipe at the bottom of this page. Make this cake, I tell you! It'll quickly become a keepsake, if you love lemon.
Whatever happened to my childhood Christmas time-line? As a kid, it seemed as though that special day of our family gathering to celebrate on Christmas Eve would never come. Being of German descent, my mother would make a traditional German dinner and then the kids would disappear into our bedrooms. We couldn't come out until we heard Mutti ringing a bell to signal that the "Krist Kindlein" (Christ Child) had come. Our parents weren't particularly well-to-do, but my memories were that gifts were abundant.
Now that my parents are gone, I try to carry on the traditions to my own son and niece. German Stollen is very much a part of my Christmas childhood memories. I've never made my own Stollen, and it's been my Recipe Bucket List for several Christmas's past. In the meantime, I have resorted to buying German Stollen's from Trader Joe's. They're not bad, as long as you eat a slice with a cup of coffee. A few days ago, I spotted King Arthur Flour's recipe for their Easiest Stollen. Traditional Stollen is made with yeast; this version uses ricotta cheese and baking powder. I was intrigued, and grateful, to find a short-cut since December 23rd was the first-- and only-- day that I had to bake something to give as gifts.
There are two ingredients that King Arthur recommends to make this recipe-- Buttery Sweet Dough Flavor and Lemon Oil. I fell in-love with the Buttery Sweet Dough flavor, about a year ago. It smells like yellow cake batter, and it gives a special flavor to any of your baked goods. Trust me, this is one of my favorite products that I order from King Arthur Flour's website (yes, I pay for it... I'm not given this for free). The lemon oil is a great product, because it's a natural product, made from the lemon rind (unlike lemon extract). Is it required that you use these? No. The lemon oil is a shortcut from having to zest lemons, and I think it packs a great punch of lemon citrus. Of course, you need pure vanilla.
As you can see, I shop, often, online at KAF-- I bought this European candied mix peel, last Christmas. It was destined to become Stollen. It never happened, so I used half to make an Easter Ricotta Pie. The other half was exactly enough to make this stollen recipe-- and it was still good to go! You can use any kind of dried fruit-- cranberries, raisins... whatever you like. If I didn't have this fruit, I would have chosen golden raisins because they are very traditional.
Almonds are the traditional nut to add to Stollen. I didn't have slivered almonds, but I always keep a bag of sliced almonds on hand. These are already toasted, which really brings out the flavor.
For the dry ingredients, we need flour, salt, baking powder and salt...
For the wet ingredients, we need ricotta cheese, vanilla. Add lemon zest or use the optional lemon oil and Buttery Sweet Dough Flavor...
...give it whisk and smell. Wow! The aroma smells so good with the vanilla, lemon and emulsion!
The dry ingredients are whisked together, and then the nuts and dried fruit is added...
Now, we need COLD butter.
My shortcut is to grate cold (or frozen) butter. It works great!
Time to make dough!
With a stand-mixer, it takes a minute or two (or, you can do this by hand).
Perfect!
Now, we add the wet ingredients...
...and mix until the flour is just moistened. Don't overwork it!
Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface, and knead it two or three times, until it holds together.
Cut the dough in half. In my case, I cut the dough into thirds. I was going to give two away, and keep one for "us".
My own "twist" to this recipe was to add a very traditional ingredient-- Marzipan. I love it. Skip it if you don't like it...
I decided to make one Stollen without marzipan and two with (guess which one is for "us"?) Now fold the Stollen in half, leaving the top half a little short of the edge. (I have read that the shape is to symbolize the Baby Jesus wrapped in swaddling clothes.)
These are baked at 325F for about 40 minutes. Because these are smaller (at 3 Stollen), I set my timer for 25 minutes. They are perfect and smell really great! To me, they seemed more like a large cookie..but I carried on with the next few steps:
Remove the stollen from the oven, and transfer to a rack. Brush them each with 2 to 3 tablespoons melted butter. Sprinkle heavily with confectioners’ sugar.
Allow the stollen to cool, then brush with butter again, and sprinkle with sugar again. I know this appears to be a bit excessive, but trust me-- it's how the German's roll (said with affection).
Now, for the moment of truth...
VERDICT: This recipe gets the O-M-G rating from me! The stollen reminds me of Biscotti, without the crunch of a second bake. The outside texture is a little crunchy, which isn't how must authentic stollens are. However, the inside is moist and has just the right amount of density to it. The flavor... (rolls eyes). I think the Buttery Sweet Dough flavor is something you have to experience. The flavor tastes like vanilla, lemon and butter. The fruit is just the right amount. The powdered sugar coating give just the right amount of balance. I'm beginning to have my first pangs of greed selfishness.
One Stollen was devoured by my husband and son. They love it! I set one Stollen on the table, unsliced. Is this a subliminal message "look, but don't eat"?
The next day, I unwrap the third Stollen, and give it a fresh dusting of powdered sugar.
VERDICT #2: I think these taste better after a day...or two. The spirit of giving is alive and well! OK, so I didn't give these away. I shared them. This is a new Christmas tradition for me to make, only I'll quadruple how much I make. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I like this recipe better than the yeast type of bread. Seriously. I don't think I'll wait an entire year to make this again. A slice, or two, of this with a hot cup of coffee brings back memories of watching my Mutti dunk hers with glee.
I used Random.Org to choose a number so that I could announce the winner of my Tate's Bake Shop Giveaway. The number was 21, which goes to:
It's a toss up between chocolate chip and frosted sugar cookies!! I keep seeing the Tate's cookies everywhere but have yet to try them. Yum!
Congrats, and please email me at foodiewife (at) gmail.com so that I can forward your mailing address to the nice folks at Tate's Bake Shop.
In closing, I'm amazed that my goal of exercise, and cutting back on eating the treats I've been baking-- well, I've lost nine pounds since December 1st! Now that the holidays are over, I'm going to start posting some of the recipes I've been making that are not loaded with as much butter and heavy cream as I'd fallen into a habit of eating.
What a wild week it's been with my hectic work schedule! Next Tuesday, I begin my vacation until January 3rd. Today, I managed to get the tree and house decorated. I was feeling a time crunch to write a review for Artisan Bakeware and for Tate's Bake Shop. Last week, I received a lovely small unglazed loaf pan from Artisan Bakeware.
I have only a few pieces of stoneware, and I have to say that I liked the feel of this American hand-painted baking product.
Right after Thanksgiving, I received this lovely package in the mail, from Tate's Bakery:
...and I also received:
...a copy of Tate's Bake Shop owner, Kathleen King's, cookbook. I bookmarked a dozen recipes. It's a lovely cookbook, indeed.
Alas, the cookies are all gone and I didn't have time to blog my own giveaway as quickly as I had hoped (as so many of my fellow food bloggers have). I ate two each of the chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal raisin and macadamia nut (in a three-day period). I'm going to talk more about which cookies we liked best when I do post a Tates Bake Shop giveaway (my next post, I promise) and that is when I will give one lucky reader a chance to win the same cookie package, and cookbook, for your own home. Today, I want to be fair to Artisan Bakeware, by focusing on reviewing how their product worked . Fortunately, I found a recipe for Double Berry Crumb Muffins on page 14 of the Tate's Bake Shop Cookbook. I decided to double the recipe so that I could bake a "tea loaf".
Since I live in California, we grown our own olallieberries in our backyard. I also buy extra from a local farm stand, and then freeze them in 2 cup increments. Chinese take-out style boxes are perfect for this:
I do a quick thaw with running water...
(There will be a printable recipe at the bottom of this post.)
Here are the dry ingredients: unbleached flour, sugar, salt and baking powder. I reserved some of the flour and sprinkled them over the berries. I do this so that the berries won't sink to the bottom of each muffin.
Melt 1/2 cup of butter. (You see two sticks, because I'm doubling the recipe.)
The streusel has chopped pecans, brown sugar, flour, butter and fresh orange zest. Set that aside.
The wet ingredients are milk, eggs and the melted butter. Whisk them together, and add to the dry ingredients.
Mix the wet and dry just until combined; don't over mix. Gently fold the berries in. You can grease a muffin tin, but I decided to use muffin liners. This is my large muffin tin, which makes six at a time.
Top each muffin with the streusel. NOTE: Next time, I'll add double the amount of streusel.
Bake at 400F for 20-24 minutes. My muffins were extra-large, so they took a little extra time. A tip I learned from King Arthur Flour-- tip the muffins to one side so that they don't become soggy on the bottom. After a few minutes, move them to a cooling rack.
... and here's the muffin recipe as a sweet loaf of goodness.
Taking a deep breath, I rotated the pan and the loaf slipped right out! For the final test, I wondered how easy this unglazed loaf pan would be to clean...
Effortless! Just like new!
POTTERY REVIEW: I strive to be respectful to my planet, my country and my health. Emmerson Creek Pottery is American made. Their products are lead-free and they're hand-painted. This loaf pan retails for $11.00 on their website. My wish list-- and that means I'd love to own more of this product-- would be the larger loaf pan, that retails for $19.00. If wishes were fishes, I'd want the unglazed deep dish pizza pan, retail price $23.00. I spent some time perusing their website, and I took a particular liking to their lavender hand painted design. I think that any of these pieces would make a beautiful heirloom that will last for many years to come.
Recipe Review: I love to bake homemade muffins for breakfast. I was able to make this batter in 15 minutes, plus take photographs. This recipe is easy enough for beginner bakers. The texture of the muffins were moist and very tender. There were a LOT of berries, so decrease the amount if you prefer more muffin to berry ratio. My husband adores berries, so he was very happy with the way I made them. The cinnamon is very subtle, and the sweetness was just right. I would definitely layer more streusel on top (which explains why I had some leftover), and maybe chop my pecans not quite as small as I did this time (I cheated and used a mini-chopper). I loved the orange zest, which complimented the cinnamon and berries perfectly. The "tea loaf" was equally moist. On a five star rating, this earned a 4 1/2 by my husband, son and me. I ate one, thank you very much. How's that for willpower? The boys will devour the rest, no doubt.
I'm baking another Tate's Bake Shop recipe, as I type this post. I will queue that post, next, and tell you how you could win an assortment of Tate's Bake Shop Cookies and a cookbook of your own. So, if you didn't win on the multitude of other bloggers who had this giveaway-- maybe this is your lucky chance!
Here's the recipe, and I hope you try these!
I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255 Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. Tomoson Product review & giveaway Disclosure.
" The first time I posted this recipe, I named it "Guilt-Less Lemon Yogurt Cake". This time, I used Meyer lemons, instead of Eureka lemons-- but either lemon works very well. You can see step-by-step photos on how to make this right here. 
into the batter, for more flavor. I also used low-fat vanilla yogurt since I didn't have Greek yogurt on hand. The cake took about 45 minutes to be ready, but I always say it's safer to check your cakes before the suggested time (Ina says 50 minutes). 
, I can easily spray my bundt pan and the cake slips right out! Allow the cake to cook for about 5 minutes, on a cooling rack.
