HBin5: Soft Whole Wheat Bread

I'm loving how easy it is to make the recipes in "Healthy Bread in 5."  This week's challenge was soft whole wheat bread and a few of its variations.  I mixed up a batch of the bread dough about a week ago and let it sit in the fridge for at least 24 hours, as directed.

The bread turned out great on my first attempt.

I enjoyed eating this bread with homemade apple butter.

A week later, I used the rest of the dough to make the apple struesel bread.  I was so excited about this recipe.  The bread has a swirl of diced apples, walnuts, raising and raw sugar.  It's like a healthier version of cinnamon-raisin bread.  It looked beautiful right out of the oven.

The only strange thing is that both loaves of bread ended up with a "crack" in the top crust.  It was especially noticeable with the apple struesel bread because the filling was oozing out.  I made sure to put the swirl's "seam" on the bottom of the loaf, so I'm not sure why it cracked.  Is anyone else having the same issue?  I'm wondering if it has to do with the "gluten cloak."

I didn't have time to make the hamburger/hot dog buns for this week's challenge.  Plus, I used up all the dough making the soft whole wheat bread loaf and the apple struesel loaf.  I must be making my loaves too big, because I usually can only get three loaves out of a batch of dough, not the four that the book calls for.

Anyhow, I enjoyed the apple struesel bread for an afternoon snack today, with a cut up pear on the side.  So good!

Really enjoyed this week's project.  I'm pretty excited about the next project: red beet buns and chocolate tangerine bars.  It will be quite a culinary adventure! 

Peanut butter goodness

Another winter storm kept me home last week, so I decided to warm up the house by turning on the oven to bake.

A few weeks back, I found refrigerated cookie dough on sale.  I could probably count on my hand how many times I've bought ready-made cookie dough.  I love to bake from scratch, and cookies are so easy to make.  But I've been itching to try the Pillsbury Cook-Off million dollar winning Double Delight Peanut Butter Cookies.  So I picked up a tube of cookie dough at the grocery store.

I've been craving peanut butter like crazy this winter.  Not exactly sure why, but I've been eating a lot of PB&J sandwiches and adding a spoonful of PB to my hot oatmeal in the morning.  It really helps curb the mid-morning slump.  So I loved the idea of a peanut butter cookie with a surprise peanut butter filling.

First, I mixed together peanut butter and powdered sugar, then rolled mixture into tiny balls.

Then I wrapped peanut butter cookie dough around the PB balls.  Rolled the cookie dough in cinnamon and sugar, then popped them in an oven.

Ten minutes later, these lovelies were done.

OK...so they aren't much to look at.  But, boy, did I love these.  Lucky for me, my husband doesn't really like peanut butter cookies, so I had the whole batch pretty much to myself.  Wahoo!

Martha Mondays: Maple granola

I took a hiatus from Martha Mondays because of the holidays, the blizzards and the traveling.  Now that I have the luxury of free weekend, I set aside some time to make this week's Martha Mondays project, chosen by Maryann and Stirring It Up with Meg.  This week's pick was a good one: Maple granola from page 24 of the February issue of Martha Stewart Living.

My husband and I love granola, so I was excited to give this recipe a try.  I've tried a few other granola recipes before, always with mixed results.  The most difficult part of making granola is trying not to burn it.  The coconut and nuts in the granola, plus all the sweetener, can turn a little too brown too quickly if I'm not watching it.

Martha's maple granola was pretty standard:  maple syrup, coconut, walnuts, brown sugar and nutmeg.  We ran out of olive oil, so we used grapeseed oil (a favorite of my husband's) instead.  I skipped the sesame seeds and added chopped dried pears, since we're still trying to get through a box of dried fruit my husband bought on a whim this summer. (He wanted snacks for his fishing trips.)  I made a stop at a local health foods store, hoping to find unsweetened coconut chips, but I couldn't find them.  So I just added sweetened shredded coconut.

This may be my new favorite granola recipe.  I loved the sweetness of the maple syrup.  I poured a little milk over the top, trying to replicate the picture in MS Living.  My one complaint is that this granola may be a touch too sweet for my taste.  But it's very possible that I may have measured something wrong.  The granola actually turned the milk a light tan color, I'm assuming from the maple syrup.

I'm going to file this one away in my recipe box, but make a note to maybe reduce the maple syrup and/or brown sugar a tad.  Loved this week's Martha Mondays pick!  Thanks for the challenge!