From Scratch, With Love

So you know how I’m into oatmeal?  Really, you don’t?  How about now?  Or now?  Or now?  Ok, so I’m into oatmeal.  I eat it almost every day, at least once.

Let’s backtrack.  On Saturday, I got this amazing book, Perfect Light Desserts, in the mail.  I immediately made Nick Malgieri’s oatmeal raisin cookies, chocolate chip cookie, and granola bars, all of which turned out delicious.  The chocolate chip cookies, however, were a little flat and not quite up to par with Kim Boyce’s whole wheat chocolate chip cookies, though they were lower in calories.  So I thought to myself, using my brain, what can I do to give these cookies a little more volume?  And of course I thought of oatmeal.

See, I still wanted to keep them healthy, so I didn’t want to raise the caloric density of the cookies.  Adding oatmeal, actually, lowered the calories per cookie, since it made more cookies without raising the amount of calories dramatically.  Why do you care about calories, Andrea, you might ask.  Aren’t you always tweeting about running?  Well yes, dear reader, I exercise (a lot).  But you may have noticed, I also write a food blog.  As a result, I also eat a lot.  That’s why this new book is perfect – it allows me to bake real cookies and cakes with real techniques and ingredients, without completely negating all the running I’m doing.  Genius.

Anyway, here’s my experiment.  I took Nick Malgieri’s basic chocolate chip cookie recipe (which he attributes to David Joachim, the co-author, by the way), with my own basic alterations (I had to add whole wheat flour, of course, and hand-chop the chocolate instead of using chocolate chips.  Thanks again Kim Boyce.  I also used about half the chocolate called for in the recipe and (John agrees) it was the perfect amount – any more would have been way too much.), and added oatmeal.  However, I also wanted to see what the effect would be of adding cooked oatmeal to the dough, since I never see that in cookie recipes, but it works very well in muffins.  So I decided to make two half-batches of the dough by dividing the dry ingredients and wet ingredients in half and trying two different methods of oatmeal integration.

The results? Well… dry oatmeal works better.  After I added the wet oatmeal (made with 3/4 cup water and 1/2 cup oats, in an attempt to make it less wet), the dough was far too moist:

Looks like it would be delicious eaten with a spoon though, doesn't it?

I ended up adding an extra 1/2 cup of dry oats to the dough to try to dry it out a little, but wasn’t too successful.  The cookies ended up very wet and with a weird texture:

They’re in the freezer right now because I want to try them out as ice cream sandwich cookies.  The cookies made with dry oatmeal, however, are amazing.  They are definitely more 3-D than the original chocolate chip cookies I made and they also have a nicer texture.  I’m really happy with them and will definitely be making them like that in the future, perhaps even with more oats!

Low Fat Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies (Adapted from Nick Malgieri’s Perfect Light Desserts) – Makes about 36 cookies

Preheat oven to 350, with the racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven.  Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.  Roughly chop 4 oz of top-quality bittersweet chocolate and place in the fridge if the room is warm (my kitchen is always warm).

In a medium bowl, sift together

3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt (or 1/2 teaspoon table salt)

Stir with a fork to mix and set aside.

In a large bowl, cream together 1/4 cup (1/2 stick, 4 tablespoons) softened unsalted butter and 6 tablespoons granulated sugar.  Add 1/2 cup packed brown sugar (recipe calls for light, I used dark) and stir until creamy.  Stir in 1 egg and 2 tablespoons whole milk.  Stir in 1 teaspoon vanilla extract.

Gradually stir the flour mixture into the butter mixture, in three batches, stirring until just combined.  This is important, since it’s a low fat recipe.  You don’t want to over stir the batter or the cookies won’t be soft and chewy.

Once the flour is stirred in, add 1 cup of old fashioned rolled oats.  Stir until just combined, then add the 4 oz of chopped chocolate.  Let the dough rest in the fridge for about 15 minutes so that the cookies don’t spread too much.

See how much better that dough looks?

Once chilled, spoon slightly heaping teaspoon-sized portions of dough onto the parchment-lines cookie sheets, about 1 inch apart.  Bake for 8-12 minutes, turning and switching shelves halfway through, or until the cookies are slightly dull in color, but still quite soft.  They should be just beginning to brown on top.  Let them cool on the cookie sheet for 5 minutes, then slide the parchment paper onto the cooling rack to cool completely.  They should be good for about a week in an airtight container, or indefinitely in the freezer (they will stay pretty soft!).  Try making ice cream sandwiches with them!

On another note I also made Nick’s (we’re on a first name basis now) chocolate spice cookies – amazing!  They’re soft and spiced and super chocolate-y!  I heartily recommend this book.

I’m really into muffins.  I think it has something to do with my obsession with breakfast.  Also, with muffins, you just need a good base recipe, then you can add whatever you want to it.  Finally, muffins are very forgiving and unlike cupcakes and many other baked goods, you don’t need to measure too carefully.

There are a couple things I like to do with muffins that might sound a little different.  First of all, I always use buttermilk.  I like the tang and the moisture it adds.  Second of all, I always separate my egg whites and yolks and beat the egg whites.  It adds a nice fluffines.  Finally, I always use melted butter, not oil.  It gives it a wonderfully buttery flavor.

After making oatmeal pancakes a couple months ago, I decided that the same idea could be applied to muffins.  See, muffins and buttermilk pancakes have a lot of similarities.  Have you noticed?  A base muffin recipe is basically a base pancake recipe with a little more sugar and a little less liquid.  I tried to adjust this recipe twice.  The first time they came out a little too dense, indicating I used a little too much liquid.  They were also too sweet and oily.

The second time (yesterday) they came out perfectly.  I brought them to my running club and I was inundated with praise.  The oatmeal gives them a nice texture, and the molasses gave it a rich flavor.  In addition, they are pretty healthy, as muffins go, since I didn’t have to use a lot of butter and sugar (in case you are wondering they’re about 180 calories each).

Having just gotten Perfect Light Desserts (by Nick Malgieri) after trying the chewy oatmeal raisin cookies that David Lebovitz posted on his blog, I was also inspired to add a little applesauce to replace some of the oil, so the muffins would be less greasy but still moist.  Here’s the base recipe I created, along with some ideas for variations.  I made them into oatmeal raisin muffins, which I think would be great around the holidays.  As a side note, those oatmeal raisin cookies from Perfect Light Desserts are amazing – they stay chewy for days and are really good as ice cream sandwich cookies AND they’re only 55 calories each.  I recommend trying them.

Andrea’s New Muffin Base Recipe (Inspired by Kim Boyce’s Oatmeal Pancake Recipe from Good to the Grain)

Preheat oven to 400 and line a 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners, or grease each cup individually.

Prepare 1 cup of oatmeal and let cool.  To do so, boil 1 cup of water and add 1/2 cup of old fashioned or quick cooking oats.  Cook according to package directions.

Melt 3 Tablespoons of butter in the microwave or a double-boiler and let cool.

In a large bowl, sift together:

1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup oat flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt (or 1/2 teaspoon table salt)
1/2 cup granulated sugar

Set aside.

Separate 2 eggs, putting the whites in a clean medium bowl, and the yolks in a small bowl.  To the yolks, add 1/2 cup buttermilk, 1 tsp vanilla extract, 1 tablespoon molasses, and 2 tablespoons unsweetened applesauce.

Beat the egg whites with a whisk or hand-held mixer until soft peaks begin to form (not until stiff).

Now it’s time to mix it all together.  Make sure your oven is preheated, so that the muffins can go right into the oven before the baking powder is fully activated.

First, pour the buttermilk mixture into the flour mixture.  Gently stir until the flour is just moistened.  It will still be quite solid and dry.  Next, add the cooked oatmeal and gently fold it until just incorporated.  It will be lumpy.  That’s okay.  Next, fold in the melted butter (again, until just incorporated).  Add the beaten egg whites and fold gently.  Don’t worry about mixing it in too thoroughly.

Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin cups.  You want them basically all the way full, unlike with cupcakes, to get a nice mushroom top.  If you don’t get all 12 muffin cups full, add about 2 tablespoons of water to the empty cups to keep the pan from getting ruined and to add some moisture to the oven.

Bake for about 17 minutes, or until the top begins to brown.  You might want to bake it a little longer if you like the muffin tops crunchy.

Variations

For Blueberry Muffins: Add a fresh grating of nutmeg to the dry ingredients. Toss 2 cups of rinsed fresh blueberries with a couple of tablespoons of the dry ingredients (so they don’t sink) and fold them into the batter after the egg whites.

For Oatmeal Raisin Muffins: add a sprinkling of cinnamon to the dry ingredients and 1/2 cup of raisins (or dried cranberries) to the batter after the dry ingredients.

Honestly, the possibilities are endless.  Try adding chocolate chips, orange zest, chopped toasted nuts, mushed bananas, or grated apples.  You can substitute brown sugar for the white sugar and molasses (added to the buttermilk instead of the dry ingredients).  Let me know what you come up with!

Storage: Let cool completely and store in an airtight container for a couple of days or indefinitely in the freezer.  Defrost at room temperature overnight or in the oven at 400 for 7-10 minutes.  Enjoy the nice crunch the oven gives the muffin.

I know, I know, not everyone’s as excited about oatmeal as I am.  But let me tell you a story.  This story is about ice cream.

I love ice cream.  A wonderful thing about ice cream is the ability to make it taste like anything.  Haven’t you had cake batter ice cream?  Cheesecake ice cream?  Brownie ice cream?  And um… prosciutto ice cream?  Anyway, last week I went to Cold Stone and had cake batter ice cream for the first time.  It was delicious.  John had their cinnamon roll combination which consists of cake batter ice cream, cinnamon, cake bits, and nuts.  And it really tastes like a cinnamon roll.  Amazing!

Where is this going?  Well I feel that oatmeal also has the ability, like ice cream, to taste like something different.  You know this already if you get that instant oatmeal stuff that is flavored.  Now, I’m not advocating anything too crazy, but if you can add oatmeal to cookies, why can’t you make oatmeal taste like cookies?  Thus, chocolate chip cookie oatmeal was born.

It came to me on a run.  I googled it to no avail – any search I made ended up leading me to oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.  So, I thought to myself: what are the main components of a good chocolate chip cookie flavor?  Vanilla, brown sugar, butter, salt, and chocolate chips.  So, I did that.  It was awesome.  It really did have a nice cookie flavor to it, but without taking away from the fact that it was oatmeal.  I highly recommend it.  I also suspect Oatmeal Cookie Oatmeal would be similarly delightful.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Oatmeal

Make a serving of oatmeal by boiling 1 cup of water and adding 1/2 cup of old-fashioned rolled oats according to the directions on the box.  Pour into a bowl and stir in about 1/8 teaspoon of vanilla extract.  Let cool slightly until at a comfortable eating temperature.  Add 1/4 tablespoon of butter, 1 tablepoon of brown sugar, a pinch of salt, and about a tablespoon of dark chocolate chips.  Fold in the add-ins gently until well distributed and enjoy with a class of milk or a cappuccino.

I’m so proud of myself.

This last week I said to John, “How about I roast a chicken this weekend?”  Then later, “What if I were to barbecue it?”  He was more excited about the barbecue idea.  I’ve been excited since Monday.

I have roasted a chicken before.  Once.  During my previously mentioned first summer of independence in New York.  My best friend, Sarah, had come to visit and we decided to roast a chicken.  It was good, but I was much more amateur and it was nothing to get excited about.  Since then I’ve come to appreciate roast chicken much more and decided I had to make one.  And then my father made a great barbecue chicken last time I went to visit and I felt it would be a better meal for the season.  Especially since corn is in season.

Another great thing I discovered was that young chickens were on sale for 99 cents at the grocery store.  That’s $3.50 per chicken! That means this whole meal probably cost me less than $10 for two people.  AND we decided to not eat the breasts and save them for putting on salad this week, so that’s a protein for four meals (entree salad, summer entree salad, and “pilotto” later this week).  If I were more confident in my barbecuing skills I would have gotten two chickens and used one of them to put on my pita sandwiches for lunch instead of using deli chicken, which sells for $9/lb.  Next time.

So I’m going to share my barbecued chicken method with you.  I hope you try it so you can feel the great sense of accomplishment I feel right now.  I recommend half a chicken per person.  By the way, the credit for this method goes entirely to my father, who I interrogated over IM this morning on the best way to barbecue a chicken.  I’m not so skilled at barbecuing yet, having just started doing it this year.

Barbecued Chicken

Buy the smallest whole young chicken you can find.  The smallest my grocery store had was 3.5 lbs.  The younger ones are more tender and flavorful.  According to my father, the more commercial it is, the better it tastes, but I have yet to test this theory.  Other people swear the organic, grass-fed chickens are the best.  I just got mine at my local Stop and Shop (99 cents a pound!).

In a small bowl, combine 1/2 onion, minced, 4 cloves of garlic, minced, 1 tsp dried thyme, a grating of black pepper, and the juice from one lemon.  Set aside.

With a sharp knife, cut the chicken in half along the breast bone and spine.  With a paper towel, pat the chicken dry and place it in a dish.  Rub the skin and the inside with the onion mixture so that it is well distributed.  If you can, try to get it into the crevices and under the skin.  Flavor!

Start up your grill.  I just bought my grill today, having had only a small tailgating grill unsuitable for grilling a chicken.  Wow, what a lush, you might say.  Come on.  Everyone needs a good grill, especially with a whole summer ahead of them!  Plus now we have a real garage to put it in!

If using a coal grill, place the coals at the edges, not in the center of the grill, so that the chicken is receiving indirect heat.  Let the coals heat up for about half an hour, then cover the grill and go get your chicken halves.  Put the chicken halves on the grate skin-side down and cover.  After 10 minutes, flip the chicken halves.  The skin should be nice and browned from its high heat experience.  Baste the skin with olive oil and cover the grill again.  Grill it for 50 more minutes, basting every 15 minutes with olive oil.  After the 50 minutes are up, cut into a drumstick with a sharp knife.  If the drumstick is still pink, continue to grill, checking for doneness every five minutes.

When the chicken is done, transfer to a serving platter and salt.  Now would be a good time to grill come corn.

I served the chicken with a side summer salad variation and corn.  I reserved the chicken breast for other meals later this week.

I took a half day today.  It was very exciting.  I went home, stopping at the store on the way, and was very productive.  I made some pita bread for my lunches (I froze it so that it could last me two weeks of lunches.  I recommend it.  When lunchtime comes around, I just put the almost-thawed pita in the toaster oven and make my sandwich.  It’s delicious.) and then I made risotto.

I love risotto.  It’s so delightfully creamy and comforting.  Usually, I just make “risotto in bianco,” which is just your basic cheese risotto.  But I was feeling adventurous.  So I looked in the White Dog Cafe Cookbook, which is filled with all sorts of interesting recipes, and found a recipe for “Tomato and Sweet Corn Risotto.”  Well, guess what?  I also stopped by our farmer’s market yesterday and bought some corn, with no clear idea in mind of what to do with it.  BAM. Idea.  It’s a great use of summer vegetables.

Another thing: I normally don’t feel like cooking anything all that spectacular when I’m eating alone.  Tonight, John went to a happy hour with his friends from work, so I decided to just make a nice meal for myself.  I’m really glad I did.  Though, I must say, risotto is not the kind of meal that is good left over, so I had to cut the recipe in fourths.  Not an easy task.  But I succeeded. Smiley face!

So, this risotto calls for you to make a simple corn-based stock, so give yourself about an hour and a half for the whole recipe, or make the stock in advance and give yourself half an hour.  Let me know if you want the recipe as it is written, for four, since I had to make some estimations and adjustments and this won’t necessarily multiply well.

Tomato and Sweet Corn Risotto (from the White Dog Cafe Cookbook) (1 main dish or 2 side dishes)

Stock

Cut the kernels off 1 ear of sweet corn.  Set the kernels aside for the risotto later.  Put the corn cob in a pot with 1 clove of garlic, 1 boiling onion (I forgot this ingredient.  It was fine.), 2 basil stems, 2 peppercorns (I didn’t have any so I just ground some pepper into it), 1 bay leaf, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and 3 cups of water. Bring to a boil over high heat and then reduce to a simmer.  Cover and allow to simmer for an hour.

After it simmers, strain the stock into a smaller, clean pot and discard the solids.  Blend 1/4 cup of the stock in a blender with 1/2 cup diced fresh or canned tomato.  Return the puree to the stock and bring it to a gentle simmer over medium-low heat, covered.

Risotto

It’s a good idea to assemble all your ingredients beforehand with risotto, as it requires you to be close to the stove, stirring, for the majority of the process.

So, before you start, dice 1/4 cup of leek (the white part).  Mince 1 clove of garlic and set aside about 1/4 teaspoon of it (I put the rest of it on my salad).  Measure out a little less than 1/2 cup of arborio rice and 1/8 cup of dry white wine.  Dice 1/4 cup of fresh tomato and add to those kernels of corn that you had reserved from making the stock.  Chop up 1/2 cup of fresh basil and grate a little less than 1/4 cup parmesan or parmesan-like cheese.  You can do all this while the stock is simmering.  What an efficient use of time!

In a large saucepan, heat 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat until it ripples.  Add the leeks and stir for about 2 minutes until they are translucent but not browned.  Add the garlic and stir for another minute or so until aromatic.  Add the rice and stir for about 1-2 minutes.  Add the white wine.  When the wine is absorbed, add just enough simmering corn stock to cover the rice and cook, stirring, until the liquid is almost absorbed.  Keep adding stock and stirring until absorbed for about 20 minutes.  You probably won’t use up all the stock.  Once twenty minutes are up, taste the risotto and see if the rice is tender, but with a little bit of a “bite”.  If it is a little chewy or starchy, it needs a little more time.  You can still, however, add the corn and the diced tomato at this point.  Continue to cook, stirring, until the rice is the right consistency.  Turn off the flame.  Add 1/4 teaspoon salt and a grind of black pepper.  Fold in the basil, then the cheese.  Decant to a bowl and eat hot, perhaps with a small green salad.