Unlike other granola recipes I’ve auditioned, this one calls for heating the oil, honey, and maple syrup before adding it to the dry goodies. Loosening up the sticky stuff made it very easy to distribute evenly.

Ingredients:

Procedure:

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat oven to 325ºF.
2. Mix together oats, triticale, coconut, nuts, and seeds.
3. Combine oil, maple syrup, and honey in a small saucepan and heat until warm.
4. Pour liquid over oat mixture and toss to coat.
5. Spread granola in an even layer on a rimmed baking sheet.
6. Bake, stirring every five minutes, until the granola is light golden brown, about fifteen minutes. When it’s ready, the granola will still look a bit “wet,” but will smell quite toasty.
7. Stir in raisins or cherries.
8. Let granola cool to room temperature and store in an airtight container.

Yields two 9″x3″ loaves. (can very easily be halved.)

Ingredients:

Procedure:

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF. Prepare two 9″ x 3″ loaf pans.
2. Whisk together flours, spices, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
3. Beat together sugar and oil until well blended.
4. Add eggs, vanilla, and chai (or water — the chai is just a way to squeeze in more flavor).
5. Beat until mixture is even and smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl and the beater as necessary.
6. Add flour mixture all at once. Stir gently until just mixed.
7. Fold in pumpkin puree until uniform.
8. Stir in nuts or seeds, and cranberries, if you like.
9. Divide batter between the loaf pans and bake, about one hour, until a toothpick inserted in the center of the loaf emerges clean.
10. Cool on a wire rack about ten minutes, then remove bread from the pans and cool completely before slicing or wrapping.

Ingredients:

Procedure:

1. Mix oats, milk and sugar. Let sit five minutes.
2. Stir in cooled melted butter and eggs.
3. Mix in dry ingredients until just combined.
4. Fold in nuts.
5. Spoon into muffin cups and bake at 350º F. until an inserted toothpick emerges clean.

Ingredients:

Procedure:

1. Rinse wild rice. Set a medium sized saucepan full of water to boil and cook rice until tender, 30-40 minutes.
2. In a separate pot, bring 1 cup water to boil and add brown rice. Cover, turn heat to low, and cook until all of the water is absorbed and the rice is tender.
3. If rices are cooked before you are ready to assemble the dish, take care to keep them moist and warm.
4. In a small sauté pan, heat butter with a little bit of olive oil.
5. Caramelize shallot, leek, or onion, then turn heat down slightly and add garlic. Cook a bit more, until the “bite” is dissipated.
6. Combine rices, the butter-and-onion mixture and raw spinach.
7. Cover and heat until spinach is wilted, just a few moments.
8. Sprinkle on hazelnuts and season to taste with pepper and salt.

    
Inspired by a certain shortbread cookie at a certain local bakery, I have been adding peanuts to just about everything lately. Behold, a very simple, chocolatey brownie, dressed up with the unlikely but delicious peanut. Above, mine are looking a tad underdone, but no less tasty.

Procedure:

1. Stir together the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, almonds and butter.
2. On medium-low speed, “cut” in the butter. It’s right when the mixture looks like coarse meal and the butter pieces are roughly pea-sized.
3. Leave the mixer on and slowly add the buttermilk, pouring it in a long, slow, stream.
4. You will probably not need the full cup of buttermilk; and you’ll be sorry if the dough is too wet.
5. Stop pouring when the dough begins to stick together. It should be crumbly, but not dry. When you press it together between your fingers, it will feel almost satiny, though not slick or wet. Stir in the strawberries. Keep in mind that adding fresh or frozen berries will also add moisture.
6. Turn the dough out onto a very lightly floured cutting board. Pat it out into a circle,approximately nine inches in diameter and maybe an inch and a half thick.
7. Brush top and sides with egg wash, if using.
8. Cut into wedges – eight or twelve according to your preference.
9. Use your knife to transfer the scones to your baking sheet. The dough may try to stick to the cutting board; do not be alarmed.
10. Bake at 400º F. until the edges are golden brown and you cannot stand waiting a moment longer.
11. Let cool on the baking sheet for just a few moments. The are at their very best still warm.

I do not often bake cakes. Cake, somehow, has become dessert of higher order. Cakes mark birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, graduations – and evidently conception – and these are no ordinary events. Cakes signal extra-specialness. I’m more of a cookie girl myself. I’m big on breakfast pastries and quickbreads. I like me a real nice tart once in a while. But I only make cake when someone else is having a party and I am asked very nicely to provide dessert.

There are two noteworthy results of this trend: One: Whenever I do make a cake, I am always eager to test a new recipe that I’ve been sitting on for weeks, maybe months. Two: Since I get such little practice, I’m not terrifically good at it.
I have picked up a few tricks over the years, though – most from the Infamous Frenchman – and this handful of techniques has served me relatively well. Attempting to be sensible, this time around I only altered one piece of the cake puzzle and stuck with the rest of my usual construction. There was little chance that the fillings, frosting, or decoration would go awry – the only wildcard this time around was Sally Schneider’s Nut Cake recipe. But it isn’t as if I found the Nut Cake recipe stuck to the underside of a MAX seat, Ms. Schneider seems to know what’s what (far better than I).

J9′s Nuts and Berries Cake, for Julia and Skippy

Components:
• Berry Compote (I used cherries and marionberries and a little bit of sugar, cooked down until very thick.)
• Fresh raspberries
• Fresh blueberries
• Candied hazelnuts
• Lemon Chantilly (chantilly = heavy whipping cream + confectioner’s sugar)
• Edible flowers
• Sally’s Nut Cake (mine was almond and hazelnut)