Monday, December 7, 2009

Biscuit FAIL.















This is really embarrassing. I made this recipe 3 times.
Read this recipe, notice anything?
Overt HINT: self-rising flour. 

Mama's Mayonnaise Biscuits from Bon Appetit, Y'all by Virginia Willis

1 tblsp. canola oil, for the tin
2 cups self-rising flour (Southern)
3 tblsp mayonnaise
1 c. whole milk
1 tsp. sugar


Preheat the oven to 350 deg. Brush a 12-cup medium muffin tin with oil.

Combine the flour, mayonnaise, milk and sugar in a bowl. Using a spoon or an ice cream scoop, spoon dough into each muffin cup, filling about half full. Alternatively, drop spoonfuls of the dough onto a greased baking sheet. Bake until golden brown, 15 to 20 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool slightly, then invert the biscuits onto the rack to cool until warm. Serve warm.















In the notes for this recipe, Southern flour (White Lily or Martha White) is recommended. In order to accommodate this recommendation, I would have to order it online, but I thought I'd get all experimental-like and follow the suggestion that Virginia Willis makes for those of us who don't have easy access to Southern flour, which is to use 1 part all-purpose four and 1 part cake flour. However, I decided I'd take it up a notch and use half whole wheat flour and half cake flour. Mistake! I would absolutely not recommend using whole wheat flour for biscuits. Even if the package says it has the qualities of white flour. It really doesn't.

But that's not the half of it. From my very obvious hint that I gave you earlier, the recipe calls for self-rising flour. If you want to sub with all-purpose flour, then you have to add the baking powder and salt yourself. And here's the embarrassing part. I forgot to add the baking powder. Not once, but twice.  I made the first batch and they turned into hardened dough. I thought it was the muffin tin I was using which was stoneware, not tin, and maybe you had to preheat it? So I start over and decide to use a baking sheet instead. Exact. Same. Result. omg. It hits me. You didn't add the baking powder!?#@$!!
Lord, help me.

Still, THE THIRD ATTEMPT looked nothing like the gorgeous photo in the cookbook. And that's because I used part whole wheat flour. The biscuits were edible at least, but tasty? No. Light and flaky, definitely not. I will not be using this recipe again unless I have acquired Southern flour. Maybe I'll buy some at Publix when I'm home over Christmas.

Oh well, you win some, you lose some.

















See, I told you, hardened dough.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Liqueurs, Cordials, Digestifs....



I almost forgot about them. They were the serene occupants of my kitchen counter, waiting patiently for their time to be up, letting the alcohol extrude all their fabulous fruit sugars. There was Super Sweet Strawberry, In Every Way Fall Fruit & Nut, Too Tart Olallieberry, Oh That's Not Good Pluot and Lime, and the Queen herself, A Hint of Spice Cherry Nectar, who was the oldest and the wisest.

Making liqueurs is so easy and so satisfying that for awhile there I was quite the addict. There is something so delightful about putting fruit in a jar with sugar, spices and alcohol, forgetting about it for awhile and then voila! You have this fragrant and potent cordial that will last indefinitely, that gets you tipsy with one sip, and can be the base for an array of cocktails.





















As you can tell from the names of the liqueurs above, some were more successful than others. The Pluot (a cross between a plum and an apricot) was an experiment gone bad. I used what was handy, which was pluots, lime and vanilla. I know they sound like they would go well together, but take my word for it, they don't. I was disappointed that the Olallieberry didn't work out because the berries were a gift from local farmer, Alex Weiser. And because, well, they're olallieberries. It's not a berry that you hear about every day. An olallieberry is a cross between the loganberry and the youngberry, each of which is itself a cross between blackberry and another berry (raspberry and dewberry, respectively). Did you get that?

However, the Cherry turned out very well according to Jonathan (my roommate and best friend who has become a liqueur/cordial fan despite his general lack of interest in alcohol with the exception of wine). I had also bottled some up for my Thanksgiving host family (the ever-spicy Hamaoui's) for them to sample. It got rave reviews. Here's the recipe from an amazing book called "Preserving" that no one ever refers to, but really should. It's a part of the Time-Life Good Cook Series edited by Richard Olney.














Cerises รก l'Eau de Vie or Cherry Nectar, adapted from Preserving.

2 lbs cherries, I believe I used Rainier cherries when they were in season. I have heard you can use whole frozen cherries, if you don't want to wait til cherry season in spring. But I would say wait til you get them fresh.
1 L brandy
2 cloves
1 cinnamon stick
1 cup sugar

Put the cherries in jars with cloves and cinnamon. Melt the sugar over low heat, and cook until this syrup reaches the hard-ball stage, 250 deg F on a candy thermometer. Cool the syrup slightly, then stir in the brandy. Mix well and let cool completely. Pour the syrup over the cherries. Seal the jars.

I shook the jars daily for a few maybe the first three months. Total sit time is 6 months. You can let this steep for much longer, if you prefer. When infusion is complete, strain the fruit from the alcohol. You can eat these brandy-drenched cherries, which are magnificent with vanilla ice cream.