No Knead | My Kids Really Eat This

We have new neighbors so I made some cookies and bars to bring over to them; welcome them. They haven’t moved in yet, doing renovations, but the builder was there and put them in the fridge. I got a message that did get them at least, just have to wait to meet them.

I made the Apricot In-Betweens my friend blogged about here. I actually made 3/4 of the pan with apricot and put chocolate chips in the other 1/4. Both tasted great.

I thought of making some chocolate cookies but didn’t have the patience (nor time) to make most recipes- melting chocolate and then chilling the dough for a couple of hours when there was a ton of housework calling out to me, just didn’t seem like the best idea. So, chocolate chip cookies are an easy thing to make. But still I wanted something, more… I found it in the form of Ghirardelli’s White Mocha Hot Chocolate Mix. I made the recipe (but just half) from just the back of a Trader Joe’s semi-sweet chocolate chip package but substituted the White Mocha mix for the white sugar. It was subtle but delicious, especially when still warm from the oven.

Mocha Chocolate Chip Cookies

Combine:

1 1/4 cups flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

Set aside.

Mix until creamy:

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup Ghirardelli’s White Mocha mix

1/2 cup softened unsalted butter

1/2 tsp vanilla

Add 1 egg and beat.

Mix in dry ingredients.

Stir in 1/2 package chocolate chips (about 6-8 oz)

Place rounded spoonfuls onto cookie sheet and bake at 375F (preheated) for 8-10 minutes. Makes about two dozen cookies.

I also mixed the ingredients together for the No-Knead Bread I posted here. It’s best to mix the dough the day before you’re baking it. I made this one with regular flour and just a Tbsp of ground flax-seed. Yum! Really, such a great method. I never used to bake bread, now I make it all the time!

Last week I mentioned my desire to make bread for the kids (and me, love my carbs!) but didn’t have the time to make the no knead recipe I’d seen by Mark Bittman in the NY Times. It comes from the Sullivan St Bakery and found on their site. Since I had planned it out this time around I could make it.

I am not a huge baker and like to cook because I can improvise; in baking it’s very important to follow directions. I guess I just have a hard time doing that, even here. So, I decided to use 1/3 Spelt flour and 2/3 unbleached wheat flour. I also looked up some yeast starter recipes too becuase I love a good sour dough. I didn’t have the time to let the yeast ferment but I started it ahead of the rest of the mixing. I took 1/3 of the flour mixture, the yeast, one cup of water and a teaspoon of organic cane sugar. I let it sit in a warm place in a glass container for a couple of hours. Then I mixed the rest of the flour, salt and water in with my starter. For the first 8 or so hours the day was warm and I let the dough rise in the calphalon dutch as directed, but when I woke up the next day to turn/pull it I noticed how the sudden temperature drop affected the rising, it had sunk a little.

This is the pre-oven state. It never regained that really puffy state because it wasn’t as warm, but when I got it out of the oven, saw the golden top, cut it, and smelled the waft of fresh yeasty bread, I was so thrilled. The taste totally lived up to the sight and smell. And my kids loved it! So did everyone lucky enough to have a taste—a friend I brought a taste to, my husband and I.

If you see from the recipe, it does not take a lot of hands-on time. Plus you can give your kids the most wholesome hard-crusted, soft-centered bread without the unnecessary vitamins (if they eat well, you don’t need fortified bread, cereal, oj, etc, etc.) and other ingredients.

My Kids Really Eat This

getting kids to eat well in the real world

Tag Archives: no knead

A Day of Baking

Homemade Bread- No Knead