Soft Pretzel Hearts

I've wanted to make soft pretzels for a long time, but have always been a bit intimidated.  They have a particular kind of a texture, and I never really thought I would be able to get that right.

I found a recipe in one of my bread machine cookbooks and it looked pretty simple.  I adapted it a bit and tried it out - here's how I did it:



Soft Pretzel Hearts

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups milk 
• 1 package dry active yeast 
• 2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar, plus a pinch or two more 
• 8 tablespoons butter, melted and divided 
• 1 1/4 teaspoons salt 
• 1 1/2 cups bread flour 
• 2 cups all-purpose flour 2 cups very hot water 
• 2 tablespoons baking soda 
• Nonstick spray 
• Coarse sea salt

Directions:

In a large, non-reactive bowl, heat the milk in the microwave until lukewarm, about 110 degrees.

Add the yeast, stir, and let it activate, about 3 minutes.

Next add the confectioners’ sugar and 4 tablespoons of the butter and stir to combine.

Sift together the salt, bread flour, and all-purpose flour. Add to the yeast mixture and knead for about 8-10 minutes, using either the hook attachment of a stand mixer or your hands.

Add the dough to a greased bowl and cover with plastic wrap and let it rise in a warm, moist environment until double in size, about 1 hour.

After the dough has risen, divide it into 12 equal portions.  (I use a food scale to make sure my portions are all exactly equal, but that's not necessary.)

Roll each portion out into a long, thin rope.

To form the pretzel, start by making the rope into a V.

Take the other two ends and join them, then twist into a heart shape.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Dissolve the baking soda into the very hot water and lightly oil 2 silpat covered baking sheets.

Take each pretzel and dip it into the baking soda-water bath and then place, seam side down, onto the oiled baking sheets, about 6 to each sheet.

Sprinkle each pretzel with coarse sea salt and bake in the oven until golden brown and puffy, about 10 minutes. Rotate the pan 180 degrees halfway through the baking.

While the pretzels are baking ,melt the last 4 tablespoons of butter. Add a pinch or 2 of the confectioners' sugar to the butter and stir. Dip the salted side of each pretzel into the butter when they're done baking and serve.

Delicious.  Soft and salty, and just delightful.  Though there were quite a few steps, they were really easy to make.  And they look fantastic!  Who could ask for a better Valentine's Day treat than these?!

Pin It

Fresh Pea Soup - A Taste of Spring Any Time of the Year

We've been picking a lot of peas in the last couple of weeks.  Despite that, we're having some pretty chilly weather this weekend.  Nothing like the folks on the East Coast, but chilly for us.

I love soup on a cold day.  And I wanted something that tasted of Spring.  Fresh Pea Soup is a delicious and healthy way to enjoy a taste of Spring in the winter.


Fresh Pea Soup

Ingredients:

• 8 cups homemade chicken broth
• 1 ham hock
• 2 cups diced potatoes
• 3 cups fresh (or frozen) peas
• 1 slight teaspoon citric acid
• 1 Serrano pepper (optional)

Directions:

In a large pot, bring the chicken broth and ham hock to a boil over high heat.  Lower heat to medium and simmer for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, if using fresh peas, trim the ends and rinse.

Add the potatoes to the pot and simmer for 15 minutes.

Now add the citric acid and the peas.

Bring to a boil and add the pepper.  Simmer for an additional 10 minutes.

In a food processor or blender, puree the soup until smooth.  Serve with a bit a feta cheese.

What a delightful flavor!  The ham hock adds a nice smoky flavor and the citric acid brightens the flavor of the peas.  Spring in a bowl!

Pin It

Easy BBQ Pork Sandwiches

Wouldn't you like to have these for dinner?  But, you work all day and need to have a dinner that you can make quickly.  After all, tonight is karate night, and everyone needs to eat and be ready to go 45 minutes after you get home from work, right?

Here's an easy fix!  All you need are a frozen pork roast, a bottle of your favorite BBQ sauce, a slow cooker and a timer.

Before you head off to work, drop your frozen pork roast into your slow cooker.  Pour the BBQ sauce over the meat and put the cover on the slow cooker.

Now set your timer.  It will take about 7 hours to cook on low, so set the timer to end about when you want to eat, count 7 hours back from there and that is where you set it to start.  Maybe the most important part of this step is to make sure to turn on the slow cooker.  Otherwise, you'll come home to cold and uncooked pork.  Not that I know about this from experience.

When you get home, shred the meat with two forks and serve!

Easy, delicious and fast.  My three favorite things for dinner.

And if you are not a fan of BBQ, this works with a jar of pasta sauce or a jar of salsa.  Don't have a pork roast to hand?  Frozen chicken breasts work beautifully too!

Pin It

Decorating Cookies

Now that you have these wonderful and lovely cookies, you may want to decorate them.  But you may not want to spend all day doing that.  Here are a couple of easy ways to finish them off.


Pretty Pink Glaze

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
• 2-3 tablespoons milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1-2 drops of red food coloring
• red decorating sugar (optional)

Directions:

Mix the ingredients together, using enough milk to make a relatively thin glaze.

I like to have glaze over the entire cookie, so I dip the bottoms in first and let them dry on a rack.

Then, dip them from the top and sprinkle with red sugar if desired.

Let these cookies dry, and you'll have delicious and beautiful treats!

Gold Bricks

Ingredients:

• 1 cup white chocolate chips
• 1 cup butterscotch chips
• 1 tablespoon light corn syrup
• 1 teaspoon shortening

Directions:

Melt the chips over a double boiler.

When the chips are about half melted, add the corn syrup and shortening.

This is a reasonably thick covering, so I only dip the tops into the melted "gold" mixture.  Once they have cooled and the "gold" has set, I like to outline the the design on the top using a toothpick.  Just makes it show up a little bit better.   Beautiful!  And so yummy.

How do you like to decorate cookies?

Pin It

Sugar Cookies for a Form Pan

Last year, in the after-Valentines's-Day sales, I got the cutest cookie pan.   Apparently I got the only one, because I've scoured the internet and cannot find a picture of it to show you. 

 And of course neglected to take a picture of mine. 

Anyway, I knew that I needed the right cookie recipe to use with this pan. It has great details, but often you will find cookies don't like to conform to the pan details very well. And those that do, often don't have great flavor. I think this recipe fits both requirements - pretty AND tastes good!

Sugar Cookies for Shaped Pans

Ingredients:

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract 
• 1/2 teaspoon  Almond Extract
• 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Lightly spray pan cavities with cooking spray.

In large bowl, beat butter and sugar with electric mixer at medium speed until well blended. Beat in egg and extracts; mix well. Combine flour and salt; add to butter mixture. Beat until well blended.

Press dough into cavities, filling 2/3 full.  This is important - too full (or not full enough) and the cookies won't be shaped properly.

Bake 9-10 minutes or until light brown around edges.

Cool in pan 5 minutes. Turn pan over; lightly tap pan to remove cookies. Cool completely on cooling grid.  Decorate with frosting or otherwise as desired.

You can see that just the very edges are brown.  Perfect!

These are very tender when they are just removed from the oven, so it is important to let them sit for a few minutes prior to removing them from the pan.  That will help them keep their shape and make decorating easier.

Tomorrow I'll show you an easy way to turn these cookies into showstoppers!

Pin It

Tuesday's Table - February 4, 2013

<center> <a href="http://zentmrs.blogspot.com/p/tuesdays-table.html" target="new"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDCRbJ1OffFjNfhzomn32_oClDmhZX5ze6WyVzynTfJQCKmgIPqqqpf0e2KDKHo-VJrq2APwuZDHxBSjqAHI4OGBay7DyZdLA5NamofjC4Yr5TwRcTfgsTCPP-mrg7pfNrQ_U8_Q/s1600/TuesdaysTable150x50-horiz.gif" /></a></center>

Time to fill Tuesday's Table!

Welcome February!  I love this month.  Ground Hog Day (one of my favorite movies) and Valentine's Day - great opportunities for fun baking.  And this month (in just over 2 weeks in fact) we're going on a Caribbean cruise!

Are you excited about anything this month?  Do you have some wonderful Valentine's Day recipes and ideas to share?  What is helping you get through the long winter months?  Bring your favorite ideas to share here!


We've had a lot of fun and creative links shared.  This week I chose Sara from Milwaukee Kitchen's Bananas Foster Cupcakes.  I was just trying to figure out something different to do with extra bananas - and these fit the bill!

Thanks for sharing - grab a button here!

I'll feature my favorite entry from this week on next week's post.  I hope you bring your favorites!

Only a few guidelines:

• Please share as many links as you like, but only if you haven't shared them here before.  
• Add a link back to Tuesday's Table (or grab a button above!) so others can join in the fun.  
• Sign up for my email reminder here.

No other requirements, but visit the other links here, and I'd love for you to follow me too!

And now, for this week's link party!

Pin It

Harvest for January 2013

Our winter garden is starting to wake up... and some of the summer garden just won't go to sleep!

We've got lots of hot peppers still growing.

The sweet peppers are still producing a few too!

And tomatoes - almost as well as we did in the summer.  Very strange.

Our carrots taste good, but are all quite small.

And the peas, the star of the show for now, grow like weeds!

2013 Harvest Totals:

Carrots	7.7
Peas	13.8
Tomatoes	0.5
Ghost Peppers	0.7
Scorpion Peppers	1.3
Habaneros	0.6
Serrano Chiles	0.8
Cayenne Peppers	0.1
Sweet Bell Peppers	3.7
Tomatoes	3.5
Jalapeno Pepper	0.3
Totals	2 pounds, 1 ounce

It's about lemon season - and I think we're in store for a bit of broccoli!  I hope we can keep up this nice weather for a while.

 Linked up with Daphne's Dandelions Harvest Monday... hop on over and see what else is being picked this week.

Pin It