Candied Orange Biscotti

Even though the days are getting nicer, brighter and longer...the nights here in the Pacific NW are still getting a bit chilly. So I am taking this shot at doing all of the wintery things I like doing, and doing them now while I still have those cozy nights to complete the scene. This means making things like hot chocolate....from chocolate. None of that powdered stuff, real hot chocolate. And would you believe that it is something kinda tricky to find that balance between smooth, creamy hot chocolate and it literally tasting like hot, melted chocolate. Anyways, I am straying from the point, C thought it would be a yummy idea to make biscotti to complement my hot chocolate quest. But this would be not just any ordinary biscotti, orange biscotti. Then, the idea got even better....candied orange biscotti. So that folks, in a nutshell, is the back story of today's treat...Candied Orange Biscotti!


What you will need:
Candied Orange Slices
1.5 c. orange slices (1-2 large oranges)
1.5 c. water
1/2 c. sugar

Biscotti
2 c. flour
1.5 tsp. baking powder
3/4 c. sugar
4 tbsp. Earth Balance (or your fav butter substitute)
2 tsp. grated orange zest
1/4 tsp. salt
2 Ener-G egg equivalents
candied orange slices

Begin by making your candied orange slices. Take your orange and cut it through from end to end, then slice each half into 1/4" slices. Set aside and take a large non stick pan, add your water and sugar, bring to a boil. Add your orange slices, arranging them neatly making sure to create a single layer of the slices. Let boil for about 10 minutes, turning over once half way through. Then, reduce the heat to medium and let it cook for 30 more minutes, turning orange slices every now and then. You should see your liquid turning into more of a sticky syrup, and your orange slices should also be turning slightly translucent. If after 30 minutes, you still have some liquid in your pan, continue to cook on a low simmer until it is all a thick syrup. Turn burner off and let your slices cool in the pan for at least 10 - 15 minutes. Set them onto parchment paper or a Silpat mat to cool completely.

While your orange slices and cooling, start to make your biscotti batter. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and prepare your baking sheet by lining it with parchment paper or a Silpat mat. Onto the good stuff....start by using your mixer to beat the sugar, butter, orange zest, and salt until it is well combined and getting a but light and fluffy. Slowly add half of your Ener-G egg equivalent, beat until it is incorporated, then add remaining half and mix. Add your flour and baking powder, slowly so it does not poof out and explode everywhere onto you.

Now, go back to your orange slices. These will be a sticky mess, but as best as you can, chop them up into bite sized pieces. Add this into your biscotti dough and mix to thoroughly incorporate candied orange bits into the dough evenly.

Take this big wad of dough, place onto your lined baking sheet and form it into a rectangle that is about 12 - 13" long and 3 - 4" wide. Put into preheated oven and bake for 40 minutes, or until it is a light, golden brown color. Set aside and let cool for at least 30 - 60 minutes.


After the biscotti has cooled, you get to do the fun part. Preheat the over (again...I know...) to 350 degrees. Use a sharp knife (serrated works well here) and cut the biscotti rectangle on the bias, cutting diagonally to create 1/2 - 3/4" slices. Arrange these slices, cut side laying down, onto your baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes, flip each slice over to have the side that was facing down now face up. Bake for another 10 minutes, until it is a light golden color. Let cool, or if you like to live dangerously, enjoy right away while warm. Although they may seem a bit crumbly at first if eaten while warm right away, they will firm up once cooled.

I suggest having these with some hot chocolate...mmm, orange and chocolate...an incredible combo!

Hot & Sour Rice Noodle Soup

This is one of those dishes that began as a thrown together, this is all I have on hand kind of dish...but it turned out surprisingly good! And I kept making it again...and again...and again. So here it is, a spicy flavorful Asian inspired rice noodle soup that cooks up quickly and is perfect for an unexpected chilly night. Also, this is my disclaimer that this soup is kind of spicy (just how I like it!). But if this is not for you, start by gradually adding 1/4 tsp red pepper flakes until it is at a spicy-ness level that suits your mood.

What you will need:
12 oz. bag stir fry veggies, frozen
5.5 oz. canned baby corn
3-4 garlic cloves, chopped
1 tbsp. fresh ginger, minced
1 tsp. red pepper flakes
8 c. veggie broth
1/4 c seasoned rice vinegar
7 oz firm tofu (1/2 block)
4 oz. thin rice noodles
salt/pepper to taste


I used a frozen bag of stir fry veggies, first because it is what I had at home, but then because I liked how many different veggies you can conveniently get in one handy bag! My stir fry veggie blend included: broccoli, carrots, sugar snap peas, green beans, mushrooms, celery, onions, and red peppers! Phew...that's quite the list of veggies! But my love of baby corns is strong, and I added a small can, cutting the baby corn into thirds.

Start out by pressing and draining your tofu. While that is going on, add the frozen veggies and baby corn into a large pot. Cook over medium heat until veggies are soft. Add the veggie broth, seasoned rice vinegar, red pepper flakes, ginger and garlic. (Remember at this step, reduce your amount of red pepper flakes if you don't want it too spicy!) Cut your tofu into small cubes, and add to the soup. Turn to medium low heat, cover and let simmer for 20 - 30 minutes to give the soup and tofu to absorb all of the yummy flavors going on.

Add 4 oz of thin rice noodles (this has usually been about 1/2 of a pack for me). Let simmer for 5 minutes until noodles become soft. This makes about 4 generous servings of deliciousness.


The end. It is that simple, and you have a wonderfully spicy, rice noodle soup to enjoy!

Vegan Caramels (with Chocolate)

So, after a bit of a break spending time visiting my family in New York, I am back and ready to do some serious cooking, baking and experimenting. I got a really super informative and awesome candy making book from C and it got me really excited at the prospect of using new/interesting ideas and techniques and translating them into tasty, vegan versions.

The first thing I tackled, just to get my feet wet in the candy making arena, was caramel. I found that coconut milk turned out to be a super substitute for the heavy cream/sweetened condensed milk ingredients. Also, not until reading this book did I know all of the nuances and different types of caramels. I decided to go with the ooey, gooey delicious caramel that I knew and loved. And apparently, the texture of your caramels depend on what temperature you raise your mixture to, so it is pretty darned important that if you want to venture this way, you get yourself a good candy thermometer. I have the kind that clips onto the side of my pot and I can peek at the temp without fussing around and having a free hand to keep it in place. Ok, ok....onto the good stuff....

What you'll need for the caramels:
2/3 c. brown rice syrup
1/2 c. coconut milk
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. brown sugar
1/4 c. Earth Balance (or your fav. butter substitute)
1/8 tsp. salt

To coat with chocolate:
8 oz semi sweet chocolate

Also, before you proceed, you will need parchment paper of sorts, OR if you are awesome, you have discovered the secret of the Silpat mats, which I used to pour my caramel mixture onto. This thing (Silpat) is amazing, and the caramel was a true test of its non-stickness. So be prepared or proceed with caution!

In a medium-large pot, set to medium heat and combine all of the ingredients listed above. Stir to melt/incorporate all of the ingredients. Clip on your thermometer and keep an eye on the temperature. Keep stirring your mixture constantly so it does not burn, as you will have this come to a boil. It might even look like a crazy, bubbly mess. Cook until the temperature of the caramel reaches 240F degrees (115C). Pour onto your Silpat mat, or your pan lined with parchment paper. Cool at room temperature until it is firm.

I was anxious to start on covering them with chocolate and gave it a try a few hours later. BAD IDEA! Like the good book says, it is better to wait at least 24 hours before attempting to cut the caramel, and I, like an amateur, tried anyways. However, I tried again the next day and although the caramel was still soft, it was not as sticky as the day before.

So, this caramel was pretty darn good on its own. However, if you wish to turn them into little nuggets of deliciousness, shape your caramel into 1" logs and put them in the freezer while you temper your chocolate. Then, they should stay formed like the shapes in the picture below. Again, speaking from experience, the caramel as is, is far to soft and delicate and the heated chocolate will melt the caramels and they will turn into weird (albeit still yummy), flat discs.


I found using a fork to hold the caramels, and a spoon to pour over the chocolate worked best for me. Place on parchment paper, saran wrap or another sort of non-stick surface and let cool. If you are in a fancy mood, after your chocolates have hardened, dip your spoon in the chocolate and in a fast, zig zag motion, swing the spoon over your chocolate covered caramels. This adds a pretty, decorative finish to your candies. I also used some sea salts of half of my chocolates, cause I like 'em like that!


And then, make more...Those are my plans, anyways!

Homemade Ketchup with French Fries

Keeping with the theme of summery, fun foods...I got to thinking about making things that I simply buy or have around the house myself. I got to day dreaming about the Teryiaki Tofu Sandwich and how wonderful it would be with a side of fries and some really good ketchup. And then I stopped at ketchup...what really is it? what goes into it? I was sure I could make my own if I did a bit of research. Low and behhold, there is a wide range of things that claim to be ketchup. After a bit of experimenting on my own, I found a blend of things that I thought made the most amazing ketchup ever. And I was left wondering why I mindlessly buy staples like ketchup when making them myself is fun, easy to do and you control everything that goes into it. This means that you get to custom make a ketchup that is right for your taste buds! (Side Note: I am obsessed with ketchup, love it, ever have since I can remember and always will.)

For the ketchup:
1 - 28 oz can diced tomatoes
1.5 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp ground cumin
1 clove garlic, chopped roughly
1/3 c. chili, I used aneheim
1 c. chopped onion
1/3 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. vinegar

1 bay leaf
1 cinnamon stick
1/4 tsp whole cloves (4 - 5 pieces)
1/4 tsp celery seeds
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
1/4 tsp all spice


Tie all of the last 6 spices into a bouquet garni, which is simply a fancy shmancy term for using a cheese cloth to make a little spice bag. That way your spices meld with whatever you are cooking, but then you can easily remove the whole thing too without fishing for each item. I simply used another strip of the cheese cloth to use to tie the bag closed. What you will have will looks somewhat like in the picture below. A little present of flavor yumminess.


Super, and now onto the next step. Add your tomatoes to a medium sauce pot, along with your spice bag and all of the other ingredients. It will look chunky and nothing like ketchup until the end, so no worries yet! Let this cook on medium heat for 45 minutes. The sauce of the tomatoes melding with all of the flavors will weirdly taste like hot ketchup, which is a strange thing. You totally get the ketchup flavor, but in a soup form! Awesome, right?

Let this cool slightly, as the next step requires the food processor. And as we all know (...or just me...from experience) hot things in the food processor can lead to an explosion of food. Not good. So let this cool a few, process in small batches while pulsing the processor until smooth.

Now, return all of this to your sauce pot again, and cook for another 30 - 40 minutes to let the mixture reduce down. Let cool, and keep refrigerated.


Now go make some fries to enjoy with your very own batch of ketchup! This just might change your life....or you just might make it on special occasions. Either way, you can't deny how good it is!

Lucky for you....french fries is next on my list. 'Cause fries and ketchup are made to be together forever and ever.

What you need for the fries:
5 - 6 russet potatoes
olive oil
salt/peppers to taste

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees, wash and peel your potatoes. Cut and slice into thin (or thicker) slices, depending on your preference of fry styles.

I actually got this really neat contraption where I place whatever I want to slice into the contraption, push on the handle, and nice, neat, even slices come out! It is another thing that motivated me to start this whole fries and ketchup thing, I really wanted to use it again! While on the subject of kitchen tools, you are either going to need the best non-stick baking sheet in the world, or a Silpat mat. I have tried several ways to get fries not to stick to my non-stick baking sheet without success until I was introduced to the amazingness of Silpat mats.


Here is a view of my fries on the Silpat mat. I poured about 2 tbsp. olive oil into a small dish, and used a brush to coat the fries. Then sprinkle with salt, pepper and any other flavors that strike your fancy. I fit about 3 potatoes worth of cut fries per sheet, so I got 2 batches made total which was plenty to share with another person.

Bake for 20 minutes, flip all the fries for even baking, and bake for another 15 - 20 minutes until golden brown.

Now go eat fries with your very own ketchup!!!

Baked Teriyaki Tofu on Fresh Ciabatta Rolls

I have been meaning to put up this recipe for over a week now, and I am finally making myself sit down and write it out because 1.) it's been a while and 2.) this is so gosh darn good, I can't wait to make it again!

I really am more of a summer person than a winter person, and I think my cravings for summery foods have officially started right on time in the middle of winter with many more months to go. I really wanted a fresh, tasty sandwich that left me satisfied but not in a "i ate so much, this is so good but now i am stuffed" kind of way. I knew I had wanted to try out some ciabatta rolls that would be perfect for a sandwich, and even better with some homemade baked tofu! All I can say is...super yum! I can't wait to be eating this outside in the summertime! Keep in mind, the ciabatta is pretty time consuming to make, seeing as it needs a sponge made the night before and then several additional rises...but it is so worth it!
What you will need for the ciabatta rolls:

sponge
1 tsp. yeast
1 c. warm water
1.5 c. flour

dough
1.5 tsp yeast
5 tbsp. soy milk
1 tbsp. olive oil
1 c. warm water
3 c. flour (plus up to an additional cup, if dough is too sticky/moist)
2 tsp. salt

The night before you want to make your ciabatta rolls, you need to make the sponge. And it only takes a few minutes to get together, and you just leave it alone until the next day (at least 12 hours). Warm you water, add the yeast and let sit for about 4 minutes. Add your flour, mix together to incorporate all of flour, then cover your bowl and let sit for at least 12 hours.

The next day, warm your soy milk, add the yeast and again, let sit for about 4 minutes. Add this to your sponge mixture, along with your water and oil. Mix together, I did mine using my kitchen aid stand mixer along with the dough hook. Add 2 c. of your flour and the salt, and mix for 2-3 minutes on a lower setting. Then add the 3rd c. of flour and mix on a medium setting for about 4-5 minutes. The dough should be soft, but not enough that it sticks to the sides of the bowl or your hands. During the last 2 minutes of mixing, I slowly added a 1/4 c. of flour at a time until my dough was a good consistancy and did not stick to my hands. All together, I added a little less than 1 c. flour to get the dough to where it needed to be.

Take a large bowl, grease it with a bit of oil, place the dough in the bowl and leave it covered in a warm place for 1 hour. The dough should be HUGE at this point, doubled if not tripled in size. *I usually preheat my oven to 200 degrees for a few minutes and then turn it off to have a warm place to proof the dough*

Have a very well floured surface ready, very gently take the dough, and seperate into two equal halves. Be careful not to handle the dough in a way that eliminates all the nice, bubbles you worked so hard for! Form the dough into two long rectangular pieces, about 10 - 11 inches long and 4 - 5 inches wide. Then cut each piece in half, then in half again, leaving you with 8 rolls. Cover your rolls again, and let rise for about 1.5 hours. Your dough will not be as huge as the last rise, and will get only a little bigger.

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees, and get a non-stick baking pan, or line it with parchment paper or a Silpat mat. Pick up each roll carefully, and place the bottom side up onto your sheet, so that the floured bottom is now facing upwards. I did 2 batches of 4 rolls each this way.

Bake for 25 - 30 minutes, and after the first 5 minutes gently brush or spray the tops of the rolls lightly with water. Repeat this 2 more times, then let bake for the remaining 10 - 15 minutes.

Awesome, right? And so delicious too!!! Still motivated to keep baking and cooking after the great day long ciabatta event? Then make this super delish baked tofu to go along with the rolls!


What you'll need for the baked tofu:
1 block of extra firm tofu, pressed
1 c. teriyaki sauce/marinade

Phew...ok, onto the good stuff. Out of sheer laziness at this point, I threw out my experiments with making marinades and used some teriyaki sauce I had at around. I know, I know...but I will get back to this very soon because it is so tasty and I want to try out some original flavors.

I got the tofu ready during one of the many rises of the ciabatta rolls. After pressing your tofu, cut it in half, then cut each half into 4 pieces. I wanted these specifically for the sandwich, so I opted for thicker, heartier slices of tofu, each being about a 1/4 inch thick. All together, I got 8 pieces. Layer these flat in a pan and pour the teriyaki sauce over the tofu and leave in the fridge for an hour or two.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Then, arrange them onto a non-stick baking pan and brush the top side with the sauce once more. For this, I used my amazingly awesome Silpat mats, which I am head over heels for. If you don't have one, get one...it will change your life, it is that good! Unless it's just me and I am a giant food nerd!

Bake for 30 minutes, flip the tofu slices, brush the sauce on the top sides again and bake for another 30 minutes! And you're done!!

For my sandwich construction, I simply added a bottom layer of greens, two slices of tomatoes, two or three slices of the baked tofu, and topped it all off with some veganaise!

Nuss-Ecken (Hazelnut Triangle Bars)

After a few very failed experiments, I received a perfectly timed letter from my Oma in Germany, along with this recipe for Nuss-Ecken! I was so happy because I needed something to make that wouldn't turn out disasterously. The original recipe from my Oma uses butter and eggs, but hey, those things are easy enough to change!


This is a traditional Germany cookie/bar/pastry and my Oma would make them throughout the year, but around the holidays, these Nuss-Ecken were a staple (along with about 20 other cookies). Not only were these one of my favs because they tasted so darned good, but when I was little, I just loved helping my Oma out in the kitchen and being able to coat them with chocolate...it just seemed so awesome and fancy through the eyes of a 7 year old me! And to my surprise, I still like making them on my own now.

What you'll need for the dough:
3 c. flour
1 tsp. baking powder
2/3 c. vegan sugar
2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 egg equivalents of Ener-G (can sub w/ ground flax seed)
5/8 c. Earth Balance or your fav. butter substitute

In the middle:
apricot preserve (about 400ml)

On top:
1 c. Earth Balance
1 c. vegan sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
4 tbsp. water
3 c. ground Hazelnuts
1 c. chopped Hazelnuts
7-8 oz. semi-sweet baking chocolate

Start by baking the bottom layer of the bar, add your butter and sugar to your mixing bowl and mix until it is creamed together. Add and mix to incorporate your egg substitute, vanilla and baking powder. Then cup by cup, slowly add your flour and mix until the flour is well combined into the dough, which should be very smooth and does not stick to the side of your bowl. To make rolling out the dough a bit easier, wrap the dough in saran wrap or parchment paper and let chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes.

Take the dough out, and either grease a 11x13 in. baking sheet or line it with parchment paper or a fancy shmancy Silpat mat. Use a rolling pin to roll out the dough to fit the sixe of the pan. It should be a fairly thin layer, maybe about a 1/4 in thick or so. Then grab your apricot preserves and spread a nice, even layer across your dough. It doesn't have to be a thick layer, just enough to cover the dough evenly.

Now to make the topping! To make the ground hazelnuts, I put about 1 c. hazelnuts at a time into my food processor and pulsed many times to get them ground up with some fairly small pieces chopped up. Do this a total of 3 times, or until you have just about 3 c. of ground hazelnuts. Next, chop 1 c. of hazelnuts into a rough chop, but making sure not to leave really huge pieces or whole hazelnuts. I found my mezzaluna worked really well for this part. Add those to your bowl of ground hazelnuts.

Next, melt your butter, sugar, vanilla and water in a pan and let cook until all of your sugar is melted and well combined. Take your pan off the burner, and add your hazelnut mixture to this and combine until everything is well incorporated and coated evenly. Spread this mixture over your dough and apricot layer.

Bake for 25-30 minutes at 375 degrees or until the sugary hazelnut mixture is a nice, caramelized golden brown color. Take out and let cool for a few minutes to let everything set. Take a knife and go around the edges of the pan to make sure non of the sides and stuck to the pan if you greased the pan. Cut into 2 1/2 - 3 in squares and then carefully cut each square in half to make the triangles.


Let the Nuss-Ecken cool completely before melting your chocolate, otherwise they might want to fall apart if this is done right away. Once cooled, temper your baking chocolate and use a spoon to coat half of the triangles, or any other way your heart desires.

Eat. Share with friends. Be happy and repeat!

Part Two: Caramelized Onion Swirl Bread

Ok...now onto the really good stuff...bread! And not just your ordinary bread, this is special because inside the crispy crust is a swirl of caramelized onions and rosemary...mmm. Perfect food for the season.

Here is what you'll need:

3 cups flour
2 tbsp vegan sugar
1.25 cups water
2 tsp salt
1 package of yeast
2 c. of finely sliced sweet onions (mine worked out to be exactly 2 medium onions)
3-4 tbsp. of olive oil
sprig of fresh rosemary


I started with a simple and very basic bread dough. Heat your water to around 100 degrees and add your packet of yeast. Stir and then let it rest for about 5-10 minutes, or until it gets pretty foamy. Add your salt, and about half of your flour and mix together for about two minutes. Then add the rest of the flour and mix/knead until all of the flour is nicely incorporated in the dough.

At this point, I usually set my oven on the lowest possible temp for a few minutes and then turn it off so I will have a nice and warm place to let the dough rise. Cover the bowl with the dough, and set it in your nicely warmed oven for about 45-60 minutes. At this point, your dough should look a lot bigger.

While your dough is rising, take your sweet onions and cut them into halves. Finely slice each half of the onion. Add the olive oil to a non-stick pan and heat your onions up to medium high for about five minutes. You just want your onions to soften up and start to turn translucent at this point. Turn your heat down to medium and let them slowly cook. Give them a stir every few minutes, you will start to see them turn a very rich golden brown color as they develop a yummy sweetness to them.


After the onions were done, I lined a 12x18 inch baking sheet with parchment paper. Make sure to liberally flour the surface of the parchment paper, as you will be rolling out your dough onto it. Take out your dough and lay it in the center of the sheet, sprinkle more flour onto the top of the dough and onto your rolling pin, and basically roll the dough out to fit the shape of the baking sheet. So in the end, you will have a nice, rectangular piece of dough. Add your onions in an even layer onto the dough, leaving one end where there is about a two inch section without the onions. This will serve as the part that closes the swirled bread, so there won't be onions gooping out of your bread. Sprinkle some fresh rosemary over your onions, or whatever other herbs make you really happy.


To roll the dough and onion up, I just grabbed the end of the parchment paper opposite of the onion-less two inch section. It took a bit of finessing the dough to begin the rolling process, but once it was started, you simply want to keep pulling up the parchment paper resulting in your dough rolling itself up jelly-roll style. Take that onion-less two inch section make press it against the outside of your dough. Then to that to each end as well, almost pinching each end shut.


I then transferred this rolled up dough to a new, clean sheet of parchment paper and formed the dough to my liking, heated the oven to 375 degrees and let it bake for 45-50 minutes, or until the crust is a golden brown color.


Let the bread cool, slice open and enjoy the amazement of what you have just made. Caramelized Onion Swirl bread just feels that good to make! It is especially yummy with the previous posting of Mushroom Soup! Eat lots and be merry!