Me and Chocolate Pudding are best good friends. So Melissa of It’s Melissa’s Kitchen really picked a good one when she chose this week’s Tuesdays with Dorie selection.

A few years ago, I was eating a cup of Jell-O chocolate pudding every single day for months straight. I do that sometimes. I’ll get obsessed with a certain food and eat it day in and day out. So, there’s no doubt that I like chocolate pudding. A lot. I’ve never made it from scratch before although I’ve made plenty of chocolate mousse at home.

This recipe was super easy, but I will say that reading it all the way through before beginning would have been helpful. Going into it blindly and trying to watch Jeopardy at the same… not good. I have to say I was quite confused at one point by all the seemingly back and forth action between the saucepan and the food processor (as well as the Jeopardy questions). But I got focused and got it all straightened out eventually. I only had a little bit of 2% milk left and had to make up the difference with vanilla flavored soy milk. I used Nestlé Chocolatier bittersweet chocolate (62% cacao) since I found it on sale.

I cannot handle pudding skins so I definitely covered mine with plastic wrap to prevent that. I’m sure the skins are fine for some, they just aren’t for me. I could gag every time I see the Seinfeld where George has his idea for “Pudding Skin Singles”.

This was good. Seriously. My boyfriend is not really open to trying anything sweet that I make anymore (he really doesn’t like sweet stuff to begin with) so I made half a recipe and poured it into a big margarita glass all for myself. That’s three servings just for me… shhh, don’t tell anyone. I used Dorie’s whipped cream recipe on page 456 and a little chopped chocolate and cocoa powder to top it all off.

Head on over to It’s Melissa’s Kitchen to check out the recipe and to see how her Chocolate Pudding turned out. Then stop by the Tuesdays with Dorie site to see everyone else’s. For next week, Amanda of Like Sprinkles on a Cupcake has picked Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler.

It’s Barefoot Bloggers time again! For the fourth selection, Sabrina and Alexander of Cooking with the Kids have chosen Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread. I thought this was an interesting choice for the group. Definitely a recipe I have overlooked in the Barefoot Contessa at Home book and one I probably never would’ve made on my own.

The recipe is simple and straightforward. I made 1/3 of the recipe, and after a long day, I have to say my mathematical skills were really failing when it came to scaling down some of the ingredients. I added extra cheese because I figured everything is better with extra cheese. I also used canned jalapeños and dried chives in place of the fresh scallions. Instead of using two bowls like Ina says, I just dumped all the ingredients into one and stirred with a *plastic* spoon instead of wooden. Yeah, that’s right, I’m a rebel.

On a side note… does anyone have one of those Aero Gardens? Every once in a while, I consider getting one because A: I don’t think an actual garden would work that well in my backyard and B: I almost always use dried herbs instead of fresh because I usually can’t justify the cost of fresh herbs. Especially when I end up using just a little bit and then throwing the rest away.

Anyway, the cornbread smelled great once out of the oven. I let it cool off for a bit and then cut myself a small slice. The texture was really light. On first taste, I don’t know if I would call it Cornbread if I was eating it without knowing what the name of it was. It was more of an almost spongy, cakey texture. Though the second day, eating it at room temperature, it was more like a cornbread I guess. The jalapeños gave it a nice kick, but it wasn’t too spicy. I’m glad I tried this out, I could see myself making it again.

Thanks to Sabrina and Alexander of Cooking with the Kids for picking a great recipe. Be sure to stop by their blog and check out how things went with their Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread. Then head on over to the Barefoot Bloggers blogroll to see how the other members did. The Barefoot Bloggers group is up to 87 members now. If you’ve been thinking about joining but haven’t yet for some reason, what are you waiting for?

Next time, the recipe selection comes from Ashley of The Spicy Skillet.

Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread
Book: Barefoot Contessa at Home
Show: Barefoot Contessa - Episode: The Cat’s Away
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup yellow cornmeal
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons baking powder
2 teaspoons kosher salt
2 cups milk
3 extra-large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted, plus extra to grease the pan
8 ounces aged extra-sharp Cheddar, grated, divided
1/3 cup chopped scallions, white and green parts, plus extra for garnish, 3 scallions
3 tablespoons seeded and minced fresh jalapeño peppers
Check out the directions here!

I love blueberries. I love everything about them. They’re good for you, they taste good, they’re blue. What’s not to like? So I was happy about this week’s Tuesdays with Dorie selection Double Crusted Blueberry Pie chosen by Amy of South in Your Mouth. Well, in all honesty, I did have one little fear about it. Pie Crust.

But I got over that fear pretty fast. Dorie’s pie crust recipe is nice because you make it in a food processor. All of my cold ingredients were frozen before I started. I had some problems working with the dough though, it wanted to stick to everything. I may have added too much water but I did add less than the recipe called for. I started out rolling the crust on the counter top but quickly switched to rolling it out in waxed paper. Doing that took care of all my issues and from there I was good to go.

The blueberries came from our local Dutch Market as well as the bread crumbs. I thought the bread crumbs were an interesting addition to the pie and they seemed to worked out great. I made enough dough for a single crust and used a small tart pan to make one mini blueberry pie. It only needed about 40 minutes in the oven.

Saturday, I picked up some blueberry soft serve ice cream to go on top. There is a small ice cream stand on the side of the road near where I live that has every kind of soft serve flavor you could think of. It is always extremely busy and the line is just usually ridiculous. But since it was POURING down raining Saturday… guess what? No line! Next on my list of kitchen gadgets to buy is an ice cream maker, I really would have liked to have tried the Blueberry Sour Cream ice cream recipe in the book.

So, what did I think about the taste of the pie? It was excellent. The crust tasted good and the blueberry filling was really nice. The blueberry ice cream also really added something to the overall flavor. I would make this one again for sure and wouldn’t change a thing.

This Double Crusted Blueberry Pie recipe can be found in Dorie Greenspan’s Baking From My Home to Yours. Click here to see the recipe and to check out Amy’s Double Crusted Blueberry Pie. Then head on over to the Tuesdays with Dorie website to see everyone else’s. See you next Tuesday!

Six down, only ten more to go. I’m moving right along on catching up with all of the past Tuesdays with Dorie selections that were completed before I became a member.

I’m almost halfway there to catching up. I adjusted my numbers because originally I had it at 17 that I had missed, but really it was only 16. I found out that one week had a choice between two similar recipes and you could choose which flavor you wanted to make. I had included both recipes in my count. Eventually I will make the second recipe that I end up not choosing. But for now, I’m not going to include it in my numbers for Blast From TWD Past posts.

I thought I had gotten through most of the seemingly easier recipes but noticed I had looked over the Pecan Sour Cream Biscuits. I already had everything on hand so I decided to just go ahead with these instead of tackling the Hidden Berry Cream Cheese Torte which was my original intention for today’s post.

I’ve never actually made biscuits at home before. I cut the recipe in half and got eight instead of six like I was supposed to. So I would say mine probably turned out a little thin.  I decided to underbake them for one minute and everything turned out fine.  

I really don’t care for pecans that much. Or any kind of nut for that matter, except peanuts or Brazil nuts. But the pecans in this, to me, were not really front and center stage. I liked the way these biscuits tasted plain, they were a little sweet and the pecans did give a nice texture difference.  But I liked them even better with butter and homemade blackberry jam from the Dutch Market. Oh yeah.

Ashley of eat me, delicious chose the recipe for Pecan Sour Cream Biscuits for the week of February 26th, 2008. Stop by here to see Ashley’s results from back then. And check out the rest of her site while you’re there, she has beautiful photography and interesting recipes.

Hope everyone had a great July 4th! I did, I went to see the movie Hancock and went to my Dad’s house for a party. He rented a dunk tank but I would NOT get in no matter how much people asked me to. Today I’m spending the day relaxing and getting ready to go back to work tomorrow. yikes, this weekend was too short.

Things are moving right along. Here we have Apple Cheddar Scones chosen by Karina of The Floured Apron for this weeks Tuesday with Dorie selection.  

I’ve been interested in this recipe since I got Baking so I was happy that it was selected. There was no melting and cooling of butter involved (which I hate to do for some reason) and absolutely NO chilling time, rising time, or any kind of time waiting at all. Yay! Except for 20 minutes while they bake in the oven. I can deal with that.

The recipe calls for dried apples and it sounds like a lot of people had problems finding them where they live. My WalMart had their own store brand dried apples in a 4 oz bag for $1.29. But I didn’t see any other kinds available either in the produce section or in the dried fruits section. I thought it was strange that there were no name brand dried apples. Maybe the name brands are focusing all their attention on dried cranberries and cherries instead because there was NO shortage on them. Cranberries even come in different flavors now like Cherry or Orange.

Back to the scones… Very easy to make. Just mix everything in a bowl, shape dough into a rectangle and cut into squares. The dough was sticky but I had no problems getting it to do what i wanted. Taste wise, I thought the scones were ok, but I didn’t love them. It could be because I had just eaten dinner and was in the mood for something sweeter. They tasted fine though, had a good texture and weren’t too dry. If I made them again I think I would use a little extra sugar to make them more sweet. I would also probably up the apple cider a little and double the amount of dried apples since, to me, the apple taste kind of got lost.

Apple Cheddar Scones recipe can be found here and in Dorie Greenspan’s book Baking From My Home to Yours.

As always, stop by the Tuesdays with Dorie site to check out how everyone else’s scones turned out. For next week, Amy of South In Your Mouth has chosen Blueberry Pie. See you next Tuesday!

Here we have my second Daring Bakers challenge.  The first one, Opéra Cake, certainly posed various challenges for me. So I was curious to see how I would fare on the June 2008 selection, which turned out to be a Danish Braid chosen by Kelly of Sass and Veracity and Ben of What’s Cooking?.  

Danish Pastry is a “laminated” dough, which means that it’s made up of dough and butter layers.  There are two components - Detrempe: ball of dough and Beurrage: a butter block.  The dough is rolled out in to a rectangle and folded up into thirds like a business letter.  This “turn” of the dough is performed four times with 30 minutes of chilling time in between each turn and a final chill time of at least five hours before filling and braiding the dough.

I had no problems making the dough or shaping the braid. I decided to use a filling of Orange Cream Cheese Filling and an Orange Blueberry Sauce.  This happened by accident because I thought I was using Vanilla Extract for the cream cheese filling but after I poured it in, realized I had used Orange instead. No worries though.

Update: I did make another mistake that I realized late last night. I never adjusted the oven temp down to 350 after the 10 minute mark….

The filling leaked out a lot but I thought presentation wise it was beautiful. And it tasted as good as it looked to me.  It was a long road to get it finished in terms of all the waiting in between each step, but this was a really fun challenge.  This is not something I ever would have attempted on my own and as I was finished and enjoying a piece of the final product, I was proud of myself for being able to pull it off. Stop by the Daring Bakers blogroll to see all of the different Danish Braid creations by other members. Can’t wait to see what’s in store for July!

From Sherry Yard’s The Secrets of Baking

DANISH DOUGH
Makes 2-1/2 pounds dough

Ingredients
For the dough (Detrempe)
1 ounce fresh yeast or 1 tablespoon active dry yeast
1/2 cup whole milk
1/3 cup sugar
Zest of 1 orange, finely grated
3/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 vanilla bean, split and scraped
2 large eggs, chilled
1/4 cup fresh orange juice
3-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt

For the butter block (Beurrage)
1/2 pound (2 sticks) cold unsalted butter
1/4 cup all-purpose flour

DOUGH
Combine yeast and milk in a bowl and mix on low speed. Add sugar, orange zest, cardamom, vanilla extract, vanilla seeds, eggs, and orange juice. Mix well. Change to the dough hook and add the salt with the flour, 1 cup at a time, increasing speed to medium as the flour is incorporated. Knead the dough for about 5 minutes, or until smooth. You may need to add a little more flour if it is sticky. Transfer dough to a lightly floured baking sheet and cover with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

BUTTER BLOCK
1. Combine butter and flour in a bowl and beat on medium speed for 1 minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and the paddle and then beat for 1 minute more, or until smooth and lump free. Set aside at room temperature.
2. After the detrempe has chilled 30 minutes, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface. Roll the dough into a rectangle approximately 18 x 13 inches and ¼ inch thick. The dough may be sticky, so keep dusting it lightly with flour. Spread the butter evenly over the center and right thirds of the dough. Fold the left edge of the detrempe to the right, covering half of the butter. Fold the right third of the rectangle over the center third. The first turn has now been completed. Mark the dough by poking it with your finger to keep track of your turns, or use a sticky and keep a tally. Place the dough on a baking sheet, wrap it in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
3. Place the dough lengthwise on a floured work surface. The open ends should be to your right and left. Roll the dough into another approximately 13 x 18 inch, ¼-inch-thick rectangle. Again, fold the left third of the rectangle over the center third and the right third over the center third. No additional butter will be added as it is already in the dough. The second turn has now been completed. Refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes.
4. Roll out, turn, and refrigerate the dough two more times, for a total of four single turns. Make sure you are keeping track of your turns. Refrigerate the dough after the final turn for at least 5 hours or overnight. The Danish dough is now ready to be used. If you will not be using the dough within 24 hours, freeze it. To do this, roll the dough out to about 1 inch in thickness, wrap tightly in plastic wrap, and freeze. Defrost the dough slowly in the refrigerator for easiest handling. Danish dough will keep in the freezer for up to 1 month.

DANISH BRAID
Makes enough for 2 large braids

Ingredients
1 recipe Danish Dough (see below)
2 cups filling, jam, or preserves 

For the egg wash: 1 large egg, plus 1 large egg yolk

1. Line a baking sheet with a silicone mat or parchment paper. On a lightly floured surface, roll the Danish Dough into a 15 x 20-inch rectangle, ¼ inch thick. If the dough seems elastic and shrinks back when rolled, let it rest for a few minutes, then roll again. Place the dough on the baking sheet.
2. Along one long side of the pastry make parallel, 5-inch-long cuts with a knife or rolling pastry wheel, each about 1 inch apart. Repeat on the opposite side, making sure to line up the cuts with those you’ve already made.
3. Spoon the filling you’ve chosen to fill your braid down the center of the rectangle. Starting with the top and bottom “flaps”, fold the top flap down over the filling to cover. Next, fold the bottom “flap” up to cover filling. This helps keep the braid neat and helps to hold in the filling. Now begin folding the cut side strips of dough over the filling, alternating first left, then right, left, right, until finished. Trim any excess dough and tuck in the ends.

Egg Wash
Whisk together the whole egg and yolk in a bowl and with a pastry brush, lightly coat the braid.

Proofing and Baking
1. Spray cooking oil onto a piece of plastic wrap, and place over the braid. Proof at room temperature or, if possible, in a controlled 90 degree F environment for about 2 hours, or until doubled in volume and light to the touch.
2. Near the end of proofing, preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Position a rack in the center of the oven.
3. Bake for 10 minutes, then rotate the pan so that the side of the braid previously in the back of the oven is now in the front. Lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees F, and bake about 15-20 minutes more, or until golden brown. Cool and serve the braid either still warm from the oven or at room temperature. The cooled braid can be wrapped airtight and stored in the refrigerator for up to 2 days, or freeze for 1 month.

I’m continuing to catch up on past completed recipes before I joined up with the Tuesdays with Dorie group.

Last week on my Blast from TWD post, I made the very first recipe ever chosen. This week, I decided to make the very first recipe in the book. Which brings us to these Orange Berry Muffins that were originally selected by Chelle of Sugar & Spice for the week of January 29th, 2008.

You don’t even have to break out the mixer for these. The recipe tells you to separate your liquid and dried ingredients first and then mix together later, but I just dumped everything in a bowl and stirred together at the same time. I did this partly because I used dried orange zest and buttermilk and partly because I was lazy.

At the 10 minute mark I added decorating sugar. I strongly believe that muffins are made 1000 times better by adding decorating sugar on top because I am a huge fan of texture differences. And extra sugar.

I thought the muffins were good. It’s a shame my boyfriend was out of town because he really would’ve liked these too.  The orange flavor is subtle, which I liked. Every Dorie recipe that I’ve tried so far I would make again and these muffins are no exception. I’m actually really impressed. For me, Dorie is to baking what Ina Garten is to cooking. You know whatever recipe of theirs you make will turn out good.

My cat struck again and ate part of the top off of one of the muffins while I wasn’t looking. He seemed to like them too. But he did NOT like getting in trouble. No sir. Oh well, don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time, right?

Orange Berry Muffins recipe can be found in Dorie Greenspan’s Baking From My Home to Yours on page 3. And that’s it for this installment of the TWD catch up posts. I’m not sure what I’ll make next but check back soon to see.  I think I’ve gotten all the easier recipes completed at this point.  Five down, only twelve more to go….  

It’s time for another Barefoot Bloggers selection. This time, Parmesan Chicken was chosen by Megan of My Baking Adventures.  I have never made this sort of recipe at home before so I was really looking forward to testing it out.  

I really waited until the last minute with this. Even though I read the posting date quite a few times, I thought I had until the weekend to get it done but that wasn’t right.  Hmm. But that’s kind of normal for me to mix up days, the passage of time is very strange to me. A lot of times, I am not sure what day of the week it is. Or what week of the month it is. Sometimes, I get the month right… sometimes not. And, I’m embarrassed to say, sometimes I even talk about the wrong year… and not just right after the turn of the New Year when it’s acceptable. My co-worker is the one who sees this flaw of mine on a regular basis and catches most of my mistakes and quickly corrects me. She’s just accepted that I’m a little off with the concept of time and doesn’t make fun of me *too* much. Unless we’re in a large group of people, of course.

Anyway, good thing this Parmesan Chicken was ridiculously fast and easy to make because I made it tonight as soon as I got home from work.  And I got off work late. 

The boyfriend is out of town so I only made one chicken breast for myself. I pounded out the chicken with a rolling pin until I thought it was thin enough. Next, I got the three plates together with the flour, egg and breadcrumb mixtures and got to dipping. Then it went right in the pan. I cooked for a few minutes each side while putting together the salad. Within about 6 minutes dinner was done. Making spaghetti from a boxed pasta and a jar of sauce takes longer than this. It was really good and I would make it again for sure. I really liked the addition of the lemon vinaigrette salad although my first instinct was to leave it out. I’m glad I didn’t. Thanks Megan for such a wonderful choice!

Parmesan Chicken
featured on the Barefoot Contessa show Mystery Guest

4 to 6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 extra-large eggs
1 tablespoon water
1 1/4 cups seasoned dry bread crumbs
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan, plus extra for serving
Unsalted butter
Good olive oil
Salad greens for 6, washed and spun dry, 1 recipe Lemon Vinaigrette

Lemon Vinaigrette:
1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice (2 lemons)
1/2 cup good olive oil
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Click here for directions!

Please stop by and check out all of the other Barefoot Bloggers takes on Parmesan Chicken here.  

This week’s Tuesdays with Dorie selection was Mixed Berry Cobbler chosen by Beth of Our Sweet Life. Things have been seeming a little rough for me lately. Ugh. So it’s actually the perfect time for a little comfort food and I can’t think of a more comforting dessert than cobbler.

This is an easy recipe, the filling and the crust are the only components. The nice thing is that you can use frozen berries and you don’t even have to defrost them first. I already had a couple of bags in my freezer and used a mix of mostly blueberries, a few blackberries, raspberries and strawberries.

I only had one little problem and that was after rolling out the crust. The crust just did not want to come off the wax paper and eventually I gave up and starting pulling it off and putting it together like little puzzle pieces over the filling. I guess I could’ve scraped off crust with something to try to keep it in one piece but I didn’t even think about that at the time because I was distracted by watching Legally Blonde while I baked. Anyway, cobblers aren’t meant to be works of art, right? No idea if my problem with the uncooperative dough could be related to the fact that I had to substitute a mixture of regular milk and butter for the heavy cream. The cream I had in the fridge expired last week, it smelled weird and I wasn’t about to use it. And I definitely wasn’t going to head out to the WalMart on Sunday morning just to get some more. Pre-baking crust issues or not, it really didn’t seem to make any difference once baked. The heavy cream substitution worked out in the end.

I had read some comments from other people that they thought the crust was too bland, or too salty or just not that good. I decided to double the amount of sugar and I thought it tasted just fine. I cut the whole recipe in half and baked in a smaller round glass dish for only about 35 minutes. I would make this again, both the boyfriend and I thought it was good. I didn’t have any vanilla ice cream but I’m sure that would make it even better.

The recipe for Mixed Berry Cobbler can be found in Dorie Greenspan’s book Baking From My Home to Yours and here. Head on over to the Tuesdays with Dorie site to check out how all the other TWD member’s cobblers turned out. Next week, the selection is Apple Cheddar Scones chosen by Karina of The Floured Apron. I have to say I’m kind of excited to make these, it’s one of those recipes that has intrigued me since I got the book. See you next Tuesday!

This installment of my “catch up” posts is going all the way back to the beginning of Tuesdays with Dorie. Laurie of Quirky Cupcake first posted back on January 1, 2008 that she would bake one recipe a week from her new Dorie Greenspan Baking From My Home to Yours book. Brown Sugar-Pecan Shortbread was what she chose to make. I don’t know if she ever expected 200 other people to eventually join her in her quest but that’s what happened.

I know I never thought when I got the Baking book for Christmas 2007 that I would end up joining a Dorie baking group and trying so many of the book’s recipes. I had already made a few things myself like the Blueberry Brown Sugar Plain Cake, My Best Chocolate Chip Cookies and Arborio Rice Pudding… all excellent. But usually, I just read ingredient lists and directions out of cookbooks and… yeah, that’s about it.

Now, my Pecan Shortbreads turned out more like Pecan “Crisps” instead. I had cut the recipe down so I would only wind up with 8 cookies instead of 32. I’m pretty sure I got all the ingredients cut down and measured out correctly. I used press and seal wrap to roll them out in and I rolled them a *little* too thin. They spread a lot in the oven with only one or two really holding their original square shape. These aren’t the prettiest things for sure (especially compared to the picture in the book) but they tasted good anyway.

I’d probably make them again being extra careful about the thickness when I rolled them out so I could actually make “shortbread”. I’d also chill them after cutting into squares and before baking. After a few things I’ve read, it seems like that helps keep their shape. All in all, even with my error(s), this recipe was still a success.

The ingredient list and directions for Brown Sugar-Pecan Shortbread can be found in Dorie Greenspan’s book Baking: From My Home to Yours.

Four down, thirteen more to go.