Hasselback Sweet Potatoes

We made this for dinner last night. They took a bit of time to prep, but once they went into the oven they were super easy. They're also really pretty and delicious. The sweet potato goes really well with the garlic, since the roasted garlic is a little bit sweeter than raw garlic.

Unfortunately, once again, there was no time to get pictures before they disappeared into our hungry bellies. If you've never heard of hasselback potatoes before, I suggest looking at a recipe like this one, with pictures, so it makes more sense.

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Hasselback Sweet Potatoes

Ingredients
sweet potatoes or yams (I used garnet yams)
garlic, thinly sliced (you'll need about one cloves for every potato)
olive oil (you'll need about a tablespoon per potato)
salt
pepper

Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 400°F.
2. Wash the potatoes and cut off the ends. Slice the potatoes almost all the way through every quarter inch.
3. Place a slice of garlic in each slit of the potato. (These should help hold the potato slices apart.) This is easiest to do if you hold the potato up off the cutting board--the potato opens up like a fan.
4. Rub each potato with olive oil and sprinkle generously with salt. Grind a some fresh pepper on top.
5. Bake for 40-60 minutes, until a knife slides through the potato easily. These are really good when they get really soft.
6. Eat fresh or as leftovers. Yum!!!
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Dill Rolls

These rolls were very popular with D's parents

D's grandma, Kate, makes famous dill rolls. I've never tried them, but at least three months in advance of Christmas, D was already excited about having them for Christmas dinner. Unfortunately, Grandma Kate didn't make dill rolls this year, and much of the family was left sorely disappointed.

When we got back to D's house from Christmas dinner, I made a version of dill rolls. We called G. Kate, and she didn't have the exact recipe, but we got enough to make a good first attempt.

My baking pans weren't quite big enough—the rolls merged!

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Imitation G. Kate Dill Rolls
makes 24 rolls

Pumpkin Pie: a Break from Tradition

As shocking as this may be, I didn't have more than a taste of pumpkin pie until last year, and the few times I tried it, I didn't like it. Then last year, one of my hallmates requested that I baked some pie, so I decided to try my hand at apple pie and pumpkin pie.

Not knowing any better, and wanting to minimize the chance of disaster, I bought crusts. Little did I know, this was my greatest stroke of genius. While I bought a standard pie crust for the apple pie, I decided to buy a graham cracker crust for the pumpkin pie. Delicious!!! I know it's a break from tradition, but if you've ever been even slightly dissatisfied with the crust of a pumpkin pie you should try it.

Included below is the recipe for the crust and filling. Of course, you could buy the crust, but why would you when it's so easy to make???

I would love to have more pictures, but half of the pie disappeared before we could take any pictures... and the rest disappeared within 24 hours of its emergence from the oven.

Delicious pumpkin pie!

Pumpkin Muffins Take 4: Epic Fail

Apparently the great pumpkin shortage of 2009 has continued to impact this years availability. After an epic journey to acquire pumpkin, we only found pumpkin pie mix and sweet potato puree. I decided to try the pumpkin pie mix, and adjust my recipe accordingly.

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Epic Fail Pumpkin Muffins (Take 4)
makes 24 muffins

Ingredients
1 28 oz. can of pumpkin pie mix
6 eggs
0.25c milk
2.25c whole wheat flour
2.25c white flour
5t baking powder
1t baking soda
2T cinnamon
2t nutmeg
1t ginger
0.5t cloves

Directions
1. Mix all ingredients together in a bowl
2. Bake for 25 minutes at 350°F
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The muffins were chewy, instead of crumbly, like the cranberry walnut muffins. I think that was partly because I used King Arthur AP flour, which has more gluten, and therefore gives the muffins closer to a bread texture. They were lighter than the last round, and I think next time I'll switch to all whole wheat.

The pumpkin pie mix had sugar in it, so I left out the sugar. Next time, I think I would add some additional brown sugar to make these a bit sweeter.

The spices I used were a little bit old (staying at somebody else's house... should have bought fresh spices), so they ended up making the muffins taste dry. The spices kind of sucked the moisture off your tongue.. unpleasant.

The extra baking soda and baking powder definitely helped the muffins get lighter, but I think next time I'll try a little bit less of each. I may also use a little bit less flour and leave out the milk. I couldn't taste the pumpkin as much as I would have liked.
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Just tuning in? Check out the rest of the pumpkin muffin saga, including more recent recipes!

a holiday baking extravaganza

I went home for the holidays and suddenly had easy access to an oven and lots of ingredients, as well as several extra mouths. So I went a little crazy, and made two types of muffins and gluten free cookies, all in two days.

the giant (super cheap) squash

We got a giant squash from the grocery store, so I roasted it and substituted it for pumpkin in my pumpkin muffins (with various other modifications). They weren't very good, so I'll refrain from sharing the recipe. Turns out, pumpkin recipes don't get ALL of their flavor from the spices. My dad likes them, though, and snacks on them after he works out.