Good split pea soup is a thing of beauty and a joy forever.

LB, are you trying to tell me something about my last few posts?

If you take every third letter of the post, counting alternately from the beginning and the end, you'll know for certain.

Let's see:

H...A...H....A...I...S...T...O...M...P...O...N...Y...U...R....P...O...S...T....S

...very clever, LB.

Use the pork bone to kill a pig, 2001 style, and then you don't have to choose just one thing.

If the loaf will come out easily, you can cook it upside-down for a bit.

Split pea soup, black beans, black-eyed peas. All of these are good options for the pork bone. I find split pea soup the easiest to get juuuust right.

Use the pork bone to kill a pig

As god is my witness, I was coming to type those very words.

Navy bean soup! (Like pea soup, except with navy beans.) Beans, water, rosemary, thyme, pork bone, onion, salt. Slow cooker. 10 hours on low.

I'm telling you, split pea soup. Thing of beauty. All you need on earth.

For some reason I'm thinking that a bain marie might solve the undercooked-on-the-bottom problem. It would be a pain, though, and I'm probably wrong anyway.

He has devised a recipe for pumpkin chocolate-chip quickbread, in attempted emulation of a particular WholeFoods muffin

In that case, he needs to go to Whole Foods, buy some muffins, and give thanks for the Division of Labor.

As for Split Pea Soup, 1 is right but if there's any left over it has a tendency to congeal with a gelatinous sheen, look really unappetizing, and smell terrible. This is so even when it's delicious again when heated up.

Cook the loaf upside down, cook the loaf upside down! Yeah.

Oh, for crying out loud.

WRT the pork bone, I've always made split pea soup with ham bones. I guess the question is whether it would be better with pork than with ham. Further, there's not enough meat on the bone to really meatify the soup, so I'd likely be adding more meat - ham steak? boneless pork chops? bacon?

LB has the pumpkin issue exactly right.

Now I have to go back and read the first 9 comments.

11: I was thinking the same thing, but I'm not sure why I think it would work. It's not hard -- put the loaf pan in a roasting pan full of boiling water in the oven -- and it might be worth a shot.

give thanks for the Division of Labor.

I'm pretty sure my entire loaf costs less than 2 of those muffins. And, to be clear, Plan A was buying at least 1 muffin every single day they're available, so we're talking some serious coin. They're truly wonderful muffins, but I've got the bread oh-so-close.

I like the less pumpkin idea. I'd thought in terms of less moisture, but not in terms of less thick batter. The first loaf I tried used a bit less pumpkin, and I didn't really think it would matter after changing other proportions. But maybe it does.

Oh. Well, no, I wouldn't make split pea soup with pork, no. Too much fat.

And yeah, of course, if the pumpkin batter refuses to cook through, reduce the density.

Next.

As for Split Pea Soup, 1 is right but if there's any left over it has a tendency to congeal with a gelatinous sheen,

You really want some gelatin in your soup, split the pork bone, too.

whether it would be better with pork than with ham

I suggest the obvious third alternative, viz, bacon.

Would the bain marie fuck up the crust? Not that it's super craggy or anything, but I'd hate to see a moist crust.

I'm thinking pretty seriously about 9, but my 14.2 still holds.

What about making the quickbread as muffins rather than all massed together in a loaf pan?

I'm pretty sure my entire loaf costs less than 2 of those muffins

OK, that's a reasonable point -- maybe agitate for the repeal of various labor and food safety laws.

Pease porridge in the pot, nine days old. It gets tangier if you let it age naturally at room temperature, without artificial refrigeration.

Aren't bain-maries normally used in baking when you want to keep the temperature stable, as in Berenbaum's chocolate decadence cake? I would imagine that a bain-marie for the pumpkin cake would aggravate this particular problem.

I guess the question is whether it would be better with pork than with ham.

I have something surprising to tell you, JRoth.

I have something surprising to tell you, JRoth.

I have something surpwning to tell you, Ben.

21: Oo, oo! Yeah, muffins.

Attempting seriousness, really, having tried to adapt muffin recipes to a quick bread, there is indeed a baking at the bottom problem. I'd forgotten that.

"Bain-maries" or "bains-maries"? Inquiring attorneys-general want to know.

I've used bain-maries for custards, when you want an ultra-stable heat and a smooth consistency. I don't think you'd get a crust with that technique; it's usually for cooler oven temperature.

Bacon in split pea soup is good! Best to drain off some of the fat.

It should probably be "bains-maries."

Bacon in split pea soup is good!/strike> Best to drain off some of the fat.

Oh, wait, I misread the problem. No, a bain-marie is not going to work for a LOAF. It might work for a muffin.

31 is even stupider than I intended it to be.

Why would you put a pork bone in a muffin, anyhow?

Oh look, someone on the internet expressed strong bacon partisanship.

Oh look, someone on the internet expressed strong bacon partisanship.

I liked bacon before it was cool.

It should probably be "bains-maries."

Ah, but is there an aigu? That is, does it mean "Marie bath" or "married bath"?

Well la-dee-da, as real people say.

Don't you people understand what you're doing? If the Republicans get hold of this thread, the bains-maries* will sink Obama's candidacy to the bottom of the sea.

*I suppose we should say "teethbrush" too, if we have more than one tooth?

The simplest approach with the bread would seem to be dividing the batter into two pans, spreading it into a bigger, flatter, square or round pan, etc. You could also look at a pumpkin bread or muffin recipe & see if your proportions are way off.

I don't really like hammy pea soup so making it with pork sounds better to me, but if you're going to add ham anyway that seems silly. Another option would be some sort of Mexican bean dish. I really like chipotle black bean chilaquiles.

You really want some gelatin in your soup, split the pork bone, too.

I made oxtail soup for the first time a week ago. Wow, it's weird having that much gelatin in your soup.

For the bread:

Use significantly less pumpkin; I'm one of those people that 1.5s the banana in banana bread, and I can tell you from experience that it's a terrible idea for pumpkin. Look up a pumpkin recipe and follow the proportions. Pumpkin is much heavier than most fruits/vegetable/whatever we use in quick bread, and it takes unholy quantities of leavening to make it all rise, and therefore cook.

If that doesn't work, cook it as muffins.

I know nothing of pork bones.

Weird? Or toothsome?

I think it means "Mary bath"; "marie" is two syllables, not three.

When I make chicken soup I crack all the bones to get more gelatin. Mmmmm.

The soup was tasty, but the fat congealing process as it cooled was different than any other soup I've ever made.

Adding a split pig's foot to your chicken stock gives it a more robust body.

I should add that my fall baking recipe is to get fresh farmer's market apples, cook them down to sauce and the use that sauce to make something like a banana or pumpin bread. It's really really good.

but the fat congealing process as it cooled was different than any other soup I've ever made.

Hrm, really? IME the fat still rises to the top and solidifies there, it's just that underbeneath [sic] the fat it's also semisolid.

That's how it was once it cooled, but while I was letting it get down to room temperature on the counter, it kept forming layers on the top that were like gelatin leaves, but that would then go away again.

EW. Gross.

I left it to JM to say it.

No, JM. Toothsome.

Ben is right.
Just don't let it cool.

If you're uncomfortable with the idea of gelatin, best not to make oxtail soup, no?

If you're uncomfortable with the idea of gelatin, best not to make oxtail soup, no?

Least effective variant on "if you can't stand the heat" ever.

40 has it. You are being too stingy with flour, maybe not a lot, but too stingy and you need a definite amount (proportionate) of baking powder, like 1 3/4 teaspoons for a loaf. It won't cook because it isn't rising enough. You're making something like a pumpkin hippy bread. The flour and the leavening will allow it to rise (i.e. air bubbles inside) enough to actually cook. Low temperature will accentuate the difference between the exterior and the inside.

Least effective variant on "if you can't stand the heat" ever.

Wouldn't want to copy a fellow Missourian.

If you can't stand the heat, stop the buck with a big stick?

a pumpkin hippy bread

Oh Noes !!!!

gelatinous soup looks good for my ailing tongue

I vote for 59 as new mouseover text. (Is there such a thing as new mouseover text anymore?)

It's the economy. We can't just go throwing out perfectly good mouseover text.

This isn't "throwing out perfectly good mouseover text". This is throwing out mouseover text that has somehow been lurking unnoticed in the back of the refrigerator and congealed into some sort of disturbing bacterial mess.

I think grackle is exactly right. A thinner batter isn't necessarily the answer. Canelés, for example, have a very thin batter and are baked for a long time and still end up with a custardy center. You need to get the ratios of flour and leavening in your pumpkin bread right.

Why would you put a pork bone in a muffin, anyhow?

That's how babies are made, Tweety.

doesn't the gelatin-y-ness of things like oxtail soup depend a lot on what you pull of the tail after it's cooked a bit? I vaguely remember that.

Pork bone = white beans (take your pick) and sage. Roast the bone first for extra flavor. I'm speaking ex recto here, but that would be my first instinct. Maybe fry up some blood sausages for the meat. Serve with a fairly acidic white to cut through the unguency.

some sort of disturbing bacterial mess.

So we don't need to pay for aspirin, so there's something wrong with that?

Use significantly less pumpkin

Yes, this. Way less pumpkin and more baking powder or baking soda. You want bubbles. What's happening is that the baking process is causing bread to form on top and everything it doesn't need for bread to clump into mush at the bottom. The outside is cooking anyway because of its constant contact with heated metal.

A radical alternative: keep your existing recipe but cook it in a cast iron pan as though it were cornbread. Thinner, higher temperature, possibly more likely to cook all the way through, easily cut into pieces.

mouseover text that has somehow been lurking unnoticed in the back of the refrigerator and congealed into some sort of disturbing bacterial mess [getting] tangier if you let it age naturally at room temperature, without artificial refrigeration

Fixed.

Despite my "Oh Noes" which was directed to the prospect of hippy bread, grackle is surely right.

I've occasionally had this hippy bread done well, and it's ... dense. How does one do that? I don't know. I suspect one uses different types of flour.

I obviously don't know what I'm talking about. What am I thinking of?

I was thinking of penicillin.

Yes, you were. Feel free to speculate upon the medicinal properties of congealed fat, however.

I've occasionally had this hippy bread done well, and it's ... dense. How does one do that? I don't know.

That's a big part of it, I suspect. Less wheat gluten gives denser bread.

Penicillin is produced by a fungus.

Aspirin is a found in the bark of some tree somewhere, to deter eaters.

via moldy bread (the penicillin, not the tree bark)

Well, the mouseover text is probably moldy, and not bacterial, anyway. Since I'm a content externalist I assert that essear was actually talking about mold.

Hm, I like denser breads very much, and the price of bread these days has me finally determined to make my own (no more just talking about it). I know I've varied the mix of white to wheat flour in the past -- more wheat -- with good, i.e. denser, results that still managed to bake entirely through. Gotta look up some of those scribbled notes.

Making your own staff of life is pretty badass.

the price of bread these days has me finally determined to make my own (no more just talking about it)

You and me both. Four bucks a loaf. My beloved children, why must you eat so much bread?

Would that my roommate didn't plow through 3/4 of a loaf in like one day. I can't figure out what to do about that. I cannot withhold bread from my housemate. But I can probably make disgruntled noises.

80 pwned by 79.

I started out thinking moldy, and then had a horrifying flashback to a summer in Chicago when a roommate managed to forget about a whole watermelon in the pantry and it turned into something that very clearly involved bacteria.

80 pwned by 79.

If you feel the need to provide for your roommate as one would for one's children.

83: It's a hippie thang, Blume. You wouldn't understand.

82: oh, let's us don't start on the moldy and/or bacterial things in the kitchen stories.

You don't want that.

84: they call the masses of illegitimate children squabbling in the dirt at their feet "roommates"?

80: Make more at a go? I dunno. I haven't made bread properly for ages. We do make the odd no-knead (improved with beer) bread, but not regularly.

From vague memories when I did do this --- the gluten content gives you elasticity, so that balanced with how hard it will rise gives you the density. Various things affect homgeneity of bubbles too. But if you don't have both a lot of elasticity and a lot of rising agent, you can't get airy bread. Lack of either will make it more dense, but so will lack of kneading, insufficient time, etc.

let's us don't start

Huh.

85: What do you have against beer, wine, bread, yogurt, cheese, tea, chocolate, and vinegar, you racist?

Really, chocolate?

82: Don't ever forget potatoes. Particularly in a warm and humid place, in a sealed container. Potatoes shouldn't slosh. If you do, however, forget them, by no means investigate the sloshing by opening the container.

This has been a public service announcement.

Salicylic acid, in some Wintergreen, innit?

89: they just aren't moldy and/or bacterial enough to make a truly disgusting story. Also if you combine them all together it tastes super gross.

I've mentioned this before, but the basic technique outlined in Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day really works. (Basically: get a big tupperware tub. Mix the ingredients for 3-5 loaves in the tub. Allow to rise normally for a few hours. Cut out dough enough for one loaf, bake as normal. Throw remaining dough in fridge. When a fresh loaf is needed, cut out enough dough, throw in a greased loaf pan and allow to rise for a half hour or so. Bake as normal. As time progresses, the dough will develop more and more of a sourdough like taste, but is otherwise identical to the original loaf.)

Mrs. Chopper has been doing this for about 6 months now. Only problem is ensuring there's enough room in the fridge for a big tub.

If you happen to find a bottle of something-or-other sitting on the floor after a party, and you decide to seal it with wax so you can watch and see what happens to it, and then several months later you have another party, do not by any means let that really, really drunk guy take a swig of it, because any humor value will be mitigated when he slips in his own puke and breaks your stairs.

This has been a public service announcement.

91: Oh my god, no. Don't investigate the melting potatoes. Please.

90: Really.

92: Willow bark.

Only problem is ensuring there's enough room in the fridge for a big tub.

This would be impossible for us (small fridge). Otherwise, sounds like a great idea.

My mom just got a new fridge. There were items in her fridge that had been moved there from her old fridge when I was in high school.

I'm going back at Christmas. I'm going to lose my shit if she has moved that stuff again.

As for the roommate-bread thing, yeah, really, it's a can of worms, is what it is. We have a shared household, kind of like siblings, and when we cook, we share the food. Just how it is.

Salicylic acid, in some Wintergreen, innit?

The name suggests willow (genus Salix). Google can likely confirm.

Sifu, some sports are meant for outdoors only.

Pwned, but with value added.

100: Can you put them to work making bread?

92: that's methyl salicylate, a slightly different ester.

Jesus, I hear that aspirin is efficacious for the pain brought on by pwnage.

Feel free to speculate upon the medicinal properties of congealed fat, however.

My mother tells me that her father considered a slice of bacon applied to the neck and wrapped up in red flannel an excellent treatment for a cold.
I don't know if that was folk medicine or if he just made it up all by himself. He was sort of crazy.

107: raw, or cooked?

Ha! Pwned in pointing to pwnage! Have an aspirin.

Did it have to be red?

Congealed fat has many uses around the home.

105, ahhh. We did that 'synthesis' with Oil of Wintergreen. Makes sense that it's close.

94: Chopper, I guess you can't freeze the leftover dough, and take a batch out every few days? I see that refrigerating it might be preferable.

109: Okay. Can I also call you in the morning?

You can call me whatever you want, M/tch.

Raw, and it had to be red.

114: Can I just brush your cheek before I leave you, darling?

112: To be honest, I don't remember what the book says. I'm pretty sure yeast dough freezes pretty well, but the thaw time would be a pain. Real bread experts please chime in.

115 to 114.

115 if it were blue, it might not have been such an appealing remedy.

a slice of bacon applied to the neck

I'll refrain from linking to a photo of the bacon bra, but if there's anything to your grandpa's theory, I'll bet that woman never gets chest colds.

we could test against the salmon bra one, and a control group.

117: I think part of the appeal of leaving it in the fridge is that there's still a low level of yeast and bacteria action going on, slowly improving the flavor over time. Freezing would pretty much shut all that down, and as you say the thawing and reawakening / reinvigorating the yeast would probably be a pain.

Pizza dough withstands freezing just fine, so go ahead and throw your bread dough in the freezer. True, though, thaw time would be long.

A back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that the savings from baking our own bread would pay for a stand mixer in a short time. Ooh, I'm this close.

123: pizza dough doesn't have to rise much though. I suspect you might have trouble reviving the yeast, you might want to do 1st rise then shape then freeze. A good solid loaf might take 12 hours to thaw too, and you wouldn't want to try and rush it.

Still, might be worth trying if you've lots of room in a freezer somewhere and none in your fridge. I presume most of us without a box freezer have the opposite problem, usually.

thaw time would be long

I can ... take it out of the freezer in the morning and put it in the fridge, and ... when I get home in the evening it'll be ready to bake? Yes? Probably messing up the whole internal activity aspect of things, but worth a shot, I'm thinking.

On second thought, and given 122/124, freezing bread dough seems workable but a bad idea nevertheless. I'd make a week's worth at a time and just use the fridge.

125: I think you could experiment. You might have to adjust the yeast level a bit, and you probably want to make sure your starting off with very good yeast. Let us know how it turns out.

Alternatively, you could bake a lot of loaves one afternoon and freeze those. That works pretty well.

Alright. We have a small college fridge type of thing in the basement I can plug in. I don't expect it will increase my electric bill enough to cancel the savings! But I don't actually have room in my existing fridge or freezer for loaves of bread in either baked or dough form. I have crammed two loaves in the freezer with a lot of wedging.

I may have to learn how to make sourdough bread in order to avoid these issues.

||

No more masturbating to Dolemite.

|>

129: I'm sure he would want us to keep masturbating to him.

might even insist.

I just had a disappointing frozen dough experience. It was a seedy whole wheat loaf, and it never really rose coming out of the freezer. It baked up OK, but was probably 50% denser than it should have been.

If you're going to freeze bread dough, you have to give it a long rising time. We're talking 12 hours or more. But it's doable. It's the same rule as always: wait till the dough has doubled in size. Do not expect that to happen the same day you take it out of the freezer, unless your day starts just after midnight. (Also, I have only tried this with bread made with fresh yeast or with sourdough: if you use instant yeast or dried yeast the fungus may not be robust enough to survive freezing.)

I would throw the pork bone to a fox. There's a family of foxes that visit my garden. I would not throw it into my garden: I would probably leave it in the nearby school playground, so that the little children could learn a valuable life lesson in what happens to bones when predators crack them.

Split pea soup is yummy-delectable. Do not spoil it by adding meat.

I have no solution for the pumpkin loaf. Why bake a loaf when muffins are so good and can be frozen?

I can ... take it out of the freezer in the morning and put it in the fridge, and ... when I get home in the evening it'll be ready to bake? Yes?

Doubtful. It takes my pizza dough at least that long to thaw in the fridge, and it's in lumps a lot smaller than the lump of dough required for a whole loaf.

Oh, and you said "ready to bake" not "ready to rise". Yeah, not a chance.

Soda bread is quick and easy to make - 5 minutes to mix everything together is much more appealing to me than kneading and rising etc. If I make normal bread I do it in the breadmaker with the timer on - very nice to get up to fresh bread. But a loaf of that barely gets us to lunchtime. I'd have to put it on twice a day, I guess.

Hey, if any Boston area unfoggeders (commenters or lurkers) have a crock pot (preferably a small one) that they'd like to get rid of cheap, please let me know.

Alright, 68 wins for offering an explanation as well as a solution.

Part of what got lost in LB's oversight is the proportions, which are 1.75 C of pumpkin to 2.5 C of flour, plus moderate amounts of melted butter, sugar, eggs, yogurt, and molasses. This is starting from a banana bread recipe calling for 2 C of flour and 1.5 C of banana. My first loaf, in which I used 2 C flour and 1.5 C pumpkin didn't have this issue. But I will proceed by cutting out pumpkin.

Chopper's 66 also has my attention - despite Ben's cuteness, I'm not thrilled at the idea of combining pork bone and ham meat in a soup. But sausage - ah-ha. Plus, I have some sausages in my freezer I can't identify, but don't think are hot Italian. They would be good candidates.

Thanks, Mineshaft!

On bread: Sunday I made my favorite loaf ever - Hungarian caraway bread, from James Beard. Uses 2 lb of regular flour plus a cup of mashed potato - other than that, pretty standard. Baked in a skillet (not pre-heated). Fairly dense, chewy, with a hearty crust. Holds very well to the next day. Best of all, hand-kneaded, even though I dislike hand-kneading. It's an excellent texture for it - I didn't feel like I was trying to give my arms a workout, nor was it so sticky I had to keep adding flour.

According to Beard, it even keeps in the fridge, although I won't be trying that. But I bet even Jesus' ravening daughters would get 4 days out of it, at a cost of $1.50 and maybe 30 hands-on minutes.

Soda bread is quick and easy to make

I convinced a skeptical AB to let me make one last year, and ended up chucking the last few slices - massively disappointing. I love biscuits, but I don't want a giant one for sandwiches.

I don't know why I've been resisting muffins, since that was the original model. I think I just find the filling of 12 little tins (and then having to clean them) to be a bridge too far - that little extra effort that turns it into a pain in the ass. Plus, if RMMP is right, that wouldn't really help.

Hey, quick menu question:

tonight I'm doing a smoked pork loin and corn spoonbread. Would butternut squash soup make any sense with that meal? It makes intellectual sense to me, but I'm not feeling it.

141: Sounds good to me. I also make a butternut squash and apple soup, which you might want to consider; it's a little sweeter, and really tasty.

I just find the filling of 12 little tins (and then having to clean them) to be a bridge too far - that little extra effort that turns it into a pain in the ass. Plus, if RMMP is right, that wouldn't really help.

I think actually it would help, to be honest: they're in constant contact with heated metal and a smaller object is more likely to cook through. When you think about muffins vs. bread, keep in mind that bread uses dough but muffins use batter. They are much wetter and the baking of muffins is in some ways a much more forgiving endeavor because you're cooking a dozen tiny things rather than one big thing with a core that is inches away from the heat. Muffins are also something I expect to be much denser than bread; they're fine with heavier ingredients and ratios of heavy to light.

That said, I could totally turn out to be wrong and maybe just another pinch of baking powder or a little baking soda would fix it for you. My gut instinct, though, is that a bread with that many heavy liquids and semi-solids - molasses, pumpkin, etc. - is just not light enough in those proportions to make bread happen. Bread wants to be able to rise in the pan and it has to carry with it everything it's got inside.

Now I want to bake pumpkin bread but have no time. Ah well.

If Obama loses the election because of you guys I'll take my trolling elsewhere. Real Americans buy their food from stores. Globalized stores.

||

As of last night, 1 in 7 eligible voters in Durham County, NC, had voted. This morning Wake County announced it's opening additional early voting sites to alleviate long lines.

|>

That doesn't really respond to my point, Robusto.

Ah but it does, Jeezy E. By voting early I have freed up valuable time I can spend giving random baking advice. Real Americans shop in globalized stores, yes, but their semi-mythical forebears, Amurkins, baked wholesome breads from scratch as just one noble expression of their threatened folkways. I am living the dream, John. Living the dream.

And you're preparing for the coming Depression, Robust. It's the Amer/Amurkin thing to do.

I like baking bread, but I can't eat it fast enough, and my GF prefers store-bought sliced soft bread for her daily bread consumption. It's kind of a bummer - a relationship that has to straddle the hearty-bread/soft-bread divide.

whups, runaway italics.

hearty-bread/soft-breadbread/bread-like product divide.

Pretty soon you yuppie folk are going to be driving around in Conestoga wagons and planing boards with adzes. It won't work, people! You'll always be despised! Give it up! Be who you are!

Nah, John, too much work. Besides, adzed boards don't taste any better than machine planed.

Say all the nays you like, John, but soup and I are going to be taming the wild frontier and hording silver in hopes we return to that standard and our bread will be indescribably fresh.

Pwned with betrayal! It's like a Greek tragedy over here.

taming the wild frontier and hording silver

Right, in Canada. After the GOP victory and subsequent economic collapse.

But damn, the bread will be tasty.

155: No betrayal Robust, just forget the adzes. There is no need to go all medieval when we can have a solar and hydro powered portable mill. Frees up time for baking.

When I was a kid I envied kids who got Wonder Bread, because it was completely uniform, bright white, and without any texture. And because you could wad it into little balls.

At some point my mom quit baking bread, but she still didn't buy the Wonder Bread.

I still like the soft sliced globalized whole wheat bread of our family tradition. Suck on THAT, America-hating swine!

When I was a kid I envied kids who got Wonder Bread, because it was completely uniform, bright white, and without any texture.

Me too! And I still crave Kraft macaroni n' cheese.

We interrupt the merka-hate with this public service announcement about
academic salaries.

Me too! And I still crave Kraft macaroni n' cheese.

There should be a name for this sort of psychological craving for foods based more on not being allowed them as a child than on them actually being good.

We were allowed them, but only in highly controlled circumstances, like when mom and dad went out and left us with a babysitter. Another "special occasion" forbidden food was, strangely, onion soup. My father hated onions with a passion, wouldn't have them in the house, so whenever he left on a business trip, my mother would brew up a HUGE batch of onion soup. To this day, it's one of my favorite comfort foods. Comfort foods have to have some sort of "tee-hee, I'm not supposed to be eating this!" allure, I think.

My son's favorite of all was Kraft macoroni and cheese, and as he grew older he started inventing his own macaroni and cheese recipes with better pasta, better cheese, etc. etc., but still recognizable mac and cheese.

envied kids who got Wonder Bread

God, me too. And Pop-Tarts.

163: Yeah, but the `Kraft' in that fills the same role as `Wonder' in above. It's still bread of a sort, it's still cheese of a sort.

A lot of these sort of things taste a lot better in your memory than on a plate, particularly if you weren't ever (or rarely) allowed them.

I also make a butternut squash and apple soup

I have an amazing rutabega-apple-squash soup from the Inn at Little Washington. Simple, but a lot of ingredients, so I save it for company.

my GF prefers store-bought sliced soft bread for her daily bread consumption.

Have you tried making homemade white bread? It's much, much better than store-bought (a bit like Pepperidge Farms, but with crustiness), but should still suit your poor, immature-palated GF. From there you might be able to stretch to a whole wheat sandwich bread.

Also, the bread I mentioned up above has a crumb not dissimilar to standard white bread. Maybe you could cut off the crusts for her.

A lot of these sort of things taste a lot better in your memory than on a plate

So true. Thanks to other children's parties, I am sometimes exposed to these American semi-foods, and they're almost always worse than I expect.

To this day, it's one of my favorite comfort foods. Comfort foods have to have some sort of "tee-hee, I'm not supposed to be eating this!" allure, I think

AB still talks fondly about going out with her mother for pizza when her dad was on business trips.

I was going to suggest making the mimicry-muffins in muffin tins.

shiv makes a bread that is basically a homemade white bread. Thin crust and smooshy. We've never made sandwiches with it because I end up eating half of the loaf while it's still warm. But I suspect it would work well; I'll see if I can get the recipe from him later.*

*Yes, we're in the same apartment. This is a sign of how very much I do not bake, except for cupcakes.

If you mix some sort of mashed turnip in with mashed potatoes it's just as good and more interesting.

Making good white bread for your girlfriend would be conceding too much to here deviancy, Nathan. Use aversive conditioning. You can't let them get the upper hand.

141: Yes, butternut squash soup makes sense, but use roasted pumpkin seeds and creme fraiche as garnishes for the soup.

Depending, that is, on the soup you make--mine tends to the intense/sweet/concentrated side of the butternut squash soup spectrum. Mrs. Chopper makes a version with potato and carrot that is fairly bland. Her version would not go with your menu. I can't seem to find my recipe for the soup around here--anyone more blessed with google-fu may be able to find it, or I'll pop back later with the recipe if anyone wants it.

Also, one of the nice things about being unemployed: I get to spend the next few hours making crabapple and pear jellies.

"hours" s/b "years"

Butternut squash and red lentil soup with tons of ginger and jalapeño is good.

I like to put curry and ginger and cayenne in my butternut squash soup.

I like to put curry and ginger and cayenne in my butternut squash soup. damn near everything. Exceptions made where it would be insane.

Cayenne makes a damn fine addition to pancakes.

I asked around this morning, and yes, there is a pumpkin bread recipe, which happens to be from Betty Crocker. The recipe is for zucchini bread but it is designed for the straight-up substitution of pumpkin for zucchini. The recipe is known to work, and it also works with the addition of chocolate chips.

It then occurred to me that that recipe ought to bloody well be online, and so it was.

max
['Useful for proportioning purposes.']

Huh, most of my baking basics -- for quickbreads and muffins, that is -- began from the ancient Betty Crocker cookbook I lifted from my mom years ago. The basic recipe has morphed quite a bit over the years, but still, I keep thinking I'm probably in a rut by now, and should really start fresh from some other cookbook(s) in order to wrap my head around the use of apple or orange juice, yogurt, things like that.

My squash soup recipe (really from Cook's) uses roasted squash and shallots, so it's decently flavorful. The spoonbread will be on the sweet side, so I don't think I want to go that way with the soup. The seed and creme idea is a sound one.

Holy shit, that Betty Crocker recipe is wet! 4 eggs? Also, a tiny bit of leavening - I think I've been using 1/2t b. soda and 1 1/2t b. powder. And getting, as I said, a very nice crumb.

Anyway, I'll bake one this afternoon, and will report back.

180: Well, that's where mine started. It's not that sweet--just a little brown sugar on the flesh of the squash to assist caramelization.

Holy shit, that Betty Crocker recipe is wet! 4 eggs?

I wondered about that too. Just checked my B.C. cookbook, and sure enough, the linked pumpkin bread recipe appears across from the basic Nut Bread recipe I've always worked from (adapting); includes variants such as apricot bread, banana nut bread, date nut bread, whole wheat raisin -- all of these using the 1 egg of the basic Nut Bread recipe. Looking for that at the B.C. site now, but the site loads slowly for some reason.

So I don't know what the 4 eggs in the pumpkin/zucchini bread is about. I'd be more likely to adapt a banana bread receipt* to pumpkin, that is, go with 1 egg.

* Bizarrely, I consistently type this rather than "recipe."

I'm not good with adjusting baking recipes, but maybe the extra eggs are related to the heaviness of the pumpkin? They're providing not so much wetness, but structure?

Four eggs is crazy talk. What else does it want one to use, powdered pumpkin? Pumpkin-flavored sand?

I guess I could see the for-structure argument. They would certainly provide plenty of protein to hold up the rest of it.

No luck on the basic Nut Bread online, not found. Weird, the online version of banana nut bread differs entirely from the cookbook version (c. 1969) I have: suddenly it wants 3 eggs rather than 1, and Bisquick (tm)! What are all these eggs supposed to be doing besides making a custardy bread?

Betty, I am not happy. I wonder if I've ever really liked you.

Yeah, it's weird enough that I'd try it with those proportions just to see if Betty Crocker's test kitchens were onto something.

i read garbled as gabriel everytime, right now even typed it grabled
something in mashed potatoes are burning painful, i never knew

is

|| The Coen Brother's new movie "Burn After Reading" is quite good if you like black comedies. Some fantastic if somewhat self-satisfied performances by George Clooney, Frances McDormand, Brad Pitt ||>

I can't help read "Burn After Reading' as if it's about some sort of inferno along the M4.

A couple of recipes from Cooks.com:

CHOCOLATE CHIP PUMPKIN BREAD
3 c. sugar
3 1/2 c. flour
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 c. pumpkin
1 c. oil
4 eggs
2/3 c. water
2 c. chocolate chips

Stir all ingredients together. Add chocolate chips last. Pour into 2 small loaf pans or 1 (13 x 9 x 2 inch) pan. Bake 1 hour in a 350 degree oven.\

OR

PUMPKIN BREAD WITH CHOCOLATE CHIPS

2 c. flour
2 c. sugar
4 eggs
2 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 c. melted, cooled butter
2 c. cooked or canned pumpkin
2 tbsp. cocoa
1 c. chocolate chips
1 c. chopped walnuts

Cream the sugar and melted butter; add eggs, one at a time, and beat after each. Add all dry ingredients. Alternately with pumpkin, add chocolate chips and nuts. Fold in. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 to 1 1/4 hours for two loaves. For smaller pans, 4 loaves, 40-45 minutes.

I also can't type in a literate manner.

i was to interpret the burn after reading like how they know about me, but alas there was a real movie which i'll see maybe next yr

OK, 192 makes things much more clear for me. I had been thinking they wanted four eggs in one (1) loaf. Seeing it's for two makes a big difference.

This pumpkin bread with chocolate chips is sounding increasingly gross to me, I'm afraid. 1 or 1.5 cups of sugar per loaf? Not my kind of thing, though to the taste of others.

I made corn bread last night from one of those Jiffy corn muffin mixes. Combined two boxes; did the recipe on the box, except into a pan rather than muffin tin.

The bread came out tasty but a bit crumbly, and I was thinking I could up the egg count by one or two to alleviate this. Am I off my rocker with this thinking?

This pumpkin bread with chocolate chips is sounding increasingly gross to me, I'm afraid. 1 or 1.5 cups of sugar per loaf?

Most of the pumpkin chocolate chip stuff that I have had reminds me more of a cupcake/cake consistency than muffin/bread. It is sweet and dense. Very tasty though.

196: I agree - I like pumpkin bread, tho' I make it with pineapple and less sugar and more nuts and raisins - but I cannot imagine it with chocolate chips. It makes my skin crawl.

This pumpkin bread with chocolate chips is sounding increasingly gross to me, I'm afraid. 1 or 1.5 cups of sugar per loaf?

Not mine! Just 1/2 C sugar plus 1/4 C of molasses to go with 2.5 C flour. Also, bittersweet morsels.

I still think that the flour-egg ratios in these recipes is fucked, as is the cup of oil to 3.5 C flour. I would also note that the 2 recipes in 192 are due for a cage match.

May I also note that Whole Foods has a pumpkin muffin recipe, albeit w/o chocolate chips:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup packed natural cane sugar
1/2 cup expeller pressed canola oil
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup canned pumpkin purée
Method

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line a miniature muffin pan with mini cupcake liners or spray and flour the pan using canola or olive oil cooking spray. Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, stir together flours, baking powder, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt and sugar. In a separate medium bowl, whisk together oil, eggs, vanilla and pumpkin, then add to flour mixture and stir to combine.

Spoon batter into prepared pan and bake for 15 minutes, or until done when tested with a toothpick. Allow cupcakes to cool in the pan for 15 minutes, then continue to cool on wire racks.

I imagine that one could add chips, use conventionally sized muffin pans and extend the baking time for a few minutes. They also have a recipe for pumpkin bread on ther website.

[Does no one ATM google recipes??]

I was thinking I could up the egg count by one or two to alleviate this. Am I off my rocker with this thinking?

Yes. Dairy tenderized crumb, not egg. A little sour cream would be nice. But honestly, Southern-style cornbread is almost as easy as Jiffy, and 10X better.

I make it with pineapple and less sugar and more nuts and raisins - but I cannot imagine it with chocolate chips. It makes my skin crawl.

Your skin can say hello to mine as it crawls by in the opposite direction. Pineapple? That's on top of the fact that I despise nuts and raisins in all baked goods (raisin exception for oatmeal-raisin cookies).

Does no one ATM google recipes??

Not half as fun as experimenting.

[Does no one ATM google recipes??]

TBH, it never occurred to me that WF would put this precious, precious recipe online. And, indeed, I can already tell you that, chips aside, this is not their Pumpkin Spice Muffin recipe - wrong ingredients.

As for the other googled recipes, I started by synthesizing a couple printed recipes, and my first pass was close enough that I decided to work form there. Starting with 3 or more base recipes would take way too long to narrow down. When the raw batter layer became intractable, I figured I'd throw it to you people, esp. since I had the pork bone question as well.

Anyway, results of the less-pumpkin loaf should come in tonight.

197: Jiffy is kind of inherently crumbly. I would recommend experimenting with using just a touch more oil rather than a whole other egg. Egg may be the way to go but oil is easier to experiment with in small increments.

Once you're messing with the recipe, I'd abandon the Jiffy and buy some ingredients. Cornbread is easy -- Newt made it this weekend and he's seven.

OT: I've just bought my election weekend plane tickets to Pittsburgh to do GOTV stuff for Obama. Any Pittsburghians want to have drinks or dinner or something on the evening of Nov 1, 2, or 3? I'm terrible at keeping track of who's where, but I know JRoth and CN are Pittsburghers -- anyone else?

LB, there are people here who have struggled all their lives to make cornbread.

I could send Newt over to help?

"Newt Lizardson: Cornbread Consultant" probably isn't a good fantasy script for a kid that age. Probably you should just have him kill malefactors of one sort or another.

Count me in for some sort of mini-meetup. Thanks to this thread, AB has become aware that there is a person on this blog called "Lizardbreath," and is further aware that Unfogged may contribute to our very quality of life. So it should be an easier sell.

We can coordinate as it gets closer.

PS - Stormcrow, too (if you count suburbs, that is - I hear he's a homeowner).

I'd abandon the Jiffy and buy some ingredients

Yeah this is probably the answer. I was already at the store and not sure what from-scratch ingredients I had at home, so I went with the lazy-and-simple option.

I guess my question was also a more general inquiry: how does one address excessive crumbliness when baking? Which several people answered in different ways.

About that pork bone, does it have lipstick on it? Makes a difference, ya know.

202: Pineapple [crushed] cuts down on the amount of sugar that's needed. It doesn't really give it a pineapple-y taste.

I suppose I shouldn't mention that I use applesauce to do the same in oatmeal cookies.

206, 209: I need Newt's cornbread receipt recipe, please.

Since there is an actual food thread right now, I will use it to crow about the fact that I have just obtained a lovely unglazed (but black! gorgeous) clay bean pot.

215: Just the Joy of Cooking -- nothing exciting.

190: disagree! It is a bit too much a trifle and too little a movie.

217: Oh. Okay, I think I've looked at that before, will do so again. Thanks.

Dear God, Unfogged has turned into a bake-off. For his sake, I hope ogged's not still lurking.

220: If it were a fashion thread, we might say the same, what with the trading of URLs to various types of shoes or pants, and serious discussion of same ... so no big diff.

I'll totally get baked. Who's competing, again?

220: IIRC, he wasn't entirely opposed to a little cheesecake now and then.

223: Yogurt, too.

So did the pumpkin bread work out or not? I hace m3 som3 bakage receipts if needed.

No luck on the basic Nut Bread online, not found. Weird, the online version of banana nut bread differs entirely from the cookbook version (c. 1969) I have: suddenly it wants 3 eggs rather than 1, and Bisquick (tm)! What are all these eggs supposed to be doing besides making a custardy bread?

Yeah, but how much flour is it using? The Better Homes & Gardens recipe is lighter on everything.

Betty, I am not happy. I wonder if I've ever really liked you.

I'm using the NEW (as of '96) Betty Crocker. Which is falling apart, unlike my '68 copy of Mastering the Art.

max
['Modern bookbinding sucks!']

he wasn't entirely opposed to a little cheesecake now and then

IYKWIMAITYD

my '68 copy of Mastering the Art

Just finished her autobiography tonight. What a personality!

222: It's on, Tweety. What were the rules again?

Max, my '69 Betty Crocker is falling apart. Spiral-bound, what's up with that?

We are no longer interested in Betty Crocker or Better Homes and Garden cookery. That's the royal We. I need to move on.

Does no one ATM google recipes??

Of course. But like all other information available on the interwebs, results are pretty mixed.

228: fuck, I forget.

OK, Here it is: the half-can of pumpkin recipe seems to have cooked through. The first bites of the heel were, to me, a bit dry, but everyone else poo-poohed that claim. AB says it's the best of the 4 loaves I've made. So I think we're close. The rise was spectacular (1 t B. Pwdr., 1/2 t B. Soda). I think the only remaining refinement will revolve around spice proportions, and maybe a slight reduction in flour. We'll see.

Thanks again, all.

Oh, and I didn't make the soup tonight - the oven was occupied. But a wilted spinach salad was excellent with sweet corn spoonbread (which was awesome) and the smoked pork loin, which may be the best boneless pork loin I've ever made.

223: Yogurt, too.

Talk about a different era.

I suppose I shouldn't mention that I use applesauce to do the same in oatmeal cookies.

Do want. Yum.

he wasn't entirely opposed to a little cheesecake now and then

Actually the pictures of Michael Phelps he so loved to post were pretty big.

the half-can of pumpkin recipe seems to have cooked through

Awesome!

I am saddened, after this week's visit to the state fair, that I didn't make time to enter a pan of cornbread. The only one on display was the 2nd place winner and it looked as dull as dishwater. So depressing. Next year I am taking home that blue ribbon, by gods.

234: Recipe? We're in different states (by a hair), but I'll still file a non-compete if necessary.

I'll type it up tonight; I can't remember it off-hand. It's a flavored cornbread (it has cheese and jalapeños) and makes a great breakfast the next morning. That I pried it out of my mother is a testament to the more-with-honey-than-vinegar approach to interrogation.

I always would tie my mother to a chair and lay out the pincers and porceps and the soldering iron, and only then would I make my polite request.

Just finished her autobiography tonight. What a personality!

Yeah she was; when I saw her on TV in the 90's she'd be up there with whichever chef, and she would blow them away just sitting there. Plus, apparently, she could really hold her liquor.

Max, my '69 Betty Crocker is falling apart. Spiral-bound, what's up with that?

Instead of being in a ring-binder? Bummer.

We are no longer interested in Betty Crocker or Better Homes and Garden cookery. That's the royal We. I need to move on.

I got one from Julia Child! Cranberry-Walnut Pumpkin Loaves!

OK, Here it is: the half-can of pumpkin recipe seems to have cooked through.

Yay! For the record, my mother seconded RMP & LB.

max
['I like cheesecake myself.']

Red & Black Curry Ham Soup
two medium onions

8-10 cloves of garlic, peeled (you may want less, but I really like garlic)
2 T extra-virgin olive oil
1 t salt
1 t pepper
2 T Patak's Original Hot Curry Paste Concentrate for Sauces--Tomato and Cumin)
remains of a spiral-cut prepared ham (about 1 lb. including bones)
2 c black beans
6 c water
1 c white wine (I used leftover mulled chardonnay)
1 can chopped cooked tomatoes (10 oz.)
2 c brown rice (I used brown & wild rice mix) with water and (scant--the ham has plenty) salt as required
Put the beans and water in a pressure cooker, bring to pressure and cook for 30 minutes, then set aside to depressurize. In the meantime, chop the onion and garlic and sauté in the oil with salt and pepper over medium heat until browned. Stir in the curry paste, and add the wine to the mixture. Allow to simmer until the alcohol has mostly evaporated and the sauce begins to thicken. Meanwhile, cut the remaining meat off the ham and dice. Put the ham and diced meat in a large stock pot. Pour the sauce over the ham, add the beans and water from the pressure cooker, and add the tomatoes. Simmer for at least 45 minutes while you cook the rice according to the package directions.

Serve the soup over rice, or stir the rice in before serving. Serves 10-12 adults.

Spicy, but good and filling.

I guess my question was also a more general inquiry: how does one address excessive crumbliness when baking?

I thought the culprit was too much fat -- oil, butter, etc. -- made baked goods excessively crumbly.

I'm not big fan of pumpkin in general, but I may try to make pumpkin pancakes soon for my bf. Every year, he waits for them to reappear at our neighborhood diner in the fall.

218: It is a bit too much a trifle

But trifle is delicious! Berries and custard and cream...

My ex-husband told me to beg my then-mother-in-law for her "secret" kugel recipe. I did, to which she responded 'Buy a package of Maneschewitz egg noodles. Turn it over, the recipe's on the back.'

The same thing happened to me with my boyfriend - he wanted his mother's biscuit recipe. She told us to buy a box of Bisquik.

Same damn thing with my mother's mouth-watering raspberry jam. Mind you, the raspberries grown in the backyard are pretty good.

I had some Phô with oxtail broth tonight, and while the Phô was only okay, that was some boss-ass broth.

Trying to get the last word on some old threads, Sifu?

I realise I'm coming in really late here, so the pork bone is probably already cooked, but I'm also a person who likes to reverse-engineer dishes I like from restaurants and cafes, as in the other quickbread story. I had a pork hock risotto in a restaurant a while back and reverse engineered that - brilliant. You start by simmering the washed hock in a stockpot with quite a bit of water, as for split pea soup, but with a bit more water, then naturally you don't add peas, but let it simmer till it's falling-apart tender. Remove the hock / bone and take out any yucky bits, like fat, skin and what have you. Cut up all the good stuff small and reserve it in a bowl. Now cook a risotto using the simmer water as stock. Italian (flat) parsley is delicious in this.

I've only tried this with the pork hock, which is salted, so I don't know if it would be a little bland with an unsalted pork bone.

You can de-fat the "stock" overnight if you want to make it more low-fat