Fig & Nuts Rye Bread

I baked these loaves (Figs & Brazil Nuts Rye Bread [big one] and Currants & Walnuts Bread [smaller ones]) last Saturday.
It was one of my experimental breads and it was a sort of last-minute inspirational thing to add figs and brazil nuts to the loaf, so I am very glad that it turned out quite well.

Amar's NZ Christmas Cake

Last weekend we had quite a bit of snow - the first accumulated snow of this year in the area - and we enjoyed staying and spending time together at home, a kind of "snowed-in" feeling :-)

It was an unusually relaxing weekend for Amar, who usually goes to office both on Saturdays and Sundays and spend at least for several hours there, and so it was a perfect timing for him to make his "famous NZ Christmas cake"!




This fruit cake uses 1.25kg amount of dried fruits (assortment of raisins, currants, sultanas, and apricots) and some nuts to be baked in a 20cm square cake tin!! So it is a very rick, heavy cake. And thanks to the bitter-sweetness of brandy, orange rind and lemon rind, and sour-sweetness of dried fruits, the cake is not overly sweet but just full of rich and complex flavour.

I heard that in the United States "Christmas fruit cakes" have a very bad press, and because it is so unpopular that there is a joke which says "It is often given as a present, but no one likes it. The joke is that the person who receives it, saves it and gives it to someone else next Christmas." I found similar things said on a few websites on the internet, and in one of them a British person declares that it is totally understandable because "American fruitcake that you buy at the supermarket is pretty nasty stuff. It contains artificially-colored glazed fruit that is bright red and green. It is sort of sticky and sort of gummy and doesn't taste real."

But (according to this English person and from what I have observed so far) English and NZ traditional fruitcakes are definitely a "real thing" --- no artificial flavour, no artificially glazed fruits, and just a natural, rich flavour.

Thank you Amar, for making this delicious Christmas Cake!

From Michiko's Kitchen - Part 2

Here are some photos from my recent kitchen experiments...

*** Baking ***

Left: Two baguetts with commercial dry yeast (5/18/07) Right: English Muffins with commercial dry yeast (5/14/07)

Left: Digestive Biscuits with Chocolate Coating Right: Raisin and Walnut Bread with Home-grown Raisin Yeast

Left: Banana Bread with Amish Bread Starter Right: Spicy Ginger Cookies

***Cooking***

Oil Sardin, Potato and Apple Casserole

Left: Pumpkin and Tomato Soup Right: Tofu Satay with Nutty Sauce

Left: Sardin and potato casserole, and Roasted Peppers Stuffed with Hummus-Miso paste Right: Hidziki Gyoza, Stir-fried Shrimps and Broccoli in a creamy sauce)

Strawberry Jam and Strawberry Mousse

A few days ago I bought a lot of strawberries that were on sale at a supermarket, and with them I made some strawberry jam and strawberry mousse last Sunday, which seemed to bring spring to our home.

I like homemade jam because I can make it according to my taste (not as sweet - about 70% less sugar than the commercial ones - and thus pleasantly fresh and tangy). To my relief, Amar also liked fresh homemade jam, so we enjoyed it together with a slice of my raisin-yeast loaf fresh from oven on that day.

English Traditional Hot Cross Buns on Good Friday Morning

I made these traditional hot cross buns for Easter this year for the first time in my life, as Amar persistantly pleaded for "hot cross buns for a Good Friday breakfast treat".
I referred to three different recipes from three different bread cookbooks including two borrowed from the public library. In the end, I went for the recipe from the book that I own, with a few changes made in favor of my preferences (such as reducing the amount of sugar and butter).

These buns turned out quite well for a first try: Amar was very happy with my buns, as well as the fact that he got to have real traditional hot cross buns for a Good Friday breakfast, as he used to do every year in NZ ;-)

According to these cookbooks I referred to, hot cross buns were born in pagan England, but somehow it became a tradition in the UK and English-speaking countries to eat hot cross buns on Good Friday morning. Some people still believe, one book says, that there is a curative power when you eat these buns on Good Friday morning. (Notes: However, it seems that hot cross buns are not so common in the U.S., as all the several American friends we asked if they eat hot cross buns for Good Friday answered that they only know of the cross buns from a nursery rhyme but never actually tasted them. Of which Amar said to me, "A sad life, isnt't it..." with a sigh and a wink.)

As I was so pleased with these buns, I made them again on Easter Sunday and shared some with two family friends of ours. When I was making the second batch, Amar's mum Christine and her husband Peter happened to "call" us for a video chat on Skype, and they saw me putting the crosses on the buns before baking and brushing syrup onto them after the baking was done! At both ends of the video phone, we all found it very funny :-)

These pictures are taken by Amar while I was making the first batch of hot cross buns on Thursday night:


(Good Friday Breakfast with Hot Cross Buns)

Michiko's Apple Yeast Bread

I started experimenting with growing wild yeast culture from fruits such as apples and raisins for bread baking in February (about 2 months ago), and it seems I have begun to get a hang of it. (There are some photographs of my early experiments with the wild yeast culture in the entry on March 17, "From Michiko's Recent Kitchen Experiments" and on March 13, "Rejuvelac Sourdough Bread").

Although Amar was quite dubious about my apple yeast or any other kind of wild yeast experiements (and it was quite understandable since at the beginning the bread made with my homegrown wild yeast weren't that terrific ;-), as I start to get a hang of it and the loaves of bread produced have become more and more in a good shape with a good flavor and texture, he started appreciating the bread made with my wild yeast.

The landmark moment was when he said of my second loaf of apple yeast bread: "Wow, this is the best toast bread that I've ever had since I left New Zealand! Seriously!! This bread reminds me of one of my favorite bread in New Zealand called 'Burgan'. I used to eat the bread a lot throughout my university days... Hmm, this [my apple yeast bread] is a really nice bread. Please make this again and again."

I asked him what about my apple yeast bread reminded him so much of his favorite New Zealand bread. To which he answered, "Well, it has a slight sour flavour similar to sourdough bread, but not too sour and light, and yet it has a depth of flavour as you bite it. The crust is nice and crispy, but the crumb is moist. It's easy to slice cleanly, and the best part is that when you toast the slice and put butter on it, it doesn't sink like some commercial bread sold here, and it absorbs just right amount of butter! So this is the best bread ever, because of such a good harmony with butter both in texture and in flavour!"

...Uh-huh. I understand how important it is for him that "a good bread" has to be a good company for a good NZ butter :-)





(The last small bread is another my experimental bread - something that I would call "apple yeast scone bread" - this is also made with apple yeast, and has several kinds of dried fruits and nuts. All these bread here are made without any commercial yeast, but just with wild yeast culture raised from apple skins.)

From Michiko's Recent Kitchen Experiments

The following are the pictures of some of my recent kitchen experiments and cooking/baking of my original recipes.

***Bread with "homemade" wild yeast culture***

(Apple yeast loaf --- apple yeast bread #4)

(Apple wild yeast baguettes --- apple yeast bread #3. "Apple yeast" is wild yeast cultured from wild yeast residing on apple skins.)

(apple yeast scone bread --- apple yeast bread #5)

(rejuvelac sourdough pizza with wholewhat flour)

(making "rejuvelac" = enzyme water from sprouted wheatberries)

(my first "rejuvelac sourdough" bread --- not very successful as you can see ... ^_^;)

(rejuvelac sourdough bread with adzuki bean paste filling)


***Bread with commercial yeast***

(Onion Walnut Breat)

(Ciabatta al Formaggio)



***Growing sprouts at home & Making Japanese food from scratch***

(homemade "natto" (=Japanese fermented soy beans) Amar usually dislikes "natto" for its "sliminess", but the homemade ones seem to have passed his test ^^. Natto is a typical acquired taste thing, like "vegemite" in NZ.)

(home-grown broccoli sprouts)



***Japanese sweets made with my original recipe***

(green-tea & adzuki beans muffins)

(Japanese buckwheat & adzuki bean "manju" cakes)

(Japanese buckwheat & adzuki bean "manju" cakes with "kinako" (=roasted soy flour))

(strawberry & adzuki cakes)


***"Experimental" vegetarian dishes***

(Daikon radish cooked in mushroom & seaweed soupstock)

(Brown rice hamburgs with onion, mushroom, nuts and cheese --- hmm, it was yummy!)

(tempeh and soybean curry)

(Pumpkin & lentil croquettes)