December in Chicago

Orange trees downtown.

Trains in the Loop.

Christ Kindle Market on Daley Plaza.

Glühwein in 14 degree weather.

Topping the day off with a Tom & Jerry at Miller's Pub.

First Snow!

Andrew Comes To Town

Thanksgiving In Review

Week of Thanksgiving p.2

The wind is howling outside and the temperature has dropped quite a bit since Monday, so there is no better day for Thanksgiving cooking/baking. Ian is sharpening his knives to prepare for tomorrow as we speak. Today, I whipped up some cranberry sauce (made from Oregon cranberries) with orange zest, made a pumpkin pie and brioche roll dough, which is now rising. Excited for tomorrow!

Week of Thanksgiving

On this balmy 62 degree day, Thanksgiving was officially kicked-off by the baking of cornbread (recipe here). After a few days of drying out, Ian will be using the cornbread in the Rogers family famous stuffing. Over the next few days we will be making cranberry sauce, brioche rolls, pumpkin pie and chicken stock. For now our 12.24 pound organic turkey waits in the fridge to be brined and cooked on Thursday. Updates to follow.

Swedish Pancakes

Swedish pancakes (similar to crepes) have been a long-standing tradition in my family. There is always the inaugural Swedish pancake in whatever new house you live in, and I just so happened to make them this morning. You can add fresh berries, syrup, or bananas and peanut butter, but I like just a little syrup. Delicious! They are very simple and only take four ingredients: eggs, flour, milk and oil.

I can't give away the secret recipe, but I am sure there is a great recipe online. The first pancake rarely works out, so don't feel bad if it comes out globby and strange.

Mayoral Candidate

The last few weeks have been a whirlwind, but they all led up to yesterday. Rahm Emanuel announced his mayoral candidacy for the city of Chicago.

"Because I love this city – the place my family came to and the place where I was born – I want to fight for a better future for all the people of Chicago. And that’s why, today, I’m announcing my candidacy for mayor." Rahm Emanuel

Pizza

Making my own pizza is a regular dinner event. I usually make the trek to Whole Foods to buy the organic thin pizza crusts, which are wonderful. The problem is, when you open the bag to make a pizza with one of the crusts the other one becomes moldy overnight. This happened to us the other night, so I decided to make my own crust from the Barefoot In Paris cookbook. The Whole Foods thin pizza crust's days are numbered. This seems like a much better deal.

Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups warm (100 to 110 degrees) water
2 packages dry yeast
1 tablespoon honey
Good olive oil
4 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for kneading
Kosher salt

Place three cups of flour in the mixture first, and then pour in the remaining cup in slowly. I found that I didn't need to use most of the fourth cup. The crust should remain smooth.

Happy Halloween!

This is our first Halloween in Chicago, and I must say, it has been a good one. Two quick gripes, and then I will move forward. One being, the lack of pumpkin beer available on Halloween. Apparently, the season starts in September and ends early October. What?! That is absurd. Who wouldn't want a nice pumpkin beer on Halloween, or around Thanksgiving for that matter. It is upsetting. Secondly, Halloween baking materials are basically nonexistent the week of Halloween. Unless you buy your Halloween goods before fall even begins, you are out of luck. This system seems illogical, but what can you do?

Moving on, we have visited a pumpkin patch, carved pumpkins, roasted seeds, attended Halloween parties, lost self-control with miniature candy and watched Blackbeard's Ghost. Halloween complete.

(headed to a UChicago Halloween party)

Tonight, I made some simple sugar cookies with a Halloween theme. I followed the recipe from The Craft of Baking. Sugar cookies can be hit or miss, but I enjoyed this recipe. The results were pretty good. There seemed to be a shortage of orange sprinkles this year, or I was too late in getting them (but in actuality right on time), so I made do with green and purple.

Simple Sugar Cookies recipe:
12 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 large egg
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 ounce unsweetened chocolate, melted (I used bittersweet chocolate because that is what I had, and it worked well)

Mix all ingredients and then split the dough in half and mix in the chocolate with the half in the mixer. Refrigerate for one hour. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

Pumpkin Patch 2010 In Review

Ian and I visited the All Seasons Apple Orchard and Pumpkin Patch in Woodstock, IL. The patch is about an hour and half away from Chicago, and it brought all the wonderful things you would expect from rural Illinois. We shared apple cider and apple doughnuts, picked our own pumpkins and walked through the corn maze. It was a perfect day.

Halloween Mini Cupcakes

Halloween is fast approaching, so in a last ditch effort I made some mini chocolate Halloween cupcakes. Mini cupcakes are fantastic, what's not to love about a perfect bite size piece of cake? They are, however, a delicate balance. With their compact size, it is all too easy to get a dry, chalky cupcake. It turned out to be the perfect night to make them. A thunder and lightning storm has rolled through bringing heavy rains. Just perfect. Ian broke out a bottle of wine from his private reserve to commence the evening. October remains the best month of the year. Tomorrow we are going to Woodstock, IL to pick out our pumpkins. Blog to follow.

Devil's Food Cake recipe (from the Art and Soul of Baking):

• ½ cup (2½ ounces) unsifted unsweetened
• Dutch-process cocoa powder
• ½ cup (4 ounces) plus 1 cup (8 ounces) water
• 1½ sticks (6 ounces) unsalted
• butter, softened (65° to 68°F)
• 1 cup (7 ounces) granulated sugar
• ¾ cup (6 ounces) firmly packed
• light brown sugar
• 3 large eggs, at room temperature
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 2 cups (7 ounces) sifted cake flour
• ¼ cup (1¼ ounces) unbleached
• all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon salt

Bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes. Regular sized cupcakes bake for 15-20 minutes.

Apple Cheddar Scones

Last year someone mentioned they make an excellent apple pie with a cheddar cheese crust. Yuck I thought. I don't know why I rejected the idea because cheese, pie crust and apples are all delicious separately. Why not combine them? Smitten Kitchen did it again with her cheddar and apple scone recipe. I made them today, and at first I couldn't really taste the cheese, but after some time, and a lot more tastes it became more apparent. The savory flavor works so well with the sweet, crispy Honeycrisp apples. Scones seem to be all the rage these days, and now that Mark Bittman discussed them last weekend I hope the dry, overly sugary scones take a hike.

Boots!

Opening up a box to find a brand new pair of boots is a wonderful feeling. This last week, Ian and I have been purchasing our jackets and boots to prepare for our first Chicago winter. I went with a giant sleeping bag of a coat, and some Hunter boots with fleece inserts. Seen above is an incredibly technical test to make sure there are no leaks. Success!