Kitchen Gadget Girl Cooks

Mark Bittman’s column about Pantry Essentials appeared in our local paper last Wednesday, and while I agree with many of the items Mark suggests (dried beans, easy in a pressure cooker; BACON; real Parmigiano-Reggiano; and good olive oil, to name a few), I do think he forgot 5 items that I deem essential in my kitchen:

1. Tomatoes – I prefer the ones I canned in August, but if I don’t have those available, I like to make sure to have a can or two of low-sodium crushed or whole tomatoes on hand. They are perfect for quick pasta sauces, soups or stews.
2. Chocolate – really, does this need explanation? I like to have 72% chips, 99% unsweetened, cocoa powder, and snacking. All are essential in my kitchen.
3. Peanut Butter – wow, straight from the jar, made into sandwiches, cookies or thai peanut sauce, peanut butter is definitely a staple in our house. I even know one babysitter who sneaks spoonfuls when he comes over (Dad).
4. All the makings for Chocolate Chip Cookies – this was how I knew I was really an adult. One day, I went in the kitchen to make cookies and had all the ingredients – no special trip to the store. Flour, eggs, baking soda, chocolate chips. Even nuts. It was a grand day in my life.
5. Green Chili – this is required by my marriage contract with my husband. I agreed to always substitute green chili in any recipe calling for mushrooms. Honest. I did. Check the video if you don’t believe me.

What do you think is missing from Mark’s list? Or what should not be on there?

For additional reading, check out these thoughts on pantry necessities:

Essential Elements of a Pantry by Gluten-Free Girl
Mark Bittman’s Minimalist Pantry Is Great…But What Happened to the Vanilla? by SpiceLines
Mark Bittman tells you what should be in your pantry by Folo

It is rainy outside as I type this, and today, instead of cookies, brownies sounded like the right treat.

I read a fun post yesterday on the Cutting Edge of Ordinary – Lisa had just picked up two new kitchen gadgets from Jo-Ann’s Fabrics, both useful for cutting brownies. I have been waiting to try my new Edge Brownie Pan, and her post inspired me.

Edge Brownie Pan

Plus, the recipe Lisa uses is the same one that I received from my Grandmother Gladys, and I think my grandmother found the original recipe on the back of the box of Baker’s unsweetened chocolate. I have upgraded to Scharffenberger 99% Cacao chocolate, but the rest of the recipe is the same. Sometimes simple can be better.

Best Chocolate Brownies

• 4 ounces unsweetened chocolate
• 3/4 cup butter
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup flour
• 1 cup chopped nuts and/or chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 350F. Lightly spray 8×8″ square pan with cooking spray.

In a double boiler, melt chocolate and butter. Blend well and remove from heat.

Add in sugar, mix well. Add in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add in vanilla. Mix in flour, then add nuts and chocolate chips, if using.

Pour brownie mix into 8×8″ square pan. Bake 30-35 minutes until toothpick comes out with moist crumbs. Cool and cut into squares.

Recipe may also be doubled – use 9×13″ pan and bake 25-30 minutes.

KitchenAid has several attachments for their multi-function mixers, devices designed to make everyday kitchen tasks easier. One of these is the Citrus Juicer, an attachment that was given to me as a wedding gift, and one I had not used until recently.

After peeling two dozen lemons for Limoncello, I wanted to juice them and the thought of doing that with my trusty hand juicer was too much, so pulled the KitchenAid Citrus Juicer attachment out of the closet.

Installing was fairly straight forward – had I just read the instructions! Be sure to remove the plate off the front of the mixer, assemble the juicer by placing the reamer and metal shaft together, and then place the juicer on the front of the machine. Don’t try installing the metal shaft without the reamer assembled!

My instructions indicated that for best results, put the mixer on level 6. I put a glass-measuring cup below the juicer and started working through my pile of lemons.

There is a small strainer on the juicer, but I found that I quickly overwhelmed it with seeds and pulp, so I ended up putting a larger strainer on top of the measuring cup, which caught all the rest of the pulp and seeds.

My recommendation: if you find yourself juicing a great deal of citrus, and you have a KitchenAid or Cuisinart mixer, then this is an attachment that you should have. If you occasionally juice a lemon for a sauce or dressing, then you are probably fine with a hand reamer or juicer.

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Lemon Curd (from my good friend Donia)

9 large egg yolks
3 large eggs
1 cup sugar
1 cup lemon juice
1 tablespoon zest

Put egg yolks, eggs, sugar in a stainless steel bowl and whisk together. Stir in lemon juice. Put the bowl over simmering water and stir continually with a rubber spatula. When the curd starts to thicken, use a whisk.

Cook the curd until thick (about 5-8 minutes). It will look very much like a thick pudding, and will set up more as it cools.

Strain the curd into a glass jar or container and cover the surface directly with plastic wrap so it doesn’t form a skin on top. Refrigerate. Eat by the spoonful.

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More recipes using lemon juice (now that you have it all squeezed)

Lovely Lemon Slice

Limonada, Lemonaid or Limeaid

Meyer Lemon and Mascarpone Tart

Last weekend, all my Hachiya persimmons in the garage decided to ripen at the same time, and when I had pureed all the pulp, the first thing I did was make a batch of these persimmon cookies, a recipe I obtained from my friend Lisa. It is one of a plethora of persimmon recipes I have collected, some of which I will probably share. I have 12 cups of puree, folks!

Lisa notes that the dough keeps well for up to a week in the refrigerator, and you can easily double the recipe (2 cups of puree right there). My husband is not fond of raisins, so I just add nuts. You could do both or neither.

Persimmon Cookies

• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 egg
• 1 cup persimmon pulp
• 2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon soda
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup raisins and/or nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 350F.

Cream the butter and sugar together. Add the egg and persimmon pulp, mix. Sift together the flour, soda, cinnamon, and salt and add to persimmon mixture. Sitr in vanilla and nuts and raisins, if using.

Drop by large spoonfuls onto cookie sheet (Note: these cookies do not spread while baking). Bake 12 minutes, or until lightly brown around the edges.

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More Persimmon Cookies, for those of you with lots of pulp, like me:

Spiced Persimmon Cookies with Walnuts and Crystalized Ginger

Persimmon Madeleines

Kay’s Persimmon Bars (gluten free)

One of the many gadgets I inherited from my Mom were two Steamed Pudding Molds. She used them every year to make Persimmon Pudding, around the holidays. Steamed pudding is a traditional English dessert, generally made out of some fruit or another. Christmas Plum pudding comes to mind. Apparently, there are also savory steamed puddings, but this post is about the sweet variety.

The molds themselves are round and decorative with fluted edges, and all have lids. This would be the important part, the lid. I could imagine that collecting steamed pudding molds might be interesting, that they might make nice wall art (or look tacky. Who am I to judge.)

There are a couple tricks to using steamed pudding molds – you have to be careful to grease the heck out of the mold, especially some of the more decorative ones, as you want your pudding to release easily when done cooking.

Also, you should not put the pudding mold directly on the bottom of the cooking pan – it should always be placed atop something, an empty can, a steaming basket, a rack, you get the idea. Otherwise, your puddings might come out lopsided (which mine mostly do, because I am always forgetting the rack part).

And finally, you should be sure to weigh down your pudding as it cooks, else you will end up with another kind of lopsided cake. I usually use beans and pie weights in a little tart pan, which fits right on top of the lid of my pudding mold.

Steamed puddings take 2-3 hours to cook, which does require a bit of planning. I like to serve my Persimmon Pudding with whip cream – others are fond of hard sauce for steamed puddings.

Here is my Aunt Pat’s recipe for Persimmon Pudding:

Persimmon Pudding

• 1 cup persimmon pulp
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 tablespoons butter (softened)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 egg, lightly beaten

Mix together and add in:

• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 cup sifted flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1/2 cup milk

Pour into greased and floured mold (spend some time on this step, it really pays to grease the mold well. I sometimes butter the whole inside, then spray with cooking spray, then coat with butter. You cannot be too careful).

Use a layer of aluminum foil over mold before latching on lid, to ensure lid is on really tight.

Put mold in large kettle with boiling water, 2/3 up sides. Weigh down mold with pie weights, can of soup, etc. If you don’t put a weight on mold, then expect a lopsided pud!

Cook two hours – do not remove lid (not sure which lid Pat is referring too here. I generally leave the lid to the mold on as well as the lid of the pot. Again, you cannot be too careful). Cool and remove from mold. Serve with whipped cream.

Other Recipes which use the Steamed Pudding Mold:

Steamed Chocolate Hazelnut Pudding with Caramel Sauce (Baking History has interesting historical information about steamed pudding)

Steamed Apple Pudding

Steamed Blueberry Puddings (done in the oven, but could probably be adapted)

P.S. I have made it sound like making steamed puddings is tricky – it is not, it is fairly straight forward, but you do need to pay attention to details. Give it a try and let me know how it goes, I am curious to know if it is only my puddings that come out lopsided! Oh, and BTW, lopsided puds still taste good!

In addition to Drop In & Decorate for the Ronald MacDonald House at Stanford, we also decorated cookies this holiday season and donated them to Little House, a resource for seniors in our community. This time, I invited some of our younger friends to participate, and along with my two kids, we decorated several dozen cut-out cookies for the Little House Holiday Tea.

A few tips when decorating cookies with kids:

• Make sure all the kids can work comfortably; for us, this meant covering the dining table with a huge holiday cloth and having the kids sit down. For younger kids, booster seats would make them more comfortable.
• If you have sprinkles and decorations in big containers, consider putting them into small dishes, so kids can pinch just what they need. That ought to avoid over-sprinkled cookies.
• Use cookie sheets as individual decorating areas for each kids. It will help contain rogue sprinkles and help with clean-up.
• Count on about 5-8 cookies per kid, depending on their attention span. We had 6 to 8-year-olds and this number was good for them.
• Make sure you have good snacks or lunch for the kids, otherwise you might find them snacking on the frosting and decorations (well, they might do that anyway!).

Again, I made a simple Cream Cheese Cutout Cookie, along with the accompanying frosting. Last time, I made Royal Icing; this time, since the cookies were going to be consumed that day, I made a frosting with butter and powdered sugar. Here are the recipes:

Cream Cheese Cutout Cookies

Makes 7 dozen cookies, or 3 dozen with the large Wilton Cookie Cutters

• 1 cup soft butter
• 1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
• 3 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

DO NOT DOUBLE IN STAND MIXER (unless you have a really powerful one!)

Beat butter and cream cheese until well blended. Add sugar, cream until fluffy. Add egg, vanilla and almond extract, beat well.

Combine flour and baking powder in small bowl, mix well. Add dry ingredients to cream cheese mixture; beat until well mixed.

Divide dough in half. Wrap each portion in plastic wrap and chill in refrigerator at least 1.5 hours.

Preheat oven to 375F. Roll out dough, half at a time, to 1/8″ thickness on lightly floured surface. Cut out with cookie cutters and place 2 inches apart on cookie sheet. Bake 8-10 minutes, until edges are lightly browned. Cool on wire racks.

Note: I have made these several weeks and advance and frozen them. Bring to room temperature before decorating.

Almond Frosting

In small bowl, beat 2 cups sifted powdered sugar, 2 tablespoons softened butter, and 1/4 teaspoon almond extract until smooth. For piping consistency, beat in 4-5 teaspoons milk. For spreading consistency, add a little more milk. Tint with food coloring or gel paste.

Original recipe from Treasury of Holiday Cookies.

Last Christmas, Santa put a lovely new Oxo serrated peeler in my stocking, just in time for my annual Limoncello-making marathon. As I pulled it out on January 1st, I was reminded of just how much I enjoy this gadget.

I wrote about different kinds of peelers back in September. Specific peelers are good for specific jobs – for this particular one, peeling two dozen lemons, the serrated is the best. I wanted to peel just the yellow part of the lemon, leaving the white pith, which would cause bitterness in the Limoncello.

Holding the lemon in the palm of my left hand and using the peeler with my right hand, I start at the far end of the lemon and draw the peeler toward me. This is a slow peel, not like a fast potato peeling, and I move carefully around the lemon, capturing all the peel.

I peel the lemons directly into large jars; add a sprig of rosemary and a bottle of Everclear. After 40 days, I will add a bottle of 100 proof Vodka, along with sugar water. Another 40 days of rest for the Limoncello, and then it is ready to strain into individual jars for gift giving or personal use.

Rosemary Limoncello

• 15 Meyer lemons, washed
• 1 4-inch piece fresh rosemary
• 1 bottle (750 ml) 100-proof vodka
• 1 bottle (750 ml) Everclear (or 100 proof vodka, if you cannot find Everclear)
• 4 1/2 cups sugar

Peel lemons with a sharp vegetable peeler, taking only the top layer of zest and none of the white pith. Put zest and rosemary in 1-gallon glass or ceramic container.

Pour bottle of vodka over zest and rosemary. Seal container, and let sit undisturbed in a cool, dark place for 40 days.

After 40 days, continue with recipe. Bring 5 cups of water to boil and add the sugar. Cook, stirring, until sugar dissolves. Allow to cool to room temperature, about 1 hour. Pour syrup and Everclear over lemon/vodka mixture, stir and reseal container. Let sit in a cool, dark place for 40 more days.

After second 40 day period, your Limoncello is ready to go. Pour it through cheesecloth into large pitcher and then into smaller gift bottles. I found great bottles at Specialty Bottles. Serve ice cold before or after dinner. Limoncello is traditionally kept in the freezer between servings.

Note: I am trying this is as a new feature for the new year – each week, I plan to highlight a tool that I find useful in my kitchen, along with suggestions and a recipe for use. Let me know what you think. And, if you have any gadgets you are trying to figure out, let me know, I would love to experiement!