Improv Recipe: Strawberry Rhubarb Biscuits

I spent a lot of yesterday in the kitchen, working on various improvised recipes. For breakfast I made strawberry rhubarb biscuits (using goat's milk instead of buttermilk) with a strawberry rhubarb honey compote. The biscuits weren't terribly sweet, which allowed the compote to really stand up to the hearty flavor of the wheat in the biscuit. I started with a basic biscuit recipe and altered it to accommodate my needs. The compote was almost an accident when I realized I'd sliced too many strawberries and didn't want to waste them!

If you have strawberries that are just at that point where you're not sure you're going to be able to use them before they go bad, this is a great recipe. These babies were bruised and abused before being turned into a fantastic breakfast!



STRAWBERRY RHUBARB BISCUITS

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup fresh strawberries, sliced
• 1/2 cup fresh rhubarb, chopped
• 4 Tbsp brown sugar
• 1 cup whole wheat flower
• 1 cup whole wheat bread or pastry flour - something finer grained
• 1 Tbsp baking powder
• 1/4 Tbsp baking soda
• 6 Tbsp cold butter
• 2/3 cup goat milk (could substitute buttermilk, whole cow milk, etc)

 

Before doing anything else, toss 1/2 cup of your sliced strawberries with 1 Tbsp of brown sugar. Then spread them on a cookie sheet in a single layer and pop them in the freezer. Adding frozen berries to your biscuit dough will keep the batter from getting overly tacky as you mix it.

Next, combine all of your remaining dry ingredients and sift together. I used a food processor for this recipe and it was amazingly fast and easy to make. After sifting add your cold butter, one tablespoon at a time and pulsing between tablespoons, to the food processor. If you're doing this by hand, you should use a pastry cutter to chop the butter into itty bitty bits before adding it to your dry mix. The goal is to get a consistency similar to course cornmeal once the butter is mixed thoroughly in.

Now it's time to add your milk. Do this bit by bit, only adding enough milk to slightly moisten the whole mix. If you add too much milk you'll end up with very sticky, hard-to-handle dough - especially once the strawberries begin to thaw.

When your dough is moistened and clumping, add your rhubarb. I ran the food processor just a bit extra after adding the rhubarb because I prefer not to ahve big chunks of rhubarb in my biscuits. If you prefer big chunks, by all means leave them that way! Same goes with the strawberries. Add those next.

Run the processor until your strawberries and rhubarb have the consistency you prefer.

Now if you're not able to cut your biscuits quickly after you finish mixing the dough I suggest you refrigerate it until you do. This dough can be very tacky and as the strawberries thaw it becomes increasingly so.

When you're ready to bake your biscuits, have your oven pre-heated to around 450º F. Knead the dough until it's smooth-ish and pat down (or I suppose you could roll it with a non-stick rolling pin) until it's around 3/4 inch thick. Use a 2" biscuit cutter to cut 16 biscuits and place them on parchment paper. This recipe has enough butter that if you like a thick crust on the bottoms of your biscuits you probably don't need the parchment paper; I didn't use it.

Bake for 12-18 minutes, checking them around 10 minutes to make sure they're not baking too quickly. I've found that with recipes that use high heat and short baking time it's very easy to over bake things.

While they're baking, make your compote!


STRAWBERRY RHUBARB HONEY COMPOTE

Ingredients:

• 1 cup strawberries, sliced
• 1 cup rhubarb sliced
• 3 Tbsp Honey

Combine the three ingredients in an oven-safe pan (I used a shallow ceramic crock) and pop it in the oven (at 450º) alongside your biscuits as they bake. I left it in for around 10-15 minutes so if you time this correctly you can be moving your biscuits to a cooling rack while your compote finishes up.

All that's left now is to drizzle compote over your biscuits, eat and enjoy! This recipe isn't terribly sweet, so I've been eating it as a breakfast food, but if you up the sugar/honey just a bit you'll be able to enjoy this with fresh clotted cream or sweetened whipped cream as a strawberry rhubarb shortcake!

What are some new ways you're enjoying this year's strawberry harvest?

Improv Recipe: Queso Dip with baked Tortilla Chips

It always surprises me when I get the urge to cook. Until the month of March and the Real Food challenge over at Not Dabbling, I only cooked sporadically. I referred to myself as a "preparer of foods" rather than "one who cooks".

Two nights ago, in a fit of craving, I decided to make some spicy Queso dip. We had cheese and buttermilk in the fridge and I knew it could be done, so I set to work in the kitchen like a mad scientist.

 

Spicy Queso Dip

1-2 cups cheese (we used raw milk white cheddar) shredded or cut in to small blocks
1/2 cup buttermilk (you could probably use cream or even sour cream too)
2-3 spears of asparagus, sliced into small pieces
Jalepeños to taste
Salsa to taste (optional)
Spices to taste (salt, garlic powder, chipotle pepper, red pepper flakes, black pepper)

This is one of those recipes that you can alter to make something truly for yourself. If you like garlic, add more garlic. If you don't have asparagus, use green pepper, or tomato, or anything else you have around the house. I used a lot of chipotle pepper in ours since I like things to be particularly spicy. If I'd really been thinking, I would've added chorizo sausage to it as well, though chorizo can add a certain amount of thick red grease to anything, despite it's amazingly wonderful taste.

Toss all ingredients into a medium sauce pan over low-to-medium heat. As the mixture begins to melt you can raise the heat to medium, just don't bring it up to temp too quickly or you'll end up with a real mess. I added my spices after the mixture melted, so that I could sample things as I went along. It took me about 20 minutes to mostly melt the mixture through, but I'm betting if I had let it sit and cook another 15-20 minutes it would have been even better. I was being impatient.

It wasn't until after I started making the queso that I realized that our tortilla chips had gone stale! No problemo, hermanos y hermanas, we had fresh tortillas in the refrigerator. I lightly brushed each side of the tortillas with olive oil, stacked them and cut them into 1/4s (they were little tortillas.. tortillitas?). I sprinkled them with sea salt and popped them into the preheated oven (350º) for 15 minutes while the queso cooked. I think I flipped them once or twice too to make sure they weren't burning. Tada! Amazing tortilla chips in just minutes, and healthier than the fried ones!

I encourage you all to try to mix it up in the kitchen now and then. It's incredibly satisfying to eat something of your own design, especially when it turns out to be delicious!

Improv Recipe: Curry Crackers

I've blogged over at Not Dabbling in Normal this morning and now it's time for the home blog. I wanted them to be related today :)

A few weeks ago I stumbled across a great little recipe for crackers from my new favorite food blog, Eat Make Read. With the Real Food Challenge going on over at Not Dabbling, I've been hard pressed to find snack foods that I can enjoy on all levels. Sure there are the "real food" potato chips made simply with potatoes, olive oil and sea salt, but they're still just starches and oils when it comes down to it. I wanted something actually good for me and it seemed like a lot of other bloggers were finding success in crackers.

The recipe on Eat Make Read is here and is a great starting place for a base cracker. I decided I wanted something different though. My first batch followed the recipe only loosely. I substituted maple syrup for the honey, used nonhomogenized whole milk and tossed in a large handful of flax seeds. Success!

Okay, success, but not exactly exciting.

I perused the shelves of spices and considered all sorts of things... then I spotted it. A little glass jar filled with the curry spiced I got from The Seasoned Home in Holland, MI back in January. I wonder if I could make a curry cracker!

I made another batch of the base cracker dough and sprinkled a tablespoon of curry into the mix. I then added a bit more maple and some paprika for fun and rolled the whole thing out, then sprinkling with more paprika. (At this point, I really wished I had poppy seeds; it would've added a great texture variation.)

Popped them in the oven and Ta Da! Curry Crackers!

My post over at NDiN today is about improvisation in the kitchen and I encourage you to read it. It's amazing what a little internet research can do for those straggler ingredients lying around the kitchen!

My next batch of Curry Crackers I am going to try to add puree zante raisins to the milk before adding it to the dough. I love the taste of zante raisin and curry!

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Have you tried making your own snack food before? Did you add your own variations to the recipe?

You can find me blogging at Not Dabbling in Normal on Fridays as well as throughout the week for collaborative posts.

Improv Recipe: Pizza

This morning out of sheer irritation with the cruddy weather I ventured into my kitchen, determined to use whatever we had lying around to make a special lunch. What did I end up with?

Whole wheat pizza with maple-lime ricotta and abruzzese sausage. Wut?!

I'll be blogging this Friday over at Not Dabbling in Normal where you'll find this recipe along with a brief description of how I use whatever is laying around to improv in the kitchen. You'll also be able to read about why I should be required to wear safety equipment for any and all endeavors in my life.

Improv Recipe: Baked Apples

I thought in order to embrace the warm cozy feeling in the house this morning I would share a few photos of the current events. Harrison is snuggled up with our collie mix, Basil, I have just finished putting a button back on Jeremy's coat, and we have baked apples to enjoy for breakfast.

While chatting online with my mother earlier I had this strange lightning-strike urge to make baked apples. What's strange is that I've never baked apples before, and even more strange is that I've never even eaten a baked apple before! I quickly googled a few recipes and after scanning them a bit I decided this is ridiculous, how hard can a baked apple be?

I quickly scanned my cupboards for whatever seemed appropriate and within fifteen minutes, Jeremy and I were sitting down to steaming hot, crispy baked apples! Success? Definitely.



A Very Vague Recipe for Baked Apples

Ingredients:

• 1 Apple
• a bit of cold, hard butter (tablespoonish?) cut into small bits
  
• dollop of preserves (I used apricot - could substitute maple or apple butter!)
  
• handful of cereal (I used granola, but I'd expect anything would be good!)
• sprinkling of flour
• a squeeze of lemon
  
• cinnamon to taste
  
• maple syrup to taste
• (a teensy bit of brown sugar if you like things sweet)

Halve your apple and dig out the core out of both halves with a spoon to create a hole for the filling (you can adjust the size of this hole to your liking!) Then use lemon juice to roughly coat any exposed area of apple. This adds a great tartness and helps it crisp and brown a bit later.

Combine the cereal/grain, flour and cinnamon. Toss with bits of hard butter. I think I added a teensy bit of brown sugar here too, but depending on your maple syrup you really don't need it.

Place a decent sized dollop of preserves in the hole. If the stem from the core made an actual hole through the apple, this dollop should help seal the hole to keep the melting butter from escaping.

Fill the rest of the holes with the cereal mixture, heaping it well over the top of the apple halves, and place apples in a microwave and oven safe dish. Dress with maple syrup to taste.

Add a half inch of water in the bottom of the dish to help steam the apples while heating. Heat in microwave on high for 4-6 minutes, until butter is melted and cereal mixture looks moist (no crumbly flour on top).

Remove from microwave and place in toaster oven. Toast on high, and check. Depending on your taste, they may need to be toasted for slightly longer. You can do the toasting in an oven as well (400ºF, 10 minutes or so), but it's not as energy efficient.

Serve and enjoy!
Makes 2 servings.

If you're serving this as a dessert, you could add a dollop of vanilla icecream, or unsweetened whipped cream.