Raisin Bran Muffins

Low-Cal But Still Lovely
Bran muffins are really good for you! So don’t stop eating them just because you are watching your weight — include them in a healthy breakfast. One muffin is 3 points. You can save a few calories if you leave out the raisins.

Ingredients
1 cup whole wheat flour
2/3 cup uncooked wheat bran
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 cup (4 tablespoons) unsalted, room temperature butter
2/3 cup Sugar
1 large egg
1 cup low fat buttermilk
1 cup raisins (optional)

Procedure
Preheat oven to 400ºF. Coat a 12-hole muffin tin with cooking spray or line with paper muffin liners. In a medium bowl, combine flour, wheat bran, salt, baking soda and cinnamon; set aside.

Using an electric mixer, in a large bowl, cream butter with sugar until sugar is dissolved; add egg and beat thoroughly. Add 1/3 of bran mixture and 1/3 cup of buttermilk; mix until just combined. Repeat, alternating, with remaining bran mixture and buttermilk; fold in raisins. Fill each prepared muffin hole about two-thirds full with batter; place in middle of oven. Bake until a toothpick inserted in center of a muffin comes out clean, about 15 to 20 minutes.

Rum Raisin Biscotti

The Altitude Adjustment Section
I love biscotti and the varieties are endless. They are easy to make, not terribly altitude affected, and they last well in a covered tin. So here is another biscotti recipe from the King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion Cookbook, Rum Raisin Biscotti, which never lets me down.

Ingredients
2 large eggs
2/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup dark rum
1/4 teaspoon rum extract
2 cups A.P. flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 cups golden raisins

Procedure
Preheat oven to 350. Line a large baking sheet with parchment. In a medium bowl, beat the eggs, brown sugar, and salt together till smooth. Add the rum and rum extract, then the flour, powder and raisins beating till smooth. Now you should be able to gather the dough into a ball, then form it into a roll 14 inches long and about 2 1/2 inches wide and 3/4 inch thick and place on sheet pan. Bake for 30 minutes till firm and then let cool for about 10 minutes. Slice biscotti into 1/2 –3/4 inch slices and stand up on sheet pan. Now lower oven to 325 and bake for 20 minutes more or till golden brown. Let cool and store in airtight container.

Rustic Apple Galette

The Altitude Adjustment Section
Last week I had to make apple galettes for a large party we were working on, so of course I turned to the master Susan Purdy for the recipe. Now you know I love Susan, but must admit sometimes her recipes seem very long and the well-described procedures sometimes seem unnecessary upon first consideration. So I decided I was qualified enough just to take my own shortcuts, and that’s what I did till everything started to fall apart. The dough was sticking and cracking and I made a mess so I went back to the book, followed the instructions exactly, and of course it worked perfectly, or at least a few hundred guests thought so. So there!

Ingredients
1 recipe for flaky pastry (see archives)
3 cups peeled, cored, and sliced, golden delicious apples
1/2 cup golden raisins
1 tablespoon grated orange zest
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup orange marmalade
2 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/3 cup orange juice
1 large egg
1 teaspoon water
2 tablespoons graham cracker crumbs
1 tablespoon granulated Sugar
1/2 cup raspberry or apricot jam

Procedure
Preheat your oven to 425. Prepare your pastry and chill for at least 30 minutes. Prepare the filling. In a large bowl, add the apples, raisins, zest, spices, and nuts. In a small cup, combine the O.J. with the cornstarch and mix till it dissolves, then add to the fruit mixture. Now you are ready to assemble. Here comes the crazy part.

Roll out a piece of tin foil in an 18 inch square, shiny side down on the counter. With your fingernail draw a 17-inch circle. Now draw another circle about 8 inches wide in the middle of that circle. Now butter the inside circle and carefully flour the outside circle. Make the dough into a flat disk and place it on top of the tin foil and roll dough out to the edge of the bigger circle. Now pick the whole thing up — foil and all — and place onto your cookie sheet. With your fingernail again draw a circle 2 inches from the edge into the pastry. Now whisk together the egg and water to make a glaze and brush the dough with the egg wash. Sprinkle the graham cracker crumbs in the inside circle. Put the fruit mixture, juice and all, into the inside circle. Pat it so it’s flat and even. Now put your hand under the foil and carefully fold the edges over the fruit let the foil help you. Remember, you are going for the rustic look. Brush off any leftover visible flour from the crust. Try to seal any cracks with the egg glaze. Now brush the folded-over pastry with glaze and sprinkle with granulated sugar. Bring the foil up around the galette to help capture the juices. Bake for15 minutes at high temperature than reduce heat to 350 and bake for 25-30 minutes more, till apples are tender and crust is browned. Let cool on rack and make glaze. Just heat jam with a little water or alcohol and brush on tart. Serve warm with whipped cream. Of course you could do this with any fruit. In Susan’s recipe the apples are nicely paired with cranberries.

Swiss Chard, Apple, and Raisin Pie

As you probably know, I am a fan of French cooking. I was raised with a healthy worship of it by my parents who traveled to France yearly. Mother of Rula is a living testament to the long life benefits of excessive butter and heavy cream, and she looks like a million bucks. But that could be good genes. Anyway, I just found another great cookbook at Goodwill. It’s from the beautiful cookbook series and it’s the Provence the Beautiful Cookbook. One recipe which caught my eye was for this Swiss chard, apple and raisin pie. You must try it!

Ingredients for crust
2 cups A.P. flour
1/4 cup sugar
pinch salt
1/2 cup room temp. butter
2 eggs, beaten with a fork

Ingredients for filling
Pinch of butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1/3 cup pine nuts
1/3 cup raisins, soaked in 1/4 cup rum overnight
1 pound golden delicious apples, quartered, cored, sliced, and diced at the last minute
1 teaspoon lemon zest
2 pounds Swiss chard parboiled squeezed dry and chopped
fresh ground black pepper
whole nutmeg
Confectioners sugar for garnish

Procedure for crust
In a mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, and salt. Make a well in the center and add the butter and eggs. Stir mix and mash till dough comes together. Knead briefly on table and add a little water if necessary to bring mixture together. Form dough into a ball, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate 2 hours before rolling out. Preheat oven to 350. Grease a 10-inch deep pie plate with a pinch of butter. Divide the dough into 2 portions, one slightly larger. Roll out the larger dough ball and line the pie pan. Let the dough hang over the edges.

Procedure for filling
In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, olive oil, sugar, and cheese. Add pine nuts raisins, remaining rum, apples, zest, and chard. Add some fresh pepper and some shaved nutmeg. Place mixture into pie shell and smooth top. Now roll out other piece of dough and cover pie. Trim excess dough and crimp edges together. Cut 4 steam vents in top of pie. Place in oven and bake 40 minutes, or till crust is nicely browned. Serve at room temp and sprinkle powdered sugar on top right before serving.

Bran Muffins

The Altitude Adjustment Section
It's muffin time here at Mouth of Wonder! I cannot find a decent, normal-sized muffin in this town. Why are they all so damn big and why do they taste like junk food? This one is different. It comes from Pie in the Sky, compliments of Susan Purdy, so it works, it rises, and it’s nutritious.

Ingredients
1 cup 100 percent All Bran cereal, not flakes
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
2 tablespoons unsulphured molasses
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup (6 ounces) golden raisins
1 1/3 cup A.P. flour
1 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 large room temp egg, lightly beaten
1/4 cup canola oil
1 1/2 tablespoons granulated sugar, to use as topping

Procedure
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Spray a 12 muffin pan with non-stick spray, or line with paper liners. In a large bowl, combine bran, buttermilk, molasses, granulated sugar, vanilla, and raisins. Set aside to soak for 10 minutes, or until the bran is very soft. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, soda, powder, salt, and cinnamon. When bran is soft, stir in the egg and oil. Now add the flour mixture all at once and stir just till well blended — don't overmix. Scoop batter into prepared pan, filling each muffin cup just below the brim. Sprinkle top with remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons of sugar. Bake for 22-25 minutes. Muffins should be slightly rounded on the top and a deep golden brown color. A toothpick inserted should come out clean. Cool for 10 minutes then eat warm with some orange honey butter, maybe?

The Real Deal Granola Bars

The Altitude Adjustment Section
Being that we ate in a real “health food” establishment this week, it got me thinking about hippy foods and tree hugging and Patchouli oil and, of course: granola. Real granola is delicious and nutritious and doesn’t need to be like a dry brick, or be chocolate coated, or have a layer of marshmallow fluff for the kids to eat it. What kids? Do I have kids? I don’t think so. But anyway here is a great recipe for a snack you can take with you hiking or you can sneak it into the movies instead of paying for a 2-pound bag of gummy worms.

Ingredients
3/4 cups (6 ounces) brown sugar
3/4 cups (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter melted
1 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 cup corn syrup
1 teaspoon salt
4 cups rolled oats
1 cup chopped almonds
1 cup sunflower seeds
1 cup sweetened flaked coconut
1 cup dried cranberries or golden raisins
1 cup chopped dried apricots
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Procedure
Preheat oven to 450. Lightly grease an 18 x 13 inch half-sheet pan. Combine brown sugar, butter, syrups, and salt in a medium saucepan. Bring to the boil and boil for 5 minutes till mixture reaches 250 degrees on a candy thermometer. While the sugar is boiling, combine oats, almonds sunflower seeds and coconut on prepared sheet pan. Bake for 12-15 minutes stirring every 4-5 minutes so nothing gets burnt. Pour oat mixture into a bowl and add all dried fruit. Add vanilla extract to the syrup mixture and pour over nut and fruit mixture. Once well-combined, put mixture back onto sheet pan and pat flat. Be firm — it needs to be compressed. Now bake for 6-8 minutes, till it bubbles a little bit around the edges and starts to lightly brown. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes and cut into strips while still warm. I use a bakers bench knife or you can use a big cleaver. Remove from pan and then cut into strips. Wrap in plastic so the lint in your backpack doesn’t stick to them.

Mandel bread (Jewish Biscotti, if you will!)

The Altitude Adjustment Section
Because we are celebrating our Moms today, I thought it only fitting I give you one of Bernice’s recipe for a Jewish classic — Mandel bread. Great to serve on Poker and Mah Jong night at the coffee break. Bernice used to put out quite the spread, including a few cakes from the famous — now defunct — Ebbinger’s Bakery of Brooklyn. Maybe a Blackout Cake, and a Babka, some sliced Halvah, and of course a Hawaiian pineapple sliced in the skin with Maraschino cherries and spear skewers. Ah, those were the days!

Ingredients
1 cup sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
2 cups A.P. flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup golden raisins
1 Tablespoon cocoa powder

Procedure
In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine sugar and oil and mix well. Add eggs one at a time. Add extracts. Sift flour, baking powder and salt. Add to liquids. Stir in chopped walnuts and raisins. Take 1/4 of the batter and put into a separate bowl. Stir in cocoa powder. Grease and flour a metal ice cube tray (you can also use a loaf pan) and pour in batter. There will not be much batter, they are small. Add 6 dabs of cocoa batter in top and with a fork swirl it through the batter to look marbleized. Bake in a 350 oven for 25-30 minutes. Let cool and remove from pan. Slice into 1/2 inch slices, and place flat on a sheet pan. Turn oven up to 375 and bake slices 5 minutes on one side then flip over and bake 5 minutes on other side, or until they look toasted. Let cool and eat all of them! Of course you can dip them in chocolate!

Apricot Raisin Sour Cream Pie

The Altitude Adjustment Section
Time for yet another type of pie recipe. This time from Susan Purdy’s great pie book called The Perfect Pie. Doesn’t an Apricot Raisin Sour cream pie sound yummy?

Ingredients
1 unbaked 10 inch pastry shell (you can use pastry recipe I gave last week — see archives)
1/3 cup packed golden raisins
2/3 cups packed dried apricot halves (about 4 1/2 ounces)
2 cups sour cream
2 large room temp eggs
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup A.P. flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
grated zest of 1 orange
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Procedure
Measure the raisins into a small bowl and cover with boiling water. Let stand 20 minutes. Cut the apricots into quarters, put in sauce pan and cover with water. Bring to the boil then lower the heat and simmer for 10 minutes till tender. Drain and discard liquid. In the bowlof an electric mixer combine the sour cream, eggs, sugar,flour, salt, zest, and vanilla. Strain the raisins and discard the liquid. Add the raisins and apricots to the sour cream mixture. Stir well and pour into pie crust.

Bake in preheated 425 oven in the lower 1/3 of the oven for 15 minutes then lower oven to 375 and bake for 25-30 minutes more till light golden on the top and when a knife inserted in filling 1 inch from the edge comes out clean. The filling will puff when it cooks and then sink down. Don’t panic it's all good. Serve at room temperature and dust the top with confectionary sugar. Refrigerate any leftovers if you don't eat the whole pie. That will never happen!