This week we decided to make crust straws. These are like pie but easier while still having all the best parts. To start, we whisked a large egg and one tablespoon of water until they were combined. In a separate bowl, we mixed granulated sugar in with cinnamon to use for later. Then, we got our puff pastry out and spread it over a floured sheet. From there, we spread the blackberry jam evenly along the surface, being careful to leave some room along the edges. We then covered these edges with our egg mix and put a second puff pastry sheet on top. With this new sheet, we again brushed it with the egg mix and sprinkled the cinnamon sugar over top. After that, we sealed the edges and sliced the two sheets into thin strips. We twisted these strips to give the dough its iconic form. The twisting stage proved to be the most difficult. Due to the egg coating, the strips kept slipping out of our hands as we twisted. From there, we put the strips into the oven until they were golden brown, and they were ready to serve. All in all, the process wasn't too difficult. However, we did not flatten the puff pastry sheets as much as we should have, which increased the difficulty of the twisting stages. Along with this, we were not able to bake as many pie-crust straws. We felt like we improved the original recipe by adding a layer of powdered sugar, adding to the taste factor. Overall, these turned out nicely and tasted delicious. As we are nearing our bake sale, we are trying to decide which foods we should choose to sell from each week of the project. The food we choose must be easy to make a lot of, and it must be a crowd favorite to be able to sell well. As we choose what to make in the coming weeks we are keeping these things in mind, and reflecting on what we have already made.
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This week, we decided to mix it up a little. Rather than just craft one dish, we baked two. We started with the most difficult portion of our task– making the gourmet donuts. After this, we baked the bread. We also began to look for potential places to set up our end-of-project bake sale. We are leaning towards setting up at a local farmer’s market. To bake the donuts, we started by preparing the dough. Before we could make the dough, we needed to warm milk in the microwave then add yeast to it, and let it sit for 10 minutes to wake it up. While that was resting, we combined all of our dry ingredients: sugar, brown sugar, salt, and all-purpose flour. In a separate bowl, we cracked and whisked the eggs together. Additionally, we melted butter. Once all three wet components were prepared, we added them to the dry mixture and mixed until a dough formed. Once the dough was formed, it was time to knead the dough on the countertop until it was smooth. From there, we placed the dough into a greased bowl and let it rise for one hour. After it was done rising, we placed the dough on a lightly floured surface, rolled it out, and cut as many donuts as we could. Once the individual donuts were cut out, we let them rise for another 45 minutes. While the donuts were rising, we preheated the frying oil to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. As soon as the donuts were rested and the oil was heated, we fried each side of the donuts for 3 minutes then let cool on a wire rack. While the donuts were cooling, we made the icing. We mixed together powdered sugar, salt, vanilla extract, and water. When the icing was prepared, we dipped the donuts in the icing fully and they were ready to be eaten. This week for our Genius Hour project, we decided to bake chocolate chip cookies. First, we cooked a pot of butter on the stove until it was golden brown. Then, we took it off the stove and added light brown and white sugar to our crisp solution. From there, we mixed the ingredients until they were combined. After that, we added an egg yolk, a whole egg, and vanilla. Then, we added some all-purpose flour, along with baking soda. Again, we mixed all the ingredients together until the dough was consistent throughout. After making certain that we got rid of all clumps, we added some semi-sweet chocolate chips. Now, it was on to the baking process. We scooped our cookie dough into balls and rolled them between our hands, which proved to be a challenge considering how perfect we wanted them to turn out. For us, this took the longest in terms of preparation. From that point, we added a few more pieces of chocolate chips on top of each cookie and chilled them. After removing them from the fridge, we baked them for roughly twelve minutes. Our baking process was complete immediately following the addition of sea salt to the surface of the cookies. Overall, we were pleased with the results of this project. It wasn’t too difficult, which may be an indication that we could move on to perfecting more challenging recipes. However, we made some mistakes here and there. We forgot to add some salt to the original mixture, which could have potentially affected the results. Fortunately, the addition of sea salt to the top of each cookie recovered for that lack of flavor within the dough itself. Even though we messed up a portion of the recipe, we still managed to turn it into a learning experience. This mistake forced us to come up with alternatives to ingredients, while also providing the same level of satisfaction when eaten. Which, ironically, is what makes a good chef. It’s one thing to be able to follow a set of instructions, but it’s a different challenge to find what is wrong and correct it.
Ingredients: ¾ cup butter 1 cup light brown sugar ¼ cup white sugar 2 eggs 1 tbsp vanilla 1 ¾ spooned all-purpose flour ¾ tsp baking soda 1 tsp salt 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips or 8 oz chopped chocolate First up for the monkey bread was the dough. we combined all the wet ingredients needed into a mixing bowl and mixed them. Then, we combined our wet ingredients with our dry ingredients. Adding the flour in one cup at a time for the right consistency was tricky. Once the dough was brought together, we kneaded it for about ten minutes. It was very sticky, so it was hard to work with at first. Then, we let it rest for an hour and a half and combined our sugar and spices for the cinnamon sugar mix. Once the dough was done resting, we rolled it into a flat rectangle and brushed it with melted butter. From there, we added our cinnamon sugar mix and rolled it up. Once rolled, we cut it into many little bite-sized pieces. From there, we rolled each piece into a ball, rolled it in more cinnamon sugar, and placed it into the bundt pan. From there, we baked it. While baking, we made the cream cheese icing glaze. Finally, we took it out of the oven, flipped it on a plate, and put the glaze on. Overall, it was not overly difficult to make. However, some parts were very tedious, such as rolling and dipping each ball into the cinnamon and sugar and kneading the dough. We were unable to make the scones as planned and did not have time for the raspberry muffins, but we may make the muffins sometime this week. Although it wasn't terribly hard to make, we could have done a little more to prepare. A lot of the problems we ran into were the result of preventable beginner mistakes. One example of this would be how we overestimated the amount of supplies we had. We quickly ran out of all-purpose flour, which made it difficult to continue the project. We also quickly ran out of time. We underestimated how long the monkey bread would take, which complicated things even further. However, we are positive we can improve upon these mistakes by making simple adjustments such as conducting a more thorough evaluation of the ingredients and devoting more time to recipes than we think is needed.
Ingredients: Bread Rolls ¼ cup (60ml) warm water 2½ teaspoons (23g) active dry yeast ¼ cup (50g) granulated sugar 1 cup (237ml) milk, warmed 2 tablespoons (28g) unsalted butter 2 large eggs 1 teaspoon (5ml) vanilla extract 3½-4 cups (420-480g) all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon (7g) salt Cinnamon Sugar 1 cup (200g) granulated sugar, divided 1 cup (213g) brown sugar divided 2 tablespoons (17g) ground cinnamon, divided 1 teaspoon (3g) ground nutmeg 1 cup (240g) unsalted butter, melted and divided Cream Cheese Glaze 4 ounces (113g) cream cheese, softened 1½ cups (180g) powdered sugar ½ teaspoon (3ml) vanilla extract 2-4 tablespoons (30-60ml) milk (may need more or less) ¼ cup (60g) butter, softened 1 pinch salt Recipe Book Link: https://www.africanbites.com/cinnamon-roll-monkey-bread/ |
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