Slightly wheat challah

My favorite recipe for challah (OK, the only recipe I know for challah!) is King Arthur Flour's Four-Strand-Braided Challah. It always turns out beautifully, and is delicious.

This time, we tried substituting some home-ground flour for white flour, almost two cups worth (from one cup of wheat berries).

It was fantastic. This is the way I'll be making challah from now on.

Round

The April Ravelry pie challenge is "round," and we're a bit in between fruit seasons, so the fresh fruit choices were apples and rhubarb--but although I love those together, I didn't love them enough to make another apple rhubarb pie so soon, so it was off to the frozen food aisle. We've been paying attention to the EWG's food news (about pesticide levels in some foods), so got the organic strawberries--and in the same section they had blueberries and raspberries:


They made a delicious pie. I used a cherry pie recipe, figuring that the berries matched the sweetness level of cherries, but omitted the lemon that I usually add to cherry pie, since the raspberries probably added some tartness. It was delicious! (I also made Slightly Wheat Water Rolls, and lasagna for dinner):

The theme was green

The Ravelry pie challenge group's March challenge was "green." I had been thinking of spinach pasties, or green peas in chicken pot pies, but the springtime fruit caught my eye--I started with these:



And ended up with an apple rhubarb pie:

Happy Pi Day

Happy Pi Day, or, 3-14.

We celebrated with apple turnovers.

(The little piece of paper says, "POINT"!)

Home ground flour

Fresh wheat berries, ready to be ground.

We just got the Kitchenaid grain mill attachment, and it's wonderful! A local market (Monterey Market) carries wheat berries, but if you're not near there, Whole Foods has them as well.

And this is the first loaf we made--we substituted 1-3/4 cups freshly ground whole wheat flour for white flour, and the bread has an almost buttery taste, in addition to the complex nuttiness of the freshly ground whole wheat. It's just amazingly delicious.

Chocolate. Pie.

The February pie challenge in the Ravelry Pie Challenge group (requires free login) is chocolate pie--but Paul can't eat chocolate, and although I want a whole chocolate pie to myself, that just didn't seem advisable. So what to do?

Make a favorite pie, such as pumpkin, and apply bites of pumpkin pie to squares of chocolate, such as this amazing chocolate that I'm so lucky to be sent every now and then by friends in Germany. Every bite is amazing.

Pita bread, first try

Today I attempted pita bread for the first time--although they came out absolutely delicious, the puffing was uneven. I used the King Arthur Flour recipe, and everything went well, except for the fact that the pitas puffed around the edges but not in the center. (This is not so useful for putting something inside them after you cut them in half!)

Our theory: I rolled them out with a french pin which made them flatter in the middle than on the edges. So next time, I'll try patting them out by hand, which usually results in a higher middle and lower edges (at least for me!)

We had them with the cannellini patties (we call them "bean burgers"), with a yogurt dressing and sliced cucumbers--putting it all on top of the unevenly puffed pitas like a pita pizza. Delicious!

Can't wait to try them again.