Lemon Ginger Scones

This was from a week ago. I meant to post it then, I really did.I just feel so busy with school and other life things. I'm baking I swear, I just don't have the time to post about it regularly=/ Whenever I come home from school and musical, I'm basically dead. And then I just have time for dinner, school work, check my blogs, and get ready for whatever tomorrow brings. Sigh. Well here's the post:


I was feeling a tad under the weather yesterday and took the day off from school to recuperate. Don't judge.

What I like about finding recipes on blogs is that you can see first hand how a regular person thought the recipe was and how it looks. So when you find a recipe in a random supermarket magazine, it's hard to tell if it will be any good. But, with the name Lemon Ginger Scones, it was hard not to at least give it a try. I had some about to go bad ginger root on hand (I assume ginger root goes bad) so I knew this recipe was meant to be made.


From this recipe, I learned how to mice ginger, I added ingredients incorrectly then had to reach in and pull them out, I had an object fall in my heavy cream mixture and spray everywhere, and I have a surplus of crystallized ginger.


Like most scones, the ingredients are pretty basic except for the special ingredient you use to make your scone unique. I coincidentally had all the ingredients on my sick day and went ahead and made them. I have made my fair share of scones, and a lot of my early attempts were not so good=( After trying so many times I was about to give up. But I kept with it and have definitely gotten better at it. I'd have to say that this batch was the best I have ever made. I didn't over mix so I really think that helped.


These scones came out light and soft, with a melt in your mouth crumb. The ginger and lemon are so soothing. Like a throat lozenge. But not at all! I swear they don't taste like those nasty lozenges! The recipe suggests the usual circle formation and then cut it to make triangles, but I NEVER get even baking when I do that. And drop scones are just as pretty so I did it my way.


Lemon Ginger Scones
from Giant Eagle Market District Magazine, adapted by me

Ingredients:
1 c heavy cream
1/4 c water
2 tbsp lemon juice
3 c flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 c sugar
2 tsp lemon zest
1/3 c crystallized ginger
6 oz unsalted butter, small chunks
2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp fresh ginger, minced
1 egg beaten
coarse sugar to garnish

Directions:
1) Preheat oven to 375.
2) In a medium bowl, mix together heavy cream, water and lemon juice; set aside.
3) In another bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, salt, sugar, lemon zest and crystallized ginger.
4) Use a pastry cutter to cut butter into the flour until butter is pea-sized.
5) Next, add vanilla, fresh ginger, and egg into the heavy cream mixture and whisk until well combined.
6) Add cream mixture to the flour mixture and mix gently until the dough comes together.
Drop rounds of 1/3 c of dough onto parchment lined baking sheet and chill for 10 minutes.
7)Sprinkle with coarse sugar. Bake in oven for 23 minutes. (Give or take)

Gingerbread Cakepops

Resolutions

1.) Bake more with and for friends and family: This has two parts to it, but they are quite similar. A lot of the baking I did this past year was for myself. Which, don't get me wrong, was great, but so much of my baking isn't seen or heard about by people I know. My mom, dad, and sister are all well aware, but I want it to go further. I was lucky enough to get to bake a few times this year with friends, but these times were few and far between. And moreover, (yes I just used the word moreover) I would like to share the fruits of my labors with friends and family! I usually never scale back recipes so I stick my family with the duty of eating all my creations. Sometimes it's a good thing, sometimes it can be difficult.

2.) Start making regular dinners for the family: Towards the end of the year, regular family dinners had broken down within my family. It wasn't really a choice we made, but it just happened. With all of our busy schedules, it was hard to coordinate who would be home to eat it or when. So, this year I'm going to make sure we at least have three structured dinners a week. I want a reasonable and obtainable goal, so I think three will be good. Of course more can be made, but this is a minimum.

3.) Comment more on other people's blogs: I used to be very good about this. Then, when my own blogging became sparse, I stopped commenting. I still read SO MANY blogs daily, but I rarely comment. That's definitely not in the spirit of blogging. If I have enough time to read the post, why can't I just write a quick comment? I'm hoping to fix this ASAP.

4) Clean Daily: This is unrelated to blogging and can mean a number of things. I don't mean to do this in an OCD kind of way, but I like having a clean house or space. I usually end up throwing my clothes all over my room and piles build up. Eventually, I will get to it and clean it, but I want to stop letting the piles turn into piles. Also, keeping our kitchen tidy since that's the center of our house pretty much. Small or big, cleaning is therapeutic and a good thing to do.

Now I could try and think of more resolutions, and I eventually will probably end up doing so, but I don't want to overwhelm myself. I think all of these things will take up my time. This year is going to be big for me anyways as I will be mulling over my college options.


Now, for these little pops, I could say a lot. But I'm going to try to be brief. I've never made cake pops, but I've obvi seen them around. I read up a little bit on instructions, but most used cake box mixes and canned frosting, so they weren't very helpful. I guesstimated as heck of a lot. I think I might have put too much frosting because it tasted very sweet to me. However, my mom thought it was just right.

I decided to dip them in plain white chocolate. This wasn't too bad, but eventually coating the balls was difficult. I luckily has skewers in my house to help me, but towards the end, my cake balls would slide down them=/ Overall, I'm not too sure I would make these again. It was a lot of time consuming work and I wasn't that wowed with the results. I would much rather just have a slice of cake. Plus, I have like 40 balls left over that are not coated because I had to stop because the process took forever!!

Gingerbread Cake
found at Lisa's Kitchen

2/3 cup of unsalted butter
3/4 cup of brown sugar
1/2 cup of honey
3/4 cup of molasses
2 teaspoons of fresh ginger, finely grated
1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
1 cup of yogurt
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon of baking soda, dissolved in 2 tablespoons of warm water
2 1/3 cups + 2 tablespoons of unbleached white flour

Grease a 12 X 9 inch pan and then line with parchment paper.

In a medium sauce pan, melt the butter combined with the brown sugar, honey, molasses, ginger and cinnamon over medium heat, stirring often. In a small bowl, beat the eggs with a wire whisk and then add the yogurt and baking soda and water. Whisk a few times and set aside.

When the butter is melted, remove the pot from the heat and stir in the yogurt and egg mixture.

Put the flour in a large bowl and add the liquid ingredients to the flour. Beat together until everything is well combined. Transfer to the prepared pan and bake in a 325 degree oven for roughly 45 minutes, or until the gingerbread rises and firms up. Nigella says to not overcook, as the gingerbread is especially nice when sticky and she also notes that it continues to bake a bit when removed from the oven. I tested it with a cake tester at the 45 minute point and it seemed just right.

Cake Pop Assembly:

After cake is cooled, crumble it to pieces in a large bowl. Dump in some frosting of your choice, but start small. You want the cake to come together but not be goopy.


Next, roll into 1 inch balls. Freeze the balls for 10 minutes to they are easier to work with when you go to dip them in the chocolate.


Melt some chocolate in a bowl in the microwave. Place the balls on skewers and dip them into the chocolate. Quickly, while the chocolate is still wet, roll the ball into sprinkles. Then, allow they pops to dry by placing the skewers into tall cups.

MSC: Gingerbread Cupcakes

Gingerbread cupcakes?? Heck yes!

One of my really really good friends was having a birthday on Thursday and I knew these would be such a treat to give her. After she tried one of my banana pecan cupcakes with caramel cream cheese frosting (still one of my top two favorite's of Martha's!), she has always called me a cupcake queen or something along those lines=) I always let her know when I'm baking a new batch, so i figured what a great surprise these would be. When I brought them to school, others seemed to like them as well, even a teacher or two.

The recipe actually yielded how much it said it would! That's a first. I actually got 23 instead of 22, but the last one was really tiny. Also, they baked for exactly as long as the recipe said! Maybe my oven's getting better?? The last cupcakes were done when it said too. YAY! And, I had all the ingredients on hand, which is always a plus!

Did anyone else realize how much butter goes into this recipe? It's a bit shocking! Good thing I happen to love love love butter. We're talking 6 sticks people. That's cupcake and frosting combined.

Lastly, and I can't hide this from you guys, there was a bit of a mis-communication/I was an idiot and don't know my measurements. I was trying to get ahead of the game and make my icing while my cupckaes baked, but my mom bought a different sized powdered sugar bag and it threw me off completely. Long story short, I put 2 lbs. of powdered sugar in my icing when only 1 lb. was needed. AHHH! It took so long to make too, because I was trying to be really concise in my mixing efforts. So I ended up having to make another batch. This time I forgot the vanilla and realized it after I iced three cupcakes. So I said screw it and kept going. There was a big difference. This is all the night before mind you.

Okay, so taste: The cupcake was buttery, melt-in-your-mouth goodness! It had a great gingerbread flavor and a perfect density. I'll say it again, melt-in-your-mouth goodness! The icing was quite sugary yet buttery, too, but I thought it was appropriate since when I think of gingerbread I except white & sugary frosting. Also, I added red, green, & white sprinkles for a holiday touch.

Gingerbread Pancakes w/ Homemade Syrup

It's Sunday morning. There's a major ice storm in progress with many accidents on the roads. Church has been canceled (for the time being). And I'm hungry. You know what that means? PANCAKES!

When it comes to making pancakes there is really only one place to go: Joy the Baker, of course. She has incredible and fun pancake recipes that will make you drool like crazy!! Carrot cake, oatmeal raisin, pumpkin, buttermilk, and the list goes on! I chose her gingerbread pancakes for the fact that they are so seasonably appropriate and because they looked sooo good.

This was actually my first attempt at making pancakes all by myself. No help at all what-so-ever. So when I was able to stand back and admire my fabulous work, I almost cried. Almost! But seriously, these pancakes are it! I mean it!!! I have long been searching for a pancake that would satisfy my breakfast needs and this is the ONE.

The recipe made around 15? I don't know. I was so hungry I didn't bother to count and then I just ate as much as I could shove in my mouth. I can tell you this, my mom and I ate a total of twelve. And we only stopped because we had my dad take them away from us.


Let's talk about the pancakes themselves, shall we? Light and fluffy. A pillow of soft warmth. Clouds dripping with butter and syrup. Do these make any sense? Try these pancakes and they will. The flavor was spot on as well. And the whole process of making the batter and cooking them was a breeze. It took me a try or two to get the hang of cooking them, but it was my first time and all.

Let's not forget the other half of this post's title. I said homemade syrup. Brown sugar vanilla syrup, to be exact. This isn't your back-to-nature-stick-a-spicket-in-a-tree kind of syrup, but I made it in a pot nonetheless. It was the perfect (I'm talking perfect) partner for these pancakes. Maybe maple would have worked, but you gotta have that brown sugary good stuff.


I seem to be really emotional in this post but they are crazy good! Okay, I'll stop GUSHING and let you whip these up yourself. Also, I definitely plan on trying her other immaculate pancakes recipes since these were such a success!

Gingerbread Pancakes

Makes: 15ish well sized pancakes

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon ground cloves

3 Tablespoons molasses (not robust or black strap)

1 large egg

1 cup sour cream

3 Tablespoons whole milk

2 Tablespoons melted butter, plus additional for brushing the griddle

Preheat oven to 200 degrees F

Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, spices and brown sugar (if you’re using it) in a medium bowl. Whisk together molasses, egg, sour cream, milk and butter in a small bowl, then add the flour mixture and stir just until combined.

Heat griddle or 12-inch heavy skillet over moderate heat until hot enough to make drops of water scatter over the surface. Brush with butter. Working in batches of 4 to 6 (depending on the size of the griddle), drop 1/4 cup batter per pancake onto griddle and cook until bubbles appear on surface and undersides are golden, 1 to 2 minutes. Flip pancakes with a spatula and cook until golden brown and cooked through, 1 to 2 minutes more. Transfer pancakes to a heatproof plate and keep warm in oven while you cook remaining batches.

Brown Sugar Vanilla Pancake Syrup from Allrecipes

3/4 cup packed brown sugar 1/4 cup sugar 3/4 cup water

1/2 cup light corn syrup 1/2 teaspoon maple flavoring 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a saucepan, combine the sugars, water and corn syrup; bring to a boil over medium heat. Broil for 7 minutes or until slightly thickened. Remove from the heat; stir in maple flavoring and vanilla. Cool for 15 minutes. Serve over pancakes, waffles or French toast.

Gingerbread Squares

I'm a member of the National Honor Society (NHS) at my school. And our biggest fundraiser of the year is definitely the Turkey Bingo. It's a huge bingo where if you're the only one to win a bingo for that round and don't have to share your prize, you get a turkey. Otherwise you get money. This also means we haven't bought our turkey yet because my mom is hoping she'll win.

As a member of NHS you have to do a ton of stuff for this bingo; make a $50 dollar basket for the Chinese auction, buy a door prize, help set-up, work from 6-10, help clean-up, cut and staple bingo cards, sell tickets, and bring a baked goodie. All of which are pretty annoying, except for the last one. At one of our meetings they asked us right on the spot what we were going to bring. What? No googling? No looking at my favorite blogs for inspration? No checking our recipe bucket in the kitchen? Nope.

So I opted to sign up last in order give myself more time to think. Bad idea. I hadn't realized but only a certain number of people could sign up for each dessert category. When I got there here's what I saw. Brownines= full. Cakes= full. Pies= full. Cookies= full. Bread= still open! I wasn't super excited for bread, though. Pumpkin, banana, and lemon had all already been taken so there wasn't a ton of choices left. And then it came to me. Gingerbread! How appropriately seasonal, too.

I did, however, bend the rules. I made gingerbread, but I cut it into bars. Whatever, it's the same thing. It came together so fast! And it turned out so perfect! I used the recommended time and it cooked evenly.


from Pie Town
Gingerbread Squares:
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup molasses
- 1/4 cup melted butter
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2 cups flour
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp ground cloves
- generous 1/4 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees; line a 13 x 9 inch pan with parchment.
Whisk together dry ingredients in small bowl, minus the sugar. In larger bowl, whisk together butter, sugar, molasses, eggs, and vanilla. Add dry ingredients to wet, mix until combined, then pour into prepared pan. Bake until toothpick is clean, about 40 minutes.
Watch it before then, though. On another blog they said it was done a bit before then.
Cool in pan for 45 minutes, then spread on icing.


Icing:
4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup softened butter
1 tsp orange peel ( I prefer it from the jar actually. It's better texture wise and tastewise.)

Combine all ingredients in a bowl. Spread over gingerbread when it's completely cool. Add festive sprinkles if you like.

Unfortunately, I couldn't try any=((. But, I'll probably end up buying it at the bingo just so I can tell you how it tastes! I'll post it soon.

Added later on...: I tried them at the bingo and they were absolutely perfect! They were exactly as I could have hoped or imagined. They were dense and chewy with a dominant flavor. The icing, though from a different recipe, is my dad's favorite and well worth it. That orange peel adds so much dimension to it. It's also fabulous because there's a wonderful 1/4 inch layer of frosting that pairs so beautifully with the gingerbread... ahh. Gingerbread at its perfection. Look no further for a better recipe!