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Apple and Toasted Oat Cookies with Penuche Frosting

26 Sep

A few years ago, we were lucky enough to be gifted a beautiful Akane apple tree. Akanes are a fantastic type of apple—sharp, only lightly sweet, and boasting a fantastic crunch. Last year we ended up giving a great deal of our tree’s apple harvest to our son’s school, but this year we will be in charge of eating these crisp little fellows on our own. I have no complaints about this. Akane apples are great when plucked from the tree and eaten straight away, but they are also superb for baking. Their less-sweet flavor lends itself well to being folded into baked goods, and their firm flesh is a champ at holding its shape and resisting the urge to melt into mush when exposed to hot temperatures.

Which makes me wonder: When did the pumpkin become the official food of autumn? It seems as though the mere mention of autumn will unleash the squash recipes with full force. Summer is barely over, and yet it is impossible to walk down the street from my house without seeing coffeehouse after coffeehouse after bakery practically screaming the virtues of pumpkin. Pumpkin bread is mighty fine, I admit, but what about the other fruits of the season? Have we forgotten about the apples and pears?

Truthfully, I think I do actually understand the tendency to learn towards pumpkins when autumn makes its first appearance. Due to the fact that one is able to make year-round purchases of apples and pears at the grocery store, the pumpkin harvest is a more notable signifier of the arrival of a new season. Pumpkins signal something, whereas apples, well, apples just mean apples.

Not that they have to. Those apples you’re getting at the market in June are nothing compared to the apples that first start showing up in September and October. June apples have been sitting in storage for months, ever since the previous year’s harvest ended, but September apples have only just barely been freed from their trees. Like warm June strawberries plucked fresh from a backyard patch, fresh September apples are a revelation in apple-eating.

However, if you’re like me and you did not manage to treat your apple tree in time to ward off spring’s deluge of codling moths (note: I treat my apple tree with an organic insecticide called Spinosad, which is unfailingly effective if you treat the tree before the moths arrive to lay their eggs, which I, unfortunately, was not able to do), sometimes you have to do a bit of slicing and dicing in order to enjoy your homegrown apples. A cookie like this, with bursts of apple and the heartiness of oats and whole wheat flour, is the perfect welcome mat for autumn’s new fruit. Drizzled with a slip of caramel-tinged penuche frosting, it tastes like the arrival of autumn, all wrapped up in a tidy cookie package.

Last Year: Balsamic-Glazed Chicken and Zucchini with Grilled Limes

Apple and Toasted Oat Cookies with Penuche Frosting Recipe

1 cup rolled oats (not quick cooking)

1 cup lightly packed dark brown sugar

1 stick (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature

¼ cup milk

juice and finely grated zest of 1 lemon

1 large egg

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 ½ cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

¼ teaspoon ground ginger

pinch of nutmeg

¼ teaspoon sea salt

1 ½ cups finely chopped, peeled apple

Penuche Frosting

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/3 cup lightly packed dark brown sugar

¼ cup milk

pinch of sea salt

1 ½ cups powdered (confectioners’) sugar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

Spread oats in a single layer on a large baking sheet, then toast in the oven until the oats are golden brown, about 8 to 10 minutes. Remove oats from baking sheet and set aside to cool.

In a large bowl, combine brown sugar and butter and beat until light and fluffy, about 3 to 4 minutes on high speed. Add milk, lemon juice, lemon zest, egg, and vanilla, and beat until combined. Add toasted oats, all-purpose flour, whole wheat pastry flour, baking soda, spices, and salt, then mix well on low speed. Stir in chopped apple.

Drop dough by rounded tablespoon-fuls, spaced about 2 inches apart, onto a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake cookies in center of oven until lightly golden, about 10 to 13 minutes. To ensure even baking, only bake 1 sheet of cookies at a time. Remove to a wire rack to cool.

While cookies are cooling, make penuche frosting by combining butter and dark brown sugar in a medium saucepan. Over medium heat, stir to combine the two, allowing mixture to come to a light boil. Boil for 1 minute, stirring constantly, until mixture has thickened slightly. Remove from heat and set aside to cool slightly.

After mixture has cooled for about 10 minutes, add milk and beat until smooth, then add powdered sugar and beat until mixture is smooth and combined.

Using a large spoon, drizzle cooled cookies with penuche frosting.

Makes about 3 dozen cookies, depending on how generously the tablespoon-fuls of dough were portioned out.

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Cheddar Apple Cornmeal Bread

24 Sep

Sometimes I just want to bake something. It doesn’t matter what, really. There are days when, faced with an open stretch of an hour or so, I just want to root around in the pantry, see what jumps out at me, then bust out the flour and create something that I can put in the oven. Maybe it’s the comfort that baking suggests, what with the emanating warmth of a heated oven and the lingering scent of something slowly baking and waiting to greet you. Or maybe it’s just that I have so little free time these days, when I have an open moment, my brain automatically commands: MAKE SOMETHING.

Unromantic as that last notion may be, I am glad to have whatever urge it may be that compels me to create new foods. It keeps my creativity sharp, sure, but it also brings me so much joy to be measuring, mixing, and anticipating what new thing I have just thrown together. Because sometimes that is exactly what happens: I find things, I put them together, and I wait to see what emerges. My efforts are not always successful (remind me to not tell you about the time I put dried pears in a batch of cookies and ended up with cookies that tasted as though they were studded with chunks of fibrous cardboard), but, as with this bread, when they are successful, it certainly makes my day feel that much more complete.

So: the bread. I had an apple, I had some cheese, and I wanted to bake something. A tour of the pantry lead me to some cornmeal, and, with the knowledge that I had only a single egg left in the refrigerator, I decided that some sort of batter bread was in order. Heavy on textural variation, this bread is not a cornbread, per se, but neither is it a standard batter bread. Chunks of apple and streaks of sharp cheddar cheese lend the bread a comforting flavor, and, along with the cornmeal, they add a sunny brightness to the appearance that I did not anticipate. Added along with the fine crumb, wonderful toothsome bite, and delicately savory/sweet flavor, it was the final element of a pleasingly successful afternoon experiment, and one I certainly plan on revisiting in the months to come.

Last Year: Lime Coconut Tart and Everything Flatbread

Cheddar Apple Cornmeal Bread Recipe

1 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1 medium apple, peeled, cored, and diced into ¼-inch chunks (about 1 cup apple chunks total)

2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

½ cup cornmeal (finely-ground, not polenta)

1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

1 ¼ cups buttermilk or sour milk

1 large egg

4 tablespoons melted butter, cooled slightly

Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Generously grease an 8 ½” by 4 ½” loaf pan.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, then whisk to combine. In a medium bowl, whisk together the buttermilk or sour milk, egg, and melted butter. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, and, with a spatula or wooden spoon, stir just to combine.

Fold the shredded cheese and diced apples into the batter until they are fully incorporated, being careful not to overmix the batter as you fold.

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan, then smooth the top as much as possible.  Bake in the center of the oven for 40 to 50 minutes, rotating halfway through. The bread will be done when the top is tall and golden brown and a toothpick or cake tester inserted into the bread emerges with just a small amount of moist crumbs attached.

Cool the bread in its pan for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to finish cooling. Bread is best when served ever-so-slightly warm, or at room temperature.

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Homemade Multigrain Crackers

20 Sep

Is it odd to admit that, though I will never bat an eye when it comes to baking my own bread, it never really occurs to me to make my own crackers? In our house, at least, there is not much separating a cracker from a slice of bread in terms of utilization. Both crackers and bread get topped with some sort of cheese, or eaten with fruit, or spread with almond butter. Crackers, though more crisp and tiny, are, like bread, a combination of flours, a leavening agent, and some liquid, so why my indifference about making them at home?

To be quite honest, I rarely make crackers at home because, unlike homemade bread, I have a difficult time making homemade crackers taste as good as crackers I buy. Homemade bread is always a treat, even if I end up making a loaf (or two) that ends up sort of squat or misshapen, the bread always tastes phenomenal, and the experience of making bread always makes me feel soothed and comforted. Making crackers just makes me want to get back all the time I just spend laboring over something that tastes underwhelming, with a texture that is never quite cracker-ish enough.

You know where this is going, right? You can all stop the presses, because here, right now, I have for you the very best homemade cracker recipe you’ll ever find. With a magical combination of rye flour, whole wheat flour, and wheat bran, the texture of these crackers is just about perfect. The taste, slightly nutty from the mixture of flours, is pumped up ever-so-slightly with a dose of light brown sugar, a spoonful of tiny seeds, and a nice undertone of butter. The dough is a dream to work with, and it comes together to form the most perfectly crisp, yet sturdy, crackers that make a delightful pairing with cheese, nut butter, or even just a cup of hot tea. As an added bonus, these crackers are a huge hit with kids. Formed into many an animal shape, the crackers are a perfect weekend afternoon project for kids and adults alike, and, though I am not the type to shoo a child away from a cookie, making crackers and eating them is, if you’re looking for some encouragement, a slightly more virtuous endeavor than turning out a few sheets of cookies. Not that it will matter, though. These crackers, I swear, are just about good enough to choose over a cookie, any day of the week.

Last Year: Tomato Tartlets with Rosemary

Homemade Multigrain Crackers Recipe

Inspired by a recipe in Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, by Deborah Madison

¾ cup unbleached all-purpose flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

½ cup dark rye flour

½ cup wheat bran

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon sea salt

¼ cup lightly packed light brown sugar

1 stick (8 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

1 large egg

½ cup buttermilk or soured milk

1 teaspoon sesame seeds

1 teaspoon poppy seeds

Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

In a large bowl, or in the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the flours, wheat bran, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and brown sugar.

In a small bowl, beat the egg into the buttermilk, then set aside.

Add the butter to the dry ingredients and mix it in using your mixer’s paddle attachment, or by rubbing the butter into the dry ingredients using your fingers. Stir in the egg and buttermilk mixture until evenly distributed. The dough should be quite combined and sticky at this point, but if it appears to be a bit dry and crumbly, add in a few more drops of buttermilk and continue to mix the dough until it clings together. Stir in the sesame seeds and poppy seeds. Shape the dough into a disc, wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 10 minutes.

On a lightly floured surface, roll the slightly chilled dough until it is about 1/8-inch thick. Cut out the crackers using a 2-inch biscuit cutter, or several cookie cutters. Combine, reroll, and recut any remaining scraps of dough. Prick the tops of each cracker with a fork, then place on an ungreased baking sheet and bake, one sheet at a time, in the center of the oven for 12 to 15 minutes, until they are lightly browned. If you have cut your crackers into very small shapes, bake them for only 10 minutes at first, then check them for doneness.

Makes about 5 dozen 2-inch round crackers. Makes substantially more crackers if you cut them using tiny cookie cutters.

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