When Dale Carnegie wrote his famous self-help book, “How to Win Friends and Influence People“, he listed six ways to get people to like you. I’m here to present you with a seventh way: make these cranberry apple cinnamon danishes and share them with whomever you are hoping to befriend.
…
Ensaimadas, a coiled Spanish pastry of enriched yeasted dough, were the second half of August’s Daring Bakers Challenge, and I’m happy to share that these blackberry and cream cheese filled babies are probably the best thing I’ve made in a long time. Thank you Swathi for this recipe!
…
The Daring Bakers go retro this month! Thanks to one of our very talented non-blogging members, Sarah, the Daring Bakers were challenged to make Croissants using a recipe from the Queen of French Cooking, none other than Julia Child!
I have been wanting to try making croissants for a long time, so this was the perfect challenge! It became immediately apparent, however, that croissants can be very finicky. To make then, you encase butter in dough and then roll it out and fold it and let it rest and roll it out and fold it and let it rest and repeat several more times, all the while making sure that the butter in the dough doesn’t get too soft and melt or get too hard and shatter and that you keep it evenly layered, so that in the end you hopefully end up with beautiful, flaky, light crescents of buttery, airy, honeycomb-textured pastry. No wonder croissants are considered daunting by many home bakers!
…
This recipe was posted to go along with the Breakfast Pizza, but obviously it can be used as a base for any kind of pizza!
Originally this dough was for grilled barbequed pizza, but I’ve modified it to bake in the oven. This version is half of the original recipe, so feel free to double it (FYI, 1 cup + 2 tbsp doubled is 2 1/4 cups). Makes 1/2 lb of dough, enough for tw0 8 to 10-inch pizzas. Adapted from Everyday Food magazine, July/August 2010, Issue 74, page 96. Original recipe available here.
1/2 cup warm tap water
1/2 tsp honey
1 1/8 tsp instant dry yeast
1 tsp olive oil
1/2 tsp coarse salt
1 cup + 2 tbsp bread flour or all purpose flour (I usually sub in 1/2 cup whole wheat flour)
Pour warm tap water into a medium bowl (water should be quite warm – almost bath water warm). Stir in the honey and sprinkle with yeast. Let sit for 5 minutes, until foamy (my yeast usually ends up looking more sludgey than foamy, but it still works fine!).
Whisk olive oil and salt into the yeast mixture. Add flour and mix with a wooden spoon until it comes together in a ball. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead a few times until it comes together in an elastic ball. Transfer to an oiled medium bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and let rise in a warm place for 45 minutes, or until doubled in size. Punch down, cover, and let rise another 30 minutes while you prepare the pizza toppings. (Alternatively, let rise overnight in the refrigerator, remove from the fridge, punch down, then allow to sit at room temperature for about 30 minutes before proceeding.)
Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured surface and divide into 2 equal pieces. Let rest for a few minutes before using.
Stretch and roll dough to desired shape, add toppings, and bake on parchment paper in a preheated 500˚ F oven for about 10 minutes, until bottom of dough is golden brown.