Sourdough Kolaches

November 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 30 Comments

I’d never heard of a kolache until I saw a recipe posted on the Homesick Texan blog for strawberry cream cheese kolaches (written in response to the awful explosion in West, Texas) with an interesting back story of how this Czech pastry got so popular there. Apparently lots of Czech immigrants settled in the “Czech Belt” of central and south-central Texas, and now the kolache – a yeasted pastry usually with a fruit filling, sort of like a danish but without the laminated dough – has become widely available at bakeries, gas stations, and truck stops and is synonymous with road trips for many Texans. Like the doughnut and the cupcake, it is gaining popularity outside of Texas as well with unique, artisan interpretations both sweet and savoury.

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Cranberry Orange White Chocolate {Sourdough} Loaf

October 21, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 40 Comments

I have become recently obsessed with The Great British Bake Off. As in, I spent most of Sunday watching episodes on the internet and searching through my cookbooks for the recipes that I would make if I was on the show. I know, get a hobby, right? (Wait, this is my hobby…) In the words of one Season 3 contestant whenever things got heated, oh my giddy aunt! I just love it – great baking combined with the typical British stiff upper lip and self-deprecating attitude, which is such a refreshing difference from the ridiculously ego-driven and sob-story-laden world of North American “reality” TV.

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Overnight Sourdough Lemon Waffles

September 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 31 Comments

Since receiving a waffle maker from Santa-Nate last Christmas, I’ve experimented with a lot of waffle recipes. In particular, I’ve been looking for a really great overnight yeasted waffle recipe, one where you mix up an enriched yeast batter, let it rise and develop flavour overnight, then add eggs and baking soda (for extra leavening power and a light, airy texture) in the morning before cooking the waffles. I made one recipe that came with the waffle maker, which was pretty good, and twice I tried the famous recipe from Marion Cunningham’s Breakfast Book, via Smitten Kitchen, with middling success. The first time I made it I intended to serve waffles to our breakfast guests, but the batter seemed to have given up the ghost and died during its overnight rest*, so I tossed it and had to whip up a quick non-yeasted recipe instead. I tried it again a second time (because the recipe has such great reviews), this time tweaking a few things, for a much better result. But still not quite the overnight yeasted waffles of my dreams (although, thanks to those glowing reviews, I will probably try again to capture the magic).

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Colossal Sourdough Cinnamon Buns

July 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 34 Comments

You know those absolutely huge cinnamon buns – the ones the size of your face – that you find at hotbeds of food culture like the mall food court? These are like those in size only – they taste a million times better (that’s a mathematical fact, I can assure you).

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Sourdough English Pancakes with Lemon and Sugar

June 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 17 Comments

I’ve been making crêpes since I was a kid – they were one of the things along with cheese sauce (for macaroni) and chocolate sauce (for ice cream) that I learned to make without a recipe. My mum called them “leathery pancakes“, which is a pretty apt description, and I remember sometimes eating them with a squeeze of lemon and sprinkle of sugar. As a kid I think I preferred them with lots of butter and syrup (or much more sugar than lemon, anyway), but now that my taste buds have matured (ha) I absolutely love pretty much anything lemon flavoured (anything, that is, except for fake lemon. Yech.)

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White Chocolate Raspberry Swirl Brownies {with sourdough!}

May 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 24 Comments

Of all the things I imagined making with a sourdough starter, brownies were not one of them. This month Sourdough Surprises showed me otherwise. Silly me.

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Sourdough Tortelli Piacentini

April 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 38 Comments

Several months ago, Jamie Oliver posted a photo on Facebook showing the most beautiful pasta I had ever seen, which immediately prompted me to start a frantic search to find out what it was called and how it was made.

The picture came from a British food TV show called Simply Italian, which of course I couldn’t watch in Canada, but I did manage to find the recipe for “wedding tortelli“. Unfortunately it didn’t give very clear instructions for how to shape the tortelli, so I turned to the Google machine and found a related pasta shape called culurgiones:

Culurgiones are also known as Sardinian ravioli and usually have a potato filling, sort of like a cross between a ravioli and a pierogi. They are formed in a manner similar to the tortelli in question, however they are more round and plump like dumplings versus the tapered, almost leaf-like shape of tortelli, which is what I was after.

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Sourdough Banana Bourbon Upside Down Cake

March 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 36 Comments

Sourdough Banana Bourbon Upside Down Cake This might be the most unattractive cake I’ve ever made, which is both disappointing and hilarious.

Disappointing because the pictures from the recipe I based it on are quite pretty, but somehow it didn’t translate (more on that later).

Hilarious because, as my darling Nate pointed out when he went to cut himself a piece, the bananas look like penises (yup, I just said that).

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Ethiopian Injera

February 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 35 Comments

Ethiopian Injera A few years ago I had lunch with my Mum at an Ethiopian restaurant in Vancouver. Never having had Ethiopian food before, I had no idea what to expect, other than my Mum telling me that we would be eating “injera” made from “teff”, which really didn’t do much to clear things up.

What arrived at our table was a giant, crèpe-like flatbread covered in dollops of several kinds of thick, curry-like stew, to be shared between the two of us. Eating with our hands, we tore off pieces of the crèpe and used it to scoop up the stew, which was spicy and flavourful and incredibly delicious. The crèpe, as it turned out, was called injera, and it was made from a grain called teff (which happens to be gluten-free). It had a pleasant, almost spongy texture and slightly sour flavour, due to it being made with a sourdough starter of sorts. Along with being one of the most unusual eating experiences I have ever had (it’s not everyday in Canada that an edible part of your meal serves as both plate and eating utensil), that lunch was also one of the most memorable and delicious.

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Sourdough Brioche Babka with Toblerone and Caramelized White Chocolate

January 20, 2013 By Korena in the Kitchen 38 Comments

Sourdough Babka with Caramelized White Chocolate Sometimes I swear that Jenni and Shelley, the ladies behind Sourdough Surprises, are inside my head, reading my thoughts. I was just contemplating baking all my leftover Christmas chocolate into brioche buns when they announced that January’s Sourdough Surprises recipe was going to be just that: sourdough brioche swirled with chocolate and topped with struesel, also known as babka.

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