Blueberry Orange Loaf

I could eat berries as if they were candy, staining my fingers red, blue and violet. And lately, I sort of have been. I've been pouring blueberries and strawberries on my Kashi cereal every morning. I've made tarts, gazed longingly at muffins, put them on salads. I have great plans for the blueberries, cherries and strawberries taking up an inordinate amount of space in my fridge and freezer. I'm thinking of crepes, crumbles and granola. And also quick bread, pulled straight out of the oven and eaten with a pad of melted butter on top.

Blueberry Orange Loaf: 2 cups flour 1 cup sugar 1 tablespoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 egg, beaten 3/4 cup milk or half and half 1/4 cup cooking oil 1/4 cup orange juice 1 cup blueberries 3/4 cup chopped and blanched almonds 2 tablespoons orange zest Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. In a medium bowl, beat together milk, egg, oil and orange juice (in that order so the milk doesn't curdle). Form a well in the dry mixture. Pour wet mixture into dry and combine until barely moistened.

In a small bowl, combine blueberries, almonds and orange zest. Stir together with 1 tablespoon flour. Add to batter and stir until just combined, be careful not to overwork the batter. Pour into greased 8x4 loaf pan and bake for 50 to 55 minutes until cooked through.

French-style Yogurt Cake

I nursed a craving for orange-flavored baked goods all last week. It wasn't until Saturday that I had time to fulfill it. This is another recipe from Orangette Molly's A Homemade Life, which you all should read. (With additional inspiration from my friend Jess at Cake and Cup.) The weekend was simply great. I had the apartment to myself and spent Saturday cleaning and then rewarded myself by baking, and I even squeezed in some time to write before heading off to a slumber party at Sarah's (yes, I'm 25 and going to slumber parties--I love my life). I do such a horrible job of scheduling time for writing what I want to write (aside from the contents of this blog). I have mastered the art of procrastination. I have two stories due at work this week for trips I went on about a year ago. I turned in a story to The Reader yesterday that was originally due on Friday at 8 a.m. Without an impending deadline and a serious time crunch, I cannot produce. But what I do produce under the time crunch is probably not as good as if I started earlier.

Baking is different. You can procrastinate and you could try to make shortcuts, but everyone will know. Baking takes a set amount of time. In this case, prep time (which is a bit more subjective) and then 35 minutes to bake. And that's it. It's time you either have or you don't.

French Yogurt Cake with Orange: from Orangette 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons baking powder dash of salt 2 teaspoons orange zest 1/2 cup whole-milk yogurt (plain) 1 cup granulated sugar 3 large eggs 1/2 cup canola or vegetable oil 1 tablespoon orange juice For Syrup: 1/4 cup orange juice 1/4 cup powdered sugar For Icing: 1/2 cup powdered sugar 2 tablespoons orange juice Preheat oven to 350. Butter the bottom of a 9-inch round cake pan. In a medium bowl, stir together flour, baking powder, salt and orange zest. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together yogurt, sugar and eggs until smooth consistency. Add the dry ingredients and stir. Pour in the oil and mix. Drop in just a dollop of orange juice. Pour batter into cake pan and bake on center rack for 25 to 35 minutes--my oven always takes 35.

Meanwhile, in a small bowl, whisk the powdered sugar and orange juice for the syrup. When cake is finished, pull out of oven and let cool for 15 minutes. Dump out onto a plate, flip right side up on to another plate and transfer to wire rack--which, as of this recipe, I decided I must invest in. Place a piece of parchment paper under the rack. While the cake is still a bit warm, pour the syrup over it. In the same small bowl, mix together the powdered sugar and the juice for the icing. Pour over cooled cake while it's still on the wire rack. Allow icing to set and then carefully transfer cake to serving platter.

Orange Upside-down Cake

I went all out for Easter this week. In fact, everyone went all out. I had a half-day of work on Friday and spent my afternoon baking. I can't think of a better way to spend a few free hours, well at least off the top of my head. Joanie and Doug spent all of Saturday smoking the beautiful salmon pictured below. It was so good, it led my mother to loudly declare "I could eat salmon all day," in response to Jason's pensive ponderings on why he loves studying philosophy. Jason said something like, "Philosophy is something I'm really passionate about." And my mom (basically) said (in no small voice), "I'm passionate about eating." Katy was laughing so hard she started crying. To be fair, the salmon was good. (The creme fraiche-ish recipe is also listed below). We had a fun afternoon cramming a dog underneath the table and 13 people around it, even though we were missing my sister Allison. After dessert and ridiculously strong coffee, a group of us rolled ourselves out of the house and down to the park to play croquet. We sort of look like a J. Crew catalog in our Easter best (aside from my house slippers). Even Shelby enjoyed croquet. She frolicked from person to person asking to be petted and didn't even try to steal any of the balls. Orange Upside-down Cake is dessert one of three that I made for the holiday meal. This one was probably the sweetest and the most like a regular cake. Sweet with a subtle note of orange (sounds like perfume). And look how pretty with the caramelized oranges on top. My little sister Emily would not eat them even though I swore they were edible. "It's like candy, Emily." Megan, champion convincer, even joined in. "Emily, it's good. Just try it. Try it." She did. But even Megan couldn't convince her to try the asparagus. Orange Upside-down Cake: inspired by Gourmet Magazine 1 orange 3/4 cup sugar 3/4 cup water orange zest 1 1/2 cups flour 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 stick unsalted butter 2 large eggs 1 1/2 teaspoon orange zest 3/4 cup buttermilk To caramelize oranges, slice orange into 1/4-inch thick pieces. In a skillet, cover with cold water and bring to a boil. Drain and set aside. In the same skillet, add sugar, water and orange zest and bring to a simmer, stirring until sugar has dissolved. Put orange slices back into the water and simmer gently until water has reduced and is syrupy. Should take 30 to 40 minutes. Remove orange slices with a fork and place in the bottom of greased 9-inch round cake pan. Pour syrup over oranges. Preheat oven to 350. In a medium mixing bowl, blend together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl, mix sugar and butter until smooth. Add eggs one at a time and mix until smooth. Add in orange zest and mix. (I bought the cutest citrus zester at Target for like $3 on Friday, best buy ever!) Alternately, add dry mixture and buttermilk to the wet mixture until fully incorporated. Pour batter into the cake pan that already has the orange slices and syrup in it. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. Allow to cool and dump cake onto serving dish. Creme Fraiche for Smoked Salmon: sour cream chopped red onion capers parsley Mix all the ingredients together.

Cranberry-Orange Loaf

If you haven't noticed, I go in kicks. First there were tomatoes, then mushrooms, squash and now cranberries. I get excited (obsessed) about an ingredient and I go crazy. (Plus, I need to finish off the leftovers). So here's another variation on orange (tangerine) and cranberries. It's rather unfortunate I chose to make this week cranberry-orange week as I have an e-freaking-normous canker sore in the back of my mouth (a result of biting my cheek not herpes simplex one, you high schoolers!). The sore is so swollen that every time I swallow I bite it, and I am in serious danger of overdosing and injesting enough oral benzocaine to warrant a call to poison control. Megan informed me last night that orange juice, tomatoes and the like (i.e. anything acidic) are bad. I'm just praying that it will heal enough for me to be able to sleep on the left side of my face and to enjoy tomorrow's feast.

On a tip from Sugar Punk (where I got this recipe) and Better Homes and Gardens, it's not necessary or adviseable to mix the batter to a smooth consistency. As you can see in the above photo, not quite all the flour has been mixed. It supposedly makes the bread lighter in the end. True, I did find this bread to be lighter than the tangerine-orange muffins, which I probably over-mixed. Plus, it's less work. We all win here.

Cranberry-Orange Loaf: 2 cups flour 3/4 cup granulated sugar 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 3/4 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 cup butter, softened peel from one orange (tangerine in this case) 3/4 cup orange juice (props to me for using juice from the tangerine) 1 egg 1 cup chopped cranberries Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda. Add butter and mix until crumbly. Add the peel, juice, egg and cranberries. Stir until moistened. Pour batter into an 8" by 4" pan. Bake for 75 minutes at 350 degrees.

Cranberry-Tangerine Muffins

Finally I bake something and don't completely screw it up. And I only had to make one frantic phone call to my mother. This was my week to bring for my office's Friday morning Breakfast Club. I signed up to be in the "club" just so I'd have an excuse to bake something new and share it. Then how come for the last two or three rotations, I have bought muffins at the store to bring? Like all good things, it starts out with coffee cake and banana bread and ends up with Winchell's doughnuts. Getting into the season, I dedided on cranberry-orange muffins (inspiration thanks to Jess). Except that I didn't have any oranges, just tangerines. Details, details.

The recipe also required chopping the cranberries. What are these people trying to do? Impale me? The cranberries were rolling all over the place. I found them on the floor, in the egg carten, in the drawer for utensils.

But look how pretty and festive they are: Here's a confession that will likely suprise no one: This is what my kitchen looks like after I try baking something. Megan had just washed a bunch of dishes and cleaned off the counter maybe 15 minutes before I came and destroyed it again. Also note the aluminum muffin trays in the background. Good for two reasons: 1.) they're cheap, 2.) they're all I could find at the grocery store. I hope they're not one-time-use, because I will be using them until they melt. Cranberry-Tangerine Muffins: 1 3/4 cup flour 1/3 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar 2 teaspoons baking powder 1/4 teaspoon salt 1 beaten egg 3/4 cup milk 1/4 cup cooking oil grated peel from 1 orange (tangerine) 1 cup coarsely chopped cranberries Line tray with paper muffin cups. Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. In a medium mixing bowl combine flour, sugar, salt and baking powder. Make a well in the center of the mixture. In another mixing bowl, combine egg, milk, oil and peel (for more orangey flavor, replace milk with orange juice). Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture. Stir just until moistened. Add cranberries. Batter should be a bit lumpy. Spoon batter into cups, filling each 3/4 full. Bake for 20 minutes until golden. Makes 12 muffins.