Baking Corner, Part 5

Baking Corner, Part 6. 
Enjoy the new thread.

Dear users, dear authors,
here is Part 5 of the Baking Corner. Keep enjoying your baking.
You can read the previous posts via the link. 
Baking Corner, Part 4. 

I baked a delicious apple cake early this morning, sprinkled with cinnamon sugar. I’m going out later to get some cream and bring it home, yum yum yum

Best wishes, Inge

Yes, Inge, adding some whipped cream is the perfect finishing touch for your delicious-looking apple cake. 

Today my dear husband was *toderich* :-) )—this word was coined by one of my grandchildren when, at about 3–4 years old, he couldn’t remember how to say that he was bored to death; ever since then we only say toderich :-)))) )
He baked a delicious apple cake today.

Love, Inge

No cake this time, but homemade and super delicious. 

The day before yesterday I was given a bag of ripe bananas. So I tried making banana ice cream🍨

aaand baked another delicious apple cake, because these apples weren’t really good for eating anymore

Best regards, Inge

L

I’m still experimenting… How do you make pizza rolls that taste just like they do at your favorite Italian restaurant?

Attempt 2 with an 18-hour rise in the fridge

Did the cold proofing in the fridge work?

No, unfortunately not—they still didn’t have that Italian restaurant flavor.

I’ll keep trying.

But they still taste absolutely delicious—just more like little rolls. 

At an Italian restaurant, they might have a stone oven—that definitely makes a difference.

I’ve come to suspect that’s the reason, too. 

You can buy stone slabs for your home oven—you just place them in the oven for baking and then put the pizza or rolls on top of the stone. The stone may need to be preheated, though. Check out a large online retailer; they sell them as “pizza stones,” but they don’t work in every oven. 

Today we’re making plum cake—yeast dough and crumble topping.

That’s just how we like it: fresh out of the oven and still slightly warm.

I can smell it all the way over here ;-) :-)))

Love, Inge

I have a pizza stone like that, too—you can get one cheaply from a stove builder.
I also put it in the tiled stove; with a regular oven, you don’t get the right flavor that way.
Today I made cheese from 30 liters of milk.

@Johansi - I thought as much. I have a grill stone. I’m only allowed to clean it with hot water, without dish soap. But this stone doesn’t give off any flavor either. I think the pizza flavor in the pizza rolls comes from the enclosed pizza oven, from the base where pizza is always baked.

My next experiment will follow anyway. I want to make Italian sourdough starter (Lievito Madre) and then bake with it. It’s still exciting........

And my baking experiments continue.

Today I baked my first bread with lievito madre.

It looks good. The next dough is already in the fridge, rising away. That will become pizza. But first, we'll try our bread tonight.

That bread looks delicious, Petra :-)

Well, my two cakes are baked, and the cream is in the fridge :-)


Best wishes, Inge

Plum cake—mm, delicious. Enjoy it while you can—it’s only available for such a short time. 

My favorite would be the apple cake—it looks amazing; just looking at it makes my mouth water!

My youngest daughter and her family are coming to visit tomorrow, and my hubby baked an almond cake—let me tell you, you could just dive right in.

Best, Inge

Inge, your cake looks delicious. What are the almond slivers like? Caramelized?

I baked a “sun” cake yesterday. No yeast, just wheat sourdough. With a few apple slices in the middle.

@ Petra, yes, exactly—those are caramelized almond slivers. You deglaze them with cream, and then let the cream simmer down slowly until it forms a smooth, homogeneous mixture. The base is a kind of sponge cake batter—it’s absolutely delicious, I tell you, yum yum yum :-)

Best regards, Inge

Oh, I can believe that. I’d love to try a little piece.

@Petra,
what does it taste like with wheat sourdough and no yeast?

We’re happy with the results. The dough rose, but it’s a bit firmer and only very slightly sour, since there’s enough sugar in it to balance that out. I found a recipe online—vegan—and used my 150 g of wheat sourdough instead of yeast.

My daughter and mother-in-law loved it, too. 

Don’t you like yeast, or did you just want to give it a try?

I’ve always baked with yeast. Since the pandemic, almost all my bread and rolls have been made that way.

But at the end of August, I was given a Lievito Madre (Italian wheat sourdough starter) as a gift. It lives in the fridge and needs to be fed and divided regularly—usually every 3 days. So every 3 days, I have to figure out what to bake. So far, I’ve made bread and pizza.

Now I’ve tried my hand at a sweet pastry. I find baking really interesting right now and enjoy trying out new things. 

Yeah, you can tell you’re having fun with this.
Enjoy your meal :-)

I’ve already eaten it all.

But by Tuesday at the latest, I’ll have to divide my dough again, and then I’ll come up with a new recipe. I still have some green spelt flour in my pantry. So there’ll be bread again. 

What does green spelt flour taste like?

Josefa, unfortunately, I don’t know that yet. I haven’t found much about it online either. Now I’m just going to give it a try.

The kids gave me different kinds of flour for Mother’s Day. I still have some coconut flour and green spelt left.

I’ll let you know when it turns out presentable ☺

Yes, please, definitely

Hubby baked cheese sticks today—wow, are they delicious :-)

Best, Inge

wow

Oh, Inge, those would have been perfect for us today, too. They look super delicious.

I was right earlier—my husband just baked the first batch of cookies :-)

Best regards, Inge

My husband has started baking—Burgenläder Kipferl and Engelsaugen—they’re so delicious :-)

Best regards, Inge

I baked again today.



Oh, how delicious—and it smells like Christmas in here! Too bad you live so far away; otherwise, I would have stopped by. I’ll be getting started on some baking myself in the next few days.

Inge, is your husband back home? That sounds great—it’s wonderful that he’s being so creative again and baking.

Yes, thanks, Monika. He’s been back home since Monday—he got himself discharged early because I was laid up with pneumonia on Monday and there was no one to look after me. On Friday I had another setback—I felt absolutely terrible—but since yesterday I’ve had the feeling that things are finally looking up. That was one of the reasons why you saw and heard so little from me this week. I’m still a bit wobbly on my feet; for days I had hardly any voice at all, but thank goodness it’s back to some extent now.
Wishing you a wonderful Second Sunday of Advent

Best regards, Inge

Oh Inge, I hope you get back on your feet soon so you can enjoy the Advent season—and your passion for sewing. But take it slow—your body still needs plenty of rest. Take it easy, both of you; there are already plenty of cookies.

Best wishes and have a wonderful rest of your Advent Sunday!
Monika

Get well soon, Inge!

Yum, and it smells so good in here.

My place smells like cookies, too. First batch. We’ll continue tomorrow.

Andrea, that looks incredibly delicious. I haven’t gotten around to it yet, but I’ll start on Monday.

Andrea, that really gives you an appetite; my first batch has already been gobbled up. Tomorrow there’ll be another small helping. To my shame, though, I have to admit that this time there’s also some ready-made black-and-white cookie dough in the mix; I’m making three kinds myself.😊

Today we had our popular Christmas apple cake. I shared the recipe with you here:
https://www.crazypatterns.net/de/forum/topic/175338/mein-weihnachts-apfelkuchen-rezept

You’ll find a photo there, too.

We also had gingerbread cookies, which are baked without flour or sugar. They’re really quick to make and have become our favorite gingerbread cookies. I got the recipe from smarticular. They’re sweetened with dates. These ones have nuts. Tomorrow I’ll bake them again with almonds.

yesterday and today, hubby first baked Elisenlebkuchen, and today crunchy cookies and walnut cookies from a very old baking book. Tomorrow it’s supposed to be angel eyes :-)

Best, Inge

Inge, you’re really ramping up production. Time for the family to pitch in now, right?

So, the “angel eyes” are baked too :-)

Best regards, Inge

Tonight I added 4 more trays of nut macarons :-)

Best regards, Inge

I had a little look around here ☺️. 
Your cookies are all absolutely gorgeous!
Christmas is now over (I hope you all got to enjoy it) and New Year’s is just around the corner. So today I baked some New Year’s cakes.


Do you know these too? Or only year-round as “Eiserkuchen”?
I know “Eiserkuchen” from the Ruhr region, where I was born. I first discovered New Year’s cakes, also called “Neujahrsröllchen,” at my mother-in-law’s house in northern Germany. They’re flavored with cinnamon, anise, and cardamom. 

Best regards 
Karola 

Hi there

I just baked cheesecake without a CRUST and on a baking sheet instead of in a springform pan, at the request of one particular gentleman (yours truly).
It freezes really well and is soooo delicious.

Best, Birgit

If anyone would like the recipe, just holler.

Here! Hey there! Without a bottom, it would be perfect for this gentleman right here!

Hi Veronika.

Melt 250 g of Sonja (it mustn’t be hot) and whisk it with 350 g of sugar and 6 eggs.

Add 3 packets of vanilla pudding mix and 2 tablespoons of semolina, then whisk.

Add 1 kg of low-fat quark and lemon to taste, and? That’s right, whisk it all together. Hihiii, just kidding

Prepare a 28-cm springform pan or a baking sheet.

Finally, add 1 packet of baking powder and whisk it all together one more time.
Then pour the mixture onto the baking sheet or into the springform pan.

Bake in a preheated convection oven at 180 degrees for about 1 hour.
Test with a toothpick.

You can add drained cherries or mandarin oranges to the batter before pouring it into the pan. It’s not necessary, but it’s delicious.
I use the reserved cherry juice to make a quark dessert.

Have fun, good luck, and enjoy! Because it’s guaranteed to be delicious.

Love, Birgit 

Oh, thank you—I’ll definitely give that a try!

I baked an almond sheet cake today—I’ll share the recipe with you right away :-) Now I just have to let it cool :-)

Love, Inge

It smells so good in here.
I finally got around to baking again after a long time.
Since there wasn’t any cake in the house, I made my muffins today. Half of them are already gone.
I also baked some rolls for tomorrow. 

  
The whole house smells wonderful

@Inge,
is this recipe yours, or is it from a book or something?
I’ll have to remove it if it’s not yours. 

Who’s baked something amazing?

The recipe comes from my grandma Josefa; I don’t know where she got it from.

Best regards, Inge

Okay, thanks, Inge.

I bought a baking pan for making rolls online. I’ve been eyeing this one at the supermarket for a long time but couldn’t make up my mind.

I just prepared some dough for buttermilk rolls and hope the pan arrives tomorrow morning.

Does anyone else have a baking pan specifically for rolls?

I think Inge has one for her baguettes.

No Petra, I don’t have a baguette pan; my husband shapes the baguettes and loaves he bakes for us freehand :-) When he was younger, he used to have a holiday job at a bakery, and a lot of that knowledge has stuck with him

Best regards, Inge

Thanks, Inge. And do your baguettes keep their shape that way? My loaves—if I don’t put them in the Römertopf—spread out and end up very flat.

My buttermilk spelt rolls keep their roll shape, but I’ve had some failed attempts where they spread out more in width than they rose in height. 

Hello, everyone.
Today I baked a chocolate nut cake with sour cherries.
It’s quick to make and always tastes good. It’s also great for using up leftover chocolate Santas or Easter bunnies.
I found the recipe in my late mother’s baking book.
 I sometimes vary the recipe and use blueberries instead of cherries. The cake also tastes good with hazelnuts. If you like, you can add whipped cream and egg liqueur on top.

Enough making your mouth water.
Here’s the recipe:
200 g fat
150 g sugar
4 egg yolks---------beat together well until fluffy
125 g flour
1     teaspoon baking powder
125 g ground almonds or hazelnuts--I always use them with the skins on
100 g chocolate--baking chocolate, chocolate Santas, or similar; the darker the chocolate, the
                                                                                                                              better
1–2 tablespoons rum, red wine, or similar; cherry juice or another liquid also works
Finally, fold in the beaten egg whites

Put half the mixture into the pan, add the cherries and the remaining batter on top.

Bake at about 180 degrees for about 40 minutes, depending on your oven.

Hope it turns out well.

I baked today too, namely a moist apple cake.

Best regards, Inge

Dear Petra, 
if your dough isn’t too soft, could the reason your loaves and rolls spread out be the way you shape them? Shaping them correctly creates tension in the dough piece so it keeps its shape and rises nicely. 
Every type of flour also has a different ability to absorb liquids. It may help to hold back a little water from the recipe at first and only add it if the dough can still take a bit more. 
I also like baking in a cast-iron pot, as it saves you having to add steam. 
I let baguettes rise in a proofing cloth, where they are nicely supported. 

Today I baked an oat bread in a loaf pan. 


I hope you all have a lovely Sunday ☀️ 

Best regards 
Karola 

Your bread looks delicious. Thanks for the tips. I haven’t tried making a baguette yet, but I’ll get around to it eventually.

Inge, I’d love a slice of your apple cake, too......

My husband baked again today—our bread for next week and some cheese-and-ham sticks for tonight.
The bread is a walnut bread and so delicious; my husband always adds some barley baking malt to it, too.

Best regards, Inge

That looks delicious. I could really go for both of those right now. 

Fresh and straight out of the oven: this delicious apple cake

Best regards, Inge

You’ve all been baking so hard. Your apple cake looks delicious. Mmmmm, slightly warm with a dollop of cream—that would really hit the spot right now 

My sourdough needed urgent attention, so I stocked up our bread supply.
A fluffy wheat bread and a wholesome, moist bread with seeds (rye flakes, sunflower seeds, flaxseeds) have just gone into the freezer.
That smell in the apartment… wonderful.

My husband baked a marble cake today—it’s so fluffy and delicious :-) HMMMMMM

my cheesecake for this weekend, the cheesecake filling was pepped up with a fresh orange

Best regards, Inge

Today I used my sourdough starter to bake a spelt bread with Ruchmehl and a little whole-grain flour—it’s sooo delicious. It’s a shame this flour isn’t available in supermarkets here in Germany.

I baked a cherry cake today :-)

Best regards, Inge

Oh, that looks so delicious. With cream… mmmmm.

I baked some bunny-shaped cookies this week, and right now the bread is in the oven for the last time. 

And it’s already done. Just let it cool, and then cut into it.

That bread looks super delicious😄

Best regards, Inge

Now there’s wild garlic butter to go with fresh 🍞 

So when I’m browsing through this, my mouth starts watering and I get hungry right away. It’s like a buffet, except that I can’t sample everything here. What a shame!

There was cherry cake today, too—though it was thawed. It was just as delicious as the fresh one.

For Easter, I’m going to bake bunnies, too—for the first time in a long while.

Gee, Inge, now I can practically smell the cake… maybe I should bake one again sometime.

We get fresh, homemade bread here regularly, ever since it’s been just the chain bakeries.
These are my two current sourdough loaves.

A wholesome, very moist whole-grain spelt loaf with oat bran, flaxseed, sunflower seeds, and sesame seeds—and as an alternative, a Pane di Altamura, baked with fine durum wheat semolina. It’s super fluffy and soft, with a wonderful aroma.

Petra, I could really imagine your wild garlic butter going great with this right now…

I’ve already looked it up online—Pane di Altamura—so I’ll definitely be adding durum wheat semolina to my shopping cart the next time I go shopping. That’ll give me another chance to bake with my Lievito Madre.  

I finally got around to it again and baked an “Ammerländer Stuten.”

It looks good enough to eat. 

Petra, give this a try.
I think it’s worth it, anyway. I also baked with my LM, using the recipe from Cookin eu—it worked really well.

Veronika, I just looked up your Stuten recipe. Cracked rye, anise, and plenty of butter—that sounds delicious. It’s gone on my list.

My Easter yeast braid is baked, too :-) Now it just needs to cool down




Best regards, Inge

Looks good.

Today we had a cherry cake here.

Mmm, delicious.

Today we had a Münsterländer Schmalzstuten (also called Münsterländer Bauernstuten)—it actually has lard in the dough.
Since the amount of dough seemed a bit much to me, I made two loaves out of it—and that was the right decision, because the loaves turned out soft as a cloud, huge, and super light and airy.
By the way, don’t be fooled by the dark appearance—the color comes from dark rye malt.
It adds a great flavor and really boosts the sourdough.
I’m thrilled.

I still have some pizza dough in the fridge for tonight. I keep trying, but so far I’ve never been satisfied—let’s see if it turns out right today.

Oh, I’m still looking for the perfect pizza dough, too—please let me know when you find it!

We found him, Veronika—check out “Polsen backt” or “kocht panonisch” on YouTube; that’s where we found ours. His recipes are really great—even beginners can bake or cook using them. We just add roasted barley malt to our pizza dough now—it gives it a nice, savory flavor. :-)
 Today, my husband baked a marble cake and topped it with dark chocolate glaze; as for me, I was only allowed to help out today—greasing the baking pan and washing the dishes afterward. :-)

Love, Inge

Veronika, this attempt wasn’t a success either.
I’d also like to make the dough with my sourdough starter, because too much yeast doesn’t agree with me.
The flavor was already much better than in the previous attempts, but the dough fermentation was significantly slower for me. The dough probably would have needed at least another 2 hours at room temperature after coming out of the fridge, but that definitely would have been too late for us. And despite the baking steel being preheated thoroughly and for a long time, the base just didn’t brown. 
We’ll probably stick with our favorite Italian restaurant for now.
Although the recipe might still be worth another try, this time without the fridge and at room temperature.

Okay, then I’ll try out Inge’s tip in the meantime! Thank you!

Inge, I just searched for the recipe on YouTube—but unfortunately didn’t find any pizza on the channel. Are you using the recipe for the rolls? 
By the way, the marble cake looks tempting.

My husband found the recipe and kept experimenting until he got the right consistency—here’s the recipe he came up with:
I’ll write it down here—500 grams of flour (wheat)
because not everything you find online is exactly what you like; you really have to get creative yourself, even with doughs and such :-) Nobody likes sticky dough, right?
5 grams dry yeast, 10 grams salt, 300 ml water; we always add a little barley baking malt, which is more flavorful than wheat baking malt. When making the dough, the water should be lukewarm, and after mixing everything together, knead it for about 7 minutes. Then place the dough in a bowl and let it rest—or rise—for at least 1 hour. You can also let the dough rest overnight in the fridge and make the pizza the next day—both methods work; I’ve tried them both. Then top the pizza—I always buy pasteurized tomato sauce and season it at home with Italian herbs, then spread it over the pizza dough. Top it however you like and bake it in the oven at 230°C for about 20 minutes; the crust will be crispy around the edges and absolutely delicious
Give it a try, and enjoy!

Best, Inge

Oh, thank you so much—that means I don’t even have to search for them myself. How convenient!

Yes, there are quite a few recipes online that don’t work.
The only thing to do is try them out…

Thanks for the recipe, Inge. 

Here’s the new thread:
Baking corner, Part 6.