Cinnamon Rolls

Ree Drummond (see the link on the right) says these are the best cinnamon rolls ever. They are. If you want to see her pictures and explanation, go to her link, but I’ve written it here too. They aren’t hard to make because there is no kneading.

These make a lot of rolls.

It’s easiest to make them in round aluminum pans. That way, you can give some away, freeze some, and you won’t tie up any of your regular baking pans. It makes about 7 pans of rolls. Your kitchen will smell wonderful. People would come from miles around just to sit in your kitchen and breathe. Then they will want to eat.

Cinnamon Rolls

1 quart Whole Milk

1 cup Vegetable Oil

1 cup Sugar

2 packages Active Dry Yeast (about 1 tablespoon)

9 cups (Plus 1 Cup Extra, Separated) All-purpose Flour or whole wheat, or a mixture

1 teaspoon (heaping) Baking Powder

1 teaspoon (scant) Baking Soda

1 Tablespoon Salt

2 c. Melted Butter

2 cups Sugar

¼ cup Cinnamon

_____

MAPLE FROSTING:

1 bag Powdered Sugar (2 lbs.)

1 tbs. Maple Flavoring

½ cups Milk

¼ cups Melted Butter

⅛ teaspoons Salt 

Mix the milk, vegetable oil and sugar in a pan. “Scald” the mixture (heat until just before the boiling point). This is so the sugar can melt.

Turn off heat and leave to cool 45 minutes to 1 hour. When the mixture is lukewarm, but NOT hot, sprinkle in both packages of Active Dry Yeast.

Let this sit for a minute. Then add 8 cups of all-purpose flour. Stir mixture together. Cover and let rise for at least an hour.

After rising for at least an hour, add 1 more cup of flour, the baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Stir mixture together. (At this point, you could cover the dough and put it in the fridge until you need it – overnight or even a day or two, if necessary. Just keep your eye on it and if it starts to overflow out of the pan, just punch it down).

When ready to prepare rolls:

Sprinkle rolling surface generously with flour. Take half the dough and form a rough rectangle.

Then roll the dough thin, maintaining a general rectangular shape.

Drizzle 1/2 to 1 cup melted butter over the dough.

Now sprinkle 1 cup of sugar over the butter followed by a generous sprinkling of cinnamon.

Now, starting at the opposite end, begin rolling the dough in a neat line toward you. Keep the roll relatively tight as you go. Next, pinch the seam of the roll to seal it.

Spread 1 tablespoon of melted butter in a seven inch round foil cake or pie pan. Then begin cutting the rolls approximately ¾ to 1 inch thick and laying them in the buttered pans.

The easiest way to cut cinnamon rolls - dental floss.

Repeat this process with the other half of the dough.

Let the rolls rise for 20 to 30 minutes,

then bake at 375 degrees until light golden brown, about 15 to 18 minutes.

For the frosting,

mix together all ingredients listed and stir well until smooth. It should be thick but pourable.

Taste and adjust as needed. Generously drizzle over the warm rolls. Go crazy and don’t skimp on the frosting.

Make sure you get the frosting all around the edges and in the corners.

These are going to a linger longer after church tomorrow, so I can’t eat them all today.

These are really, really good.

Yeast Breads

Everyone should have a signature dish – a cake your mother made, that salad Aunt Carol made for the holidays, a pie that Grammy made. Well, mine is this bread. I even won a blue ribbon for it years ago at the Campbell County Fair. And I’ve tweaked the recipe since then – more whole wheat and flax and sourdough. I used to make it every week when the kids were still at home. It makes six loaves – one to give away, one to eat as soon as the bread comes out of the oven, and four to last the rest of the week.

KIM’S REGULAR OL’ BREAD

Soften 2 tbs. yeast in ½ c. warm water in large bowl or bread mixer for 10 minutes

Optional: add 1 c. sourdough start

About 4-5 c. white flour    

4-5 c. whole wheat flour  

1 c. oats

½ c. flax seed 

1/3 c. shortening

3 ½ c. warm water

2/3 c. brown sugar    

1 tsp. salt

Optional: leftover pumpkin/squash puree – about a cup (this makes a pretty, sort of golden, loaf of bread)

                  

While yeast is softening, melt shortening. Add warm water, brown sugar, and salt to shortening. Stir.

Add to yeast: water mixture, sourdough, oats, flax seed and pumpkin.

Add 4 c. white flour. Beat for 2 minutes. Let proof for 15 minutes.

Add whole wheat flour and enough flour to make a soft/medium dough.

Knead 6-8 minutes by machine or 10 minutes by hand. Place in greased bowl and turn to grease top.

The floor of the sunroom is nice and warm.

Let rise 1 ½ hours.

Punch down and divide into 6 portions.

Grease pans (I use melted butter), form loaves, brush with butter.

Roll out dough portion about as wide as your pan is long.

Then roll it up like cinnamon rolls. Place seam side down in the pan.

Brush each loaf with butter

Let rise ½ hour, bake at 375° for 30 minutes.

When you take them out of the oven, you can brush with any leftover melted butter.

Cool 10 minutes, remove from pans. 6 loaves. Freeze the ones you aren’t going to use in the next day or so.

After you brush the tops with butter before they are baked, you can sprinkle on whole oats, whole flax seed, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds.

Or you can brush with butter when forming loaves and sprinkle with cinnamon-sugar and roll up like cinnamon rolls for a breakfast loaf of cinnamon bread.

What’s “proof”? This is just the step where you allow the yeast to work its magic for 15 or 20 minutes.

I make this ciabatta a lot in the summer – it’s nice for a quick supper of marinara, pasta and salad.

CIABATTA

1 ½ tsp. active dry yeast

½ c. lukewarm water

2 c. ice water (really)

1 c. sourdough start

About 6 c. flour – use whatever proportion of white/whole wheat you prefer

1 tbs. salt (I usually cut this in half)

Optional – rosemary, thyme, basil 

It helps to do this with a bread mixer, but you can do it by hand also.

My bread mixer - it was my grandmother's, then my mom's, now mine. It's probably about 40 years old and still works great.

Dissolve yeast in warm water. Let stand 5 minutes. Add sourdough start, ice water and 5 cups flour. Stir or mix 1 minute. Add the salt and stir or mix 2 minutes. Let the dough rest, or proof, for 20 minutes. At this point, the dough will look soupy.

Knead the dough with a bread mixer for 6 minutes, adding flour a tablespoon at a time to make a very soft, almost doughy, mixture. Or knead by hand for 10 minutes on a floured surface. Add any herbs at this time.

Place the dough in a well oiled bowl, turn to grease the top. Cover with a clean towel or plastic wrap and let rise 2 ½ hours (this is great because you can get other things done). You want it to rise slowly because this bread has such a nice yeasty flavor.

Pour the dough on a floured surface.

Divide in half, thirds or quarters – I usually do thirds because that’s a big enough loaf for two of us. Gently and quickly form into a ball or loaf – you don’t want to work the dough too much at this time.

Put the loaves on a bread peel sprinkled with cornmeal.

Cover and let rise another 2 hours (now you can read a book or something). You can sprinkle additional herbs or seeds on the top of the loaves. Fifteen minutes before you bake the loaves, place a baking stone in the oven on the top shelf.

Heat the oven to 450°. Get a pie plate or 8x8” pan and fill the bottom with ice cubes. This is what will make the loaf nice and crusty. You can also mist the baking stone with sprayed water, but I prefer the ice.

Slide the loaf onto the baking stone, place the pan with ice cubes on the bottom shelf. Bake 20-30 minutes depending on the size of your loaves – you want the crust to be a dark golden brown.

Remove from the oven; bake any additional loaves – adding a new pan of ice each time. Let loaves cool at least 30 minutes before slicing. The extra loaves can also be frozen.

Rosemary Lemon No-Knead Bread

This bread is almost effortless to make because it requires no kneading. Instead, the dough is allowed to slowly rise over a long period of time. Then it is baked in a preheated covered cast-iron pot, which helps produce a crispy, bakery-style crust on the finished loaf.

3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp. active dry yeast
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. chopped fresh rosemary
2 tsp. chopped lemon zest (or finely grated from one lemon)
Cornmeal as needed

In a large bowl, combine the flour, yeast, salt, rosemary and zest. Add 1 5/8 cups water and stir until blended; the dough will be shaggy and very sticky. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Let the dough rest at warm room temperature (about 70°) until the surface is dotted with bubbles, 12 to 18 hours.

Place the dough on a lightly floured work surface. Sprinkle the dough with a little flour and fold the dough over onto itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest for 15 minutes.

Using just enough flour to keep the dough from sticking to the work surface or your fingers, gently and quickly shape the dough into a ball. Generously coat a cotton towel, preferably a flour sack towel (not terry cloth), with cornmeal. Put the dough, seam side down, on the towel and dust with more flour or cornmeal. Cover with another cotton towel and let rise until the dough is more than double in size and does not readily spring back when poked with a finger, about 2 hours.

At least 30 minutes before the dough is ready, put a 2 3/4-quart cast-iron pot in the oven and preheat the oven to 450°.

Carefully remove the pot from the oven. Slide your hand under the towel and turn the dough over, seam side up, into the pot; it may look like a mess, but that is OK. Shake the pan once or twice if the dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes. Cover with the lid and bake for 30 minutes. Uncover and continue baking until the loaf is browned, 15 to 30 minutes more.

Transfer the pot to a wire rack and let cool for 10 minutes. Using oven mitts, turn the pot on its side and gently turn the bread; it will release easily. Makes one 1 1/2-lb. loaf. 

I guess a word about sourdough starter is needed here. I got my start from a friend about 30 years ago. She told me the original start came across the plains with an ancestor and was passed down from mother to daughter until it got to her. This is how women used to bake bread because they didn’t always have yeast. And sourdough pancakes are the lightest tastiest things ever.

Anyway, if you want a start of your own:

SOURDOUGH START

3 c. warm water

1 ½ tbs. yeast

1 tsp. sugar

3 c. white flour 

Mix this together in a stainless steel or glass bowl, cover with plastic wrap. Place in a warm, draft-free area and let sit for 8-12 hours. It should be bubbly and smell, well, sour. But nice.  

Use what you want, but you have to feed this to keep it going. Each time you use it, reserve at least ¼ c. of start and replace the amount you used. So if you used a cup of start, whisk together 1 c. flour and 1 c. warm water and add to the starter. Stir well. 

I keep mine in a quart glass jar and cover with plastic wrap. Don’t put a lid on it or you will have an interesting science experiment on explosions in your refrigerator. I use mine about every other week, but sometimes it’s longer than that. If I don’t have time to bake, I pour a little of the start out, and add some more flour and warm water. Another cool thing about sourdough is that the yeast it needs actually lives in the air around you. So your starter will be different from mine depending on the flour you use and where you live.

Later, I’ll do a blog on some sourdough recipes other than bread. Get your start ready because you can’t believe the brownies you can make.

Okay, back to bread.

SOURDOUGH BREAD

2 c. flour – white, whole wheat or a mixture

1 ½ c. sourdough start

¾ tsp. salt 

This was easy, easy. Put the sourdough start in a bowl. Add enough flour to make a medium/soft dough. Add the salt.

Stir until the flour is incorporated, then knead on a floured surface or in the bowl.

Place in an oiled bowl, then turn to grease the top.

Let rise in a warm spot until doubled in size. This might take a few hours because there is no dry yeast in the recipe.  

It's also warm by the wood stove.

Turn out onto a floured surface and shape into a round or oblong loaf. Place on a baking peel and let rise another 2 hours or so.

Just before baking, take very sharp knife, cut an X – if a round loaf – or slashes – if an oblong loaf.

Put a baking stone in the oven and heat to 400°. Put a pan of ice cubes (like in the ciabatta recipe) on the bottom rack and slide the loaf on the baking stone, or you can use a baking sheet dusted with cornmeal. Bake about 45 minutes until dark golden brown. Cool about 30 minutes, if you can wait that long.

Bread is home. The smell of fresh bread says “welcome home” to anyone walking in your door. I saw a show on TV recently that focused on baking bread. The lady who hosted the show said that, when her bread comes out of the oven, she has some butter and honey butter and jam or jelly ready. Then, when the loaf is just cool enough, everyone gets to tear it apart and put toppings on the pieces and eat it while it’s still warm. Sounds like a lovely tradition to me.

Raised Garden Beds

I know it doesn’t seem like the time to think of gardening stuff. After all, we just put the garden to bed for the winter and there’s 6” of snow on everything. But if you want a good garden next year, winter is a good time to plan and build your raised beds.

Why raised beds? Why not just dig up a space in your yard and make it your garden? Well….

 

v  You can plant the vegetable closer together than in a row garden. This way, the leaves overlap which conserves moisture and suppresses weeds.

v  It extends your planting and growing season because you can cover the beds with plastic or sheets in case of a light frost.

v  You can create a better growth medium than your native soil.

v  They reduce the amount of water you will use because of drip irrigation, plant density, and fewer weeds.

v  You don’t walk on the raised beds so the soil doesn’t get compacted and the roots can grow easier. Think really big carrots.

v  You get much higher yields from a smaller space than with row gardening.

v  They’re pretty – many gardeners are using raised beds for edible landscaping including yours truly.

v  You don’t have to bend over or kneel as much as row gardening. You can build the beds as high as you need for ease of access.

v  You can use them to control erosion if you build along contour lines on slopes.

v  You can move them, with some work, depending on the changing needs of your garden.

v  Plants can grow up with a trellis like peas, down with root vegetables like carrots, and on the surface like lettuce, all in the same bed.

What’s a raised bed? It’s just a box, built no more than 4 feet wide, which can be any length or shape. You can make them out of wood (untreated), rock, concrete or decorative border material. They can be built as high as it’s convenient but you want them at least 12” deep. You can even raise them off the ground and have sort of a floating garden waist high so there’s no bending at all. Or you can build some window boxes.

We built ours out of untreated red cedar. Walt stained the outside (not on the inside) of the beds in front since they are decorative too. But the ones in back – the main garden – were left plain. You don’t want them more than 4 ft. wide if you can walk on both sides of the bed. That way, you don’t have to reach more than 2 ft. across. If you can only access one side, only build them no more than 2 ½ feet wide, again so you can reach all the way across.

 

Building them is simple. Walt cut the boards to the length we needed – 12 ft. long x 4 feet wide in our main garden beds. There’s nothing fancy about them – they’re just butt-jointed and wood-screwed together and reinforced with L-shaped brackets – three of them in each corner. Then we just had a big wooden box without a top or bottom. Once the boxes are in place, he sunk four 18” pieces of 1 ½” PVC pipe along the long sides and anchored them to the sides of the box with some half-circle brackets. Those hold the trellises. He built five beds for the main garden and three for the front landscaping beds. The front beds don’t have the trellis brackets because we use pretty wrought iron trellises for those.

 

For the other beds, the trellises are also very simple. They’re simply a frame made from 1” PVC pipe. The size of the trellis is dictated by the size of your beds and the height of what you plant. Ours are 12’ long and 6’ tall, with another 18” added to the legs of the trellis to go into the support pipes. They have construction wire (they kind they use in concrete) attached to them with heavy-duty cable ties.

Notice that there is straw between the beds - it keeps the weeds down

Next, you put your box exactly where you want it. Does it have access to water? Is it protected from the wind? Does it have lots and lots of sunshine? We’ve found that the trellises need to go on the north side of the bed, so that the plants get all the south sun. The lengths of our beds run east to west with the trellises on the north to make the most of sunlight.

This faces south

Now you’ve got to fill this bed. You need compost (we’ll talk about that in another blog), peat moss, and some soil – not much. Some people like to add vermiculite. We don’t; vermiculite is nasty stuff, especially for the people who have to mine it. We put a bit of our yard soil in the bottom – enough to cover any weeds or grass that may be under the raised bed. Then we add equal parts of compost and peat moss. Put in enough to at least be level with the top of the bed. It will settle and you want lots of depth for those little veggie roots. Don’t get dirt in the trellis supports.

Turn this over with a shovel, or till with a tiller. We use a Mantis and it does a fabulous job. Make sure all the peat moss is broken up and well tilled.

Now rake it all smooth. Isn’t that pretty? If you’ve built your trellis, put it in the holes.

If you are using drip irrigation (and I really recommend that you do) you can now put your drip irrigation system in place. This way you’ll know where to plant the seeds so they get watered. Each line needs to be about 12” apart and as long as your garden. At one end, we put a valve so we can turn that line on or off as needed. For example, when we pull all the onions or potatoes, we no longer need to water those beds, so we can turn the valve off and conserve water. You are ready to plant!

Right now you’re saying, “Yikes!” or something like that. “All this will cost a lot of money!” Yes, the first year or two is expensive. But after you get things established, the food you get from your garden will more than compensate. Now that we have things set up, I probably spend about $50 on seeds, maybe another $50 on water for the summer, and maybe another $50 on incidentals – a new hand trowel, whatever. We easily make that up whenever I go to the garden and harvest. Plus, the vegetables are fresh, we know where they came from, and we have so many more varieties than the store. Ya gotta eat, right? So you might as well eat something you grew yourself instead of spending your money at the store.

I guess I’d spend my money on the raised bed, then the planting medium – the compost and peat moss – then the irrigation system. You can always hand water if you have to for one year.

We’ll talk later about how to design your garden, but you are now ready to plant a wonderful garden.