Author: akc

Sourdough #2

Sourdough #2

by akc

I did not get into sourdough baking along with everyone else during the pandemic lockdowns. Instead, in true fashion, I am coming to this a few years late.

The sourdough from the bakery that comes to our farmer’s market is good bread but not a sour as I like my sourdough, and at some point this summer I decided I should learn how to make my own. I figured if I started practicing in the winter I’d probably be in pretty good shape for tomato season 2024.

So, for Christmas I asked for and received a sourdough kit from King Arthur, that came with some of their starter and a crock to keep it in. Knowing it had the starter in it, I opened it almost right away when it arrived and then followed their instructions to wake up the starter and feed it for a few days.

A couple of days before Christmas, I made my first loaf. I followed a recipe that came with the kit, which was billed as a good recipe for beginners. It came out fine. It was pretty good bread but it wasn’t the more rustic sourdough vibe I’m going for. But it was good for a confidence boost and some nearly-instant gratification.

Two slices of white bread a stacked on a white plate with a fried egg in the background. The bread has a very light brown crust, and a mostly even scattering of small holes, with four larger ones going through the middle.

After that, I had some questions and started looking around for books. I pretty quickly landed on The Perfect Loaf. I was able to peruse a surprisingly long chunk of it as an ebook sample, and saw that it starts out with a tutorial-style recipe that walks you through all the steps with just enough explanation for the moment. So, I purchased a copy of the ebook and embarked on my first attempt with the tutorial.

I really appreciated the extra explanations of the tutorial. There are several places where the author describes a couple of things that might be happening with your dough, how to address it right now, and what to change next time. For example, the flour I have on hand at the moment has a lower protein content than is called for, which I think led to the more flat shape of my loaf. So next time, I’m going to experiment with doing some extra stretches and folds (basically kneading) to see if that helps. I also appreciated the encouragement to take notes as I went along, and I have a couple of other things to pay closer attention to next time as well.

In the meantime, it was still a stunning success! I’m very happy with the crust and the interior texture. It’s great fresh and toasted (one of my favorite snacks is toasted sourdough with butter), and I’m already looking forward to making another loaf.

A white hand holds a round loaf of bread. It is a dark golden brown colors, with small bubbles visible under the crust. It's scored in a box pattern with a cross in the middle.
Four slices of white bread rest on a white plate with orange, teal, and green brushstrokes. The slices of bread are long pieces cut in half. They have a lot of holes in them of different sizes. They look delicious.
2023 Best Books of the Year

2023 Best Books of the Year

by akc

This year I read 120 books, which is an all-time high. I didn’t realize I was on track to do that until a couple of weeks ago, at which point I was close enough that I knew I’d make it. So that was kind of fun to see! I wanted to share a few of my favorites (OK, maybe more than a few). I hope you find a couple of things to add to your TBR list.

Best Book Club Book
Land of Milk and Honey, by C. Pam Zhang

On the surface this seems like it’s probably climate fiction, and it is. But the focus is on just a couple of characters, and there are a lot of themes (grief, isolation, loneliness) interwoven that elevate it into something else. You may have seen or heard a lot about this book this fall, and it’s definitely worth the read. Don’t let the hype scare you off.

Best Audacious Book Club Book
Chain-Gang All-Stars, by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

Roxane Gay runs The Audacious Book Club. Each month, paid subscribers can access asynchronous chats about the book, and can watch an interview she conducts with the author. This introduced me to several great books I didn’t hear about otherwise. Chain-Gang All-Stars has a lot of characters to keep track of, and the perspective shifts between them, but for the most part those shifts serve the story well. While this was a little hard to read at times, it was also completely gripping and had a lot of heart.

Best Recommendation from TBR
Symphony of Secrets, by Brendan Slocumb

TBR is a paid service from Book Riot, where you get three book recommendations each quarter. I’ve been a subscriber since 2018. One thing I really like about it is that I tend to get recommendations for books I haven’t heard about otherwise, which I really appreciate. I don’t always read all three recommendations right away, but I keep track of which books come to me through TBR. Symphony of Secrets was a recommendation from this year and was just a delight to read. There are two stories running in parallel, and the themes that connect them worked really well. I’m not musial, so I was a little concerned that I might miss out on important aspects of the story. But I did not at all. I suspect that if you do an additional layer will be unlocked, though.

Best Book in a Series I’m Already Reading
Grave Importance, by Vivian Shaw

This is #3 in the Dr. Greta Helsing series. This book was so chaotic but in the best possible way. Also, a decent portion of this installment is spent in the back offices of Hell, and I just find that kind of thing so delightful. Bureaucracy! In Hell! (Yes, this is one of the things I like about Good Omens as well.)

Best Book in a New Series
The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi, by Shannon Chakraborty

This is the first book in a new series about a retired female pirate who is blackmailed into coming out of retirement for a job. I loved Amina, the protagonist, for how pragmatic she was. And it was really fun to see a creaky old band of pirates reassembling themselves and getting back into the groove of things.

Best Entry in the Austen Extended Universe
The Heiress, by Molly Greeley

There are so many books out there inspired by Jane Austen’s writings, but I particularly enjoy those that are set amongst her locations and characters. The best is still The Other Bennet Sister, but of those I read this year The Heiress was my favorite. This novel answers the question “Why is Anne de Bourgh so sickly?” in a very intriguing way.

Best Book I Bought
Starling House, Alix E. Harrow

This did not unseat The Once and Future Witches as my favorite by this author, but that’s a tall order. This was fast-paced and had a really interesting concept involving a sentient house and “a lonely pining man with tattoos and a sword.” (Yes, please.) The main character makes a mix of good and bad choices, but they all add up to a very believable and well-developed protagonist.

Best Book I Read in Print
Demon Copperhead, by Barbara Kingsolver

The vast majority of my reading is ebooks borrowed from DCPL, but I read 11 print books this year, including a re-read of Matrix for book club. For reasons I can’t articulate, I was sort of avoiding reading Demon Copperhead. But this spring it won the Pulitzer, and then the Women’s Prize for Fiction, and I finally put it on hold. Naturally the hold list was enormous so I ended up buying the hardcover, and I’m so glad I did. This is a book that rewards the time you spend sinking into the language, and demands your attention as you’re reading. It’s heartbreaking and full of difficult moments, but it was wonderful. And don’t worry if you don’t remember David Copperfield, you won’t miss anything.

Best 2023 Release
Prophet, by Sin Blache and Helen Macdonald

I read 46 books published in 2023, which was more than I would have guessed, and made it a little hard to pick. But I chose this one because it surprised me. The description focuses more on the plot and makes it sound like a rather sterile sci-fi story. But I thought about H is for Hawk and I figured there must be more to it. And there is. The premise is wild, the writing was gorgeous, and there’s scads of witty banter that made me laugh aloud more than once. However, there is not nearly enough worldbuilding, the wild premise is rickety, and the ending made no sense. But it was also satisfying? I don’t know. Read it or not.

Best Backlist Title (2021 or prior)
The Starless Sea, by Erin Morgenstern

I absolutely loved this. It was so immersive, and had wonderful characters. The plot was perhaps a bit predictable at times, but I was so charmed I didn’t care. It’s a book about storytellers, and it was big and enveloping, as it should be.

Other Books I Want You to Know About

Chile-Cheese Cookies

Chile-Cheese Cookies

by akc

These Chile-Cheese Cookies from Bon Appetit are so good. The chile gives them some zestiness and the cheese adds a savory note. The shortbread texture is perfect.

You do need a food processor for this recipe, because there’s really no liquid. You’re just processing until the cheese and butter break down enough to form a dough. It’ll take a little while, just persevere, it will get there.

I recommend that you form these into two or more logs as it’ll be much easier to handle. I did find it a little tricky as they’re so dry; rolling into a log sort of worked but I had better luck patting it into shape and then gently rolling to try and even it out into something vaguely round. There were some cracks going through them that I was a little worried about, but chilling seemed to take care of that. (Mine chilled for a couple of days.)

One other note. I couldn’t get much of the sugar and pepper (I used Aleppo pepper) to stick until I brushed a bit of water on. So, I recommend doing that as it didn’t seem to hurt the final product.

I didn’t count how many I got, but this recipe made a lot, certainly more than 24. They didn’t spread, so you can crowd your baking sheets a bit. I did find it was hard to tell when they were done, and a few of them got a little caramelized on the bottom, but were still delicious.

A jumble of round yellow cookies rests on a white serving platter. The edges are dark red from Aleppo pepper, and a few of them are a little darker than the others. They still tasted great.
The Chile-Cheese Cookies from Bon Appetit, after book club feasted on them.
Why Haven’t I Made That?: One Year Later

Why Haven’t I Made That?: One Year Later

by akc

You can see all the recipes I made as part of this project on The Why Haven’t I Made That? List

It’s officially been a year since I started Why Haven’t I Made That?, which was a project to make one Smitten Kitchen recipe every week. I tried to focus mostly on recipes that were new to me, but I didn’t want to set a bunch of rules and then feel like someone else was in charge of my kitchen. So how did it go?

In reality, I didn’t cook a Smitten Kitchen recipe every week. But I still managed to make 65 of Deb’s dishes as part of this project. In the early summer I was working ahead for a while to try and make sure I had posts to put up while I was out of town for almost half of June, so there was a stretch of weeks where I was making a point of doing two a week.

They weren’t all new-to-me recipes, in part because I wanted to share some of our favorites. And in part because there were some weeks where I just didn’t feel like making something new (or at least, I didn’t feel like it on the day we did meal planning and groceries).

For the most part I haven’t repeated anything yet, but there are several recipes from this project that I know I’ll make again:

I’m sure there are others I’ll end up making again, but these are the ones that jump out at me when I review the list. Interestingly enough, I still haven’t made the Pizza Beans or the I Want Chocolate Cake Cake, the two things that were on my mind when I dreamed up this project. I might have to throw a dinner party to rectify that.

I feel like I should wrap this post up by sharing some learnings, but I didn’t really go into this project with learning as a focus. It was interesting to notice that there are some very similar dishes on the blog and in the cookbooks, though. So if you hear about something in one of Deb’s cookbooks, poke around on the blog a bit. You might be able to turn up something similar.

I suppose the main thing I’ve learned is that if I want to cook out of a particular source, I need to make a point of doing it, not just see what happens. While I don’t see myself doing another yearlong project, I can see where I might pick a cookbook and make something from it every week for a month. And I will definitely continue sharing things here.

Carrot Cake with Maple(less) Cream Cheese Frosting

Carrot Cake with Maple(less) Cream Cheese Frosting

by akc

I made a half-batch of these Carrot Cake cupcakes from the Smitten Kitchen blog recently and they were a delight. Perfectly moist and not too sweet.

I grated the carrots by hand on a box grater, which doesn’t take too much time. The only change I made to the recipe was to use more walnuts than called for, because I chose not to add the raisins. This was a great idea as there was a nice amount of walnut in each cupcake.

When I was checking for ingredients, I thought I had enough cream cheese to make the cream cheese frosting in the recipe, but I was short by quite a bit. I looked back at the recipe for the Spiced Applesauce Cake and realized I had enough cream cheese for that frosting, so that’s what I used. In terms of flavoring the frosting, I just put in some extra vanilla. Carrot cake doesn’t need anything else.

When it was time to frost the cupcakes I did kind of a messy job, in part because I wasn’t sure I’d have enough and in part because the frosting started to warm up too much in my piping bag. And there were a couple of times when it got stuck somehow? I’m unclear on what was happening. I thought I would cover my tracks with sprinkles but I didn’t have any, so they were just messy. But they tasted great, and there was a good proportion of frosting. A little more would have been nice, but really just because that would have given me more confidence to really go for it in terms of giving them a nice swirl.

An orangey-brown cupcake sits on top of a purple cake liner and a white plate with red and black edging. It is topped with a creamy white cream cheese frosting that has been piped on with a star tip, but in no particular pattern.
A Carrot Cake Cupcake with Maple(less) Cream Cheese Frosting, from the Smitten Kichen blog.