Several weekends ago, I not only got a weekend away with my girlfriends, but I came home to two happy (and alive) kids, a pretty clean house and chocolate croissants, my all-time favorite pastry. These were not only super delicious, they were clean and all-natural too!
Quick story about my love for croissants...when I was in my first trimester pregnant with Liesl, we went on a company trip to St. Thomas. Unfortunately, I was sicker than a dog and sustained myself on chocolate croissants alone. No lie.
Anyway, I LOVE them! I recently bought Matt his dream kitchen tool, a KitchenAid mixer and he used it to make these delectable treats. He said they weren't too difficult to make, but did take a long time to prepare. Just don't get overwhelmed by the length of the recipe; the author gives VERY detailed instructions!
If you ever want me to love you forever (or want to try them for yourselves ;) here's the recipe:
Chocolate Croissants
from Baking Illustrated
Dough
3 cups (15 oz) all-purpose flour, plus extra for rolling
1 tablespoon instant yeast
1/4 cup (1 3/4 oz) sugar
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
1 1/4 cups cold whole milk
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
Butter Square
3 sticks (1 1/2 cups) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch pieces
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
8 oz bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
1 large egg, lightly beaten (for egg wash)
To make the dough: In a medium bowl, whisk 2 3/4 cups of the flour with the yeast, sugar and salt. Add the milk to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook. Add the dry ingredients and turn to the mixer to low, beating until the dough comes together in a rough ball, about 4 minutes.
Add the pieces of butter and continue kneading until the butter is completely incorporated, about 5-6 minutes. The dough will still be sticky, but should form a rough ball and mostly clear the sides of the bowl (if you make bread regularly, this dough will be more sticky than you're used to and won't clear the sides of the bowl as fully as a typical yeast bread). If it's too sticky, add the remaining 1/4 cup of flour, 1 tablespoon at a time.
Turn the dough out onto a piece of plastic wrap.
Wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.
To make the butter square: Place the pieces of butter on your work surface and sprinkle the flour over the top of them.
Use a bench scraper to smear the butter/flour mixture back and forth against the work surface.
Continue until the mixture is uniform and smooth. Gather in a piece of plastic wrap and shape into a 7-inch square.
Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Place the dough on a lightly floured work surface. Roll into an 11-inch square, lifting and turning as you go to make sure the dough isn't sticking. Place the chilled butter square diagonally in the center of the dough.
Lift each of the four corners of the dough up and over the butter square.
It's fine if they don't meet exactly, just pinch them together to seal completely.
Use your rolling pin to gently tap the dough, starting in the center and going outward, until square gets larger and the butter begins to soften slightly. Roll the dough into a 14-inch square, flouring your work surface and rolling pin as necessary to ensure the dough isn't sticking. (no idea why I chose to roll it diagonally over my parchment...)
Fold one side of the dough to the center and then bring the other side up and over it - basically, you're folding the dough like you would a business letter. This is also called a "turn" of the dough.
Complete a second turn by folding the top half of the dough down to the center and then bringing the bottom up and over it.
Wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate for 2 hours.
Repeat the process above (roll into a 14-inch square and fold like a business letter twice) to complete 2 more turns of the dough. Again, wrap in plastic and refrigerate for 2 hours.
Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Place the dough on a lightly floured work surface, and roll into a 20-inch square (flour as necessary to make sure it's not sticking). Cut the dough into 4 equal 10-inch squares.
Cut each of those squares into 3 rectangles (about 10 x 3 1/4-inches each) - you should have a total of 12 rectangles.
Add about 1 tablespoon (about 1/2-oz) of chopped chocolate to the center of each rectangle.
Fold the top of the rectangle over the chocolate and down to the center, then lift the bottom up and over it (again, we're folding it like it's a business letter).
Transfer to the prepared baking sheets, seam-side down. Try to keep the croissants horizontal as you move them so the chocolate doesn't spill out the sides. Also, you can see on mine I have a little flap sticking out the side - that flap will get bigger as the croissants rise and puff so you can try to hide it under the croissant a little better than I did to avoid that.
Loosely cover the croissant with plastic wrap and let them rise at room temperature for 45-60 minutes, or until they're puffy (they won't necessarily double in size). While they're rising, preheat oven to 400 F with racks in the top and bottom thirds of the oven.
Brush the croissants with the egg wash then bake for 18-22 minutes, or until they are golden brown, rotating the baking sheets from top to bottom and front to back at the halfway point. Transfer the baking sheets to wire racks and let the croissants cool for at least 20 minutes before serving. They're best warm, but will keep for a few days at room temperature if tightly wrapped. I zapped mine for 15-ish seconds in the microwave on the 2nd day to enjoy it warm.
Another day, another Pinterest recipe. It was really good but I don't know if it was the World's Best Chicken as the name suggests. (I just kept picturing Buddy the Elf bursting into my kitchen to congratulate me on making the world's best chicken :) It is really easy to make and would make a great meal to take to someone, as well as good freezer meal. It will stay in our recipe repertoire as Really Good Chicken ;)
The World’s Best Chicken
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1/2 cup Dijon mustard
1/4 cup maple syrup
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
Salt & pepper
Rosemary
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. In a small bowl, mix together mustard, syrup, and vinegar. Place chicken breasts into 9×13 greased baking dish. Season with salt
& lots of pepper. Pour mustard mixture over chicken. Make sure each
breast is coated. Bake for about 30-40 minutes, or until meat thermometer reads 165
degrees. There will be extra sauce in the pan, which
you can elect to toss out or use for extra flavoring. Season with chopped rosemary. To make this in the slow cooker, combine all ingredients and cook on low for 3-4 hours.
While I don't have a new recipe to share with you, I just had to brag on my garden a bit. The other night we had a meal that was nearly all from our garden. I made beef fajitas, using the grain-fed organic beef we have and onions and yellow peppers from our garden. I paired them with freshly made pico de gallo (tomatoes, onions, jalapeno from the garden with some store-bought garlic and lime juice). In the fajitas, I used my homemade taco/fajita seasoning, found here.
Not only was everything delicious, it was fun to eat something we've produced on our own (and I didn't have to pay for!)
Hello blogsphere! Sorry for the lack of posts in the last few days but I spent a long weekend with my parents visiting my brother and sister-in-law in Albuquerque. Thanks Kyle and Kensie for a wonderful visit and tour of Albuquerque! :)
I've never been to New Mexico (or anyone of the nearby states) before, so it was great to see the southwest United States. It was very beautiful and so different from Indiana. We saw Old Town Albuquerque, took a trip on the tramway to Sandia Peak and of course, ate our way across the town. Here's a recap of some of the wonderful, mostly clean (and some not-so-clean) meals I enjoyed....
I enjoyed a Sweet Roll from The Frontier...Travel Channel fans might recall that Adam Richman visited The Frontier and helped make these delicious sweet rolls on Man vs. Food Nation Albuquerque. You can see that episode here.
Hamburger from Chama River Brewery.
The best chicken salad I've ever had (yes, even better than Eddie's Corner Cafe!). Walnut Chicken Salad in a tomato basil wrap at the Cheese and Coffee Cafe in Old Town.
Chocolate milkshake from the Route 66 Malt Shop.
One night we took a break from eating out and had our own cookout with balsamic chicken, bruchetta, sweet corn and grilled veggies.
The best Mexican food I've ever had at El Pinto (and the largest restaurant I've ever been in!). I branched out and tried the calabacitas burrito. Quick culinary lesson...calabicitas is a Mexican side dish of zucchini, summer squash, onions and sometimes peppers. In short, in my burrito doused in green chili sauce, it was AMAZING! Their chips and salsa were some of the best I've ever had too. The white sangria wasn't bad either ;)
As I've mentioned before, our garden and especially our zucchini are going crazy right now. See exhibit A, the latest zucchini I picked that's almost three times the size of my hand! I wasn't very inspired for dinner last night and so I just decided to use up some of the veggies I had in the fridge in a chicken teriyaki stir-fry. It was a little bit of this, little bit of that, clean out the fridge type of meal ;)
In my wok (SIDE NOTE: if you don't have a wok, I highly suggest buying one...they are the BEST for not only stir-frys but other types of sauteing. They aren't too expensive either; I got mine at Ikea for $8), I sauteed sliced chicken breast with a little salt and pepper until no longer pink. Add in veggies, all cut to the same size to keep the cooking times even (I used zucchini, yellow squash, broccoli slaw, sweet peppers and onions) and cook for another 5 to 7 minutes until the veggies are desired softness. Add in about 2 tablespoons of teriyaki sauce and 1 to 2 tablespoons of soy sauce. Cook for another 2 to 3 minutes and serve piping hot over rice.
My teriyaki and soy sauces are both organic and all-natural from Whole Foods. They only cost a little more than "regular" soy and teriyaki sauce, but without any of the preservatives. The soy sauce is actually a tamari sauce, which is gluten-free as well.
Because girls weekend was in Columbus, I went a night early to spend some extra time with Kathy, Joe and sweet Sebastian. On Saturday morning, Joe made me a delicious smoothie after my run that totally hit the spot. It had just the right amount of sweetness and the oats really made it filling. I could only eat about half of it.
Joe said he also tried with chocolate chips but found it to be a bit too chunky and chewy for a smoothie. I might try mini chocolate chips to see if that helps. A little cocoa powder or peanut butter would be good too.
Thanks Joe for the great breakfast recipe! Every time I have one, I'll be thinking of you ;)
Banana Oatmeal Cookie Smoothie
Courtesy of The Joseph Wilson
2 frozen bananas
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup milk
Add everything to the blender or a glass if you're using an immersion or hand blender. Blend until smooth. Enjoy!
