Apricot, almond and coconut scones

 

Happy New Year! 

Every year after Christmas I find myself with leftover bits of baking ingredients that I really only use at Christmas. Depending on which cookies I made from my rotating roster, that could be almond paste, Heath bar bits or sweetened coconut.

This year it's an overly large vat of sweetened coconut, so this recipe lets me get the year off to a good start on one of my resolutions: Use up leftover holiday baking bits before the next baking holiday.

Apricot, almond and coconut scones

From “Farmhouse Weekends” by Melissa Bahen. Having grown up in a farmhouse, I'm not sure exactly what is supposed to be relaxing about meals prepared there, but I get the beguiling allure of the concept that somehow if you escape to a remote rustic location your life will be simpler and you'll magically have more time to cook. I will turn a blind eye to the fact that unless you move there it simply means you have two kitchens to maintain and clean, and how that frees up your time is apparently advanced math. But there are many appealing recipes in the book for when you actually do find time, regardless of kitchen location. (Hers is scenic.)

Ingredients

2 cups flour

⅓ cup sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt

5 ounces cold cream cheese, cut into chunks

6 tablespoons cold butter, cut into chunks

½ cup chopped dried apricots

½ cup sweetened coconut flakes

¼ cup sliced almonds, slightly broken up with your fingers

4 tablespoons whole milk, divided

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

¼ teaspoon almond extract

1 tablespoon coarse sugar (I used Demerara)

Toasted sliced almonds and/or toasted coconut for optional garnish

Glaze ingredients

1 ounce cream cheese, softened

1 tablespoon cream cheese, softened

¼ cup powdered sugar

¼ teaspoon almond extract

1 teaspoon whole milk

Method

If baking immediately, preheat oven to 400 degrees. 

Place flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in the work bowl of a food processor. Pulse briefly to combine. Add cream cheese and butter and pulse until the mixture resembles very coarse crumbs.

Turn mixture into a mixing bowl. Stir in ½ cup dried apricots, ½ cup coconut flakes and ¼ cup sliced almonds.

Combine 3 tablespoons milk, egg, vanilla and ¼ teaspoon almond extract in a small bowl. Add to dry ingredients and fold to bring together. You may need to knead it for a turn or two. Turn out onto a lightly floured board or sheet of parchment paper. And pat into a circle about ¾-inch thick. Cut into 8 wedges. If baking immediately, transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet; I just use the sheet I used to roll out the dough on. Refrigerate pan of scones for 15 minutes.

Make-ahead tip: To bake these scones later, transfer the cut scones to a freezer storage box along with the parchment sheet and freeze until ready to use. Add 5 more minutes to the baking time and back from frozen; do not thaw them first. Best to bake these off within a month.

Brush scones with remaining 1 tablespoon milk and sprinkle with coarse sugar. Bake for 17-20 minutes if fresh, 22-25 minutes if baking from frozen. Check sooner rather than later, since any protruding bits of apricot are likely to pick up color quickly and it’s easy for them to get too dark for optimum appearance.

While scones bake, mix together 1 tablespoon cream cheese, butter, powdered sugar and almond extract. Add milk as needed to make desired glaze consistency. Spread over scones and top with additional toasted almonds and coconut if desired. Note: It’s a small amount, so you may not need a mixer for this glaze, but if you’re operating in a cold kitchen in Minnesota in January, you might be at it awhile, because room temperature does not mean softened.

Rating: Worth waking up to when made in advance. Decent texture. Not sure that I detect the coconut flavor at all, oddly, but any apricot almond baked combo works for me. Also not sure that it absolutely requires the glaze, so if you're pressed for time in your farmhouse retreat, I think you can skip that bit unless you prefer more sweetness.

Now maybe if I had made my life choices differently and could spring for this Two Harbors retreat as a family compound, I would magically slow down time in the kitchen. 

Almond zucchini bread, with a side of statistics

The right to vote is something many of us take for granted, to the point that many simply don't bother. In a heavy turnout year, easily a third of eligible voters don't, according to the Pew Research Center. 

Women got the right to vote several decades before I was born, so that has been my normal. But sometimes I think of my grandmother, who would have already attended college, taught school and staked a homestead claim in Wyoming before she would have become eligible to vote in 1920. 

I've no idea if she voted in the 1920 election, given her remote homestead location, or if she did, whether she would have voted for Harding or Cox. But you can damn well bet she had an opinion. A woman so famed for her bluntness that it was mentioned from the pulpit at her funeral would not have been reticent.

Before 1980, the rate of voter turnout for women in presidential elections was lower than for that of men, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers, but that's been flipped since. This year the media reports a gender gap in early voting, with women leading the way. Best not to make any assumptions about what that means for the outcome; it would be a patronizing mistake to think women vote as a bloc.

Whatever your political persuasion or gender, if you're legally eligible to vote, consider giving it a go this year. Even if the election doesn't go your way, it's surprisingly cathartic. 

And if it doesn't turn out as you had hoped, there's always baking.

Zucchini-almond bread

From “Rage Baking: The Transformative Power of Flour, Fury and Women’s Voices,” by Kathy Gunst and Katherine Alford (Tiller Press). It’s a collection of solicited submissions from many women. In that regard, you could say it’s a bit like a community cookbook, but this one is set in the context of post-2016 political climate. It includes section headings like “The Revolution Will Be Catered,” so that gives you an idea of the ideological bent. 

Baking may not heal the contributors’ rage, but it does help focus attention on something else beyond the news. And it yields tasty things, which also help.

This particular contribution is from Rebecca Traister, author of “Good and Mad.”

Ingredients

1 cup almonds
3 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1¼ teaspoons fine salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs
2 cups grated zucchini
1 teaspoon almond extract (or vanilla)

Method

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9- by 5-inch loaf pan if you’ve got one. Or if you’re like me and your standard loaf pan is more like 8½  by 4, grease that plus one mini loaf pan.

Grind almonds in a food processor until almost fine.

In medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda and cinnamon.

In a large bowl of either a stand mixer or handheld mixer, beat sugar, oil and eggs for 3 minutes. They should be slightly thickened. With motor running on low speed, blend in flour mixture. Then add zucchini, ground almonds and almond extract.

Pour into prepared pan (or pans; I’m really glad I didn’t try to cram that all into the slightly smaller size). Bake for 75 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let rest for 5 to 10 minutes before trying to remove it from the pan.

Rating: A decent zucchini bread. Nice texture, and almond brings a bit to the party.

Crustless asparagus-Gruyere quiche

 

I was in the market for a gluten-free asparagus quiche recipe for a gathering. I opted to avoid recipes that required pastry, since I'm only just now dipping a toe into gluten-free baking and that smacks of something that might involve some trial and error to get optimal results. I'm perfectly willing to make my guests guinea pigs, but I'd like them to feel like well-fed guinea pigs, so I pick my battles.

This still delivers all the cheesy custardy goodness of a quiche, and it comes together quickly enough that you could pull it off on a weeknight or for a weekend brunch. 

Crustless quiche with asparagus

Adapted from the Bojon Gourmet website. The original also includes options for other gluten free flour options, so if you don't have that combo on hand, they're not the only choice that would work in this recipe.

Ingredients

1 tablespoon butter, divided, plus a little softened butter to grease the pan
1 bunch asparagus, 12 to 16 ounces, tough ends snapped off and discarded
¼ cup cassava flour
3 tablespoons arrowroot starch
½ teaspoon fine sea salt
Generous pinch of black pepper
6 eggs
1 cup whole milk
¼ cup heavy cream
2 to 3 tablespoons chopped fresh chives
4 to 5 ounces grated Gruyere, divided

Method

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 10-inch quiche pan or 9-inch deep dish pie plate.

Cut tips off asparagus; set aside. Cut rest of the stalks into ½ thick pieces on a diagonal. Heat ½ tablespoon butter in a large skillet. Add asparagus stalk pieces and a generous pinch of salt and cook until asparagus is bright green and tender crisp. Remove from pan to cool.

Add remaining ½ tablespoon butter to the pan and cook the asparagus tips for a minute or so. Remove from heat.

In a large bowl, combine cassava flour, arrowroot starch, salt and pepper. Add two eggs and whisk until smooth. Add remaining eggs two at a time, whisking mixture well in between. Whisk in milk, cream and chives.

Place asparagus stalks in base of prepared dish. Top with most of the cheese. Pour flour-cream mixture over the top. Array asparagus tips on top and top with remaining cheese. Bake for 40 minutes or until golden and puffed. Remove from oven and let sit for a few minutes before slicing. It will settle a bit, but it stays warm for quite some time if you tent it loosely with foil, so it's something you can get completely out of the way before guests arrive so you're not answering the door as the buzzer goes off.

Rating: With that much Gruyere and creamy dairy, it's really hard to go wrong, and this didn't. It's got that classic quiche flavor and custard texture.

Do I miss the crust? Well, if it's a really good one, like my favorite Julia Child leek quiche, then perhaps a bit. but so many quiche crusts I've been served turn out either mushy or dried out, so it's not always a plus. I'll have to revisit a couple of my favorite recipes to compare; it's been awhile since quiche was my go-to so I need to refresh my memory. 

I do know that not having a crust makes it super fast to make, which definitely cannot be said of the Julia Child recipe. I remember a number of angst-filled moments the first time I attempted that for company. It turned out to be heavenly, but again, that pastry came with a learning curve.

My only nit: The recipe is actually fairly attractive in the pan, but you'd be doing your guests a disservice by making them be the ones to extricate a piece, especially that first one. You really want to get the serving spatula well under the base.

Variation: Zucchini-red pepper quiche with feta

 I wanted to see how well this approach would stand up to substitutions, so I tried this variation. Make as above, only instead of the chopped asparagus stems, I substituted 2 medium zucchini/summer squash, sliced in half lengthwise and then cut into ¼-inch pieces. I used 4 ounces of feta in place of the Gruyere, 1 roasted red pepper cut into narrow slices in place of the asparagus spears (no need to heat them) and 2 tablespoons fresh oregano for the chives.

Rating: The soft cheese didn't result in quite the same quiche texture while it was warm that the Gruyere provided, so I was a bit disappointed. I suspect hard cheeses work better in this recipe in that regard. But the leftovers, served cold, were quite nice, since cold quiche always has a more custardy consistency, so it wasn't a detraction there. The flavors had intensified, and the oregano and feta really came through. I seriously could see making this ahead and just eating the entire thing cold for office lunches or a picnic. 

Our deep blue hydrangea finally bloomed. All it took was torrential rains.

 

Several years ago I stuck this hydrangea in a corner somewhere. It came to the office free, as a trial plant, back when I wrote about gardening for a blog at work. Since it was Zone 5 long before they redrew the zone hardiness maps, I didn't have high hopes. And it turns out those were justified, because for several years it has done absolutely zilch except manage to survive amid a welter of invasive spreaders, which I guess is a form of an accomplishment.

Then the rains came. One day I rounded the far corner of the house where I don't go on a daily basis and was dazzled by this stunner of a bloom. I desperately wish I knew enough to be able to do a better job of color correcting this, because every camera I tried wants to wash it out. It's a deep, vivid blue, many petals so deep they warrant being called midnight.

The plant is nearly twice as tall as it has been every other year (it grows back from the roots each season). The same is true with the Endless Summer hydrangea this year, which also deigned to sport several large pink or blue blossoms after years of managing a stunted proto-bloom about October for the last couple of years. 

For the record, we DO water these plants on a regular basis. After all, hydrangeas are kind of the litmus test for dryness, since they'll wilt first. But I'm not sure we could have managed to dump as much water on as nature did earlier this summer when we were inundated by daily downpours. Apparently the plant requires regular drenching to put on a show. So it may be a one-year wonder, but it was worth trying to document.

And no, at this point, I no longer know what kind of hydrangea it is. In googling, it looks most like a Nikko blue, although on some sites that plant is listed as Zone 6 hardy, and while I stuck it in the most protected spot I can find, there is no part of my Minneapolis hard that could pass for Zone 6. Whatever it is, it's lovely, and worth the wait.

Somehow or another I had never made rhubarb bread. It seems an odd omission that needed to be rectified. I suspect it's because I usually use rhubarb in baked goods, and I have a preference for warm baked goods straight out of the oven on a Sunday morning, so I skew toward scones and muffins over quick breads, which generally should be allowed to cool.

This recipe comes from a 1979 tome on baking, written in calendar format. It smacks of its hippy-dippy era, with a noticeable bent toward honey, bran and whole grains, and rustic line drawing illustrations. This clearly is not written in the era of relentlessly photographed recipes. The receipt that has been bookmarking the rhubarb recipe all this time dates to 1992 from the Hungry Mind Bookstore in St. Paul, so clearly a vacation souvenir.

The cookbook is also sometimes a tad loose on the recipe end. This one says to divide the dough between two "small to medium size loaf pans." Um?? I've got three bread pan sizes in my house, but it seemed fairly clear from the baking time that they weren't necessarily thinking of the standard size loaf pans. Also not thinking of the miniest of loaf pan sizes. I opted for three of the regular minis but should have gone for four since it overflowed a bit so now I've got a mess on the oven floor. They must have had something else in mind entirely that's lost to the ages and 1970s Vermont.  

Rhubarb bread

From Garden Way Publishing’s “Bread Book: A Baker’s Almanac,” by Ellen Foscue Johnson. Now I just want time off to cook my way through the rest of the year. 

Ingredients

2½ cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon ginger
½ cup melted butter, slightly cooled
1 cup honey
½ cup orange juice (or pineapple)
1 beaten egg
1½ cups chopped raw rhubarb
¾ cup chopped nuts

Method

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease four mini bread pans. (See discussion above about size.)

Whisk together flour, baking powder, soda, salt and ginger in a medium bowl. Set aside.

Combine butter, honey, orange juice and egg in a large bowl. Stir in rhubarb and nuts. Stir in dry ingredients until just wet through. Divide among pans and bake. I found the small loaf pans took about 30 minutes until top is springy.

Rating: Delightful. Wonderful flavor and texture; perfectly moist. It comes together quite quickly, so it's a fast fix if you don't count cleaning up the oven if you guess wrong on pan size. Works fine served at room temperature. And now I don't have to go down the hill to get bread for breakfast.

Drink and a nosh: Rhubarb gin and tonic, smoked fish horseradish dill dip

I was looking for more ways to preserve rhubarb for a lingering taste of spring. This puts a splash of spring flavor in a summer drink.

Rhubarb gin and tonic

From “True North Cabin Cookbook” by Stephanie Hansen. This book very much transports you to whatever location you usually call The Lake, whether it's for one week a year, like us, or a family dwelling that seemingly has a built-in homing device, like hers. It has as much of a sense of place as any cookbook that specializes in the cuisine of a particular region. I smell pine and hear loons. 

(The first time we ever heard a loon call was when we were novice campers trying out our cook stove for the first time at Mille Lacs Kathio long before we even moved to Minnesota. It was pouring rain and we seemed to be the only foolhardy campers around, but yet we heard laughter at our inept attempts at lighting the stove, and we really did not appreciate it. Never actually saw that loon. Maybe it was smart enough to be out of the rain.)

Ingredients

2 ounces gin
2 tablespoons rhubarb syrup
Tonic water
Ice

Method

Fill a glass with ice. Add gin, rhubarb syrup and fill with tonic water.

Rhubarb syrup

4 cups chopped rhubarb
1 cup sugar
1 cup water

Method

Combine rhubarb, sugar and water in a heavy large pan. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for about 15 minutes or until fruit is soft. Press through a strainer. (The recipe suggests saving the solids for use as a bread spread; it makes a subtle but nice jam on toast.) Chill before using. Makes just shy of 2 cups, so enough for weekend houseguest levels or a small dinner party.

Rating: While technically I didn't need to be in the market for another rhubarb drink, given that the rhubarb martini batch cocktail is heavenly, it's always good to branch out. I was worried this one might be too sweetish, but it actually has some tartness to it. Just really refreshing, and pink! Would definitely not mind pulling that out of the cooler at the cabin. A perfectly viable use of rhubarb that will last past the pick-by-July-4th dictum. Well, if you don't share with others, in which case it won't last that long.

To pair with it, I opted to make another recipe from the same book, both being things that seem northish. Plus we'd brought back a couple kinds of smoked fish from the Fisherman's Daughter on a recent trip north.

Smoked whitefish spread

From “True North Cabin Cookbook"  by Stephanie Hansen

Ingredients

8 ounces smoked whitefish or smoked lake trout (or salmon), skin and bones removed
½ cup cream cheese, softened
¼ cup sour cream
¼ cup Greek yogurt
1 tablespoon prepared horseradish
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon minced red onion
1 tablespoon chopped dill
Juice of ½ lemon
Chopped green onions or chives for garnish

Method

Combine smoked fish, cream cheese, sour cream, yogurt, horseradish, mustard, dill and lemon juice in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until well mixed. Garnish with green onions or chives.

Rating: Fine. Slightly better the next day after the flavors had time to meld. It's pretty mild. If I make it again I might up the horseradish quotient a tad, or more onion, something to kick up the flavor quotient a bit. But if you make it as is, it's perfectly serviceable and won't offend any timid tasters. Would be easy to make in advance for toting to a cabin in the cooler.

To play along: Wesley Stace's "Late Style," a good backgrounder if you're up North looking at a lake view through the lens of relaxation. We saw him open for Loudon Wainwright III on a recent tour and enjoyed it quite a bit.

Yet another rhubarb scone recipe

Did I need another rhubarb scone recipe? Heck, no. I've already tried several, including revisiting a favorite during our recent cabin week. But was I rewarded for trying another rhubarb scone recipe? Hell, yeah.

Rhubarb scones

Adapted from theviewfromgreatisland.com. I ran across this one in my rhubarb Pinterest feed (is it peak Minnesotan to have a rhubarb feed?), but this site has lots of other lovely looking prospects to try as well.

Ingredients

½ cup sugar
2¼ cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons cold butter (1 stick), cut into pieces
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ cup buttermilk or half and half
1 cup chopped rhubarb

Method

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In the work bowl of a food processor, combine sugar, flour, baking powder and salt. Add butter and pulse until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. (Alternatively, if you don’t have a food processor, you can use a pastry blender or two knives to achieve the same result.) Add vanilla and buttermilk and process briefly until dough just comes together.

Remove to a lightly floured board and knead a few times to fold in rhubarb. Pat out into a circle and cut into 8 triangles or pat into a rectangle and cut into squares. (Or use a fluted biscuit cutter to cut rounds, as the original recipe called for.) Place two inches apart on a baking sheet (they spread quite a bit) and bake for about 20 minutes until just turning golden.

Rating: These are superb. Moist with excellent texture, not overly sweet or overly rhubarby, if that's a thing. They also reheated well. OK, so maybe I didn't need another rhubarb scone recipe, but I may have found a new favorite. It's possibly tied for first. It would be worth trying with the biscuit cut-out method, since it was the prettiness in the picture that led me to try this one in the first place only when it came time to make them I was in a hurry.