Best Breakfast in SF

A crazy short visit to San Francisco for Halloween was just what I needed. Or so I convinced myself on the plane ride down Friday afternoon. There was a dirt cheap sale on plane tickets to the Bay Area and after some short pitching to a friend or two, we were off to discover what the city by the sea had in store for us.

Every time I visit SF I have to have breakfast at a long standing favorite - The Crepe House. It is the best for hangovers, jet lag, or just plain insatiable hunger.

The food is fresh, tasty, and unbelievably good. I have a few favorites, but anything they make in that kitchen is scrumptious.

Now I can only vouch for the Polk Street location (been frequenting there for 6 or 7 years), however I bet all the restaurants are delicious.

 

This is my favorite crepe to order... the Mediterranean. Seriously, you must try this joint. You would regret it!

And of course, it isn't a San Fran trip unless I make a special visit to SF MOMA.

This was a great piece by Bruce Conner.

Apple Cake

 

Time, oh where do you go? Sometimes you just slip away. Well, I am back and on top of my game. A few weeks of traveling left me with little time for sharing recipes. However, my arsenal is full and good posts are to come!

About a month ago I decided I should try a recipe that has been on my radar for a while - Jewish Apple Cake. After toying with the idea of doing some moderate catering again, I unearthed a recipe for Mom's Apple Cake from Smitten Kitchen. Breads, cakes, and sweets of Eastern Europe are one of the areas I am focusing more on. And this one was right up my alley!

My changes included using Braeburn and Fiji apples, brown sugar instead of white in the cinnamon mixture then half and half of each for the main recipe, applesauce instead of oil, adding 1 teaspoon of almond extract, and I completely forgot the orange juice (go me). Hence I am not sure I can call it a true Jewish Apple Cake, but it was damn good anyway. I was planning on adding an orange glaze, for which I have supplied the recipe below, but didn't end up using it. Enjoy!

PS - Figured you would love the view from my kitchen. A little feathered lady friend! 

Apple Cake

• 6 apples, Braeburn and Fiji work great 
• 1 tablespoon cinnamon
• 5 tablespoons brown sugar
• 2 3/4 cups flour, sifted
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup applesauce
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1 teaspoon almond extracdt 
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup walnuts, chopped 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a tube pan. Peel, core and chop apples into chunks. Toss with cinnamon and sugar and set aside.

Stir together flour, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together applesauce, sugar, almond extract, and vanilla. Mix wet ingredients into the dry ones, then add eggs, one at a time. Scrape down the bowl to ensure all ingredients are incorporated.

Pour half of batter into prepared pan. Spread half of apples over it. Pour the remaining batter over the apples and arrange the remaining apples on top. Bake for about 1 1/2 hours, or until a tester comes out clean. Cool in the pan for at least 10 minutes or until the cake naturally separates from the pan. Finish cooling on a rack.

If you opt for an orange glaze to sweeten things up, mix 1 1/4 cup powdered sugar, 1/4 cup orange juice , and 1 teaspoon of vanilla together. Whisk until well incorporated and thickened. Add more powdered sugar if needed to thicken the consistency. Drizzle it over the completely cooled cake and allowed to set before serving.

Orange Marmalade Cookies with Orange Zest Icing

 

Last month I made my Wish List of recipes to bake in the near future and I have been slowly, but surely, making my way through the list. This week I attempted a batch of Orange Marmalade Cookies with Orange Zest Icing. Mmm...heaven melting in your mouth. Best visual I can give you here.

The recipe came from White On Rice Couple (cute blog) and honestly, couldn't have been easier. While there are a few steps to making these little sweet babies, none of them are hurdles. The basic cookie plus the icing are both amazingly easy recipes. And from the response of my taste testers (bowling team, friends at work, folks I am pawning these cookies off on), everyone votes to add them to the Xmas Cookie Tray this year! Yippee!

I didn't modify this recipe too much as I wanted to maintain the basic integrity of the recipe. Only changes included adding a little fresh orange and lemon zest to the batter and using whatever orange marmalade (Dundee) I had in the fridge plus another brand I happened to pick up at the store. I also only chilled the dough an hour, then let each sheet of cookies ready to be baked sit in the fridge for a few minutes before popping them in the oven.

Bake on, lovely folks. Roll up your sleeves, try to keep your fingers out of the icing (I sure as hell couldn't), and enjoy!

Orange Marmalade Cookies with fresh Orange Icing
Makes about 36 cookies.

Cookie Dough

• 1/2 c unsalted Butter
• 1 c White Sugar 
• 2 lrg Eggs (as always I use farm fresh from my ladies) 
• 1 c Seville Orange Marmalade (regular Orange Marmalade will work too-Seville Oranges will give a slight bitterness to cookie to offset icing sweetness)  
• 3 c all-purpose Flour
• 1/2 t Baking Soda
• 1/2 t Sea Salt

Orange Icing

• finely grated zest from 1 Orange
• finely grated zest from 1/2 a Lemon
• 1/4 c fresh squeezed Orange Juice
• 1 t fresh squeezed Lemon Juice
• 3 T unsalted Butter, melted
• 1/8 t Sea Salt
• 3 c Confectioners’ Sugar

Combine butter and sugar in a mixer bowl and beat with paddle attachment until light and fluffy.  Break eggs in a small bowl, whisk to break up, then incorporate into the butter/sugar mix. Mix in orange marmalade.

Sift together flour, baking soda, and sea salt.  Gently incorporate into wet mix until just combined. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate until chilled (@ 1-2 hrs.)

While dough chills, make orange icing. Combine citrus zests, juices, melted butter and sea salt in a bowl. Whisk in confectioners’ sugar until well combined and smooth.  Cover and set aside. Preheat oven to 300° F. Line sheet pans with baking paper or silpats.

Using 2 teaspoons, drop walnut sized cookie dough balls onto prepared sheet pans, spaced about 3″ apart.  Bake for about 20 min. or until cookies are light brown.  Remove from oven, transfer to wire rack and allow to cool completely.

After cookies are completely cool, ice them with a small spatula or butter knife. Refrigerate to set the frosting.

Fall in the French Quarter

The next few weeks have me on the road a bit, so likely less baking and more sampling of the local fare. Once again I found myself in the Big Easy. Just thinking of my trip has me swooning in love for New Orleans. This time was a solo venture, which meant I could eat any place I liked. Yippee!

One of the places I have been meaning to sample is El Gato Negro near the French Market Place. And after a super filling meal, I suggest the place to any upcoming visitor. Nom nom nom, yum yum yum.

While their vegetarian selection is pretty limited, I was definitely happy with my food. I ended up with the vegetarian fajitas, which came with lots of beans and rice, plus a little side dish of goodies to pile onto my fajitas. The house margarita made with orange juice was a tad sweet, but very tasty (and on the rocks as good margs should be).

With the location easy to find, seating available inside and outside including a sweet little hidden patio out back, and decent prices for the over-priced Quarter ya'll should try it if you find yourself in the Big Easy anytime soon.

Pear Berry Crisp

Not everything that comes out of my kitchen is a well formulated recipe. Some days, a craving takes me and the next thing I know I am elbow deep into a dish without realizing it. This happened to me a few weeks back as I found myself with an abundance of pears from the yard, berries from the blackberry brambles, and a sweet tooth to boot.

By and large, making a crisp is easy. Insanely easy. Cut up some fresh fruit. Line the bottom of a baking dish with it. Throw some oats and spices on top. Bake until bubbly. Easy as pie...err, crisp I mean.

Let's call this my hodgepodge recipe. I have been making crisps for so many years, I no longer have a true recipe. However, like all good chefs I had to start somewhere so I listed one below for your pleasure. Enjoy!

Pear Berry Crisp

Filling

• 3-4 large pears, cored and sliced
• 1 cup berries of your selection, frozen or fresh
• 1/4 cup brown sugar 
• 1 tbsp cornstarch 
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon 
• 1 tbsp lemon juice

Topping

• 1/2 cup rolled oats 
• 1/4 cup flour
• 3-4 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into small pieces 
• 1/3 cup brown sugar 
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg

Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees F. Use a 8'x8' square baking dish or similar.

Toss the pears with the lemon juice. Next add berries, brown sugar, cornstarch, vanilla, and cinnamon. Mix until everything is thoroughly coated.

Transfer the mixture to the baking dish, lining the bottom of the pan in one even layer.

For the topping - two methods are available. First option is to use a food processor to pulse together all of the topping ingredients. Second option is to mix the oats, flour, brown sugar, and spices together for the topping, then sprinkle evenly over the fruit, followed by sprinkling the butter pieces over the top. Either method works, the first simply incorporates the ingredients better. This time around I used the second method (call it laziness and less to clean).

Bake the crisp for about 35-40 minutes, or until the top is golden brown and the pears are tender. The crisp should be nice and bubbly at this point. Let things cool a bit before serving. Vanilla yogurt tastes amazing on top of a warm plate of this!

Carrot Cake Muffins with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

Baking requests are always welcome, and if the person gets lucky I will actually whip up a batch of whatever was requested pronto. This week I received a request for a healthy version of carrot cake cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. Sounds insanely delicious, right?

Upon digging around I unearthed a healthier version of carrot cake cupcakes from Healthy Food for Living. The lovely Lauren over there at Healthy Food for Living had taken a typical carrot cake cupcake recipe and toned down the amount of fat as well as sugar.

 
Now before you get all sore thinking we killed the sweetness of these little babies, just wait to taste a batch. You really won't notice much other than the taste of delicious in your mouth.

As this week's request is likely to end up as bribery in the local university office, I decided to make a double batch, mixing mini cupcakes with normal sized ones. As I ended up with a little extra left over, I had these mini bundt pans I recently picked up and decided to make a few for kicks.

One thing you will notice is that I call these muffins as opposed to cupcakes. To me, they taste and feel like muffins, especially with the lessened sweetness. However, the beauty of this recipe is that you can add more sugar to the batter or make the cream cheese frosting sweeter. My modifications to the recipe included adding walnuts, using olive oil as it was all I had on hand, using cinnamon applesauce as opposed to natural, using maple flavor as opposed to extract, and using more maple syrup for the cream cheese frosting. Enjoy!


Carrot Cake Muffins with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

yields about 12 normal muffins

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour, sifted
• 1/2 cup unbleached all-purpose flour, sifted
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1/8 tsp ground ginger
• 2 Tbsp neutral-flavored oil, such as canola
• 1/2 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar (use 1/4 cup more for added sweetness)
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup + 2 Tbsp cinnamon applesauce
• 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cup finely grated peeled carrots, about 2 medium (A microplane grater works best)
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts 
• 4 oz 1/3-less-fat neufchatel cream cheese, at room temperature
• 3-4 Tbsp pure maple syrup (personal taste)
• 1/8 tsp pure maple extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line 12 muffin cups with paper liners or coat with canola oil cooking spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the first 7 ingredients (through ground ginger).

In a large bowl, whisk together the oil, brown sugar, and eggs. Whisk in the applesauce and vanilla extract.

Stir in the grated carrots.

Add the dry ingredients into the wet and stir just until fully incorporated.

Using a large spoon, divide the batter between the prepared muffin cups.

Bake in preheated oven for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the middle of a muffin  comes out clean.

 

Allow muffins to cool in muffin tin for 5 minutes before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely.

In a medium bowl, beat together the cream cheese, maple syrup, and maple extract using an electric mixer, until smooth.

Frost muffins once they have completely cooled. Store any uneaten muffins in the fridge.

Wish List

It is with great joy I report that baking season is almost upon us. Yippie! And yes, there is definitely a baking season in my life. While I probably do more baking than most folks, come cold season I spend as much time as I can in front of the stove...primarily to stay warm. Oregon fall and winter lend themselves to darker days, cooler temps, and a cup of hot buttered rum in front of an oven baking some delicious treats. Equate it to my version of the holiday season = baking season!

While December will bring the annual (massive) cookie tray spread, I have some time to fill before then. Below is a short list of recipes that have recently caught my eye, not to mention taste buds, and deserve some attention this coming season:

• Parmesan Rosemary Flatbreads by The Italian Dish
• Peanut Butter Banana Oatmeal Cookie Sammies by Crepes of Wrath 
• Orange Marmalade Cookies with Orange Zest Icing by White On Rice Couple
• Mom's Apple Cake by Smitten Kitchen
• Port Wine & Cherry Chocolate Cupcakes with Mascarpone Frosting by Ming Makes Cupcakes
• Apricot Almond Tart with Blackcurrants & Lavender Syrup by Vegalicious
• Ale & Pretzel Soft Carmels by Sprinkle Bakes
• The Best Coffee Cake Ever by The Pioneer Woman
• Cinnamon Sugar Brioche by Culinary Concoctions by Peabody

However, next up... Carrot Cake Cupcakes by personal request. Mmmm, I just may have to start those now.

If you have a recipe you haven't tried or have been eyeballing for a while, please share and maybe I can whip up a batch. If you live near my neck of the woods, maybe you will even get a taste test. Enjoy!