Blueberry Jam with a Breadmaker

It has been very busy here. The fall harvest was fantastic, and food preservation has been a time-consuming hobby. I have made several jams in the breadmaker this year, and the most popular by far was the blueberry jam. As soon as I made it, it was gone, so I am just now getting a picture of it. 

I also have been continuing to perfect the sourdough bread. Here is a slice I toasted for the picture. 

I found these canning lids online and was so smitten with the lightning bug. They are no longer blinking in the night with summer over, but  love using the lids in my fall canning to remind me of the precious early summer months.

Here is the blueberry jam. I made this in the breadmaker, and I didn't crush the berries, but you could to get a more jam-like consistency.

 

Blueberry Jam in the Breadmaker

 

1 lb. blueberries (frozen or fresh)

3/4 cup sugar

1 tablespoon lemon juice

 

Works best if you defrost the frozen blueberries first. Place all in breadmaker. Select the jam cycle. Once jam is finished transfer to sterilized jar and let it cool. Then it may be stored in the refrigerator for three weeks or the freezer for a year.  

Recipe resource: culinaryshades.com 

Here is my favorite sourdough success. 

I made it again in a loaf pan instead of a dutch oven, but I liked the first loaf better. I am still working out the options and techniques.

Took a fall drive and zooming along in the car I got a good picture of a round barn. It was even decorated for fall!

 In Victory,
Sherry

The Fall Garden

The fall garden is winding down. Today it is 92 degrees outside, and I can hear a chorus of cicadas singing on the next street. It will possibly be the last time I hear them this year because it is getting cooler tomorrow. 

The garden has been dry and hot for months now, and I am very glad I planted native flowers and plants that can survive the heat.

I still see monarchs; they have begun their migration, but some still linger in my garden. The same is to be said of the hummingbirds.

We got a much-needed rain and everything in the garden seemed to breathe a collective sigh of relief.

I went to plant a pansy I brought home last week, and I had been watering it faithfully so I could transplant, and this frog had taken us residence in my pot and seemed to not be bothered that I found him.

I had another pansy I did transplant, and it had a happy home in this thrift store planter. There are a few gardening chores left to do, and it is just about time to put the garden to bed. I will putter about inside and keep the kitchen buzzing much of the fall and winter. Do you enjoy the change in seasons? Do your hobbies change with them?

In Victory,
Sherry

Browned Butter Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookies

I was watching a YouTuber the other day that was talking about making sourdough starter, and her t-shirt said, "currently hyper-focusing on sourdough." I thought, 'yah', that about sums up how it feels when you are trying to learn to make a decent loaf of this bread. I have never been very gifted with making bread anyway, so this is a new frontier in the kitchen. I have got a really active starter after almost a month of tending it everyday, and I also have several successful sourdough discard recipes.

This is one of my favorite, the browned butter sourdough chocolate chip cookies.

I feed my starter, and it goes to the top of the jar. This should be when I bake a loaf with it, but I am just learning that.

 

Then the next morning the starter has fallen, like this, and it is ready to be fed again. Why would I want to make sourdough anyway? It is really labor-intensive. The last time this country had a crisis we couldn't get yeast anywhere or bread. If I learned this skill, this would solve that problem. Not to mention that the kitchen has turned into a bakery with all of the discard recipes.  

I tried several sourdough chocolate chip cookie recipes, and I wasn't convinced they were the cookie I was looking for till I tried this one. This is the Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe from Simplicity and a Starter. I am no expert with sourdough at all, but if I can make it, you could make it. This cookie was perfect, but I made the cookie with a normal cookie-size scoop and baked it for 8 minutes instead of what the recipe suggested. The author used a 2-inch scoop and made large bakery-style cookies. In the beginning I did that, but my family likes a normal size cookie better than a giant one. 

Have you ever tried baking sourdough bread or baking with the discard? I hope to keep expanding my skills and make some decent food in the process.

In Victory,
Sherry 

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

How have you been? I have been on hiatus trying to learn to make sourdough. You can definitely emphasize the "trying to learn." I have been successful with sourdough in the bread maker, but then that is cheating, sort of. So anyway, I will soldier on. I am sure I can master it. Meanwhile, so the family didn't starve, I made a pile of brown bananas into banana chocolate chip muffins. If I put enough chocolate in baked goods, my family will eat it, and I had never posted banana muffins before, so here you go. 

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

Makes 12 or more muffins (regular muffin tin size)

Ingredients: 

3/4 cup softened butter

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

4 ripe bananas, mashed

1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips tossed with a tablespoon flour

extra chocolate chips for tops of muffins

 

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350°F.  

In a large mixing bowl add granulated sugar, brown sugar, and softened butter. Use an electric mixer and cream the butter and the sugar for a minute on medium speed.

Then add to the bowl the vanilla, the 2 large eggs, and combine them with the butter and sugar on medium speed. Now in a separate bowl mash the four ripe bananas. Then add them to the batter bowl. Now add the dry ingredients; all-purpose flour, baking soda, salt and mix them into the batter. Take the chocolate chips in a separate bowl and toss with a tablespoon of flour to prevent them from sinking to the bottom of the muffins while baking. The fold them in with a spatula. Pour the batter into regular muffin tins, lined with parchment cups if you prefer and top with extra chocolate chips. Bake at 350° F for 20-24 minutes, until the toothpick comes out clean of the batter.

 

Recipe adapted from: simplyhomecooked.com 

 

Enjoy!

In Victory,

Sherry 

 

Moody Fall

These are actually outtakes from last year. I have been busy baking and practicing my skills in the kitchen, so I found these and thought I would post.

Moody and fall go together. It has also been cloudy so it was perfect.

In Victory,
Sherry

Raspberry Jam and Nectarine Crumble

Several years ago I found a crumble recipe for a crumble with a crumble crust and crumble topping. This recipe sort of ruined all my attempts at making crumble, unless I used this formula of making the crumble crust and topping. So here is yet another version of this recipe with seasonal fruit. This is also another way to use the Raspberry Jam in the bread maker recipe I shared a few weeks back.

Raspberry and Nectarine Crumble

Serves:8

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
8 tablespoons (4 oz.) unsalted butter, melted 
1/4 cup seedless raspberry preserves
2 1/2 cups nectarines, peeled and sliced
Crumble topping:
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
pinch of salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
4 tablespoons (2 oz.) unsalted butter, melted

Directions:
Place an oven rack in the middle position.  Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.  (190 degrees C).  Lightly butter the bottom and sides of a 9-inch tart pan. I baked this in an 8" x 9 1/2" retro enamelware baking dish lined with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, combine the flour, brown sugar, granulated sugar, salt, and cinnamon.  Add the butter and use pastry cutter until moist crumbs form. Dump the crumb mixture into the pan and press firmly it into the bottom and up the sides.  
Spread the 1/4 cup raspberry preserves over the tart crust. Then top with the nectarines.  In a medium bowl combine the crumble topping dry ingredients.  Add the butter and mix until the  moist crumbs form.  Sprinkle the crumb topping over the nectarines.  Bake 25-45 minutes.  Let cool 20 minutes on a wire rack.  
Serve with a topping of ice cream or whip cream if desired.
Makes: one 8-9 inch tart
Recipe adapted from: Leite's Culinaria

Enjoy!

In Victory,

Sherry