Beginners’ Guide To Baking

Even if you’ve never baked before, the rewards of home baking are within your reach. Many recipes for baked goods aren’t at all difficult. Plum-Good Coffee Cake is a prime example. The coffee cake is a good way to add more fruit servings to your diet for breakfast, brunch or a late-night snack and, best of all, it’s easy to make.

For success, start by gathering all the ingredients and equipment. Let the butter sit at room temperature until it’s soft. This makes it easier to beat the butter with the sugar so they take in air and form a fluffy, creamy mixture. Adding cold eggs to the creamed butter and sugar could harden the butter again and make the batter curdle. To prevent this, take the eggs out of the refrigerator 20 to 30 minutes before you use them or put them in a bowl of warm water while you’re assembling the other ingredients.

Low speed on the mixer helps keep the flour mixture from flying in the air. Because overbeating the flour could toughen your cake, beat just until the batter is smooth. Use a rubber scraper or spoon to add half of the fruit by hand. Be gentle to avoid crushing the plums.

In about half an hour from the time you pop the pan into the oven, you’ll have a cake you can proudly serve to family and friends. Nobody has to know how simple it was to bake!

Plum-Good Coffee Cake

1 (9-inch) cake or 8 servings

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter,

softened

2/3 cup sugar

4 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie

spice

1 1/2 cups diced fresh plums

(about 8 oz.)

Confectioners’ sugar,

optional

In small mixing bowl at medium speed, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs and vanilla until thoroughly blended. Stir together flour, baking powder and spice. Add flour mixture to egg mixture. Beat at low speed until smooth. Fold in 3/4 cup of the plums. Pour into lightly greased 9-inch round cake pan or quiche pan. Top with remaining plums.

Bake in preheated 375 F oven until lightly browned and top springs back when lightly touched with finger, about 30 to 35 minutes. Cool on wire rack. Dust with confectioners’ sugar, if desired. Cut into wedges. Serve warm or cool.

Nutrition information per serving of 1/8 recipe without sugar dusting: 283 calories, 15 g total fat, 137 mg cholesterol, 210 mg sodium, 101 mg potassium, 33 g carbohydrate, 5 g protein and 10% or more of the RDI for vitamin A, riboflavin
Even if you’ve never baked before, the rewards of home baking are within your reach. Many recipes for baked goods aren’t at all difficult. Plum-Good Coffee Cake is a prime example. The coffee cake is a good way to add more fruit servings to your diet for breakfast, brunch or a late-night snack and, best of all, it’s easy to make.

For success, start by gathering all the ingredients and equipment. Let the butter sit at room temperature until it’s soft. This makes it easier to beat the butter with the sugar so they take in air and form a fluffy, creamy mixture. Adding cold eggs to the creamed butter and sugar could harden the butter again and make the batter curdle. To prevent this, take the eggs out of the refrigerator 20 to 30 minutes before you use them or put them in a bowl of warm water while you’re assembling the other ingredients.

Low speed on the mixer helps keep the flour mixture from flying in the air. Because overbeating the flour could toughen your cake, beat just until the batter is smooth. Use a rubber scraper or spoon to add half of the fruit by hand. Be gentle to avoid crushing the plums.

In about half an hour from the time you pop the pan into the oven, you’ll have a cake you can proudly serve to family and friends. Nobody has to know how simple it was to bake!

Plum-Good Coffee Cake

1 (9-inch) cake or 8 servings

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter,

softened

2/3 cup sugar

4 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie

spice

1 1/2 cups diced fresh plums

(about 8 oz.)

Confectioners’ sugar,

optional

In small mixing bowl at medium speed, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs and vanilla until thoroughly blended. Stir together flour, baking powder and spice. Add flour mixture to egg mixture. Beat at low speed until smooth. Fold in 3/4 cup of the plums. Pour into lightly greased 9-inch round cake pan or quiche pan. Top with remaining plums.

Bake in preheated 375 F oven until lightly browned and top springs back when lightly touched with finger, about 30 to 35 minutes. Cool on wire rack. Dust with confectioners’ sugar, if desired. Cut into wedges. Serve warm or cool.

Nutrition information per serving of 1/8 recipe without sugar dusting: 283 calories, 15 g total fat, 137 mg cholesterol, 210 mg sodium, 101 mg potassium, 33 g carbohydrate, 5 g protein and 10% or more of the RDI for vitamin A, riboflavin

Christmas Cookie Baking Recipes

The first beautiful dusting of fluffy white snow always puts me in the mood for baking Christmas cookies. At this time of year I tend to spend longer hours in the kitchen, baking up massive batches of cookies and candies as holiday music and movies play in the background. I love and have always loved the tastes and smells that come from a kitchen filled with love at Christmas time. Here are two of my recipes for traditional Christmas cookie favorites.

Gingerbread Cookies

6 cups flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 tablespoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon ground cloves

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 cup shortening, melted and cooled

1 cup molasses

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup water

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a medium bowl, sift the dry ingredients together (flour, baking powder, ginger, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon). In a large bowl, mix the shortening, molasses, brown sugar, water, egg, and vanilla. Mix well. Add in the dry ingredient mixture slowly and mix well. Divide the dough into 3 pieces, make into pieces no bigger than 1 1/2 inch thick, wrap and refrigerate for 3 or more hours. Roll the dough (about 1/4 inch thick) out on a slightly floured surface and cut into shapes (smaller shapes work best with this dough). Bake in a 350 degree oven for 10 to 12 minutes. Frost with powdered sugar icing (milk or cream and powdered sugar). Word of warning on this recipe, it makes a very large batch so I hope you have a lot of family and friends to share this with.

Sugar Cookies (roll-out)

3 cups flour

1 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 cup soft butter

1 beaten egg

3 tablespoons cream

1 teaspoon vanilla

Combine softened butter and sugar until creamy. Add in egg, cream, and vanilla. Sift together flour, salt, and baking powder and add it to the liquid mixture. Chill for at least one hour. Roll out to about 1/4 inch thickness on a lightly floured surface and cut into your favorite Christmas cookie shapes. Bake in a 350 degree oven for about 10 minutes. If desired, put red and green sprinkles on top of the cookies before putting them in the oven. If you would rather make it a family project, bake the cookies, allow to cool, and make a powdered sugar frosting (milk and powdered sugar). Divide up the frosting into different bowls and color it with food coloring. Sprinkles, chocolate chips, red hots, and mini M&Ms can help add fun to the frosting process.

Old Fashioned Baking Powder Biscuits

I have noticed over the years that there are two philosophies for Strawberry Shortcake. There are the people who make Strawberry Shortcake with biscuits. And then there are those who make it with angel food cake or plain white or yellow cake. My mother belonged to the biscuit philosophy. She also made baking powdered biscuits when she ran out of bread and needed a quick bread to serve with a meal.

My mom and dad both considered baking powder biscuits spread with butter and drizzled with pancake syrup or dark corn syrup to be an extra-special treat.

3 cups flour
1/2 cup shortening
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons sugar
1 cup milk

Measure the flour, shortening baking powder, sugar and salt into a mixing bowl. Cut the shortening into the flour with a fork until it resembles coarse meal. Gradually stir in the milk to form the dough. If the dough seems too dry, add milk by tablespoons. If the dough seems too soft, add flour by the quarter cup.

Knead the dough on a floured surface for a minute or so. Then roll out to a half-inch thick and make biscuits with a biscuit cutter or donut cutter or round cookie cutter.

Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 or 25 minutes or until golden brown.

Makes about 12 to 18 biscuits, depending on the size of the cutter you use.

Strawberry Shortcake
4 cups of fresh strawberries (or thawed frozen strawberries)
1 cup of sugar (or to taste)

Crush the strawberries. Stir in the sugar until dissolved. Serve over baking powder biscuits and topped with whipped cream. Yum!

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From “The Rural Route 2 Cookbook” (July 2008) — Tried and true recipes from rural Wisconsin farm country. http://ruralroute2cookbook.com

Other books of true stories about growing up on a farm:

http://ruralroute2.com