Remember my new prized possession? Good to the Grain? A book on baking with whole wheat flours.
Well so far, I baked three different items: whole wheat cookies (with my additions of oats and dates and omitting chocolate chips), banana cereal muffins using rye flour and lastly my proudest accomplishment so far…
Whole wheat and oats sandwich bread Continue reading
photo credit: Noaf Nackshabandi
If you like a no non-sense apple pie, then this is the recipe you want. A thick flaky pastry encases a generous amount of apple filling that becomes slightly ‘jammy’ after baking. We use a little bit of sugar here since we want a pie that is not overly sweet. Besides, apples have enough natural sugars, which condense and give the pie a natural sweetness. And, by no means waste time trying to make the top crust look perfect. Unevenness and imperfections will give the pie a rustic look, which is very becoming of this old-fashioned dessert. If you still feel you need to fuss about something, then go out and find yourself a presentable deep 9-inch pie pan. Continue reading
Lovely readers,
I would like to introduce you to The Oven Experiments’ new contributing blogger, my sister Besma, who is going by the name (for the time being as I am still trying to figure out how come her name does not come out as Besma) busymomskitchen (her up and coming food blog for busy moms).
Here is a list of her blogposts on The Oven Experiments:
And one coming right away.
Enjoy!
I recently impulse-bought a new cookbook on baking with whole grain flours, Good to the Grain, and so I decided to go to Al Raha Stone Mill in Qadsiya Co-Op to stock my cupboard with some oats and different kinds of flours.
I am big fan of this shop and I love how knowledgeable their staff are. It’s very rare in Kuwait to go into a shop and find the shopkeeper actually know what they’re talking about. I mentioned them here and here.
Of course I couldn’t stop after getting what I went for. I saw a selection of different kinds of goat cheese, which are made locally at their goat farm, and saw ricotta goat cheese. I had to get it!
I also grabbed a bag of 4 grains flat bread and went back home.
In a bowl, I spooned some of the ricotta cheese, added barbeer, mint, cucumber slices, walnuts, green olives, a drizzle of olive oil and a few flakes of sea salt.
And what I had was one of the most satisfying simple meals ever! The bread was on the sour side which I love and the cheese was so smooth and creamy.
*picture taken from my iPhone using the ShakeItPhoto, an application that gives a Polaroid effect.
Marron glacé. This is a treat I had to accustom my palate to. All my life up until 3 years ago I assumed I did not like marron glacé! Why? Because as a child I tried it and hated it and so I grew up thinking I didn’t like it.
My mother, on the other hand, loves it and always has. Three mother’s days ago, I decided to change the routine and make her marrons glacés instead.
When I had my BDesserts business I got some of my supplies from a local company that imports French products called FAMECO and they sent out recipes on a monthly basis and one of them was how to make marrons glacés. It seemed fairly easy and it was. This is when I had my first bite as an adult and fell in love with it.
I made it again yesterday and this what you need: Continue reading
Ever since I was a little girl, French onion soup has been a favorite. So when I fell upon the treasure of a cookbook (my mother’s 70’s edition of the Betty Crocker’s Cookbook) when still young and learning to cook, naturally the first soup that I would attempt was the French onion soup. Simple and basic, it’s easy to make and tastes great. Of course, as I learned more about cuisine, I began to add French herbs, some wine (de-alcoholised in our case) and proper gruyere cheese. This weekend, I made it for my visiting sisters that have been craving it for a while. But this time, I added a new ingredient that I learned of from Elizabeth David’s French Provincial Cooking. The addition of egg yolks gave the soup a new dimension and a subtle creaminess that we loved. Thank you Elizabeth! And now for the soup:
Yes you read it right, camel milk chocolate! Never did I think that anyone would think of making chocolate using camel milk! So you can imagine my surprise and my hesitation when my friend and colleague handed me a bag of camel milk chocolate bars after her return from a trip to Dubai. Each bar has a different flavor as you can see from the image below.
I took the 70% chocolate bar and broke a small piece and placed it on my tongue. As it melted, the chocolate had an unfamiliar taste. It was strong. I’m not sure if it was the camel milk or because I was thinking too much. But I liked it.
So if you happen to be in Dubai and feel a bit adventurous, then why don’t you try some camel milk chocolate and while you’re at it, how about a camel burger?
The Oven Experiments 