Category Archives: Baking

Food, money saving, pulses, scratch cooking, sourdough, Uncategorized

Sausage and peppers, only vegan…

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completed meal
bread and beans- what life is made of

We have many vegan dishes in our recipe box, because vegan to us is simply another way to eat. These are not ‘sacrifice’ meals, but meals that really would not be made better with meat anyway. I like to bring this one to pot lucks, because it’s vegan and grain-free, which sometimes makes it one of the only things a guest can eat.
And it’s tasty. An omnivore friend has deemed it ‘sausage and peppers’ and we agree.

And, it’s simple. If you don’t have an instant pot, you can do it on the range or in the oven. If you do it in a slow cooker, start with beans that have been boiled first (not completely cooked through), though.

The first thing to do is soak the beans. My current way to do that is to put dry beans in the Instant Pot for a 4-minute cook, with water, a little salt, and a bay leaf. You can do a ‘quick soak’ with the same add-ins on the range (a 2-minute boil and a 1-hour soak) or do an overnight soak first in plain water. I like the way the bay and salt flavor the beans as a base for pretty much anything.

Navy beans soaking. Any white bean will do.

Then you want to cook a lot of onions (I used 3 large ones) in a lot of olive oil until they are translucent. That is the only cooking that will happen outside of your bean pot. You then toss the onions and everything else into your pot, and let it go until it’s cooked all the way.
It’s seriously that simple. Serve it with bread, or over pasta or rice, and it’s a great, tasty, cheap and healthy meal. Leftovers will be done with pasta tomorrow at our house.
Yes, you can cut the oil down, but there is no other fat in the meal, and olive oil is healthy. 😉 (Do NOT use ‘high quality’ olive oil for this. This is your cooking oil.)

Onions cooking… mmmmm

1# white beans soaked (As mentioned, a little salt (1/2 tsp) and a bay leaf if you are doing a quick soak adds nice flavor)


3 onions, sliced or chopped
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 tsp salt
Sautee these three until the onions are translucent.



3 large green bell peppers, sliced or chopped
1 hot pepper- optional. Add more or less, and any pepper you like. I add 1 sliced pepperoncini. This is not to make it hot (although you can) this is to add a little flavor. The pepperoncini is not really hot, but adds a bit of brine to the dish.
1 quart crushed tomatoes (standard can)
2-3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp dry oregano
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
2c water
add all of these to the pot and cook until done.

all ingredients except onions and water in IP
Cooked beans.
Baking, Uncategorized

Buttermilk chocolate pound cake.

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So, I hurt myself last month and had to take a break from cooking. But I am slowly getting back to myself, and today I am baking with some help to use up the buttermilk that was being stockpiled while I couldn’t cook. We normally go through a lot of buttermilk.

So, here we go with a ‘triple chocolate buttermilk pound cake’. I grabbed it off a web site just to use buttermilk. This is the buttermilk, vanilla and [amazon_textlink asin=’B00DTR9R9Q’ text=’espresso powder’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’002′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’d0ba76d2-ca52-11e8-bedb-595448e40aa8′] ( not instant, but plain old normal. It’s powdered- it dissolves.).

This is the butter, eggs and sugar.

And the flour, cocoa, salt and baking powder, which they say to wisk, not sift, which is easier. And seemed to work ok. Since we no longer need to sift  to remove bugs, but to put air into it, this actually worked well.

Then there were chocolate chips— that was 2 types of chocolate.

And now, before a stint in the oven…

Almost done! Smells so good!

Done! That’s an actually bit of broom corn from a broom class we took. It’s what people used to use to check cakes. You can see it came out clean. [amazon_link asins=’B0743B496X’ template=’ProductCarousel’ store=’002′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’b548546b-ca54-11e8-92f1-531b2aeea62b’]

And then there were two glazes, a buttermilk glaze and a chocolate glaze. Neither was remarkable, but both were serviceable. But I didn’t get a photo of it before being cut because company came and we served it right away. It was a decent cake, and really moist. Company liked it, but It’s not one of the best chocolate cakes I have made for the amount of work that went into it.  So, not a keeper. Two people had 3 pieces each though, so it was certainly not a bad cake. 🙂


I am going to say something about the pan. A lot of comments on the recipe was about how hard it was to get out of the pan. In 1991, I needed to stock a new apartment, and I went to the now defunct McCrory’s that was across from the University I went to. I purchased a few items, including a springform bundt/flat pan. On the way home, I dropped that bag and dented the round part. I pounded it out and it worked fine. I got it out specifically to use it fro this, but the cake plopped right out easily.
I love this pan and would recommend it to anyone. I have more expensive and newer pans, but I will never stop loving this first one. This is basically it, only way higher quality.
[amazon_link asins=’B00004RFPR’ template=’ProductCarousel’ store=’002′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’6c88ac5f-ca54-11e8-a4d4-d3c4cde2a13a’]

Baking, sourdough

The care and feeding of Starter.

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I own a sourdough starter. This starter is older than our son (he’s 11 now) and has moved with us two times. It has come back from the brink of death at least twice, and has exploded into 8 jars at a time other times.

It is so easy to care for and maintain, it’s like the easiest pet in the world. Keep it in the fridge, feed it at least every two weeks, and make things with it.

No problems.

You need a non-reactive container. Mine is a cool little crock that will hold about 2 1/2 cups my dad got me. I have used glass jars and enameled steel bowls as well. Key here is you do not want something that has a tight closing lid, or that has no lid at all. One will explode, one will dry up. My crock is perfect for this by not sealing. A piece of plastic wrap with a rubber band would do the trick as well.

I see so many people so tentative about taking care of a starter. They are nervous about weighing versus measuring, temperatures, so many things. And I am sure that my methods would make some people turn up their nose, but they work, and that is all I really care about. Things that work and don’t add stress to my life. So, here it is.

Once a week (it’s on our list of things to do), I remove the starter from the fridge. I look at it. I’ll have to update with pictures! Because if it’s happily bubbling with some liquid, yay! The only thing to worry about is orange. If it goes orange, it’s not salvageable. Liquid on top, even greenish liquid is fine. Pour it off (I have never attempted to drink it, although people apparently would, in desperation). Spoon half the starter out (or as much as you need for your recipe, but let’s assume you are splitting your starter for a friend (or are asking a friend to split hers/ his)). Add to the starter at least a quarter and no more than a half of the total starter volume in flour (all purpose, whole wheat, high gluten, whatever floats your boat) and an equal amount of water. I use filtered water, I don’t know about using ‘normal’ tap water. Please don’t fret over the amounts, this is all eyed. Then stir them up, and put them in the fridge.

A big fear of early users was that if it froze in Alaska, it would die, so ‘sourdoughs’ used to sleep with their starter. But if it freezes, it ought to be fine. Heat will actually kill it. I like keeping it in the fridge so that it grows slowly. If I need a lot suddenly, like for the new donuts I want to try, I will leave it out on the counter, where it will bubble happily.

And this ought to be done every 1-3 weeks, so every week or two is a good excuse to make some tasty sourdough goodies!

And that is seriously it. All you need to do to care for and feed your starter.