Overnight Cinnamon Rolls

So it's the last week before the Spring semester & besides having a job, I (Katie) find myself extremely bored (also note that Bingham is in the Smokies doing his geology thing). Boredom, in my case, usually leads to baking.

I decided to make some homemade cinnamon rolls for my co-workers. This also gave me a good excuse to go out and buy a French rolling pin from Sur LA Table... a baker without a rolling pin seems absurd but I had managed somehow before (i.e. stealing my mother's). Note to self - do not enter a cookware store unless the bank account is overflowing. I haven't been that excited about shopping since Toys-R-Us.


Anyway, I decided to use Alton Brown's version. With his "overnight" rolls you can prepare almost the entire recipe the night before, which helps when you have a job that starts at 7 am.

I started out by gathering all the ingredients for the dough:
4 large egg yolks, room temperature
1 large whole egg, room temperature
1/4 cup sugar
6 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
1/2 cup buttermilk, room temperature
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 package active dry yeast (Alton calls for instant, but no go at Wal-Mart)
1 1/4 teaspoons kosher salt
Vegetable oil or cooking spray


So I had to make some modifications, first of all I wasn't going to buy 1/2 gallon of buttermilk when I just needed 3/4 cup. So I created my own: 1 cup of skim milk + 1 tbsp white vinegar (you could also use 1 tbsp lemon juice)


Also, Alton's recipe called for instant yeast but I only had active yeast. The difference is active yeast has to be activated with 100-110 degree water whereas instant yeast can just be thrown into the dough.
That being said, I "proofed" my yeast by mixing 1/4 cup of 105 degree water with 1 pkg. active yeast & 1 tbsp sugar (not skilled enough to guess the temp with my hand, I used a candy thermometer). Then I let the mixture double in volume(if it doesn't, get some new yeast, yours is dead).
Because of the 1/4 cup increase in liquid caused here, I had to reduce the buttermilk from Alton's 3/4 cup to my 1/2 cup.

Starting out, I beat the yolks, egg, sugar, butter & buttermilk. I used a hand beater since I don't own a stand one.


I then mixed in the the salt & 2 cups of the flour before adding the proofed yeast.


At this point, the hand mixer just wasn't working out so I switched to a good ole wooden spoon. (Alton switches to the hook on his stand mixer.)


Continued with 1 more cup of flour & added a little of the remaining cup to get the right softness without any stickiness (although I think I either added too much dough or my spoon work was not ideal because my dough did not turn out as soft as Alton's).


Kneaded the dough on a lightly floured surface for about 1-2 minutes. Thanks Mom for that skill.
Coated the dough & a bowl with cooking spray, covered with plastic wrap, & let it rise for about 2 hours (until it doubled in size). Unfortunately my dough did not double in size after 2 hours so I turned the oven on 150 for about 5 minutes, turned it off, then shoved my dough in there. See whose not rising now!...but maybe not completely "doubled."


While it was rising, I threw together the cinnamon filling:
1 cup light brown sugar (lightly packed)
1 tbsp cinnamon
Pinch of salt


Rolled out the dough on a cleaned, floured surface into a 18x12 rectangle with my new rolling pin! Then buttered up the surface with 2 tbsp melted butter & covered completely (except for the top inch) with the filling patting it down to stick.


Now the fun part! I tightly rolled up the dough, sealing by pinching the dough together at the end seam. To make 12 even rolls, with a serrated knife I cut the dough in half, then in fourths, & each fourth in 3.


After spacing the rolls out on a heavily butter baking pan, I covered them with plastic wrap & slipped them in the fridge for the rest of the night.
Waking up at 5:45am (I enjoy this way too much), I placed the pan in the oven (turned-off) with a boiling pot of water for 30 min. Alton says this wakes up the yeast. It also helped rehydrate the dough.


I took the rolls out, preheat my oven to 350, then put them back in for 30 minutes or until fluffy, brown, and the smell makes you drool.




Top Left: Pre-refrigeration, Top Right: Post-steaming, Bottom Left: Post-baking, Bottom Right: Post-icing

While baking, I whipped up an icing of:
1/4 cup cream cheese
3 tbsp milk
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

They turned out buttery, sweet & delicious. Everyone at worked loved them.


Being a perfectionist, I found they were a tad bit too dense. Probably due to either:
1) Too much flour added
2) Poor mixing (would have helped to have a standing mixer with a hook)
3) Incompletely dough rising (Mom says this could be caused by the cold weather)


Didn't matter, still ended up with a Happy Pan!

Every Pepper Chili

Let's face it, every time the temperature gets to freezing in most of the United States, we think CHILI!!! It's in our blood to eat it by the bowlfuls during the winter. Here is our version:



Chili is really easy, just throw everything into one pot. This is one of the first things I made in college. Toss whatever beans and meat together with some onion, and -boom- you got chili.

First start with the vegetables.


3 onions, chopped
5 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 bell pepper, chopped (Oops! We forgot this but it still turned out good)
5 spicy peppers of choice, chopped (Jalapeno and Serrano worked for us)


Look at that steam shot. Awesome.



3lbs ground meat (we used 2lbs beef, 1lb turkey). Our pot was too small so we swapped it with that bigger one. Mistake- yes, fixable- sure!




We didn't want to lose all that goodness from the veggies and meat, so we deglazed with a little red wine and poured it into a bigger pot. Along with...

1 large can of Blue Ribbon red beans
2 cans black beans
2 can tomato soup
1 can Rotel tomatoes
2-3 tbsp chili powder
1 ½ tbsp cumin
2 tbsp vinegar
2 tsp salt
2 bay leaves
Dash of cilantro
10 dashes of Tabasco


Let cook for an hour, or however long a scrabble game takes you.


Serve with a sprinkle of Cheddar cheese. Others do rice also, we didn't.

Happy bowl.

The best parts about this recipe you can't ignore: the Blue Runner red beans and the vinegar. The Blue Runner beans gave it an amazing creamy texture that got better by the bite. And the vinegar is a must. It just makes ever flavor pop. Use it and your taste buds will tell you.

Chocolate Chunk Cookies!

Katie here (the baker of duo). Always looking for an excuse to bake, I thought I'd make some cookies for the students in the MCAT class I taught over the Christmas break. Being a firm believer that all things baked should never come from a box with a pretty picture on the front, I decided to make a unique chocolate chunk cookie from scratch.


Recently I compiled a cookbook of favorite family recipes. In the process my Aunt Rita sent me an awesome chocolate chip cookie recipe (with oatmeal & peanut butter!!) so I decided to give it a whirl.


Starting off, I beat:
1 stick of softened butter
1/2 cup of shortening
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter

I only had about 1/3 cup so I upped the shortening a little so my consistency wouldn't be compromised. Word to the wise - never substitute low fat margarine for butter or shortening. I did this once and ended up with burnt, paper-thin cookie crisps....not what grandma use to make. Be extremely cautious with substitutions in baking.


To round out the wet ingredients, I added 2 eggs & 1 tsp of vanilla extract


Now here's the trick, to get the flavor of oatmeal without the appearance, I processed 2 1/2 cups of oats.


Throw the oats in a separate bowl and mix with:
2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder


Little by little (about 3 portions), add the dry ingredients to the wet ones. Try not to over beat your dough, this will make your cookies tough.
After mixing, the dough was pretty dry so I was a bit worried.


Now for the chocolate! I used one 12 oz bag of semi-sweet chocolate chunks (Wal-Mart ran out of 12 oz chocolate chips). I ended up liking the chunks better anyway.


I dropped the cookies in palm-size globs about 1 inch apart on an ungreased, foil-lined baking sheet (for easy cleaning). I was able to do this by hand since the dough was dry.


Finally, I baked the goodies at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. The recipe made about 4 dozen cookies.


They were a little crunchier than I would have liked (I like mine chewy), next time I may try adding another stick of butter. But it didn't seem to bother my MCAT class, they ate all of them.

Chana Masala

On our first food adventure, we went bold and chose an Indian dish - dot not the feather. Never having eaten a chick pea without it being masked in a mix of tahini & garlic, we thought chana masala, a spicy, curry chick pea dish, would be a great start.


Add veggies into a food processor; a tomato, an onion, 5 garlic cloves, 3 Serrano peppers (homegrown), and an inch of ginger.


Fry up a couple of bay leaves in 3 tbsp of oil no longer than a minute.




Pour processed veggie goodness into pan and cook for about 8 minutes. It looked a little funky because our tomato wasn't all that great, but that all soon changed. I snuck a taste at this step, it was crazy hot but crazy flavorful. We second guessed the peppers, but the kick was perfect after the spices were added and the ingredients had time to merry a bit.



Next, add the spices! 2 tbsp of salt also.


Cook for 2-3 minutes and add about 1 cup of water or until it has a thick consistency. Let boil.



Finally (it's smelling REAL good) dump in a drained can of chick peas. Cook 5-7 minutes.



Serve with a squirt of lime.



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