Alyssa’s Cheddar & Trad Biscuits

Dan    Alyssa, Start From Scratch, Student Recipes     Alyssa, baking, beer, biscuits, Kick The KD, learning

What you’ll need…

1 3/4 cup unbleached flour

4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup roasted pumpkin seeds

1 cup shredded cheddar

1/3 cup butter

1 cup of Big Rock Traditional Ale (or whatever brew you got going on in the fridge)

We were having turkey chilli for supper, so I thought what better opportunity to kill 2 birds with 1 stone by executing my variation of the “Grammy’s Grab ‘n’ Go Biscuits” recipe from class and have something traditional to go with the chili.

Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. Mix flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium-sized bowl. Cut-in butter (with hands works best), until mixture appears ‘crumbly’, then add-in the cheddar cheese. Mix in the beer until a dough forms. Next, fold in pumpkin seeds.

On a floured surface, knead a few times, then cut into even portions and place onto a prepared baking sheet. Cook for 12-15 minutes in oven or until a toothpick comes out clean.

The reason for the beer instead of the milk was simply because I didn’t have any in the fridge, but I had some Big Rock Trad kicking around, so I thought, “why not?” They worked out just fine! It was also another great excuse for me to finish the some 100 ml left in the bottle…this may become my signature.

Yields 8 biscuits

Total cook time…25 min

The “biscuits” photo is my attempt at food photography, and the “model” is my boyfriend, great teamwork!

Alyssa: Steam Whistle Banana Muffins

Dan    Alyssa, Start From Scratch, Student Recipes, The Participants     Alyssa, awesome, beer, calgary, cooking, Kick The KD, learning, recipes, Steam Whistle, thoughts

What you’ll need…

3 bananas (ripe, mashed)

2/3 cup jam (I used up my cheat jam from last week)

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 TSP cinnamon

1/2 TSP vanilla

1 1/2 TSP honey

1 cup Steam Whistle Pilsner

2 cups flour (I used whole wheat, I would recommend either 1 cup unbleached and 1 cup whole wheat or just 2 cups of unbleached)

1 TSP baking powder

My morning class had been cancelled for the day (YES!) and Say Yes to the Dress wasn’t on TLC, so I thought I better do my KTKD homework all before my 1 p.m. Geology class.

Start time: 10:45 a.m.

So I mashed up my 3 bananas with a fork, mixed in the jam, brown sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, honey, and beer. Then, I combined the flour and baking powder in a separate bowl and added the liquid mixture to it, mixed it all up, sprayed my muffin tray with Pam and spooned in the batter.

I had a bit of beer left over, so I downed that, then did the dishes. By the time I finished brushing my teeth and straightening my hair the muffins were ready. I ate one, which was still quite warm, but I liked it. It wasn’t too sweet and the edges were nice and crunchy and the jam was a lovely addition, especially with the whole blueberries in there.

When I took another look at the muffins, I noticed they were quite flat…and the only things that I could think of was either the heaviness of the Whole Wheat flour or that I needed more baking powder. Does anyone know? Now I’m worried they’ll be hard as rocks once they cool.

Yields 15 muffins

Total cook time…1 hour

Follow-up: I just ate another one after they had more of a chance to cool down, and hooray! They still taste good and aren’t as hard as a rock.

Alyssa: Thoughts on Week 3

Dan    Alyssa, Start From Scratch, The Participants, The Progress     Alyssa, breakfast, calgary, cooking, jam, Kick The KD, learning, thoughts

Sunday Fun-day!

After a chilly Saturday evening out in Kensington, Sunday morning was the perfect opportunity to indulge in some warm hot cakes and show off my new talent of flipping pancakes SANS-spatula.  You got that right, flipping a pancake in the air with just me, a pan, and some f***in’ (flippin’) determination.

I rinsed off a pint of blueberries and a pint of strawberries to prep for the jam.   Because I’m not a fan of chunks of strawberries in my jam, I decided to blend them into a puree (Dan thinks: Great idea Alyssa!).  The puree became quite liquidy so I opted to axe the call for “1/2 cup of apple juice”.  Which turned out to be a wise decision as the jam turned out to have a perfect texture.

While I let the jam cool and thicken, I used Peter’s family recipe to cook up some pancakes.  They turned out great. I also attempted to show my friends my newly acquired flipping skills, but was unsuccessful!  My friends then attempted flipping as well, but we all ended up folding the cakes.  But it was worth it.

Strawberry Blueberry Jam (no pics of the pancakes we were too eager)

–Alyssa

Alyssa

Dan    Alyssa, Start From Scratch, The Participants    

What’s your major? Communications.

Why did you want to take part in Kick The KD? As much as I love KD with Frank’s, I could totally use some cooking lessons.

How would you describe your level of cooking expertise? On a scale of
1 to 10, 1 being “intermediate toast maker” and 10 being “risotto extraordinaire”…I would put myself at a 5 or 6.

If you could learn to cook one dish what would it be? Peppercorn roasted pork and gravy with potatoes and carrots.

Which Calgary restaurant(s) do you go to regularly? I try not to go out that much, but when I do it’s about quality: NOtaBLE, Farm, and The Lazy Loaf and Kettle.

Any last words? This would be an incredible experience for me as I’ve been known to state how much I dislike cooking and I think it’s just because I don’t know what I’m doing or have enough confidence in the art. I appreciate food and am a whiz at baking, so I would love to take this creativity and passion into something more everyday.

Following Canadian food blogger Dinner With Julie