I’ve been baking.

Aside from the sourdough starter that keeps on calling out my name every time I open the refrigerator ( see picture below)

– I have two men who keep looking for goodies for their lunches.  BUT as soon as I make the goodies, they devour them, so there are none left for their lunches. 

 

Conga bars or brookies or Chocolate -pecan bars- I don’t care what you call them- they taste really yummy and pack well for a lunch box dessert.

The ingredients:

2 2/3 cups flour -All purpose

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

Sift these ingredients together in a small bowl and set aside.

2/3 cup butter or margarine

1 lb. light brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla

Cream the next 3 ingredients together until smooth.

3 eggs

Add, 1 egg at a time, alternatively with the dried ingredients, mixing well after each addition.

Then add 1 package of chocolate chips and 1 cup chopped pecans.

Dough will be quite stiff,  smooth out into a greased 13×9 inch pan and bake in a pre heated oven (350 degrees F) for 30 minutes.

When lightly browned, remove from heat and allow to cool slightly before cutting into bars. 

Don’t over bake these- they are so good when still a little tender inside!

 

Cardamom-cinnamon Owls.

I’ve been all over the blogosphere getting this recipe.

I saw it first here on Celia’s blog, Fig jam and Lime Cordial.

She found it on Joanne’s blog, Zeb Bakes, and she got it from a book by Tessa Kiros, Floating Cloudberries.

ANYWAY- it was in European measurements, grams, ml, etc.- so I had to go to a measurement conversion site- and I’m just so VERY glad they turned out as wonderful as I had hoped!  Because they are delicious- and cute and I’m ever so happy I made them!

Do you see the owl eyes looking at you?

They look so good on a plate- but I took a couple of close ups as well.

 

The recipe I used ended up being approximate because I have no math skills anymore and the conversion chart kept giving me fractions that were hard to find a common denominator.

THEY taste really good- so I think I did alright.

Ingredients:

1 FULL cup of milk, scalded

1/2 cup sugar

2 TBS instant yeast

1 lightly beaten egg

1 stick of butter- 4 oz

2 tsp. ground cardamom

1 tsp sea salt

1 1/2 lbs flour- about 4 1/2 to 5 1/2 cups

Stir all ingredients together in a large bowl with a sturdy spoon.

Since you are using instant yeast, make sure the milk is still warm/hot so that the yeast will be activated.  Stir together until dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl and stays together in a lump, then flour your surface and dump dough onto counter and knead – adding flour as necessary- the dough should become silky and easy to work with within a couple of minutes.  Add flour if the dough is too sticky.  Knead for about 10 minutes.

Butter the bowl, form dough into a ball and place into the bowl after inverting it to butter the top.  Cover with plastic wrap and let raise until double.

Interestingly, this dough is a VERY slow raiser- there was some discussion on Celia’s blog about the addition of cardamom retarding the process.  I was glad I read this because otherwise it would have worried me that it took around 3 hours for the dough to raise sufficiently to roll out.  Wait the time the dough needs- you will know it is ready when it leaves an indention when you poke the dough.

Now- divide in half and roll the dough into a large rectangle.  Butter the surface with 2 1/2 TBS of soft butter and sprinkle with a sugar/cinnamon mixture.  If you love cinnamon- put it on thick- and you can decide how much sugar you want to add at this point. 

Roll up the dough from the long side so you have a long thin roll and cut it into triangles.  Go to Celia’s blog to see her instructions- she even drew a picture.

It’s on my blog roll on the side bar, or at the beginning of this recipe.

Allow to raise for 45 minutes, covered with plastic, while your oven preheats to 350 degrees F and bake for about 15 minutes or until golden brown.

While they were still warm I coated them with a 10x/water glaze – just because I wanted them to photograph well- but Jordan said he really liked the glaze, so you may want to add it as well. 

Glaze= 1/2 cup confectioner’s sugar and 1 or 2 TBSP of warm water mixed together.