junior kitchen

This fig-blueberry combo is a delightful bread for a weekend breakfast or delicious snack any time of day. Made in the flatbread style of traditional Italian focaccia, children will be happy adding the ingredients into the dough and rolling it out into a free-form pizza shape. This recipe calls for dried mission figs because they are usually available at any local grocer. You may use either the manual method to make this with a big bowl and spoon or else use your standing electric mixer with the dough paddle attached – either way it’s guaranteed to make your day!

Ingredients

• 1 cup dried mission figs
• ½ cup blueberries
• 3 cups bread flour (or all-purpose flour)
• ¼ cup olive oil
• 1 egg
• 1 cup warm water
• 1 ½ teaspoons yeast dissolved in the warm water
• 2 tablespoons reserved liquid from soaking the figs.
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon orange zest (optional) (It’s fun to explain that you can use orange peel – no garbage!)
• Coarse sugar (optional)
• Handful of unsalted roasted sunflower seeds (optional)

Process

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Place the dried figs in a bowl and pour enough boiling water over them to cover them. Let the figs soak for 10 minutes. Drain, reserving 2 tablespoons of liquid. Coarsely chop the figs, discarding the stems.

Place the flour, egg, olive oil, salt, yeast, orange zest, water and the reserved liquid into a large mixing bowl and blend together well. The dough will be sticky but pliable. Next add the fruit and, if you like a little crunchiness, sunflower seeds using your hands (coating your fingers with oil first helps). Children like getting their hands into the dough and helping.  Spread the fruit and seeds around in the dough, trying to distribute them evenly. If you find the dough too dry, add a tiny bit of water, then a little more, until you have something pliable enough to work with.

Leaving the dough in the bowl, find a warm spot in the kitchen and let it sit for an hour to rise. Take the risen dough, knead it a few times, then place it on a greased baking sheet or pizza stone. Flatten it out with your hands and place a sheet of parchment paper over it. Using your rolling pin, roll out the dough from the center towards the edges. Let the kids take over and help with the rolling.  At our house we tend to go for abstract shapes, but you may like a more geometric circle or rectangle. Whichever shape you go for, try and have the dough as evenly spread out as possible. If you’re adding the sugar, sprinkle it over the top of the bread just before it goes in the oven.

Place the bread in the oven and turn the temperature down to 350. Bake for 20-25 minutes. Let the bread cool on a wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature. Bread may be stored in an airtight container for several days.

*The dough can be made the day before and stored the refrigerator. Roll it out and pop it in the oven the next morning for a freshly baked breakfast!

Try something different one morning – pack the bread in a basket, throw in some juice boxes and eat breakfast outside!

Mmmm, hot warm biscuits!

There’s nothing better than pulling apart a biscuit and smearing it with butter. I have several recipe cards and even a book for making a variety of different kinds of biscuits. It’s one thing I remember learning to cook from my grandmother when we would visit her in Mississippi. This recipe is pretty straight forward and super easy with the kids helping. Keeping with the appalachian theme of the Sody Sallyratus story I tweaked it from this Appalachian Cat Head Biscuit recipe.

We’ve even made our own butter in the past and believe me if there is anything that delights children more than making biscuits it’s making their own butter!

Ingredients
2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour (do not use self-rising)
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup milk (buttermilk may be substituted)
4 1/2 Tablespoons unsalted butter cut into small cubes

Process

Preheat oven to 450 degrees

Combine the dry ingredient together in a large mixing bowl. Next, add the butter a few cubes at a time and with your impeccably clean hands snap the butter between your fingers until the dough resembles coarse bread crumbs. Make a well and add the milk and again mix with your hands, until the dough is just moistened. Knead just until it comes together, about three or four times. Always be careful to not overwork the dough.

The kids, by the way, love, mixing, kneading and playing with the dough – here is where they get to have some real fun!

To make biscuits, have them pinch off a ball of dough about 2 1/2 inches across and shape into a biscuit. Place the biscuits into large cast iron skillet side by side,(if you don’t have a skillet lay them on a cookie sheet) and pat them down as flat as you can. We’ve found this dough to be super sticky and the best way to flatten them is to use the bottom of a glass with a little oil on it. Bake for 12-15 minutes or until the tops of the biscuits are a light golden brown.

This recipe was inspired be the appalachian folk tale Sody Sallyratus and you can find a link to the story here.

There are also some very nice books available on amazon.

Nothing better for breakfast on a slighly chilly morning.

I’ve been very happy with the rustic aprons but sometimes pockets are a must. This is our newest offering now with added pockets frayed around the edges.

As the summer growing season comes to an end – we’re getting in as much local watermelon eating as possible. I tried carving one in a fancy shape this year like you can see here but that was a dismal failure – so I’ve looked for other ways to liven up our watermelon habit. There’s a very cute folk tale about a Turkish folk hero named Mulla Nasrudin. Nasrudin is a very wise man and also very funny. Children and adults will both delight in these humorous tales. If you’re interested in learning more Turkish folk tales this book is a wonderful resource – Watermelons, Walnuts, and the Wisdom of Allah: And Other Tales of the Hoca by Barbara K Walker.

Walnuts and Watermelons – find this story and others here.

As Nasrudin rested under a tall walnut tree one day, he looked a few yards to his side and noticed a big watermelon growing on a thin vine near the ground.
Nasrudin looked up and said, “Great God, please permit me to ask you this: why is it that walnuts grow on big strong trees, while watermelons grow on think weak vines. Shouldn’t it be the other way around?”
But at that very moment, a walnut fell from high on up in the tree and hit Nasrudin square on the head.
“Ah!“ remarked Nasrudin. “I suppose Nature’s ways might not be as backward as I thought. After all, if a big watermelon fell out of the tree and onto my head, it might have killed me!“

Here is our version of a watermelon, walnut salad with the added goodness of fresh blueberries – at our house it’s become a special breakfast treat. If you’re in a light mood, feel free to stop and serve the fruit salad in its simplest form. You won’t be disappointed, I promise. But adding freshly made whipped cream elevates this dish to new heights and if your kids are like ours, you’ll have them singing songs in your honor!

Ingredients
2 cups watermelon, cut into bite-size pieces.
1 cup blueberries
¼ cup broken-up walnut pieces
1 cup heavy cream
Sugar (optional)

Process
Toast the walnuts in a skillet over medium-high heat, being careful not to burn them. Note: If your walnuts are not already broken into pieces, place them in a napkin and let your little ones bang them with the bottom of a can to break them up, then shake out the napkin into the skillet.
Put the watermelon and blueberries in a bowl and add the toasted walnuts. Gently mix everything together. I let the kids handle the mixing part and they love to snitch extra bites of fruit while my back is turned. Ah! The wonder of childhood – that joke never gets old!

For the Whipped Cream
With your hand mixer or standing mixer with the whisk attachment, making fresh whipped cream is very easy. Pour the cream into a bowl, adding 1 to 2 tablespoons of sugar if you like your whipped cream to be a little sweet. Starting out on a slow speed so as not to splatter yourself with liquid, gradually increase the speed as you see the cream start to thicken. Pay attention to the consistency of the cream as it mixes – you want the cream to stand up in peaks, but you don’t want to over-mix and make butter! There are great tutorials on YouTube.

Serve by dishing the fruit into bowls and adding a dollop of cream on top.

Our summer was busy with the kids going off to camp and short little weekend trips exploring our own little corner of Florida. The biggest thing we did this summer was purchase a new house. It’s a fixer-upper in every sense. A sad little house, neglected for a long time but the yard is big and the neighbors are friendly.

You can see more photos and follow our progress here .

If you’re ever on the Treasure Coast of Florida this place is a wonderful place to stay. The original family still owns the property and the great granddaughter runs a lovely bed and breakfast.

Delicious breakfast

Florida Hibiscus

sleepy husband

I’ve always been fascinated with the process of making cheese. Farmer’s cheese looked easy enough for our first attempt. After reading dozens of recipes that all appear to be closely related I opted for an easy version that did not require a trip to the store for the purchase of cheesecloth. By using more vinegar the cheese will have bigger curds and using a fine mesh strainer will work. Kitchen Daughter was very happy helping with the process and impressed herself with what she remembered from science class when she studied states of matter.

Ingredients:
1 Gallon Whole Milk
2/3 cups White Vinegar

Pour the entire gallon of milk into a large pot. Heat over medium high until hot.

The milk is hot enough when the top has the skin on it

Add the vinegar and stir it in. The curds and whey will start to separate. Let the pot sit for 15 to 20 mins.

Empty the pot by pouring into a fine mesh strainer. You can have a bowl under it to catch the whey.

The cheese sat in the strainer for an hour before it was fully drained. After that I scooped it out added a little salt, some fresh dill and served it with crackers.

Although everyone who ate the cheese enjoyed it, half of the folks said they thought they could taste a hint of vinegar. I think next time I will try the cheesecloth method using a half gallon of milk and buttermilk with less vinegar.

Easter morning, ready to hunt for eggs

The night before Easter, dear friends invited us over for an evening of pot luck and egg dying fun.

With an abundance of tomatoes right now, we made bruschetta to take to the party.

Ingredients
4 ripe tomatoes
1/4 cup minced basil leaves (or whatever herbs you have around – we used Mexican tarragon, parsley and chives for part of that total)
2 cloves minced garlic
3 tablespoons olive oil (be generous!)
A few dashes balsamic vinegar (if you have any herbal vinegar, this is a great time to bust it out.)
1 loaf of Italian bread
a pinch of salt and pepper

Prepare

Get a large bowl. Mince some of your garlic and glug a little balsamic over it. Add some cubed tomatoes. Mince some basil (or whatever herbs) on top of that. Add more tomatoes. Put some oil over that. Add salt and pepper, whatever tomato you have left, and some more olive oil. If you feel the mixture is not coated with enough olive oil, you can add even more. It’s healthy, right? Allow the mixture to sit for minimum 10-15 minutes for the flavors to blend. A couple of hours is better. Overnight is even better than that. This is a great dish to take to a party because you can make it ahead and let the tomatoes sit in the fridge for a while and let them get all juicy.

When you’re ready to serve, cut the bread cut into diagonal slices and place on a baking sheet under the broiler until they get brown on both sides. If you feel brave, put a drop of olive oil on them, too, before broiling.

Serve

Spoon the tomato mixture over the warm bread and enjoy.