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Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Living. Lovely. ~ Savor Slow Food



Enchant, stay beautiful and graceful, but do this, eat well.

Bring the same consideration to the preparation of your food

as you devote to your appearance.

Let your dinner be a poem, like your dress.


~Charles Pierre Monselet, French author (1825-1888), Letters to Emily




Did you

Savor Slow Food

this past week?


Tell me all about it. Pictures! Recipes! Do share!


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I was in bread mood. Really in a bread mood.




[Breadbaking is] one of those almost hypnotic businesses, like a dance from some ancient ceremony.

It leaves you filled with one of the world's sweetest smells...

there is no chiropractic treatment, no Yoga exercise, no hour of meditation in a music-throbbing chapel,

that will leave you emptier of bad thoughts than this homely ceremony of making bread.

~M.F.K. Fisher, The Art of Eating

I love bread in all forms.
French baguettes. Whole grain toast... buttered, of course. Corn bread.
Biscuits. Banana bread. Scones. Fresh tortillas. Focaccia. Croissants. Shall I go on?
Swedish Limpa (more about that in a couple days).
Orange Cardamom Bread with Cardamom butter (be still my beating heart...).

Bread


I had fresh cranberries on hand this week. My mouth was watering for Cranberry Orange Bread.
My dear mother brought me her Pillsbury's Bake Off Breads Cook Book she has used since first married (40 years ago!!).
I thumbed through the pages, remembering various breads she has baked for our family over the years.
I'm pitifully sentimental. I think the Cranberry Orange Bread tastes so much better,
just because I got to use Mom's bread cook book....

Baking with Helpers

I always have helpers in the kitchen. Always. Luke and Leif refuse to miss out on the process. Levi joins us here and there.
I'm counting on the fact that the boys will be able to cook and bake on their own in a few years.... (We also made yeast bread this week, but I'll post about that in a day or two.
There is nothing more theraputic than kneeding bread, I tell ya!)

I made a couple batches. The loaves don't last long around here.
This is all that remained when I remembered I needed to get a picture:

Cranberry Orange Bread

Want the recipe? Voila!



Cranberry Orange Bread

4 cups unbleached white flour (I use 3 cups white, 1 cup whole wheat)
2 cups sugar
3 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 cup orange juice
2 Tablespoons grated orange peel
4 Tablespoons (or 1/4 cup) shortening (I use olive oil)
2 eggs
2 cups fresh or frozen cranberries, chopped or halved
(1 cup chopped nuts)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 9x5 loaf pans.
In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and soda. Stir to mix well.
Add orange juice, orange peel, shortening and egg to dry ingredients. Mix until well blended.
Stir in cranberries (and chopped nuts). Pour into loaf pans.
Bake for 55-65 minutes, until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool thoroughly
.




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Next week's Living. Lovely. challenge:

Be Silly!!



Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans;

it's lovely to be silly at the right moment.


~Horace (Ancient Roman Poet. 65 BC-8 BC)

9 comments:

Threebusybs said...

Heidi!

The kids and I made banana bread on Sunday. It is a family fav. around here.

Last week I picked up fresh cranberries and we have a box of oranges. I just may have to make your bread.

~Aimee

Molly Anne said...

Cranberry orange - oh yum!

I've only made yeast bread once so far - an interesting recipe that can be used for everything. I made a batch in order to make a pizza but had so much left over that I took the remaining, sprinkled it full of herbs and made rolls. They were so good!

I wish I'd been more into food prep help when I was younger because then I might be a little more adventurous in the kitchen now. :)

I really like the idea of family memories through family recipes.

My post: http://mollythepirate.blogspot.com/2009/11/savor-slow-food.html

Tricia said...

OOh, that looks and sounds delicious. I love all of the quotes you mix in too. Your blog is always so much fun to read.
Thanks for sharing.

XO*Tricia

Lisa said...

Heidi,

We did savor slow food this week! We tried a new crockpot soup recipe, Pasta e Fagioli. It was so good and it was nice to be able to come home to our finished dinner after taking dinner to a sick friend.

Thank you for sharing the recipe for Cranberry Orange Bread, it looks delicious.

Elena_Valeriote said...

Mmm bread... It is a dirty little wish of mine to get a fresh french baguette and eat it plain all by myself...

Mara said...

I have been craving cranberry orange bread. I will be trying this recipe very soon. Thanks for posting and thanks for all your hard work and time you are putting into this blog. It is so appreciated.

Mon Cheri said...

Heidi, loved seeing that old cookbook of mine in your photo! I was reminded of something, by the person who commented about wanting to eat a whole baguette by her self. There is a French Bread recipe in that book that I used to make and have comming out of the oven for your Dad when he got off work late at night. We would sit down and eat the whole thing with butter. I had to quit doing that or we'd weigh...
well let's just leave it at that!!
Mom

Gina said...

Yum! I love cranberry orange bread-I'll be making this for sure with the kids!

Sarah at SmallWorld said...

I made that cranberry orange bread for the first time last fall and it was a HUGE hit! Thanks for the reminder!!