Canterlot: No Reservations

[Rosewind]

Hay everypony! In the recent MMMystery on the Friendship Express thread, several of us started talking about baking and cooking (especially Ashton's microwave brownie adventure), and figured an official culinary thread would be a welcome addition to Canterlot's thread lineup!

Have a cool recipe to share, pony-inspired or not? Put it here! Do you set juice on fire and need culinary advice? Ask away! Curious what my secret cupcake ingredient is? It's a secret, silly!

Let the culinary cookery craziness commence!

[Gorgoroth]

For those of you who like the sour tang of lemon, take a cucumber and either partially (4 "stripes" running down the length) or completely remove the skin after washing it. Then, take said cucumber and carefully slice it into coin-style slices along the length, like a loaf of bread. Arrange them on a plate however desired (flat is easiest). Take a good lemon and cut it in half down the center; squeeze the juice over the cucumber slices, and then add salt to taste. Drink the juice if desired, if there's any still left on the plate when you're done.

Cucumber and Lemon: It's healthy and it's bucking delicious.

[Rosewind]

That sounds like a simple and tasty dish.

Have you heard of a berry that makes everything sour taste sweet? I've tried it before, it's for real!

[Dessa]

More importantly, ITT: Rosewind will deliver unto us recipes for baked goods we see on the show. I want to see how Rosewin does Baked Bads.

[accountdeleted]

Eh, okay

Rice cream

1/2 cup rice (Jasmine, Basmati, etc)

1/4 cup sugar

1L of milk (I think its about 2pts)

Vanilla to taste (extract, essence or bean if you are fancy-pants)

Cream

Place rice, sugar, milk and Vanilla in a baking pot. Medium oven, stir every so often. takes about 40-45 min. When done, take out from oven and mix in cream.

Eat while really hot.

Smoked cod pies (orange fish!)

750g smoked cod (good supermarket or fish monger)

2 cups milk

1 lime

2 fennel sprigs

3 fennel bulbs

60g butter

1 thinly sliced leek, white bit only

1/4 cup plain flour

1 tbsp whole grain mustard (or more, if you like. MOAR!)

1 cup fish or chicken stock

1/2 cup white wine

1 egg, beaten

Puff pastry

put cod in heavy based pan with milk, fennel sprigs and peeling from lime. Slowly bring to boil, then simmer for 10min or until fish flakes easily. Remove cod and discard milk. Allow cod to cool before breaking cod into large flakes, removing skin and bones.

thinly slice fennel bulbs and heat butter and olive oil in heavy bottomed pot. Fry off flour and mustard, cook until bubbly. Add fennel, leek and continue to fry untill soft. Remove from heat, add stock and wine, mixing thoroughly. Return to heat, cook for a few min before adding cod. Done.

Allow to cool before making into pies, brush egg on top of pastry. Remember to grease pans! Cook in moderate oven until pastry is golden.

Supposedly serves four, but makes about 8-12 pies. I think.

Chicken, chorizo and veg soup.

Olive oil

200gm bacon, thick and smoky preferably, 1cm diced

3 onions, 1cm diced

2 carrots, 1cm diced

2 celery stalks, 1cm diced

1 chorizo, 1cm diced (good supermarkets)

4 chicken thigh fillets, 2cm diced

3 cloves, crushed

1 400g can crushed tomatoes

3 cups chicken stock

1 cup tempesta or other small pasta

1 400g tin cannellini beans, rinsed and drained

baby spinach (handful, or to taste)

Heat oil in heavy bottomed pan. Cook bacon over moderate-high heat untill it starts to colour. Add onions, carrot, celery and cook for 10 min. Then add chorizo, chicken and garlic and cook until chicken becomes opaque. Add tomatoes, stock and season to taste. Boil, then reduce to moderate heat for 10min. add pasta, peas and beans and cook until pasta is ready. remove from heat and stir though spinach.

serve, nice with bread and cheese.

I don't really do deserts much... just MOAR rice cream.

[Rosewind]

I'll use real worms! For science.

That looks like a nice recipe for rice pudding.

[SirShadowdeath]

I'll use real worms! For science.

I will die on the floor right here. Literally. I'm deathly afraid of worms. I almost completely faint when I see them. Brrr....

[Rosewind]

I will die on the floor right here. Literally. I'm deathly afraid of worms. I almost completely faint when I see them. Brrr....

This is an interesting development. The Reaper, afraid of little wormies? Deathly afraid indeed!

(I've actually eaten worms before. The non-earthworm baked bad type.)

[SirShadowdeath]

I had a bad experience as a child. A really bad one. I will never recover.

[Rosewind]

I had a bad experience as a child. A really bad one. I will never recover.

I suppose we can take a break from cooking to talk about your childhood. Continue! (Um, that is, if you want to... )

[SirShadowdeath]

I'd rather not. Also, when I was in seventh grade I had to dissect a worm in science and I almost had a stroke!

Anyway.....back to food! I like food.

[Rosewind]

Pfft! Sometimes I'll take some lemon slices, muddle them with a spoon on the bottom of a cup with a little sugar, add water and ice, stir -- single serving lemonade!

[SirShadowdeath]

Anyway, I baked this cake with a recipe my mom sent me. It's an Apple Pecan Cake covered in Caramel Sauce. And that container in the background says flour. My grandmother grave it to me.

http://t.co/Xzvrq6NJ (sorry, had to link it)

BIG HINT ABOUT ANY FROSTING OR SAUCE: Adding Whiskey makes it better. No exceptions. That's how I got the caramel sauce to taste so dang good.

[accountdeleted]

2 somethings which sound nasty but are nice:

Juice of lemon + copious amounts of sugar + hot water. Drink up!

Coffee shots + small amount of ice cream. Yum.

Also, Lemon frosting is really, really nice.

[MyLittlePonyTales]

Haha, that awkward moment when this is the third topic of its kind to pop-up.

[Dessa]

This is an interesting development. The Reaper, afraid of little wormies? Deathly afraid indeed!

(I've actually eaten worms before. The non-earthworm baked bad type.)

Well? How were they?

Haha, that awkward moment when this is the third topic of its kind to pop-up.

Well, it seems like a popular topic. Should we sticky it?

[MyLittlePonyTales]

Well, it seems like a popular topic. Should we sticky it?

If it's popular, it will stay near the top on its own.

[starswirlthebearded]

If it's popular, it will stay near the top on its own.

Not to undermine your logic, but the more informational a topic is, the less people post frivolously, and thus the less posts there are overall. At least from what I have seen over the years. Especially with something like recipes, where people will be choosy about which they'll share because they want to choose ones that will be more universally accepted.

Personally, if this really is the third one, I would be for the merging of all three and the stickying of the resulting topic.

[Rosewind]

Gather 'round the campfire, ponies! I'm going to share my super secret amazing awesome biscuit recipe of awesomeness (that's awesome twice). However, I'm not just going to give you the recipe, I'm going to tell you why and how it works, so you can understand the principles of what's going on, which will improve your own baking. This recipe is a fusion of two different biscuit recipes. It carries the will of the north, and the charm of the south. Sorry in advance to the UK crowd -- I'm assuming most of the people who will use this recipe don't have a kitchen scale, and you know how the US is with metric...

Rosie's Buttermilk Biscuits

Yield: One Dozen-ish

Preheat oven to 450F/232C

Meanwhile, mix together the following:

1 cup bread flour. Bread flour contains more gluten, which will help give structure to the biscuits. This is a double-edged sword, however, as overworking the dough can make the biscuits tough.

1 cup All-purpose flour: This will give the biscuits a nice flakiness when combined properly with the butter. Gold medal flour sucks; avoid using it if possible.

1 tbsp baking powder: Baking powder contains a leavener (sodium bicarbonate) with a powdered acid (tartaric acid, aka cream of tartar). The acid and base exist together in harmony, until you add water and heat -- they react and produce gas, giving the dough little air bubbles, which will ultimately translate to a nice, tender biscuit.

1/4 tsp baking soda: This is to adjust the alkalinity of the dough which will aid in browning, as well as assist the baking powder in giving proper rise to the biscuit. It will also react with the acid in the buttermilk to produce the initial lift. It won't be enough to give proper rise at the start of the baking process, which is when the baking powder will kick in and finish the job. It's a double whammy of rising action!

1 tsp salt: This adds flavor to the dough, or the biscuits will taste flat.

1 tbsp sugar: This will aid in browning, as well as give the flavor a nice background sweetness.

Once those are all mixed, you'll need:

1 stick chilled, unsalted butter: Always, always, always use unsalted butter to cook with. Two reasons: 1. Unsalted butter is usually fresher than the salted variety. 2. You will be able to control the salt content way better. We've already added as much salt as we've intended to the recipe, so adding more would make the biscuits too salty. A few more notes about butter: Butter is a fat; all fats will absorb smells and flavors from their environment, so make sure it's tightly wrapped. Butter is perishable, on the order of a week or two. If butter turns rancid, it will acquire a cloying floral smell to it, which is bad. If you're not going to use your butter in that time frame, wrap it up well and freeze it.

1 stick of butter is 8 tbsp. You'll take 6 tbsp of that butter and coat it in that flour mixture, then slice it up into little cubes. Keep coating the butter cubes in flour as you cut them so they won't stick to each other or the knife. Melt the remaining 2 tbsp of butter in the microwave for about 30 sec.

Take your chilled, flour-coated butter cubes and toss them all into the flour mixture. With your (washed) hooves, rub the cubes of butter into the flour. You're aiming to combine the butter with the flour until it resembles a coarse, sandy mixture. This is to coat the flour particles in the fat of the butter. Butter also contains water, which will turn into steam in the oven and produce flakiness.

Add one cup buttermilk. Buttermilk is usually sold in pints; a pint is two cups, so you'll need half of the carton if you buy it as a pint. Mix it together with a spoon until it just comes together. It will look terrible. Don't worry about it, it'll come together.

Lightly sprinkle a flat, clean surface liberally with flour. Dump your mix on top, flour your hooves, and sprinkle a little flour over the dough. Gently pat it down and fold it over on itself a few times. Be as gentle as possible. If you horse around with the dough too much, it'll get tough. Keep your hands and surface lightly floured. Next, gently flour a rolling pin, and gently shape the dough into a rectangle of about 12 inches. Fold over the bottom end of the dough, and the top end of the dough, so they overlap. This is called a three fold, and will give the biscuits some nice layers. Gently roll this into another rectangle, aiming to keep a thickness of about 3/4 to a half inch. Square off the dough by cutting off the ends with a floured knife. Cut it lengthwise, then divide the dough into squares. Remember the less you handle your dough, the better. Don't press down hard when rolling; you want to be gentle. The idea is to shape it, not massacre it.

Your biscuits should be cute little squares. Stick them on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Baking with parchment is a really good idea; it's cheap, and you don't have to add more fat to the recipe by buttering the pan. Nothing sticks to it.

Roll up your dough scraps and cut out a few more biscuits. You should get one or two. With your remaining 2 tbsp of melted butter, brush the tops of the biscuits, and stick them in the oven for 12-15 mins. Buttering them does two things: 1. Allows them to rise higher because the butter keeps the top of the dough from immediately drying out and preventing the rest of the dough from rising. 2. Butter is a fat, and fat transfers heat better than the hot air of the oven. Heat affects the amino acids and sugars present in the flour, producing something called the Maillard reaction, which browns the biscuits nicely (in addition to the alkalinity of the dough).

When they are nice and brown, pull them out, brush again with the remaining butter. Eat!

I made these this morning; from start to finish it took about 20 minutes. I hope some of you try my recipe, it's really fantastic!

[Rosewind]

Really everypony, ask me anything you want about baking. I know my way around a flour bag pretty well!

Do your cookies turn into puddles? I can fix it! Do your cupcakes turn so rock solid that only Spike will eat them? A few fixes will fix them up! Do your souffles crawl out of the pan and try to take over the world? Ask meeee!

[Dessa]

Yeah, I was thinking along Stars' lines. If it's a good reference, it might be worth a sticky, even if it doesn't generate lots of posts. Topics can be popular by views, too. But considering Tales' 2 cents, we'll hold off on that for now.

Rosewind: My mom's baked concotions involving blueberry always seem to end up watery and a bit too cakelike. How to solve?

[Rosewind]

Yeah, I was thinking along Stars' lines. If it's a good reference, it might be worth a sticky, even if it doesn't generate lots of posts. Topics can be popular by views, too. But considering Tales' 2 cents, we'll hold off on that for now.

Rosewind: My mom's baked concotions involving blueberry always seem to end up watery and a bit too cakelike. How to solve?

Like blueberry muffins? What kind of blueberries does she use? Fresh, canned, frozen, wild? I've found using fresh, whole berries tends to add extra water into the batter, which might produce the cake-like texture you're talking about. You might try using wild berries that have been rinsed and dried thoroughly on paper towels, as they're smaller and have less water in them (not to mention they're a bit more flavorful), or reducing the moisture in the recipe by a few tablespoons. As with anything with blueberries in it, you'll want to add them last and fold them in gently, so they don't burst and turn the dough purple. You can also freeze them and mix them in to avoid mashing them.

Additionally, if you're making muffins, you'll want to remove them from the pan right away when they finish baking so they don't sit in the pan and "steam bake," which overcooks them and makes them soggy.

[PixieSunBelle]

I enjoy Mozzarella, Cucumbers and and Tomato

Cut up some mozzarella cheese and lay it flat on a plate. Then cup up a few slices of cucumber and lay it flat on top of the cheese. Then cut a tomato and do the same. After that pour some vinegar and olive oil to taste. An alternative is Italian Dressing.

Yum!

[Rosewind]

Lookie at this!

[starswirlthebearded]

A supportive mother whom uses a show for girls to feed her sons healthy food?! WHAT SORCERY IS THIS?!

(but really, that sounds good, I kinda want to try it)