Category Archives: Experiment

One Way Not To Drink Coffee

January 11, 2019 BiscottiDon Leave a comment

I <3 Coffee … This is pretty well known.

I had an amusing revelation about my coffee-of-late — frankly it was also kind of gross …. so of course I had to share about it here! And it is cookie related by the way …..

I recently got on a crinkle kick. Growing up, my mom made chocolate crinkles as one of our Xmas cookies, and they were AMAZING! I’m not clear if crinkles are considered strictly-Xmas cookies, however going toward my next recipe book I’ve been developing an assortment of flavours — Lemon Crinkles, Orange Crinkles, Ginger Molasses Crinkles, modifications on the classic Chocolate Crinkle… Only one problem — the powdered sugar keeps cooking into my cookies and disappearing.

I made mention of this problem on my personal Facebook profile and received a remark back — that if you mix a little cornstarch into your powdered sugar it won’t melt into the cookies. So the last time I experimented with with a crinkle recipe I gave this cornstarch trick a try — and had No Luck. In fact, it seemed like it melted in MORE. At best I had spots of powered sugar on the cookies. The worse part was that I had made up a cereal bowl size mixture of powdered sugar and cornstarch and had a TON left over!

Image result for dalmatian — My cookies kinda looked like this fella and — aside from the blotchy sugar — about as happy!

Just so we’re clear, powered sugar is also know as confectioners sugar….

Not my actual bowl of confectioners sugar, but doesn’t the picture look nice with my blog post?

Lately, to use this bowl of corn-starched powered-sugar up I’ve been putting it in my coffee. Big deal, right — it’s sugar, and the cornstarch won’t hurt me — so what?!?

What happens when you put cornstarch into something hot — like hot water? It clumps, it thickens still but it thickens to itself — I didn’t even think of that! Yeah … if you don’t want dubious coffee-tasting sludge in your coffee …. this is not a way to use up the bowl of corn-starched powdered-sugar.

Lesson learned & laughing at myself,
Don

Announcement, Author, Baking, Book, Cookies, Experiment, Make Your Own Darn Good Cookies, Product, Public Appearance, Publication, Update

New Year – New Endeavours!

January 1, 2019 BiscottiDon Leave a comment

HAPPY 2019!

New Years can be a bit funny — because what is it really? Another 365 days and 6 hours* past and another to go … a December 31st and January 1st is just the difference of a day … and yet it is also something many of us use as an opportunity. We look to the past to make changes or try something new with the future — and sometimes it’s not so much about the past as it is about trying something new to enjoy. So what does 2019 hold for you? I know a few of the things I’m looking toward…
(* Yes, 6 hours — this is how we get leap year AKA the bissextus or a or bissextile year)

It’s harder to show a picture of the e-book version…

This past October I published my first book — “Make Your Own Darn Good Cookies” — then in mid-December I followed with publishing the e-book version. I’ve had the pleasure of getting to present my book a few times during late 2018, and with the New Year I aim to get more speaking dates. I thoroughly ENJOY getting to talk with other people about baking — getting new-bakers turned on to the idea and talking with old-hats at baking to find out about their ideas!

On the heals of releasing Make Your Own Darn Good Cookies I was compelled to get to work on 2 new books — yes, “compelled“! These were not the next projects I thought I would do, but they were the two that chewed on my mind the most — I was just drawn to them…

But what are they?

I both can and can’t tell you you that…

Yours truly in my other superhero persona… (you can also find me on FB as BagpiperDon BTW)

YES, 2 books, not just 1 …. because that’s how I do things.

One of these books is an ‘official’ Highland bagpipe sheet music book for the local-chapter of a Scottish military origination I’m a part of. The aim of this is not just to create something for my group but ultimately to offer this to the national organization to become all of our ‘official’ bagpipe sheet music book ….. SO, potentially producing and publishing a book for a national (actually international) organization … it’s kind of a big deal!

As for the other book…
(I’m really excited about this project!)

As a performing musician and recording artist I have learned to play certain things close to the vest. I have something in excess of 30 album ideas which I would LOVE to record — and have every intention to produce ….. HOWEVER … I generally don’t reveal those ideas to many if any people beforehand. Why? Simply because I want to make my albums — as opposed to someone hearing my idea, swiping it, and beating me to the punch. This other book is along these lines, but I will tell you this…

So far as I know there is only one other recipe book at all similar to it currently on the market &/or ever before made; it involves cookies which I am developing new recipes specifically for this project.
I may be partnering with another writer for the content of this book.
To fully and correctly publish this book I will have to learn and do things that I previously have only been familiar with however have not otherwise done.
This will probably be a coffee table book. I would like this book to have its own t-shirt. I may not make an e-book version however I definitely would like to make an audiobook version. AND it is my preference to release all of these at the same time.

AND two other things I’m working on…

As an extension of being a professional musician I like to record things — and I do mean ‘things’ being not-music however are sounds I find interesting. I do this under the project name of Archive Of Resonance. I have been a busy boy over the last number of years — both getting things done and sometimes having to put a few things on the shelf. One such thing …. or moreover four such things … are AOR recordings. While there are recordings I have wanted to make*, I have captured four sets of audio which I have wanted to turn into albums …. just that finishing this work has not been a priority. By my guesstimate, each of these need about 20 hours of work. My aim is to work on these over the course of 2019, publish them, and make them available on Amazon.
(*mostly couldn’t because I lacked transportation — but that’s changed now!)

AND LASTLY …

With pivoting WIBC from production baking to writing and publishing books and other products, I knew that I would need to get an Author’s/Musician’s Day Job. I got an initial start on my job search in the fall of 2018 and will be getting back at in during January 2019. This previous start was a decent beginning — I have some leads that look interesting and a decent idea of what my skills apply to. So the future looks …… interesting!

Going Forward!
~ Don

Baking, Book, Cookies, Experiment, Real Food

Beat Your Black Friday Blues

November 23, 2018 BiscottiDon Leave a comment

~ The Loved & Loathed BLACK FRIDAY ~
What Are You Doing?

Are you hitting the Black Friday sales? Hiding out, staying home, and avoiding the chaos? Or are you busying yourself with something else today?

Aside from drinking coffee and enjoying some leftover Thanksgiving PIE, I’m at home working on a few future-book-projects. For the past week+, while the e-book file of my current recipe book is getting reviewed for me, I’ve kept myself busy making progress on a few future book projects. One of these calls for me to create some NEW COOKIE RECIPES — which couldn’t have me More Pleased! Black Friday

I enjoy the creative process of imagining new baked goods and bringing them to fruition — it puts me in my element. Get an idea, figure out how maybe to make it, give it a go, possibly fail, try again, and then … finally … FIND IT! For the book I am chiefly working towards, I want recipes with finished baked goods with serious visual and taste-bud POP. Cookies that delight the eye, that the hand can’t resist picking up, and makes a mouth smile from a promise fulfilled. If a cookie could have the electric ambiance of a rock concert, THAT would be THESE COOKIES! Black Friday

As you know from my first book — Make Your Darn Good Cookies, published last month on Amazon — I gratefully accept recipe submissions. If you have a cookie recipe you’d like to submit for possible publication in one of my future books — and in this case a recipe that to you looks and tastes like ROCK’n’ROLL — please run-don’t-walk to e-mail your submission to me.

Can cookies be Rock’n’Roll?
OH YEAH! I think so…

Do you want to do some experimenting, too? Download my FOUR FREE COOKIE RECIPES from my recent book, go get in your kitchen, and have some FUN!

Cooking, Experiment

Slow Cooker Ham & Rice – Results

March 22, 2018 BiscottiDon 1 Comment

Follow-up to today’s Slow Cooker Ham & Rice Experiment …

OBEY! Wouldn’t it be handy if I could somehow succinctly sum-up my slow cooker ham and rice experiment — perhaps using a 1-10 score card system or a red/yellow/green-light indicator?

Well … I don’t have that … so let’s break it down in short order. Ready … GO!

The Rice

Rice rice baby! — Pretty idyllic looking rice, huh? Yeah, mine didn’t turn out this nice.

In the previous post I wrote two ways to slow cook rice. I’m going to have to try this again because my 2 parts water to 1 part rice flopped. About half of it turned to mush. I received a text from my mom about 4 hours into cooking saying that she does equal parts water and rice then cooks on high for 1 hour. OOPS! When I’ve had her slow cooker rice it’s turned out great. I’ll have to try this the next time I need rice.

The Ham

Hammy ham ham! — Also NOT my ham …. looks like a good one though!

Cooking the ham for 8 hours was of course easy. When I pulled the pieces out of my 2 slow cookers the work to clean it out (remove the fat, bone, etc) was straightforward but a bit time consuming … but then at times I can be fastidious.

At the beginning of this work I took a nibble and the ham seemed to be on the bland side*. I didn’t know if this was because of the way I cooked it or if it was just a lower-salt ham**. As my ham cooled the flavour seemed to return. I suspect this happened as a result of the water I cooked it with steaming out.

Ultimately I opted to give the ham a little boost improvising a simple glaze with what I had on hand. In a 2 cup measure I started with a healthy splash of apple cider vinegar. Then I added a healthy dollop of molasses followed by a hearty sprinkling of Johnny’s Seasoning Salt, then about as much warm water as the molasses. After mixing I felt that the volume was a bit low, so I doubled everything except the vinegar. In increments I poured this around on the meat, tossed the meat, and repeated until all of my ‘glaze’ was in. I then cooked on high for another hour. It didn’t ‘glaze’ of course, but it made additional elements of flavour.
(Hindsight — I could have used a cap or two of liquid smoke as well.)

In the end, it turned out pretty tasty — not fantastic, but I think this shows promise. This is definitely worth another attempt along with some further tweaking.

(WARNING – SHAMELESS SELF PROMOTION in another 3… 2…)

Well, back to work on completing my ***FIRST RECIPE BOOK***. It’s pretty close to being done!

* It made me think of the 1979 Coppola film “Apocalypse Now” when the character Jay ‘Chef’ Hicks talked about military cook training when they boiled beautiful cuts of meat — I thought my ham was destroyed.
** If you’re not familiar with how ham is cured there are 3 common ways, 2 of which use a special pink salt which gives ham its color.

Slow Cooker Ham & Rice EXPERIMENT

March 22, 2018 BiscottiDon 3 Comments

Trying something new-to-me today — I’m preparing ham and rice slow cooker style!

Black slow cooker ... it must be EVIL! — Not my actual slow cooker … too bad, then it’d match the rest of my appliances!

While I’ve baked plenty of hams, during the past week I thought about how I wanted to prepare the one in my fridge. Lately I’ve been busy up-to-my-ears and I wanted something that would be Low Hassle. Then it occurred to me — I should be able to slow cook a ham (read: DUH!). I posted the idea on my Facebook profile and of course other folks have done this before. Doing it, I’m told, is simple — put the ham in the slow cooker, add about a pint of water, and cook it on low for about 8 hours and then it falls off the bone!

(WARNING – SHAMELESS SELF PROMOTION in 3… 2… 1…)

WOW — that’s practically identical to my Slow Cooker Pulled Pork featured in my soon-to-be-published FIRST RECIPE BOOK!

I got started about three hours ago. The ham was big enough I had to cut bits off and fit it between my 2 regular-size cookers. When it’s done I plan to clean the meat — getting rid of the fat, bone, etc. The friend who said she prepares ham this way sounded like she shreds it, too. My original thought was that at this point I would add a glaze for flavour, as I would BBQ sauce to my Pulled Pork, and re-cook it on high for 30-60 minutes — but folks who replied said that wouldn’t be necessary. So I think I’ll keep it simple for this first time around.

As for the rice, I’m doing my mom’s trick in my small cooker — usual 2-1 ratio of water to rice and let it go all day (note that this cooker only cooks on one temp which I believe is high). Believe it or not I think this is the first time I’ve all 3 of my slow cookers going at once!

UPDATE – My mom said she does 1-1 water & rice and cooks for 1 hour. I did 2-1 and cooked for close to 4 hours. It came out sticky but … well, I got lucky. Results may vary, experiment, you’ll find out what works for you.

All that and some french-cut green beans … yeah, I think I’m going to have a nice dinner for the next number of nights — not bad for a single guy! (*Read my follow-up to this experiment here.*)

Lastly, I realized a LOL lately…
Slow Cooker = Easy-Bake Oven for Adults

Whidbey Island Baking Company

Category Archives: Experiment

New Year – New Endeavours!

HAPPY 2019!