This recipe is from the King Arthur site and is a nice basic white bread for toast or sandwiches (especially PB&J).

The details of the recipe are available here but it’s a basic 50% water recipe, with some butter for fat and some powdered milk for some additional protein.

1 cup + 2 tablespoons lukewarm water
1 heaping tablespoon honey
2 1/4 teaspoons instant yeast
1 3/4 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons soft butter
17 ounces Bread flour
1/2 cup dry milk

Work the dough together and knead by hand or in the stand mixer for 8 minutes. Let the dough double, punch it down, shape it for a loaf pan and then let it double in the pan.

When cooking, I use my gas grill, a 4 burner (running front to back) with the 2 side burners on medium, and the center 2 on low. I invert a cast iron frying pan to elevate the loaf pan while cooking.

Bake the bread for 15-20 minutes, checking once or twice to make sure your temperature is good. Then tent some tinfoil over the loaf (to avoid over cooking) and bake another 15-20 minutes.

Check the internal temperature with your meat thermometer, should be 190 or so. Take it our, remove from the pan and let cool before eating. Since there aren’t any preservatives this bread will go stale quickly, but that usually isn’t a problem with homemade bread.

It’s easy to cook and bake in your grill, and avoid heating up the house in the summer months.

Ingredients

• 1 C. AP flour
• 1/2 C Whole Wheat Flour
• 1/2 C Other Flours (Buckwheat, Corn, Rye mix)
• 1 tsp Baking Soda
• 1 tsp Salt
• 1/4 Baking Powder
• 2 1/2 C Buttermilk
• 2 Eggs (separated)

Directions

Sift dry ingredients together, add buttermilk and egg yolks and mix until just combined (don’t over mix). In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites to medium stuff peaks, then fold into batter.

Heat a non stick pan (I like an electric skillet) to medium high. Lightly brush some butter on the hot surface before dropping a 1/3-1/2 c of batter. Cook 2-3 minutes each side and serve with butter and syrup (ok you can serve them any way you like).

There really isn’t anything better than home-made pizza. And it couldn’t be easier. With a few simple techniques and some simple ingredient, you can make the kind of gourmet pizza you’ve always dreamed of.

Dough

I’m using a long pre-ferment to give the dough a nice flavor.

The night before combine 5.3 ounces of bread flour, 5.3 ounces of water and a 1/8 tsp of yeast in a bowl. Mix to combine and cover. Leave out to ferment all overnight.

In the morning, remove the cover and mix in 5.3 ounces of water to the dough and stir to loosen it. Then add 2 Tbsp olive oil, 10.7 ounces of flour and 1/2 tsp of yeast. Mix together and work by hand or in your stand mixer for 10 minutes. Allow dough to raise for 1 hour. Knock down the dough and then divide into 4 equal parts. Roll them into round balls and place in a 9×13 pan with a damp towel to cover. Place in your fridge till you are ready to use them for dinner. Remove from the fridge 30-60 minutes before you want to use them (this is also a good time to start preheating your oven)

Sauce

For the sauce, I tend to use simple tomato sauce and a drizzle of olive oil. Flour your workspace and slowly work the dough in circles pulling and pressing and stretching into a flat round shape. Put 4-5 table spoons of tomato sauce on your round and swirl it to cover the dough. Drizzle a little olive oil around the pizza and then sprinkle a small amount of kosher salt into the sauce. You can optionally add some oregano it this stage.

Toppings

Keep your toppings simple. A handful of mozzarella cheese, some pepperoni, some basil, some olives, whatever tickles you fancy. Just keep it simple and don’t overwhelm it.

Baking

Experiment with your baking. I have good results with 2 methods. Place a baking stone 1/3 of the way up from the bottom, preheat your over to 450 and back for 10 minutes. Alternatively, you can put the stone on the lowest rack, and turn your oven to broil. Let the stone get hot and then slide the pizza from the peel onto the stone. This method give a nice soft doughy crust and a good char to the cheese.

Let you pizza rest for 5 minutes before you slice and enjoy!

Kid loves fried chicken. Took the piece right off his mamma’s plate and wouldn’t give it back. The recipe for this is an adaptation of a recipe from the Food Network show Tyler’s Ultimate, but is quickly becoming our family recipe. Hope you enjoy

Deep Fried Chicken

Ingredients

• 1 whole cut up fryer
• 2 quarts peanut oil
• 4 cups AP flour
• Cayenne Pepper
• Garlic Powder
• 4 cups Buttermilk
• Sriracha (chili sauce)

Directions

1. Brine chicken for at least 30 minutes in salt water solution then drain.
2. Heat oil in a large pot to 350 degrees
3. Season AP flour with 1 tbsp garlic powder and 1 tbsp Cayenne Pepper. Add other seasonings to taste.
4. Add 1-3 tbsp (depending on taste) chili sauce to buttermilk and mix in a large low sided bowl.
5. Dredge chicken in flour to coat shaking off excess flour.
6. Dip chicken in buttermilk coating all sides and allow a few seconds for excess to drip off
7. Roll chicken back into the flour mix to coat
8. Rest breaded chicken for 5-10 minutes before cooking to allow coating to set
9. Carefully place chicken into hot oil and cook for 12 minutes moving pieces around with a spider or heat safe tool
10. Remove cooked pieces and allow to drain and cool for 5 minutes

Cook in small batches, 3-4 pieces at most. Consider cutting large breasts into 2 pieces to speed cooking and prevent undercooked middles. Salt pieces as they cool. For best results, remove skin from large pieces (breast and thigh) to allow batter to adhere directly to the meat.

1lb bread flour
.65 lb warm water
1 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp instant yeast
2 tbsp melted butter or olive oil

Bring all the ingredients together in a bowl till the dough comes together. Kneed for 3-5 minutes (by hand or in a stand mixer with dough hook). Lightly coat with additional butter or oil and let rise on a warm location for 2 hours till doubled in size.

Turn out the dough and gently flatten, fold and flatten 3 times in thirds, leaving the dough in the same spot so that the bottom is always on the bottom. After 3-4 folds, flip over and tuck the loose corners in the base and shape into a ball. Place the ball into a round pottery vessel 6 inch round and 10 inch tall and allow to rise till dough reaches the top of the container.

Once the dough has risen, slash the top of the bread with a sharp knife. Preheat the over to 400 with a glass container of water on the bottom rack.

Once the oven reached temperature, allow 10 more minutes before putting the bread in the oven. Watch out for the steam when you open the door and place the bread on the top rack with the top of the vessel 3-4 inches from the ceiling of the oven.

Cook for 25-35 minutes. Use an instant read thermometer to test for doneness, look for a reading of 195-205 (over 212 and you are burned because all the water has boiled out of the loaf as steam). Remove loaf from vessel and allow to cool.

Enter the simple solution. Remind yourself when to use your leftovers. If you don’t already have an online calendar, get one. Google Calendar is my favorite but there are plenty of other choices (online calendars). Once you have that its a breeze to keep track of your leftovers.

After you pack your leftover dinner and put it into the freezer, log into your calendar, go a couple of weeks into the future and set up a reminder to use your freezer supplies for dinner. Most online calendars have the ability to send you an email reminder, so set it your “appointment” for dinner time and then set the reminder for 2 hours before. That should give you plenty of time to defrost it. You can also set it to remind you the day before so you can move them to the fridge to defrosting.

This way you can use your leftovers in a timely manner and not have to worry about cooking dinner every night.