irish brown bread

Each year for St. Patrick's Day, I like to make a loaf of Irish brown bread to share with friends in celebration of my Irish heritage. I learned this little tradition from my mother, who also makes a loaf each year. Every year when I make it, I can't help but revel in how simple this bread is to make and delicious it is to eat! It deserves a place on our tables all year round, so here it is - Irish brown bread in September! 

Irish brown bread requires no yeast, and no waiting. It's a quick bread that relies heavily on the rising powers of baking soda, so you can have it on your table in about an hour! It is dense and wheaty, and will form an amazing crust if you bake it in a cast iron pan instead of on a baking sheet. 

So please, take a little break from your busy life to make this beautiful bread, and enjoy it warm with a table of your favorite people. Or standing in the kitchen just as soon as it's cool enough to cut, as I've been known to do! 

Now, for the biggest secret of all! My mother has long been lauded for her brown bread, rightfully so as it is quite phenomenal. Her secret? Bob's Red Mill Irish soda bread mix. It comes out so beautifully, there was never any reason to search for the best recipe to make from scratch. For a long time, I too swore by the "family recipe" whenever I was craving a loaf. But no longer do I rely on that trusty crutch! 

This past March, I searched the stores of Traverse City high and low, but couldn't find the mix anywhere... leaving me to my own devices. I couldn't be more thankful for this problem of small town life, because now I can always rely on this amazing from scratch recipe any time the hankering comes - no frantic shopping required! 

I recommend eating this bread warm, slathered generously with butter. It's perfect for breakfast or an afternoon snack, and goes wonderfully with a bowl of hearty soup. Here's to the arrival of fall and the return to our ovens! 

This recipe has been slightly adapted from The Cook's Illustrated (my bible of cooking). 

Ingredients: 

1 1/2 cup all purpose white flour

1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup cake flour (use all purpose if you don't have cake flour) 

1/2 cup wheat germ or oat bran 

2 Tbsp cane sugar 

1 1/2 tsp baking soda 

1 1/2 tsp cream of tartar 

1 1/2 tsp salt 

2 Tbsp butter, softened

1 1/2 cup buttermilk

Instructions:  

• Place flours, wheat germ, sugar, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt in a large bowl and whisk until fully combined. 
• Using fingers, rub softened butter into the flour mixture until completely incorporated. 
• Create a well by pushing some of the flour to the sides of the bowl, and pour in 1 1/2 cups of the buttermilk. 
• Using a fork, stir the mixture gently to incorporate the buttermilk into the dry ingredients. The dough will come together in large clumps. 
• Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and use your hands to bring it together to form a 6 inch round. It will be a little uneven, don't worry! 
• Place the dough in a 12 inch cast iron, or on a baking sheet, and score a deep cross into the top of the bread, nearly reaching each edge, and about half an inch deep. 
• Bake bread at 400 degrees for 40-45 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool for about 20 minutes, then dig in! 

nutty whole grain power waffles

while pancakes get a lot of the breakfast food spotlight, waffles are one of those things i can't help but come back to over and over again. they have all the fluffy joy of pancakes, with a nice crispy exterior and plenty of little pockets to hold any glorious toppings you want to shower them with! real maple syrup and my vanilla bourbon apricot jam is a favorite! 

plus, we just about always make a big batch for just the two of us and have a whole stack leftover to pop in the freezer. it's adult life, wholesome ingredient eggo waffles - with all the ease of popping them in the toaster oven for a quick weekday breakfast! 

these power waffles (as we like to call them) go above and beyond the normal joy of a waffle breakfast. with a hearty dose of hearty ingredients, there is no shame in this healthy and filling breakfast packed with fiber, protein, and whole grains! even with all that goodness, they still manage to be just as fluffy and satisfying as your typical white flour buttermilk waffle. 

so dig in, and make some extras for the week - go ahead and extend your sunday morning all the way through those pesky weekdays! 

before you get started, a few notes: 

on freezing your waffles - let them cool to room temperature, then stack them up with parchment paper in between each waffle so they don't go sticking together and giving you a headache before your morning cup of coffee. to re-heat, i recommend a toaster oven, but you can slip them in a regular toaster, and rotate halfway through so they are evenly cooked! 

on the nut flour - i love to use roasted hazelnut flour from pressmeister oils in this recipe (because really, healthy hazelnut waffles are just heavenly - no arguing on that note). cristoph is making incredible cold pressed oils here in traverse city (if you're ever in the area, make sure to find him at a local market and taste through his products!). he grinds the waste product from his oils into incredible and versatile nut flours. that said, many of you probably don't have this ingredient at your fingertips, so you can use widely available almond flour, or grind your own flour from whatever nuts you have in the pantry with a high power blender! 

ingredients: 

1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour 

1/2 cup white flour 

1 cup hazelnut flour (or another nut flour) 

1/2 cup freshly ground flax seeds 

1 Tbsp baking powder 

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt 

3 eggs 

2 cups whole milk 

3 Tbsp melted butter 

instructions: 

combine flours, flax seeds, baking powder & soda, and salt in a large mixing bowl. 

whisk together eggs, milk and melted butter in a medium mixing bowl or large liquid measuring cup. 

pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and whisk gently until just combined. be careful not to over-mix your batter as it will lead to tougher, less fluffy waffles! 

cook waffles using your waffle maker, placing them directly on the racks of a warm oven as they finish to keep them warm until they're all cooked, without them getting soggy. or jut eat them one by one as they come off the waffle maker, standing in your kitchen. that works best for me when i'm really hungry!  

simple chewy granola bars

i'll say it, i'm not afraid - i have a pretty serious thing for granola bars. for as long as i can remember, they've been a go-to staple in my life. it started when i was young with old school chewy bars, nutri-grain bars, and those super crunchy nature's valley bars. always there for a pick-me-up when hanger pangs are coming on strong. 

i've since gone through a number of granola bar stages, the most memorable of which has been an obsession with lara bars for their simplicity in ingredients. but, paying one dollar or more for each little snack left me knowing there was a better way... so i started doing some research, and landed on these little wonders. 

i first made these as a treat for some of my indiegogo supporters... they were so good that within a week, i was throwing together a second batch (one i could keep all to myself!). i have a feeling i'll be coming back to this one over and over again. sometimes i get hungry out of nowhere, and this is the perfect thing to have on hand for a quick snack. these should freeze well, and keep in the refrigerator for two weeks... now i just have to test how possible it is to actually keep them that long! 

i would try this recipe as is to start with, then feel free to get creative with your mix-ins and type of nut butter used. the trick to them turning out well is two fold: first, using quick oats, or thick rolled oats pulsed in your blender which can more easily absorb moisture. second, gaining the perfect balance of moisture to dry ingredients will lead to the perfect texture in your bar. too moist and they'll be sticky. too dry and they'll fall apart. take this into account if you decide to start making substitutions! 

these were adapted from the minimalist baker. 

ingredients:

1 cup pitted dates

1/4 cup maple syrup 

1/4 cup peanut butter 

1/2 cup chopped walnuts 

1/2 cup chocolate chips or cacao nibs 

1.5 cups rolled oats, pulsed in blender (or quick oats) 

instructions: 

first, you want to create a paste with your dates by pureeing them with a food processor or a blender. be careful doing this, stopping the machine frequently, as it can be really hard on the motor (there may or may not have been some troubles in that department the first time i made these!). you want to make the puree with no added liquid if you have moist dates. i've yet to try this with dry dates, but you can soak dry dates in hot water for ten minutes to soften them if needed! 

place date puree, walnuts, and oats in a big mixing bowl. 

in a small saucepan, bring syrup to a gentle bowl over medium-high heat. add peanut butter and whisk to combine into a smooth mixture. 

pour the maple-peanut liquid over the rest of the ingredients, and stir until thoroughly combined. i do this in my stand mixer with the paddle attachment, but you can also do it with a strong arm and a wooden spoon. 

stir in chocolate chips (if you're using nibs, you can add them with the rest of the ingredients. the chocolate might melt if you add it then!). 

pour the mixture into an 8 x 8 pan lined with parchment paper. using your hands, firmly press the mixture until it evenly covers the pan. place the pan in the fridge for about an hour. once your bars have hardened a bit, lift the sling of parchment to remove them from the pan and slice into bars. store, with parchment separating layers, in the fridge or freezer - depending how fast you plan to eat them! 

you can also double the recipe to fill a 9 x 13 pan for a bigger batch (yes, this is the way you should do it every time!).