Loaded Pancakes

Everyone knows that breakfast is awesome.  Especially when you eat it for dinner.  

I love pancakes, potatoes, eggs, and bacon (even though I know it isn't the healthiest...), so made Loaded Pancakes.  They have fried potatoes and bacon bits in them.

Also, they were HUGE.  Like, that's a 10" dinner plate.

Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread

I created another bread recipe today.  This time it has an unusual ingredient... cocoa powder!  I had already added the onion and garlic powder and was trying to figure out what else to add when I saw the cocoa powder.   Why not? I thought, and added a little.

Ingredients

• 2 2/3 cup warm water
• 2 Tbsp. sugar
• 1 1/2 Tbsp. active dry yeast
• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 1 Tbsp. salt
• 2 Tbsp. milk powder (added because I didn't have milk on hand and wanted a little creamier batter)
• 1 tsp. onion powder
• 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp. cocoa powder
• 3 cups whole wheat flour
• ~5-6 cups white flour

Instructions:

1. Mix warm water, sugar, and yeast together and let sit for about 5 or 10 minutes to make sure it foams up a little.
2. Mix in butter, seasonings, and 3 cups of whole wheat flour.
3. Start adding the 5-6 cups of white flour, kneading when it gets too stiff to stir.  I used only enough flour to get to a sticky dough state, and didn't knead in more to make it more elastic.
4. Knead 8-10 minutes.
5. Let rise in a greased bowl for 45 minutes to an hour, or until doubled.
6. Punch down and divide in half, forming 2 loaves in greased loaf pans.
7. Let rise 45 minutes.
8. Bake at 350F for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.

Enjoy!

Tortillas!

Yesterday, I made my second batch of tortillas ever.

Before making them, I thought it would be a long, difficult process.  But it's super easy!  You basically make the dough, roll it into balls, wait, then roll them out into circles and cook on a skillet.

The recipe made 18 8" tortillas, which you can see cooling below.

Tortillas cooling on the counter.

Today I tried one with peanut butter and honey and it was delicious!  Next time, though, I will add less salt to the dough and possibly a little less oil.  You can definitely taste the salt, but it isn't completely overpowering.  As for the oil, after 45 minutes of letting the dough rest, little bits had seeped out. 

Tortilla with peanut butter and honey.

I got the recipe from Pinterest:

Source: amandascookin.com via Anne on Pinterest

Decorating My Own Cake at Cakemix

Yesterday it was my birthday, so my mom and I went to Duff's Cakemix and decorated some cakes.  This awesome place was started in LA by Duff from Ace of Cakes.  Pretty cool, huh?

Well, I had no idea what to expect!  It turned out to be in a great place with half of the building for decorating cakes and half (separated by large windows) a studio for the actual cake professionals to work (oh, I would love to have that job title!).

Here's what I ended up with:

 It's a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting and covered in fondant.  The decorations are all fondant, too, except for the dark purple that I used to outline everything.

Below, you can see the awesome cake that my mom, from Dammit, Minnie!, created.  Those white things are little molded skulls, since she adores everything Halloween and Day of the Dead.

Now excuse me while I go order some 6" cake pans and see where I can get fondant, since I think this is a love that will last!