Chocolate-Hazelnut and Banana Pancakes

 I recently came up with this recipe while I was sitting in Farmhouse. Each year, they host an event called “Philanthro-cakes” in hopes to donate towards K-State Proud. This is such as great event that I enjoy going to. Here’s my "Philanthro-cake"

inspired recipe: Chocolate-Hazelnut and Banana Pancakes.

Dry Ingredients

• ·      1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• ·      1 tablespoon of baking powder
• ·      1 tablespoon white sugar
• ·      1/2 teaspoon salt

Wet Ingredients

• ·      1 1/4 cups milk
• ·      1 ripe banana, mashed
• ·      1/3 cup Nutella
• ·      1 egg
• ·      1 tablespoon canola oil
• ·      1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Toppings

• ·      Strawberry Topping Ice Cream Spread
• ·      Nutella

1.    Preheat your skillet to a medium heat.

2.    In a large bowl, combine your flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt together. In a separate bowl, combine your milk, banana, Nutella, egg, canola oil, and vanilla extract. Mix together and pour it into the flour mixture and whisk together until thoroughly mixed.

3.    Ladle batter in 1/4 cup portions onto a hot skillet. Cook until tiny air bubbles form on top. Judging how your batter looks, you want to make sure that you cook it for 2 to 5 minutes each side; flip and continue cooking until the bottoms are browned, 2 to 3 minutes. Repeat with remaining batter. Keep finished pancakes warm.

When you stack your pancakes, take a spoonful of Nutella and coat a thin layer on it. Top it with a pancake, and repeat. Top it with another pancake, you’ll finish it by topping your pancakes off with an even spread of Strawberry topping

If you want, you can vice-versa the routine. Leaving the insides with Strawberry and the top with Nutella.

Baking With A Passion: Tips To Becoming A Better Baker

In my years of growing up, it was baking that got my love for sweets. Whether it was my mother’s cheesecakes, breads and cookies, or my father’s cakes. My family, including my extended family did a lot of cooking and baking. To this exact day, we’re still continuing that tradition. So with this blog, I want to go ahead and write up some tips to follow.

Break Away from the ordinary.

            First, let’s begin with using quality ingredients when it comes to baking. When I was little, I would always buy flavored boxed cake mix. It was great as far as easy to read step-by-step instructions. With using only eggs, oil and water, that’s all that it was called for. Cakes were good at the time, but then it was about how to take it up a notch with using cake flour combined with other dry and wet ingredients. If you’re using regular store bought Pillsbury and Duncan Hines, try to break away from it from time to time.

Science and Knowledge.

            Read a lot of “Baking” cookbooks and study the recipe that it’s asking. Follow it step-by-step, and understand the technique of making it. Remember, a recipe is used as a guideline. Feel free to substitute ingredients, but also remember that Baking is a science. You have to be precise in knowing how much to measure out, what to measure, and what order you combine everything in. It all makes a huge difference.

             This is where knowledge is very important. It’s great to study things such as, types of flours, texture, structure, and content of ingredients. It’s great to know it step by step so that when you’re testing out a recipe, you know how to work around it, and work with different tools. Sometimes, you can pick and choose alternate methods like Mayo can be a substitute for oil and eggs. Brown Sugar, if you have light brown sugar, add some molasses to make the flavor rich.  Breads, for example, if you are making any type of “Sweet Bread” such as Apple or Banana, you can substitute sugar for Applesauce for a light sweetness that can add some moisture.             Ovens also play a key role in baking. Convention and Convection are different because at times, you’ll have to adjust temperature and times.

Plan Ahead

            Before I do any sort of baking, I have to know in advance what ingredients I have. If not, I have to buy some. If I do go out to buy the ingredients, I also have to be precise in the quality of ingredients. Don’t always think that buying the “name brand” product will make a huge difference. Most of the time, they’re recommendations, and by that, you can use the knock off brand. So if you think buying the name brand is a MUST, It’s most likely not going to be the case.

            I do however recommend that you should compare the products that you buy. I have formed a habit to check what the product ingredients say, only to make sure if it’s the same, what’s most likely the first item being put into the product, and what type of preservatives are in the product. Checking and testing your products can make a huge difference. For example, there’s regular vanilla versus imitation vanilla. Hershey’s Chocolate versus Nestle Toll-House Chocolate.

            Compare your ingredients because even though it may smell and look the same, it can also taste different. So always know to get the best ingredients and when not to get the best ingredients. Also, If you ever think that you have an ingredient at home, buy it again. You don’t want to bake something at home and find out that you ran out of something.

Passion with Perfection.

            Many people who bake from their homes, will tend to bake for others. Those who study and bake constantly will always try to bake something new to please their customers. The one key ingredient that I find many people lack nowadays, is love. If you truly love baking, you’ll need to spend time perfecting your craft. I urge you to bake the same thing over and over until you get what you want, right. You may succeed, and you may fail. But it takes passion and dedication to continue perfecting your craft. Also, don’t be afraid to branch out from your own recipes for a bit. Bake from a variety of recipes that you find delicious and most rewarding. Make some tweaks, take notes, and always document exactly what it is that you do to it. Until you perfected your craft, you have already invented your own.  Also, don’t ever let your pride get to you. Everyone has their own style of baking, so don’t ever be that person where your dish is better than someone else, or that your dessert isn’t met to another person’s standards. You are your own, you create your own. The only people who should urge you to be a better baker, are the customers who buy from you, that loves your dessert dish no matter what. Until then, their word will spread around.

Happy Baking!!

Ronald Atkinson 

Italian Sausage Sandwiches: Chicago Influenced

I didn’t technically write down this recipe as I was cooking this since I happen to go with the flow, but I tell you, it was a delicious flavor in my mouth. Please don’t be upset for I didn’t provide any sort of measurements and cooking times, but it varied.

Serving size: Two

Anyways, here's how I did this.

You will need

            2 Hotdog style Hoagie Buns

            Package of Italian sausage (With casings): Hot

            Sweet Red Bell Pepper (One quarter)

            Sweet Yellow Bell Pepper (One quarter)

            Sweet Orange Bell Pepper (One quarter)

            Sweet Onion (One quarter)

            1 tomato quarter (Chopped)

            Sweet relish

            1 tablespoon of Canola oil

            1 teaspoon of salt

            1 teaspoon of crushed black pepper (You can use ground)

            Olive Oil Mayo

           

First, in a medium skillet, brown your sausage until the outside had formed its perfect color. Flip after every three minutes. When they appear to look done on the outside, with your fingers, check to see if the inside is fully cooked. If not, place them in a 300 degree oven to let them finish cooking. If you want to continue to cook them in a skillet, by all means go ahead. There’s no right or wrong way to cook sausage.

While your sausage is cooking, cut up all of your peppers in quarters, and slice them as if they were to be used in Fajita tacos. Next, cut the top half of your onion, and then the bottom half. Take the skin off your onion, and immediately, cut a quarter off. With that quarter of the onion, cut them so that they are strips. Then, cut a quarter of the tomato removing all juices from the middle, and dice them. The tomato will allow the sweetness to come out once it’s all being sautéed.

In a medium skillet, heat about a tablespoon of canola oil, and began to sauté your vegetables. Season them with salt and pepper, and you’ll want to sauté them for 5-10 minutes “Covered” until they become caramelized. Be sure to keep stirring them with a spatula.

Once your vegetables begin to caramelize, go ahead and reduce the heat, and let sit while the pan is still covered.

            Now would be a good time to check your sausages in the oven. If they’re not ready, let them cook a bit longer.

Take your hoagie buns, slice them as if they were hotdog buns, and place them in the oven for about 3-5 minutes. You don’t want them hot and toasted hard, but you want a slight warm crisp to them. The bread should still be soft when you take them out of the oven.

Building the sandwich

            Hoagie Bun

            Spread some Olive Oil Mayo on both sides in between your bread, and place a small spoonful of sweet relish inside.

            Next, take a little bit your vegetables, and then top it off with your sausage. After, top the sausage with the remaining of your vegetables. You want to make sure that every bite you take will contain vegetables. So it’s best to have them IN the sandwich, and on top.

You will repeat this step depending on how many sandwiches you are serving.

Italian Scotch Eggs

Scotch Eggs at The Thirsty Lion. Phoenix, AZ

Scotch Eggs are slowly gaining a popularity here in the Midwestern Flint hills of Kansas. Well, at least in from seeing them on the menus in various restaurant bars. With that said, I first had scotch eggs back when I had visited Phoenix, Arizona, at a restaurant known as The Thirsty Lion.

Aggieville

Simple and delicious, here’s how you can make these scotch eggs. I’m only writing this recipe as 12 servings just in case you’re willing to make a dozen of eggs to serve for a gathering.

You’ll need

            3 Pounds of ground Italian Sausage: Mild

            12 hard boiled eggs, peeled

            3 tablespoons of all-purpose flour

            ¼ teaspoon of season salt

            ¼ teaspoon of black pepper

            ¼ teaspoon of paprika

            ½ tablespoon of Italian seasoning

            ½ tablespoon of Ground red pepper

            3 beaten eggs.

            2 cups of Italian bread crumbs

            Oil for deep frying   

First, put your eggs in a pot of cold water and bring them to a boil. You can boil them depending on how you prefer the middle yolk to be. 3 to 4 minutes will allow them to be slightly runny. When your eggs are finished, place them in a bowl of cold water and allow them to sit for peeling. Gently, you will want to peel them carefully.

In a medium bowl, mix together your sausage along with your Italian seasoning and red pepper. Take a small handful of your sausage, roll them, and divide them up into twelve balls. Use your best judgment to determine how much it will cover the egg.

Three Bowl Method

In one bowl combine your flour, season salt, black pepper, and paprika.

In another bowl, have your 3 beaten eggs.

In your third bowl, you should have the breadcrumbs.

Forming Method

Flatten out your sausage in the palm of your hand into a Pattie. Roll a peeled egg into the flour, and then pop it in the middle of the Pattie. Gently mold the sausage around the egg with your hands so that the egg is covered completely.

            *Repeat for each egg

Roll the sausage-wrapped egg in the flour, shake off the excess, and dip it into the beaten eggs, and last, roll it in the breadcrumbs for a really good coating.

In a skillet, saucepan, or deep fryer, heat your oil to 300-365 degrees F. carefully lower the eggs in the hot oil and fry for five minutes.

            *Repeat for each egg

If you’re cooking them in a skillet or a saucepan, be sure to turn them over every so often so that you get a golden brown color.

Tip: If you are unsure about the sausage being undercooked, take them out and place them in a oven to cook for a couple of minutes.

Let them cool off slightly, and serve it with Hot Mustard, Mayo, or Garlic and Herb Mayo.

Any condiment of your choice will do just fine.