Earlier this week, The Girl sent me a Facebook message (from her bedroom) that read, in its entirety, “You should make these, I want them.”  That heartfelt message was followed by a link to a recipe for Pao de Quiejo, also known as Brazilian Cheese Bread.  I looked it over and wrote back (from the living room), “That doesn’t look too hard.  I’ll try it later this week.” A few hours later, when she actually emerged from her fortress of solitude, she gave me a hug and said “I love having a cookin’ mama.”  Then she added,  “When are you going to make them?”

Pao de Quiejo is difficult to pronounce–I looked it up on several websites, and I’m still not sure how to say it–but not difficult to make.  It does call for two ingredients that might be hard to find.  Queso fresco (“fresh cheese”) is always in stock at my local grocery store, but it might be harder to find as you move farther north of Texas.  If you can’t find it, mozzarella is probably the best substitute, in terms of approximating its taste.  The second odd ingredient is tapioca flour.  My usual grocery store didn’t carry it, though a larger store nearby carried the Bob’s Red Mill version.  I’d never worked with tapioca flour before.  It’s very light, almost like corn starch, and therefore a little tricky to measure.  Just use a gentle hand, and don’t go plopping a cup of the stuff into a bowl. Unless you want a face full of tapioca dust, that is.  Trust me on this one.

Like most recipes, there are dozens of versions of pao de quiejo online.  Some call for a mashed potato in place of part of the tapioca flour.  Others call for plain yogurt instead of milk, or Parmesan cheese in place of the queso fresco.  The taste of Parmesan is so completely different than queso fresco that, while I can see it would make for very tasty cheese bread, it definitely wouldn’t taste the same.  I might try using plain yogurt next time I make this recipe, just to see what the sour edge of the yogurt does for the bread.  And I might try using garlic salt in place of the regular salt, just to add a different flavor.

While they’re baking, the pao de quiejo puff into these odd little shapes.  One they’re done, they collapse just a little–chewy inside, crispy outside.  They’re kind of like a popover, or a Yorkshire pudding (without the beef drippings, of course.)  The Hubs went wild for them, and Mr. Picky even ate one without much prompting.  The Girl said they weren’t quite what she’d expected, so we talked about how I might adapt the recipe to get closer to what she was hoping for.

Because you know a recipe for The Girl’s Cheese Puffs is somewhere in my future.

Pao de Quiejo

Ingredients:

1 egg, brought to room temperature
1/3 cup olive oil
2/3 cup milk
1/2 cup grated queso fresco, packed
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 cups tapioca flour

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Coat a mini-muffin pan with cooking spray and set it aside.

Combine the egg, olive oil and milk in a blender. Pulse briefly to combine. Add the queso fresco and salt; pulse again. Add the tapioca flour in small amounts, pulsing after each addition. You may need to use a spatula to scrape down the sides of the blender canister as you keep blending. After you've added all the tapioca flour, let the batter blend for a minute or two, until it's smooth.

Pour the batter into the wells of the mini-muffin pan. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until the bread is puffy and lightly browned around the edges. Cool on a rack for a few minutes before transferring to a plate. These are best eaten warm, since they get pretty chewy after cooling.

I got a new camera for Christmas, mostly to help me take better pictures for this blog–I’ve been relying on professional stock photos for illustrating most of my blog posts, and I think it’s time to get serious about documenting what I do in the kitchen.  So be patient with me, please, since many of the photos you’ll be seeing here will be of less than professional quality.  I have a lot to learn.

When I started thinking about how best to incorporate photos into my blog, it occurred to me that The Pioneer Woman  has a corner on that market. The photos that illustrate her recipes are really, really helpful as a visual reference.  But the sad truth is, I can’t see myself taking the time to photograph each step of every new recipe I prepare.  I can, however, do that once in awhile.

Like today, for instance.

I think everyone should be able to make a nice, basic loaf of bread.  I owned a bread machine for awhile, but I like the process of making bread as much as I like eating fresh bread–and the bread machine takes all the fun out of that process, so I got rid of mine.  Many people are of the opinion that making bread is just too difficult and too much work, but here are the facts:  bread requires only a few basic ingredients.  It takes some time, but not a lot of effort–and you don’t have to be around for most of the time it requires.  Bread dough will rise while you’re running errands, cleaning the house, studying for a test, getting your hair cut, or doing whatever it is you need to do.  And, let’s face it, there are few things more satisfying than the way your house smells while a loaf of bread is in the oven.  I swear the smell alone can raise the temperature of your house by five degrees.

Just to demonstrate that bread is, in fact, easy to make, we’re going to start with a bread mix and take the matter of ingredients out of the equation.  I found this mix in the baking aisle at my local grocery store.  Once you’re comfortable making bread from a mix, using the ingredients someone else has measured and provided, you can move on to making it from scratch. (Use this recipe for my Cinnamon Bread and leave out the butter-cinnamon-sugar mixture in the center.  Voila!  A simple loaf of bread.)  When he saw that I was using a mix today, The Hubs asked “What’s the point of doing a blog about making bread from a mix?”  The point, I explained to him, ever so patiently, was focusing on technique and getting comfortable with the process.  That way, even if your dinner plans involve just opening a can of soup, you can still have something special to look forward to.

In the interest of keeping things simple, I followed the directions on the box and dissolved the yeast in a cup of warm water.  Normally I would proof the yeast first, but today I decided to live on the edge.  Generally speaking, you want to dissolve yeast in water that’s a little too warm to touch comfortably, but not actually hot–and certainly not boiling.  Water that’s too warm will kill the yeast; water that’s too cool won’t dissolve it completely.  Stir the yeast into the water, then stir the bread mix into the liquid.  You’ll end up with a sticky dough that looks something like this.

Now it’s time for kneading the dough.  Grab a handful of flour and sprinkle it over your counter top or cutting board; then just plop the dough from the bowl onto this surface and get to work.  Kneading isn’t an exact science: push down on the dough with the heels of your hands, fold it in half, pick it up and twist it.  Whatever.  The point in manipulating the dough is creating sheets of gluten that turn springy as they develop.  You’ll notice, as you continue kneading, that the dough gets spongy and more substantial as you work with it.  Knead the dough for at least 5 minutes.

Now leave the dough alone on the cutting board while you rinse out your mixing bowl, getting rid of the dough that was sticking to the sides.  Pour a small amount of oil in the bottom of the bowl and use a paper towel to distribute it around the sides–or just use non-stick cooking spray, if you have it on hand.  Plop the kneaded dough into the bottom of the bowl and turn it over, oiled side up .  And now–here comes the easy part–cover the bowl with a clean dish towel and find a nice warm place for it to park.  Any place where it’s safe from a cold draft will be fine.

Your dough should rise for at least an hour, but it won’t hurt anything if you let it rise longer than that.  All you’re doing is allowing the yeast to release carbon dioxide and create the air pockets (bordered by those springy sheets of gluten you just created) that give bread its spongy texture.  My photo shows bread dough that was left to rise for about two hours because I got busy with other projects and forgot about it.  When you’re ready, just plop it out of the bowl again and give it a few good smacks to release the air in the those pockets.  You’ll see that the dough quickly goes back to its original size.

Now you’re ready for a second rise.  Oil the loaf pan you plan to use and place the deflated dough in the pan.  (See how small the dough is after you punch it down?  Just like it was before you let it rise.  Don’t worry.  It’ll poof up again.)  Cover the loaf pan with the clean dish towel again and set it in the same warm spot.  Once again, if you get busy or forget about it, don’t worry–you can always punch it down and start over.  But the easiest thing to do at this point is let it rise for about an hour, then put it in the oven to bake.

Here’s my bread, all ready to get in the oven.  See how it’s kind of domed on top?  See the little air pockets along the sides? These are the signs that your bread will be light and delicious.  If it looks too solid, or if the top is flat, let it rise a little longer.  When it’s ready, bake it according to the package directions–in my case, about 25 minutes at 425 degrees.

And here’s the finished product:  golden brown, crusty, delicious.  As soon as your bread has finished baking, turn it out of the loaf pan and onto a cooling rack to prevent the bottom of the loaf from getting soggy as it releases steam. You’ll need to let it cool about 15 minutes before you try to slice it; otherwise, the bread will fall apart.  Use a serrated knife when you cut into it, and saw back and forth rather than cutting straight down.

Mmmmmm.  Like I said, even if dinner will be a simple bowl of soup, a chunk of homemade bread makes that soup a little more special.  If you’re baking for yourself and fairly certain that you can’t eat a whole loaf of bread on your own, keep in mind that dried-out bread can easily be turned into bread crumbs–or, better yet, bread pudding.

I hope you all had as lovely a holiday as my family did.  We ate a lot of good food, opened a lot of great presents and spent a lot of time laughing together.

Since I didn’t get the chance to do much blogging last week, I’m going to get right down to the Orange Meal recipes–most of which are very simple, all of which are very tasty.  While I absolutely enjoy sharing a good meal with my family on Christmas Eve, most of the cooking takes place after we attend church services–which means the recipes I’m using need to be quick-cooking and easy to put together.  Taking care of the basic preparations (the chopping, the trimming, etc.) ahead of time makes this a very easy meal to pull together.

I started the day by making a batch of this:

Orange Vinaigrette Dressing

2/3 cup rice wine vinegar
1/3 cup orange juice
2 T. olive oil
1 T. Dijon mustard
Honey, to taste

2 tsp. minced garlic
2 T. chopped fresh cilantro (or flat leaf parsley, if you aren’t a cilantro fan)

Whisk together the vinegar, orange juice, olive oil and mustard.  Add honey to taste, just to take the edge off the acidic quality of the other ingredients.  Stir in the garlice and cilantro. Cover the dressing with plastic wrap and allow it to chill in the refrigerator for at least four hours, so the flavors can mingle.

The next step was preparing my vegetables:  trimming one pound of green beans (just use a large knife to cut off the ends) and peeling two large sweet potatoes, then cutting them into chunks.  I stored the veggies in resealable plastic bags in the refrigerator until I was ready to cook them. Then, just before we left for church, I mixed up the herb rub for our pork loin.  I bought a three-pound pork loin for the five of us–three of whom are not big meat-eaters–but if you’re serving a larger crowd, you’ll want to adjust the amounts below accordingly.

Herb-Crusted Pork Loin with Orange Sauce

1 T. freshly ground black pepper
2 T. grated Parmesan cheese
2 tsp. basil
2 tsp. rosemary
2 tsp. parsley
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 tsp. salt

Rub a pork loin with olive oil, then sprinkle the herb rub on all sides.  Press lightly to make sure the herb rub sticks to the pork.  Roast the pork loin at 325 degrees until the internal temperature reaches 160 degrees.  I put the pork loin in the oven when we left for church, and when we got home–about an hour and a half later–it was ready to come out of the oven.  If you need it to be ready a little sooner, bump the heat up to 350 and figure 20 to 25 minutes per pound.  

While the pork loin is roasting (or after it’s finished and resting), make the Orange Sauce:

1 cup orange juice
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1/3 cup water
1 tsp. corn starch
1 T. Dijon mustard
1/2 tsp. ginger

Whisk together the orange juice, brown sugar and water.  When the sugar has dissolved, whisk in the corn starch, mustard and ginger.  Let this mixture come to a boil; cook for two or three minutes, until the sauce has thickened.   If you like, you can glaze the pork loin during its last 10 minutes of cooking–or you can just serve this sauce on the side, like I did.

While the pork loin was resting, tented in aluminum foil to keep it hot, I baked these:

Thyme-Roasted Sweet Potatoes

2 large sweet potatoes, cut into bite-size chunks
olive oil
dried thyme

In a large bowl (or right in the plastic bag, if you’ve cut up the potatoes earlier in the day), toss the sweet potatoes with enough olive oil to coat them.  Spread the potatoes on a baking sheet in a single layer; sprinkle with dried thyme.  Bake at 425 degrees for 25 minutes, stirring once or twice so the potatoes brown evenly on all sides.

The roasting time for the potatoes gives you just enough time to steam some green beans in a small amount of water, until they’re bright green but still crisp.  Then toss them with butter and some fresh lemon juice.  Transfer the beans to a serving plate and top them with some chopped almonds.   And that, believe it or not, is the entire recipe for Green Beans Almondine.  Sounds fancy, but it’s really simple.

The final piece of the dinner puzzle was a big salad:  mixed baby greens from Costco, some mandarin orange slices, toasted pecans, and feta cheese, all tossed with the orange vinaigrette.  Even The Girl, who is not a big fan of vinaigrette salad dressings, pronounced it “super yummy.”

And that was dinner–all put together in about half an hour, not including the minimal prep time spent on the veggies or the roasting time for the pork loin.  For dessert we enjoyed the Orange Cake (pictured above), which was a big hit with everyone.  So much so, in fact,  that I suspect it may become the traditional finale for the Orange Meal.

T-minus-2 days until The Orange Meal!  This evening I made a batch of orange curd with which to fill the luscious Orange Cake I’ve decided to make for dessert on Christmas Eve.  When I mentioned this plan to Mr. Picky, I said “You know how you love creamsicles?  This is going to be an orange and vanilla cake.  You’ll love it!”

But he remained unconvinced.  “You’re going to be making it with actual oranges, right?” he asked.  “The things I like have artificial orange flavor.  That’s completely different.”

This is true, so I guess we’ll have to wait until he tastes the finished product to reach a definitive verdict.  My plan is to make a basic vanilla cake, flecked with orange zest; then to fill the cake with delightful orange curd; then to top the whole thing with a fluffy vanilla frosting.  If I decide to go completely crazy, I’ll add some mandarin orange slices (artfully arranged, of course) on top.

But that might be a step too far for Mr. Picky.  Actual oranges on the Orange Cake?  The horror, the horror!

Orange Curd

1 cup sugar
1/4 cup corn starch
2 cups orange juice
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 stick butter, cut into chunks
2 T. orange zest

In a small saucepan, combine the sugar and corn starch.  Whisk in the orange juice and beaten eggs.  Let this mixture come to a boil over medium heat, whisking constantly.  (It will burn on the bottom of the pan if you aren’t whisking, so stick around.  It takes only 5 minutes or so.)

Once the mixture has come to a boil, allow it to cook for 1 or 2 more minutes (still whisking, whisking, whisking.  Come on, it’s 7 minutes of your life.  Really, you’re that busy?)  When the orange curd has thickened to something like a pudding, remove the pan from the heat.  Whisk in the butter and orange zest.

Pour the completed mixture into a bowl and press plastic wrap against the surface of the orange curd.  Allow it to chill overnight–even longer is better, since the orange zest will release more of its orangey goodness the longer it’s allowed to sit.