Everyone needs a treat sometimes to get through quarantine. I decided to make an old family recipe: my grandmother’s applesauce raisin cookies.
They turn out moist and cakey, and taste like my childhood.
Anyone else got an old (or new) family baking recipe to share?
There has been a lot of baking here. COVID-19 will be the new “Freshman-15”. I am on track to gain 19 ponds in 4 to 6 weeks. Which I am happy to do to flatten the virus curve. But it not helping me flatten by stomach curve.
I’m actually quite disappointed in my family in this regard. My grandma (passed) was the daughter of a German baker and not a single documented recipe for those glorious decadent German treats. We’ve somewhat re-created a few from the Italian side of the family but that’s still in testing.
However, it does seem that with the numbers of people staying home, they have taken to baking. The prepared cookie doughs, biscuit doughs, etc. in the refrigerator section of the grocery store are completely wiped out here.
Same, and I couldn’t even find the gluten free flour we have to use for the resident celiac sufferer. I also never bothered to restock my sugar supplies after gingerbread season, so I only have a little of that left. I am hoping I can at least find some yeast, since I have to make my own gluten free bread and I have enough flour for a couple more loaves at least.
Funny thing about small-town groceries – in the first few weeks of COVID-19 all the flour and yeast sold out, but there was plenty of bread. When Hubs ventured to the larger town to deliver stuff my parents needed, he found the opposite there. 
I only have a little yeast (I didn’t think to have him get any, since I expected there would be a giant supply in one of the freezers given Mom’s proclivities, but alas, I have not found anything but a small jar with maybe two loaves’ worth in it), so I’m going to start a batch of sourdough starter today, and see if I can learn how to use that instead.
A quick to-go about here is Mexican pizza. The basics is a biggish flour tortilla, crumbled cheese (solid cheese becomes a mess when frozen, but grated cheese is not grately affected) and the basic bacon crumbles. We have pasta sauce, but it is a bit thin, but whipped with an egg works well, and of course whatever else is available, as well as basil, smoked salt etc. Baked in an oven in a frying pan the sides are turned up a bit so watery stuff like eggs don’t run away, and the cheese gets a nice crust 
That’s funny, because here there is no bread either. The first day I saw that I headed straight for the eggs so I’d have enough to make my own, and had just bought flour. Now I’m running out of flour, am out of yeast. Still have 18 eggs though, and they are getting scarce at the store too.
A little yeast becomes all the yeast you need pretty quickly. Back in my brewing days I saved out some of the “Angels share” for the next batch, and in those days used it for cooking bread as well. Any artisan brewery will have plenty as well.
I still have baking powder where it can be used as well though it is likely older than your DD.
Ah yes, but gluten free baking is a bit trickier since the flour is denser than wheat flour (and also why gluten free bread is, for the most part, not very good ). So the yeast becomes a lot more important, and baking powder just isn’t enough. There’s also the small fact that I am much too lazy to make bread by hand, I have a bread machine that does all the hard work for me. Just need the right ingredients.
No shame in using a machine.
I put the bowl onto a scale that measures down to grams, and have ingredients for my favorite recorded by weight so I don’t need to measure with a cup.
One minute or prep, and I have bread 4 hrs later - or when I wake up if I set a delay. Costs me $0.39 for a 1.5lb loaf.
A small amount of Yeast if fed in the refrig becomes a large amount of yeast very quickly. Yeast is also wild in the environment, though some are better tasting than others. It is not that hard to reinvent Sourdough though experimenting in tiny batches first is recommended.
Same here. And the ironic thing I just got that bread machine about a month ago. I got tired of paying 10 dollars a loaf for frozen gluten free bread that doesn’t last longer than four or five days once thawed, and is smaller than normal bread, and breaks so easily you can’t even have a decent sandwich with it. So as it turns out, it was a lucky thing I bought it. It even has a gluten free cycle!
Back to the original point of the thread, I don’t have any recipes handed down really, but I just saw this. Looks easy enough and has common ingredients! Well, except for maybe brown sugar, but I usually have some because of gingerbread.
Depression era, no eggs, milk, or frosting needed. We added the chocolate chips. Best eaten the next day if you can resist!
My kids love this stuff, we just finished one yesterday. It didn’t last long.
Went looking and found this but it is really a hot topic among preppers also.
I have a double sized bread machine buried from the aforementioned brewing days that I should dig out. great for the hard work and timing but I prefer to bake it separately.
A thing about wild yeast is that it fights its own battles against infection if given a chance so several tries may have some smelly losers, but the rest will manage on their own.
I’ll definitely look into it. As it turns out, my husband just found some! So I’m good for 12 more loaves, I’ll run out of eggs and flour first (and he said the eggs are all gone).
I keep something like this for baking when out of eggs. again can last for years in a cool dry place (I put the bag in a big jar)
Huh. Here’s one on making your own yeast, starting from store-bought yeast. This makes dry yeast, not a starter.
1lb of the best quality yeast (InstaFerm red) is $5 from a commercial restaurant or bakery supply outlet.
