Honey Wheat Bread

This weekend, Mai and I made home made butter with fresh cow's milk.  The butter turned out beautiful but we quickly discovered we needed some fresh baked bread to go with it!  

Here are the ingredients:

2 1/4 teaspoons yeast
3/4 cup warm water
3/4 cup warm milk
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons honey
2 cups white flour
2 cup whole wheat flour

In your mixer, add the warm water and yeast.  Let that sit a few minutes to let the yeast activate.  You will know when the yeast is active because it will bubble and/or foam. 

Once the yeast is active, add the salt, sugar, milk, honey and white flour.  Mix together, adding the remaining flour a little at a time.

The dough will form on the dough hook.  When it balls up, the dough is ready.  Cover with a clean towel and let it rise in a warm spot - about 1 hour.

Punch the dough down and let it rise again-another hour.

Punch down again and put into a loaf pan, sprayed with PAM.  Let it rise another 20 min or so. 

Brush with melted butter and bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes.

Enjoy!

Homemade Ice Cream

This recipe is listed on Pamela's Heavenly Treats

Last month my mother gave me an ice cream machine and I have been dying to try it!  I love watching Iron Chef America and Chopped when the judges make a big deal about the chef going to the ice cream machine.  This little machine helps me imagine that it is me going to the ice cream machine and that Alex Guarnaschelli, Marcus Samuelsson, and Geoffrey Zakarian rave over the bacon ice cream I have concocted....................

OK, back to reality!  Let's start by making a simple vanilla ice cream.  Here are the ingredients:

1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1/2 cup whole milk
1/4 cup honey
3 tablespoons brown sugar
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise and scraped
2 egg yolks
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
Pinch of salt

Heat the cream, milk, honey, sugar, salt and vanilla bean in a sauce pan until very hot, but not boiling.

In a separate bowl, whisk the egg yolks.  Take 1/4 cup of the hot cream mixture and whisk that into the eggs.  Make sure you whisk constantly or you will cook your egg........

Stir the egg mixture into the cream mixture.  Remove from heat.  Strain with a fine mesh strainer to remove vanilla bean and any other solid particles you may have in your ice cream base.

Put the mixture in an ice bath (a bowl sitting on top of another bowl full of ice)

Refrigerate until cold.  When that is cold, assemble your ice cream machine.  I had to make sure my ice cream base was frozen.  I had put it in the freezer the night before.

When your ice cream machine is together, slowly pour the ice cream base into the machine and turn it on.  It is that easy!

The paddle turns and the mixture will thicken.  When the paddle slows down and the mixture is thick, turn off the machine and put the ice cream in a bowl, placing it in the freezer.

Allow that to freeze for an hour or so before serving.

Enjoy!

Honey Citrus Lip Balm

This recipe is listed on The Chicken Chick

My new fascination with creating concoctions led me to try making lip balm.  It turned out great!  Here are the ingredients:

1/2 cup Illipe Butter
1/2 cup Beeswax
1 cup Calendula Infused Oil
Lemon Essential Oil - 4-5 drops
Orange Essential Oil - 8-10 drops
1 tablespoon honey
Liquid from 3 Vitamin E capsules

First, let me start by saying the the ingredients are completely interchangeable.  If you don't have illipe butter, you can substitute jojoba or cocoa butter.  You don't have to use calendula infused oil.  You can use almond oil, coconut oil, grapeseed oil or olive oil.  I used calendula infused oil because of its soothing properties.

To begin, melt the beeswax and butter in a double boiler.

When that is melted add the infused oil, liquid from the vitamin E capsules, honey and essential oils.  Stir all of that together and pour into your containers.  I got these at http://mountainroseherbs.com/.

It's that easy!  If you like your lip balm a little softer, decrease the amount of beeswax.  Have fun experimenting with it! 

This recipe is featured on Chic and Craft Party!