Saturday, November 5, 2011

Jam tart day



That's today! Today is jam tart day. Or, more specifically, jam tart for dinner day. This started with an early morning text session with shannon- or was that during my afternoon nap?- about her failed pie crust. The night before, I had told her that making pie dough the day before would not be a problem. It's never been a problem for me, or really anyone else in the history of the planet. Apparently none of those people had ever made pie dough with straight whole wheat pastry flour. Which, we now know, does not work. Don't do it. But the whole thing got me thinking about flour. I am not a huge fan/user of whole wheat flour, for the same reason that I put salt and butter in everything- I like food to taste good. It then occurred to me that perhaps i could make something tasty and whole wheaty. So I did. It started off with salt and butter, so I knew I was on the right track....




This is the top half, with a hole cut in it


And then the jam goes on the bottom, gets topped with the ring
Thumb print cookies with the left over dough


This recipe is from 101cookbooks, one of my favorite blogs. I chose marion berry jam at the insistence of my mother, with whom I was talking on the phone to while grocery shopping.

Jam Tarts

1 c finely ground cornmeal
1 c whole wheat pastry flour
2 c flour
1.5 t salt
2 t baking powder
3 T sugar
1 cup butter, very cold, cubed
1.5 c milk
1 egg, white only
1/3 c jam, or so

Start with the dry ingredients in a big bowl, cornmeal and all. If you have a food processor, you're stoked- I did not, as usual I was cutting in butter with my hands. Once the butter is nicely distributed, add in the milk, about half at a time, and work the dough into a ball. I had to turn it out onto the counter to accomplish this. Roll it out with what ever you got- a fancy rolling pin if you're some people, a reusable coffee cup if you're me. About a 1/3 inch thick. You need 2 slightly different sized round things now ( if you can't manage different sizes, the same size would totally be fine) to cut out the circles. Half slightly larger for the bottom, half slightly smaller for the top. Cut a small round out of the tops. Lay out the bottoms on a baking sheet- I didn't grease mine because the spray was empty but knock yourself out- and put a plop of jam in the middle. Get your egg white in a bowl and whip a bit with a fork, then put a bit around the edge of the bottom ring with your finger ( or a fancy pastry brush, if you're so inclined) then put the doughnut lid on. More egg on top of that, then in the oven. 400 degrees, time totally dependent on how big you made them. The jam should be bubbly, they should not jiggle if you poke them in the side, and you should be able to life them up and see the nice, brown bottom. Cool on a wire rack. ( or an inverted broccoli steamer, your choice).

In other news, I stayed up waaay too late last night, retouching pictures. I was pleased to be able to save these two, taken in such low light that I thought they were goners. 


     
Oh, Lily with her diaper off! It just doesn't get any better than that!

And halloween happened at some point in there, too. I didn't do much, just hit the space room with whit and alisha, as well as nick from savoy and, as it turned out, peter's new roommate, whose name I just can't remember (and by remember I mean look up on facebook, of course.)