Saturday, February 12, 2011

Made #Lowcarb Bread Today - YESSSSSSS!!


The basic recipe is here but of course I never follow a recipe exactly. In this case, I used Bob's Red Mill baking mix in place of the soy flour, and added 1/2 tsp of salt, plus 1 tsp of sugar.

I put the hot water, yeast, and sugar into the bread machine first, closed the lid, and let the yeast proof. Meanwhile, in a bowl I mixed all the dry ingredients. When the yeast was ready, I added the egg (beaten) and butter, then the dry ingredients, and set the machine for 1#, light loaf.

I read that someone, to avoid the apparent difficulty that many have in trying to remove the loaf from the pan, let the bread machine do most of the work, then removed the dough and baked it in her oven. I might try that the next time. Even with a nonstick breadmaker pan, and even after letting the loaf cool completely, I still had to spend several minutes trying to coax it out.

Another complain was that the bread is spongy. And that is valid, although it isn't nearly as spongy as I thought it might be. I rarely eat bread that isn't toasted since my surgery though, and it was AMAZING toasted with lots of real butter! In fact, our supper tonight was just steak and toast!

I will probably need to make a loaf of this every day. I could only get 8 slices out of it, and between toast and my husband's sandwiches that he loves, I don't know that it will last more than a day. But it is so easy that will be no problem. And at less than 20gN carbs per loaf, it is something that will want to have around anyway!

Monday, February 7, 2011

Recipe: Corn Bran Muffins! #lowcarb

Leelan (my 22MO grandson and I) just made WONDERFUL corn bran mini-muffins! They aren't exactly like corn bread but they're more corny than a typical muffin, not exactly sweet but not exactly savory either - somewhere in-between. This recipe makes 24 of them, and I've got to hurry and write it down before I forget it!

2 large eggs
1/4c heavy cream

Whip together with whisk attachment on mixer until doubled in volume.

1/4t salt
1t baking powder
1/2t baking soda
1/4c polydextrose*
1/4c almond flour
1/4c golden flax meal
1/2c corn bran*
1/4c Ideal granulated sweetener
1/4t granulated onion
1/4t granulated garlic

Blend dry ingredients in a separate bowl with a whisk, then mix into egg/cream mixture on low speed; add
1/2t vanilla extract (probably would be fine without this)
3T melted butter

Continue mixing until thoroughly blended, scraping down sides as needed.

Divide into 24 well-greased mini muffin cups, filling NO MORE THAN 2/3 of the way. These rose a lot, and the tops came off of the ones that overflowed when I was removing them from the pan. (Perhaps if you use paper muffin cups this wouldn't be an issue?)

Bake at 325 until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the biggest muffin comes out clean. In my oven, this was about 25 minutes, but I had started them at 350, then noticed the tops browning too quickly after the first 10 minutes and turned the heat back to 325.

* can be purchased at www.honeyvillegrain.com and are both staples in my cupboard - the polydextrose in sweet baked goods, and the corn bran as part of a good coating for fried chicken and fish and to dust the pan when I make pizza crusts...and now to make these lovely muffins!