Baked Oatmeal Recipe

Here is one of our most popular breakfast dishes. Even people who normally don't care for oatmeal as for a second helping. The fruit in the dish can be altered according to availability. Make a double batch and enjoy leftovers for breakfast for several days.

Baked Oatmeal
Pre-heat oven to 350
3 cups milk
½ cup brown sugar
2 tbs butter
Bring these 3 ingredients to a boil in a pot on stove top
While these are coming to a boil mix the following in a bowl:
2 tsp cinnamon
1 ½ cups oats (not the instant kind)
2 granny smith apples cubed and chopped
¾ cup raisins
¼ cup dried cranberries
¾ cup chopped nuts

Spray a 9 inch square pan with non-stick coating
Put dry mix into pan and then pour boiling milk mixture over dry mix
Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes

Moist Apple Buttermilk Bread

This is a new recipe I tried because of the billions of pounds of apples we have this year (okay, maybe a SLIGHT exaggeration). I pretty much followed this recipe to the "T" as far as ingredients go. However, I let the butter/sugar mixture sit for about 45 minutes, stirring intermittently. I learned that little trick from a recipe in Cook's Illustrated, which claimed that this allows for a caramelizing to take place which lends a richer taste and moister product. I believe it works and use it when making any dessert bread and also with some cookies.

Ingredients:
3 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup brown sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup buttermilk
1 1/2 cups apples (I used what I had-- I don't know what kind we have on the trees, but they are very sweet) chopped & cored (I leave the peels on as I think it improves the taste)
1/2 cup nuts
1 teaspoon orange zest

Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and set aside.

Cream butter and both sugars (let sit if you like, stirring every 10 minutes for 30 minutes or so)

Add eggs to creamed mixture, beating well after each addition.

Alternate adding buttermilk and flour mixture to sugar/butter/egg mix.

Stir in apples, nuts, and zest.

pour into two greased and floured loaf pans (pick larger pans for a smaller slice and smaller pans for a taller slice)

Bake at 350 for 45-60 minutes, until knife inserted in center of loaf comes out clean. Invert onto wire rack and cool before storing. Freezes well, wrap in parchment before wrapping in foil.

No, THIS is really lazy.... (and a rhubarb punch recipe)

I cannot believe it has been a year since my last good intention to keep this blog going. Something about July must kick-in my urge to post....

Yes, it's the rainy season AGAIN. We had a great and rainy June, which means the fruit trees have gone nuts. Because it's been so much cooler this year we're experiencing a later bloom time for many of our plants. So far I've harvested lots of rhubarb, herbs, spinach, & radishes. Which has allowed me to make some rhubarb jam, and some excellent eggs Florentine.

We added another 9 chickens to the Cottonwood Inn flock back in August of last year. Lucille passed away in March, and has left a big hole in flock hierarchy. I would have liked to get more girls this spring, but have decided to wait until the projected "coop expansion" finally occurs. When that finally happens we will be getting ducks as well. Yay!

It's the 4th this weekend, so we are packed to the teeth and looking forward to hitting the Craft Fair that is taking place in Kit Carson park. Also a couple of interesting looking art openings, one at The Stables Gallery.

It's heating up finally-- it looks like 79 degrees and it's only 10 after noon! Two of the hens are out in the back courtyard right now, beating the heat by wrecking my mint garden. I don't have the heart to kick them out as they are making wonderful happy clucking noises.

Here is a great recipe I received from a guest who is also a rhubarb lover:

Rhubarb Punch

Mix the following 3 ingredients:

2 lbs roughly chopped rhubarb
4 entire cloves
1 cup water

bring the above to a boil on high and then reduce to med/low and cover.,
simmer for 25 minutes stirring as needed,
remove from heat and sieve out juice
add 1/4 cup sugar and mix until dissolved and refrigerate until cool.

This is your base and should yield about 3 cups of juice.

Mix this in a large bowl with ginger ale to taste. Add about 1 cup of OJ and some sliced strawberries and oranges.

This is great for a hot day and wonderful for the 4th of July.