7-Up Biscuits

7-Up Biscuits hot from the oven

I saved the 7 Up Biscuits recipe one of my friends posted - it had been repeatedly shared on Facebook. I shared it to my wall (or whatever the heck it's called now) so I could access it easily because they sounded so simple and yummy.  I am not a good biscuit baker.  I don't know why, but I just have issues with biscuits.  They don't rise, they aren't flaky or soft, they are too dense...all kinds of problems likely caused by over-use of egg wash and over working the dough.  I have not, however, tried biscuits from scratch for a couple of years.  Saved this recipe in case I wanted to change my mind. (I know Bisquick base is not baking from scratch - sue me, I don't care - if it doesn't come out of a can I reserve the right to call it baking from scratch)

I've been working on cookies for 4 days now.  Two days of baking, icing preparation, base coats, and the beginning of some of the detail work.  (I still have a lot to go)  When my thin piped lines started consistently breaking this morning I decided I needed a break.  It's Saturday morning (well, okay, it's really "barely" Saturday afternoon...but my husband and son didn't get up until after 11:00...so it's still morning for them - I've been up since 7:30ish).  I decided to make the 7-Up Biscuits in hopes that something that appears quite simple really is!

I'd bought a bottle of 7-Up (because the teen drinks Sprite and I was hesitant to substitute...so 7-Up it was!) and some sour cream...knew I had Bisquick and butter...and that's all there is to it.

My two comments regarding this recipe are:
1.  Sounds easy - makes a freaking mess!
2.  Possibly the best biscuits I've ever eaten - worth the mess!

This was AFTER I had washed my hands
once...and was now patting the remnants
for cutting...you end up with doughy monster hands!

The Facebook post/picture said it was a difficult-to-find recipe.  I'd heard of 7-Up cakes, but never 7-Up biscuits.  I'll share my experience...with some additional steps I found helpful, not mentioned in the original post.

7-Up Biscuits
From Tonja Busch Facebook Post

Ingredients:

4 cups Bisquick Baking Mix
1 cup sour cream (I used regular - not reduced fat)
1 cup 7-Up
1/2 cup melted butter (real butter - it was delicious)

Extra Bisquick for countertop

Method:

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

I used a 9x13 glass (Pyrex) baking dish (I've always been told not to bake above 375 in a glass dish but the picture in the post showed them made in a glass dish so I hoped my old-school info was wrong and that I wouldn't end up with an explosion of glass in the oven...which, of course, I did not have).

I placed the stick of butter into the glass dish and microwaved it for two 30-second intervals sitting on the rack, turning dish before second interval.  Remove and let it be ready for you when you get the dough prepped.  It needs to be right next to the dough - it is not a sturdy dough.

Mix Bisquick, sour cream and 7-Up in mixing bowl until the ingredients are a sticky mess. (my words).  Do not over-mix. (NOTE ADDED 5/27/2013...another blogger recommends cutting the sour cream into Bisquick and THEN adding the 7-Up.  If anyone has any suggestions on this method, please comment)

Sticky, sticky dough - in retrospect I might have let
the sour cream come to room temperature.
It was quite hard to mix in evenly

Sprinkle extra Bisquick onto counter top and gently knead and fold dough until coated with baking mix.  Don't over-work.  It's a sticky mess.  Just get to the part where you can gently pat dough into your desired shape (I used a square cutter so I patted into a rectangle).  I tried to dip my cutter into Bisquick to help release it for transfer.  I don't think there's enough Bisquick in the world to make them release easily.  I found it easiest to let the pieces stick to the cutter, pull away the excess, and move the pieces individually to the pan.  You just place them on top of the melted butter.  I ended up with enough remnants to re-pat and cut a total of 13 biscuits (the end two were "half size").  A baker's dozen - nice.

Ready to go into oven - they look a mess - but all turns out well!

As you can see - gunky cutter.
I really appreciate a granite counter top
and a bench scraper when I make this
kind of mess!

Bake for 12-15 minutes or until brown at 425 degrees.  I baked 17 minutes.  I set the timer for 12 minutes - at the 10 minute mark I knew they would need more than that so I added 3 minutes.  Then, they didn't look very brown, at 15 minutes, so I added 2 more minutes...as Goldilocks says, they were "just right" at 17 minutes in my oven, in a glass dish.  Much of the cook time depends on the type of pan you use.  The original post said to use a cookie sheet pan or 9x13 casserole dish.  Baking times for the two of those are really different.  Keep an eye on your biscuits!

The house smelled awesome while they were baking - I could smell the richness of the sourcream and butter and the 7-Up did its' thing by making the biscuits light and fluffy.

You can see the bubbly butter when the biscuits come out of the oven.

I let them sit in the pan on the cool cook top while I fried up some sausage pieces and prepped some fruit for the men.  They came out of the pan very easily with a silicone pancake turner.

All that butter makes for easy release from pan!

Mr. Flip Flop gave the highest compliment..."these taste almost as good as my Mom's".  For Ms. Makes-a-Bad-Biscuit, that was high praise indeed!!!  I literally clapped my hands in glee.

The teen, who doesn't like to try new things, declined biscuits and sausage.  He was leery of the entire "experiment"...who the heck puts soda water in biscuits?  Well, from now on, guess we do!  I brought him a "bite" and encourage him to try it and he, hesitantly and with "a look" did so.  He smiled.  He said "I'll take some!"  Duh...of course he will.

Mr. Flip Flop had his with a berry-blend jam, sausage, and a bowl of watermelon.  He polished off two and went back for two more.  The teen went "no jelly or jam" and had sausage and a bowl of sliced apples (got to get something healthy inside him).  I went for just biscuits and apple butter.  DELISH!  You don't need to butter these biscuits - they have absorbed the entire 1/2 cup of butter in the baking process (and it bubbled up around them, getting the sides as well).  The sour cream also adds enough of that awesome mouth feel to negate further addition of butter.

These are company-good biscuits.  I will be keeping some 7-Up on hand whenever we have visitors or I plan a special breakfast.  These will definitely be part of it from now on!

Bon Appetit, Y'all!!!

BLUEBERRY CREAM CHEESE BREAD

I have been away for quite a while - my Mom is in the hospital, and has been since mid-September.  Baking and doing fun things has really been placed on the back-burner.  This has been one of the first cooking/baking endeavors in weeks.  It is a worthy project for a return to blogging!

I found this recipe online several months ago and pinned it on my Pinterest Board of recipes I'd like to try.  It just looked so yummy and I finally got around to making it.  Despite it taking a boatload of mixing bowls, spatulas, measuring cups, and measuring spoons - I'm definitely happy with the outcome.  Being a first try, I didn't change the recipe.  I did have to bake it longer.  It simply was not done at the recommended time.  So, the recipe I've typed below includes that note...and a few other of my thoughts and additional instructions (in italics usually).

I found the recipe at Tasty Kitchen and encourage you to link back to the site and scope out their many yummy recipes.  This one was posted by Savannah in the Breads section.  In my opinion, it is more like a cake - and was eaten with a fork by my family.  We also liked it after it was at room temperature...everything firmed up nicely and it was easier to slice.  The recipe said prep time was 20 minutes...well, she's a better cook than me.  It took me over 50 minutes to pull this together and get it in the oven.  Of course, I had to stop for many photos...maybe that was the problem.

So, here it is...lots of effort, but worth it for a special breakfast or brunch.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Bread
by Savannah at Tasty Kitchen: A Happy Recipe Community

INGREDIENTS:

For the Bread Batter:

1/2 cup butter (I used salted)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 egg yolks
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 cups Blueberries (up to 2 cups she said - I used a pint)
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
2 egg whites
1/4 cup white granulated sugar

For the Filling:

8 ounces, weight, Cream Cheese (softened)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon flour
1 whole egg
1 tablespoon Orange zest

For the Glaze:

2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon water

METHOD:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Filling:
In a medium bowl, combine cream cheese, sugar, 1 tablespoon flour, whole egg, and orange zest; beat until smooth.  Set aside.

Glaze:
Stir together the glaze ingredients (2 Tbsp sugar, 1/2 tsp vanilla, 1 tsp water) and set aside.

Bread:
Cream butter and 1/2 cup sugar until fluffy.  Add salt and vanilla.  Add egg yolks (be sure to save the egg whites for later) to the sugar mixture; beat until creamy.  Set aside.
In another bowl, combine 1 1/2 cups flour and 1 tsp baking powder.  Add this to the butter and sugar mixture, alternating with milk (1/3 four, 1/2 milk, 1/3 flour, 1/2 milk, last third of flour.  Very stiff batter.)
In another bowl, coat blueberries with 1 tablespoon flour and add them to the batter. (Note - when I do this again, I'm changing this to the last addition - I squished many berries by adding them to such a dense batter - which is lightened in the next step with egg whites...it makes sense to me to add them at the end.  However, I followed recipe and added them at this point).
In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks form.  Add 1/4 cup sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, and beat until stiff peaks form.  Fold egg whites into batter.

Putting it into pan:
Pour 1/2 of the blueberry batter (or a little less) into a floured and greased pan.  Smooth it with a spatula.
Layer the filling over the batter - smooth it with a spatula.
Finish with the remainder of batter - carefully smoothing to the edge of the pan.  This will create a layer of "cheesecake" between the blueberry bread layers.
Pour glaze over top of UNBAKED loaf and place in preheated 350 degree oven for 55-60 minutes.
(As stated above, mine took longer to bake - a total of 1 hour 15 minutes and it was perfect)

I allowed the bread to cool 20 minutes in the pan on a rack.  I turned it out onto a tray and allowed it to firm up for another 15-20 minutes or so...then we couldn't wait any longer to try it. 

It was still crumbly (and firmed up much more within a few hours).  Very, very delicious!  We had large slabs with our coffee.  Not overly sweet but, a bit more cake-like than bread-like to me.  I just had another piece with coffee while I wrote this post.  Excellent the next day as well!!!

Bon Appetit, Y'all!!!

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OUTSIDE-IN BURGERS...on homemade buns!

Wednesday night's dinner plan was simply hamburgers because I'd been busy doing my "day job" most of the day.  Then I decided I'd make a batch of the homemade hamburger buns like I did last month (oh so freaking delicious and not too time consuming). 

THEN I decided to push the envelope a bit. (not a lot, we're not big envelope pushers around here)
The teen likes me to stuff his ground beef with chopped green onions before I make the burger patty and cook it... and while I was chopping the green onions and slicing some pickles I started thinking about stuffing the patties with some chopped up fried bacon and some cheese too. 

Sort of an outside-in or inside-out burger. 

Seasoned with some KC Masterpiece BBQ rub on one side and some season pepper on the other - yum, yum - easy to cook in a grill pan.

It turned out great!  (well, I did have cheese leakage from one patty...which burned on the bottom of the pan - but all-in-all really darn good)

Tonight was a casual dinner - burgers, deviled eggs, Fritos, and slices of apple...all made just a trifle more special with homemade yeasty burger buns and a different hamburger patty with goodies tucked inside.

Bon Appetit, Y'all!

SHARED WITH:

FRENCH BREAD

Spaghetti for dinner - nothing but a loaf of sandwich bread in the house - no desire to go to the store.  What's a woman to do?  Well, she quickly looks for online bread recipes that don't look too challenging and don't take half a day to make.  I decided to make my first attempt at baking a loaf of French Bread.  The recipe looked quite similar to pizza dough in my humble opinion...just put together differently.  This would also give me the opportunity to try out my new big old package of Instant Yeast that I purchased for less than half the price of Active Dry Yeast.  I was feeling brave...and figured if it flopped, I was home alone, no one was expecting homemade bread, and what would be would be...the old Que Sera Sera!

Every darn recipe I found was for 2 loaves...I didn't have the time nor desire to have two loaves of bread hanging around...I'd already spent part of the day making Madeleines and I was splurging with more white flour with this recipe...so I was brave and just halved the recipe down the middle (that doesn't always work when baking).

The result?  Tasted great - looked "rustic"....or as the teen said "Mom, its skin split"...uh, thanks, I hadn't noticed ;-p

Anyway, we managed to finish off half the loaf between us at dinner so I must have done something right.  The crust was chewy and the insides just the way you want it - not too soft and not too hard...Goldilocks would say "jussst right"!

Here's how I did it.

FRENCH BREAD
adapted from www.breadworld.com

Ingredients:

3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons warm water
2 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast
1/2 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil plus extra for rising bowl
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
2 1/2 to 2 3/4 cups flour
Cornmeal for pan
1 egg white beaten with 1 tablespoon water - egg wash

Method:

In bowl of stand mixer, with dough hook attached, add warm water, oil, salt, yeast, and flour.  Out of habit I sprinkled the yeast on the water...but you apparently don't have to do that with instant yeast.  No proofing required.
Allow stand mixer to knead dough until smooth and elastic (about 5-6 minutes is how long mine took).  If you are doing it by hand then 6 to 8 minutes of kneading recommended on a floured surface.
Place in an oiled bowl, turning to grease top.  Cover with plastic wrap and allow to rise in warm draft free place until doubled in size.  Anywhere form 30 to 45 minutes.  I left mine for an hour because I was busy.  It was more than doubled.

Punch dough down.  On floured surface, roll to 15x10 inch oval.  Roll up along the long side to make a loaf.  Pinch seams and ends to seal; taper ends.

Place seam side down on large greased baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal (I used a Baking Mat and sprinkled corn meal on it).  Cover with a clean cloth and let rise in warm draft free place until doubled in size - about 30 to 45 minutes.

On the sheet and ready to rise

Wasn't really double but it looked right to me - fat and fluffy

Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.  Brush loaf with egg wash.  With a sharp knife, make some diagonal cuts about 1/4 inch deep on top of loaf. 

Bake for about 25 minutes or until loaf sounds hollow when lightly tapped with a wooden spoon.  Remove from sheet and cool on wire rack.

I guess this is not a bad first attempt.  I loved it.  The teen said the slices that I toasted for garlic bread to go with the spaghetti were too hard on the outside for his tastes...but that the inside was great.  Bless his heart, the boy just doesn't like crunchy food.  I usually slice and toast Bolillos for garlic bread - they are very soft and airy...wonder if I could make those???  I always buy them at HEB and they are very cheap...but they've started putting them in a big self-service bin and all I can imagine is the tons of people opening the bin, leaning over and potentially touching my food.  Eek.  I'll find a recipe!

Bon Appetit, Y'all!!!

BRAIDED VANILLA BEAN-CINNAMON BREAD

I've had this recipe on my mind for quite some time.  I found a recipe that looked and sounded good...but, of course, I wanted to make only one loaf...and I wanted to use some whole grain flour.  Then I ran into the problem of being out of milk - so I used Half and Half...it just got to the point that it was a totally new recipe before I was finished!

Here's how it happened....

Braided Cinnamon Bread
Based primarily on a recipe from Diana's Desserts

Ingredients:

Dough

2 cups white whole wheat flour
2 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose flour (plus more for kneading)
1 1/4 cup Half and Half - warmed to 115 degrees
3/4 cup granulated white sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons Quick Rise Yeast
1 large egg - room temperature
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
3 tablespoons butter, melted and slightly cooled
1 1/2 teaspoons natural vanilla bean paste

Cinnamon-Sugar Filling

1/2  cup butter, melted
3/4 cup light brown sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 egg, beaten with a bit of water - for brushing top of loaf

Glaze

1 1/4 cups sifted confectioners sugar
2 tablespoons Half and Half
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste

Method:

Dough:

Dissolve yeast in 1/2 cup warm Half and Half and 1 tablespoon of the sugar.  Allow to sit for about 5 minutes. (Mine didn't get very bubbly - maybe it didn't like that it was Half and Half instead of milk)

In the bowl of a stand mixer, mix the remaining Half and Half, sugar, egg, salt, the melted butter and a small amount of flour.  Beat until smooth with paddle attachment.

Add the yeast mixture and all but 1/2 cup of the remaining flour, replace the paddle attachment with a dough hook and allow it to knead for you until it is pulled away from the sides.  Add flour as needed to reduce stickiness and allow the dough to come together on the hook and away from the side.  (I used all the flour and actually had to add a couple of tablespoons more.)

Remove dough from hook and sprinkle with a bit of flour, cover the bowl with a cloth and allow it to rise in a warm place until it has doubled in bulk (2 hours).

Turn dough onto a lightly floured counter or board and knead until smooth.

Divide dough into three equal parts (each piece of dough weighed about 15 ounces!). 

Roll each part into a long rectangle (mine were 15 inches long by 8 inches wide).

Filling:

Brush melted butter over each rectangle to cover.

then sprinkle with the cinnamon and sugar (I combined the two before sprinkling).  You can add raisins or nuts if you desire - or even chopped dried fruit.

To Assemble:

Roll each rectangle of dough into a long rope, seam side down. 

Braid ropes together and seal ends by tucking under and pinching. 

Place braid on a cookie sheet on parchment paper or on a Silpat.  (I worked directly on the baking sheet so I didn't have to move it)  Cover and let rise again until doubled in bulk (this is a heavy loaf!).  This rising took about 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

To Bake:

Brush top of loaf with egg wash and bake in a preheated oven at 375 degrees Fahrenheit for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.  I baked mine for 18 minutes.  That's what the original recipe said to do.  I think I would have reduced it to 325 or 350 and cooked for longer.  The bread between the cross-overs looks a bit "doughy" still - but it was getting too brown to leave it in longer.  Lower and slower would likely have done the trick.

Some of my filling leaked out so I was glad to have had a Silpat underneath the loaf.

Allow to cool completely before frosting with a glaze.

Glaze:

Whisk together confectioners sugar, vanilla bean paste, and Half and Half until smooth.  Drizzle over completely cooled loaf.

Oh my goodness - I can't say how delicious my house smells.  Yeasty bread...cinnamon...vanilla...just the best smells in the world.

I'm thinking I'll allow it to cool until I go to bed and I'll glaze it in the morning before serving for breakfast (hmmm...wonder if it will make it until morning...maybe a midnight snack?  Yep - overnight is not going to happen - I can tell already)

Because of all of the rising times it isn't something I would get up early enough to make fresh for breakfast.  I'd have to get up at dawn...or earlier...and that is just NOT going to happen!  I get up early to cook on Thanksgiving morning and Christmas morning and that is IT! 

This, however, does work quite nicely with a cup of decaf before bed (I know I'll regret it later and have to do extra Zumba to pay for the badness).  The taste is delicious - the buttery cinnamon filling is wonderful...I'm not happy with the pockets of undercooked dough - but you know what - I didn't leave a bite on my plate so can't say it bothered me too much!  Next time, though, slower and lower.
It's yummy - I'll surely make it again!

Bon Appetit, Y'all!


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