Tropicalsenior

I've converted a lot of my recipes from butter to oil, mainly for the moisture and also for the, probably mistaken, idea that they are a bit better for your health. I have converted them just one to one with good results. Years ago, when we first moved to Costa Rica, with the change in the quality of ingredients, the banana bread recipe that I had always used turned out very dry. I decided to try it with oil and I mistakenly used one cup of oil instead of one half cup of butter. It turned out to be the best banana bread that I have ever made and I have used the recipe that way ever since and I am always asked to share it.

I also have a recipe for a wonderful soft white sandwich bread that calls for instant mashed potatoes.

@Kim Shook I'm putting my recipe for Light Brioche Bread here instead of in the bread topic because it is perfect for one loaf of bread and one batch of dinner rolls, cinnamon rolls, hamburger buns or whatever you might want to make with a soft sweeter dough. You don't need to worry about cutting a recipe in half. Just make a variety of things that you could use up in a couple days. I also use it for stuffed buns, calzones and to make small cocktail bread loaves. Knock on wood, I have never had a failure with this bread. My method of mixing is a bit unorthodox but it works for me. This was one loaf of bread and eight small calzones. Only six here because we ate two.

Light Brioche Bread Yield: One Bread Loaf Plus This should probably be called mock brioche because it is neither light nor is it actually brioche. But it is an excellent dough for sandwich bread, hamburger buns, cinnamon rolls or any use that calls for a soft, sweet bread. 3 1/2 cup all-purpose flour 2 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast 1/4 cup sugar 1 teaspoon salt 1/4 cup butter, softened 1 large egg 1/2 cup warm water 3/4 cup warm milk In the bowl of a stand mixer, add the flour, salt, yeast, and sugar. Using the dough hook attachment, mix until the flour is completely aerated. Add the softened butter and mix until the butter is the size of crumbs. Stir in warm water, milk, and egg. You may not need all of the milk mixture. Add only until you have a soft, not sticky dough. Run the mixer on low (I use #2 on my Kitchen Aid) until a dough forms. Knead for 5 minutes, rest for 10 minutes and knead for 10 minutes longer. Remove from the mixing bowl and shape into a ball with a firm top surface. Place it on a cutting board or the surface of your counter and cover with a large bowl. Let the dough rise until it has doubled in size, 1 to 2 hours (See Note). This will give you about 30 to 32 oz. of dough, depending on your flour. I use 15 oz of dough for a loaf of bread and use the rest for dinner rolls, hamburger rolls, cinnamon rolls or whatever else that I decide to bake that day. If you have a scale, weigh each piece to guarantee that they’re all the same size. Shape the smaller rolls first and set to rise while you shape the bread. One way of shaping the loaf is to roll it to an 8 x 12 to 14 inch rectangle and starting at the short end, roll it, jelly roll style, into a loaf shape. Place it seam side down in a greased 8 x 4 inch bread pan. My preferred method of shaping bread dough is to shape it into three equal sized balls and place in a greased 8 x 4 inch bread pan. Plan on at least 45 minutes second rise for bread and at least 30 minutes for smaller items. Cover your bread with plastic wrap or a light damp cloth while it is rising. When the bread is finished with the 2nd rise, gently brush each one with milk. About 15 or 20 minutes before your bread has fully risen the second time, Heat your oven to 350o and place a skillet or metal baking dish on the oven floor. Before the dough goes in, add about 1/2 cup of boiling water to the pan to create steam. This will help keep the bread nice and moist. Bake the loaves for about 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown. Smaller items will bake in 12 to 15 minutes. I like to brush the top of the bread with butter while it is hot out of the oven. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Notes: Giving your dough enough time to rise is crucial in bread baking. Rise times will vary depending on temperature and climate. Be patient and let your dough, not your timer, tell you when it is ready.

They are really pretty good and you can dress them up any way you want. The second year that we were in Costa Rica, I had 30 people to feed for Thanksgiving. Not being a fan of mashed potatoes I had never tried to make them down here, but I know that mashing potatoes for 30 people was going to be a bit of a strength challenge so a friend of ours, a "chef" from Canada was elected to mash the potatoes. He presented me with glue for 30. Then he told me that that was about all I was going to get with the potatoes down here. Not too long after that, we ate in one of the better restaurants here and the mashed potatoes were wonderful. So I asked the chef what his secret was and he invited me back into the kitchen to show me. He pulled a box of these out of the garbage and said that he never used anything else. Since then, if I want mashed potatoes I don't either.

The only potatoes that I can buy here in Costa Rica are the waxy type. Therefore, if I want mashed potatoes I have to fall back on this. Compared to the glue that I would get if I tried the local potatoes, they're not half bad.

Did they ever say anything about soft wheat flour versus hard wheat flour? The only flour that I can get here in Costa Rica is soft wheat and it doesn't seem to thicken worth a darn.

It is. I have used @Duvel's recipe several times and I love it.

I prefer not to think of that part of it or I would have nightmares Imagining the yeast Massacre every time I shove a loaf of bread in the oven.

@Kim Shook this is one of my better efforts. It's my favorite way to shape a loaf. I make three equal size balls, usually about 5 oz a piece. I shape the balls tightly before I place them in the loaf pan so that they have a lot of surface tension. I like it because I never get that slope at the end and my slices are equal size. I can also get better tension on the top of the loaf. Those are small calzones with it.

Most definitely it is. As long as we've got her to blame it on, why not. Bread baking is a very fickle thing. Differences in flour, differences in the humidity in your kitchen or hers and the difference in temperature. Proofing bread cannot be calculated by time. It's different on rainy days than it is on dry days. I find a big difference if I bake in the morning or if I bake in the afternoon. You just have to go by the feel of the dough not by how long it has been proofing. After you have baked a while you get used to how it looks and what it feels like when you poke it. Even after all that, there is no guarantee. Baking bread for me is always a crapshoot.

Lord knows that I am not a bread expert as anyone that has seen my pitiful offerings on this forum can tell you, but this has happened to me several times. First, when I have let it rise too much on the second rise and second when I have not kneaded the bread enough. When I hurt my arm and couldn't use my KA, kneading bread was my physical therapy and sometimes I got a little impatient. I had several rather deficient loaves.

I grew up in the house that my father was born in and we had a bucket just like this in our store room. I never knew what it was for. Now I know that it was how my grandmother made bread. She said that she used to make 10 loaves of bread twice a week. I always wondered how she kneaded that much bread because she was barely four foot 10. She also churned her own butter for all that bread.

I get a Yen for it every once in awhile and I have made it several times and several ways and it just isn't the same as it used to be. I think it is the tuna. It just doesn't seem to be as rich a flavor as it used to be. And I've used all kinds of tuna from the nominal to the "oh my God, that can't be right" price range.

Wow! You passed me up at the very beginning. Everything looks so good.

@TdeV and @Maison Rustique I have posted my recipe for Instant Pot New York Style Cheesecak. I'm now working on the recipe for bread pudding made with leftover cake. But I'm having trouble coming up with a name. It's not bread pudding and it's not exactly cake pudding and leftover pudding just doesn't sound right. Maybe you could give me some suggestions.

Instant Pot New York Style Cheesecake This will make eight small or six larger servings of cheesecake. It will keep for about 5 days in the refrigerator and it will freeze beautifully. Crust 3/4 cup any type of shortbread cookie (crushed) 2 teaspoons sugar 1/4 cup butter melted Filling 16 oz cream cheese, room temperature 1/2 cup sugar 2 tablespoons flour 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 tablespoon lemon peel grated 2 eggs, room temperature 1/4 cup sour cream, room temperature 1 pinch salt Sour Cream Layer (optional) 1/2 cup sour cream 2 teaspoons sugar Crust Add cookies and sugar to the bowl of food processor and pulse a couple of times, until small crumbs form. Melt butter in microwave and add to cookie mixture. Pulse until just combined. Pour cookie mixture into bottom of greased 6 to 8 inch cheesecake pan and press the mixture firmly into the bottom of the pan and no more than one inch up along the sides. Place pan with crust into freezer for 20 minutes while you mix up the filling. Filling Blend together cream cheese, sugar, flour, grated peels, salt and vanilla extract until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, lightly mixing until just combined. Do not over mix the eggs. Gently stir in the sour cream. Pour filling into the pan, on top of the crust. Add 1 1/2 cups of water to the bottom of your pressur cooker and place a trivet inside the pot. Cover the cheesecake first with a paper towel and then with a piece of aluminum foil and loosely secure the foil. Place cheesecake into pressure cooker. Lock on lid and close Pressure Valve. Cook at High Pressure for 35 to 45* minutes. Allow a 20 minute natural release. After all pressure has been released, open pressure cooker and leave the cake the cooker. Remove the foil and paper towel. Tilt the cheesecake pan and dab off any liquid that may have accumulated. Sour Cream Layer (optional) Whisk together the sour cream and sugar and then spread on the hot cheesecake. Let cool inside the pressure cooker for at least one hour. Tightly cover and place in refrigerator overnight. Cheesecake can be removed from pan after an hour in the refrigerator. Note: the gentler that you treat the ingredients, the denser the cake will be. If you want a creamier cheesecake whip the cream cheese sugar and sour cream together, but never whip in the eggs. This will cause air bubbles in the cake that you do not want! *35 minutes cook time will give you a creamy cheesecake. I like a slightly firmer cheesecake so I generally set mine on high for 45 minutes. I have made this quite a few times now and it has never failed. And yes, it is much better in the IP than in the oven. It never cracks, and it never falls, and I don't have to babysit it in the IP. I just set it and forget it until it's done

It's interesting to see that so many have mentioned the way that our parents cooked liver. They sliced it so thin and then cooked it until it was hard and dry. My ex-mother-in-law was the worst. You could have taken the liver that she cooked and resoled your shoes. You would have only had to have done it once. I used to hate liver until I finally had it medium rare and it was a life changer.

They sell the cubes here in only chicken or beef flavor. Unfortunately, with the humidity here, within just a week they turn into gummy little squares that are almost impossible to unwrap. But they have the powder in envelopes in quite a few flavors. These are the three that I have on hand right now. I particularly like the tomato cubes that we used to get in Mexico. I always came back with a few packages of that. I keep looking here but no luck.

I'm paying about $3.50 USD here in Costa Rica, and I thought I was having to pay a lot. I don't know for sure but I would suspect that most of these are from caged hens. If I can, I try to buy from a vendor at the Farmers Market that I have known for years and his chickens are all free range. His eggs are always larger and fresher and cost about $3 a dozen.

I will be more than happy to share recipes as soon as I get them in a form that I can put on the Recipe Gullet. Just out of curiosity, do you have my recipe for cheesecake that I posted on the instant pot topic? I thought I had posted it in recipes but I can't find it. If you don't have it, I will post it there, too. It is probably one of the easiest cheesecake that I have ever made because it uses just Pantry items and it has never failed.

What a great idea @ElsieD. Thank you. With just two in the house for years, I've had to come up with a lot of small desserts. I've amassed quite a collection of small baking items. I have a six and a seven inch springform pan that I use to make cheesecake in my instant pot. And I bake my cakes in 8 inch square glass pans that have snap on plastic lids. For muffins, I love these cute little silicone molds that are only two and a half inches in diameter. If I cut most muffin recipes in half, I get 12 to 18 nice little muffins. I have a Hamilton Beach countertop convection oven that I use for all my baking. I use my big oven to store cast iron skillets and some cookie sheets. I used it Monday for the first time in 3 years to bake some baguettes because it goes to 500°. My little one only goes to 425° but it is perfect for small baking. I would never bake as much as I do if I had to use the big oven all the time. When I read recipes now, I just automatically calculate if I can cut it in half and if the quantity will fit in my small cake pan or even a loaf pan. Sometimes if I wind up with extra batter I bake it in a little 3x5 loaf pan and that is Cooks treat. There are still times that I wind up with leftover cake and when that happens I developed a recipe for a bread pudding type dessert that I make in my instant pot. It's a great way to use up cake, cinnamon rolls, or a quick bread. It's easy to make and you don't get tired of it because it is always something different. This pudding was last week's cinnamon rolls made with an eggnog type custard. Served with a homemade butterscotch sauce, it was delicious.

I really don't know. I use a teaspoon and a half to four cups of flour. I thought maybe the salt conversion was off because I use sea salt instead of the kosher salt that it calls for. But according to my salt conversion chart I should be using less sea salt.

Okay, I think I'm almost there. 4 days in the refrigerator, 8 hours rise on the counter, baked at 500° for 30 minutes. I'm happy with it. I think it needs just a bit more salt for flavor.

Me too, but the top blew completely off my electric pressure cooker and I had pork chunks and broth all over my kitchen. My kitchen is 25' by 20' and it managed to hit every surface, including me. It sounded like a bomb had gone off.