Vegan Coffee Rolls

I've been on an eggless/vegan kick recently. Honestly the idea of eggs is freaking me out slightly. I never really enjoyed making or eating eggs, but now I'm more inclined to bake without them than with them if I can.

We have a family recipe for Coffee Rolls, that is similar to this recipe. However I wanted to work with a separate recipe than my families, because I wanted these rolls to not be a vegan version of something great, I wanted this recipe to be great on its own.

Vegan Coffee Rolls
prep time:  3 1/2 hours
cook time: 15 minutes
oven temp: 400 degrees
yeilds: 35 coffee rolls

1 package dry yeast
1/2 cup warm water
1 cup soy milk (I used light soy because that is what I had.)
3 cups flour plus 1/4 cup flour for kneading
1/4 cup earth promise vegan butter
3 Tbsp sugar**
1 Tbsp ground flax seeds
3 Tbsp water
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 Tbsp earth promise vegan butter
1 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon

 It does say that this recipe will take 3 1/2 hours from start to finish, and yes that is true but a lot of it is resting and rising time. This recipe is not as intense as it seems from first look. So I'd definitely recommend trying it.

Dissolve the entire package of dry yeast in warm water, then add the soy milk and stir. Add 1 cup of flour to the yeast and soy milk mixture-you are making a yeast sponge. Let sit for 30 minutes.

Cream the vegan butter, and sugar. Microwave the flax seeds with the 3 Tbsp water for 30 seconds until it forms a gummy texture. Add the flax seeds to the creamed butter and sugar, stir in the salt. 

Once the yeast sponge has sat for 30 minutes mix in the vegan butter, sugar and flax seed mixture. Add 2 additional cups of flour to make the dough soft. Turn out onto your kneading surface. I needed an extra 1/4 cup of flour to get my dough to the correct consistency, but just work your dough slowly until it is soft and no longer sticky.

Place the dough into a greased bowl, and put in a warmed oven, let the dough rise for about an hour. The oven should not be on. You can warm the oven prior to placing the bowl in by having the oven on 100 degrees for about 5 minutes. The dough should about double in size.

While the dough is rising you want to make the filling. Fork the 1/2 Tbsp vegan butter, sugar and cinnamon in a bowl. It will end up being the consistency of sand.

Punch the dough down, and let it rest for 5 to 10 minutes. Roll out the dough into a rectangle, should be about 12 inches by 18 inches. Spread the cinnamon mixture over the entire surface. Roll the dough tightly. Cut into about inch width pieces and place into a greased muffin pan. Let the rolls rise in the muffin tin for another hour.  

Bake at 400 degrees for about 15 minutes until golden brown. Let sit in the muffin tins for a few minutes then turn out onto cooling racks, and let cool.

**Please note that if you are making this recipe for someone who is vegan you should either check with them on if they eat refined sugar, or buy vegan sugar.

Recipe variations: The coffee rolls that my mom makes have raisins in the filling, so if you like raisins you could always add this to the filling. I prepared half the recipe without raisins and half with. I added 1/8 cup of raisins to the filling ingredients. You can also top these rolls with icing, but I don't think they need that extra sweetness.

Be careful, as you can see above. One of mine stayed in the oven for a minute or two too long, and these ended up going down the drain. The caramelizing of the sugar and cinnamon creates this sticky goodness, but it will burn if you leave the rolls in too long.

I really liked these coffee rolls, just enough sweetness paired with the yeast dough, makes them perfect for a snack or breakfast.

Odwalla Chewy Nut Bar

Another review...another bar...but there was a coupon a few weeks ago for like 55 cents off of one Odwalla Bar. So even though I wouldn't normally reach for an Odwalla bar I went for it because of the coupon.

Odwalla Chewy Nut Bar
Chocolate Chip Trail Mix

Now if you're smart, and apparently I'm not part of that group you would have seen that this bar is called a Chewy Nut Bar, and the flavor is chocolate chip trial mix. I just saw chocolate chip trail mix and snatched it off the shelf. My first bite in my reaction was wow this is very nutty for a chocolate chip trail mix bar...That being said there was only a hint of chocolate and raisins in this bar, it's predominantly a chewy nut bar. It was decent. Maybe I didn't choose the right flavor, but I'm also not that big into chewy nut bars. If you love a nut bar, then these are right up your alley. After realizing that this Odwalla bar was supposed to taste like nuts, I was then very disappointed by the scant amount of chocolate and raisins.There was just a hint of each. Overall I'd give this Odwalla bar a 2.5 out of 5 stars.

On to nutrition: This bar boasts that it is made of 24% organic products...In my mind its either organic or its not. I appreciate then that a few of the ingredients in this bar are organic, but it seems like a bit of a waste of money? on those few organic ingredients, since overall this bar is NOT organic. The Chocolate Chip Trail Mix bar has 200 calories, 7 grams of fat, 2 grams of fiber, 15 grams of sugar and 5 grams protein.


Another thing I noticed while attempting to take pictures for this blog post. The enjoy by date was September 19th 2011, and I definitely bought this bar after the 19th. This tells me two things...no one has been buying this bar at my grocery store, and maybe for good reason. Also next time I go out on a whim and buy something with a coupon I should check the expiration date. :) So eh, Odwalla Chewy Nut Bar not a winner.

Oatmeal Raisin Craisin Bars

So I made up a recipe. Based off of another recipe of course, but it's all mine. It probably needs some tweaking but YAY, my first and hopefully not my last experiment into creating my own lovely baked goods. And...they were good!


These will also be heading off to the Boston University chapter of Alpha Delta Pi for all of the amazing girls to consume.

Oatmeal Raisin Craisin Bars

2 sticks unsalted butter, room temp
1 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup flour
1 1/4 cut quick cooking oats
1 cup raisins
1 cup craisins
(walnuts optional 1/2 cup)

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Grease the bottom of a 9 by 13 inch pan. In a mixing bowl melt the butter and then whisk in the sugars. Add in the eggs one at a time and stir to combine. Add the vanilla, and stir. Add in all of the dry ingredients and max sure it is all well mixed. Fold in the raisins and the craisins (if you are using nuts add them here too.) Pour into your prepared pan and bake for about 25 minutes. Let cool and then cut when the bars are at room temperature.


They are a really good and easy alternative to making brownies or other bars, or if you are craving oatmeal raisin cookies these give you that flavor without all the scooping and drop work of cookies. Pour, bake and cut. Easy.


I really hope you enjoy these new bars. I did and I know Alpha Delta Pi girls will as well!

WOW Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

"Love it." Was the official quote from my father, now I'm not sure I've ever ever heard this from him. There is usually some comment attached, "Really good, but..." I almost can't believe how good these cookies are. They are the best oatmeal raisin cookies I've ever made. You need to make these. You will wow everyone. It's an exciting day when you print out a new recipe and it becomes the new standard because it is just so damn good. This cookie is amazing.


Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

3 Large Eggs
1 generous tsp vanilla extract
1 cup raisins
1 cup butter
1 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup granulated sugar
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
1 generous tsp cinnamon
2 cups quick cooking oats
1 cup toasted walnuts

In a bowl combine the eggs, vanilla and raisins. Let sit for about an hour. (I only let mine sit for about 40 minutes.) You can just do this as the first step and then start on with everything else and by the time you need the raisins it will be about 30 minutes.

Beat the butter (room temperature) and the sugars until homogeneous. Mix the flour, salt, baking soda and cinnamon together, well. Slowly add this mixture to the butter and sugar. The dough will be dry at this point. Add in the egg, raisins and vanilla and mix, then add in the oats and the toasted walnuts.

Scoop onto cookie sheets and bake for about 10 to 13 minutes at 350 degrees. They cookies will turn very golden brown. Let them cool a minute on the tray and then move to a cooling rack. I made 15 big cookies and 15 medium cookies. It may be around 40 medium cookies total.

I found the original recipe here, I did make a few changes in that I never use shortening, which is what the original calls for. You can substitute butter for it at the same amount.


Please, please make these, they are just so good.

Mommy's Pecan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

I really wanted to do something nice for my mom yesterday. She's been having a hard time taking care of my immobile Dad. She finally left the house yesterday to go to work, which gave me an opportunity, not only to steal her kitchen to bake in but also to make her a little something special to come home to.

My mom and I love Oatmeal Raisin cookies, but we can never find a recipe that makes a decent cookie, well I mean there are very few cookies that I wont eat, but I want something extraordinary. I want something spectacular, I want the best damn oatmeal raisin cookie recipe in the world. And while I have not found that recipe yet, this one came very very close. My mom and I plan to make it again with a few changes and see if it can be that cookie. I'll let you know if I do make it again, and include what changes we made. This recipe made a small batch of cookies, it made 12 good sized cookies, which I liked a lot, becasue sometimes 36 cookies is just a lot. The original recipe can be found here. I did change a few things to the original this time. I wanted less oats in mine and more cookie.



Mommy's Pecan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

1 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
10 Tbsp unsalted butter
6 Tbsp dark brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 egg white
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 cup oats
3/4 cup raisins
2/3 cup toasted pecans

Preheat your over to 350 degrees. In a mixing bowl cream butter and sugars together until light in color. In a separate bowl combine the flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon, and set aside. Beat in the egg white and vanilla into the butter mixture. Make sure to scrape down the sides to make sure that everything is mixing evenly. Add in the flour mixture slowly until fully incorporated. Finally add in the oats, raisins and toasted almonds.
Place in heaping mounds on your baking sheet. I use an ice cream scoop to ensure that all of my cookies come out about the same size. Because these are very chunky cookies, I would recommend flattening the tops slightly of the mounds before they go into the oven, they will not spread very much while baking, and you don't want to end up with little rocks. Mine baked for about 18 minutes, however my mom's ovens take a few extra minutes to cook everything, so I'd say start watching them around 12-15 minutes.

These were great oatmeal raisin cookies. I'm sure we'll be making this recipe again, maybe with a few changes, but it'll show up in the future.

Raisin & Almond Nola

Nola is no different that granola, maybe it is different thought, it has Hallie love in it. Ben and I tend to shorten any word that can possibly be shortened. Granola became Nola, Bananas became Naners. You'll get used to the short cute, love-y names that we have for our favorite foods. But nola, I eat nola every day. At work, during the week for lunch in yogurt and for breakfast on the weekends. I'm not sure when I realized that granola existed in a non-bar form but it wasn't until recently, but almost every morning for all 3 1/2 years of college, I ate granola bars for breakfast. And yes I am that oblivious to the world.

Last week I found a recipe for granola, and thought how good an idea it was to make my own. I make my own cookies, soup, etc. why have I never though of making granola before? And besides I spend like 7 dollars on granola every week at the grocery store, this way is a lot cheaper and you can customize your granola and add in any thing you like. It is such an easy, yummy snack, or meal.

This is my second attempt at making granola so I have change the original recipe a lot, so much so it seems unnecessary to post the original.

Granola

2 1/2 cups old fashioned oats
1 1/2 cups puffed rice cereal (rice crispys)
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp salt
1 3.9 oz individual size applesauce
1/4 cup granulated sugar
just under 1/2 cup honey
1/8 cup molasses
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup almonds roasted or natural
3/4 cup raisins

In a big bowl combine the oaks, rice cereal, and spices. In a separate bowl stir all of the wet ingredients including sugar, apple sauce, honey, molasses and vanilla. Stir until combined, pour wet ingredients into dry and mix throughly. Mix in almonds and raisins (or any other mix-ins that you like.)

Spread out on a baking sheet in one even layer. Bake in a 325 degree oven for 30 minutes, then flip granola to other side and let bake for an additional 30 minutes on the other side. Granola will break apart while flipping, just try your best to make sure the majority of it is on the other side. If some still feels wet take out the dry granola and continue baking until crunchy an additional 10-15 minutes.One thing I must warn you about granola is that it smells so good while its baking. Its just almost impossible to wait on trying it, but you should really wait until its cooled to taste it.

The first time that I made this granola I added in the raisins after the granola was cooked, but did not like it because the raisins were not part of the actual granola, just almost an after-thought that fell to the bottom of the bag. This time I added them in before baking and the raisins exploded, well not exploded, but blew up into little raisin balls. But they shrunk down as soon as the granola was cooled, and look like normal raisins again. So don't be alarmed, however cooked raisins do taste a little different than straight from the box, so you can add them in before or after cooking, it doesn't really matter.

Store in an air tight container, and will last for as long as it takes you to eat it all. It's hard not to snack on...

Yum.