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Saturday, January 03, 2009

Baking with Brooke

My office was closed the week between Christmas and New Year's so Brooke and I decided to get together to tackle one of my biggest fears - baking bread. She thought Hawaiian rolls would be a good place to start. After a few minor mishaps involving an errant mixer and needing to run to the store for more yeast this is what we produced:


Delicious, sweet, pineapple-y rolls. SP loved these, especially with a pat of butter. We cheated and used her breadmaker, which gave us this huge ball of dough after an hour and a half:


We separated the dough into two pieces so we each got 9 rolls. We rolled the dough into balls and placed them in baking pans:


After the dough went into the pans it needed to rise another hour so we took the opportunity to make cookies. Since SP loves peanut butter cookies and we all love the combination of peanut butter and chocolate we decided to make these peanut butter cookies.


The cookies are a pretty basic recipe. We added copious amounts of chocolate and peanut butter chips:


... before rolling them in sugar and pressing them down with the tines of a fork. Here they are ready to be baked:


SP said these were the best peanut butter cookies he has ever had, and that says a lot because he loves peanut butter cookies. I have to say, they are truly amazing. We've been rationing them out because we could have eaten them all in one sitting if left to our own devices. Delicious!

Thanks for a fun day, Brooke! We have to do it again sometime. :)

4 comments:

  1. Now you need to get yourself a bread maker. But not a stand mixer. Cause clearly those suck. Hmph.

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  2. I blogged those same cookies! My first time I baked. :) I figured anything approved by smitten kitchen had to be great. I'm so glad you made these. Steve loves pb cookies too. I didn't add pb chips to mine though, just a lot of chocolate.

    And you made rolls woohoo! I need a baking mentor like Brooke.

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  3. Oooh, Hawaiian bread! I've always been a fan of King's Hawaiian bread and never thought of attempting to make them. Thanks for sharing this and it looks like you succeeded deliciously with these rolls!!

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  4. Brooke - Ha!! You were hysterical with that mixer. I definitely see a bread machine in my future. The smell of these rolls when I was driving home was outrageous.

    Melissa - Really!? Of course, because our minds are linked like that. :) The pb chips were great, but I love anything with peanut butter.

    Joelen - I know you have/had a yeast issue like me, but these were nice and easy.

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