Daring Bakers: Nanaimo Bars

The January 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Lauren of Celiac Teen. Lauren chose Gluten-Free Graham Wafers and Nanaimo Bars as the challenge for the month. The sources she based her recipe on are 101 Cookbooks and www.nanaimo.ca.

Living close to Nanaimo, British Columbia, but never having tried Nanaimo Bars, I was looking forward to trying these. I’d seen them at the bakery, so I bought a few before attempting the challenge just to get an idea what to expect. They were good, but very sweet. Not really my thing. However, a friend visiting from out of town told me she loved them, so I timed my challenge for her visit.

For those unfamiliar with Nanaimo Bars, they consist of a wafer crumb-based layer with coconut and nuts, topped by a layer of vanilla or custard butter icing, which is then covered in chocolate.

Making graham crackers...

Flour, sugar, baking soda, salt…

The magic ingredients -- honey, milk, and vanilla…

Adding the butter…

Forming crackers…

Crumbling for the first layer…

The middle layer is where I lost interest -- a half cup of butter, heavy cream, vanilla pudding mix (I was unable to find custard powder), and two cups of powdered sugar.

Then a layer of chocolate and butter, which for some reason didn’t prove to be enough for me. Because we’d made brownies the night before, I didn’t have any “extra” chocolate, so I just made do with what I had.

I sent the majority home with my house guest, then stuck the rest in the refrigerator and forgot about them.

Eventually I pulled them out for their photo shoot, but by then they’d seen better days.

So while I wasn't at all impressed with the Nanaimo bars, I did discover the beauty of a homemade graham cracker.

With the leftover crackers from the Nanaimo Bars we made S'mores, and since this challenge I've made the crackers two more times. While I still have some perfecting to do (mainly dealing with dough thickness and length of cooking time), they will definitely be a regular snack in my home, the perfect accompaniment to my afternoon espresso, or as a snack with a late-night bowl of yogurt.

The next batch will be dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with salt.

The Perfect S'more

One of last year's baking challenges required me to make marshmallows. Ever since then I've been dreaming of homemade s'mores. This month my baking challenge included making graham crackers. S'mores were inevitable. Here is the story of The Perfect S'more.

Making marshmallows...






The story of the graham crackers will come after the 27th.


Assembly...



A few minutes under the broiler...






Nom, nom, nom...


The end.

Skipping Christmas

We made the decision in November to skip Christmas; we don’t like the commercialism, we had no plans for family visits, we are in no way religious, and I had to work. We didn’t decorate, we didn’t plan a special meal, we didn’t exchange gifts. I work at home, so it became clear that unless we turned on the TV, we could pretty much escape the holiday all together.

I couldn’t refrain from some baking, however. I have an easy fudge recipe that I make only during the holidays. I couldn’t not make something I only make in December.

As a compromise to Christmas, I decided to send out Solstice cards.

From winter’s stillness light returns…

Everything was going as planned. Until the 14^th, when I woke up with abdominal pains, fatigue, and what I thought was some kind of virus. 17 days, two trips to the ER, a CT, a bottle of Percocet, a GI specialist, several missed days of work, and an endoscopy later, this self-proclaimed foodie was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease -- an autoimmune disease in which the body's immune system attacks the gastrointestinal tract, causing inflammation. (More gory details here, but thankfully so far all I’ve experienced is abdominal pain and fatigue.) There is no cure for Crohn’s. Talk about a big bummer of a Christmas gift. But wait, I wasn’t celebrating. Which was even more a blessing in disguise, really, because time stopped on the 14^th. My pain and fatigue took over, and I wasn’t in any shape to do anything but sleep and watch TV. I couldn't finish baking, and I had to set aside my Solstice cards.

I’m feeling much better now, but I’m still on a somewhat restricted diet and am cautious – make that paranoid – about what I put into my body. I have, however, lost 10 pounds this month, and I can’t say I’m disappointed about that.

New Year’s Day was my first dive back into baking since becoming ill. Birthday brownies for far-away friends.

They’re good brownies. They came from Martha Stewart's Cookies: The Very Best Treats to Bake and to Share, a birthday gift from Eric. They are very dense, reminiscent of truffles, though I prefer a slightly more cakey brownie. I cut them into squares, wrapped them by fours in plastic wrap, and then a freezer bag. I was able to fit a stack of five in each take-out container, which then was packed into a 6x6x6 box for mailing.

My next baking project is a Daring Bakers’ Challenge, one I’m very much looking forward to. Details about that sometime after the 27^th.