Bouchon Bakery: Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

My second foray into Bouchon Bakery cookbook occurred today when I baked the oatmeal raisin cookies on page 32.

I am dedicated to weighing everything, but I didn't weigh the vanilla paste. I used my measuring spoon instead! Ingredients all gathered below. I've never weighed eggs before. I broke two eggs and then whisked them to break them up so I could pour off the excess.

I was supposed to sift the cinnamon and the soda into the flour, but I did the cinnamon and the salt. The Kosher salt had no inclination to go through the sieve!

Maybe because my brown sugar is not new, the lumps didn't break up with the whisk as described. I got a pestle and broke them up with it instead. Then I whisked it all together.

Creamed butter - supposed to look like mayonnaise.

I forgot to take photos for the adding of the dry ingredients, the flour/cinnamon/soda/salt mix. Then when it was time to add the oatmeal, the directions said to pulse 10 times. That kind of instruction goes with a food processor and this was being made in a stand mixer. I turned it quickly on and off ten times, but it didn't make sense to me. I used my rubber spatula to fold the oats in and then to fold in the raisins.

I made the small version of the cookies so that the recipe made a dozen cookies. It is designed to make six huge cookies, which I guess would be the size of salad plates. I had no desire - these are more than big enough for me. I baked in a convection oven and my cookies look darker than the photo in the Bouchon Bakery cookbook. But these taste DELICIOUS. 

My son-in-law and daughter each ate one and had a fit over how good these are.

 Confession: the photo below is of the recipe with golden raisins in it, but my grandchildren don't like raisins, so I baked six with golden raisins and six with chocolate chips. In the photo above, the left six are made with raisins and the right six are made with chocolate chips.

BBA Cinnamon Raisin Walnut Bread

We've had an ice storm in Atlanta, but since I have power, I'm just baking up a storm inside!

Yesterday I made the Cinnamon Raisin Walnut Bread from BBA.  It is absolutely delicious and looks just like Reinhart's photo, so I am well pleased.  I loved raisin bread as a child and today the smell of it toasting warms my heart.

There are two ways to make this bread - as a loaf with cinnamon and raisins studded throughout or he suggests as an alternative, adding a cinnamon sugar swirl to an already delicious bread.  Since the recipe made two loaves, I did one as a loaf and the second as a swirl.

I found it an easy bread to mix and make.  Since I'm used to making breads that add dry ingredients gradually to the yeast raised in warm water, it's always unnerving to me to put all the dry ingredients into the mixer and then add the liquids.  But I'm an oldest child and always follow the rules, so I do what he tells me to.

The dough was quite sticky and I probably added about a handful of flour in tablespoons as it mixed to get it to come together in a bread dough.

Here are the raisins, draining, and the walnuts, chopped.

Here is the dough rounded up before putting it into the greased bowl to rise.

I rolled one half of the dough out to make a regular loaf.  I forgot to take a photo of the cinnamon swirl being created.  I did use a brush and brushed water over the dough before adding the cinnamon sugar to help it stick.  Don't know if that was a good idea or not.

Here are the two loaves in their pans to rise.  The one on the right has the cinnamon swirl.

He suggested that you brush the tops of the baked loaves with melted butter as soon as they are out of the bread pans and roll them in the cinnamon sugar, so I did that with the non-swirled loaf.

Here is the loaf sliced - made absolutely delicious toast,  reminding me of childhood (although the bread we had from the grocery didn't had walnuts in it!)

Below is the cinnamon swirl loaf.  I don't care what the filling is, I can't ever make swirled bread that doesn't have a gap in it when it cooks.  So disappointing.

 Slicing further into the loaf, you can see the gap around the swirl.  Would love it if someone knew how to keep that from happening.  I roll tightly and pinch the seam together at the bottom.  I wonder if wetting the dough surface before I put the cinnamon on makes that happen?