Aprons: The Baker's fashion statement, part 2

Since I am getting back to blogging about baking I decide to read through some of my old posts. There were a lot of ideas back there that I completely forgot about. One was my obsession with aprons since, well, an apron is what inspired this blog's name. I think about aprons a little too often. Whenever I'm shopping at Target or any store like that I find myself straying towards the kitchen section to see what aprons they I have.

I realized that there were a few other ideas out there I wanted to share along the lines of themed aprons. One theme I so wanted to go for was geek. Or nerdy. Or just totally awesome. Which works since nerd is so cool right now (thank you to The Big Bang Theory, best TV show ever).

With that said, I bring you my top picks for totally awesome, nerd-tastic, geek-out aprons (again brought to you by etsy.com). Most of these are totally on my wish list. I might need to start a section in my closet for my aprons...

Let's start with the obvious nerd topic for me, Harry Potter. Because I'm just slightly obsessed with the Boy Who Lived. While some may go for something like this, my pick is a little more subtle. This one is super cute, too. But this Polyjuice Potion apron is just so hilarious that I kind of want one.

Keeping with the British theme there is always a Tardis inspired option. Sure, there are some that look more like the Tardis itself. But, come on. Bow tie? Total win.

Of course, when talking nerd you can't leave out Star Wars. That's just wrong. But this apron? Just right. 

And let's not leave out the gamers. A little Link inspiration, anyone? Ok, not really the cutest but there is no doubt there's a Zelda theme going on. 

And for the superhero, comic fans? Well, plenty to chose from. 

Finally I leave you with this epic Hunger Games version. And yes, I kind of want this one, too. Oh, Peeta...

British Baking - Pan au Chocolate Pudding

Pan au chocolate roughly cut and in corningware.

Well, Ryan's birthday was this last weekend. For the last few years I have baked his favorite pie (blackberry) but this year I was ready to try something new. Since I continue to read Nigella Lawson's How to be a Domestic Goddess cookbook just for fun I looked through it again searching for any inspiration. I am glad I did since I stumbled upon something I have had on my baking wish list for some time and it would work perfect for Ryan's birthday: Pan au Chocolate pudding! Ryan loves pan au chocolate so I thought this would be a perfect substitute for the traditional blackberry pie. I also have been wanting to do a British baking series for some time so luckily this recipe worked for both.

As with all Nigella's recipes this one was simple to follow. I need to read up on copyrights to see if there is any issue posting her recipe but I can give you the gist of it anyways. The key ingredient, pan au chocolate, was easy to find. Safeway aways has fresh pan au chocolate. However for this pudding I needed something a little stale. Simple trick- just leave the box open for a night. I tried, of course, to hide the extras since the recipe called for a just a few but with my very observant husband that didn't last too long. That same night I hear him in the pantry, "uh-oh!" Yea, go ahead and have some. The surprise wasn't really ruined, though, and he was happy with his pan au chocolate for breakfast. Funny boy.

It's finished and looks delicious!

Everything else the recipe called for was standard pantry ingredients. Milk, heavy cream, sugar, egg, egg yolk, and vanilla. And as usual Nigella makes recommendations for substitutions. Ok, not really substitutions. More like variants on the ingredients. Since I didn't have any heavy cream on hand and didn't want to purchase more of what I would't use or need I switched out the milk and cream for half-and-half. Might not have been the best substitution but I figured I'd give it a go. The egg yolk proved to be not as tricky as I thought. There are so many gadgets out there to separate eggs; they're not really necessary. Just a few passes of the yolk between the broken halves of the shell and I had my yolk and whites separated. First time I really tried that, by the way, so there's hope for those who don't feel so bold to try this. The cream was brought almost to a boil (so glad it didn't curdle) and added to the egg, egg yolk, and sugar (which also didn't curdle). I'm not sure if there was any concern of that happening in this recipe. Nigella didn't mention it. But I made sure to temper the eggs before dumping the whole pot of cream in. Tempering is just adding a little bit of the hot (this time the cream) to the eggs to slowly bring up the temperature without actually making scrambled eggs. Because scrambled eggs and pan au chocolate were just not what I was going for.

Perfect with vanilla bean ice cream.

Once mixed the whole lot was poured over the pan au chocolate and left to set for about 10 minutes. Then, into the oven at 325 and baked for about 25 minutes. Well, the recipe says 25 minutes or until the pudding is softly set. Since Ryan and I aren't fans of runny pudding I baked it for about 35 minutes.

In the end, this turned out better than I hoped. Ryan loved it. It was easy and super quick. And it smelled fantastic! I am tempted to add just a hint of cinnamon next time to really take this over the edge of amazing. Who says the Brits don't know how to cook. This one is definitely a new fave.

Happy birthday, Ryan! I am so thankful for you and so happy to celebrate you on the last birthday of your twenties. Here's to many more birthdays and hopefully many more desserts to enjoy!

Time Flies

Wow, I can't believe it's been over a year since I posted anything. What a year it has been in both life and my baking adventure. Here are some highlights. 

We bought a house! We started looking February last year and closed Memorial Day weekend. It has been such a joy to make a home with Ryan. It's my favorite thing to do and my favorite place to be. We are still figuring out where to put things and deciding on things like curtains and area rugs. And I love our kitchen! We have dreams of reconfiguring the pantry and a few hall cupboards just to make everything fit just right. But I love standing in my kitchen cooking dinner and being home. 

I haven't baked in my kitchen as much as I would have liked to. It feels like life just sort of happened and baking wasn't a part of it. I did find time to make my favorite banana bread a few times (there's even a loaf in the oven as I write this). I did learn a few lessons this past year that I should have informed you of as soon as they happened because some were gems. The best: do not leave a pie on the stove when you take it out of the oven. Because when your spouse helps you when you're busy, takes the pie out of the oven and leaves it on the stove and then you come home and heat some water for tea you might just turn on the burner the pie was left on. And then it will explode. And you will run into the kitchen with bare feet to turn the burner off and, well, it's just not good. And this was all on the night before Thanksgiving!

Lesson definitely learned. Luckily I had some pumpkin ginger bundt on hand to contribute to the family meal. This fact slightly eased my pain, physical and emotional, but I couldn't help crying "this was going to be my best pie ever!" Oh, well. I'll just have to try again next year. 

I hope to continue baking and sharing my stories with you and that you find inspiration yourself to get in your kitchen and create something delicious!