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Brett Braley-Palko 5/30/17 Brett Braley-Palko 5/30/17

A Tea Party with Nordic Ware

Rain.

Each day, for the last week, it has rained. The dogs have been restless when they're awake, but sleep most of the day away. Their muddy paws mark the base boards, the tiled kitchen, and, occasionally, the armchairs. We let them on the bed, we let them sleep at our feet. We give them what they want because we can't give them fresh air, warmth, the sun.

We were busy this week. Photoshoots and cakes and flea market paintings. We ate lunch with Nolan's parents and bought curtains. We took a bath together and then fell asleep on the couch. I feed the chickens four times a day and called my dad to say they were growing. I remembered my uncle on Memorial Day. My brother asked me to be his son's godfather. I found five dollars in the washing machine.

Rain. Like a slow throb in the back of my eyes, I felt tired. Nolan sneezed in the sunlight and I took a puff from his cigarette with my coffee. My body shivering, my eyes still tired, we were up at six most mornings this week. And by three we were tired and by five we were exhausted. And so, this weekend, I wanted to make it special. Something to look forward to mid-day.

I brewed some tea, I baked some cakes. Nolan licked the spatula and squeezed the lemon over the still-warm bakes. We snacked, candles light and a window open, and warmed our hands on the china my mother gave us. A moment when beauty was small but worthwhile, like the steam that rises off the ground and the deer prints are still fresh in mud.

Mini-cakes!

The recipe I used was adapted from the previous madeleine recipe, here. You will, of course, need this beautiful bundt charm pan from Nordicware, which will (honestly) change your tea party game for LIFE. What made me most nervous was greasing the pan, so I went with a little bit of melted shortening then a light dusting of flour and it was perfect.

If you do NOT have a charm pan (which I suggest you get), you can use a muffin tin, but just add about 1/3 of the way up and add a 2 minutes to the baking time.

Ingredients:

1 cup AP flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 c sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
8 TB unsalted butter, melted
2 TB lemon zest
Juice of one lemon

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400*F
Prepare your pan
In a mixing bowl, sift together flour and baking powder
In a separate bowl, whisk together sugar, eggs, vanilla, and zest vigorously until foamy
Add egg mix to flour and stir
Finally, add melted butter and fold with a rubber spatula.
Fill about 3/4 of the way up, using a spoon to control the amount better, and bake for 10 minutes or until golden and puffed
Immediately turn out and allow to cool. When still warm, squeeze lemon juice over your cakes
Enjoy with a warm cup of tea. Remaining cakes can be stored in an airtight container for 3 days (or frozen forever!)

A special thanks to Nordic Ware for sponsoring this post. Nordic Ware has been producing quality kitchenware products in their 70 years and are now one of America's most beloved and iconic brands. Today, Nordic Ware manufactures the vast majority of its products in America, at our Minneapolis headquarters, including cookware, bakeware, grillware, microwave, and kitchen gadgets and accessories.For more information or products, check out their website! I highly recommend buying the charm pan mentioned above, as it is just so cute! With its gold finish, its heavy cast aluminum and its 6 unique charm shapes, it will be a staple in your kitchen for years to come!

Brett Braley-Palko 2/26/17 Brett Braley-Palko 2/26/17

Kale and Eggs! A breakfast (or lunch!) of champions!

Kale was the first thing we bought in our new house. It was the first thing I made that was from instinct of taste rather than a recipe in a long time. The bag, split down the middle because I tore it too fast, rustled against my hand when I would reach for a yogurt, half and half for my coffee, or a stray piece of fruit that rolled away from me earlier. It was something I wanted to try. It was on sale that week. I wanted to impress Nolan when he came home, and so I started to cook.

I am no cook by trade, or even by accident. I did not come about cooking the way I did about baking. It was not by need or necessity or for pleasure. It was, and sometimes still is, a means to an end. I did not always enjoy the cleanup; and I very much less enjoy the lack of control and tactility involved versus when I make a cake. But I work from home and I have free time and so I cook for the boy I love.

I make simple dishes. Things I like. Nothing too complicated and a varietal of five rotating flavors that work in an interchanging meander on my otherwise underdeveloped savory palate. Starting out, I never want to get too complicated. The whole chickens are still in the freezer for another day. For now, I want declaratives and not interrogatives.

“This is good.”

“Make this again.”

“I’m getting seconds.”

Because dishes like the below are so simple, I need to make sure my utensils are the best I can have for starting out. American Kitchen Cookware is perfect for me. Made in West Bend, Wisconsin, each piece is durable, unforgiving in its exactness of preparation, and carefully constructed to last. A company that is over 100 years old must be doing something right, and I believe that using this pan was the reason this dish has come out so successfully the last few weeks.

American Kitchen Cookware is also part of my Instagram giveaway for this week! Head on over to Instagram for more details, where you and a friend could win either of the pans featured in this post (the 10-inch stainless steel casserole pan or the 10-inch stainless steel skillet) for you and a friend!

Kale and Eggs

Ingredients:

2 TB olive oil
2 cloves garlic, peeled and diced
6 cup kale
½ teaspoon flaked sea salt, or more if desired
½ teaspoon black pepper, or more if desired
4 eggs
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Directions:

In your casserole pan (I used the 10-inch stainless steel casserole pan) or covered skillet, heat your oil on medium-high
Add garlic and allow to cook for a minute or until it becomes fragrant
Add your kale, salt, and pepper. Stir with a wooden spoon to coat the leaves with oil and garlic
Allow to cook on medium-high until kale begins to get tender
Crack your eggs evenly on top of the kale and cover your dish
Turn heat to low and let cool for 6 minutes
Uncover and check your eggs. This dish is really dependent on the natural liquid from the kale escaping and making steam, so it is, in turn, dependent on your kale and the oven temperature. If eggs are have not set to your desire, replace lid and continue cooking for a minute or two
Remove from heat, sprinkle with red pepper flakes and serve immediately

Brett Braley-Palko 12/11/16 Brett Braley-Palko 12/11/16

Funfetti Gateau Breton with Nordic Ware

Right now, I am watching the snow fall in bed, wrapped in a blanket and sandwiched between two dogs and a boy. We're busy these days, making preparations for a house and a move and a mini vacation next week. We are busy these days, trying to fill the time between this year and the New one. There are parties to go to, people to love, presents to open; and my brother is having his child on the 27th.

Instead of calling him, I'll probably spend the day watching Westworld and falling asleep.

I'm sure everyone's holidays are like this--somehow lazy and busy all at once. Mine used to not be, but now they are and it is as exotic as it is familiar. When Nordic Ware asked me to try out their Sweet Snowflake Shortbread Pan, I wanted to make a dessert that could impress as much as it could invoke nostalgia; so I made a funfetti gateau breton. You may remember my previous ones (here and here), and you may remember how simple and delicate these French cakes are to make. Something that is sure to ease a bit of the holiday craziness for you this month.

Funfetti Gateau Breton

Ingredients:

1 3/4 cup AP flour
2 TB cornstarch
3/4 cup white sugar
Pinch of salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
6 egg yolks
1 TB clear imitation vanilla (a tip from Molly on getting that nostalgic flavor juuuuust right)
2 TB rainbow sprinkles

Directions:

Prep your Nordic Ware shortbread pan or a 9-inch springform pan with a liberal amount of butter or oil
Preheat oven to 375*F
In the bowl of a stand mixer, sift together flour, cornstarch, sugar, and salt
Add butter until well incorporated; it will be very clumpy
Add egg yolks, one at a time. Do not add subsequent yolk until previous is fully mixed into dough
Finally, add your vanilla and sprinkles and mix for a few seconds to blend
With floured hands, pat into your prepared pan
Bake for 15 minutes at 375* and then lower temperature to 350* and bake for an additional 25-30 minutes or until edges are golden brown
Allow to cool before removing from pan. Enjoy immediately or store in an airtight container for up to a few days.

Brett Braley-Palko 12/7/16 Brett Braley-Palko 12/7/16

No Bake Cookies with Bob's Red Mill Steel Cut Oats

Last week I told you all that baking cookies was a favorite thing about being home for the holidays. My second favorite thing is eating the batter while baking a cake. And maybe the THIRD thing is using up all my ingredients before I move out at the end of the month to our farm.

Luckily, these No Bakes are a great combination of all of these joys of December! They're a super simple cookie, requiring little prep and even less skill. They're gooey and remain soft for a very long time, while also melting in your mouth. And you can basically add anything to these without messing them up (I like to think of the coconut here as "intentional experimentation").

One ingredient you will notice on here is steel cut oats. Bob's Red Mill sent me steel cut oats a while back and I have been trying to find the perfect way to use them that wasn't, well, just a bowl of oatmeal. This oatmeal is almost pellet-like, but produced a toothsome effect to the cookies that make them gooey but firm in the most delicious way. They were a huge hit at the party I threw this weekend for my boyfriend. (okay, my brother-in-law was the only one who ate them but he liked them a lot!) I had rented out a local theater and played his favorite movie, the Parent Trap and we will be doing that again very, very soon.

Follow me on instagram (@figandbleu) for more stories of my life that don't fit on my blog!

So if you have 15 minutes and 2 hours of patience, make these! If you don't have steel cut oats or can't find them, try a specialty foods store, online at bobsredmill.com, or you can substitute that cup for regular ol' quick cooking oats.

Steel Cut Oat No Bake Cookies

Ingredients:

2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup half 'n half or heavy cream (can use whole milk, but I'm going for decadence here)
2 tablespoon butter
1 cup steel cut oats
1/3 cup peanut butter chips
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup milk chocolate chips
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1 tablespoon vanilla
2 cup quick cooking oats
1/2 teaspoon sea salt

Directions:

Prepare 2 cookie sheets with parchment or wax paper
In a medium saucepan, whisk sugar, half 'n half, butter, and steel cut oats and heat on medium-high
Allow to heat, stirring occasionally, and simmer until butter is melted and edges of the mixture are frothy
Remove from heat and stir in remaining ingredients with a wooden spoon
Allow to sit for 3 minutes to congeal a bit
Using a cookie scoop or spoons, drop your batter onto your prepared cookie sheets
Allow to rest in your fridge for at least two hours to firm up
Can be kept in a container for up to a week

Note: I am fortunate enough to be a Bob's Red Mill brand ambassador this year and will be partnering with them more and more throughout the year. While Bob's Red Mill supplied the ingredient, coconut flour, for this post, all opinions are my own. Check out their website for more information on all the amazing products they have to offer!

Brett Braley-Palko 11/15/16 Brett Braley-Palko 11/15/16

Happy #nationalbundtday! Pumpkin Chocolate Bundt, in partnership with Nordicware!

Microwaved coffee and Milo in his sweater. That's who my week has started. I worked outside yesterday, pulling dead branches off an old fruit tree and took the trash to the curb. I looked for a used truck, I have big plans to live in a farm. My dad called from a gas station outside of Virginia to say he loves me.

The cats outside are shaking, the cats inside are fighting. I babysit them while my parents take a week to visit my brother at their house in North Carolina. They bought three trash bags full of clothes for the flood victims, but most of what they found were swimming trunks. There's irony in there somewhere, but I didn't have the heart to tell my mother. She's always been bad at thinking things through, we ran across the country when I was little, moved to five new states by the time I hit kindergarten, and then when I was 15 she asked if she thinks that affected me at all.

But we're a home now, tucked in Pennsylvania. I drive two hours roundtrip to see my sister and my niece. We watch the football game my brother-in-law went to and we bring over sandwiches so she doesn't have to cook. Next week, she's hosting Thanksgiving at her house for the first time and we'll help how we can. I promised to bring the dessert, a chocolate pumpkin cake spiked with peanut butter and cinnamon. She doesn't need to do everything alone. We're all in this together now.

No more moving, no more leaving anyone behind. There's irony in there somewhere, but I'm not thinking about that now.

Chocolate Pumpkin Bundt Cake

An easy, all-on-one cake recipe that it perfect for a bundt, but can also be baked in any traditional pan, you will just have to adjust the temperature. Coming from Indiana, I always think that a bundt cake during the holidays is just that much more festive; and with NordicWare's bundt cake with the fall leaves pattern, it takes autumn to a whole other level.

Ingredients:

1 ¼ cup AP flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup cocoa powder
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 tablespoon cinnamon + more for sprinkling
¼ cup peanut butter
1 egg
½ cup pumpkin puree
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
¾ cup buttermilk
White sugar, for sprinklin

Directions:

Prepare your bundt pan with shortening and flour (I used their harvest leaves bundt pan to add a little festivity to this post)
Preheat oven to 350*F
Sift together flour, baking soda, salt, cocoa, sugar, and cinnamon twice in a large mixing bowl
In a measuring cup, whisk together peanut butter, egg, pumpkin, vanilla, and buttermilk
Create a well in the center of your dry ingredients with a wooden spoon
Gently pour a steady stream of your wet ingredients into the center of the well, stirring constantly until thoroughly mixed—but beware over-mixing
Pour into your prepared bundt pan
Bake 1 hour or until a toothpick comes out clean
Allow to cool, remove from pan, and sprinkle with white sugar and cinnamon on the leaves, as shown
Enjoy! Can be stored for up to 3 days in an airtight containe