Jammers at home!

My favorite bakery - The Grand Central. My favorite baking book - The Grand Central Baking book. It only makes sense, right?

Isn't it amazing that you can reproduce your favorite chocolate chip cookies, shortbread and Jammers at home, right on your table?! Yes, I like their Jammers, because they are not sweet, except for the fresh jam topping, which is the perfect company for the buttery & salty biscuits. But what I love most about the jammers is the flaky & crumbly texture! After all I realize I am a texture person too I guess.

So here it goes. My version of the jammers - extra crunchy outside.

(The recipe below is from "The Grand Central Baking Book")
Ingredients (10 to 12 jammers according to the book but I ended up making more than 20!)
4 cups all-purpose flour
3 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup cold unsalted butter
1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cup buttermilk
Your favorite jam for the filling

1. Combine the dry ingredients (teh top five ingredients above).
2. Dice the butter into small cubes and blend them into the dry ingredients either by hand or using a stand mixer. There should be tiny pieces of butter remaining. That's the key to flaky biscuits! (You can store this dough in the fridge overnight if not baking immediately.)
3. Mix the flour mixture with buttermilk (1 cup first) by using a stand mixer or by hand in a bowl. The dough should look messy and come in a few big clumps.
4. Turn the dough on a floured working surface and pat it into 1 1/2 to 2 inches thick.
5. Use a biscuit cutter (2 1/2 inch diameter) cut the dough into circles.
6. Continue to work on the remaining dough by re-shapting and patting it to a sheet.
7. Use your thumb to make an indentation in the center of the circle for the jam to be filled in.
8. Fill the indentation with 1 tablespoon of jam
9. Bake the jammer in the 350F pre-heated oven for 35 - 40 minutes.

you must have a cup of cafe Latte ready in time for the jammer out of the oven!

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies from The Grand Central Baking Book

Very easy recipe. The cookies are delicious, especially when they still warm right out of the oven :-)

I love Grand Cenral Bakery and love this baking book!! More recipes on the table soon!

Kids Bento Box for Adults

Fumiko, another meat lover among my foodie friends, was craving meatballs. I didn't even ask her why, because the reason or her motivation was not important. All I needed to hear was "I want meatballs!"

I had made meatball stew in the past for kids party catering. So I reproduced the same recipe, although I was out of cans of Heinz demi glace sauce and made it from scratch by using my cheat tricks (canned tomatoes, onion, celery, red wine, etc). Meatballs are kids favorite items in Okosama Lunch (kids plate) at casual restaurants and cafes in Japan. Everyone has fond memories of Okosama lunch, but usually you have to be under a certain age (usually 6 years old??) to be "eligible" to order Okosama lunch (what's up with that!?)

Anyway, so here it is; my version of Okosama Lunch bento box for sophisticated adults :-)

Menu: meatballs with creamy tomato & red wine sauce, spaghetti with parsley, fried scallops and fries with hommade tartar sauce, butter rice pilaf with fresh English peas, shrimp toast, octopus wienies, tandoori chicken (this was just added sponteneously ;-))

(Photograghs by Fumiko)