On my blog, Blue Bowl Recipes, I try to focus on classic baking recipes while giving many of them my own approachable spin or a modern twist—and I’ve taken the same approach in this cookbook. Instead of classic peanut butter cookies, we’re making Peanut Butter and Jelly Thumbprint Cookies. A classic yellow cake with chocolate frosting gets an upgrade from malt powder to turn it into a Malted Vanilla Birthday Cake with Chocolate Frosting. Traditional wedding-cake flavored cupcakes are transformed into something new and exciting—Raspberry Almond Cupcakes—by adding raspberry preserves to the center of the cupcakes and to the frosting. You get the picture. These are recipes that don’t require any wild or complicated techniques, and of course, they’re all made in one bowl. I’ve done a little finagling here and there to keep the number of dishes down—using an already dirtied measuring cup for your egg wash or mixing wet ingredients together in a glass measuring cup instead of a separate bowl. No matter how simple a recipe, we still don’t want to be left with a mountain of dishes in the sink at the end of it. Some of these recipes do have a special finishing touch that might require a quick rinse of your batter bowl to make—like frosting on a cake or chocolate ganache on a tart. With these simple, beginner-friendly recipes, there’s no need to be too fussy. Even though I’ve added little shortcuts to these recipes and cut back on steps wherever I could, these are all recipes you can absolutely take to any event—potlucks, picnics, work gatherings, holiday parties—and get asked, “How did you make this? It’s SO good! Can I have the recipe?” And that’s my goal: giving you recipes that you can bake no matter your level of baking experience, won’t take you ages to make, won’t leave you with a mountain of dirty bowls and will still trick people into thinking you’re another Martha. Make sure you take a moment to read my tips and tricks in the Baking Basics section. This will familiarize you with everything you need to know about my recipes and ensure the best baking success—especially if you consider yourself a novice in the kitchen. I hope that this book has your new favorite thing to bake, and I hope that you share what you make with the people you love.

BAKING BASICS Read the Recipe I always recommend reading a recipe through before starting it to ensure you are aware of all chill or resting times and to double check that you have all the ingredients. Preparing Baking Pans You’ll notice that on recipes that call for a baking dish to be lined with parchment paper, I say spray it with nonstick spray and line it. Spraying the pan with nonstick spray first helps the parchment paper adhere to the pan, so it’s not jumping back out while there’s nothing in the pan to hold it down. You can certainly skip this step; I just find it helpful. All About Butter The most common issue in the baking world (in my experience) is not softening your butter properly. Letting it sit at room temperature to soften on its own is the best method. I do not recommend microwaving it. This usually results in butter that’s bordering on melted, instead of softened, which can affect your finished bakes (especially with cookies—this is usually why they spread too much in the oven!). When letting your butter come to room temperature naturally, don’t let it sit out for too long. It shouldn’t feel warm to the touch, and when you press your finger lightly into it, you shouldn’t immediately make a huge indent. Your finger should make a small indent, without sinking into the butter. It shouldn’t be shiny or feel greasy. I use salted butter for everything, since I personally think it tastes much better than unsalted butter. However, if you want to use unsalted, feel free! I don’t feel like you need to make any changes to the recipe to account for this. Cutting Butter into Dry Ingredients For any recipe that calls for butter to be cut into your dry ingredients, I recommend using a pastry cutter. It’s easy and cuts down the time it takes to do this step. Some people recommend using a fork or your hands, but I personally prefer a pastry cutter and feel that it’s a worthwhile tool to have around. You can find them at most stores that carry kitchen tools (Target, Walmart, etc.), and they’re usually between $5.00 and $12.00. If you don’t have or don’t want to purchase a pastry cutter, you can use your (clean!) hands to rub the butter into the flour, breaking it up into pieces and making sure it’s coated in flour—which is what a pastry cutter does. Creaming Butter and Sugar When you mix sugar into butter, cream it with your mixer on a higher speed for at least 30 seconds to a minute. You want the mixture to really come together. It shouldn’t feel like light sandy crumbs; there should be a smidge of resistance from your mixer and the whole thing should feel like a more cohesive, moist mixture. Measuring Flour I know that everyone has a different way of measuring flour, but my preferred method is the scoop and level. Here’s what that means: Dunk your measuring cup into your bag or jar of flour, and lift it out. Don’t shake the measuring cup around or pack the flour. Simply take the flat edge of a butter knife and level off the flour that’s piled over the edge of the measuring cup. This does yield a slightly higher amount of flour than if you did the spoon and level method, but I find that method to be slow and clunky. All my recipes are based off this easy way of measuring flour. So even if you’re used to spooning and leveling, or if you’re saying, “1 cup of flour is 120 grams, not 140,” you should be aware that my recipes are measured this way and are based around 1 cup of flour weighing 140 grams. The one exception to this is with cake flour. I prefer to spoon and level it, and that’s noted in the three recipes where I call for it. Measuring Brown Sugar Make sure you’re packing the brown sugar in as you go. You should be packing the sugar down in between every few generous spoonfuls into your measuring cup. Make sure to level it off at the end, too, with the flat end of a butter knife. Bake Time Everyone’s oven runs a little differently, and I suggest using an oven thermometer for the best baking accuracy. I also always start my bake time a few minutes under what the recipe says. So, if a recipe says to bake for 35 to 40 minutes, I’ll probably start the timer at 30 or 35 minutes, especially if it’s something I haven’t made before. With things that have a shorter bake time, like cookies, I usually bake a single cookie first to make sure that the bake time is correct to my oven. This way, if your oven does run a bit hot, you can avoid overbaking and drying out a recipe. I always err on the side of starting with less time because you can always add a few more minutes … but you can’t undo an overbaked dessert. I also prefer to bake just one thing in my oven at a time—one sheet of cookies, etc. This allows the oven to concentrate on just the one pan, giving you a more even bake. But if you are comfortable baking two pans at once, go for it! I do recommend rotating the top and bottom pan halfway through if you do this. Modifying Recipes Speaking of recipes turning out meh … I tested these recipes as they were written, and any modifications that I tested will appear in the notes for that recipe. Keep in mind that once you start making your own changes, I cannot guarantee that the recipe will still turn out. Some small changes will certainly not ruin a recipe, such as swapping strawberry jam for raspberry in the coffee cake or leaving out the coconut from the oatmeal cookie bars if coconut is not your thing. You might run into trouble if you choose to make larger changes, like changing one type of flour for another, or changing one type of sugar for another. If I call for all-purpose, use that unless otherwise stated in the recipe, and the same goes for sugar, etc. If you do want to experiment with different ingredient swaps, feel free! Just know that you may not end up with the best possible results.

The One-Bowl Baker: Easy, Unfussy Recipes for Decadent Cakes, Brownies, Cookies and Breads by Stephanie Simmons Page Street Publishing 2022 EPUB 168 pages 230 MB Free download: https://wz.d-ld.net/50f307d502

Notice: free download for educational purposes only. Not for commercial use. For commercial use, buy The One-Bowl Baker: Easy, Unfussy Recipes for Decadent Cakes, Brownies, Cookies and Breads (Kindle edition or Paperback) on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Q533p4