Tag Archives: Bread Baker’s Apprentice Challenge

Celebrating Blog Post #500 – Apple Cinnamon Ginger Crunch Cake

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On May 19 2009, I wrote my first blog post . Today marks my 500th! I never set out to write a blog. It happened accidentally. I joined an online group who were baking their way through Peter Reinhart’s tome, “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice”. I was hoping to increase my bread baking skills beyond the simple challah I baked each Friday.

The premise of the group was that we would work our way through the book, alphabetically, from Anadama Bread to Whole Wheat , one loaf each week, for 43 weeks. Group members would share their experiences in a Google group. I noticed that some members were chronicling their journey via blogging. It seemed like a cool idea, so I stayed up all night and figured out, with the help of wordpress.com, how to do it.

Here is a shot from that first post. My bread turned out perfectly, but clearly my photography skills needed work.
There were 212 of us, from all over the world, who started the challenge together. Only 12 of us actually finished! I loved the whole process! At heart, I think I am a born storyteller, so blogging really spoke to my soul. I love to create, so baking, taking photos of the process and telling stories about it really fed my creative needs.

After I finished my final loaf, I just kept on blogging. Along the way, I bought a better camera, took some online classes in food writing, and photography and attended several workshops on food styling and photography. One of the best investments I ever made was purchasing this online course from Rachel Korinek, of Two Loves Studio. She is an amazing teacher and extremely generous with her time. I have also been inspired by the effervescent Bea Lubas. Her ability to tell stories is unparalleled.

Another outstanding teacher is Joanie Simon of The Bite Shop. Her youtube videos on food photography, released every Thursday, are the highlight of my week. I have learned so many tips and techniques from her. All of these mentors have helped me along my journey, but the most important tip I have learned is practice and perseverance. Nothing replaces these.

With 500 blog posts under my belt, I am excited to see where the next 500 take me. I have a loyal group of followers who encourage me by leaving me questions and comments. Thanks from the bottom of my heart. It’s so nice to know someone is out there reading what I’m writing!

I am so grateful for the community of food bloggers and photographers. For the most part, they are people who are generous of spirit. I adore the trait of generosity. My fellow food bloggers and photographers share knowledge and offer gentle and constructive criticism as well as heaps of praise. I feel like I have found my tribe.

To celebrate this milestone I decided that a special cake was in order. This cake is quite spectacular. It starts with three layers of moist apple spice cake. Each layer is covered in silky cinnamon Swiss meringue buttercream. To finish this gorgeous cake, I added a drizzle of apple cider caramel.
The cake batter is crammed full of diced apples. I used three huge Honeycrisp for mine. When you mix the batter together you will think you made a mistake because it is so thick. It basically looks like bits of diced apples, barely held together by batter. Don’t worry. As the cake bakes, the apples release their moisture and your cake will be perfect.

This cake recipe is barely adapted from John’s recipe on The Preppy Kitchen. His knowledge of  cake baking is mind-boggling. He taught me about cake strips. They help prevent domed and cracked tops and over-cooked edges.

 I went with a silky Swiss meringue buttercream, accented with cinnamon. While admittedly a bit more work than a simple American buttercream, I just adore the light and velvety texture of a Swiss meringue buttercream. If you are curious, here is everything you ever wanted to know about buttercream from the über-talented Stella Parks.

For the shiny caramel drizzle recipe, I went straight to Tessa Huff’s gorgeous book, Layered, for inspiration. In a traditional caramel sauce, you use water and white sugar. Tessa suggests reduced apple cider and brown sugar instead. The tang of apple cider is perfectly balanced by the toasty notes of brown sugar in the cooked caramel. It really helps to offset the sweetness of the buttercream.

I added a little surprise of crunch between each layer with a ginger-pecan crumble, because texture is important in everything.

Truthfully, we didn’t drink the Prosecco (in the first photo of this post) with this cake. My first slice I had with some ice cold milk, and the second (and third, if we’re being honest), I had with tea. My fourth slice I just ate standing in front of the fridge. I ended up making this cake three times, before I got it exactly where I wanted it, so we had lots of cake. Even the mistakes were delicious. The first cake was served at our Rosh Hashanah dinner, with a birthday candle for my cousin Barbara. The second and third cakes were sliced, photographed and then wrapped and sent off to my husband’s office, where most of my baked goods go to have a happy ending.

Click here to print recipe for Apple-Cinnamon Crunch Cake with Caramel Drizzle.

Addictive Blogger Award

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Imagine my surprise when I opened my email last Friday morning and discovered that the Addictive Blogger Award had been bestowed upon Salt and Serenity. So exciting! I must admit that sometimes when I am sitting at my computer, typing away, I wonder, if there is anyone out there even reading this stuff? So, it is quite rewarding to know that someone is out there reading what I have so carefully crafted and that some readers even find me addictive! I suppose it is a basic human need to want to feel validated and recognized for what we do.

A great big thank you to the talented blogger behind at350degrees for the award! I do not know her name, but I can tell you that she is a busy student and still has time and a great big passion for baking. It’s inspiring! Check out her blog. It’s lovely!

My award comes with a few rules:

  • Thank the person awarding you
  • Share a little about why you blog and how the journey started
  • Paste the blog award on your page
  • Nominate 10 other bloggers you feel deserve the award

I actually stumbled into blogging by accident. I never intended to be a blogger. In the spring of 2009, I was surfing the net, doing some research for a food column I was writing  for our local newspaper, when I came across a wonderful food blog called Pinch My Salt , by Nicole Hamaker.  Nicole was about to embark on an exciting journey, baking her way through Peter Reinhart’s book, “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice”, one recipe at a time.  She was looking for company.

The next thing I knew, I was e-mailing Nicole to tell her to count me in.  I am not ordinarily a goal oriented person and the thought of joining any group usually makes me shudder, but for some strange reason I was drawn to this challenge.  I have several bread baking books on my cookbook shelf but have never gotten around to baking anything other than challah.  I have always wanted to learn to bake amazing baguettes, Ciabatta bread and other artisan breads but just never got around to it.  It always seemed like such an ordeal.  This was just the kick I needed.

It seemed like a simple exercise.  We would go through the book in alphabetical order and bake one bread each week, for the next 43 weeks, beginning with Anadama Bread and ending with Whole Wheat.  Within 2 weeks there were 216 bread freaks from all over the world, who, just like me, decided that their life would not be complete if they failed to bake their way through this book. Our main way of keeping in touch was through a Google group. We decided to share photos of our finished breads on Flickr.

I baked my first bread (cornmeal molasses bread called Anadama) on May 12 2009.  I logged onto our Google page and under the conversation thread titled, “Post your Anadama Bread links here” I told the group I had made my bread and they could see pictures of it on Flickr.  While on our Google page, I decided to check out what other group members were up to.  I was blown away.  Many of the participants had their own food blogs and told a whole story with photos about their Anadama adventure.

What had I gotten myself into?  These were serious food people with their own web sites.  As I perused some of their blog entries I became somewhat jealous.  I wanted to start a food blog too.  I could do this!  The next day as I baked our second bread I took my camera into the kitchen and shot every step of baking “Artos, a Greek Celebration Bread”.  By the end of the day I was sweating and my camera was covered in flour.  But I was so proud.  That night I began researching blogs and within 48 hours I had my very own blog set up with my first post, complete with photos.

I must admit, that when I told my children what I was doing, they mocked me and told me to “get a life.” I quickly shut them up with homemade bagels, cinnamon buns, kaiser buns,  and 40 other wonderful breads.

I actually finished the challenge in July 2010 and surprisingly, I came to love the writing and photography almost as much as the baking. I found that blogging was an amazing outlet for my creative energy. I love the generosity and camaraderie of food bloggers. They are, by and large, a wonderful and supportive group of people. After the challenge was done, I decided to continue blogging and see where it would take me. It has now been over three years and I think that my writing and photography skills have improved and I learn so much from other bloggers. I continue to gather more followers each day and am up to over 459 followers at this point. I am grateful for those who subscribe to my blog and want to hear what I have to say.

In the spirit of food blogger generosity, here are 10 food blogs that I think deserve the Addictive Blog Award. Check them out, and I think you’ll agree that they are indeed addictive!

Aprons and Sneakers, A Healthy Life For Me, Biscuits and Bobbins, Bob Vivant, Bravetart, Dash and Bella, Emmy Cooks, Raspberri Cupcakes, The Patterned Plate, The Usual Bliss.