My Homemade Bread Recipe and How Advil Lets Me Enjoy The Simple Things

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #WhatInconvenience #CollectiveBias

Baking bread has become one of my very favorite things to do in the kitchen the last couple of years. When all my kids were growing up, I never had the time to bake bread and sometimes it got so busy in our house that it seemed like a circus just to get dinner on the table.

But now I have the time, and it's become something that is calming and centering to me. And of course I love the taste of freshly baked bread. There's really nothing like it.

Though I'm a busy lady with work and family, on weekend mornings I love having a cup of tea and slice of toast with my favorite jam. My kids and grandkids love this bread too, and so I'll often make two loaves and give one away. It makes me very happy to share my bread with others, and that they really appreciate it.

As much as I enjoy making bread, the kneading it requires can really make my hands hurt. I have to deal with the pain of arthritis, but I try not to let it interfere with doing the things I love.

I consider myself very lucky to be fairly healthy at the age of almost 59, and I try to take care of myself so that I can live an active life with my family, which includes my four grandchildren.

Did you know that arthritis effects nearly 53 million Americans? It can really have an impact on the quality of life for many people. Though my arthritis and joint pain isn't nearly as severe as some other people's, it can make some things I do much more challenging.

If you've ever struggled to open a bottle of pain medication like I have, then you can understand how glad I was to find Advil with the new EZ Open cap. I can open it quickly and easily, and not get frustrated the way I feel with some other bottles.

Before I start making bread, I take Advil for the relief of my joint pain. It really makes a big difference for me in the way my hands feel, and lets me enjoy the bread making process so much more. The kneading of the dough is key to how your bread turns out, and Advil helps me be pain-free.

I wanted to share my favorite recipe for white bread. It's delicious, and I've found that the bread you make at home is so much better than anything you can buy at the store. And like anything, the more you bake bread, the better you become at it.

Recipe for Crusty White Bread

Ingredients:

1 egg
1 egg yolk
2/3 - 1 cup warm water
3 1/2 cups white bread flour, sifted
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
2 tablespoons butter, diced
vegetable oil, for greasing pan


Directions:

Place the egg and egg yolk in a 2-cup measuring cup and beat lightly. Add enough water to make 1 1/4 cups. Stir well.

Put the flour, salt, sugar, and yeast in a large bowl. Add the butter and rub it in with your fingertips until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.

Make a well in the center, add the egg mixture, and stir with a heavy spoon to a smooth dough. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead well for 10 minutes until smooth.

Brush another large bowl with oil. Shape the dough into a ball, place it in the bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place for 1 hour, or is doubled in volume.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Oil a loaf pan. Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead for one minute, until smooth. Shape the dough into a loaf size and place it in the greased pan.

Cover and let stand in a warm place for 30 minutes, until the dough has risen above the pan.

Place in the preheated oven and bake for 25-30 minutes, or until firm and golden brown. Transfer to a wire rack and let cool.

Makes 1 loaf.

It's so delicious right out of the oven, or great for toast or sandwiches. It also makes fabulous French toast when you make it with flavored coffee creamer.

The EZ Open Cap is great for people who struggle with arthritis. Based on a survey of monthly doctor recommendations, nothing's proven stronger than Advil for arthritis and other joint pain.*  *For minor arthritis pain.  Among OTC pain relievers.

I've been using Advil for years for relief of headaches, backache, and other kinds of joint pain. It lets me keep up with what I want to do in life, and helps me to be pain-free to enjoy it all.

You can find Advil EZ Open bottles at your local Walmart in the pharmacy section.

If you suffer from arthritis or joint pain, go ahead and check out the Better Living Tool Kits from the Arthritis Foundation.

I don't intend to let arthritis keep me from enjoying life and being an active and vital woman. And neither should you.

Banana Coffee Cake Recipe

Coffee cake will always remind me of my mother, and being a kid who grew up in the 60's. It seemed to me that all of the other moms I knew had a favorite coffee cake recipe too, and it always seemed to be available as a snack.


My mom would make one every Friday afternoon so that we could enjoy it over the weekend. I remember waking up and going into the kitchen on Saturday mornings and there would be my father at the kitchen table, reading the newspaper, a cup of coffee and a slice of my mother's coffee cake in front of him.

There are hundreds of recipes for different kinds of coffee cakes, using many different ingredients. I wish I had some of my mother's recipes, but I don't.


This recipe for Banana Coffee Cake is really delicious, moist and tender cake with walnuts, brown sugar, and cinnamon inside the cake and on top.


I baked this in a tube pan but you can easily use a Bundt cake pan and that works great too. Make sure your bananas are very ripe to bring out the banana flavor in the cake.


Enjoy it in the morning with a cup of coffee or tea, or for dessert with whipped cream on top, like my grandchildren ate it.

Recipe for Banana Coffee Cake

Ingredients:

1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup sour cream
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 medium ripe bananas, mashed
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup walnuts, finely chopped
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
powdered sugar, for dusting cake


Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 12-cup tube or Bundt pan with baking spray.
In a large bowl, use a mixer to cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs and beat thoroughly to combine. Add the sour cream, vanilla extract, and bananas, and beat until just smooth.
In another bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the creamed mixture and beat well until fluffy and thick.
Combine the walnuts, brown sugar, and cinnamon in a small bowl. Pour half the batter into the prepared pan. Sprinkle with half of the nut mixture. Spoon the remaining batter over the nut mixture and then sprinkle the top with the remaining nut mixture.
Bake in the oven for 50-55 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted into the middle comes out clean.
Let the cake rest 10 minutes before removing it from the pan, let cool on a wire rack. Dust with powdered sugar before serving.


Makes approximately 8 servings.

Hard Rock Cafe San Francisco 2016 World Burger Tour Review #worldburgertour

*The information, gift card, gift pack and giveaway have been provided to me by Hard Rock International.

This year for Mother's Day we decided to drive to San Francisco to celebrate. I LOVE the city, the food, the people, the houses and the ocean. Each time we go to San Francisco we stop at Pier 39 to eat and shop. This time we decided to eat at Hard Rock Cafe San Francisco. The first thing my son loved was the giant guitar that stands outside the entrance of the restaurant, we had to take a classic tourist picture of course. The gift shop is the first thing you walk into as you go into the restaurant, they have so many great items and even a Bob Marley life like figure.

Once you are in the restaurant the place has so much to see. The priceless items that decorate the walls are amazing! The wait staff encourages everyone to walk around and look at the memorabilia and other patrons are very nice if you want a pic of something cool near their seating area. There was even a guy going around making animal balloons, of course we had to have him make my son one.

The menu has so many great burgers on it! I had a hard time deciding which one to select. My mother in law went with the Legendary Burger and I had the World Burger Tour Seattle Java Lava Burger to celebrate my own Mother who lives in Seattle area. The Java Lava is amazing! It has a very unique flavor from the espresso rub that I loved. It was a juicy burger with crispy onions, bacon and even a fried jalapeno.

The wait staff was amazing too! We were seated by the kitchen which for me is a treat. I like hearing the kitchen bustling, seeing and smelling all the great food passing by us as we wait for our own. Our server Matt was super kind, he fixed an issue we had right away, checked on us often, made recommendations and even giggled with us as my son ordered two things off the menu. My son could not decide on a meal so I let him get both, he picked a bit from each and we took the rest to go.

We had a wonderful experience of good food, great location and amazing staff. We stopped in the gift shop to get my son a Hard Rock Guitar plate like the one his meal was served on. He loves that plate and has me serve his lunch on it daily. I bought myself a Hard Rock coffee mug with pictures of San Francisco on it so I can be reminded of the great Mother's Day I had there.

With full bellies and smiles on our faces we left Pier 39 and headed to the beach to make sand castles and jump in the waves. I highly recommend eating at the Hard Rock Cafe in San Francisco, its good food and a fun environment. I told a couple I met at my work who was visiting from Australia to check out the Hard Rock Cafe since they had plans to go to San Francisco the next day. Hopefully they will grab a World Tour Burger too!

The limited-time World Burger Tour menu is available Sunday, May 1 through Thursday, June 30, 2016. Hurry to a Hard Rock Cafe near you to try these legendary burgers! I made a reservation using the Open Table App, it was super easy and I recommend reservations in the upcoming summer months since it is a busy time for Pier 39.

Strawberry Clafoutis Recipe

This recipe for making a Clafoutis is becoming one of my favorites. It's sort of like a flan and a tart, and it's French, so how can you go wrong?
I know when I have read about making this dessert, it seemed like something I would never attempt. My first and only try at making flan was somewhat of a disaster, so a Clafoutis would have the same fate I thought.

But I was wrong, and it turned out delicious. So here I am again, using strawberries to make this one, and it's amazing.
A Clafoutis is very simple to make, and you can use different fruits in it for different tastes. It's creamy and smooth, and just fancy enough to impress your guests.
After it bakes in the oven, let it cool for a bit, then sprinkle it with powdered sugar. And you could even top it with a tiny bit of whipped cream if you like.



Recipe for Strawberry Clafoutis

Ingredients:

 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 cup half-and-half
2 eggs
1 egg yolk
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups fresh strawberries
Confectioners' sugar, for dusting

Directions:

 Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Brush a 9-inch ceramic pie plate or casserole dish with the melted butter.
In a large bowl, whisk together the half-and-half, eggs, egg yolk, sugar and almond extract. Add the flour and whisk just until smooth, being careful not to overmix. Pour the batter into the prepared baking dish and scatter the raspberries evenly over the top.
Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the Clafoutis is just set and the surface is golden brown. Dust with confectioners' sugar and serve warm. 

Serves 6.













Little Flourless Chocolate Cakes Recipe

Chocolate is my weakness, and these little cakes had me going slightly crazy, that's how good they are. If you love over the top, rich and chocolaty desserts, you'll love this recipe.

I've always wondered how a flourless chocolate cake would taste because I've never made a cake without flour before. I guess I just thought it was an odd concept, no flour in a cake?

Well, this cake needs no flour at all because it's filled with moist, and chocolaty goodness. I made it in six ramekins, though the recipe says to use ten smaller sized ones. You can do either, but I liked the idea of a bigger serving.

The recipe comes from the cookbook Sheet Pan Suppers by local Seattle author Molly Gilbert. Of course the supper recipes are amazing but when I was looking through the book, my eye caught the Flourless Chocolate Cakes.

You can either sprinkle them with powdered sugar or do what I did, which is to add a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Either way, they are just so good.

Recipe for Flourless Chocolate Cakes

Ingredients:

1/2 pound ( 2 sticks) unsalted butter
8 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
1 teaspoon espresso powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
6 large eggs

Confections' sugar, or vanilla ice (optional)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, with a rack in the center position. Place ramekins (6 larger or 10 smaller) on a sheet pan.

Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat. Remove from the heat and stir in the semisweet chocolate. Stir until the chocolate is smooth and fully melted. Add the vanilla and stir to combine.

Whisk together the granulated sugar, cocoa powder, espresso powder, and salt in a large bowl. Add the eggs and whisk until smooth. Add the melted chocolate and whisk until well incorporated.

Divide the batter among the ramekins, filling each about three-quarters full. Bake until a skewer inserted into the center comes out with just a few moist crumbs, 30-40 minutes.

Let the cakes cool slightly- they will fall a bit in the center-  before serving warm, dusted with confections' sugar or a scoop of ice cream.

The cakes will keep, wrapped in plastic, in the fridge for 3-4 days. Eat them cold or rewarm them in a 350 degree oven for about 15 minutes.