baker

Italian Sesame Twist (w/a heart!) 💕🥖💕

Last night I made a yummy Italian Sesame twist! Actually, many cultures enjoy making bread like this.

I wasn’t sure if I wanted it a little sweet or salty, so I divided it and used salt on one side and sugar on the other. I also want to share the recipe in case anyone is interested in making it.

Ingredients:

3 1/2 cups white all purpose flour (plain bread flour has a higher protein content but you can use all purpose too)

1 tblspn active dry yeast or 2 (1/4 oz) packets

2 tblspns white granulated sugar

1/2 tspn salt

1 cup warm milk

2 tblspn melted butter (salted or unsalted)

First, melt the butter in a pan. Heat the milk. They can both stay in their pans for now. Combine the flour, the yeast, and sugar in a separate bowl. Whisk them together. Then add in the salt. The salt helps strengthen the dough and stops it from collapsing during baking. Make sure you mix the flour and yeast in well with the sugar, then add the salt. Combine all together.

Now, make a “well” in the center of your combination. This is where you add the butter and milk. MAKE SURE THE MILK IS NOT TOO HOT OR COLD. You can do this by sprinkling the milk on your hand before you mix it in. If the milk is too hot or too cold the rising of the dough will take longer. Here are some pics:

Use a spoon to mix and combine. Scrape up the dough on the sides. Then place the dough onto a lightly floured surface and USE CLEAN HANDS TO KNEAD for about 10 minutes or until the dough comes together. Continue to knead the dough ball with hands until the dough is smooth and elastic. It does not have to be perfect, but it has to have some elasticity to it.

Brush a seperate bowl with Extra Virgin Olive oil, classic olive oil, or butter. Place the dough ball into the new bowl and cover with a tea towel for 45 minutes to 1 hour.

The dough should double in size after 45 minutes. Get out your rolling pin and stretch. Cut the dough into three “ropes.” You can twist them with your hands, they do not have to be perfect, but just make sure they look like ropes!

Then, place down parchment paper and lightly grease the parchment, make a loose “braid” with the three ropes. Pinch the ends together and tuck. You can just roll the ropes with your hand, again. Crack an egg into a dish and brush the loaf with the egg. Sprinkle sesame seeds (I toasted my sesame seeds first. Just put them on high heat in a pan for a few minutes). Sprinkle salt or sugar on top, whichever you prefer.

Bake at 400 F for 20-25 minutes but check on it make sure to not burn. The bread is done once it is golden-brown!

You can see I added a heart to the top of it. You can make a separate heart with the rope and seal it down with toothpicks. I hope you enjoy it!😊🥖💕

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s recently been featured on the Intuitive Edge podcast! She’s also been on ESPN’s “Solutions from the Huddle” broadcast and on Grace and Truth Radio World! Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students of all ages from many different backgrounds and cultures. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. She writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also writes on health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm is live and for sale! You can order your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Without-God-Hope-Storm-ebook/dp/B09P9T2DLT

I’d like to be a “culinary queen!”👸🍅🥮👩‍🍳

This is how it looks when I decide to ‘whip something up’ really quickly!😂👩‍🍳 I had a little family company over yesterday and planned it just the night before. All @authenticmeals #original #cooking and my very own #recipes !!! Ka’ree as the main #meal accompanied with #brownrice, of course! The main dish—and #homemadewalnutcake for dessert. This time I added #toasted #sesameseeds to the top of the #cake to add a twist! Yummy. We also had #homemadewheatchocolatechipcookies! #coffee and few other things!🍚🍛🌾🍶🍪 #mediterraneandiet #paleo #protein #keto #homemade #diet #cook #baking #entertaininginstyle #fresh #food #foodie #tomatostew #beef #protein #health ⚕️🍅🧅🥩

Finally, when a baby terrorizes your living space!💕😂👶 It’s OK.🙆‍♀️🙅‍♀️ We just cleaned it right up!😂♥️😃

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s recently been featured on the Intuitive Edge podcast! She’s also been on ESPN’s “Solutions from the Huddle” broadcast and on Grace and Truth Radio World! Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students of all ages from many different backgrounds and cultures. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. She writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also writes on health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm is live and for sale! You can order your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Without-God-Hope-Storm-ebook/dp/B09P9T2DLT

Whole Wheat Flour Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies!🍪🍪👩‍🍳

Yesterday night I made homemade whole wheat chocolate chip walnut cookies and they are sooo delicious! Yumm! Since whole wheat is a much better alternative to white flour, I would like to share my recipe to put a health spin on baking. The next time you make homemade cookies, you may want to try whole wheat flour yourselves! It is better for you than white flour. 🍪🍪☕️

This recipe calls for:

3 cups of whole wheat flour

2 tspns baking soda

16 tablespoons cold unsalted butter

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup white granulated sugar (optional)

3/4 tspn salt

2 eggs

2 tspns vanilla extract

8 ounces of chocolate chips

2 cups crushed walnuts

First, you whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt. Put in a bowl. In a separate bowl, mix together the butter, sugar(s), eggs, and vanilla, and these don’t need to be too well blended just combine. Oops, don’t forget to add the walnuts and chocolate chips also!

Then, add the flour mix from the separate bowl. Now that all ingredients are in one bowl, use a wooden or regular spoon to combine and mix them together.

The mixture may seem a little dough like and hard to combine at first. Here’s the trick: add up to a half cup of water (as much as needed but not too much!) to moisten the combination of all the ingredients. Use your hand to knead. Put the mixture into cookie dough form.

You can even add extra flour and extra water to the combo mix to make more cookies. I added 2-3 cups extra flour and a little more water! It came out to 43 cookies!

Scoop the cookie dough (1-2 tablespoon sizes) onto oven trays covered with parchment paper, and bake for 8-10 minutes at 350 F. Then move the trays around to rotate cookies, bake for an additional 8-10 minutes. The edges should be golden brown!🍪👩‍🍳

Then let them cool on oven racks for at least an hour. Refrigerate. You can even freeze them for up to a month!🍪☕️🌰

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s recently been featured on the Intuitive Edge podcast! She’s also been on ESPN’s “Solutions from the Huddle” broadcast and on Grace and Truth Radio World! Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students of all ages from many different backgrounds and cultures. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. She writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also writes on health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm is live and for sale! You can order your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Without-God-Hope-Storm-ebook/dp/B09P9T2DLT

Homemade Whole Wheat Walnut Cake!🥮🌾🌰

Baking has always been a favorite past time since I was a kid. At home they’d call me ‘Betty Crocker.’ As an adult I’ve grown more into the baking art and really enjoy embracing my ethnic side with the foods I make!🫒

They said it couldn’t be done, but I did it. Homemade wheat walnut cake from scratch! It’s never been done without white flour as far as I know. Mom was proud. I altered this traditional recipe to make it healthier. It is delicious! Even more delicious than the all-purpose flour version.

I have to be original and think of healthier methods. I hope I see posts from people in the future who have swapped the all purpose white or self rising flour for whole wheat cakes.

I altered the recipe a bit. Since it’s a foreign food, I was able to locate a few people who made this and one even attached a video. I didn’t follow the exact measurements. The better you get with baking the more you just know what to do.

Here is my own recipe:

It contains 3 and a 1/2 cups of whole wheat flour, 3 eggs, two teaspoons of baking powder, crushed walnuts (as many as you’d like :), a cup of whole milk, a cup and a half of sugar, a cup of butter, a tablespoon of vanilla extract, and I add a little water to make it more of a liquid form. You don’t want the cake mix to seem like dough. You are not making bread, you are making a cake. That’s why I add about a half cup or less of water. You basically mix them all together. I add a little extra flour (about a cup or two) to make two cakes each time. You can slice and freeze the cakes for up to a month. You bake at 350 F for a minimum of 30 minutes. Baking time can take up to an hour. Once your toothpick comes clean you’ll know it’s done.😊🥮☕️

Oh, and it might not be a bad idea to add about a 1/2 cup of vegetable oil into the mix.☺️ It will help the cake to keep that liquid form.

#wheat #wholewheatflour #diabeticfriendly #cake #betterthanwhite #assyrianchaldean #yummyfood #walnuts #tchai #tea #coffee #cake #mediterranean #style #foodie #conossieur 🥮☕️😀

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s recently been featured on the Intuitive Edge podcast! She’s also been on ESPN’s “Solutions from the Huddle” broadcast and on Grace and Truth Radio World! Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students of all ages from many different backgrounds and cultures. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. She writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also writes on health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm is live and for sale! You can order your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Without-God-Hope-Storm-ebook/dp/B09P9T2DLT

Assyrian Chaldean Cake!💟☦️

These cakes were fun to make today! Homemade walnut cakes made with all purpose flour (3 cups), baking soda (2 tspns), vanilla extract (1 tblspn), walnuts (chopped up) 1 cup or more, white granulated sugar (1 1/2 cups), milk (1 cup), three eggs, and a bit of water (the water was my trick to keep it cake like and not in a dough form).

I’ve wanted to make this cake for years. It’s a cake I often had while growing up and visiting relatives houses with my parents or with their friends. This cake is almost always accompanied with ‘Tchai,’ or tea. It’s a social dessert, comforting, and yummy all at the same time!

I found this recipe from a girl in New Jersey who posted it online. She had the accent.😄 Nonetheless, it wasn’t until I was two thirds of the way into making it that I realized something was missing. The mix was not liquid like enough, and then I realized I forgot to add the milk!🥛🥛🥛

Voila! There goes that. I also remembered (by watching mom for so many years making bread), that I could add a little water to increase the amount of cake! I also added a little flour. All of a sudden, I had two cakes!! I tried to make walnut topping designs, as you can see here!

Oh, and here’s a little secret. I didn’t use one of those fancy cake mixers! (Ssshhh!) I never liked those anyway. I used my hand to knead. My hands were clean. I wash throughout cooking and baking multiple times! That is the REAL way to bake. Bakin’ the ol’ school way!🥮😂🥮

I never liked those plug in mixers anyway!👩‍🍳⏲🥧🍮

#traditional #baker #foodie #cake #homemade #connoisseur

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s just been featured on the Intuitive Edge podcast! She’s also been on ESPN’s “Solutions from the Huddle” broadcast and on Grace and Truth Radio World! Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students from all over the world from many different backgrounds and cultures. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. She writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also writes on health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm is live and for sale! You can order your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Without-God-Hope-Storm-ebook/dp/B09P9T2DLT