The Jane Austen Tea Party

It began a wishful tweet and ended up a delightful afternoon. I can't remember which one of us brought it up first, but the planned event grew from four or five of us to more than a dozen. Most of us made our own frocks, shawls, and/or bonnets. Many made scrumptious treats to accompany our tea and cocoa. Some entertained us with lovely muscial offerings. A few had a lively "Wentworth vs. Darcy" debate. Conversation was wonderful, and new friendships were made. Divine.

Book Group Guide for Dispirited

I am thrilled to let you know that I have just posted discussion questions for my fantasy novel Dispirited. At the top of this page, you'll see a tab that will take you there.

My dear friend, Christine Edwards Allred, has a Ph.D. in American Literature. She used to get paid a hefty sum to lead book groups for rich ladies on Manhattan's Upper East Side and in New Jersey. Later, she wrote book group guides for great writers like Elizabeth Berg. 

I was honored when she agreed to come up with discussion questions for my book, and I was beyond thrilled when I read them. Spoilers abound, so be alerted! But if your book group should choose to read and discuss Dispirited, please feel free to use these questions as the abundant, thoughtful resource that they are.

GCRP: Cinnamon Rolls of Vermont

I've subscribed to Cook's Illustrated for nearly twenty years. It is the Consumer Reports of cooking magazines; when its staff wants to make the very best roasted turkey, for example, it'll roast 20-30 of them in different ways until it finds success. The results are almost always spectacular. 

It was actually CI's spin-off show "America's Test Kitchen" that inspired my method for the Great Cinnamon Roll Project. Therefore, even when CI's cinnamon roll recipe looked a little spartan, I went forward in full trust. CI has never let me down before. 

But apparently there is a first time for everything. Perhaps it is because CI originates in Vermont, where the yankee-est yankees live. Perhaps those stern, frugal Vermonters frown upon rich, gooey indulgences like my ideal cinnamon roll. I'm not sure, but I have my suspicions.

The recipe heading stated that its creators had compromised between "a rich brioche dough" and "a lean sandwich bread." (Based on past GCRP experiences, I'm pretty sure I would have erred on the side of brioche.) In addition, the filling was made with a couple of tablespoons of milk in lieu of the usual butter. I hoped that these substitutions would not detract from the taste and texture I was going for, but my hope was in vain. The result was a faintly spicy piece of bread with a dash of anemic icing on top. Boo. My taste testers all vehemently agreed.

The next recipe on my list was from the King Arthur Flour company, another bastion of my kitchen, and another very successful company based in Vermont. I love KAF's flour, its website, and its recipes--usually. But when I saw that KAF's recipe was nearly identical to CI's, I didn't bother. Next, we'll move right on to Bon Appetit's Yukon Gold Cinnamon Rolls.

GCRP: Tyler Perry's Cinnamon Rolls

On we go with The Great Cinnamon Roll Project (GCRP). You'd think my kids would be sick of them by now, but today when we were at Trader Joe's, Daniel spied a package of pre-baked cinnamon rolls and begged me to buy them. I refused. I love Joe, but I seriously doubt that his cellophane-wrapped cinnamon rolls can compete with homemade.

I found our latest contender on Oprah's website. Oprah seems to love food as much as I do, so I reasoned that her recipes would be decent. Whoever came up with the actual recipe claims that these rolls are the favorite of many celebrities, including Tyler Perry--thus the name. This was the first of two recipes on my master list that require instant vanilla pudding as an ingredient. This is not something I keep in the house; I had to make a special purchase, and I hoped it was worth it.

Hmm. Once the dough was mixed, I failed to discern what the vanilla pudding was adding. It just tasted vaguely artificial, and I hoped that would go away once the rolls were baked. When I saw how little mixing the recipe called for, I was on alert. To develop gluten (the protein composite that gives bread its characteristic elastic texture), flour needs to be kneaded for a fair amount of time. I let my Viking stand mixer handle that little chore. With so little kneading to this method, I feared that the texture would not be what I wanted.

However, once the dough had been refrigerated for the requisite hours, and I turned it out on my floured counter to roll it and fill it, my hopes rose somewhat. The dough was almost impossible to manage--extremely floppy and very sticky. I thought this might be a good sign, meaning that it would yield tender rolls. 

Tender, pretty, and fluffy? Yes. But the texture of the baked rolls was more like strudel--"except not as good," James interjected. I want that pull-apart, classic yeastiness to my cinnamon rolls, not a labor-intensive coffee cake.

They were somewhat tastier the second day, and surprisingly didn't get stale, so that was nice. Perhaps that was the pudding's contribution. But the fact that they were still hanging around the second day was telling. With the memory of Grandma Ida's rolls fresh in their minds, everyone gave Tyler Perry's the thumbs-down. 

Up next: The mighty Cook's Illustrated throws its hat into the ring.

GCRP: Grandma Ida's Cinnamon Rolls

Well, I'm a happy woman right about now. I'll continue with the GCRP, but as of today, we may have a winner.

A few days ago, after reading about The Great Cinnamon Roll Project, Patrick's Aunt Karen sent me an email containing her mother's cinnamon roll recipe. It was published in 1941 in the book Favorite Recipes of Ephraim Women.

Ephraim is the town in Sanpete County, Utah in which Patrick's father's family lived until the end of World War II. (Correct me if I have my Perkins family lore wrong, Aunt Karen.) Oh, how I love the kind of cookbook that the women of Ephraim put together--community compilations of tried-and-true recipes from seasoned cooks and bakers. My Nani has a whole shelf of such Relief Society cookbooks, and she has promised they will be mine someday. TREASURE.

I knew and loved Grandma Ida late in her life, but I had no idea that she was an accomplished baker. Her recipe is written in the style of her generation, with shorthand instructions. There was no need to school the reader on how to proof yeast or the optimal temperature at which dough will rise. You could just write, "Roll out as for cinnamon rolls," and bakers of that day, tutored by daily experience and wise forbears, would know what to do.

I just pulled a batch of these rolls out of the oven. Grandma Ida apparently didn't frost her cinnamon rolls; in the lean days in which the recipe was published, the unadorned bun would have been treat enough (especially if raisins had been added, as Aunt Karen reports that she would beg). But I wanted to assure a level playing field for the project, so I adapted the Magnolia Bakery's Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting--and I also frosted some rolls with a simple powdered sugar-cream-vanilla glaze. 

They are outstanding. Feather-light, yeasty, fragrant, with that perfect pull-apart texture and just the right amount of sweetness and spice. Grandma Ida, I know that you are smiling down from heaven right now as your great-grandchildren happily devour your legacy. Thank you--and thanks, Aunt Karen, for passing on this gem.

Grandma Ida's Cinnamon Rolls (translated for the modern baker)

1 tablespoon yeast
1 cup + 2 tablespoons water (105-110 degrees)
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted
3 eggs
1-1/2 teaspoons salt
4-3/4 cups flour

Filling:

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon 

Mix the yeast with two tablespoons water and two tablespoons sugar and set aside. In the bowl of a stand mixer, mix 1 cup water with 1/2 cup sugar, then add the 1/2 cup melted butter, eggs, and salt and mix well. Add the yeast mixture. Replace the mixer's paddle beater with the dough hook. Add the flour and mix on medium speed for 8 minutes until well-kneaded and elastic. The dough should still be sticking to the bottom of the bowl. 

Cover the mixing bowl with a dishtowel and set in a warm place to rise. 80-85 degrees is best; if there's nowhere in your house that is warm enough (like the top of the refrigerator), set the mixer bowl in a big pot containing hot (115-degree) tap water, cover, and set on the back of the stove. My oven vents to the back of the range, so I turned it on to about 150 degrees, just so some additional warmth would hit the bottom of the pot and keep the yeast happy. Let the dough rise for 2 hours. It should be double in size. 

Butter a 9x13-inch baking pan. Mix the brown sugar and cinnamon together with a fork. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough into a large rectangle--about 12 x 18 inches. Pour the 1/4 cup of melted butter in the center, then spread it around evenly over the entire surface. Sprinkle the cinnamon sugar evenly over the butter. Roll the dough up tightly into a log and press the edges together to seal them. Slide an 18-inch length of dental floss under the log and cut one-inch rolls. Place the rolls in the buttered pan, cover the pan with a dish towel, and set the rolls to rise in a warm place for a half hour. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. 

Uncover the rolls and bake them for 25 minutes. They should be golden brown, and some of the centers might have popped up a bit. While the rolls are baking, mix up ONE of the two icings. Once the rolls are out of the oven, spread the icing over them so that it can melt into all the crannies. Leave the room and distract yourself for at least fifteen minutes while the rolls cool somewhat. Serve warm, with plenty of cold milk on the side. (They are also plenty tasty at room temperature--if they make it that long.)

Caramel Cream Cheese Icing

4 ounces (1/2 package) cream cheese, room temperature
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, room temperature
1/3 cup Caramel Sauce*, room temperature

Mix all ingredients until smooth.

OR:

Vanilla Icing

3 tablespoons heavy cream
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup powdered sugar

Mix all ingredients until smooth.

*Caramel Sauce

1 cup cold water
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups sugar
2 cups heavy cream

Put the water, salt, and sugar in a heavy saucepan over medium heat, stirring until the sugar dissolves--about 3 minutes. Raise the heat to high and boil without stirring until the syrup turns a deep amber color--about 15 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat. Very slowly, add the cream and whisk like mad. The caramel will bubble up furiously at first. Just keep adding the cream in a thin stream and whisk until it's all mixed in. Put the pan back on medium-low heat and stir for one minute. Turn off the heat and let cool to room temperature. Store in a quart jar in the refrigerator. Excellent over ice cream.