Bakeries Around Rowan University

21Nov09

Pitman Bakery

 

I don’t always eat my own baked goods. Sometimes I go out with friends to a coffee house or a bakery and enjoy baked goods there. Having been at Rowan for almost two semesters now, I have gathered a few favorite locations around Rowan University.

 

 

I have made a map of the locations of these places. The only bakeries I have on the list are Pitman’s Bakery and Liscio’s. Liscio’s is a favorite among Rowan students. Located on Delsea drive, it is actually within walking distance of the university. Pitman’s Bakery is a bit further, located in Pitman. It’s not out of walking distance but it can be a hike. Pitman’s bakery is widely renowned for their donuts. They sell chocolate iced, powdered and glazed donuts the most. They are very popular in the early morning.

Pitman Bakery. Photo by Ismaa Viqar.

PB’s restaurant is a diner on Delsea drive. It’s an inexpensive diner that many Rowan students go to for a quick and easy meal. My friends’ favorite is th cakes they offer.

My two favorite locations for baked goods, or just hanging out, are Progressive Coffee House on High Street in Glassboro and The Ground House on S  Broadway in Pitman. Both coffee houses are small coffee houses. In both places, the owners are easy to talk to and very friendly. They also both display the artwork of local artists on their walls and jave open mic nights, live bands and large couch seating.

At Progressive, the owner’s wife makes all of the food. All of the food they offer is great but my personal favorite baked good is the chocolate chip muffins. They’re large and go great with a cup of coffee. Another note worthy baked good is the quiche. I am a big lover of quiche and normally don’t like any quiche as much as my mother’s.

The Ground House has cookies and muffins at the counter. They change up which muffins or cookies they have out every two weeks and accept requests for batches. Right now, they have pumpkin and crandberry muffins because of the season. They also have blueberry but less often since it’s wintertime. They also have blueberry and banana pancakes that can be ordered. Their biggest seller is chocolate chip cookies, an old time favorite of many people. The Ground House also offers something unique that I plan to utilize in the near future.

Locals bring their own confections to be put at the counter for free. Anyone can grab one as they get their coffee. What the baker can do is put their baked goods out for the public along with a survey for them to take. This way they can get feedback on new recipes and learn how to improve on their baking.

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Cornbread

21Nov09

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For a Thanksgiving dinner party my friends were holding, I cooked a good portion of the food. The one item I baked myself was cornbread. Instead of buying a box of mix, I bought Aunt Jemima’s self-rising whit corn meal mix.

The recipe is simple:

• 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil
• 2 cups of Aunt Jemima’s Self-rising White Corn Meal Mix
• 1 to 2 teaspoons of sugar (optional)
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 1 egg, beaten

I chose to skip the optional sugar addage. This was a mistake. The bread turns out okay but it was bland. I wanted to make my parts of the Thanksgiving feast a bit more healthy but sometimes trying to be a bit healthy doesn’t pay out in the end. In the future, I will definitely opt to add the sugar.

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Tags: cornbread, thanksgiving

4a.m. Experimentation

16Nov09

It’s almost 4 a.m. as I begin this blog post. Between weird sleeping patterns and school projects, I cannot get to sleep. Being as I won’t be getting any REM tonight, I decided earlier to make yellow cake instead. This was not meant to become a blog post but through the events that occurred, it certainly has earned one.

Yellow cake is a comfort food for me plus it’s easy to bake, lasts awhile and is something sweet to have around the kitchen. I always make it from scratch, which adds a home-baked added bonus to its effect and makes me feel more at home in my on-campus apartment (Believe me — Rowan Boulevard might be a beautiful building with wonderful apartments, but the white walls and forest green, stiff couches can be reminiscent of a hotel rather than a home).

I gathered the ingredients and begun the recipe. There was one huge problem: my milk had gone sour, and how. Honestly, that smell is absolutely atrocious. Turns out even a half gallon for a baker is a lot while living on your own.

I had poured ingredients and still wanted to make these cakes. (I had decided to make use of the two brownie tins I had purchased at a dollar store, making two small cakes instead of one. Side note; Dollar Tree has surprisingly good bakeware. I got my brownie tins and the best whisk I’ve ever used there.) What could I use in my small kitchen as a replacement?

The whisk from the Dollar Tree. It was arguably the best investiment I have made for one dollar, a large bag of animal crackers in a close second place.

I considered using more eggs but that didn’t sound too appetizing. Water would just water down the vanilla taste. I decided to take a risk and use my coffee creamer. The creamer I use is Coffee Mate, french vanilla. Web sites online say to water down the creamer, using about half as much as the recipe called for milk and using water for the rest. I decided against this. I like my vanilla tastes to be strong. Paired with the usual dose of vanilla extract, this cake would either be a wonderworld of vanilla for the taste buds  or simply overwhelming to the senses. The way I figure it, I was taking a gamble anyway. I might as well go for it and see what happens.

My milk substitute.

 

Batter in brownie tins.

 

In a preheated oven.

After about 45 minutes, I took the two cakes out of the oven. After they cooled off, I put Betty Crocker’s vanilla whipped icing on top of both.

 

 

End result: delicious. It turns out it is not an overwhelming amount of vanilla at all. In fact, it’s about as vanilla tasting as the usual taste of yellow cake. The cake is a bit richer than usual but overall, this was a success. I’m glad I wound up not watering the creamer down. It would have taken away from the taste.

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Tags: baking, baking experiment, baking substitution, coffee creamer, creamer for milk, french vanilla coffee creamer, milk, substitute, yellow cake

Kei Dallmer

15Nov09

Kei Dallmer has been one of my closest friends since I was nine years old. On the first day of class of fourth grade, fate had it that she and I wound up sitting next to each other in homeroom. About a week later, she was my best friend. It’s funny how quick that happens when you’re nine.

Kei is hardcore after getting face-planted with a cupcake.

In any case, we are now 20 years old and are still close friends. She came from our hometown, Marlton, N.J., to visit me at Rowan. During Kei’s visit, she made a baked apple for the camera, taking the audience through each step of making an easy-to-make recipe she and I found on Recipezaar.com.

(Video by Josh Gager)

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Tags: baking, baked apple, video, kei dallmer, KEI, dallmer

AllRecipes.com

14Nov09

Since I’ve been at college, I have been without a cookbook and have relied on the internet for recipes The search for recipes can sometimes be challenging and awkward. Some recipes I have found have been absolute failures that should have been delicious.

I have found one Web site that I find points me in the right direction. All Recipes is a great site I use often in my baking escapades.

The user can search key phrases and find exactly what they are looking for. Unlike a lot of baking blogs, there is little story telling or personal voice. Due to its direct approach, the site works more like a cookbook than a blog. I appreciate that sentiment. I would much rather have a great recipe than a colorfully flavored blog post written by someone I don’t know.

 

 

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Graham Cracker Crust

09Nov09

For my friend’s birthday, he wanted a plain cheesecake with cherry pie filling as a topping. I made him a cheesecake homemade but the one part of the cheesecake I found to be the best part of making homemade was the crust.

Instead of buying a pre-made graham cracker pie crust, I made my own. Having never made a cheesecake on my own, I looked to the internet for a recipe in which I could make the pie crust. I found an easy-to-make recipe on about.com.

The recipe is as follows:

Difficulty: Easy

Time Required: 10 minutes

Here’s How:

1. In a small saucepan or the microwave, melt 6 tablespoons of butter.
2. Place about 24 graham crackers in a plastic bag. Roll with a rolling pin until finely crushed. This may be done in small batches.
3. Measure 1 1/2 cups of graham cracker crumbs into a medium bowl.
4. Add 1/4 cup of sugar to the graham crackers.
5. Add the melted butter.
6. Stir or blend together with your hands.
7. Press into the pie plate or other pan.
8. To pre-bake the pie crust, bake for 8 to 10 minutes in a preheated 350 degree F. oven.

Tips:

1. Add a little cinnamon, nutmeg, or allspice to the crumbs for a spiced flavor.

What You Need:

• 6 tbsp butter, melted
• 24 graham crackers
• 1/4 cup sugar

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Tags: cheesecake, graham cracker, pie crust, recipe

Chocolate Chips

09Nov09

In my experiences with baking, one of the greatest tools I have come across are chocolate chips. It might sound a little strange but chocolate chips have saved some of my baking disasters and boring cakes and made them something delicious.

One of my most recent uses of chocolate chips was in a box of chocolate cake mix. I personally do not like using cake mixes. I like making everything from scratch. When I do use boxes, I like to add something to make them more personal. In a chocolate cake, I added chocolate chips to add a burst of flavor.

Another use I found was in yellow cake. The one time I made it from scratch, they added another level of flavor. Chocolate and vanilla can often play off one another quite well in a palette of flavor. When I did use a box of yellow cake, I also added 1/8 a teaspoon of vanilla into the mix to up the level of vanilla to play against the chocolate chips.

 

An image from a chocolate chip yellow cake I made in a previous post.

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Tags: baking secret, chocolate chips

Michael Anthony Michael Wolf

09Nov09

Today, I had a friend of mine come over to bake with. Mike Wolf and I have been friends since I was 12 years old. We met in a writing club in middle school and now go to Rowan University together.

Mike is a sophomore music education major. He acts, sings and directs in Rowan’s music and theater programs. His last project was directing the Charlie Brown musical in Boyd Recital Hall in Wilson Hall on Rowan’s Glassboro campus. Miek agreed to get in front of the camera for me and tell the readers what he likes about baking and what he enjoys baking the most.

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Tags: baking, baking memories, inspiration, interview, memories

Crumbled Cake

31Oct09

While making a cake for a holiday get together, I had the cake I had baked crumble on me. Fixing the situation was a very easy task.

In order to rememedy the situation, I simply turned the cake over to its less destroyed side. I pieced it back together a used the icing to cement it together. I then smoothed more icing over the entire cake.

In this cake, I used vanilla frosting with food coloring. I “painted” one side orange and the other black. After this, I used a butter knife to create a swirl with the two colors and added orange and black jimmies to op off the cake.

Filed under: Decorating   |  1 Comment
Tags: cake, Decorating, halloween, icing, orange and black

Chocolate Raspberry Cookies

31Oct09

 

I decided to try something new and experiment with cookies today. I found a recipe from Healthy Baking Recipes for Chocolate Peppermint Balls. I replaced the peppermint extract with raspberry, due to the grocery store being out of peppermint extract, and wound up with a great mix of chocolate and raspberry flavor.

 

The recipe I used:

• box of Duncan Hines’ Devilfood cake
• 1/2 cup of margarine
• 1 egg
• 1/2 teaspoon of raspberry extract

 

This was one of the few times I have ever used a box mix in a recipe. The turn out is an easily made cookie that tastes great with minimal fuss. I don’t like using cake mixes straight up but the added bonus of the raspberry extract made it tolerable to use the premade mix.

 

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Tags: baking, chocolate, cookies, experimental, experimental baking, raspberry extract