Recipe test: Cinnamon surprise

Every fall I get the bread-baking itch. Actually, that's not true. I always want to bake bread, but in the fall, the kitchen gets cold and drafty, so I'll turn on the oven as much as possible. The smell of bread also makes things feel warmer, even if it isn't. A couple weeks ago I checked out Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Bread Bible from the library in an attempt to up my game. Beranbaum takes title seriously as she includes ratios that should be learned and understood by the most earnest bakers, and lays out step-by-step instructions including how many hours and days to plan out each recipe, which I appreciate. She is also specific on flour brands - King Arthur is indeed king in many of these recipes. She seems worthy of my trust for all the trial and error, the mathematical equations, and variations featured with each recipe.

I mean - I suppose I could become a home baking expert someday, especially if I studied this book. But the longer I live and the more time I spend in the kitchen, the more I don't want to be an expert. I just want to wield my trusty kitchen utensils and equipment and turn out something decent and be delightfully surprised by the results. Something I'm learning about myself is that I need a healthy balance of understanding why things work while leaving room for the magical, nostalgic and even therapeutic moments that make me love baking in the first place.

I'm also finding that the best bakers of bread are patient people, as noted above. And because most of my baking is done on the weekend, the thought of having to start something on a Friday (good luck to me, who is more apt to pour wine on a Friday than weigh flour), tend to it on Saturday and finish it on Sunday, or later, is a surefire way for me to lose steam. So as I paged through this bible, I fell into my usual trap of identifying the easiest looking, least time consuming recipe to try first.

Enter: Cinnamon crumb surprise. No yeast! A couple hours required! Moist crumb, warm spices! And, a surprise!

The recipe checked all the boxes for me. It was fairly easy but still taught me something - in this case, that it is important to use either cake flour or a bleached all-purpose flour to keep the butter suspended in the batter. Otherwise, the surprise, i.e., sliced apples throughout the middle, may sink. And the magic: I fully expected it to completely fall apart when I took it out of the pan, but I managed to keep it in one piece, and it sliced up beautifully. It tasted like all the flavors you want in the fall.

Though it should come as no surprise at all - this is not bread. It's cake.

Perhaps I'll make bread next.

The recipe is posted here, if you're interested in checking it out.