And the Snow Came Softly Down

The view at dusk this evening

They had forecast snow for today and they were right.  I woke up to hear my phone signal a text and found one from Ann saying too much ice, no school today. Apparently there was black ice everywhere.  Dan said he had trouble even in the gravel while getting the paper when he got up. And it was starting to snow.  A day to spend in the kitchen for certain as the snow continued to fall. At first I thought I would begin on my Christmas cookie baking, but then I remembered a recipe I've been wanting to try.

A little back story:  When my brother and I were kids, as in grade school, my mom, who was not a baker, would very occasionally make a sweet roll she called orange kuchen rolls. Oh, were they ever good! For whatever reason, she only made them during a short season of a year or two. They had a crunchy topping of butter, sugar and grated orange peel and the bottoms were gooey with the same ingredients.  

When we were cleaning out my parents' house, one of the things I searched for was that recipe. As I looked, John came in and asked if I'd found a recipe for "those orange rolls Mom made when we were little." He'd never forgotten them, either!  I never did find it.  I searched the internet and came up empty.  I looked through her old cookbooks. Nothing.  And then one day this past year, I was looking through her Electric Bread cookbook which I had kept and spotted a picture that looked like those orange rolls I remembered. The recipe was called Orange Kisses, and from the description, sounded like it came from the same era Mom made hers.  

Today was the day.  I texted John and told him my plan to try and began.  I did use my Zojirushi bread machine to make the dough and then finished up in the oven.  I seemed to remember that Mom made hers in an angel food cake pan, so I dug out mine and used it.  That was mistake number two.

Mistake number one you ask?  Well, I've used the same brand of yeast for ever and a day.  It's Saf-Instant Red and it's great stuff.  I opened a new package about the time the virus became known and everyone was buying up all the flour and yeast in the land.  And a strange thing happened the first time I used it.  My bread rose twice as high. What? So I tried again, with the same results.  High is nice, too high, not so much. As a result, since then I've used half the amount of yeast a recipe calls for.  Until today.  Um hum, I used the full amount and my dough was very soft and puffy.  

Back to the pan.  The  butter and sugar/orange peel mix leaked out the bottom of the pan, all over the oven I just cleaned a few weeks ago. 

I know what I'll be doing tomorrow!  Running the self-clean program again!  

Meanwhile, the rolls.  The verdict?  I think I've found the right recipe! I'm so excited! I just ate one, and despite the "fluffiness" of it, the taste seemed to be what I remembered, with the crunchy top and the gooey bottom.  Bruder Bear will be thrilled!

I made supper in the crockpot, potatoes, carrots and hamburger in white sauce, but I just may eat my way through these rolls instead.  Oh, and about the yeast.  I think it's been a gift to me that it's, for some reason, double strength, because it has been impossible to find these last ten months.  I've made all our bread and I still have so much yeast left. I'm thankful. ♥