Year-End Teacher Gift: Oatmeal Scone Mix and Strawberry Jam

Ah, the end of the school year! The first year my son was in preschool, I was caught completely off-guard by teacher gifts. There was a picnic the last day of school, and many of the other parents had nifty little things for the teachers, and it hadn't even crossed my mind! It may have been because my son was going to be with them all summer, but I still wish I'd thought to express my appreciation for his teachers, who we loved.

Last year I was ready - I hit on this idea of homemade jam and homemade scone mix.  I liked it so much that I did it this year, too (for a new set of teachers)!  I wanted to give his teachers something from us, and since I bake so much (and bring baked goods to school), I liked the idea of a baked good.  I also figure the teachers don't need lots of little tchotchkes from every student every year - I like that they can use this up and repurpose or recycle the jars.

I think this would make a nice hostess gift, as well - the recipient doesn't have to do a lot of work or have special tools, ingredients, or skills to make the scones.  I made a jar of the scone mix for us, too, because it's convenient to have on hand!

I made and canned the jam last weekend (so convenient that our favorite farmer's market opened for the season last week!), so it's nice and fresh and they can keep it for a year if they want to.  I don't really use a recipe for strawberry jam; it depends on how many berries I'm using, and how fresh they are, and that sort of thing.  I generally use lime juice, sugar, honey, and Pomona's Universal Pectin in my jam, because I don't like it too firm or too sweet.  There are tons of recipes around!

The scone mix is just the wonderful Cook's Illustrated Oatmeal Scone recipe, without the wet ingredients.  I toasted the oats the night before, so they have time to cool.  I mixed the flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder in the food processor, cut in the butter, stir in the toasted oats, and put it all in a quart-size mason jar. You'll have to bang the jar on the counter after every few scoops, in order for it all to settle and fit in the jar, but if you do that it will fit! The reserved oats for the bottom and top of the scones go in a tiny baggie just under the lid. Note the "use by" date on the butter you put into the mix: that's the use-by date for the mix, too (it does need to be refrigerated).  I typed up the instructions and other labels and printed them on a big, full-sheet-size label, and stuck it on the side of the jar. (Here's a pdf of that file, so you can use it.)

I tied a nice little ribbon around each jar, with a note for each teacher, and put the scone mix and the jam in a gift bag.  My son drew cards for his teachers, and we had a nice, personal, teacher gift!  I made four of these this year, and all of this assembly (with the oats already toasted, the jars washed, and the labels printed) took me under an hour to do (we won't talk about how long it took me to get the labels right...).  The teachers loved it!

Sockerkaka (Swedish Cardamom Cake)

This cake is a new one to me, and I'm so glad I found it - because it's both lovely to eat and simple to make.  This is a sockerkaka, which means "sugar cake" in Swedish.  The cardamom is optional, says my Swedish sister-in-law, but it's so wonderful that I don't see myself leaving it out (and I am not always a fan of cardamom!).  It's a delicate cardamom flavor here, almost more scent than flavor, and it's perfect.

This is also one of those great "dump everything in a bowl and mix it" recipes, so I can see myself using it as a jumping-off point for cakes with other flavor profiles (in which case I would leave out the cardamom, most likely).  I think it would be great with chocolate chips, or nuts, or cinnamon, or berries, or any number of things!

Sockerkaka
from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book
Serves at least 12

Note: The recipe calls for a "9-inch tube-type fancy mold," by which she probably means something like a kugelhopf pan, but I don't have one of those.  I made mine in a star Bundt pan, which is a 10-cup pan, I believe, and it worked great.  It would work in a 12-cup Bundt pan, too, but would be shorter. I'm willing to wager you could also use 2 standard loaf pans.

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cardamom (I do not crush my own. If you do, more power to you - and the cardamom flavor will be stronger in your cake!)
1/2 tsp salt
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups whipping cream
bread crumbs or vanilla wafer crumbs, for coating pan (I use store-bought bread crumbs)


Preheat your oven to 350°F.  Butter a Bundt pan (see note above), or use cooking spray (this is what I do; it gets into all the nooks and crannies better that way, I find).  Coat the pan with the bread or wafer crumbs and set aside.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, cardamom, salt, eggs, and whipping cream.  Mix at low speed for 15-30 seconds, until just blended. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, and mix at medium speed for 3 minutes.

Pour into prepared pan, and bake for 55-60 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.  Remove from pan immediately; cool on a rack. Just before serving, dust with powdered sugar.

Hazelnut & Cocoa Nib Pound Cake

This cake was born after an afternoon spent looking through cookbooks, recipe binders, pins, and links, and not finding something that precisely matched the vague idea I had in my head.  I usually hate when that happens, but this time I'm so glad it did because it made me come up with this - this cake that was exactly what I wanted.  It's soft and dense, not overly sweet or fussy, nutty, and gently chocolatey - but with a fantastic sharp crunch from the cocoa nibs.  It was great with whipped cream, but would be outstanding with coffee ice cream, I think.  I wish I'd had time to get some before the cake was all gone!

Hazelnut & Cocoa Nib Pound Cake

adapted from Smitten Kitchen
Serves 12-14

1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 8oz. package cream cheese, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
6 large eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
3 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1 to 1 1/2 cups chopped toasted hazelnuts
1 1/2 cups cocoa nibs

1. Preheat the oven to 325°F.  Butter and flour a 12-cup Bundt pan (I'm a big fan of the cooking spray with flour in it, like Baker's Joy, for Bundt pans.  Saves a ton of work and gets better coverage than I do with butter!)

2. In the bowl of a stand mixer (or in a large bowl, with an electric mixer), beat the cream cheese and butter on medium speed until smooth.  Add both of the sugars, increase the speed to high, and beat until light and very fluffy, at least five minutes.  Add the eggs, one at a time, beating after each. Scrape down the sides of the bowl after every 2-3 eggs.  Add the vanilla and almond and stir briefly.  Add the flour, salt, and nutmeg all at once.  Beat until just incorporated.  Fold in the hazelnuts and cocoa nibs.

3. Pour the batter into the prepared pan, shaking a little to smooth out the top and get rid of big air bubbles.  Bake for 60-75 minutes, until the cake is dark golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.

4. Cool on a rack for 20 minutes, then remove cake from the pan and let cool completely. Serve at room temperature.

Brown Sugar Graham Cookies

These cookies are so simple, and SO good... I grew up with them, and I have no idea where my mom got the recipe.  Mom made them last Christmas, and we realized that while these cookies are good with light brown sugar, they are AMAZING with dark brown sugar.  It makes a big difference!  


Brown Sugar Graham Cookies
Makes about 48, depending on how you cut them


Ingredients:

1lb. box Nabisco graham crackers (3 packs), broken into squares

1 ½ cups unsalted butter (3 sticks)

2 C. packed dark brown sugar

1 C chopped walnuts

1. Preheat the oven to 350°.  
2. Spread 1 layer graham crackers in greased 10 x 15” pan.  You may need to break them into the small rectangles to get a full layer. 
3. Combine HALF of butter and HALF of brown sugar (3/4 cup and 1 cup, respectively) in small saucepan.  Bring to a boil and let boil 3 minutes.  Pour syrup over crackers; bake for 10 mins.
4. Meanwhile, combine remaining butter and brown sugar in the saucepan, making another batch of the syrup.  Add walnuts when it starts to boil. 
5. When the pan comes out of the oven, add another layer of grahams (It’s important to act quickly when adding the second layer, otherwise the layers don’t stick together). Pour syrup over, and bake 10 more minutes.
6. When slightly cool cut in strips.  If you wait too long to cut, they break.

Concord Grape Pie

I married into this pie - so to speak - and oh, I'm so glad I did. You've probably never heard of a grape pie - it does sound weird, doesn't it? But if you can find Concord grapes where you are, you should make this. It's like grape juice in pie form, and it's delicious. It tends toward the sweet, so it's best with vanilla ice cream or, in a pinch, whipped cream.

Concord grapes have a really short season here in Seattle, so grab the grapes when you see them! The season is usually sometime in September, but the weather has been so weird this year that I'm keeping an eye out now. Alas, Concord grapes are not seedless, so you have to get the seeds out of them before you can make the pie. Just put on some comfy shoes and some good music and you'll be done in no time!

Grape Pie

serves 6-10

Filling:

1 ½ pounds (~4 cups) Concord grapes

1 cup sugar

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

¼ tsp salt

1 Tbsp. lemon juice

2 Tbsp. butter, melted

Bottom Crust:

Your favorite crust, homemade or store-bought

Top Crust:

½ cup flour

½ cup sugar

¼ cup butter

Filling: Slip skins from grapes (just squeeze them and the insides will eject); set skins aside. Bring pulp to a boil; reduce heat &simmer for approx. 5 minutes (until grapes fall apart). Press pulp through sieve to remove seeds; addskins to pulp.

Combine sugar, flour, and salt; add to grapes. Add lemon juice and butter; mix well. Pour into pie shell.

Crust: sift flour and sugar. Cut in butter until crumbly. Sprinkle over pie.

Bake at 400° about 40 minutes, until the top crust is just getting color around the outer inch or so.

Bonus: if you want to be able to make this pie when the grapes are not in season, you can can the filling in a hot water canner - just omit the flour and butter. When you open the jar to make the pie, stir in the flour, and then add the butter and dump the whole thing into the pie crust. It works great!