Help with recipe directions please

Ok, so I'm even embarrassed just to ASK this question, but I've never really made things completely from scratch.

I have a recipe that says to do the following:

-cream together shortening, sugars, eggs and vanilla
-add baking soda dissolved in water
-blend in flour, baking powder and salt
etc

Ok, so what the heck does "cream" mean and also "blend"???

What I was going to do is to use my hand mixer to mix the shortening, sugars, eggs and vanilla. Would that be the same as "cream"??

And for the blend part, I guess I would mix with maybe a hand wisk?

Please help - I would love to make this recipe, but don't want to f it up. TIA!!

Re: Help with recipe directions please

Re: Help with recipe directions please

"Creaming" is a process where you whip a fat (shortening or butter) with something granular (usually sugar). Use a hand mixer on high speed for a few minutes. The crystalline structure of sugar helps encorporate air into the fat. If properly done, the consistency should be like buttercreme...

as for the remaining ingredients.... once you add flour to a cake/cupcake/muffin recipe, you should be very careful to not overwork the mixture. Overworking flour strengthens gluten, which would make the cake hard and breadlike, not soft and crumby. So "blend", refers to the careful stirring of the batter with a spoon. Merely combine until reasonably well combined. No more electric mixers!

Message edited 6/14/2009 10:51:41 AM.

Re: Help with recipe directions please

When they tell you to cream they want to make sure that the shortening (usually I'm using butter) is fully combined with the sugar and egg. Use your hand mixer. Use the high setting. Mix it until it's "creamy." Then add the other ingredients, with the mixer. Just do it on a lower speed. My mom's old electric mixer didnt have low, medium and high settings...it was blend, mix, whip, etc. I would not use a hand whisk for this recipe. HTH and make sure you post the recipe you're making (i'm hungry now!)

Re: Help with recipe directions please

Thanks everyone!!! I'm used to using boxed mixes to bake, but I found a yummy looking recipe and figured I'd try my hand at it.

I'm making chocolate chip cookies/bars from a recipe I found on the same website that tj2008 posted for the baked french toast. (I'm actually making that baked french toast right now!! Can't wait!).

Here's the recipe:





ETA: I'm going to make it in a cake pan to try to get it to look like the picture - like cookie bars! I'm really excited, but nervous about messing it up. lol

Message edited 6/14/2009 12:02:49 PM.

Re: Help with recipe directions please

That looks YUMMY Dont worry, you wont mess it up...use your mixer to cream and I would use a spoon to blend the dry ingredients together. The mixture is going to be sticky. Also make sure you use butter as your shortening and that it is at room temperature. Good Luck!

Re: Help with recipe directions please

Posted by Domino

That looks YUMMY Dont worry, you wont mess it up...use your mixer to cream and I would use a spoon to blend the dry ingredients together. The mixture is going to be sticky. Also make sure you use butter as your shortening and that it is at room temperature. Good Luck!

Re: Help with recipe directions please

butter makes everything better

Re: Help with recipe directions please

you can use butter, but butter technically isn't 100 fat like shortening. there's a smidge of water in it... something like 5%

on the flip side, that shouldn't matter in a recipe like that. It's only an issue when making flaky things like pie crust.

definitely room temp... if it's cold, the bars will be flatter (not as much air encorporated during the creming phase)