Breakaway Cook's Matcha article, plus a delish recipe

A new article in the San Francisco Chronicle  by Breakaway Cook's Eric Gower talks all about matcha.  It's an easy read, and those delicious-looking carrot cake & matcha cookies that are pictured? Yes, there is a recipe for those as well.  They look fabulous!

Read the article:

Matcha An Acquired Taste, Works Wonders With Dairy

Whole Wheat Matcha Granola Flaxseed Scones with Matcha Icing

This is a quick and easy recipe that you can pull together in minutes(assuming you have all of the right ingredients).  It's a very flexible recipe, so if you don't have matcha you can leave it out; you can add apples, raisins, cinnamon, etc.  But adding matcha is a fun twist to a great recipe.  It's so easy I pulled it together while getting my son ready for school!

Ingredients:
1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup white sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp matcha powder(a culinary grade matcha works best here, though you can use your ceremonial matcha as well)
1/4 c granola, crumbled
1 tsp flax seed
1 Tbsp old fashioned oats(optional)
1/4 c butter, chilled
1/2 c milk

Glaze: 
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp matcha
2 drops almond extract
1-2 Tbsp milk
Almond slivers or oats for garnish

Measure flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, matcha and salt into large bowl.

You will notice that when you add the matcha, the color of the mixture will be a very light, pale green.  Once you add the liquid ingredients, the color will change to a deeper, darker green.

Incorporate butter.  It helps to cut into very small pieces; I use my hands to work butter into the dry ingredients until it is crumbly.

Add the granola, flaxseed and oats.

Add milk, and stir mixture with a fork until it forms a soft dough.  The less you work the dough after this point, the more moist your scones will be.  (That's a good thing!).

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface.   Pat into two 6-inch circles for small scones, or one 6-inch circle for cafe-sized scones.  Place on a baking sheet sprinkled with flour.

At this point, if you don't want to make or add icing to the scones after baking, you can brush the tops with a little milk and sprinkle some Sugar In The Raw on them. 

Cut each dome into 6 wedges, and separate them so that they will cook evenly.  Bake at 425 degrees for 15 minutes(small scones) or 20 - 25 minutes(large scones).

Mix all icing ingredients together.  After the scones have cooled, drizzle icing on top with a spoon, and garnish with oats or almond slivers.

Enjoy!

From the Seattle Weekly blog: Seattle's 5 Best Baked Goods With Green Tea

 We love desserts made with matcha(ground green tea)! I was happy to see these excellent bakers get some love from the (somewhat) mainstream publication, the Seattle Weekly. 

In Eve Tai's blog post "Seattle's 5 Best Baked Goods With Green Tea", she says that green tea pastries "offer a novel twist from the East without giving up much of the West."  Bakers can utilize culinary grade Matcha because it can easily incorporate into dough and batter.  The challenge is to find a recipe where matcha's brilliant color and mild yet slightly grassy flavor can take center stage.

Check out her blog and pictures - the last picture of the matcha roll brings back so many memories of when my husband would make these for our store, they were indeed a hit.  Maybe he'll make me one!

http://blogs.seattleweekly.com/voracious/2011/05/seattles_top_5_baked_goods_with_green_tea.php

Matcha in the mainstream

I was vacationing in sunny CA last week, hanging out at a 55+ mobile home community by the beach with my family. I picked up a copy of Woman's World magazine in the community reading room, and was surprised to find an article on Matcha in between the Coconut Easter Bunny Cupcake recipes and the obligatory new weekly diet plan. (Another random thing I noticed about this magazine is the very generous use of exclamation points - every single sentence has one - but I digress, it's still a leisurely read).

Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised to see the following in the 4/25 issue:

"Enjoy more energy every day! Sip matcha green tea!"

It went on to say that according to the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, "drinking four cups daily can increase your endurance by 24% after just 10 weeks". Because you are drinking the entire ground tea leaf by consuming matcha, you are also ingesting approximately 10 times more nutrients than with regular green tea. It's no surprise that you would get an extra boost from that.

You don't have to do the whole ceremonial ritual in order to get your matcha. You can add a cooking grade matcha to your smoothies, or to a shot of OJ or soy milk. There are so many possibilities for enjoying a delicious and nutritious serving of matcha. It's nice to see it in the spotlight more and more.

Matcha for the holidays

The holidays are upon us.  For many it's a time of eating and sometimes overindulgence. I know I'm looking forward to some good food!

Matcha, with its extremely high concentrations of anti-aging components and catechins, sounds like a nice antidote to have on hand when we've partaken a bit too much of the rich foods and sweets that are all around us at this time of year.

Also, the calming effect of L-Theanine may be just what's needed when the stress of the holidays starts to mount.

Perhaps you've been telling your friends and family about the benefits of Matcha. Now would be a great time to introduce matcha to others by making a Matcha-Banana Smoothie for an energizing breakfast treat.  2 tsp matcha, a banana, some milk and some ice(and a little sweetener), delicious!

Of course, a traditionally made cup of matcha enjoyed with a rich treat is also something I'm looking forward to.  Or I may just get out my bag of Culinary Matcha and make a tray of Matcha shortbread cookies.  So much for overindulgence!

Some recent articles on matcha:

http://www.brainready.com/blog/thetop5brainhealthfoods.html

http://www.gayot.com/lifestyle/health/features/matcha-green-tea-health-benefits.html

Breakfast - Granola with bananas and Greek yogurt with Matcha

...with a dab of whipped cream for extra sweetness.  The Greek yogurt is a bit tart, but it goes quite well with the sweet bananas and granola.  There are more banana slices buried under the yogurt.  

You can use any type of yogurt, vanilla or plain, and add matcha to it for extra nutrition and color.  I'm not a fan of non-fat yogurt(maybe I should be!) but I just can't get past the artificial taste.  Next time I'm going to try the vanilla flavored Activia yogurt with this.  Activia is the yogurt that in my opinion comes closest to wonderful, full-fat Japanese yogurt(well, besides Brown Cow organic yogurt but that's not so easy to find).

You can use either Ippuku Matcha Latte Powder for both the matcha and sugar, or the straight Matcha for Cooking and add your own sweetener if the yogurt doesn't contain any.  I think this would be great topped off with a little bit of drizzled honey.:)