silicone and egg bread

I am sure at least a few of you out there are a little confused about silicone. I know I was!

First of all, you may already be familiar with silicone if you have parchment paper. Parchment paper is paper that has been dipped in silicone. This is in stark contrast to waxed paper, which has been dipped in -- duh! -- wax.

Silicone has some advantages over waxed paper, though. For one, you can make egg bread on it! Let me repost the recipe here. I am trying to get organized, I swear I am, but I just haven't had a chance to go back and make a cleaner recipe archive yet.

EGG "BREAD" (STAGE ONE)

Five eggs, whites and yolks separated
1/2 cup well cooked vegetables

Separate the whites into a large bowl and put the yolks into a smaller bowl. Beat whites with a pinch of salt until glossy and fluffy.

Squeeze the water out of the vegetables with some paper towels. They don't have to be dry, but using two to three paper towels folded over will allow you to get a substantial amount of water out. Plop them into the bowl with the egg yolks. Beat the yolks with the vegetables until the vegetables are nearly pureed. You can use a stick blender for this if you like.

Fold the yolk mixture into the egg whites, mixing well. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and dump the mixture in, spreading around with a spatula.

Bake at 350 degrees for 40-50 minutes. The bread will puff up a little and settle as it cools. You can carefully flip the whole bread over and bake the other side for an additional 10 minutes if you like, but it doesn't seem to make all that much difference so I don't.

I cut it into 12 square pieces and sprinkle with sea salt. You can use them for sandwiches or snacks.

Here's a tip: DO NOT USE ANYTHING OTHER THAN PARCHMENT PAPER. I tried. I used foil with olive oil, foil with lots of olive oil, and wax paper (which melted and stuck to the pan) before I gave up and just bought the damned stuff. It's like magic. Food does not stick to it AT ALL. Comes right off. Parchment paper is full of win.

So! As you can see, parchment paper is necessary for this recipe.

One small problem -- I moved.

And none of the stores near me had parchment paper!

I finally gave up and purchased silicone pan liners at Target... these ones.



If you click on the link, it will take you to Amazon where you can read more about them. I got two of these, and now I don't have to buy parchment paper anymore.

Anyway, another way I was using the parchment was to cook pineapple. Before this, I was just cooking it by lining a pan with foil, then lining the pan with parchment, and covering the whole thing with more foil. The reason for my crazy double layering? Well, you don't want the pineapple acids to leach aluminum into your food.

So, silicone pan liners to the rescue! I do have the size listed above, and it fits in a 9 x 13 Pyrex pan pretty well.



You will notice that my Pyrex pan looks dirty. That is because it is. See, I have rheumatoid arthritis, which makes it not so easy to scrub stuff off pans like this. I am also just a teeny bit lazy.

I never plop anything directly into a Pyrex pan for this reason -- it's always lined with foil, sometimes double lined, so I never ever have to scrub the inside out. :D Unfortunately, stuff does still get on the outside sometimes, and that is where the lazy part comes in. :)

Also, be warned that the silicone liners do stain over time. It's not dangerous or anything -- just be sure to wash them as thoroughly as possible between uses.

Oh, and I also bought these to make almond butter brownies for my son:



I totally LOVE these. Fair warning -- the first few times I've used these types of molds, I've noticed a distinct plasticky flavor, despite washing them. My son doesn't seem to mind. But after the first few uses, they're completely fine. I have several different ones and I usually buy a new set or two yearly.

Happy baking!