New year, old stuff

Wow.  Welcome to 2011.  I had grand plans for blogging in December, and toward the end of the months, things just got away from me.  (Especially with the cookies--my apologies to my friends for not finishing the Saveur cookie baking project.)  But it's a new month and a new year, and I'm starting fresh.  I've been trying to decide what I want to accomplish this year.  2008 was my first year of blogging--lots of TWD and Daring Bakers.  2009 was the year of bread--starting with getting ABin5 for Christmas (08), challenging myself with Baking Your Own Bread, making croissants, starting the BBA Challenge.  2010 was the year I tackled sourdough, from Crusty Cheese Bread to Panettone.  So far I only have a few things on the slate for 2011.  I want to learn to temper chocolate.  It's one of the few techniques that really scare me.  But hey, if I can handle caramel without fear, I can do chocolate, right?  The second thing was inspired by my friend Kayte.  Last year (and again this year, I think), she has strived to use the things she already has, rather than buying new stuff.  I'm not going to say that I won't buy anything new, but I really do want to make use of the many, many baking & cooking books that I already own.  The third thing is to get back on track with baking my own bread.  Last year, I still did more of it than most people, but it got pushed to the back burner a lot due to timing.  I want to get better organized with it this year.  

So this post is about two of those things, anyway.  (No chocolate yet, sorry.)  Baking more bread, and using stuff I already have.  What helped me bake lots of bread in the beginning was Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day.  No-knead bread, using dough that you mix up, let proof for a couple hours, then stick in your fridge and bake when you want.  I pulled the book off the shelf, and looked for a recipe to get started.  (I actually did this last week.)   Semolina is a favorite of mine, and I realized that I'd never made the Semolina Bread recipe because I didn't have durum flour.  But thanks to a couple orders from King Arthur, I'm now well-stocked.  One reason that I stopped doing the ABin5 method is that the 6-quart dough container just takes up too much room in my fridge.  So I decided to scale the recipe to fit in my 4-quart container (which is the same height but a much smaller diameter).  

I do most of my measurements by weight these days.  The full ABin5 recipe calls for 2 pounds of flour, which is roughly 900 grams.  Two-thirds of that is 600 grams.  I did 200 grams of durum flour and 400 grams of bread flour (I wanted chewy bread in this case).  Two-thirds of the water is 2 cups, or about 450 grams.  I used 10 grams of instant yeast and 14 grams of kosher salt for my adjusted recipe.  I measured everything directly into my dough bucket (more about that here) and mixed it with my handy dough whisk.  The dough spent a couple hours on the counter, then went into the fridge for the night.  That was Wednesday.  Thursday morning before work, I took half of the dough and formed it into a batard.  I let it warm up and rise on a sheet of parchment on my peel for about an hour.  Then I dusted it with flour, slashed it, and baked it for about 35 minutes.  For the first ten minutes of the baking time, I covered the loaf with a disposable aluminum pan instead of pouring water into a steam tray.  

The verdict?  This bread was excellent with some garlic butter, and paired nicely with our pasta dinner Thursday night.  I'd forgotten how easy the whole ABin5 process is.  I'm definitely going to be doing more of it.  I love making bread with lots of different techniques, but this one is great for getting something baked & on the table quickly.  The rest of the dough was baked the next morning, shaped as a Dragon Tail Baguette (sorry, no good pics--will do some next time), and was served with bean soup for dinner.  Overall, the results were better than I remember, probably because I'm so much better at shaping now, even with wet doughs.  I kind of wish I'd made a full batch, since this only made two loaves, but there just isn't that much room in my fridge right now.  And hey, that means I can try something new that much sooner! =)  

If you'd like to try your hand at no-knead bread, head on over to the ABin5 website.  If you're new to their technique, this is a good place to get started.  If you like what you see, buy the book.  And if you're a little crazy and want to start baking all your own bread, join in the BYOB adventure.  To see lots of other yummy bread and other yeasted treats, check out Yeastspotting!

The hole (short) story

Those of us doing the Slow & Steady version of the BBA Challenge (watch for a round-up on Nancy's blog) are up to Ciabatta,

which is one that I've really been looking forward to since I love using it for sandwiches as well as just eating plain, and I'm pretty happy with how mine turned out (especially since I had to improvise a couche--bought half a yard of linen at JoAnn's which worked great),

which I attribute in part to all my experience dealing with the wet, sticky doughs from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day; I'll definitely be making this one again since I want to try the biga version (I did the poolish version this time) and since I want to make sandwich rolls as well as see if I can get more holes, though I was happy to find some bigger ones in one of the loaves.

Yes, it's another 1-sentence post. =)

Monkeying around

I'm not entirely sure why, but Gillian really loves monkeys.  The first sign was when she started to carry around a small stuffed Curious George that belongs to Brianna.  Brianna wasn't exactly thrilled with that, so fortunately Santa Claus brought Gillian a Curious George of her own (yay for Kohl's Cares for Kids).  We have a couple of monkey cups that she's quite fond of as well, often arguing with Brianna about who will get which one.  They have a carpet with animals on it at her daycare, and she claimed the monkey as her spot to sit during circle time.  She likes to sing about the Five Little Monkeys (jumping on the bed and swinging in the trees, both).  And it's quite entertaining to ask her what monkeys say--"Ooh, ooh, aah, aah!"  

And then there's the fact that she acts like a monkey.  She was quicker than Brianna was to start climbing into and out of things.  Like the playpen, and then her crib.  It's still pretty funny to watch her climbing over the side, which stays lowered all the time now--she's quite capable of scaling it when it's up, which is rather scary to watch.  We have a very difficult time convincing her not to climb over the arms of chairs and the couch, not to mention actually getting her to stop standing on the furniture.  Brianna still wins for climbing the front of the refrigerator, though... =)

So with all the monkey business around here, it's kind of surprising that it took me this long to get around to making another monkey item--monkey bread.  What made me decide to make some was a great post about Monkey Bread Muffins over at Two Peas and Their Pod.  I'm not really sure why it's called monkey bread, but boy, is it tasty.  =)  Sort of like cinnamon rolls, but with the cinnamon on the outside.  And fun to eat, especially with kids, since you get to pull it apart.  I was home by myself when I decided to make some, but it would be a great thing to make with kids, as well--they'd have a lot of fun rolling the dough in the butter and sugar.  

I used the bread dough that I already had in my fridge, which was a result of my monkeying around with another Artisan Bread in Five recipe.  I was looking for dough that would make a good sandwich loaf.  The recipe for Buttermilk Bread caught my eye, and it was something I hadn't tried yet.  It's not that different from the basic dough, but you substitute buttermilk for some of the water and add a bit of sugar, both of which make for a more tender crumb.  However, I started to get everything together to make the dough and then discovered that I didn't actually have buttermilk.  I don't always have it around, since I have a bad habit of opening a pint container, using about half a cup and then forgetting that I have the rest.  What I did have, though, was plain yogurt.  I figured it was worth a shot!  

The verdict?  The dough turned out great.  I liked the bit of tang in the finished loaves of bread.  And it worked quite nicely for the monkey bread--not too chewy.  And not too sweet, which was good since there was plenty of sugar on the outside.  I will definitely make both the plain loaves and the monkey bread again.  I'd like to try it with part whole wheat, too.

For the full bread method, head over to the Artisan Bread in Five website, or check out a copy of the book.  For lots of other great bread, be sure to check out the BYOB roundups.  And I'm submitting this to Yeastspotting (this week hosted by Zorra) as well, another wonderful source of inspiration.

Monkey bread

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

20 ounces bread dough (see below for what I used)

Spray an 8 1/2 by 4 1/2 inch loaf pan (I use Pyrex) with baking spray.  Mix the sugars and cinnamon together in a small bowl.  Using a bench scraper, cut the dough into small pieces about the size of a walnut.  Dip each piece of dough in the melted butter, roll it in the sugar mixture, and then place it in the loaf pan.  If you have any butter or sugar left, drizzle/sprinkle it over the top of the dough balls in the pan. Don't pack the dough balls in too tightly.  

Loosely cover the pan with plastic wrap and let the dough rise at room temperature until the pan is about three-quarters of the way full.  While the dough is rising, preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.  Place the pan on a rack in the middle of the oven and bake for about 50 minutes.  The dough will fill the pan and be nicely browned on top.  The center of the loaf should be 190-200 degrees F when done.  Let rest in the pan for about 5 minutes, and then invert the bread onto a serving platter.

Yogurt bread dough

(adapted from ABin5)

18 ounces room temperature water (I used spring water since my tap water is extremely hard)

8 ounces whole milk yogurt (Brown Cow)

2 pounds unbleached all-purpose flour (King Arthur)

1 1/2 tablespoons granulated sugar

4 teaspoons kosher salt

4 teaspoons instant yeast

Place the water in the bowl of a standing mixer.  Stir in the yogurt.  Add the dry ingredients to the bowl.  Using the paddle attachment, mix on low speed until the dough starts to come together.  Switch to the dough hook and mix on low speed for one minute.  Transfer the dough to a large (5-6 quart) covered bucket.  Let it rise at room temperature for about two hours, then refrigerate.  Use the dough within seven days.

Mellow yellow

So far, I've been doing quite well with my goal of baking all my own bread.  Unfortunately, I haven't been doing as good a job of blogging about it.  One thing I may try for April is an idea that I love from Sandy of At the Baker's Bench (our lovely BYOB moderator).  She keeps a running baking log for the month on the sidebar of her blog, complete with links to blog entries about some of the items.  

The thing that has been keeping me going is still Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day.  It really helps with the daily bread need.  I've tried a number of the dough recipes in the book (a couple of which are still sitting as drafts that I haven't finished...) and have started playing around a bit as well.  One of the more recent recipes I tried was for bagel dough.  It's similar to the basic dough, but made with bread flour and a little sugar.  It was a bit stickier and harder to handle than my usual bagel dough.  I'm still not sure how I like it, but it is certainly convenient.  What I really liked, though was the loaf of bread I made from that dough.  It was fantastic--wonderful crust (the sugar in the dough helped with the browning, I'm sure) and really tasty.  I have to admit, much as I've been trying to be good and add whole wheat to my bread, the bread made with just white flour was so darn good! =)  (I know, all things in moderation.)

Because of the bread flour, the dough was a bit stiffer and easier to work with than the basic dough.  It didn't result in really big holes in the crumb of the loaves, but it still had a really nice texture.  For the next batch, I decided to play around a bit more.  I keep some semolina on hand because I like it in pizza dough, so I used it in place of some of the bread flour.  There is a recipe in the book for a semolina dough that uses about half semolina flour and half all-purpose.  I didn't think I should add that much, though, since all I have easy access to is coarse semolina, not the really fine durum semolina.  (I really have to do that order from King Arthur one of these days...)  So I went with about a cup of the semolina.  

When I first started making ABin5 bread, I went with the 16 ounce boules recommended at the beginning of the book.  For our needs, though, I find that a batard works well.  And we go through the small loaves very quickly, so my standard loaf is now made from 24 ounces of dough.  I preheat the oven and my baking stone (on the bottom rack) for about 20 minutes at 450 degrees F.  Then I bake with steam (often using this cool idea from Zoe, using a disposable pan to cover) for 10 minutes, then bake the loaf for an additional 25 minutes.  

The verdict?  I really liked the way this variation turned out.  The semolina was enough to give the crumb of the loaf a very pale yellow color and a nice flavor.  The crust was excellent.  Fresh bread is a hit with everyone in this house. =)  And Brianna and Gillian were happy to eat some of the older bread as French toast. 

Be sure to check out lots of other wonderful bread creations at Yeastspotting. 

Semolina Dough

(adapted from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day)

26 ounces room temperature water (I use bottled spring water since my tap water is very hard)

5 ounces semolina

27 ounces bread flour (King Arthur)

1 1/2 tablespoons granulated sugar

4 teaspoons kosher salt

4 teaspoons instant yeast

Place the water in the bowl of a standing mixer.  Add the remaining ingredients to the bowl.  Using the paddle attachment, mix at low speed until the dough starts to come together into a ball.  Switch to the dough hook and mix at low speed about one minute.  Transfer the dough to a 6-quart container and let rise at room temperature until doubled in volume, about two hours.  Place the container in the refrigerator and store until needed.

BYOB

This seems to be the time of year when I take on new challenges.  It's not really a New Year's resolution thing, since I don't get around to it until February.  Last year, when I was still very new to blogging, I joined two amazing groups--Tuesdays with Dorie and the Daring Bakers.  I was quite nervous about it at the time.  I knew I'd be making things that would take me out of my comfort zone.  (That was kind of the point...)  And when I make a commitment to doing something, I want to make sure that I follow through.  Yes, I'm a big worrier as well as a rule-follower. =)  Things have turned out great--in a year's time, I've only missed one DB challenge, and I've made all but a handful of the TWD weekly recipes.  More importantly, I've made some amazing blogging friends, more than I can mention here (but check out my list of blogs on the left for many more of them).  

I'm probably crazy, but I've decided to take on another personal challenge.  It's an informal group with a simple goal--BYOB (Bake Your Own Bread).  Yes, all of it.  My first thought was that I must be insane for trying to do this.  But when I really started thinking about it, it wasn't as scary.  Since I got the Artisan Bread book for Christmas, I don't think I've actually bought any bread at the store.  And over the past year, I've made a lot of things that I would usually buy, like croissants, pizza, Danish braids, doughnuts, hamburger and hot dog buns, and bagels.  

In most cases, I was pleasantly surprised that these baked goods weren't as hard to make as I thought they would be.  I find it really satisfying to make things myself.  Some, like the laminated doughs, required a fair bit of time and effort, but the result was so worth it.  And some weren't as successful--like the doughnuts, which I really need to try again. =)  I love making the bread that my girls eat, because I know what goes into it.  And they love eating it.  

As Sandy says in her original post, there aren't any "yeast police."  I may very well end up buying bread at some point, and that's okay.  I'm in this to have fun and make some new things, not stress myself out.  And speaking of new things, does anyone have a good recipe for whole wheat flour tortillas?  =)  (B & G love quesadillas...)

A future in food styling

I know I said the challah would be next (and it's coming as soon as I finish writing the post), but I'm taking things a bit out of order.  When I was off last Wednesday, I mixed up a batch of light whole wheat bread using the Artisan Bread in Five method.  It's pretty similar to the master bread recipe that I started with.  You just substitute a cup of whole wheat flour (I used King Arthur white whole wheat flour) for a cup of the all-purpose flour.  After I mixed it, I let it rise at room temperature for a couple hours and then put it in the fridge.  I pretty much ignored it until Saturday morning.  When I checked on it, I noticed that the dough had deflated some.  So I stirred it around in the bucket with a spatula, thinking that might get the yeast going some more.  And it did.  When I checked it again this morning, it was bubbly and had risen back up somewhat.  I took out a pound of the dough and made a batard with it.  After letting it rise at room temperature for about an hour and a half, I baked it for 35 minutes.

The bread was cool just in time for lunch, so I used it to make some sandwiches for Brianna and Gillian.  Chicken and mozzarella cheese for Gillian, chicken and "orange cheese" (sharp cheddar) for Brianna.  It's funny how they're different about so many little things... =)  After cutting the sandwiches in half, I turned around to get a couple plates out of the cupboard.  When I turned back, Brianna told me, "Look, Mommy!  I stacked it up so it looks nice.  Will you take a picture of it?"  "Sure, I can do that."  "And then will you put it on the computer?"  How could I say no? =)

More fun with bread

Lately my pantry seems a lot more full than before.  And I'm not quite sure why.  Okay, I do have some idea.  I've always had a lot of chocolate on hand.  (And it's about to get worse, since as usual Jamie did his best to completely fill my Christmas stocking with assorted bars of chocolate.)  The canisters for light brown sugar, cornmeal, regular sugar and AP flour live on my kitchen counter, but others are in the pantry--cake flour, dark brown sugar, powdered sugar, bread flour, whole wheat flour, whole wheat pastry flour, rolled oats, semolina.  And with all the baking I've been doing, I keep extra of a lot of stuff on hand--unopened bags of all-purpose flour, bread flour, white whole wheat flour, brown sugar, powdered sugar, granulated sugar.  Most of this stuff I use quite regularly.  And occasionally I'll pick up something just because it looks interesting and I might want to use it in something.  Which is why, when I decided that I was going to try the European Peasant Bread from my new cookbook, I actually had rye flour on hand.  Now I just need to find a container for it...  

Before embarking on my second Artisan Bread recipe, I had to acquire a new piece of equipment as well.  Since the first batch of dough threatened to escape my 4-quart container (I wish I'd taken a picture!), I wanted something bigger.  I managed to get down to my favorite restaurant supply store, Ace Mart, just a few days after Christmas.  Thank you to the nice employee who let me in even though it was about 2 minutes before closing time!  I got in and out with what I wanted, picked the girls up from day care, and went home to make dough.  

This dough is similar to the first one I made from this book, with some whole wheat and rye flour substituted for part of the all-purpose (2.5 ounces each of whole wheat and rye; 27 ounces AP flour).  I went with white whole wheat flour, since that's what I had on hand.  I used an extra two ounces of water (26 ounces total), as I did with the master boule recipe, since I use King Arthur all-purpose flour.  I cut the yeast and kosher salt back to 4 teaspooons each.    (The basic recipe and method can be found here.)

The first loaf I baked from this batch was the simple boule shape.   With the later loaves, I tried my hand at baguettes.  I need to work on my shaping skills!  A boule is pretty easy with this rather wet dough.  I have a harder time making other shapes without handling the dough too much.  I did find some great tips here, with pictures that help a lot.  I got one baguette that turned out pretty good!  

Even though the recipe says it makes 4 1-pound loaves, I found that I was able to make three, but then there wasn't quite enough dough left for a fourth.  So I made a second batch of dough and added the remaining old dough to it, figuring it would add flavor.  I've made three loaves from that and have enough left in the fridge for one more.

The verdict?  We all really liked this one!  The whole grains give some interesting flavor to the bread.  Brianna happily ate it in her lunch all week.  And it makes great toast.  The loaves made with the old dough did develop more interesting flavors, but didn't turn out quite the way I'd hoped--kind of dense.  I'm still working on the shaping issues; I think my dense baguettes were handled too much.  And I've learned that while you can get away with a minimal rising time with this dough, the bread is much better if you let it rise longer after shaping.  I found some great tips here on how to deal with the dense crumb.  On the whole, I'm having a lot of fun experimenting!  

And I'm submitting this European Peasant Bread to Yeastspotting.  

Next up:  Challah

Daily bread

Yay for Christmas presents, especially when they're new cookbooks!  I've mentioned before that I have a lot of cookbooks.  So I have no idea where I'm going to put these new ones.  =)  But I'll figure something out.  The two new ones bring my collection of bread-specific books to four.  I already had The Bread Bible and The Bread Baker's Apprentice.  I've had The Bread Bible for quite a while, but haven't baked that much out of it.  I was kind of intimidated by it at first--it's a pretty impressive tome.  I should really go back through it now that I've got more bread baking experience.  I bought The Bread Baker's Apprentice back in May, and I really like it.  I've made a number of the recipes from it, although not all of them have made it as far as the blog (like the Italian Bread post that's been sitting in draft for a couple months).  

So it was pretty safe for Jamie to point his parents in the direction of my Amazon wishlist, where there were a couple other Peter Reinhart books.  They were nice enough to send me a copy of Crust and Crumb.  I've just started reading it, and I'm sure that I'll be making some of the recipes soon.

Jamie decided to look for books similar to what I have on my list but not actually on there.  He always does such a great job picking stuff that I'll like that I haven't actually considered for myself.  (He's the one who bought me The Bread Bible before I even knew it was out.  The Secrets of Baking is another favorite that he got me.)  He gave me a copy of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day.  As I started looking through it Christmas morning, I realized that I'd seen references to it on a lot of other food blogs, but I'd never even looked at it at the bookstore.  The idea introduced in the book is that it's easy to have fresh bread with minimal daily effort when you make a large batch of dough and store it in your fridge for up to two weeks.  

It's an understatement to say that I'm thrilled with this gift!  I think Jamie was surprised and impressed that I started my first batch of dough on Christmas Day.  =)  I hadn't read through the entire book, so I just started with the Master Recipe Boule.  The process is pretty straightforward--I mixed together water, yeast, salt and flour with my dough hook in my stand mixer.  I transferred the dough to one of my Cambro buckets that I use for dough and left it on the counter to rise for a couple hours.  I quickly learned that when they say that you should use at least a 5-quart container, they mean it. =)  My container was only 4 quarts, and the dough tried to push the lid off!  I was able to get by with stirring the dough to deflate it a bit so it would stay in the container.  

I pulled out enough dough for the first loaf and stuck the rest in the fridge.  This is definitely a sticky dough.  I shaped it into a boule and placed it on a sheet of parchment paper on top of my peel.  (I find that's a great trick for dealing with very wet doughs so you don't have to worry about them sticking to the peel.)  Once the dough had time to rise some, I preheated the oven with my baking stone on the lower middle rack and put the bottom of my broiler pan on the top rack for the water (I think the use of the broiler pan is brilliant--I never would have thought of it, and it works better than other things I've used for making steam in the past).  I baked the loaf for about 25 minutes, when the internal temperature was about 200 degrees F.  I could tell the loaf had worked the way it was supposed to because I could hear it crackling once I took it out of the oven.  It was hard, but I let it cool for about 45 minutes before slicing it. 

The verdict?  Very tasty. =)  Maybe a bit on the salty side, but that's easy to adjust.  I buy my kosher salt in bulk, so I don't know how it measures compared to what the authors used (different brands of kosher salt compact differently in the measuring spoon).  

A couple days later (Saturday; about 36 hours after the first loaf) I decided to bake a second loaf for breakfast.  I was trying to make a batard (my shaping needs work), but the dough seemed to spread out quite a bit on the peel while it was resting, so I thought I'd end up with something more like ciabatta, so I didn't slash it before putting it into the oven.  I was wrong--I didn't realize just how much oven spring this wet dough has!  Good to know for next time.  As for the flavor, it definitely had more character than the first loaf.  

For the third loaf on Sunday I was much more successful with the batard shaping.  And the flavor was even better.  I didn't have quite enough dough left in the bucket for a fourth loaf, and I was thinking about mixing it into a new batch of dough for more flavor.  But then I realized that I needed rolls for hamburgers that evening, so my 10 ounces of remaining dough turned into four rolls of varying sizes (for 2 adults and 2 kids).  

One really cool thing I discovered is that there's a website/blog run by the cookbook authors, Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François.  You can find it here.  I found lots of great information, including what weights of flours they use (the book only has volume measures) and how to adjust the ratio of water to flour depending on what flour you use.  Zoë also has her own blog, found here.   

Next up: European Peasant Dough (already in progress)

Dough for Master Recipe Boule

(adapted from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day)

26 ounces warm spring water (my house has very hard water, so I use bottled; I increased the water because KA flour has higher protein than most AP flours)

4 teaspoons instant yeast (what I'll use next time to slow the rise just a bit)

4 teaspoons kosher salt (since the original amount was a bit too salty)

2 pounds (32 ounces) King Arthur unbleached all-purpose flour

Place the water in the bowl of a stand mixer.  Add the yeast, salt and flour.  Mix the dough with the dough hook until it is just mixed together with no dry patches.  Transfer the dough to a 5 or 6-quart container and let it rise at room temperature for about 2 hours.  Store the dough in the refrigerator for up to 14 days (though it hasn't lasted more than 5 so far!).