Breadmaking

Homemade artisan bread.

A dinner experiment

15 May, 2009 in Breadmaking, Cooking | No comments

I’m probably the least creative cook I know. I often find myself paralysed by the question ‘What’s for dinner?’

I also like to make bread, but am probably the worst dough-handler ever. For some reason gluten does not like to cooperate with my hands.

So what if I could make something for dinner, involving bread, that would be reasonably foolproof? With my limited culinary imagination I came up with the following: casserole-dish flatbread with vegetables.

The bread is inspired by focaccia, even though it ended up being too thick. I proofed the dough (a mxture of white, whole grain, and rye with wild yeast) once in bowl before spreading it in a baking dish with copious amounts of olive oil and letting it proof a second time.

During that time I stir fried onion, courgette, aubergine and mushroom (yes, in more olive oil!) with italian spices. Then I finger-pressed the dough (as with focaccia bread) and simply layered the veg on top with some parmesan.

Would the bread turn out ok, or would it get squashed and mushy from the topping? No stress of course; I’ll just have two hungry, whining women on my hands if it’s a failure!

I let it bake for maybe close to an hour…

It ended up being a moderate success. The bread wasn’t too doughy, though I will definitely make it thinner next time. The oil made it nice and crispy on the bottom. And there were leftovers for tomorrow!

Tags: dinner, personal

‘Transformational food’

29 January, 2009 in Breadmaking, Brewing | No comments

The preface of one of the recipes I’m testing for Peter Reinhart’s new book (don’t worry, no spoilers!) describes bread and cheese as being two examples of ‘transformational food’. What a phrase! So much more inspirational than ‘fermented’.

The title of this blog is ‘transformations’. For me that concept connects with much of what I do– from the bread and beer that I make, to the music that I write and enjoy, to the way I hope that my own self will develop through time.

The crux of the idea of transformation is that the thing in question is not static, but changing and progressing in a certain direction; and that the slow, incremental, and sometimes imperceptible process of change can cause it to emerge, surprising and quite suddenly, as something entirely new.

Which reminds me: time to check the bread!

Tags: personal, transformation

This morning’s baking frenzy!

21 January, 2009 in Breadmaking | No comments

Today is the day Olivia spends at nursery, and I’m supposed to be working. However, I had to stay at home in the morning to wait for a package, so of course I ended up in the kitchen! There is a conflux of bread-related projects that I decided to tackle all at once:

1) The normal every-other day bread for sandwiches,

2) A request from Melissa’s co-workers to sample sourdough bread (a mystery, apparently!),

3) Recipe testing for Peter Reinhart‘s new book,

4) Basic brioche, which is new to me.

Those who know my cooking style (life-style, really!) will be surprised (amazed?) that I managed to do all that without leaving the kitchen in utter chaos! (I didn’t, I swear.) Here’s what happened:

For no.1 I meant to follow my normal recipe of sourdough whole wheat, white, and rye. However, in last night’s levain I accidently put in more rye instead of whole wheat! The dough was much more dfficult to work with, but I did manage to get it shaped and in the oven. Bread no.2 I decided to cut out the whole wheat to make it more palatable and to let the flavour of the rye and sourdough come through for people who have not experienced sourdough before. The recipe for no.3 uses commercial yeast and white bread flour which will ferment in the fridge until tomorrow. Finally, no.4 is also a quick-rising bread with commercial yeast, enriched with milk, eggs, and sugar, and I decided to shape in in a braid.

Here is the array of doughs: