Flour, Water, Salt

Concepts that float around and somewhat astound me: people born in 1998 are turning 10 years old this year, which means I will celebrate my 30th birthday this July; Shane enjoys cleaning the bathroom; and a small boule of artesian bread costs $3.00. Add walnuts or raisins to the bread and add another $2.00 to the cost.

What makes bread? Bread is made from flour, water, salt, and leavening, and leavening in this case is a pinch of active yeast juxtaposed with time.

So I will make my own $3.00 bread. In fact, as a good night’s sleep gave me a brilliant idea as I was mixing the ingredients for my dough. I will add fresh thyme and increase the value of my bread to $5.00. Brilliant! I hastily cleaned and stripped thyme twigs. Brilliant! What else can I contribute to my dough? Dried Kalamata figs? I hurriedly chop 3, no 6 figs and add them to the mix. Just right for a small, yet fig-filled, loaf, six figs and about two tablespoons of fresh thyme tickled my nose as I kneaded this morning’s loaf. How fancy of me.

As the loaf baked, comforting smells of sweet and savory drifted in and out of the kitchen. However, the taste of both the thyme and figs were lost in the overall loaf. On my next attempt at a fancy loaf, I will double the amount of figs, and up the thyme to three tablespoons for a one pound (or just under) loaf of bread. If you like a more subtle loaf, keep the amounts as written in my recipe. Typed in parentheses are amounts I believe will make a stronger flavored loaf. I’ll file this one under “still experimenting.”

My First Attempt at a Fig and Thyme Boule

½ cup all purpose flour
¼ cup whole wheat flour
½ cup lukewarm water
1/8 teaspoon active dry yeast

Mix ingredients together in a large bowl, cover, and let sit overnight up to 12 hours. Mixture will be bubbly by the end of 8 hours, but I leave mine for almost 12 hours to increase the flavor of the bread.


When ready to knead the dough, add to the above mixture:

1 ½ cups all purpose flour
½ cup whole wheat flour
1/8 teaspoon active dry yeast
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons fresh thyme (3 tablespoons)
6 medium to large dried figs, roughly chopped (12 large)

Add 1 – 1 ½ cups lukewarm water to the mixture. Feel your way through the dough. Sticky dough is good, but do not allow the dough to become soupy. If too much water is added, balance it with a few spoonfuls of flour. The sticky dough will become firmer as the flour soaks up the excess water. Knead dough until it is firm, bouncy, and it passes the windowpane test. This could take up to 20-25 minutes. If you’re used to kneading bread dough in a food processor or with dough hooks in a stand mixer, feel free to do so. I have never kneaded dough with anything but my ten digits, two palms, and a lot of four letter words, so I have no clue how long either of these machines will take to knead bread dough. However, if kneading by machine, I would recommend adding the figs afterwards and just kneading them in by hand until they are incorporated into the dough. A few figs will pop out of the dough on occasion; just poke them back into the dough.

Shape dough into a tight ball and place in a lightly greased large bowl. Cover with plastic wrap or lid. Let rise for 2-3 hours, or until dough has doubled in size. Punch down dough and shape into a boule or whatever shape is preferred. I shaped my dough into a boule and let it rise freeform. However, I usually prefer shaping it to fit my 9 inch round rising basket.

Okay, it’s shaped. To keep dough from drying out on top, I cover the top of the dough with greased plastic wrap. Some bakers prefer lightly dusting a tea towel (non-fuzzy towel) with flour and draping that over the top of the dough, but I’ve never had luck with the towel’s not sticking to the dough.

Rise bread for half as long as the first rise, 1 – 1 ½ hours. At least 30 minutes before the bread has finished rising, preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Slash bread and bake for 30-35 minutes. I usually bake my bread for 35 minutes, but I like well-browned bread. To check for doneness, insert an instant read thermometer into a conspicuous section of the bread (somewhere on the bottom). When it reads 190 – 200 degrees, bread is done. Remove bread from the oven and let cool on a rack completely before slicing.

Listen closely to the bread. When it’s fresh from the oven the bread will sound of crackling, akin to a fall fire or carbon paper receipts being crumpled. Over crashing symbols, pop songs, and even cicadas in the summer, freshly baked bread is my preferred music.

Beauty and the Baguette

Before I reveal my startlingly ugly baguette blunders, I want to prove that I can make pretty bread. This is my standard loaf of bread. I made a dough from 2 3/4 cups all purpose flour, 1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour, 2 tablespoons of my home grown sourdough starter, 1 teaspoon of salt, and enough water to make a shaggy to firm dough, roughly 1 1/3 cups. After a 25 minute hand knead and a 30 minute nap, the dough grew nicely in my well floured 9 inch brotform.

Twelve hours later a doughy, lightly sour-smelling butterfly emerged from it's wicker cocoon where I slashed it crosswise with a serrated knife. In a mega-hot, 450 plus degree oven, my beautiful butterfly let out a mighty RAWWRRR as it ripped its crust Ala the Incredible Hulk. Fortunately my bread is not as sour as Mr. Hulk, and it tastes much better with a variety of sweet and savory food things. My latest breakfast trend has been to slather toasted slices with almond butter and plum jam.

Oh but how my ego whimpers as I long to make a loaf that is somewhat passable as a baguette. This darling was one of three that rose horizontally instead of vertically even with my cushioning each baguette with an oil-slicked slice of cling wrap. The baguettes were conceived from the same formula as above. With a quickly sinking love for baking, I slashed each baguette, bummed my beauties couldn't even make it to the swim suit round. Even a blast of hot, gassy air wasn't enough to inflate the impossible. Not feeling worthy enough to display these loaves next to a hearty soup or with a hunk of cheese and olives, I devoured part of each (quite tasty) loaf for breakfast that week. A pop under the broiler and a smear of almond butter and plum jam was yet again a nice way to begin my day.

With a little help from a sheet of parchment paper crafted into a complicated couche, my next loaves did obey my command to sit and stay. The top loaf was another sourdough, victim to a drag and slash. And the bottom loaf is a faux baguette, meaning I used leftover egg and olive oil enriched dough to create a baguette shape in order to practice my slashing technique. Naturally, my mock baguette is the most attractive of the three, although the egg and olive oil gave the loaf a soft crust and mildly flavored crumb. Eating breakfast as if I were a king, or at least prime minister, I toasted slices of the bread, smearing each slice with (mmmm yes) almond butter and plum jam

But my heart beats to beautify my collection of baguettes. While the complicated couche did a stellar job cradling my baguette dough, I prefer the rise-and-dump method of a brotform. It's less fussy and I've never had luck with a real couche. Dough sticks to the cloth, I yell embarrassing words and glare at the oven for the half hour. Therefore, I have almost talked myself into purchasing a brotform especially for baguettes. Perhaps I can once again cheat my way to making more authentic looking baguettes with a promise I'll start pairing even the ugly ones with a gorgeous slice of Stilton to go with my plum jam.

E for Effort

I am part mad-scientist in my kitchen. I’d rather wear a lab coat than an apron. And after kneading many pounds of dough for sourdough bread, I’m sure the scent that clings to me is akin to that of my college lab professors – ripe and heady.

Baking can be a finicky craft, and one does have to possess a bit of a scientific mind to experiment with flour, water, and leavenings. This is precisely why I love to muck with well-written, tried and true bread and cookie recipes. It’s not broken, but I will wrap tape around it.

My basic sourdough bread recipe: 3 – 3 ½ cups flour, 1 ¼ - 1 ½ cups of warm water, 1 teaspoon of salt, starter, rise, punch down, shape, rise, bake at 450 degrees for 40 minutes, bread. While this is a tried and true technique, I seek a method that will allow a slow rise while I’m either in bed or at work. I have seen many a recipe for "no knead" bread using both commercial yeast and wild yeast. No knead bread, as the title shamelessly gives away, replaces the work of kneading bread dough with a simple, vigorous stir. No knead bread recipes still involve a bit of hovering over the shaped bread to ensure it doesn’t over proof. Besides, I enjoy kneading bread dough. It's stress relieving, and two 30 minute kneads a week count as weight training in my book. Never have I had such bulging biceps. I dare you to ask me for directions to the beach.

As long as I'm willing to ruin a few loaves through experimenting with time, a well-risen, tasty loaf of bread without having to coddle it is not diffictult to achieve. My first test at a long rise started at 6:30 on a Tuesday morning. I kneaded a dough consisting of 2 cups of 20% bran flour, 1 ¼ cups whole wheat flour, 1 ½ cups warm water, 2 tablespoons of starter, and 1 teaspoon salt. After kneading, I allowed the dough to rest for 30 minutes before shaping it into a tight ball and placing it in a floured banneton. At approximately 8:00 in the morning, my bread started the long proofing process snug in its little basket. At 6:45 in the evening, I started preheating the oven to 450 degrees. As the oven heated, on the bottom rack I let a pan of hot water steam, and on the top rack, I preheated my cast iron skillet. By 7:30 in the evening the dough had almost tripled in size, and was edging towards over-proofing. In my fear of deflating the loaf, I dumped it out of the banneton and into the heated cast iron skillet a half hour earlier than I wanted. Baking wuss. However (!) the dough almost deflated as I slashed it with a clumsy yet abstract letter E.

Fresh from the oven

There isn't much oven spring, but it's still a beauty of a loaf, even with a messy, er, abstract E pattern. I did not slice the loaf until the next morning, as I wanted it to cool completely, and each slice cut beautifully. Forty minutes in the oven gave the crust a good chew, and, considering I used a good amount of whole wheat flour, the crumb has a nice, open webbing. The slices are hearty, but not dense. Overall, a wonderful bread that will not only make scrumptious grilled cheese sandwiches, but thick slices evenly toasted and slathered with butter and jam will be just blissful for breakfast.

I can hear the tea kettle's whistle now.

Will this be my new tried and true method? Perhaps. I do like the ease of only one rise while I'm at work or in bed. Next time I think I'll add some walnuts and rosemary....

The Mason-Dixon Line

As I have recently discovered, my wintertimes in Oklahoma City were a breeze (literally) compared to the arctic and blustery weather here in Chicago. Nevertheless, to ease us through those colder months of January through late March, my mom would often fix a large pot of pinto beans flavored with nothing but onions and ham hock.

The best part of the meal was the pan of cornbread she'd fix in her 8 inch, well-seasoned cast iron skillet. Mom would first (and most importantly) heat the skillet in the oven as she mixed the corn bread: cornmeal, baking soda, baking powder, salt, milk, eggs. After heating the skillet, mom would scoop butter flavored crisco into the hot skillet, pour the cornmeal batter into the hot skillet, and 25 minutes or so later, a crispy cake of cornmeal emerged from the oven. To loosen the bread, mom always gave the skillet a good shake before turning loose the cornbread, bottom side now up, onto a plate. The brown and crispy bread was ready to be cut into wedges, buttered with Country Crock, and served with the thick, meaty pinto beans. To have sweetened this delightfully savory cornbread with just a pinch of sugar - sacrilege!

Here I am, years later and newly married to a true country boy (I declare enviously, as he grew up in a more rural area). When the weather turned cold enough for cornbread (this time with chili), I did my best to replicate my mother's method (butter replacing both the Crisco and the Country Crock). To my chagrin, my country boy, my true Okie requested that I add jalapenos, sugar, and a bit of flour to my cornbread. This suggestion makes the cornbread more akin to his grandmother's cornbread. Knowing I cannot in anyway compete with Shane's grandmother (even my heart attack worthy cinnamon rolls cannot compare to her pecan rolls), I have fine-tuned my corn bread recipe for my palate and his. The result is a beautiful, red-chile speckled corn muffin, heavy on the (fine) yellow cornmeal and light on the all purpose flour and sugar.

I served these corn muffins with a chicken chili featured in the April 2007 Gourmet. The chili was good, but the consistency needs some adjusting. I plan on making the chili again soon, specifically to fiddle with the chunky to smooth ratio but also because Shane was not able to fully taste the chili because of his lingering cold.

Adapted from Southernfood.about.com

Soaking the chile peppers in warm milk infuses the milk with the flavor of the peppers. Both the milk and the peppers in mixed into the muffin batter creating red-speckled, mildly spiced muffins. For more heat, do not remove all the seeds from the peppers.

INGREDIENTS:
2 dried New Mexico Chile Peppers, stemmed and seeded
2 cups sour milk, warmed
1 cup all-purpose flour, sifted
1 1/2 cups yellow corn meal
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons salt
1 - 2 tablespoon sugar (optional)
1/4 cup unsalted butter, chilled
2 eggs, beaten

PREPARATION:
Soak peppers in warmed milk for 15 minutes. Remove peppers and set milk aside. Coarsely chop peppers and set aside.

Sift dry ingredients together; cut in butter until mixture is coarse like meal. Combine eggs and milk; stir into cornmeal mixture. Carefully fold in chopped peppers being careful to not overmix. Spoon into greased muffin pans and bake at 425° for 25 to 30 minutes.

Makes 18 muffins