The Humble Kitchen

Making bread at home is a deeply satisfying endeavor. It may seem daunting, and time consuming, but there are ways around that. If you have a nice heavy dutch oven you can make a beautiful loaf without much effort at all. Add a stand mixer to the equation and the whole process takes only about two hours.

When I first heard about Jim Lahey’s no knead method I was eager to try it. It requires a wet dough that sits at room temperature for 12 to 18 hours, which replaces the kneading. I’ve made bread this way numerous times and am always pleased with the result. America’s Test Kitchen did a version of his bread, replacing some of the water with a light beer, which adds to the flavor. I like to make bread this way when I have been thoughtful enough to make the dough the night before. I am not always thinking of the future me, and am often impulsive about my food choices. Michael Ruhlman is my unwitting enabler here, as he offers a version of Lahey’s dutch oven bread that does require kneading, thus making this a quick and easy recipe. I have changed the process slightly, and added a bit of malt syrup, which adds some flavor that I find agreeable.

20 oz. bread flour (approx. 4 cups)
12 oz. warm water
1 teaspoon malt syrup
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon active or instant yeast.

Set your oven to 200º. Mix the ingredients in the warmed bowl of a stand mixer. With the hook attachment, knead the dough for 10 to 15 minutes. If you’re going to walk away leave the mixer on the lowest setting, or it might walk off the counter. If you’re keeping an eye on it you can up the speed a bit. Once you have a silky smooth ball of dough, knead it a few times and shape into a ball. Flour the bowl, place dough ball in it, cover with a towel.

Turn off the oven! Place the bowl in the oven with a tray of water on another rack. The dough will rise quickly in the warm, moist oven. In about an hour it will double in size. Remove the bowl and tray of water from the oven. Put a dutch oven and lid in the oven, turn it to 450º.

While the dutch oven preheats, punch down the dough. Shape it into a ball or an oval, depending on the shape of your dutch oven. Place it seam side down on a well floured towel and let sit for 15 minutes. At this point your oven should be nice and hot.

Carefully lift the lid off the dutch oven. Using the towel as a sling, lift the dough and flip it gently into the hot dutch oven, seam side up.

Bake, lid on for 30 minutes. At this point remove the lid. It might look done but it needs more time. Bake another 15 minutes or so. To check it you can remove it, carefully, from the dutch oven and knock the bottom of the loaf, if it’s done it will sound hollow.

The temptation to cut into it immediately will be overwhelming, but it really should rest a while. Anyway, I love the crackling sound the bread makes as it rests.

-Jennifer

Step #1 Find recipe

Step #2 Get bread

Step #3 Get Eggs

Step #4 Select green egg

Step #5 Stir egg becuase you do not prefer a soft boiled egg

Step #6 make hole in bread

Step #7 Place bread in buttered skillet, fry for a moment on each side, then pour mixed (or unmixed) egg into the hole

Step #8 Remove from pan and say, "oooooo"

Step #9 Add some homemade nectarine and thyme jam on top

Step #10 Eat!

~Sarah

I didn’t realize that the death of my sourdough starter had such an effect on me. I have been crushed honestly. Unable to make ANY bread. Unable to take pictures for the blog despite having made tortilla soup, brownies, beef stew, cheesecake squares and all sorts of other dishes.

Although I had a few days off in a row, I simply could not muster the will to start again. But last night, somehow, I was able to do it. I enlisted the help of the three year old and just did it. Who knows if it will work since it is only day one, but at least I have started. I feel better already. Aren’t humans peculiar? I mean really, letting a food product get me down. Sheesh.

This wild seed starter is made from one cup freshly ground quinoa and 3/4c water. The idea comes from The Bread Baker’s Apprentice. The original text uses rye flour, but of course I can’t use nor do I own rye flour so I picked quinoa since  I had that enormous bag from Costco. Just mix the flour and water together with a plastic or wooden spoon and keep it lightly covered in a plastic or glass container.

As usual, the little one had a blast grinding it up in the coffee grinder (not used for coffee) and pouring the water in to the cup. Here it will sit for 24 hours.

Day 2

It doesn’t look any different than Day 1 so there’s no picture. Same idea though, mix 1c of rice flour and 1/2c of water into the starter from Day One. Let it sit out for another 24 hours. It might rise a little, or it may do nothing as mine did.

Day 3

Day 3 is a little different, you have to throw out or give away one-half of the starter. Then add one cup of flour and 1/2 c of water. Stir and let it sit for another 24 hours. (yes there is a lot of sitting and waiting). My Day 3 isn’t over yet, so I’ll take a picture later. Last time my Day 3 is where something started to happen! Here’s hoping…

Well days 4, 5 , 6 and seven never got posted because this starter is hassling me. I think I finally have it going, but I’m just not sure it smells quite right. I am going to try and refresh today to see if it will work. Otherwise I may need to start over.

Recently I acquired a lovely book called Loaf, Crust and Crumb by Silvija Davidson. It’s a sort of encyclopedia of bread. There are recipes, but not for the bread itself, rather how to use the bread once you’ve got it. I love this idea, particularly the uses for stale bread. We tend to forget that necessity brought about so many delicious recipes we still enjoy today. Who doesn’t love French toast (pain perdu to the French), a way of saving yesterday’s lost bread? Stuffing, croutons, all these are in the book, along with some unexpected recipes like Brown Bread Ice Cream.

I have the great fortune of living near enough to the Acme Bread Company that I can enjoy these exceptional loaves on a regular basis. My favorite being pain au levain. I could happily eat the entire loaf in one day, but when I manage to show some restraint and I have a bit leftover, there are so many possibilities. One of my favorites is a Moroccan inspired stuffed fish. I particularly like Jamie Oliver’s recipe, though I tend to use butterflied whole trout, and I don’t bother to tie it. Delicious with or without the bacon & crème fraîche.

The most recent way I’ve used up my bread was for breakfast, after having noticed a recipe for Migas in a beautiful book by Sam & Sam Clark called Moro. I decided to see what I had in the fridge. I sauteed onion and garlic in bacon drippings, added in the bread cubes, salt, pepper, smoked paprika, a fresno chile and some spinach for color. Topped it off with a fried egg. Breakfast served.

-Jennifer

This is amaranth bread. It is the third-generation sourdough (the one with the egg white added). I am quite happy with how it turned out. It looks like “normal” bread and has a reasonably soft texture due to all the tapioca flour.

For those of you who don’t know what amaranth is it is a super-tiny seed that comes from an ancient, beautiful magenta-pink colored flower that is actually a weed (I think). It is high in protein and can grow damn near anywhere, hence it’s weed-like qualities. It is a little like hemp in that it contains essential amino acids that human bodies need. It is a valuable crop indeed!

This bread uses the entire seed, not the flour most people may have seen. While I use amaranth flour in lots of other things, I chose to use the seed here. Here’s what I came up with to put in this simple bread:

1/2c of whole amaranth

1c millet flour

2 1/2c tapioca flour

1t each of guar and xanthan gums

1 1/2t salt

1 C of starter

1 egg white, lightly beaten and

about 2 cups of water

I throw all this is a bowl and mix it up for a few minutes. I let it rise, covered, in the bowl on the counter for about 30 minutes and then plop it in the 9×5 loaf pan that has been spray oiled and dusted with cornmeal. Then it sits to rise until it is almost at the top of the pan. After that, it’s off the oven set at 375 degrees. It bakes, for 10 minutes uncovered and then about 30 or so covered with foil. Then it must cool completely on a rack before I can eat it.

I don’t know if I have just grown accustomed to gf bread or if this really is good bread. As much as I tried to get my mother to buy Wonder when I was younger, I never ate any of the super-soft loaf breads. Then as I grew older, I always ate the whole grain ones that were firmer from bakeries like Alvarado St.. It may just be that I don’t long for soft, squishy bread because I don’t have a memory to which I could compare the texture. Who knows.

What I do know is that gf bread keeps me from being sick and I think this bread tastes lovely. Why would I expect anything less from such a beautiful flower.

~Sarah

Crocodile bread?

I saw this picture and said, “Oooo, what a neat picture.” To which my son replied, “It looks like a crocodile.”

This is my fourth attempt at a GF bread without eggs, store-bought yeast, milk or other flavor additives. Straight flour mix, wild starter, salt, water and xanthan/guar gums.

Both loaves look fabulous, but I think the flavor is a bit too sour. Here’s a picture of my firmish starter (I think it sorta looks like tofu):

I may add a tablespoon of sugar the next time around. My son thinks the loaves are going to taste “hecka good” despite not yet trying the bread (he licked the top). My neighbor who is a retired chef said it was “very good, but still has that cake-like quality that all gluten free bread seems to have.” He then ate some more. Apparently, the flavor is not affected by this cake-like texture.

I made one fake rye and one plain. Despite being a tad too sour, they are darn tasty if you ask me.

I have been contemplating and tinkering with how to make a vegan or GF/CF bread for years. I was also looking for something simpler. I mean, look in any gluten free bread baking book and you’ll find myriad ingredients ranging from chia seed gel stuff to Knox gelatin to recipes using six different flours. Don’t get me wrong, I own those books and I’ve made those recipes. In fact, my pizza recipe is awesome, but it has a lot of ingredients.

The problem with these recipes is that they usually require shopping at multiple stores, shelf space, more dirty dishes etc etc. And as if eating gluten free didn’t already make you sometimes feel like a freak, when you are standing there making bread with twenty ingredients, that feeling only gets worse.

My first three attempts at a simpler bread had one egg white in them. I must admit that I think the egg white makes a huge difference in not only appearance, but texture. This bread is good, damn good in fact, but the egg may come back in future loaves. Of course it can be left out if one chooses.

It will be interesting to see where this journey takes me.

~Sarah