Bread Bread Bread Fridays

SO. I have a challenge. Is it possible to go an entire year without buying a loaf of store-bought bread?? (Although I do admit I bought probably 2 loaves the first few weeks of January before I got my mixer..But i'll just extend my challenge into January 2011.)

So on Fridays, since I don't have class or work, I've sort of made it my baking/laundry/baking/cleaning/baking day.

This past Friday I baked FOUR loaves of bread!

1 Loaf of Honey Oat (For Sandwiches for the week.)
3 Loaves of Cinnamon Raisin (1 for my family, 1 for Max's family, and 1 for us!)

They both turned out much better than I expected!


Honey Oat during 2nd rise:




This is the Finished Honey Oat:



Now the Honey Oat was good, but the Cinnamon Raisin was awesome! My roommates don't even like raisins and they've still been eating this as toast in the mornings. The Cinnamon raisin bread is based off of this recipe: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/recipes/cinnamonraisinoatmealbread

If you've never visited TheFreshLoaf... go there now! It is so inspiring! I read for hours before deciding on this recipe, and this will probably be one of my main sources of inspiration for friday bread day.

Anyway... Here's my spin on The Fresh Loaf's Cinnamon Raisin:

(Warning: this is a THREE loaf recipe.. I didn't feel like doing the calculations for fear of messing it up.. so i just ran to TJ Maxx and bought 2 more loaf pans for $4.99 each-- this way I could rise and bake all 3 at once. ) I don't think dividing everything by 3 would have too much of an impact on this particular recipe though.

What you need is:

5 cups of all purpose or bread flour
2 cups of whole wheat flour (I've been using a lot of whole wheat since I scored 2 bags of King Arthur in the Discount Bins at HEB)
1 1/2 cups of rolled oats
2 1/2 cups of water
1/2 cup of milk
3 Tbs of Honey
5 1/2 Tbs of Vegetable Oil
1 Tbs + 1 tsp of Salt
1 1/4 Tbs of dried instant yeast
3 Tbs Cinnamon (It only called for 2 but I like a lot of cinnamon)
2 cups soaked and drained raisins


Before you begin:

Go ahead and start soaking the raisins and the oats (separately) in water to plump them. In the finished bread you can DEFINITELY tell that the raisins have been plumped- especially the ones on top. (For the oats you will use 2 of the 2 1/2 cups of water listed above.)



Right before you add the raisins to the loaf, you'll pour them through a strainer to remove the water- but the oats will go directly into the dough- water and all.

Next, warm the remaining 1/2 cup of water, and dissolve the yeast into it. I usually just do this with a 1 cup measuring cup, and use warm water from the sink. This step-- if you're using dried yeast like I do-- just activates the yeast before it's added in- which will later cause the beautiful rise in your loaf.

Next, mix the soaked oats (water and all), flours, yeast, milk, honey, oil, salt, and cinnamon. Mix well, until all of the flour is hydrated. Knead by hand for 5 minutes or in a standmixer for about 3.

After it all kneaded and ready, it should look about like this:



Now, after draining the plumped raisins, they are ready to be kneaded in. I would definitely do this by hand, sort of spreading the dough out and then folding it over with the raisins distributed. You have to be fairly patient with this so that all the raisins aren't clumped together.



Put the dough back into the bowl, cover it, and let it rise for 1 hour. (This is when I made my dash to tj maxx for the loaf pans)

After an hour, take the dough out of the bowl, and set it on a floured countertop. In this step you are going to degas the dough. (Degas as in this is the DEGASSING step.) You basically want to flatten the dough out just a little bit with your palms, and then fold it in thirds like a letter one way, and then again on top of that. (I don't have pictures of this step- but if you go back to the original recipe site, they have good step by step instructions.)

After this step, place the dough back in the bowl, cover, and let it rise for another hour. (Ugh I know, another hour. But it is So worth it-trust me.)

After the hour, take the dough out and shape into 3 loaves. If you have a kitchen scale you can get really technical about this- but I just eyeballed it and it turned out semi-even.

Place each shaped loaf into a greased (I just use PAM for baking) loaf pan--(Just to reiterate, these are NOT expensive. I've bought 3 for about $5 each in TJ maxx's awesome house-ware section) Cover the pans and let the loaves rise until they are about as tall as the pan, maybe a little above.




Preheat the oven to 450. Place the loaves in the center rack of the oven. After 5 minutes, reduce the oven temperature to 375. Rotate the loaves 180 degrees after 20 minutes, (I found this step to be very helpful, as my oven has been cooking very unevenly. Some of my loaves have risen several inches higher on one side, making for a tasty, but crooked loaf) and bake for another 15 to 25 minutes, until the tops of the loaves are nicely browned. I have an instant-read thermometer that I use-- 185 degrees or more means done for me-- but you can also use a skewer or knife. If it is coming out without goo on it, then the bread is probably done!

Also: When you take the bread out of the oven, it's ok to let it sit in the pan for a couple of minutes, but get that loaf out of there as soon as possible. The residual PAM on the loaf pan will start to soak into the crust, making for a not-so-yummy- texture.

Also Also- when you do take it out, don't leave the loaf on a paper towel or just sitting on the counter- this can cause some sogg also. I don't have any cookie cooling racks, so I used the rack from our toaster oven, upside down!

Here are the finished loaves!




YUM!

Next Post: Valentine's Day Dinner for Two

Monday Dinner: Maple-Glazed Salmon with Pineapple

This is one of my all-time favorite recipes from my mom's kitchen--(This is often what I would request for my birthday dinners.)

Salmon was on sale at HEB this week, so I couldn't really pass up the opportunity to make this...

Ingredients:

1/2 cup maple syrup (You really need to spring for the real stuff-- Aunt Jemima won't really cut it this time.)

2 tablespoons Dijon mustard (I like a whole grain, stone ground type mustard)

4 6-ounce salmon fillets (Depending on how on-sale Salmon is at HEB)

1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 fresh pineapple

2 cups cooked rice (or however much you need- depending on how many people are eating.)

Prep:

Whisk together the maple syrup and mustard in a small saucepan over medium heat and bring to a boil. Simmer until slightly thickened, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and set aside.

Place the salmon in a foil-lined 9-by-13-inch baking dish sprayed with non-stick spray. Season with the salt and pepper. Cube the pineapple, and scatter it around the salmon. Brush the salmon with the syrup mixture. Broil for 5 to 7 minutes, or until the salmon flakes easily when pricked with a fork and the inside is the same color throughout.

Serve salmon over a bed of rice (I used brown rice to try to be sort of healthy.) Definitely remember to drizzle the leftover glaze on the salmon-- it's the best part! Get a little rice, salmon, and pineapple with each bite.

Also, my parent's friend who is a produce broker brought over some amazingly huge asparagus that I stole from their fridge to have with this. I just coated it with olive oil, seasoned with kosher salt and cracked black pepper, and threw it in the oven to broil for a few minutes.

Try it!

Baking with my Beautiful Yellow Kitchen Aid

A few weeks ago for my 20th birthday, Max got me this amazing kitchen aid, and since then i have been on one huge baking spree. Here's what i've made in the last few weeks.... (I'm a little dough happy..)

French Bread....

(Actually Kind of made this one up!)

Sourdough Bread...

http://www.recipezaar.com/Basic-Sourdough-Bread-34753

Focaccia Bread...

And Delicious Sourdough Cinnamon Rolls...

They were so good I have to share...

This recipe is from Linda at http://whatscookingamerica.net/Bread/SourCinnRolls.htm

1 cup sourdough starter (I will probably post on this next)
3/4 cup warm milk
2 tablespoons butter, room temperature
1 egg, room temperature
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup granulated sugar
3 1/4 cups bread flour or unbleached all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon instant active dry yeast

For Filling:

1 tablespoon butter, melted
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup raisins, optional

For Frosting:

2 cups powdered (confectioners') sugar
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
4 tablespoons hot water

I just basically put everything into my mixer until it was combined, and then switched out the whisk for the dough hook, and set it to kneading while i made the filling.

After the dough was nice and elastic, I turned it out onto my floured counter, and rolled it into a sort-of-rectangle-ish shape. (The longer your rectangle, the fatter your cinnamon rolls will be.) Next, (with clean hands of course-- thank you Sanitation and Safety class for making me paranoid of food-borne illnesses) i just patted all the melted butter down into the rectangle of dough, so that the filling would stick to it. Then i rubbed the sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon mixture down into the buttered rectangle. I actually did have a dried fruit mixture to put into the rolls (that may or may not have been from a Starbucks' Oatmeal Packet) but i forgot about it until the end. i ended up just kind of shoving them into a few of the rolls when they had about a minute left to bake.

Next, loosely roll up your rectangle of dough and filling until it looks like a spiral-y log (or maybe like how rolls or biscuits look in a Pillsbury can?) Now for the cutting of the rolls: Cutting them with a knife tends to make them squish, so i used dental floss instead. (I actually only had mint waxed floss (ha ha) but no one seemed to notice any unwanted mint flavor- so I think it was fine.) Slide the floss underneath the roll about 1/2 an inch down. Cross it over the top, and then pull down in the opposite directions. This will cause the floss to slice cleanly through the dough, giving you a beautiful cinnamon roll! (Continue this through all the dough- it will yield about 12 rolls.

Put the rolls in a cake pan, or whatever you have, really, and let them rise for about 30 minutes. After they have risen they should be puffed up and touching each other in the pan.

Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes, or until slightly brown and yummy looking. (These make the apartment smell SO good.)

Mix up the frosting, drizzle on top, and try not to devour all 12! (Between me, max, and my 3 roommates, these were gone in less than 24 hours.)

Hellooo Blog

So with a little inspiration from Natalie (http://thedesignercook.blogspot.com/) and a few others, i've decided to start blogging about all my kitchen experiments.

A little history:

I moved back from California in August 2009, and this Spring semester, I started at Both UTSA, and St. Phillips College. At UTSA I am in the Small Business Entrepreneurship program (basically just a branch of a management degree.) At St. Phillips, I am in the process of getting a 2 year degree in the Bakery and Pastry arts-- through their culinary school.

I really started experimenting with cakes and more complicated desserts this past fall semester, since I had so much extra time on my hands. Here are a few of my favorites from the fall:

This was just an experiment with fondant (my first time using it.) I actually made it from scratch using mostly marshmallows-- and let me tell you, those ace of cake people make it look SO easy. This tiny cake took me about 6 hours.

This is one of my all-time favorites. I made this cake for my boyfriend Max's 22nd birthday, and it turned out so beautifully! (Probably better than it should have being a new recipe and all.) The cake is Chocolate Grand Marnier (Orange Liquor), and topped with candied oranges and fresh citrus leaves (courtesy of the for-sale house down the street with the orange tree in the front yard.)

So this was the inspiration for my Christmas Eve Cake...

And here was the final product! This cake, between all of the different parts, took almost 3 days to make! But it was sooo worth it.

Well those were just a few of my favorites to get this started. When I have time i'll start on my recent adventures with my newest pet, the sourdough starter.