Porter House

Banzai Blackout Blast

We received Ryan's present from Amazon Friday. We accidentally let him open it immediately. We just couldn't stand waiting, to see it set up, ourselves. It is pretty awesome. I cannot imagine how I would have loved it when I was his age. The kids had a lot of fun with it yesterday.

Hopefully, this will keep my kids outside during a Louisiana summer. Well worth the investment, right?

While they were sliding down the water soaked blackout blast, I was making gumbo and french bread. I decided to use this recipe from Emeril. I rotisseried a chicken, pulled the meat, and added it towards the end of cooking instead of using chicken thighs.

I also roasted some fresh okra and stirred it in at the same time. I like my gumbo with file and okra, I know that it is not exactly traditional.

The french bread was from Bread Baker's Apprentice. The first time I made this recipe, I doubled it for a big family gathering. Something went wrong. It turned stark white in the oven instead of browning. I was glad to see it wasn't the recipes fault. These baguettes were perfect. I think I might have forgotten the salt the first time? I really do not know.

It turned out very good. I am about to go eat a bowl of the leftovers, which are certain to be even better.

Reinhart's Folded Greek Salad Pizza

Dang, that picture does not do this justice. Originally I was going to just tell you about the recipe. Then I thought I would at least have to post the amazing Greek dressing recipe. At that point, I decided I would do the world a favor and post the whole shebang. It. Is. That. Good. The recipe is from one of my favorite cookbooks ever, American Pie by Peter Reinhart. I suggest you pick it up, but until then...

Neo-Neapolitan Pizza Dough (This makes 4; you only need two for this recipe)

5 cups (22 1/2 oz.) unbleached high-gluten or bread flour
1 tablespoon sugar or honey
2 teaspoons table salt
1 teaspoon instant yeast
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 3/4 plus 1 tablespoon room-temp water

1. Place all ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer, fit with the dough hook and mix for about 4 minutes or until it forms a coarse ball. Let the dough rest for 5 minutes, then mix on med-low speed for an additional 2 minutes.

2. Immediately divide the dough into 4 equal pieces. Round each piece into a ball and brush or rub with extra olive oil. Place each ball in a separate oiled freezer bag. Let the balls sit at room temp for 15 minutes, then put in the fridge over night. (Or if you are making the pizzas the same day, let the dough sit at room temp for an hour, remove them from the bag punch them down and reshape them, return them to the bags, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.)

3. The next day (or later the same day), remove the dough from the fridge 2 hours before you plan to roll them out to let them warm up.

Greek Dressing

1/2 cup ev Olive oil
3 tablespoons red wine vinegar
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
7 Greek (I use kalamatas) olives, pitted
2 tablespoons brine from the Greek olives
2 cloves garlic
1/3 cup crumbled feta cheese
1 scallion, coarsely chopped
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1/8 teaspoon dried oregano

1. Combine all the ingredients in a blender. Blend until smooth.

Tossed Salad

1 head iceberg or green leaf lettuce, torn into small pieces
1 English cucumber, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch pieces
2 tomatoes, chopped
1 small Vidalia or other sweet onion, sliced thin
12 Greek olives, pitted
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
6 pepperoncini peppers (pickled), stemmed and coarsely chopped

1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese (reserve separately for pizza)

1. An hour before baking pizzas, place a pizza stone on the middle rack of your oven. Preheat at your ovens highest setting.

2. Stretch or roll one ball of dough to a diameter of 12 inches on a sheet of parchment paper, using flour as necessary. Brush a little of the dressing over the surface. Sprinkle with half the shredded cheese.

3. Slide the pizza (on the parchment) onto a peel, and then onto your preheated stone. Bake for 7-9 minutes, or until golden brown.

4. While the pizza is baking pour the dressing (except a bit to brush on the next pizza) over the salad; toss to coat. When the pizza is finished baking, immediately cover one-half of the pizza generously with salad. Fold over the other half and press down, transfer to a platter. Repeat with the remaining ingredients to make the second pizza.

5. Eat carefully.

Vienna Bread

I am back. After that wonderful Pugliese, I was dying to try something new. The Vienna bread with Dutch Crunch topping has been calling for me since I first looked at The Breadbaker's Apprentice. This bread has a little barley malt syrup in it for browning, and is enriched with a little butter and egg. It is formed into batards, which is a shape I love. You can also use loaf pans. This would be a good idea because the bread makes great sandwiches.

The very best part though is the Dutch Crunch topping. It is made of rice flour, ap flour, sugar, salt yeast, oil, and water. You brush it onto the loaves either before or after the last rise. It actually grows with the bread. Weird. It bakes up beautifully golden and crunchy.

This bread is so wonderful sliced, toasted, and slathered with butter and jam. I can't wait to try the next bread!

Pugliese

I have been feeling antcy lately. It has been a while since I have baked bread out of Bread Baker's Apprentice. I looked through the book and decided on the Pugliese. I think the decision was made when when I read "Combined with the flavor enhancement of long fermentation, this formula brings forth a loaf that is so dramatic, so delicious, and so much fun to make that it will forever change your standard of what constitutes great bread." in the beginning of the recipe. You know what? Once I tasted this bread I agreed.

I tried to keep the dough really wet. I didn't want to add too much flour. I was also extremely careful to not handle the dough too much, when I was shaping it into boules. You want to keep as many of the air pockets as is possible. During the second rise they turn into  the great open holes you want in this kind of bread.

This dough is similar to ciabatta. However, it uses half fancy durum flour and half bread flour. I also included the optional addition of mashed potatoes. This bread turned out really nice and baked perfectly.

We enjoyed the bread with stracotto Italian pot roast. The meat and vegetable gravy was piled on top of  buttered polenta. This is a Cook's Illustrated recipe that I have made several times.

For dessert I made Cook's Illustrated dark chocolate cupcakes with easy coffee buttercream. These easy buttercreams are the best. Every time I make one of the flavors I am amazed that they made a simple confectioner's sugar frosting so wonderful. These cupcakes are spot on perfect.

This recipe frosts 12 cupcakes. Double the recipe to frost a two-layer cake.

CI's Easy Coffee Buttercream

10 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 1/4 cups confectioners' sugar (5 ounces)
   pinch table salt
1 1/2 teaspoons instant espresso powder
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon heavy cream

In standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat butter at medium-high speed until smooth, about 20 seconds. Add confectioners' sugar and salt; beat at medium-low speed until most of the sugar is moistened, about 45 seconds. Scrape down bowl and beat at medium speed until incorporated, about 15 seconds; scrape bowl. Dissolve instant espresso in vanilla and cream, and beat at medium speed until incorporated, about 10 seconds, then increase speed to medium-high and beat until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes, scraping down bowl once or twice.

Quite a bit of baking...

I really love this book; especially now. I have been doing a lot of baking the last couple of days. Including two breads from this book.

First I made the anadama bread from Whole Grain Baking. I have been reading about this bread for years and had never tried it. As much as I love molasses and cornmeal, you'd think I would have by now. I wish you could have seen it before the second rise. It only came about 1/2 way up the pan. It rose quite a bit even in the oven.

It turned out to pair really well with the sour cherry preserves I bought at Central Market. It wasn't as good as the multi-grain bread in BBA for sandwiches though.  I am not sure anything could be.

I also baked a cardamom/sour cherry/apple pie. I have made this awesome pie a few times now. The recipe was posted by Amy on the Cook's Illustrated board. In the thread Amy describes it as almost piquant, which perfectly describes it. If any of you are like me and prefer sweet-tart to sweet, this is the apple pie for you.

I was also able to take advantage of my wild yeast starter and make the Poilane-style miche from Whole Grain Breads. It was so exciting to see my starter and bread rise. I used Reinhart's tip to create the 'high extraction type' flour. I sifted coarse whole wheat graham flour. This removed about 15% of the bran. It worked quite well. The bread was too big for my brotform. I thought it turned out pretty nice for my first attempt. Peter Reinhart's description of slashing bread with a knife really helps me out. As long as I visualize letting the knife do the work, it works out well. You have to let the serrated knife bite into the dough while you are just gently running it across. I am not sure if I got as much rise as the one I had in class. I might need to try it a couple more times.

I also made Craig Ponford's ciabatta from the recipe I found on Lindsey's Luscious. Ciabatta happens to be my favorite bread. I like to slice it in half, toast it, and run a garlic clove over the surface. Then I eat it with spaghetti or make any number of sandwiches with it. Amy (once again), who happens to be a pastry chef, has declared this the best ciabatta recipe she has tried. I'll take that. It is an extremely wet recipe. You almost treat it like a batter. This is what you want. This made the best ciabatta I have ever tasted.

The picture of the sandwiches we had last night, does not do them justice. I used the toasted garlic rubbed bread. I sandwiched it with mozzarella, de-fatted pepperoni, and pepperoncini. It was warmed in the oven and served alongside a ramekin of Reinhart's crushed tomato pizza sauce from American Pie. Shut up. It was crazy good. We didn't even mind that the toasted ciabatta tore up the roof of our mouths. Yum.

Obviously I need to pay more attention to the recipes that Amy likes. We obviously have the same tastes in food...

Dallas, Texas- Day 1

I woke up early Friday morning and finished packing.  Justin took Kacey to school, and then we started out. We were meeting Karen halfway between our houses, because we live an hour apart. Karen's husband Jason had to stay close to home because their daughter Ava had to be picked up from school that afternoon. We met up and said goodbye to Jason and Jack. We have a lot of J boy names around here. It was a little sad leaving Jack, I believe it is the first night Karen has spent away from him. We told ourselves it was healthy to spend a little bit of time away from our babies and headed 45 minutes away to our local airport. Justin dropped us off at the door. We gathered up our two carry-on bags and headed in. While we were printing out our boarding passes we entered our first giggly phase. We are not used to being so by ourselves anymore. Before long we were allowed through security. We were relieved that we didn't have any complications. About five minutes later our flight started boarding. Now I have only flown twice before. I flew to and from Washington D.C. on a school trip. You can imagine that the plane I flew in with all of those students was much larger than the small plane from Monroe to Dallas. I didn't even realize planes that small were used around here. Once we got our bags stowed, we settled into our seats. Unfortunately we  were across the aisle from each other. We were going to try and exchange seats, but the lady beside Karen was very business oriented with her ear bud and pda. We didn't want to bother her. I dealt with a few nerves during takeoff but it really wasn't bad at all. Plus, the view was great.

It was only about an hour and half before we were able to get off the plane at DFW. We gathered our bags and proceeded to follow our directions to Enterprise Rent-A-Car. We managed to find the waiting area for the rental car shuttle with no trouble. We had a ten minute wait so we sat down and had some maple/pecan/cranberry bread I had brought. Karen seemed to enjoy it. I have to tell you now. In virtually every picture we took, Karen and I are eating or drinking...

The shuttle drove us 8-10 minutes away to the car rental place. Once there we waited in line for a minute and then picked up our car. We were lucky enough to get upgraded from economy to compact. It actually was a terrific car for us, especially for the price. We hooked up Karen's brand new TomTom and departed. It actually started working right away; even in the restricted air space. Now this is the one time TomTom let us down. We are pretty sure it was human error anyway. It led us to the south side of Dallas, right to some really rundown buildings and informed us that we had reached our destination. Hmm. This really doesn't look like the pictures. Karen searched for the hotel. Once she chose our hotel again, we received the correct directions. We checked into our beautiful Radisson North hotel at about 2:30 PM. We went up to our room and immediately drank a cup of coffee. I had brought coffee filters and good ground coffee with me, so it was a pretty good cup. After our coffee we decided to grab something to eat nearby. We asked for suggestions at the front desk and they recommended Humperdinks. It was practically right next door to the hotel. I had asked the guys at the desk for a low-key non-chain place. I do not think they heard me right. It was close by though and we were hungry. The menu looked good, but I realized during my entree that the quality wasn't there. I got a pretty good salad and mediocre fish tacos.

After our meal we went back to the hotel to change before we left for Central Market. This is when we first realized that there was something odd happening in the Radisson parking lot. It felt about 10 degrees cooler there than the restaurant parking lot. It was so incredibly windy in the parking lot that we could barely walk straight. It was like the tall buildings were placed in such a way that the wind collected there and cycled around. It was wonderful for our hair.

I was so ready to arrive at Central Market. This place almost stresses me out because there are so many things I want to examine and I just never have enough time. We got there about 1 to 1 1/2 hours before the class started. It was not enough time to finish my shopping. I had the store stow my buggy during the class. I knew I would only have an hour after the class before the store closed. It was once again stressful...

The whole time we were shopping I couldn't help but notice the baking bread smell wafting throughout the store. It was so exciting knowing it was Peter Reinhart up there baking bread. Before long it was time to go up to the class. My sister took a picture of the sign. I didn't notice until I got home that Central Market had misspelled his name. You would think with all the copies of his new book laying around they could have spelled it right.

When I got there, Reinhart was signing books for people. I had brought my copy of Whole Grain Breads. When I got up there I was so happy to see that he is every bit as nice as he is talented. I would have hated to be let down. I told him that I had a blog and that I had been baking recently out of The Bread Baker's Apprentice. I also let him know that I had flown in from Monroe to attend his class. We only had a few minutes but he told me he was honored that I had come all that way to see him.  He noticed his signature on the Jessica's Biscuit label in the book. He mentioned that he remembers the Sunday afternoon that he signed all of them. He wrote an expanded version of this other signature. I will make another post today or tomorrow with a picture of his signature and all the good stuff I bought from Central Market. My sister was able to take one picture of us together. It wasn't the best picture, but I am thrilled to have it at all.

We received a booklet of the four recipes we were making. Then they gave us our choice of wine or beer. I chose beer, what could be better suited to bread? They also gave us a plate of charcuterie and cheeses.

That last picture is my favorite bread of the night. I am going to try my hand at it tomorrow! It is a Poilane-Style Miche. When I first read The Bread Baker's Apprentice, I was struck by Reinhart's description of certain good breads that change in flavor with every chew. That is what I got with this bread. The subtle taste of the wild yeast starter combined with the complexity of a high-extraction whole-wheat loaf was amazing. I took my time finishing that tiny square of it you see above.

This second bread was as good in a different way. It is Vollkornbrot which means "whole meal bread". It is a very dense, moist bread that is or is nearly 100% rye. It is dusted generously with whole rye flour, which gives it an earthy, rustic crust. This crust was so chewy and crisp. The sunflower seeds were wonderful in it. I might try it with shelled pumpkin seeds. I have them on hand and Reinhart said either can be used. I am making this one very soon as well.

Now I am almost positive that the bread on the left is the mash bread and the bread on the right is the spent grain bread. Both of these were good. Just not as great as the two prior. I love how honest he was about that last bread. He had to cut the rise time short, and may not have shaped it perfectly. This resulted in an air pocket.

Now during the course of the whole class I was thinking about ways to talk him into letting me have a small piece of his starter. My starter wasn't coming along very well and all I could think about was how he was discarding perfectly good starter every day. About this time I ask him a question about wild yeast starter. He not only answers my question, he casually mentions that we are all going home with an ounce of his starter as well as a bag of spent grain. I nearly pass out I am so excited. I do not think most of the others in the room fully appreciated the gesture. At least I didn't notice them grinning like a fool for the next ten minutes.

The rest of the class was very informative. He is a very likable instructor. He even stayed behind after the class to sign more books and answer questions. Only the thought of my shopping minutes ticking by tore me away from the class.

Karen and I finished our shopping and headed back to the hotel. We took a quick shower and then snacked on cheese curds, Marcona almonds, and stroopwafels. To say we had a good day would be a huge understatement...

To be continued...

Transitional Country Hearth Bread

Ice Cream # 2: Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream

I have wanted to try Vietnamese coffee since my sister sent  me a link about it. Unfortunately I have not ran across one of the metal filters for it yet. This ice cream is based on the coffee and consists of sweetened condensed milk, espresso, half and half, and a big pinch of finely ground coffee.

Unfortunately I found this way too sweet for me. The kids and hubby loved it though! There is a coffee ice cream and coffee frozen yogurt left in the book. I am sure I will love at least one of those.

I also made my first bread recipe out of Whole Grain Breads. By the way, look what I found when I first looked through my new book.

How awesome is that! It was totally unexpected and made my day. I am pretending he signed it just for me.

I made the Transitional Country Hearth Bread. The first time I used my brotform, my dough stuck to it. So this time I over compensated and used way too much flour on it. The loaf did turn out pretty nice looking just the same.

Tomorrow I am going to do a sourdough loaf out of the new book.

My 1st Sourdough. (Lately)

Things have been pretty low-key here this weekend. Justin is home, and I have been in the kitchen. We've been watching movies. It's been nice. By the way, the movie Waitress is my favorite movie ever. I could have been so mesmerized by all the talk of baking pies that I missed some of the movie, but it was wonderful. It had that same bright interesting quality that I love with Pushing Daisies. (Do you see a pie theme emerging here?)

When I started my Reinhart sourdough starter last week, I also decided to start a whole wheat sourdough starter as well. As a back-up, in case it did not take. Well they both seem to be coming along nicely. A little slow perhaps, but still progressing. So yesterday I decided to try making my first sourdough bread with my WW starter, because it seemed the strongest. Whole Grain Baking had a recipe that could be made in one day, instead of 3 days with Reinhart's. I knew it wouldn't be as good but at least I'd get to test my starter and my brotform. I was really worried that it wouldn't rise as all. It didn't expand much before baking. However it did experience a decent oven spring. I learned that rice flour + brotform does not create a very defined pattern on the bread. I will use  bread flour next time.

Now I do not know how I got the big cavernous holes. I don't think those are quite right. The taste though is fantastic. Reinhart describes some breads as "changing flavors while you chew", this actually had some of that complexity. It tasted like sourdough. It was not too acidic, it was just lovely. I ate 2-3 hunks of it with my delicious albeit unattractive looking supper.

The night before last I made dinners rolls (variation 2) to go along with supper. We all preferred these to variation 1. I think I really like the buttermilk in them.

As I type, I have cinnamon buns rising in my kitchen. I did make an error last night while making the brioche dough for them. Bread Baker's Apprentice has three versions of brioche; Rich Man's, Middle Class, and Poor Man's Brioche. You are supposed to use middle class for cinnamon rolls and sticky buns, but I accidentaly made rich man's. I suppose though that anything with 16 ounces of butter and 5 eggs cannot taste anything but good? I used cinnamon sugar in the filling without adding any extra butter. I think these might be really delicious. I wish I could share them with you, as we will probably only be able to eat 1-2 each...

Pane Siciliano

Well, I had one post that included a cake and now I am back to bread... Sorry about that. I have been intrigued by this bread since I first saw it in the book. It is so beautiful and interesting looking. It also allowed me to use the semolina I ordered from King Arthur. It uses a high percentage of pâte fermentée (16 ounces). In addition it uses 8 oz. semolina and 8 ounces high-gluten flour. It takes 3 days to make altogether. Day 1- pâte fermentée; Day 2- make dough and form loaves; Day 3- bake.

The crust on this bread may be my best yet. It crackled as it was cooling which always makes me happy. The crumb was lovely. One of the breads had to be adjusted on the sheet before baking. It is the only one I cut into, so this bread may have even deflated a little. It looks great though.

The taste is wonderful. The problem with these high-quality breads is that I never feel like I have nice enough meats and cheeses to serve alongside...

Dallas Anyone?

I have been immersing  myself in Bread Baker's Apprentice for a couple of weeks now. Each new recipe gives me a new appreciation for bread baking.  I have absolutely loved American Pie for a couple of years now; and have tried nearly every recipe.

I am absolutely thrilled to say that todays post on Peter Reinhart's blog led me to sign up for his bread class in Dallas on February 1st. Dallas is only about 4 1/2 hours away from here, but I really wouldn't consider going there by myself. This morning I called my sister and talked her into a road trip. She agreed to come with me to Dallas, but not necessarily to the class. She is not as obsessed as I am about bread baking. As they still have available spots, I am hoping she might change her mind. However, I will be very thankful just to have her there at all. Here is a link to the class description. He will be showing breads from his new book Whole Grain Breads.

It will be so good to meet him. I do not often get to meet people who are as passionate as I am about food. I cannot believe that the class is held in my favorite store on earth! Every other time I have been in a Central Market, I have been there with my kids. Okay so technically, I would go into a zombie like trance while perusing the store. This would result in my dad/sister/husband being forced to entertain my kids. I promise, I still lived with the guilt the entire time I was shopping.All I am saying is it will be nice to be able to devote myself fully to exploring the store. 

I cannot wait! Seriously...

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On a slightly less exciting note. I did make a delicious Texas sheet cake from Cook's Country yesterday. I had been craving chocolate and this recipe looked great. It did not have cinnamon like most versions I have tried. I ended up preferring it. Very very good.