Bread Makes The Meal

It's time to go back and find some more bread recipes. Admittedly, I haven't made much bread lately: on the other hand, I never want to be short of ideas. There are a number of bread blogs and sites around, but mostly either they post relatively infrequently, like breadbasketcase , or they're large bread-related forums, like The Fresh Loaf , that can overwhelm with the sheer amount of information they present. Either drowning in or starving for new information is my fate, if I'm not careful.. My journey with bread ought to be a joyous exploration; there's certainly enough information out there to help me along. I just have to learn how to swim with the information, not drown in it. Starting tomorrow, you will (I hope) see more of this. God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less with bread .

I haven't made bread for quite a while. Largely because Nancie's food has been so good, and so plentiful, that we've been eating mostly leftovers for lunch, not sandwiches. (We have a lot of stew in the freezer; I should see how dinner rolls will go over.) So Sunday I went back and made the basic Amish White bread. I don't know what happened, but Everything Went Wrong . The bread didn't rise adequately, it started drying out, and when I tried to roll it out and roll it up into a loaf, it wouldn't stay together. Baked, it started falling apart. I don't think I've "lost my touch", but it was a very disappointing experience. The bread has a good taste, but it's very dense. I don't even have pictures; it's too annoying. Actually, dinner rolls sounds like a great idea; I can use some of the rye flour for them. Do you think I need to make the whole sourdough starter, or can I just mix the bread flour and the rye flour? God spe...

Wow. I'm definitely going back to a post a day. This is just too long to be absent. That said, I haven't made much bread (we've been pretty busy) and what I have made hasn't turned out that well; but I'll get into that tomorrow, I think. We're "packing up and closing down" the garden; I've been going over there occasionally and spading and turning over a quarter at a time. So far I've got half-way: The garden, half dug. You can see that the strawberry and the one pepper plant are still thriving. I left them up, especially since the pepper plant still has blossoms. Blossoms on the bell pepper. This is before I took off the weed-block fabric. About half the other plots in the community garden are already dug over and prepared for the winter. But a few people are still growing flowers. I'm slightly ashamed to admit that I only think these are marigolds. In other goings-on, I've been reminded that we are on a migration ...

It's been a long time (almost a week!), and I was going to be showing you my newly revised recipe for Tuscan White Hearth Bread (made with water instead of milk, since we were out of milk, and with my buckwheat honey). But I think I seriously didn't bake it long enough. It was quite not done in the middle, and I think that's what made me sick for the first couple of days of this week. The last couple are a different story; but I think most of my "feeling ill" yesterday and today is mostly a second- or third-order consequence of not getting quite enough sleep—and trying to make up for that with several cups of tea. Let's just keep in mind for the future, shall we, that if a recipe calls for a pan of water to provide steam, I'll automatically bake it an extra ten minutes or so. This weekend, I plan on (a) making some kind of well-baked bread, and (b) finally finishing up the garden for the season. Oh, and celebrating our anniversary. Looking forward t...

I will have something else up later today; after all, I do plan to make bread of some sort. I just thought I would offer a few brief thoughts on my (continued, but still not complete) reading of The English Bread Book . So, here are my thoughts. The "German yeast" used in 1857 seems to be like the yeast variously called "fresh yeast", "wet yeast" or "yeast cakes" that are often available (though I personally use the dry yeast). This seems to have been only available for sale in bakeries. If you've never seen fresh yeast, here's some (actual size about 1 inch by ½ inch by ½ inch): Fresh yeast. (Image courtesy of ElinorD, via Wikimedia Commons). Since German yeast was relatively expensive and didn't last long, the yeast in common use was that which would have been used in brewing beer; and there's considerable discussion of how it can be affected by hops, gentian, and other ingredients used to flavor beer or ale; also of...

"Boughten" bread. On Sunday—though we didn't eat it until tonight. It's not that I couldn't have made it. We just haven't had a whole lot of time recently, and we picked our menu for today (meatball sandwiches) kind of hastily. So we had no bread in the house, and I happened to see this walking by the bakery department. By this evening it had started hardening (which I hadn't entirely expected), so we reheated it and split it for the sandwiches. I also got it because I thought I might like to try and imitate the loaf, if it was any good. Well, it was; but I'm debating whether to go ahead with the idea. My idea of "Country White Bread" has a bit softer crust, and something that doesn't dry out quite so quickly. Maybe with a bit more sugar to it? I have a recipe for it in Everything Bread ; maybe I'll make that on the cookie sheet rather than in the loaf pan. Just an idea. What's the difference for you between Country...

Nancie and I were watching the Food Network channel this morning. We often watch the Sandwich King program on Sunday mornings, because we both love sandwiches. Today was a Mexican-inspired sandwich - chicken molé torta. This is pretty standard (I guess, as I've never had it) chicken molé on a roll called a "bolillo". The website gave the recipe for the chicken, with a link to Food Network's glossary for the word "bolillo". It took a bit of searching for me to find that they actually did have a recipe for bolillos (bolilli?) on the site (so why didn't they just link to the recipe? You might think...) Which got me thinking: Jeff Mauro, the chef who is "the Sandwich King", did a good job of describing what a bolillo is, and how it looks and tastes; but he didn't talk at all about what it was, or how it was made. He didn't even mention that there was a Food Network recipe for it. Now I understand that bread is probably not the mo...

Paul, over at The Fresh Loaf , had some interesting thoughts this morning on why we bake bread, and what it is that makes bread important as bread—especially its flavor. Which started me thinking. (A potentially dangerous activity, but I risk it from time to time.) I started baking bread again about six months ago, because I missed the experience of baking, but also because I missed the taste and smell of home-made bread. But as I've blogged about the recipes, even with all the descriptions of how to do it, and lovely pictures (or sometimes not so lovely?), I've been leaving out that important point: the resistance, then give, of the crust in your teeth; the warm, sharp tang of the sourdough; the simple "Here I am, feeding you!" of plain white bread. I'm going to change that. I'll start blogging more about what the bread smells like, and feels like, and reminds me of. As I said when I wrote my About Me page, is part of what I'd like to be sharing...

Before I start on the main post, I must apologize for the long delay. You don't want to know what the last few days have been like. So, Sally Lunn bread was a major success. I don't think I got everything quite perfect; but the end result was that one of the two loaves I made was gone in three days. With very strong approval from Nancie and her mom as well. There was the "not-very-bready" taste to it I remembered; I can now say definitively that this results from the eggs. Three eggs are more than I usually put in two loaves of bread (which is to say, more than none). And one thing I learned from it was that only about 25% of the pictures I take are really good enough to use as illustrations. Here's the recipe, then: Sally Lunn Bread ½ cup warm water 1¾ teaspoons (1 packet) active dry yeast (I actually used 2, I don't remember my reasoning at the time) 1 cup warm milk ½ cup (1 stick) butter ¼ cup sugar 2 teaspoons salt 3 eggs, well beat...

Although we watched an episode of Chopped last night in which one of the mandatory ingredients for a dish was barley flour—but I don't think I've seen barley flour before. It was described as having essentially no gluten; maybe I could make a flatbread out of it? Assuming of course that I could find some. (Apparently, Bob's Red Mill has some, but I've never seen it at ShopRite, Acme, Stop'n'Shop, or even Wegman's. Now, on to Sally Lunn. Wikipedia speaks of it as referring to a kind of bun . The recipe I got from Mama is for a loaf. And the article says it's "often lightly scented with lemon." Are we talking about the same thing? I think not. Mrs. Acton's English Bread Book from 1857 mentions "Flour, 1 lb. [about 2½ cups]; butter, 3 oz.; pounded sugar, 3 oz.; German yeast, full ounce; [let rise] 2 to 3 hours, or until extremely light. Flour, in addition, one pound; to stand in tins until risen to their edges." It allo...

I'm not feeling totally great this evening, but I wanted to share with you something from Wild Yeast Blog , one of the bread-baking blogs I follow. The recipe is for Sourdough Banana Bread, a combination of two of my favorite breads. Thanks, everyone, for following and (hopefully) telling people about this blog. I really appreciate the love from all of you. Good night, and remember, All sorrows are less with bread .

And better, I think. See if you agree. Looking back, I don't see that I've ever posted Leslie Bilderback's "Amish White Bread" recipe. Assuming I haven't, here it is, then (unless she tells me to please take it down): Amish White Bread 1 cup warm water ⅓ cup sugar 1¾ teaspoons (1 packet) active dry yeast 1 cup flour 2 tablespoons oil (I usually use olive oil for flavor) ¾ teaspoon salt 2 more cups flour So start off by dissolving the sugar in the warm water (as always, not much warmer than body temperature) and adding the yeast. Stir until the yeast is all mixed in and go read a book or something for ten minutes. When the yeast is all foamed up on the top, add the oil, and then stir in the first cup of flour. When this is well mixed, add the salt, and then the other two cups of flour. Flour your surface, and empty the bowl out. You should have a soft, but fairly cohesive, dough. Knead this for eight or nine minutes. It'...

I was going to make some other kind of bread on Wednesday, but it was pointed out that we had a number of bananas that were ready to go—more than we were going to eat. And we didn't have long to eat them, so could I please do something with them? Four of these—perfect for banana bread. So I looked for a recipe with plenty of bananas, and guess what? Leslie Bilderback came through again! Thanks Leslie! (Note: I think I've described this before? But not with pictures like this.) Banana Bread ¼ cup (½ stick) unsalted butter ¾ cup granulated sugar 3 ripe bananas 1 egg ¼ cup sour cream (I actually used closer to ½) 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 cups all-purpose flour 1½ teaspoons baking powder ½ teaspoon salt (Optional; I don't usually bother) 1 cup chopped walnuts Preheat oven to 350 °F (175 °C; Gas Mark 4). (Here Leslie gives instructions for prepping a 9" x 5" loaf pan with "pan spray" and parc...

I have to say, this dark rye I made yesterday is delicious! (And almost gone!) I made a couple of sandwiches with it, and I wanted to share. Yesterday, I was just hungry, and I wanted to have something hearty. Fortunately, we had some Kerrygold "Blarney Castle" cheese around. This is lovely cheese, not bland but not with an overpowering taste and smell; a bit sharp but mild enough to let the taste of the bread show through. The only thing I found disappointing about the bread was that the characteristic "rye" taste wasn't very strong. I wonder if this was because I modified the recipe not to use the sourdough starter? It was still delicious, a lot like the brown bread I remember Mama making for us. I just cut off a few slices, put them straight on the bread, and Yum! But you know what was missing? (And I haven't had this for ages .) That's right—pickle! They have this at the Stop & Shop, but we rarely go there for our groce...

So Saturday we were out pretty much all day shopping and running errands, so I took most of Sunday off to recuperate :-) Today was going to be the recipe I gave for bread from 1857, but Nancie requested rye bread instead, so that takes precedence. Since I didn't have a sourdough started, I tried to modify the recipe. It's just coming to the end of the rise, but I thought I'd share with you what I've done so far: Dark Starterless Rye Bread (modified from Leslie Bilderback's Light Caraway Rye recipe) 1 cup warm water 1 tablespoon granulated sugar 2 teaspoons active dry yeast, about 1 package ½ cup cool water; 2 cups dark rye flour 1 teaspoon salt 3 – 4 cups bread flour In a large bowl, combine warm water, sugar, and yeast. Stir to dissolve, and let stand until foamy, about ten minutes. Add cool water and rye flour; stir to combine and form a sponge. Let the sponge stand for about 10 – 12 hours, until well fermented: Add enough bread flour to c...

Happy End Of (Northern Hemisphere) Summer to you all! Of course, when exactly the end happens is debatable. Me, I like the idea that the equinoxes and solstices mark the midpoints of the seasons, so that my autumn began about a month ago. But however you reckon things, fall is about here, here. So I wanted to show you a recipe for bread that I'm going to make this weekend. It's another bread from The English Bread Book by Eliza Acton. I haven't actually converted it into a "modern-style" recipe yet, but I know my basic approach. Here's the recipe, as Eliza has it: Flour four pounds, mixed in a very large bowl with a teaspoonful of salt. The middle made hollow, and a single tablespoonful of brewer's yeast (which has been well watered for two days, and kept in a cool larder) very smoothly mixed with a pint of cold milk and water,—of which one part of three was new milk, and two were filtered water,—poured in, and stirred and beaten well with as m...

I thought I had some really good pictures for you tonight. What I actually have for you is some good evidence that it's difficult (for me at least) to take good pictures with a cell phone camera. Difficult enough that I'm going to go back to borrowing Nancie's mom's camera to take the pictures. But I'll post the pictures because I want to at least show you something . I made the Milk and Water Bread over the weekend. It didn't go exactly as I had planned the recipe; the sponge was considerably wetter, and I let the dough rise for a lot longer (because we got occupied in making the slow cooker ribs). Didn't seem to hurt, though: The bread came out just as tasty. After all that baking, I could hardly wait to eat! The next thing, obviously, was to use the bread appropriately, namely, to mop up the barbecue sauce from dinner: Fortunately, there was plenty of bread for all that sauce. Again, I apologize for the poor quality of the pictures. But...

So we went to the community garden last night and I have to say it was as bad as I had imagined it. Here's what we saw walking in: Things hadn't got knocked over or pushed about so much as they had been stripped of leaves. There are a few leaves left on the tomato plant, but they're mostly gone: We may be able to salvage it, though; I'll take a look. The pepper plants actually came off virtually unharmed; we got our first pepper of the season. It looks, smells, and feels wonderful! Is there a way to use bell pepper in bread? That would be a great way to combine the two interests of mine. I'll be back tomorrow with pictures of bread with our slow-cooker barbecued ribs. God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less with bread .

And much less of a big deal than I thought it would be. At least, by us. Now closer to Trenton, there's a lot of flooding; and up in Hightstown, where we used to live, the Peddie Lake dam gave way, yielding this: But by us, except for a very minor leak in the front window, and a few branches down next door: nothing. I have to go find Nancie's camera, which has the pictures of bread from yesterday and today. I discovered a good use for the Milk and Water bread: sopping up barbecue sauce. You can find the recipe I used here . Unfortunately, it looks like the owner of the blog hasn't updated in over a year. I wish I could get in touch with her and see what was up; this was a good recipe and I'm sure she has many more. And it was really easy to make, too. And the bread was perfect with it :-) God speed, and remember, All sorrows are less with bread .

(Posted from my phone) I'm making bread (the Milk and Water Bread).  It's just out of the oven; I'll add a picture after it cools.  I'll also add a picture of the incoming hurricane clouds.  It's on Nancie's camera right now. I agree with something a friend said.  I imagine we will lose power, and I'm not looking forward to it, not because we're not ready (we are) but because I don't like being in the dark. Stay well, God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less wi th bread.

I must say, things are looking decent overall, but not as good as I would have wanted. The pumpkins are looking pretty scraggly and bedraggled overall; I wonder if I didn't get overenthusiastic in trimming things up last time? The one (taller) tomato plant seems to be doing reasonably well: The other one seems to have fallen over again, despite efforts to tie it up. I'm definitely not getting that variety again next year. Our peppers are doing really quite well (even the one that looks a bit droopy). That's the droopy one. The peppers on the other one aren't quite ripe yet, but there are more of them. And the strawberry plant still has no strawberries (even though the blurb said that it can produce fruit through late September); but it's got some new growth sprouting round the edges. With however much of Irene that affects us over the weekend, it's probably going to be rather rainy through the weekend. (Maybe I ...

This is not bread except in the remotest of senses (namely, it requires flour), but I just had to share with you a recipe I got from the blog Mama Loves Food!: namely, Easy Fried Pickles . Yummy!

I haven't made bread for ages , it seems like. At least partly because the Milk and Water Bread recipe makes two loaves. Well, it looks like two loaves is too much for us to get through, at least recently. I checked our second loaf and it was all moldy. Oh come on, you didn't really want a picture of that, did you? :-) So anyway, no bread, no sandwich. I brought leftover pizza for lunch. Of course, pizza dough is also a type of bread (though I don't think I'd call pizza a "sandwich"). But since I didn't make it or bake this pizza, it doesn't count. What do you think? Is pizza a sandwich? We've occasionally made our own pizza, but not our own dough—yet. If we do, I can do an article on that. Not this week, maybe next, after we've had a few other things as well. And I'm going to the garden this evening; the weather's supposed to be great and I'm expecting great things, all of which I will share with you tomorrow. ...

Nancie has been making the discreet suggestion for a while that I should do something with the sourdough starter or else get rid of it. I eventually decided that I had to agree with her; I really am not using the starter often enough that I can justify taking up the space and the mixing bowl. So tonight I took a couple of final (unfortunately very blurry) pictures: and then washed the bowl out. I haven't given up on sourdough; but I have to be practical: it's not my favorite bread, or Nancie's. On another note, I've been meaning to tell you about the next recipe I'm looking at from the Eliza Acton cookbook I told you about Thursday . I found another recipe for "Good Family Bread". Unfortunately, this one I would have to more than halve before I could bake it manageably. The subheading reads "Sufficient for a week's consumption for ten persons." Presumably that includes the family and the servants. The recipe begins ...