Bread Bible Alpha Bakers Bake Along

Basic hearth bread variation: Velvety buckwheat loaf

9/11/2015

I've made the Basic Hearth Bread more times than I can remember and decided that I would make the variation of the recipe called "Velvety Buckwheat Loaf."

I've never had buckwheat bread, or buckwheat anything, to my knowledge, but I was intrigued by the "velvety" description.

The sponge pre-ferment mixture included yeast, water, bread flour and sour cream, which no doubt contributes to the "velvety" texture. It is very stretchy already after just a couple of minutes of beating.

How would I describe this color, anyway? Sawdust? Putty? Beach sand?
It's a bit unappealing, I must admit.

Here is the risen loaf, tucked into the bottom of my ceramic cloche baker and ready for the oven. Note the slashes. I am getting braver! They are much deeper than my previous attempts.

Fresh from oven and you can see that a pretty good oven spring opened up my slashes! That hole in the top is where my Thermapen took the bread's temperature to check for doneness. I don't like to leave things to chance. Baking is about precision.

The bread is a slightly strange color, but has a moist, firm and yet soft texture. You can see that it can be sliced thinly. I would describe it as similar to pumpernickel, but without the prominent rye flavor that is sometimes present in dark breads. The buckwheat flavor is hard to describe. Mild, but definitely different from wheat.

The bread stayed fresh for two full days after baking.

VERDICT?

I prefer the standard Basic Hearth Bread recipe.

I don't like the buckwheat flavor enough to work with it again, and it's the only bread recipe in the book that uses buckwheat flour. I will pass the rest of the flour on to a friend.

NEXT UP: Banana Feather Loaf

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"Proscuitto Ring," aka St. Thomas' Bread

7/5/2015

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I baked this on the feast day of St. Thomas the Apostle, and since I didn't use any proscuitto in the recipe, I have renamed this bread St. Thomas' Bread.

Rose's headnotes in the Bread Bible call this bread "lard bread," and more recent editions of the book include an updated ingredient list that includes lard, plus options for the meat that is folded into the dough.

Although I have had this book for years and bake with it weekly, this is one of the recipes I hadn't baked before. This is one of the joys of baking with a group! How I love the Alpha Bakers!!

This is a rustic bread, and the dough is made quickly in the food processor. It's baked in a ring shape and filled with bits of spicy cured meats. I chose capocollo. Note the tub of "Recipe Ready" lard there on the left. Yes, this bread isn't recommended for the cardiac rehab patient. But the lard does lend such a silky richness to the dough, it's worth it. I think, anyway. I feel fine right now.

Note the bits of spicy capocollo kneaded into the dough, along with black pepper and (gulp)...lard. It's probably no worse than butter, but the very sound of the word makes me think I might as well schedule my cardiac catheterization right now.

The dough is shaped into a log first.

And then formed into a ring.

My crystal cake dome worked great as a cover for the rising dough in my warm kitchen. Just one rising period means this bread is very fast to make.

I opted to brush the dough with melted bacon grease. What's a little more pork fat at this point?

The bread is crusty, fragrant and delicious! We served it with shaved slices of Grueyer cheese.

This is such an easy and fast recipe, I think it would be wonderful for a party.

I think I will make it half-sized next time so that we can finish it easily. It's so filling that it's almost a meal in itself and was a lot the two of us and three friends.

Do try it, but if you have an early edition of the Bread Bible, make the updated changes to the recipe! Add 2 TBSP of lard, and use 6 oz of spicy cured meats.

We are all still feeling fine. No chest pain or shortness of breath. So I guess that means this bread didn't push any of us over the edge into coronary artery disease! And it sure is delicious!

A final note on St. Thomas, since I have dubbed this bread in his honor:
Although he is remembered for his famous doubt, "It is because Thomas attained faith through physical touch that we are confirmed in in the faith beyond all doubt." --St. Gregory the Great

Thanks so much, everyone, for stopping by my blog and leaving your comments!

Visit again in August when the Bread Bible Alpha Bakers will be baking Rose's Beer Bread--one of my favorites!

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Touch of (Cousin!) Grace Biscuits

5/5/2015

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Here is my wonderful cousin Grace with her husband Ken, and her son Steve and daughter Marie. They live in Michigan and I miss them all!

I was born into a grace-filled life--the grace of God, my grandmother Grace, my aunt Grace and my beloved cousin and dear friend Grace. Cousin Grace and I have only lived in the same town for a couple of years in our entire lives, but we have remained close since childhood.

These biscuits, from the Bread Bible, will remind me of her whenever I bake them.

Like my cousin Grace, they are:
tender
sweet, without being sugary
a pleasure
leave you wanting more!

I had never made these before, but they are so simple and quick to prepare, I will definitely put these on the menu more often.

Although biscuits are a religious experience in the South, they aren't always my favorite (gasp!). Biscuits take third place behind yeast breads and cornbread at our house.

The dough is dropped by a scoop into a pan of flour and then gently shaped by hand instead of being rolled and cut.

The biscuits are crowded in the pan so that they rise up, not sideways. Mine were a bit smaller than Rose prescribed--I made a dozen instead of 9 from the batch of dough.

I wouldn't describe these as typical Southern biscuits. These are rich and almost cakey in texture, lightly sweet and fragile when warm. In short--delightful!

They were also delicious cold the next morning for breakfast.

NEXT ASSIGNMENT: Ricotta Loaf Bread (June 3)

Thanks so much for visiting and commenting!

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Pita Bread--easy, delicious, and fast!

4/7/2015

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The Bread Bible Alpha Bakers tackled homemade pita bread this month. I've made it before, so I knew that anyone who hadn't was in for a real treat!

Take a look at this gorgeous dough!! It's very easy to prepare with a stand mixer. (Directions to mix it by hand are included in the Bread Bible, BTW.) The simplest of ingredients--unbleached all-purpose flour, water, olive oil, salt and yeast--are mixed and then vigorously kneaded in the mixer for several minutes until very silky and elastic. The dough is refrigerated until ready to use--up to FOUR DAYS in advance!
Here it's been removed from the refrigerator and is bubbling up, anxious to be introduced to the hot oven.

The dough is cut, rolled into balls and patted into discs and then allowed to rest. Meanwhile, the oven is preheating at a whopping 475 degrees with my baking steel (not stone!) along with it. By the way, we love our pizza steel! We used ceramic pizza stones for years, but they broke so often it was getting ridiculous. We purchased the baking steel two years ago and use it constantly. Naturally, it's never going to break, but it is REALLY heavy! (More info here: http://www.bakingsteel.com/shop/baking-steel)

The oven is hot and the dough is rolled flat.
Once they go in the oven--then we see the magic!

I already ate half of that one on the left! They baked in just two and a half minutes. These are large--big enough to fit inside a gallon-size Ziploc bag. When I made the second batch (yes, I've already made them again this week!) I made them smaller.

These are simply delicious, far better than anything you can purchase. They are soft and chewy. I cut one in half and stuck the pieces in the toaster and they came out crispy--great for dipping!

I made the second batch using the whole wheat variation, and they were even better.

On Easter Sunday, I pulled out the dough and my son Dustin and I made pitas for an afternoon snack. It was such fun! My daughter Jessica made our family's favorite roasted garlic and red pepper hummus and we ate the pita straight from the oven at the kitchen counter. There wasn't even time for a photo!

I love the Bread Bible, and bake with it weekly. Do try this recipe! Follow along the rest of the Bread Bible Alpha Bakers here-- http://breadbiblealphabakers.blogspot.com/

Thanks, everyone, for visiting my blog and leaving comments!

NEXT UP: Touch of Grace Biscuits (May 1)

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Garlic and Rosemary Focaccia--kickoff to The Bread Bible Alpha Bakers project

3/5/2015

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This is the best focaccia on earth!!

I have had The Bread Bible for years, but hadn't baked this recipe before. Why, oh why? This recipe is terrific!

After 20 minutes of beating, the resulting dough is the consistency of melted mozzarella, as Rose describes it. Right on there--that's it exactly!

Flour, water, sugar, salt and yeast--that's all the ingredients in this dough. Or is it batter?

This is such a "slack" dough that it's tempting to call it a batter! My dough doubled in only 2 hours, instead of the 4 that it was supposed to take, according to the recipe. No complaints there!

My understanding of bread baking is rudimentary:

yeast is a living organism
when fed and warmed, it produces carbon dioxide gas
that gas makes the bread rise
you can kill the yeast if you expose it to high temperatures

OK, that's about the entire scope of my knowledge.

That having been said, I have been happily baking bread for 40 (gasp!) years! Although the fine points are interesting, and sometimes I do read up on those things, it's not critical to know much more than that--so long as you have excellent recipes that you can trust. Need I say it--bake with Rose's The Bread Bible and you can't go wrong.

My son Dustin taught me to make poached garlic a couple of years ago, and I always keep a jar of it handy in the fridge. Rose includes this in her focaccia recipe. Fresh whole cloves of garlic are simmered in olive oil and then used as you would roasted garlic. Plus, the garlic-scented olive oil is an added bonus!

The dough is spread on a sheet pan. The little holes are actually pockets into which I have inserted cloves of poached garlic.

Promising texture!

Adding fresh rosemary to the focaccia. I also sprinkled it with Maldon flaked sea salt, which added sparkle and crunch.

The dough deflated in the oven for some reason, but it emerged crispy, chewy and amazingly light and full of holes. Next time I won't dimple the dough if I add the garlic cloves, because that step might have been unnecessary and that may be why the dough fell.

It was simply the best focaccia ever! I will be making this often!

Thanks, friends, for visiting and commenting on this monthly bake-along with the Bread Bible Alpha Bakers!

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Rose says, "Happiness is a new bake along!"

2/26/2015

3 Comments

http://www.realbakingwithrose.com/2015/02/happiness_is_a_new_bake_along.html

Rose has a post on her blog about our new venture!

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BEGINNING MARCH 4!

2/16/2015

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I am thrilled to be one of a group of bakers that will be baking through The Bread Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum starting March 4, 2015.

Several of Rose's Alpha Bakers are dedicated bread bakers, and others of us (me included!) are interested in improving our bread baking skills. We have agreed to bake one recipe per month, starting with Rosemary Focaccia, and blog about our results.

You can follow the group's progress here: http://breadbiblealphabakers.blogspot.com/

The Bread Bible includes many of my favorite recipes, including brioche, pizza crust, "basic" white sandwich bread, and challah--too many to list! What Rose calls "basic" is anything but ordinary!

Pick up your own copy of the book on Amazon or at your local bookstore and bake along with us!

Thanks to Glori, my fellow Alpha Baker, for leading this effort.

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Basic hearth bread variation: Velvety buckwheat loaf

"Proscuitto Ring," aka St. Thomas' Bread

Touch of (Cousin!) Grace Biscuits

Pita Bread--easy, delicious, and fast!

Garlic and Rosemary Focaccia--kickoff to The Bread Bible Alpha Bakers project

Rose says, "Happiness is a new bake along!"

BEGINNING MARCH 4!

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