Tackling Bread Making

I've never been much of a baker. Too much of an exact science and following recipes has not always been my thing. However, you cannot beat fresh bread so I tried my best to simplify more complicated recipes. I never have yeast in the house so I've tried everything from self rising flour to flat breads. Some attempts were ok, but everything was mostly unimpressive. I caved and started using yeast. The importance of yeast is immeasurable in beer making and I now concede that it is very important in bread making. On a side note: Yeast is expensive in the grocery store. Three small packets will cost you close to $3.00. Making your own bread is supposed to be cheap! A quick search on Amazon will yield (pun intended) something like 2 pounds of the same yeast you find in the grocery store, but not in packet form for like $8-$10. This is the way to go.

For the Bread bowl, I spit a regular loaf in two and instead of letting it rise in a bread pan, I let it rise in a ball. Cut it as pictured and you have yourself an edible bowl to serve soup or chili in. Only mystery I have yet to solve is how to make the bowls smaller. The bowl is essentially a half a loaf of bread which is way too much for consumption during one meal. I might try cutting the dough into thirds or quarter it instead next time.

Anyway, here is the current status of my bread recipe:

3c flour
1/2 milk
1 Tbsp of olive oil
2 Tbsp of sugar
1 tsp of salt
1 package of yeast

Mix in Kitchen Aid or like machine, and add a 1/2 cup of warm water. Check the dough, sometimes more water is needed, but you do not want too much water so be careful. Place dough in oiled bread pan and let it rise for 30 minutes to an hour. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes.

I've also been trying to double this recipe and freezing half of it for an easy bake the next day. Only problem is the dough doesn't rise nearly as much after being frozen. I'm working on this, but it may simply be a matter of science that I cannot fix. Regardless, it still tastes great.

Lunch! Wife Style

My wife made a delicious lunch the other day. She kept it classic and simple. The rustic tomato soup is about the healthiest thing on the blog to date. It is literally the freshest of vegetables chopped and thrown into vegetable stock with salt, pepper, and spices. Done. Delicious. Add to that a simple grilled cheese on wheat bread and that's a meal. She also tried an apple bake that turned out pretty well for her first try. Next time around I think she will remove the skin of the apple. Only thing to really note here is to make sure the apples are cooked long enough.



Happy cooking.

Evolution

Recipes build off one another. Lack of ingredients often leads to invention, or better known as, necessity is the mother of invention (cited from my Father). I very much agree this is a truth in cooking. Knowing how to do one thing can serve as a launching point to something new. In a previous post I discussed simple syrup for a mixed drink. While I'm still not too fond of the mixed drink (though I'm still working on it), the syrup served as a launching point for a missing sauce to a batch of Asian noodles I was making. The sauce was fantastic, but the dish looked anything but appetizing. It was missing color and crunch. It was an incomplete dish (that said, I cooked only with what I had on hand). What I would of done differently is added many more colorful and tasty vegetables and either ditched the chicken or marinated it in the sauce well in advance. The chicken was much too bland and didn't soak up the sauce. But I learned and I moved on.

I stuck with the chicken, but this time I delightfully breaded and fried it so it could soak up sauce. And a new instant favorite was created. While I believe the chicken was perfectly breaded, the sauce is the star here. I want to revisit my first dish attempted with this sauce, because rice noodles compliment the sauce so well, and perhaps better than breaded chicken.



Accompanying the chicken was chips from a previous post and a lovely corn based salsa my wife made (lack of ingredients driving the recipe yet again). Recipe is as pictured. Simple as that.

 

The sauce recipe is a very simple one and without knowing it, I recreated something I've tried to create in the past. My good friend once took my to a Filipino restaurant where I was very impressed with the sauce served with a fish served split open and fried. I never got it down after a couple of attempts and I forgot about it. After making this sauce, I was instantly brought back to that Filipino meal and I knew I had accidentally recreated the sauce I once tried to make. I have not nailed down the proportions yet, but the ingredients are:

simple syrup (half water, half sugar)

soy sauce

lime juice

I know that recipe is very vague, but I've only made it to taste so far, not paying attention to proportions just yet.

Saturday Morning Breakfast

We are a very young family, but traditions have already started. Every Saturday morning either my wife or I cook a variation on this classic American breakfast dish. The dog is even in on this tradition too. We do not feed our dog people food, but we break every Saturday morning and save a piece of bacon for him (but we only give it to him in his bowl when he is not looking so he does not start begging).

There isn't much to say about a recipe but I suppose after much trial and error I could offer some tips:

For the potatoes, whether you grate them to hash browns or cut them homestyle (pictured), make sure they are cooked long enough. It isn't so pleasant to bite into a raw potato during breakfast. Additionally, use lots of your favorite seasonings. We have come to a consensus that Tony's Creole seasoning is best for these potatoes.

As for the bacon, I grew up with my mother always frying the bacon in a pan, and I did it this way for many years too. This method is messy and the bacon often comes out cooked unevenly. One day I tried cooking the bacon in the oven. It came out perfectly and there was no mess! Lay down a piece of foil over a cookie sheet for even less clean up and preheat the oven between 400-450, and cook to the desired crispiness. I now know that most restaurants cook bacon this way, but I was in the dark for many years.

Things don't always work out.

So, I tried a Bacon Popcorn recipe of Christopher J. Ciesiel (found here) and it turned out well, though he is probably right to suggest that I should of added more bacon fat. All bacon lovers should give this recipe a try as it is fun to watch the kernels pop and it is tasty. (The picture to the left is Ciesiel's and the one below is NOT his recipe).

I liked his recipe so much that I tried to make a caramel/kettle corn version of this without the bacon fat (just butter) and brown sugar. If you take a gander below, you can see that things did not work out. I have not given up on expanding flavored popcorn beyond this recipe, but I remain defeated thus far. Unfortunately, I do not have any pictures of my success in following his recipe, I only have one of my defeat. That said, if you take a walk over to his blog (link posted above), he has detailed pictures and explanation on how to make a good bacon flavored popcorn.