Monthly Archives: August 2009

First Weekend in My New Home!

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Hooray! A weekend at home at last! We’re sitting in the living room with the laundry going watching SportsCenter and going to Wachovia in a moment to open our joint account. Goodness, all the sudden I’m feeling very domestic. I woke up this morning and unthinkingly put a load of wash in and then fifteen minutes later was like, woah I’m turning into my mother. Weird sensation. But! Happy day I found my nuts and bolts and whatever to put on my bike rack and I bought a little pump to put air in the tires so yay, I can bike around all the awesome trails we have soon. As for today, I have my next bread for the BBA Challenge (cinnamon raisin bread…axing the walnuts), and then Drew wants to play some video game called Diablo. Also hopefully tennis, or running as sometime this weekend I need to run 15 miles. Hmm! I have been a little spotty lately because I did something funky to my hip a while back, but it’s getting better I guess, so hopefully it’s alright. Anyway, off to enjoy the day–hope everyone has a delightful weekend! (oh man, any other HIMYM fans out there that can’t wait til the end of September? I’m dying over here.)

sparklepower etsy shop

BBA #8 Cinnamon Buns

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So Michael had a soccer tournament one weekend and I decided to make a double batch of cinnamon buns to bring for all the parents and such. Oy! This was my first adventure of not all the dough fitting in the mixer. After struggling for a few minutes to knead the dough like a real human being, I cut the dough in half and mixed it KitchenAid style in shifts. What can I say, I guess I’m just a wimp in the kneading department. I like kneading the last minute by hand and feeling it all come together on the counter, but I’m quite happy to let modern marvels get me to that last step. So, yeah. I was thinking about doing half cinnamon buns, half sticky buns, but then it was going to be a nightmare baking them all together and I just decided, no I’m gonna do all sticky buns. So at 3:30am on Saturday I crept downstairs to take the buns out of the fridge so they could finish the last proof, then stuck ‘em in the oven around 7. That’s when I discovered we only had about 1 cup of powdered sugar for the glaze. Well, no problem, I’ll just make my own from granulated sugar and a bit of corn starch. Except for the Cuisinart must have HATED me and I only got half-the-size-of-granualated-sugar particles, and as we were already running late, I just had to plow on. So I made the glaze that didn’t quite turn into a smooth paste, and spooned it onto the buns. I think we ended up with…well at least 30. Everyone really enjoyed them, and I think if I made them again I would make them bigger and actually use powdered sugar, and they’d be great!

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This post has been part of the BBA Challenge started by lovely Nicole…join us!

BBA #7 Ciabatta

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Well, it was unanimous that this was the favorite one so far. I did a half recipe of this one because I made it at the same time as the cinnamon buns, and it was gone in one night. I came down the next morning and there was a measly little piece that I promptly ate up, sad that there wasn’t any more but also pleased that it was such a big hit. It wasn’t exactly how I pictured it turning out…I kept thinking of the oily ciabattas I normally eat at restaurants, and this definitely wasn’t that. But it was nice and crusty, if a bit smaller holes than I should have had as I degassed the dough accidentally even though Peter Reinhart warned me that I had to be careful…whoops. But I would definitely make this again if I was having friends over or whatnot…and even though I would put this one behind the bagels, Michael thinks it’s a close favorite. Well, I guess it doesn’t get any better than that!

Michael pointing out the spot where I must have sprayed the water a little wildly in the oven. Ciabatta was the first of the rustic breads, and as I don’t have a steaming oven, OR a spray bottle, I ended up using a turkey baster to spray water into the oven every 30 seconds. In the end I think it worked pretty well!

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You know you want to start acting like a crazy bread freak like the rest of us participating in the BBA Challenge :)

BBA #6 Challah

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Mmmm, this was good. I ended up making a half recipe of this and the casatiello because I made them at the same time, and boy was I glad I did. I ended up with a huge loaf of challah and even though we ate it all, it was enough! All braided loaves remind me of my aunt’s cinnamon bread that we eat at Christmastime toasted with butter. It reminds me of warm pajamas and family and sleepy, happy times, and I have to say, the challah lived up to those memories. It was nice and crusty on the outside, and really moist on the inside, and toasted really well. One morning Mom and I had like 6 slices, so we deemed that as a sign that it was pretty tasty. Michael said it was “alright” hahaha :) Also Wrigley (the puggle!) really liked it as well!!!

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Join us in the BBA Challenge!

BBA #5 Casatiello: Surprisingly Tasty!

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Okay so when I read that the casatiello was a bread with cheese and salami I thought, oh no, I don’t eat salami, and I’m really not a fan of cheese in my bread (what can I say? I’m a purist). In the end I compromised and included mozerella and cheddar cheese, but omitted the salami…I’m sorry I just find it gross. I made these into little muffins and a little boule with the leftover dough that didn’t fit into one pan. We ate a few right away on the way to pick up Todd from the airport and I have to say, they were delicious! They weren’t too cheesy, and since they were warm the cheese was all melty and yummy. I have to say they were decidedly not as good once they had cooled, so if I made them again, I’d only make enough to feed people right away at dinner.

Also, because I love you, I thought I’d just share what kind of photog sessions go down once I’ve baked all this bread: the unabridged version of my casatiello.

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Honestly! You’d think there was a limit to how many times you could arrange some muffins on a tray ;) Oh it’s all in good fun, but does this little dance happen to anyone else?

Obligatory link to the BBA Challenge!

BBA #4 Brioche…Eh, Alright

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Okay, so not only did I forget to take pictures of this one, but the brioche was also the only bread so far that I genuinely didn’t enjoy. I made the middle class brioche, since 8 ounces of butter seemed like quite enough. I liked working with the melty dough, and I had such high hopes for yummy breakfasts of brioche and strawberry preserves. I didn’t shape them as well as I ought…I should have had them more cone-shaped so they didn’t justs expand outward into a hockey puck shape, so that probably didn’t help. I dunno, I just didn’t get it though! Mom had a few for breakfast and enjoyed them, but Michael gave this recipe a flat “no” and we all hoped for better next time.

BBA #3 Bagels: OMG Soooo Good

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Okay I’ll be honest, I didn’t really think these were gonna be as good as they were. First off, they took FOREVER. I ended up making a crapload of large and mini bagels to use for pizza bagels. Which I decided halfway through so I had to degas the little ones so I could make the holes smaller so the sauce didn’t fall in the middle. But hey, I fulfilled a pestering daydream these days of owning a bakery and making bread for a living, because that’s what it sort of feels like when I get up to make a poolish or take the dough out of the refrigerator…it’s nice. :) But yeah, I ended up making 2 cinnamon sugar, 2 poppyseed, 2 everything (my “everything” was poppyseeds, sesame seeds, cinnamon, sugar, and salt), and about 20 pizza bagels. They were all really good! I preferred the large ones because I hadn’t degassed them and I didn’t leave them in the water as long so they were a bit less chewy. Michael really liked the chewy though and pronounced this the first bread of the challenge that he liked. I ate one of mine right away and it was so warm and delicious I immediately forgot how long they took to make and just enjoyed! I did use the baking soda in the water and I think that did a good job in glazing the outsides a bit. It was better than any bagel I’ve ever bought…and that’s saying something because I really love bagels!!! Okay Peter Reinhart, maybe you do know what’s up. :)

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Pizza bagels!

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BBA #2 Artos: Greek Celebration Bread

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Well hey there!

My lovely brother Todd just emailed me all the pics of the bread I’ve baked but have neglected to post about yet (don’t worry! I’m still in the challenge). When I moved to DC I forgot to load them onto my computer before I left (I took them on my mom’s camera), so they’ve been in limbo land for while. But yes! Finally, here’s my bread!

This week was Artos, a Greek celebration bread. There are lots of variations, including some with nuts and raisins and other dried fruit, but I stuck to the classic this time around (and to be honest I’m not a big fan of fruits and nuts in my bread). There were lots of yummy spices in this one that made it delightful to sniff while it cooked, and I enjoyed the LARGE loaf for several weeks after when I made up some french toast to eat for breakfast. Overall the baking went pretty well except for the fact that it rose so much in the oven that it bumped into the shelf above it!!! Dang! I was so depressed because it was my first real boule and I had made it so well, and then it came out with weird indents all over it (I took out the offending shelf with about 10 minutes of cook time to go). But it still tasted good! And I think I’d make this one again, though maybe a half portion since Drew and I just don’t eat that much bread.

Oh dear, seem to have misplaced the pics for this one…well, full steam ahead!