BBA Challenge Bread #26—Poolish Baguettes

I'm baking my way through Peter Reinhart's award winning book, The Bread Baker's Apprentice, along with 200+ other amateur bakers. Want to join in the madness, or just learn more about this semi-crazy undertaking? Check out the following links:

• Pinch My Salt BBA Challenge page—master resource for the challenge
• Buy the Book Bread Baker's Apprentice by Peter Reinhart
• List of Breads See what's coming up.
• Blogroll See who's baking. Great list of some amazing foodie (and not-necessarily-foodie) blogs.
• Flickr Group Photos, photos and more photos!
• Facebook
• Twitter Search for #BBA to find challenge tweets.

Bread #26, Poolish Baguettes, is another lean bread utilizing a pre-ferment to  help bring out the flavor of the wheat. Poolish, the pre-frement used here, was also used in the Greek Celebration bread, the Ciabatta and was an option for the Focaccia.

The most popular pre-ferment is the pâte fermentée, which is basically a small batch of French bread. Poolish is like pancake batter. You let it bubble up nicely then put in the refrigerator to use within three days. The overnight (or longer) rest allows the flavors to build and develop which in turn allows you to get a very flavorful baguette.

These came together very easily and tasted great. They're perfect for having dinner guests as the bread is best the same day. I did have good luck reheating parts of the loaves in the toaster oven. I misted them with a little bit of water and let them warm through. The crust was nice and crunchy and the crumb delicious and tender.

 


I was able to get three small baguettes and a batard out of this bread. While it was very good, I still prefer the pain à l'ancienne for baguettes.

My Million Dollar Idea

As I was being tailgated last night, and trying desperately not to tailgate the painfully slow driver ahead of me (yeah, I get it—it's winter and the wind is blowing like a you-know-what, but come ON), I had a idea for a product that would make me a millionaire. Or get me arrested. Not sure which.

Picture it. A lighted sign—one of those long, narrow ones with the little Lite Brite looking bulbs that spell out words—that fits in the back window of your car. It would be hard wired to a dash-mounted control panel pre-programmed with helpful sayings. Things like, "You have your brights on" or "Your lights are NOT on" or "Accident ahead". You know, helpful things like that.

It would also allow you to create your own messages, such as, "Stop crawling up my ass, it won't make me go faster." And "Do you NOT see the cop up ahead???" And a favorite, "Stop flicking your &$*%@# cigarette butts out the window, #@%*!!" You could have all kinds of fun with it.

Now, because I'm all about safety first, the sign would not allow you to create custom messages while driving. We wouldn't want any accidents caused by texting!

I'm thinking, though, that this might cause an "accident" of another kind, due to some serious road rage sure to develop if you would use the more *ahem* colorful messages. That's where the "getting arrested" part comes in.

On second thought, it's probably not a good idea. Kind of like Dwight's idea to have a gun mounted to his front bumper. Ah, well. Guess I need come up with some other idea to make me a millionaire.

BBA Challenge Bread #25—Pizza Napoletana & a lesson learned

Ah... pizza—my favorite food, ever since I can remember. I think I could eat it every day, so I was looking forward to this recipe... sort of. WHAT? I know, sounds silly given that I just said it was my favorite food. I think the (self-inflicted) pressure of the challenge caught up with me on bread #25, Pizza Napoletana.

I'm baking my way through Peter Reinhart's award winning book, The Bread Baker's Apprentice, along with 200+ other amateur bakers. Want to join in the madness, or just learn more about this semi-crazy undertaking? Check out the following links:

• Pinch My Salt BBA Challenge page—master resource for the challenge
• Buy the Book Bread Baker's Apprentice by Peter Reinhart
• List of Breads See what's coming up.
• Blogroll See who's baking. Great list of some amazing foodie (and not-necessarily-foodie) blogs.
• Flickr Group Photos, photos and more photos!
• Facebook
• Twitter Search for #BBA to find challenge tweets.

This pizza dough is another 2-day bread, with divided portions of dough spending the night in the fridge waiting for proofing, shaping and baking. I made half a batch, which resulted in 3 approximately 6 ounce mounds of dough





As had been the case with a few of the other breads, I was pressed for time and made the dough Sunday night, hoping to have pizza for dinner the next night. The problem is that I can't predict how long I'll have to work and I ended up working late Monday night. I didn't start Pizza Prep until almost 7:30pm and it needs 2 HOURS to proof. Hmm... dinner at 10:00 pm — doesn't sound good to me. While I waited for the dough to proof, I made the pizza sauce.




I stumbled on this recipe a few months ago and haven't used any other since. It's super simple, super delicious and freezes great. 

Pizza Sauce
 by Our Best Bites 
1 6-oz. can tomato paste
6 oz. water (just use the empty tomato paste can)
3 Tbsp. garlic bread seasoning*
1 Tbsp. sugar
3/4 tsp. onion powder
1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes (optional) Kelly's note: I LOVE the flavor, "bite" and heat this gives the sauce

Empty tomato paste into a bowl and add water a few tablespoons at a time, stirring constantly until combined. Add remaining ingredients, stir to combine, and allow to stand until ready to use. Covers two average-sized pizza; freezes extremely well.

*Garlic Bread Seasoning:
combine the following ingredients
1/2 c. powdered Parmesan cheese (Kelly's Note: I've used fresh grated when I've made a small batch to be used right away)
2 tsp. Kosher salt
2 Tbsp. garlic powder
2 tsp. oregano
2 tsp. basil
2 tsp. marjoram
2 tsp. parsley
Store in a jar (preferably one with a sprinkle top) in the fridge.

I let the dough proof for only about an hour and 15 minutes, very hungry and wanting some pizza!  


Here's what I put on mine. Peter Reinhart suggests using minimal toppings because more toppings makes the crust harder to bake. I exercised restraint and here's what mine looked like.




It might not look like I was conservative with toppings, but I LOVE a lot of sauce and cheese on my pizza, and my usual crust can take it. But I reigned it in here.

I had the pizza stone preheating in a HOT oven and slide the parchment and pizza all on the stone. I was worried that if I didn't use parchment, the pizza would stick on the peel and turn into a big ole mess. I tested the limits of parchment yet again, and managed not to catch it on fire.





Not bad! It looks like pizzaria pizza! Check out the bottom:


It looked good AND tasted good. Hooray!

But things went horribly wrong the next day. See, I only made one of the pizzas on Monday and had 2 left to bake the next evening. Once again, I made it home late and this time I rushed it even more. I think I let the dough rest about 20 minutes before I shaped, topped and baked it. I used the same toppings and this is what I got:



A cracker thin (not in a good way) crust that was tough and decidedly not right. It was edible, but suffered greatly from the rushed prep.

This is when it hit me that I was just going through the motions to check another bread off the list. "Hold on," I told myself. "Why are you in this challenge? Just to say you did it, or to actually LEARN something from it, too?" It was a bit humbling and more than a little eye opening.

So I decided that I needed to slow down when it was necessary and do this right. I had a little less than half the challenge to go and I needed to do it right, avoid just going through the motions and pay attention to WHY I was doing this. It shouldn't be a chore, something to slog through.

I've been reminding myself of this as I've made bread since. I haven't baked every weekend because the timing hasn't been right. Plus I have to catch up on blogging! I still have two more finished breads to share with you then I'll be back on track. Bear with me while I find my way along this adventure.

Pumpkin Pie Brioche Monkey Bread

So after I made the pumpkin pie brioche sticky buns, I had half a batch of dough left. If you'll recall, this is a no-knead, make-ahead bread dough you store in the fridge until you're ready to use it. I made half a batch—enough for two 1-pound loaves—so I had about a pound at my disposal. I'd seen a reference to monkey bread recently and realized that it would be a fun way to use up the dough.

I didn't realize how freakin' AWESOME it would be. Seriously, this blows the sticky buns out of the water. The monkey bread tastes amazing warm from the oven, but it's so good for breakfast the next day.

So let's make some, OK?

You'll need about a pound (16 oz) of dough and the following ingredients:

1/2 stick (2 oz) butter, melted
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, loose–not packed
1 Tbsp cinnamon

Melt the butter in a small bowl. Combine sugars and cinnamon in a large zip top bag. Shake to mix.

 
Spray a bundt pan with cooking spray.

Using kitchen shears, snip 1/2"-1" chunks of dough and form into a rough ball. They don't have to be perfect, and they can be of varying sizes. Just remember that they will rise and become almost doubled after proofing and baking.


 
Dip the dough ball in the melted butter and pull out with a slotted spoon.
Drop into sugar bag. Repeat with about 4 more pieces. You don't want to crowd the bag.



Gently shake the bag to completely coat the pieces then place in the bunt pan.



Repeat with remaining dough. You'll end up with left over sugar. You can sprinkle more over the top if you want.

Cover with plastic wrap and let proof for at least 40 minutes up to an hour.




Preheat oven to 350°F. Bake about 30-35 minutes until browned and internal temp is around 190-195°F.



Immediately turn out on to plate. Let cool a few minutes then DIG IN!




The insides are soft and sticky with cinnamon-y goodness and the bottom (that used to be the top) is a bit crunchy and carmel-y.

It rocked my world.

Birthday Cake — A Commissioned Work

My sister's oldest daughter (and my goddaughter) turns 12 today. Happy Birthday, K! About a month ago, she asked me to make her cake. How could I say no?

I spent a couple of weekends testing cake and frosting recipes (a tough job, but I wasn't taking this lightly) and going through cake decorating books from the library. After learning a bit more about cake making and the critical importance of correct cake pan preparation, I settled on the recipes and the kind of decorations I wanted.

Here's one of my first attempts. The decorating is not ideal, but making the tiny layer cakes was so much fun. Please note: Brown frosting is not a good idea. Not at all. K mentioned that, along with blue and green, brown was a favorite color. Needless to say, I nixed that plan after this attempt.



Since K's birthday was so close to Thanksgiving and the family was already going to be together, her mom decided that we'd celebrate on Thanksgiving. K's youngest sister, C, shares a birthday with her Papa (my dad) on November 30 (Happy Birthday, guys!) so we celebrated theirs as well.



This meant that Thanksgiving food prep would be extra intensive, since I'd already planned on making a couple kinds of bread and another dish. I started early and made it all work even though I was a tad late and the frosting was not happy being in a hot kitchen!


First, the recipes.

1-2-3-4 Cake
Adapted from Paula Deen
A delicious, easy, all-purpose yellow cake that stays nice and moist.

1 cup butter (2 sticks), room temperature
2 cups sugar
3 cups self-rising flour*, sifted
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 cup milk, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp butter flavoring
*An easy substitute for self-rising flour is to add 1-1/4 tsp baking powder and 1/4 tsp salt for EACH cup of flour. That's what I did.


Directions

• Preheat oven to 350°F. 
• Grease and flour 3 (9-inch) cake pans. Here's how! On parchment paper, trace around the bottom of each pan and trim just inside the line. Spray pan with cooking spray, then line with trimmed parchment. Spray again, making sure to coat entire pan. You can smooth it out with a pastry brush if you want. Then sprinkle with flour, tapping the edge of the pan with the heel of one hand as you rotate the pan with the other. This ensures that the flour is evenly distributed over the entire surface. Don't skip this step. You'll be sorry - trust me!
• Using an electric mixer, cream butter until fluffy. This will take a few minutes. Scrape the bowl and continue mixing.
• Add sugar and continue to cream well for 6 to 8 minutes, scraping down the bowl a couple of times to make sure it's all getting mixed in and fluffy.
• Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Scrape.
• Add flour and milk alternately to creamed mixture, beginning and ending with flour.
  
• Add vanilla and continue to beat until just mixed. 
• Divide batter equally among prepared pans. Level batter in each pan by holding pan 3 or 4 inches above counter, then dropping it flat onto counter. Do this several times to release air bubbles and assure you of a more level cake. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until done. Cool in pans 5 to 10 minutes. Invert cakes onto cooling racks lined with plastic wrap. Wrap tightly and put in the freezer for at least 1 hour prior to decorating.

The Best Buttercream Frosting EVER
Seriously, this stuff is amazing. It frosts beautifully and isn't too sweet. I doubled this for the three-layer cake and had about a cup left over.

1 cup sugar
6 Tbsp flour
1 cup milk
1 cup butter (2 sticks)
1 tsp vanilla extract (you could use any flavoring you want)

Directions

• Measure sugar and flour into a medium sauce pan. Whisk together to incorporate the flour into the sugar. This makes it easier to dissolve. Add milk to pan and whisk until smooth. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens. It will seem like nothing is going to happen, when all of the sudden, it thickens up. Cook for just a few minutes after it begins to set up. Keep stirring; you don't want it to burn-and it will.
• Remove from heat and let cool completely.
• Once cooled, combine with butter in large mixing bowl or stand mixer and whip like crazy (use whisk attachment). Beat for at least 5 minutes until the mixture is light and fluffy. Use immediately. It can be kept in the fridge, but it hardens considerably and will need to warm up a bit before being spreadable.

Now some decorating pics and tips...

First of all, this is why cake should be a special treat, not an "oh, it's another co-worker's birthday, I deserve a piece of cake" kind of thing.


Butter. Lots and lots of butter. Two sticks for the cake and FOUR for the frosting. Yeah, that's why it's both soooooo good and sooooo bad.



This is the reason I used parchment paper to line the bottom of my pans. They release SO nicely. As long as you grease the sides and run a knife around the edge before turning out, you don't have to worry about leaving half the cake in the pan. You can see that I've lined the cooking rack with plastic wrap. That's so it's already in place, I just have to wrap it over the top.


Then I stack them up on a rack and pop the whole thing into the freezer for at least an hour. The layers are so much easier to handle when partially frozen and they ice better, too.


This is what I used for the dots—Airheads. I could have used fondant, but I wanted something people (ok, KIDS) would want to eat, and fondant isn't the best tasting stuff.


I unwrapped a piece then nuked it in the microwave for 7 seconds on power level 1. These melt very, very easily and I just wanted to soften them up a bit. Even so, they were difficult to roll out.


Sandwich the slightly warmed piece between parchment paper, NOT wax paper. They will stick. Or more accurately, the wax paper will stick to the candy. Blech.


Roll them to desired thickness. You have to start at one side and firmly push/roll, rocking back and forth, slowly squishing it flat. It's not for those with weak wrists. Mine were feeling it after it was all said and done.


I used my apple corer and a borrowed cookie cutter.  I needed leverage when using the cookie cutter because it was so small and you need a lot of force to cut through the candy.


So I used the bottom of a small dish. PLEASE put a cutting board underneath the candy if you're cutting on a soft surface - unless you want small circular cuts in your table!

My apple corer pops the disks out, but the tiny cookie cutter was another matter.


I used the end of my instant read thermometer holder to push them out.


And then, after what felt like far too long, I had lots of dots in two sizes and two colors.




Mmm... frosting.

I took out a cup or so for each color and tinted them blue and green to go with the theme. It's GO TIME.





Sure, it was far from perfect, but K was happy with it and it tasted great. I'd call that a success!

Pumpkin Pie Brioche Sticky Buns

Before I inadvertently threw myself into the food blogging world, I had what I thought was an epiphany. "What if... I made pumpkin bread — but not like regular pumpkin bread. One made with YEAST. I'm a genius!" I think I even jotted a note in my ever-present idea notebook. Yep, I just found it. It says:
Bread Ideas
   Jalapeno bread
   Yeast Pumpkin Bread

And then I found out that I was not, in fact, the first person to ever come up with such a brilliant plan—for either of them. Yeast pumpkin bread existed long before I thought of it, and while it did put a damper on my illusions of genius, it didn't make me less enthusiastic about the concept.

It wasn't until I saw the words "Pumpkin Pie Brioche" that I finally thought, "That's it. That's the one I'm going to make" and proceeded to drool all over my keyboard as I looked at some of the recipes made with said dough.

I've talked about Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day before, but Zoë and Jeff didn't stop there. They teamed up again to create Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day which was released last month. I had my copy pre-ordered as soon as I saw the announcement on the ABin5 website and received it the day of the release. Michele, fellow BBA baker over at Big Black Dogs, decided to create a HBinFive baking group. I still haven't decided if I'm going to join. They officially start baking after the first of the year, but in the mean time, Zoë and Jeff are releasing 2 new recipes to tide the challenge folks over. Pumpkin Pie Brioche is the recipe for November. You can find it here.

I mixed up half a batch the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, planning to use part for a Thanksgiving breakfast treat for Dwight and me.




According to the recipe, the dough will be "loose" but will firm up in the fridge. Well, it was still VERY loose when I used it Wednesday night. I had to use a lot of flour to get it out of the plastic container and a lot of flour when rolling it out. It was incredibly slack. I covered the rolled out dough with cinnamon sugar then carefully, with the aid of my scraper and lots of flour, rolled into a log, sealing the ends.

Instead of a knife, I used thread to cut the log into rolls. It works great in general, but was especially helpful with this dough. You slide the thread under the roll, criss-cross the ends over the top, then pull through the dough creating a nice, clean cut.





I placed the rolls on top of the prepared caramel glaze in a jumbo muffin tin.





I used the BBA recipe for the caramel glaze, the same I used to make the amazing BBA sticky buns. I halved it because I was only making a half-dozen rolls, but realized too late that I should make a full recipe. The small amount of ingredients in my large Kitchen Aid mixer didn't mix quite right. Here's what it should look like — nice and whipped:




But this time, it was quite heavy:




The flavor was still great, so no harm, just a lesson in the limitations of my KA mixer. Here's the recipe:




Ingredients
1/2 pound (2 sticks) butter, room temperature
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup corn syrup
1 tsp vanilla extract (or other flavor of choice)

Directions
Cream butter, sugars and salt for 2 minutes on high speed with paddle attachment. Add corn syrup and extract and cream until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Cover the bottom of jumbo muffin tins or baking dish with approximately 1/4" layer of mixture. Then sprinkle with chopped pecans and dried cranberries, if you so choose.




I covered the pan and put it in the fridge overnight. I pulled the pan out when I got up and let it warm up for about an hour or so before baking at 350°F for about 20-25 minutes.



I turned them out onto another pan after about 5 minutes and let the caramel glaze cover the turned out buns.



After a tough 20 minute wait, I gave them taste. Delicious!



These are best eaten right away. I had one the following day, and while it tasted good, it wasn't the nicest looking roll. Dwight actually said, "What is THAT? Oh, the cinnamon roll." They don't age well.

With all of the other flavors going on, it was a bit difficult to tell what the dough tasted like, but one of the rolls had more bread than cinnamon sugar. I have to be honest and say that it didn't taste anything like brioche. It tasted like a very soft and somewhat gooey whole grain bread. Not bad, but not brioche. It worked great for sticky buns, but I can't see just eating a slice of this bread. Michele at Big Black Dogs made French Toast. I can definitely see using it that way! Basically, this dough needs to be made into something other than just a loaf, at least in my opinion. I just made monkey bread with it (post to come) and it was incredible. Even better than the sticky buns.

Give it a shot! The HBinFive method is SUPER simple.

Some other posts using this dough:
Bread Pudding (Yes, please)
Gorgeous Traditional Brioche
A whole new twist on the usual Pumpkin Roll

Places to Shop—Unique Gifts for the Holidays

It's that time of year again—the official start of the holiday shopping season. Although I love Amazon for just about anything, I have a few other suggestions for places I've found that offer  unique and special gifts.



Etsy
A treasure trove of unique gifts. You can find anything and everything here, from furniture to note cards to jewelry, all handmade. I've purchased a number of gifts from Etsy. Here are a few:

Probably the most unique—A Terrarium from The Oak Leaves shop

I was blown away by how adorable these are! I stumbled upon this shop through a link at Design Sponge (a great resource, by the way).


The perfect gift for the music buff—A recycled record cover journal from Vinyl Frontiers

Yes, it's an actual album cover.  Recycling has never been so fun!

Always clever, often irreverent, and completely adorable stationery from Terry Taylor Designs. She has a holiday special going on, so take advantage!

Note pads, note cards, invitations, and more. I love this stuff!

Beautifully crafted wodden rings by MnM Woodworks

In men's and women's sizes and designs, these rings are simply stunning.
All are custom made to your size and specs.

This is just a sampling of the wonderful items you can find at Etsy. Please, check out the site. I promise you'll be bowled over by the quality and diversity of items made by artists and artisans of all kinds.

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Uncommon Goods
Not as diverse and personal as Etsy, although some artists sell work through both places, Uncommon Goods has been a go-to gift destination of mine for years. They have gifts at all price points and lots of fun and often beautiful items.

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Klutz
For all the kids in your life, Klutz is FULL of interactive games and activities for all ages. Science kits, paper dolls, jewelry making — Klutz offers a delightful alternative to the boring, generic toys you find most places.

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What about you? Where do you like to find unique gifts?

All photos are from the seller's etsy shop.