Slow Rise Whole Wheat Challah

It's been awhile since I posted about my latest challah exploits hasn't it? Yes, I know. But I assure you, it's not for lack of challah baking. Trust me, I've been baking weekly and developing my own recipes for loaves. I just haven't posted out of fear of boring all y'all. Is that even possible? In any case, I stumbled on this Slow Rise Whole Wheat Challah from A Blessing of Bread and decided, why not? What's unusual about this challah is that it features a starter, little yeast, long rising times, little sweetener but these things intrigued me nonetheless. It is also mostly whole wheat which made me a bit nervous as I know my father can be a little biased about his breads. This challah was a pleasure to make and although I don't think it'll be gracing the weekly table, I'm glad I tried it anyway. The starter was quick to pull together the night before and it rose wonderfully. I'm not going to lie; it was necessary for me to add a little yeast to the final dough to speed up the fermentation as Shabbat has started to come in really early and I was afraid it wouldn't be completed in time. I did add very little though so I don't think the effect was lost here. I let it slow rise in the oven with just the light oven and waddya know, the little yeast puffed right along and raised my dough. Although Ms. Glezer offers a recipe for a starch glaze, I opted for the usual egg to give it a bit of color and shine. The result was actually pretty good. The first night we had it, the whole wheat flavor was present but not dominant. It was lightly sweet with a really pleasing texture. You could practically taste the slow-rise. By the second day however, the whole wheat flavor became more dominant, which is not a bad thing.. unless you're in the not-a-fan-of-whole-wheat camp. Check out her book for the recipe and an interesting challah experience.

Berry Pie

In these fall days with winter almost upon us, I sometimes long for the days of summer. The fruits of summer.. the desserts of summer... So I decided that this weekend's dessert should be an expression of that longing! Oh, and I wanted to make a pie. I was going to make apple, but that would be too fall appropriate. So I decided to make a berry pie. In my supermarket I found frozen strawberries and blueberries and fresh blackberries! It was settled- mixed berry pie. I wish I had a recipe for you-- I don't. I just threw together the berries with about a cup of sugar, some flour and cornstarch, a bit of salt, vanilla, and lemon juice. The crust recipe I used was the trusty and appropriately named KAF Guarantee recipe. I baked until beautiful but sliced way too early. Of course I let it cool for a few hours but I realized that pies like this should be refrigerated for a generous amount of time before slicing because the juices will run uncontrollably. When I sliced into it Friday night that's exactly what happened. But when I refrigerated for serving the next day, slices were clean. I guess I'll just have to exercise some restraint next time. The flavor was realllly good and fresh- a nice balance between sweet and tart. Satisfied my summer craving, that's for sure.

The dough draped into the pan,

and trimmed to fit.Here's the filling. Just some berries and stuff.
Filling in the pie. Look at those colors!

The pie is covered and ready to bake!

My finished, and oozing, berry pie!

Reinhart's Anadama Bread

Like many of you fellow bakers out there, some of you just get the urge to knead dough. It happens to me alot, especially when I need to calm stress or just have the urge to bake. We also needed some bread in the house. It was perfect. Leafing through the few bread books I have with me in the states, I decided to make Peter Reinhart's Anadama Bread. I had made this loaf once before, but the cornmeal that I used was so... earthy shall I say, that the resulting loaves tasted like, well, earth. In the nicest possible way. Needless to say, they were not edible. My sister recently gave me a canister of pleasant smelling cornmeal and I decided to attempt it again. I was nervous, I won't lie. But the cornmeal pulled through! The resulting loaves were reallllly good! I loved the flavor. Subtle, but nutty with an even and brown crumb from the molasses. The crust was particurly good, as well. I stashed one loaf in the freezer as usual and the other was enjoyed by my mom and me throughout the week. If it's not white, my dad won't touch it. It starts with an overnight soaking of the cornmeal to extract as much flavor possible. Putting the rest together was easy. I mixed with a mixer-- I know!- but finished it off by hand to make sure the consistency was correct. I'm not always so sure with the mixer. This is a very good sandwich loaf. Slices of it are particularly good with cream cheese.

Anadama Bread

Bread Baker's Apprentice

Soaker:

1 cup cornmeal

1 cup water

Dough:

4 1/2 cups bread flour

2 tsp yeast

1 cup water

1 1/2 tsp salt

6 tbsp molasses

2 tbsp shortening or butter at room temperature

The night before baking, combine the cornmeal and water in a container. Stir and let sit overnight.

On baking day, make the soaker. In you mixer bowl, place 2 cups of the flour, water, yeast and the soaker.
Stir to combine.

Allow to rise for one hour or until bubbly.

Add the remaining ingredients to the bowl,

and mix until all the ingredients are combined.

Knead the dough with the dough hook until it begins to clean the side of the bowl. At this stage, I removed it from the bowl and finished kneading by hand.

Here is my kneaded dough.

Place in a large bowl to rise until doubled in size.

Here is the beautifully risen dough.

Pour it out onto a lightly floured counter.

Divide the loaves into two equal pieces shape into loaves.

Place the loaves into two greased pans to proof.

Towards the end of proofing, preheat the oven to 350. The proofed loaves. I suspect that I need to use smaller loaf pans next time so that the loaves actually rise above the rims...
Dust with cornmeal.

Bake for around forty minutes, rotating the loaves halfway through until the loaves are nice and golden. Cool on a wire rack.

Banana Pancakes

My sister, R, awoke this morning with the words "french toast" coming out of her mouth. And then she went back to sleep. I didn't think much of it until I heard her later say, "pancakes...waffles". I thought, this girl definitely has breakfast on the brain. When she was fully awake, I asked her where on earth it came from. All she could say was, I don't know. But then, on a "let's spoil R this morning and treat her to something nice and nourishing" whim, I offered to satisfy her craving by making pancakes for breakfast-- or rather brunch, as it was heading toward lunchtime already. We had some ripening bananas lying around so I just figured I'd make banana pancakes. Sometimes, cooking a nice, wholesome for someone you love is a great way to show them your love and to help kickstart their day right. They were quite tasty I must say and simple to whip together. This recipe is adapted from some site on the internet. Run a google search... if this one doesn't suit you, there are plenty of recipes to be had. Serve with real maple syrup, no imitations, or enjoy like I do.. plain!

Banana Pancakes

3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup all-purpose flour

2 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

2 tsp baking powder

1 egg

small squirt vanilla extract

1 cup milk

2 tsbp vegetable oil

2 ripe bananas

Place the bananas in a large bowl,

and mash well.
Add the milk, egg, oil and vanilla,

and stir well to combine.

Add the dry ingredients,

and combine thoroughly, without overmixing.

Cook as you would regular pancakes,

and enjoy breakfast!

Mommy's Olive Levain

I think I'm getting lazy. I know. It's terrible of me. I have been baking and photographing... but it seems that things keep getting in the way of organizing and posting. Things like holidays, weekends, hospital visits and delicious nieces that keep finding their way to this side of New York. Wonderful distractions really... well, except for the hospital visit to my grandmother who recently broke her hip. Anyway, after many days, I'm finally posting about this wonderful olive bread that I made in honor of my mother, hence the title, who in recent weeks has been pestering me about making a bread with green olives in it. Let me tell you, she was not disappointed. She absoconded with the entire loaf the day after it was baked and returned with but a small piece. When she initially tasted, she couldn't stop gushing about it. I'm so glad I finally satisfied her craving. Unfortunately... I don't think this olive kick is going to stop. In any case, this is a recipe from Daniel Leader's Local Breads. It's the Pain au Levain with the green olive variation. A long but really uncomplicated recipe, I began the night before using my own sourdough starter to make his levain, which worked out wonderfully. I mixed the final dough by machine (laziness...) using whole wheat flour to compensate for the rye flour that I did not have, and I'm glad I did because the dough turned out so smooth and silky and shiny. I love that look.. I feel like I rarely achieve that consistency by hand. Instead of forming batards as instructed, I made a small boule and baked it the no-knead way, in a preheated, covered Le Creuset. Don't worry, next time I'll do it the normal way. The resulting bread was light brown and had some give but the inside was nicely crumbed and tinted from the olives. The bottom crust was substantial and so offered the bread a pleasing bite. The flavor was pleasingly olivey, but not sour at all, which continually surprises me. I was also very impressed with its rise from start to finish. I guess that's the miracle of sourdough. This bread can be enjoyed plain or with olive spread, if you are a true olive connoisseur.

My sourdough starter,

with some water...
and dissolved.
Add the flours,

and stir to form a rough dough.

Here's the resulting starter, ready to rise.

Here, it is nicely risen.

Most of the remaining ingredients are added to the bowl of my mixer.

They are left to hydrate for around twenty minutes.

I've added the salt and the levain to the mix.

The dough is almost finished being kneaded,

at which point I added a cup of green olives,

and finished kneading. I then left the dough to rise for an hour.

Here is the dough ready for a fold. Here's the dough after its fold.

This is the nicely puffy dough after 3 hours of rising.


I turned it out onto floured parchment,


and haphazardly shaped it. I know, not my strong suit.


This was the resulting loaf.