Recent Blog Entries

I’ve been following all the wonderful things being baked by the testers for Norm and Stan and decided I need the excitement of a challenge. Over the years I have had more rye bricks than loaves but lately I use Beatrice Ojakangas’ “Whole Grain Breads” and get good results but I wanted the Sour Rye experience.  We used to have a great German deli that carried some but alas they are gone. I picked “Eric’s Fav Rye”.  Got a quick order of First Clear Flour from KAF, and last Friday evening began converting my starter to rye. First feeding 50/50 white four/medium rye left out over night, a.m. fed all rye and once again late Sat. night. It was very active right off and seemed ready to go Sunday morn so I had at it. Started early so the sponge could sit 8hrs. and I’d have the bake finished sometime around 10/10:30. (Just in time for the annual 4th of July war zone type explosion of our neighborhood)

               

If absence makes the heart grow fonder can not doing a task give your hands the opportunity to learn it on their own? For 6 months I’ve been barely baking except quick sandwich loaves...shape up, drop in the pan. Suddenly I noticed a totally different feel or awareness when shaping this rye, and the same thing with a sourdough bake for Fathers Day. I think I’m finally getting a strength and tightness to the gluten cloak. It just happened and seemed so natural. Oh that elusive assuredness in the tactile core of this bread baking thing. Isn’t it glorious.

Well, the oven preheated an hour and I don’t use the pan water/ice for steam but mist heavily with water and use a deep aluminum roaster as a cloche. It’s rectangular so for this batard shape I just stretched it out a little and smooshed it in so it would sit flat and be elongated. Not elongated enough!! Guess I got that cloak going real good. the shaped batard was just under 12” and the roaster was just over 13”. after the first 12 min. when I went to remove the cover it stuck, really stuck and I ended up pulling off about 2” of each end getting it off. A biter sweet moment indeed. I was amazed and so happy with the oven spring but now I had a rather strange endless loaf of rye. No heels!!! boooo. Didn’t get a pic of the shaped loaf to compare size to the finished bread but the difference was pretty great.

What a great bread this is. Had to zoom out first thing Monday for the corned beef  kraut and deli pickle. Reuben time! Great sour flavor moist crumb at the just right mode, not too light nor dense. I may try the Greenstein Jewish rye that dmsnyder worked up and posted awhile back. It uses the First Clear flour also. (looks like I may need to order more) Has anyone tried the recipe on the bag from KAF? It has sour cream in it. Ooooh ssoouurrr ccrreeaamm!....

Here’s a “bonus” pic of the sourdough I made for Dad this Father’s Day. One of the prettiest I’ve done even if I do say. It’s good to have the gifts turn out that way. No crumb shot, it was for their meals that week.

Bake on!.......
Dosi

So this is my first Introduction entry to the fresh loaf site. My name is Cat, I'm a homemaker, wife and mother of two young sons. My primary passion is of course being a mother but my real fascination is being a cook and baker. I run my own blog at http://www.neohomesteading.com, my short term goals are satisfying my families need to eat, and ideally I'd like to publish a cook book. My long term goals well... I'd like my children to be grown with fond  memories of how I tried extra hard to give them cherished food memories, for as long as I can remember I've documented things in my mind by the foods of each occasion. Many years from now I really just want my family to have great memories and to be proud of me. 

Although I maintain my own personal blog regularly I plan to update on this site as well. For a few years now I've become mildly obsessed with all things bread, and sourdough especially. I do bake from scratch and often make every meal as home made as possible but my passion is baking and fermenting. In addition to being obsessed with bread I also home brew my own meads, wines and beers, and I'm fond of home preserving. The absolute perfect supper to me is a glass of home brewed mead, a loaf of crusty bread and sometimes even a home preserved chutney or jam. So this is my hello I hope to offer something to this lovely bread head community! 

Dearest Regards, 

Cat

What's better to celebrate July 4th than making/eating Chicago Style stuffed pizza?!

Followed the recipe here, I have been to chicago and ate their famous deep dish/stuffed pizza numerous times, I won't call this "authentic" (in fear of bashing from Chicago natives ), but it's indeed delicious and VERY similar to what I had from famous Chicago eateries.

My parents had no deep dish pizza pan, nor 9'' deep cake pan, so I used an 9" aluminum pan, which is 3" high, worked perfectly. The extra height allowed me to stuff more ingredients inside! My parents usually prefer Asian foods, but they loved this one - Itatlian sausage, shiitaki mushroom, spinach, loads of fresh mozarella cheese, homemade tomato sauce, what's not to love? Despite the long ingredient list, it's actually not hard to make.

For desserts, I made Japanese style light cheesecake, sometimes called "cotton soft cheese cake".

It has a tiny bit of cake flour and corn starch in the batter along with cream cheese, butter, and eggs, lighter and airier than American style cheese cake, yet still rich and moist. I used a Chinese recipe, but this recipe is pretty similar.