Peter Reinhart's Light Wheat Bread

You know what I love about fall? It's not too hot to bake a loaf of bread. I mean, I like the pretty leaves and I like sweaters and boots, but is there anything better than the smell of bread baking? The loaf you see here is the one I've been baking every week or two for the better part of a year.



The recipe is from Peter Reinhart's book The Bread Baker's Apprentice, which is tied with Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone with my number one favorite cook book. It's a mix of white and wheat flours, and I like to add half a cup of this grain-and-seed blend from King Arthur just to up the hippie factor. The resulting bread is flavorful from the whole wheat flour but not overhwelmingly nutty, so it stands up brilliantly to a variety of sandwich fillings.



It's also a dough that is really pleasant to work with. If you've never made a loaf of bread before but you're looking for a place to start, give this one a try. The dough comes together easily and it bakes up with a nice tight crumb.



And let's be honest, we all know the ultimate test of a bread is how well it toasts. Voila:



Peter Reinhart's Light Wheat Bread

Dudes, if you're baking regularly (or if you wish you were), get on the bandwagon and get a scale. I've been using this one for 3 years, and it makes everything so much easier. Just start pouring flour in the bowl and hit the tare button before you add the next ingredient. Who needs mulitple measuring devices? I dirty exactly one spoon for this whole recipe.

11.25 ounces (2 1/2 cups) bread flour (you could use all purpose, too)
6.75 ounces (1 1/2 cups) whole wheat flour
.75 ounces ( 1 1/2 Tbsp) sugar (or honey, added with the water instead)
.38 ounces (1 3/4 tsp) kosher salt
1 ounce (3 Tbsp) powdered milk
.17 ounce (1 1/2 tsp) instant yeast*
1 ounce (2 Tbsp) shortening (or butter), room temperature
10 ounces (1 1/4 cups) water, warm (slightly warmer than body temp, 100-110F is perfect)
spray oil (I use Pam)

Mix together the flours, sugar, salt, powdered milk and instant yeast in a large bowl. Add the shortening and stir to mix it in a bit. Add the water and stir until the ingredients clump together in a ball. Then dump the whole mess out on a lightly floured counter and begin to knead. It should take about ten minutes of fairly vigorous kneading to get it to where you want it, which is smooth and cohesive, maybe a little tacky but certainly not sticky. You can add a bit of flour as you knead if the dough is sticking.

You can also do this in a mixer, just measure the ingredients into the mixer bowl and attach the dough hook, then turn the mixer on low and add the water in a slow stream, it should come together in a ball, then you can turn up the speed to medium and knead in the machine for 6 minutes or so.

With either method, when the dough is ready it will spring back if you poke it with your finger.

Now wipe any crumbs out of the mixing bowl (no need to wash it) and mist it with spray oil. Shape the dough into a ball and put it in the bowl, rolling it around to coat it with oil. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave it alone for an hour or until it doubles in size. When it's doubled, it will feel pillowy and soft if you touch it gently.

Once the dough has doubled, spray the counter with oil and dump the dough out onto it. Press it into a rectangle about 6 by 10 inches, it will deflate as you press it. Starting at a short end, roll the rectangle into a log, pressing each seam tight with your fingers as you go. When you have a loaf shaped log, pinch the seam closed and roll it on the counter top to smooth it out. Spray a loaf pan with oil and put the loaf in, seamed side down. I usually squish it down a bit, trying to even it out some. Cover it gently with plastic wrap.

Preheat the oven to 350F.

Let the loaf rise until it just crests the lip of the pan. When it has risen, Use a serrated knife to slash down the center of the loaf about 1/4" deep. Put the loaf in the oven. After 30 minutes, rotate it for even baking and bake another 15-20 minutes. The loaf is done when it's evenly golden brown all over and sounds hollow if you tap it. If you take the temperature of the finished loaf, it should read between 190F and 200F. Make sure you let the bread cool for at least an hour before you slice it, toast it, and enjoy it with some delicious fried eggs.



*Instant yeast is a lot like active dry yeast but it doesn't need to be proofed or allowed to bloom in warm water first and I prefer it because it's easier to use. If you only have active dry yeast, just use the same amount and let it get foamy in the water first.

No-Cook Dinner: Panzanella Salad

Apparently I have been using the word scrounge incorrectly. There's no begging or mooching involved for me; I've been saying I could "scrounge something up" for dinner when I guess what I really meant was more along the lines of "rustle up some grub" or "throw something together." But you know the kind of cooking I mean, right? Not so much cooking as assembling, easy to put together meals that are perfect for hot summer nights. A couple of tomatoes, a cucumber and some bread: boom! Dinner.

My loaf of bread wasn't stale, so I made it into garlic croutons, but the idea is to use hard, neglected bread that softens up in the bowl with juicy tomatoes and olive oil. At its heart, panzanella is a way to use leftovers and what's ripe in the garden right this minute, but I scrounged rustled up chose to add olives for their briny bite and a splash of white wine vinegar for punch.

Panzanella Salad
serves 2 as a light dinner, probably 4 as a side

Olives aren't traditional in panzanella, but I had a few in the fridge so I I had some time, so I made and used garlic oil, but plain olive oil is traditional and equally delicious. 

1 stale loaf Italian or French bread, cubed or not-so-stale bread, cubed and toasted
3 medium tomatoes or a pint of cherry tomatoes or a combination
2 small cucumbers, peeled, seeded and cut into chunks
small handful basil, (I used purple Thai basil) torn into bits
about a dozen good black olives, pitted and torn in half
salt and pepper
1/2 - 1 cup olive oil
1-2 tablespoons white wine vinegar

If you have the time or inclination to get a little fancy, make garlic oil: peel 5 or 6 cloves of garlic and put them in a small pot. Add a cup of olive oil (you'll only use about half of this in the salad, but who doesn't like having garlic oil around?). Put the pot over the lowest heat your stove can manage for 15 minutes or so. Some bubbles will form around the garlic and it may simmer but it should never boil or even come close to boiling. If it gets too bubbly, just shut it off and let it hang out. The longer it sits the more garlicky it gets, but you can use it as soon as it has cooled.

Toss the bread cubes with a couple tablespoons of garlic oil (or plain olive oil) and a big pinch of salt on a baking sheet and stick them in a 350 degree oven, tossing occasionally, for about 15 minutes or until the cubes are crunchy but still a little soft in the middle. Let cool.

Cut the big tomatoes into chunks and remove the seedy goo. Cherry tomatoes can be left whole. Put the tomatoes, cucumbers, olives,  and basil in a big bowl and season with a big pinch of salt and a few turns of the pepper grinder, toss to combine. Add the bread cubes on top and drizzle 1/4 - 1/2 a cup of olive oil and a tablespoon of white wine vinegar over the whole thing (make sure to get a little bit down the sides of the bowl). Toss well and let the salad sit for as long as you have, 20-30 minutes is plenty but you can leave it for a few hours if you want. Don't put it in the fridge though, or the tomatoes will get mushy. Just before serving, toss again and taste it, add more oil or vinegar or salt or pepper if you think it needs it.

Momofuku Steamed Buns

Monday evening my friend Jeremy came over (hi, Jer!) and we finally embarked on a cooking project we'd been talking about for, oh, about two years. Jeremy brought some pork belly he brined for a couple of days and cooked Monday morning. I mixed up a strange but pleasant dough that included both yeast and chemical leaveners. We made super quick pickles and minced some scallions. We set up a steaming rig in a roasting pan with some canning rings, and we steamed almost 50 buns. Filled with sliced pork (we also made a couple with chicken), pickles and scallions a good schmear of hoisin sauce, the buns were so good I didn't even want to focus the camera because I wanted to get back to eating.

Fish with Sage Crumbs

Do you keep fresh breadcrumbs in your freezer? I do. When I know we won't finish a loaf of bread before it goes stale or if all that's left is the last two inches of a baguette, I rip it into crumbs and stash it in a freezer bag. You can also use a food processor, whizzing chunks of stale bread to create fine crumbs, but I like the larger pieces that come from doing it by hand, and it's sort of meditative to sit at the table with a piece of bread tearing it into eensy weensy pieces.

I'm almost embarrassed to blog this because it is so simple, but the crumbs you see on top of that fish absolutely transformed our dinner. I could have just cooked the sage in a little oil and used fried sage on top of the fish, and I'm sure it would have been delightful. Instead, inspired by this recipe in the January issue of Bon Appetit, I sauteed fresh bread crumbs with the sage and made sage crumbs, also known as the worlds tiniest croutons.

Oh, and we had some leftover that I used at breakfast the next morning: leftover spinach and beans and a fried egg, topped with the crumbs. Do this. You can thank me later.

The side dishes were pretty straightforward, too. The sweet potatoes (four small ones, probably just over a pound total) were stabbed all over with a fork, cooked in the microwave on high for about 10 minutes until cooked through (flip them over once), and mashed with a tablespoon of butter, some salt and a teaspoon of the chopped fresh sage. The spinach was cooked in just a bit of olive oil over medium high heat until it started to wilt. Then I added a can of black beans, rinsed and drained, and a couple of teaspoons of adobo sauce from a can of chipotle chiles.

Simple Sauteed Fish with Sage Crumbs
I had less than a cup of breadcrumbs in the freezer, but you could certainly scale this up if you were serving more than two people. I used cod, because it was the only thing they had at the fish counter, but it flakes very, very easily, which I find a little frustrating for this sort of preparation. I'd recommend tilapia or haddock, something a little firmer that will hold together when flipped and removed from the pan.

2 white fish filets, such as tilapia or haddock (if filets are very small, use two per person)
a small knob of butter
salt and pepper

about 3/4 cup fresh bread crumbs
2-3 teaspoons olive oil
2 teaspoons chopped fresh sage
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

Toast the bread crumbs in the toaster oven or under the broiler, watching to make sure they don't burn. You may have to stir them or rotate the pan if your broiler/toaster oven doesn't heat evenly.  Heat the olive oil in a large nonstick* skillet over medium high heat, then add the sage, breadcrumbs, and kosher salt, stirring to coat the crumbs in oil. Saute until golden and crunchy, then remove.

Wipe skillet clean with a towel, or just make sure there are no huge crumbs left. Pat the fish filets dry with a paper towel, then season with salt and pepper. Melt the butter over medium heat, and when the foam subsides, add the fish. Cook 2-3 minutes, then carefully flip the fish over and cook the other side for another 2 minutes; you may have to increase cooking time if you filets are very thick, just cook until the fish is opaque all the way through.

Serve fish sprinkled with sage crumbs.

*I use nonstick when cooking fish, but if you have a pan you trust not to hold your fish hostage, by all means use that.

Black Pepper Brioche Burger Buns

After our self-imposed vegetarian stint last month, I'm finding that I don't actually even want to eat meat all that often. In fact, while we have recently ordered meat dishes in restaurants, we haven't prepared it at home in... I don't know how long. I actually can't think of the last time we- oh wait, we made that chicken braised in milk like a month ago. Man, that was good. But I digress!

So last week when the craving for burgers hit me like a sack of iron deficiency, I knew it was time to break the meat drought (er, apologies for that somewhat icky metaphor). Conveniently, my friend Evan, a fellow home-cooking enthusiast* wanted to get together to cook and eat and generally make merry that Saturday night. I wasted no time in informing him we would be having burgers. In retrospect, perhaps it would have been more polite to ask what he wanted, but he seemed enthusiastic and told me he would pick up some ground beef and fixings.

Here's where it gets food bloggy: I offered to bring home-made buns. I know, I know, the bread's not really the point of a burger, but a couple of weeks ago Adam had enjoyed a burger at Lord Hobo in Cambridge, which they served on black pepper challah buns. Actually, 6 of the 8 people in our party ordered the burger (I did not) and when they were brought to the table the floral notes of black pepper were almost overhwelming, and I was instantly filled with orderers remorse. I wanted a black pepper bun!

You guys, this is the black pepper bun I wanted. They smelled like the buns in my mind, and were flavorful without being overtly peppery. And the burgers were exactly what I had been craving, juicy and meaty, all snug and cozy in their bready pillows. If you want to take your family's burger night or your neighbor's backyard cook-out up to the next level, you should really give these bad boys a try.

*Let's see if we can eradicate "foodie" once and for all, eh? I offer this up as a more accurate if slightly more cumbersome substitute.

Black Pepper Brioche Burger Buns
I used 3 teaspoons of black pepper, but I dare say you could use more. Or hey, go crazy, grind up one of those mixes of three colors of peppercorns and take the floral notes as far as you can! This is adapted from the Comme Ça burger buns recipe from the New York Times this past summer.

3 tablespoons whole milk, at room temperature
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
2 1/2 tablespoons sugar
3-4 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
2 large eggs
2 cups bread flour
1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
sesame seeds (optional)
 
Combine 1 cup warm water, the milk, yeast and sugar in a small bowl. Stir then let stand until foamy
 
In another small bowl, beat one egg.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, then rub the butter in with your fingers until the mixture looks like crumbs or meal. Stir in yeast mixture and beaten egg; you will probably need a dough scraper.

Scrape the dough out onto the counter (don't flour it, just be prepared to use your dough scraper a lot). Instead of traditional kneading, you'll want to pick the dough up and slap it down, using some of the fold and push motion you'd normally use but trying to do it in the air. Do this weird pick up and slap knead thing for 8-10 minutes until it's smooth and elastic. It may be a little tacky. (The reason you don't flour the counter is that the more flour you work into the dough the tougher the buns will be. Sometimes sturdy bread is awesome, but we're going for soft and pillowy here.)
Shape the dough into a ball and return it to the (cleaned, lightly oiled) bowl. Cover and let rise until doubled in bulk, 1-2 hours.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silpat. Divide the dough into 8 equal parts (eyeball a half, then cut each half in half, and then again). Gently roll each piece into a ball and lay them out 2-3 inches apart on a baking sheet. Cover with a clean towel or the plastic wrap you used to cover the bowl, and let rise again for another hour or two.

Fifteen to twenty minutes before you want to bake, (say, after the buns have been resting for an hour or so), put a large shallow pan of water on the oven floor (or bottom rack). Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. After 15-20 minutes, beat the remaining egg with one tablespoon of water and brush the egg wash over the tops of the buns, then sprinkle with sesame seeds, if using. Bake for 15 minutes, turning the sheet halfway through, or until the tops are golden brown and toasty. Remove buns to cooling rack to cool completely before slicing and stuffing with burgery deliciousness.

Fourth of July + Book Winner + More Books

It's always so nice when dinner greets you with a friendly wave, eh? As usual, lobster was on the menu for the Fourth of July feast-ivities. We also ate some baby carrot salad (recipe via 101 cookbooks, I added feta and tossed it with quinoa).

Oh, and I made coffee-chocolate cake.

And some sweet and fluffy cloverleaf rolls.

We also tried out the jet skis, got caught in a rain storm, played cribbage, and ran into people playing cribbage. All in all a delightful way to spend the holiday weekend!

But now we're here to find out about the winner of my first book giveaway! I used random.org to generate a random winner because, well, it's 10pm and I'm here by myself. Also, I'm having a pretty bad hair day so I don't think you want to see pictures of me drawing a name out of a hat. I can't figure out how to show you how it works, so you're going to have to trust me: of the 13 eligible comments (I didn't include my own comments, people who commented after midnight, or people who said they didn't want the book), the random number generator spit out the number...... TWO! Congratulations, Aimee, you're the lucky winner of a paperback copy of Julie and Julia! Shoot me an email with your address and I'll get it in the mail.

What's that? You wish YOU had won the book? Well, let's see. How about I sweeten the deal a little bit? We'll go the nonfiction route, but this time it'll be a pair of books:


The United States of Arugula, by David Kamp, an essential history of the gourmet revolution in the US, and In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan, which if you haven't heard of by now... well, that's all the more reason for you to read it. I'll pick a winner at random on Friday. Two books for the low, low price of a comment left on this post before midnight (Boston time) on Thursday, July 9th. I want to know: what was the best thing you ate this weekend?

Grissini and a Giveaway!

Crunch. Crunch, crunch. Shnomf, munch, crinchety-cronch. Mmm. Pass me another?

These, my friends, are the thin, crunchy, Italian breadsticks known as grissini. A couple of weekends ago Adam and I spent an afternoon making sixty some-odd crunchy breadsticks for a dinner party we were going to that evening. No, I did not notice before we started that the recipe made 16 per portion of dough and therefore 16 x 4 = SIXTY FOUR. Heh.

But you know what? Between the 8 of us, we ate all of them. After a totally delicious meal of insalata caprese, goat cheese and portabello salad, eggplant Parmesan and cherry clafoutis, I looked over at the grissini platter and there were only 3 (!) left.

It stands to reason, then, that you should make these for your next party. I found them via Nick over at Macheesmo, who added a little whole wheat flour to the original recipe, but you don't need to. I used regular old all purpose flour and I was very happy with the results. If you play around with the toppings (cheese? chili powder? fennel seeds?) or flour (rye sticks with caraway seeds?) let us know in the comments, ok?

Oh what was that other thing I mentioned in the title? Riiight: giveaway! I'm moving into a new apartment in a month, and I'm trying to lighten my very heavy load of books. I thought you guys might appreciate some of the food-related novels and such so let's begin the giveaways with this one:

Have you read Julie and Julia yet? The movie's coming out at the beginning of August, so you better hop to it! If you'd like this copy, leave a comment on this post any time before midnight on Sunday, July 6. I'll pick a winner at random on Monday. Oh, and if you just cannot wait another minute to find out what other books I'll be giving away, you could sneak over to my Flickr photos. [Update: winner has been selected! Check it out here.]

Grissini
adapted from Wild Yeast and Macheesmo
makes 64 breadsticks

623 g flour (about 5 1/2 cups)
397 g water at room temperature (scant two cups)
6.5 g (2 t.) instant yeast
9 g (1.5 t.) salt
28 g (2 T.) olive oil
kosher salt and coarsely ground black pepper

Combine the yeast, salt, and flour in a large bowl. Combine the water and olive oil in a small bowl or liquid measuring cup. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir with a wooden spoon to combine. Eventually you will need to use your hands, and once a shaggy dough has formed, turn it out onto a floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, 5-10 minutes. I added probably another 1/4 cup of flour total as I was kneading to keep my dough from sticking to the board.

Lightly oil the mixing bowl (no real need to wash it at this point) and place the dough in the lightly oiled bowl. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and allow to rise at room temperature until doubled in volume, 1.5-2 hours.

Once the dough has doubled, preheat the oven o 350F. Line a baking sheet (or two if you have them) with parchment. Divide the dough into four equal pieces. Start with one piece and keep the others covered. Flour a work surface and roll the dough into an approximately 12x8 inch rectangle (no need to bust out the ruler here!). Using a pizza cutter, slice the dough rectangle into 16 equal strips. Fold each strip in half the long way (they go from 8 inches long to four inches long) and roll them out into long snakes on an UNFLOURED surface. It has to be unfloured, they need a little stickiness in order to come together and stretch out. Each snake should be a little longer than your baking sheet.

Distribute the snakes evenly across your baking sheets. Lightly brush them with olive oil and sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper. Roll them around a little to catch the salt and pepper around them. Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes until golden; if you think of it, rotate the sheets once while baking. Cool the grissini on a wire rack - the crunch develops as they cool! Repeat with the other 3 portions of dough as baking sheets become available.

The Custardy Allure

I have never been a sweet breakfast person. If I'm out to brunch, I may try to steal a bite of your banana-walnut pancakes or cheese and strawberry blintzes, but I only ever want a bite, and I will quickly return to my huevos rancheros or everything bagel and smoked salmon.

The custardy allure of french toast is not totally lost on me, though, so when Adam suggested we bridge the great sweet/savory divide last weekend and add some Gruyere and fresh herbs to french toast, I said Yes! Now let's make a brioche. (Clearly, you can buy a brioche or use sandwich bread, but don't you own ABin5 yet? So. Easy.)


Adapted from a very schmancy breakfast sandwich recipe found on cookthink, this recipe used the very end (!) of last summer's slow roasted tomatoes that I had hidden away in the back of the freezer. If you're already through your stash, I suggest you 1. bookmark this recipe and make it in September and 2. try it with a different vegetable! Asparagus would be lovely, blanched first and arranged on top of the toast. I bet sauteed spinach would be good, or even broccoli, as long as you cut the florets small enough and tossed the blanched pieces with a light touch of olive oil. Heck, you could even skip the veggie topper altogether.

Savory French Toast with Slow-Roasted Tomatoes
Serves 2

4 thick slices brioche, ciabatta, or other bread
1/2 cup half-&-half, cream, or whole milk
1 egg
salt and pepper
2-3 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1 1/2 tablespoons fresh herbs such as sage, marjoram, thyme, chives (we used thyme and marjoram, and garnished with chives)
3 ounces Gruyere or other swiss cheese, grated
4 halves of slow-roasted plum tomato (one total tomato per person) or the veg of your choice, blanched

Preheat the oven to 400F. In a wide, shallow dish, whisk together the cream, egg, and salt and pepper (start with a half teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper). Dip the bread slices into the egg mixture, turning to coat, and leave them to soak for about 20 minutes. Defrost the frozen tomato halves, if necessary.

Line a baking dish or cookie sheet (with sides) with parchment paper and butter it well so the toast doesn't stick (and believe me, it wants to stick). Place the bread slices on the paper, and spread each with a thin layer of mustard. Sprinkle with herbs and cheese, divided evenly among the four slices, and top each with a tomato half, face up. If you like, you could sprinkle more cheese and herbs on the tomato.

Place the baking dish in the oven for 20 minutes or so, until the bread is slightly browned on the inside and the tomatoes are taking on a little color. Garnish with chopped chives or other herbs.

Alton Brown's Buttermilk Biscuits

I can't stop baking. Evidence: cilantro cake, bread, chocolate cake, cupcakes, and biscuits, all in the last two weeks. I made the biscuits twice last week, and I think I might do it AGAIN tonight because it is the last day of my buttermilk's life.

I mean, hello? Buttermilk biscuits? Yes, please, with honey. There's no delightful POP when you jab the can with a spoon, and these are significantly less buttery (I call that greasy) than the insta-biscuit, but it really doesn't take THAT much more time. This dough mixes up in about 10 minutes, and they bake for 15. Piece o' cake biscuit.

Adam made a chicken-sausage based gravy to go with these on Saturday morning that was positively freaking scrumptious, but like those mojitos way back last summer, you'll have to ask him for that recipe.

Buttermilk Biscuits
by Alton Brown, makes 10-12 if you use a 2 inch cutter

2 cups flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons shortening
1 cup buttermilk, chilled

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Using your fingertips, rub butter and shortening into dry ingredients until mixture looks like crumbs. (Alton says: the faster the better, you don't want the fats to melt. I say: use a pastry cutter if you want, and make sure the bowl is cold, too.) Make a well in the center and pour in the chilled buttermilk. Stir just until the dough comes together. The dough will be very sticky.

Turn dough onto floured surface, dust top with flour and gently fold dough over on itself 5 or 6 times. Press into a 1-inch thick round. Cut out biscuits with a 2-inch cutter, being sure to push straight down through the dough. Place biscuits on baking sheet so that they just touch. Reform scrap dough, working it as little as possible and continue cutting. (Biscuits from the second pass won't be as tall, but they'll still be biscuits, so whatever. I actually reworked my scrap scraps twice and got a single, fairly flat biscuit out of the last pass.)

Bake until biscuits are tall and light gold on top, 15 to 20 minutes. Best served hot, but reheat ok in a toaster oven.

Savory Cilantro Cake

Earlier this evening I caused a bit of a stir on Twitter. Nothing major, I just mentioned this "cake" and a number of people (including actual professional food writers, WHAT?) were all oh hey that sounds goooood.
Do you ever just all-of-a-sudden remember a recipe? I must have bookmarked this at least a year ago, and I made it once and promptly lost the bookmark. Luckily, I email things to myself! This past weekend I accidentally bought MORE cilantro instead of parsley (oops) and I was looking for a way to use some.

In case you wanted to know what yogurt and olive oil look like on top of a bowl of frothy eggs, now you know. I subbed yogurt for milk because I don't keep milk around, but I'm thinking perhaps I should have used buttermilk instead (oddly, I have that around more often than regular milk).

The way I remember this the first time I made it was lighter and more crumbly; I think it was the yogurt that made this incarnation denser. Freaking delicious, but denser than I remember. The original recipe is here, from Dorie Greenspan: it's a french cake salé, and she uses cheddar and chives.

The incarnation I bookmarked many moons ago was this one, with cilantro, cheddar and goat cheese. I had originally planned to use dill Havarti, but... let's just say it was past it's prime. I ended up using the not-very-French combination of 2.5 oz provolone, .5 oz Parmesan, and 2 oz cream cheese (my kitchen scale has a tare function and I l-o-v-e it). It would be an interesting addition to the Easter Brunch table, n'est-ce pas? Next to the lemony tarts and danishes and all those sweet things?

Savory Cilantro and Cheese Cake
keeps about 2 days at room temp, well wrapped, and makes excellent toast and croutons when it starts to dry out.

1 cup AP flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 to 1 tsp salt, depending on your cheeses. I used 3/4 tsp because Parmesan is pretty salty.
several grinds fresh black pepper
3 large eggs, room temperature
1/3 cup milk or yogurt
1/3 cup olive oil
3 oz cheddar or other medium hard cheese, coarsely grated
2 oz goat cheese or cream cheese, cut into small cubes
1/2 cup chopped cilantro (or other herbs, or a combination)
optional: 1/3 cup chopped walnuts or other nuts

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

Put the flour, baking powder, salt, and pepper in a large mixing bowl and whisk the ingredients together to combine. Put the eggs in another mixing bowl; whisk for about 1 minute, until they’re foamy and blended. Whisk in the milk and olive oil.

Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients and, using a spatula or a wooden spoon, gently mix until the dough comes together. When there is still a little bit of dry ingredient showing, stir in the cheese, grated and cubed, the herbs and the toasted walnuts, if you’re using them, so that everything is moistened. Don't take it too far; like all quickbreads you want to be gentle with this one, lest it get tough on you. You’ll have a thick dough. Turn the dough into a buttered loaf pan and even the top with the back of the spatula or spoon.

Bake for 35 to 45 minutes, or until the bread is golden and a slender knife inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a cooling rack for a few minutes, then run a knife around the sides of the pan and turn the loaf over onto the rack; invert and cool to room temperature right-side up.

Rosemary Cracker Bread

It's sort of a strange thing, this bread...er, cracker. Bread? Cracker bread? I saw it over on Smitten Kitchen first, she referred to it as a Crisp Rosemary Flatbread, and apparently that's what they called it in Gourmet this summer. I don't know guys, I think it's too shattery to be called a flatbread. There's virtually no chewiness, and it makes crumbs like CRAZY. Crumbs like I only eat it standing over the sink in the kitchen, and then I clean the counter. Absolutely NOT the sort of thing you'd want to eat in bed.

But it is the sort of thing you want to EAT, period. It's flaky and crispy and salty, which I love, and the rosemary gives it a delightful herby punch. It comes together in approximately no time at all, and I bet it would be delicious smeared with goat cheese or sundried tomato spread or tapenade. I've been eating it instead of toast with my scrambled eggs all week! If you've got half an hour (including baking time!) you should give this cracker/bread a shot.



Rosemary Cracker Bread

1 3/4 unbleached AP flour
1 tbsp fresh rosemary, chopped
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup water
1/3 cup oil plus more for drizzling
flaky sea salt (I used Maldon)

Preheat oven to 450 degrees with a heavy baking sheet upside down on the middle rack.

In a medium bowl, stir together flour, chopped rosemary, baking powder, and salt. Add water and oil and gently stir into flour with a wooden spoon until a dough forms. Knead dough gently in the bowl 4 or 5 times until the dough ball is cohesive.

Divide dough into 3 pieces and roll out 1 piece on a sheet of parchment paper into a 10-inch round or oval or whatever wonky puzzle piece shape you can. It should be thin, and you should keep the other pieces covered until you're ready to roll them out.

Brush the top lightly with additional oil and if you want, scatter small clusters of rosemary leaves on top, pressing in slightly. Sprinkle with sea salt (don't skip this part!). Slide round (still on parchment) onto preheated baking sheet and bake until pale golden and browned in spots, 8 to 10 minutes. Transfer bread to a rack to cool, then make 2 more rounds (1 at a time) on fresh parchment, brush with oil and salt and bake each round. Break into pieces if you want.

If cooled completely, cracker bread will keep in an airtight container at room temperature for a few days.

Don't be scared!

There's this sandwich shop in downtown Boston on Summer Street called Al Capone's. Aside from the fact that we're not in Chicago and I've never eaten one of their sandwiches, it's my favorite place to walk by in the morning because they bake bread there. And baking bread is a smell that slays me every time, it's just so... warm.
I am not a timid cook; I'm usually confident that I can follow even a complicated recipe and get a pretty good result. I've baked before. But bread still made me a little nervous. Deb at Smitten Kitchen has a couple of very good and encouraging posts about bread making and when I read the early one featuring dill bread from the Joy of Cooking, I was hooked. I made a few changes to the recipe based on what I had in the fridge, and I've got to say it is STELLAR.

Studded with bits of onion and savory dill, it fills the house with this amazing, inviting, yeasty aroma. Plus, the tactile pleasure if kneading dough cannot be denied. The key is not to worry that you're doing it wrong, just keep pushing the dough around until it comes together. It's quite a shaggy dough at first, but keep your hands floury and eventually you can maneuver it into a nice soft ball.
Toss it in an oiled bowl, and let it rise for an hour and a half or so in a warm place, or until you can poke it and the hole stays in place. My apartment is on the cool side, so I usually turn the oven on very low for a couple of minutes (my oven has a 'warm' setting of 170 degrees) then shut it off (that part is important!) and let the dough rise in the warm oven.

Then you take it out, pat it about a little to let some of the air out, and finagle it into a vaguely loafy shape, and put it in the greased loaf pan and let it rise again. I put it back in the warm oven and in 45 minutes it was threatening to rise out of the pan and take over my kitchen. I tapped the pan gently on the counter and it deflated enough to fit back in the pan - this might not be a step you need to take, but I wanted to make room for the melted butter. Butter is very important to me.

Oh and guys, if you made that meatloaf? And this bread? And you have a couple slices of cheese? Hooo boy, have you got one AMAZING meatloaf sandwich in your future. Please, I beg you, do make a sandwich on this bread, even if it's just turkey. And if you make a turkey sandwich, might I suggest you put mustard and cucumbers on it? A few weeks ago I spent an entire lunch hour NOT participating in conversation, because all I could say was, "This turkey sandwich is so good. This bread is so good. This turkey sandwich is so good. This bread is so good."

Dill Bread
adapted from Joy of Cooking

I don't have a stand mixer, but you could use it if you do!

Makes one 9×5-inch loaf

2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast (one package)
1/2 cup warm water (105 - 115 degrees)
3 cups bread flour
1/2 a medium red onion, finely chopped
3 tablespoons fresh dill, chopped
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup large-curd cottage cheese
1/2 cup sour cream
1 egg
For top of bread (optional but oh so recommended!)
1 tablespoon melted butter
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt

Combine yeast and water in a small bowl and let stand until the yeast is dissolved, about five minutes.

Combine flour, onion, dill, sugar and salt in a large mixing bowl. Add the yeast, cottage cheese, sour cream and egg. Mix with a wooden spoon until the dough comes together, addition additional flour or warm water if needed. Knead for about 10 minutes by hand until the dough is smooth and elastic.

Transfer to an oiled bowl and turn it over once to coat with oil. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, 1 to 1 1/2 hours. If you poke it with your fingers, it should retain the hole instead of springing right back into place.

Grease a 9×5-inch loaf pan. Press the dough down to de-gas, form into a loaf and place seam side down in the pan. Cover with oiled plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 350°F. (Make sure you take the bread out first, if you're letting it rise in there!) Brush the top of loaf with melted butter, and then sprinkle with the additional salt.
Bake until the crust is golden brown and the bottom of the loaf sounds hollow when tapped, about 35 to 40 minutes.

Take the bread's temperature - it should be around 200 degrees. Remove the loaf from the pan to a rack and let cool completely.

Please, please, make a sandwich with this bread.