Tag Archives: bread

Rosemary and Sea Salt Grissini

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Now instead of taking a bunch of flowers to someone what about a bunch of grissini?

Easy breadsticks, that look a bit different to your usual bready business. Usually made about the thickness of your finger, and as long as you want to make them. Perfect thing to give someone as a little gift, take to a picnic, or a funny little snack that The Monkey’s thought were very cool.

Rosemary and Sea Salt Grissini

(adapted from The Bourke Street Bakery Cookbook)

600gms strong bakers flour

2 tps dried yeast

400mls water

3 tbls olive oil

2 tps salt

* 180gms old dough (I keep some in the freezer, you can easily omit this if you don’t have it though.)

extra sea salt

roughly chopped fresh rosemary

Pop all ingredients in to mixer, and mix until throughly combined (approximately 5 minutes). If using the old dough add it in, broken in to small pieces. Keep mixing on low, until dough is smooth. Cover with a damp  tea towel and let prove for 1.5 hours with two folds in between at the 30 minute marks.

Put the dough on to a lightly floured surface and roll out to about 1cm thickness. Any tears in the dough just join it together, rest the dough for 5 minutes and then roll again. Once it’s rolled out let it rest for another 5 minutes and then cut the dough into strips. Any thickness you like, and then gently roll them in some fresh roughly chopped rosemary, and roughly ground sea salt. I twisted my ones which you can just make out in the end product. Pre-heat oven to 170C. Place them on a lined baking tray and let prove for 20-30 minutes. Turn oven down to 150C and bake for about 30 mins. I then turned the oven off, but left the grissini in their to further dry out.

Grissini should be dry with a great snap when they are finished.

This post submitted to Yeast Spotting.

Almond Coffee Cluster

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Night starvation…It doesn’t sound very good does it? All my life, my grandfather has used the words ‘night starvation’. I thought it was just his way off getting in a few more biscuits before bed time. “Better have a little more, you don’t want any night starvation”…Don’t mind if I do Grandpa, biscuit number 43 should do it. I always thought it was just Grandpa’s way of looking out for me, and being lovely.

It turns out, that yes, he was looking out for me as there really was something called the dreaded ‘night starvation’. Horlicks invented it back in the 1930’s as a selling slogan. A cure of those terrible hunger pains that you may be prone to if you didn’t drink their lovely malted drink before bed time. So there you go…

So what’s that got to do with my Almond Coffee Cluster? This is my prevention of night starvation. I have a habit of being just a little peckish around 9pm, not one for hot malted drinks, the cluster is an easy one to pop in the freezer and break off a segment when I need to.

Night starvation prevented once more.

Almond Coffee Cluster

200mls luke warm milk

2 tps dry yeast

1 tps vanilla

1 egg

100gms softened butter

1/3 cup raw sugar

1 cup almond meal

1/4 cup espresso coffee

450gms flour (3 cups)

3 tbs olive oil

1 tps salt

almond flakes

Mix yeast in luke warm milk and set aside for 10 minutes. Mix remaining ingredients together and then also adding milk. Once mixed together, knead well until smooth and elastic. Cover and leave until doubled in size. Divide dough into 8 even balls. Placing in greased large springform pan. Scatter some almond flakes on top. Bake at 190C for approx 30-40 minutes.

After being generously given some chestnut flour from Celia, I thought I would give Chestnut Coffee Cluster a go as well. Tastes remarkably similar, a little darker in colour, the subtle tones of the coffee added to the nuttiness of the chestnut. Same recipe just substituting the almond meal for chestnut flour.

Night Starvation prevented yet again.

* This post submitted to Yeastspotting.

Apricot and Sunflower Sourdough

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I have four new comers in my little kitchen at the moment and I love them all equally.

A flat bottomed wok- who knew cooking could be so quick and easy with this little fella.

A hand made wooden Huon Pine mini rolling pin- beautifully made. I fell in love with the workmanship and needed a smaller one than my broken handled marble one. It really is the perfect little roller. Light and smooth…(not generally like my pastry.)

A super sharp lame (French blade for cutting my sourdough)- slash, slash, slash!

and….my new Banneton. Otherwise known as Brotform or Brotformen…Other, otherwise known as a little basket to prove your bread in. This I have to say is my favourite. Lovingly stored away at night, ready to work its banneton magic on my bread the next day. If I tucked it up and gave it a good night kiss, I wouldn’t be surprised.

… Mr Chocolate might be though.

Apricot and Sunflower Sourdough

200gms starter

2 1/2 cups flour

1/3 cup dried chopped apricots

1/3 cup sunflower seeds

1 tps salt

3 heaped spoonfuls natural yoghurt

water: enough for elastic dough consistency

Mix ingredients together, then leaving for an hour or so. Into fridge for a lovely long and slow ferment for 12 hours. Out of fridge and fold the dough. Leaving to prove for approximately two hours. Fold again and popped into my lovely, lovely new banneton. Prove until, I couldn’t stand the excitement any longer and had to pop the dough in the oven to see how my new basket had shaped up. Baked at 250C with steam on top shelf for approximately 20mins and then down to the bottom shelf for a further 10 minutes.

This loaf I have made a few times now and I’m really happy with the results. It keeps beautifully and still toasting well a week later. Topped with the Lime and Cumquat Marmalade and my morning begins.

* This post submitted to Yeastspotting.

it’s all gone a rye

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When I was a little kid all I wanted for lunch was a white sliced sandwich in triangles. Ideally with devon, tomato sauce and slapped together with so much butter it would make even a French chef frown. Why did I want that? Because that’s what I didn’t have. That’s what other kids had.

I had the sensible bread with grains or wholemeal, with nutritious things inside. Up until about 9 years old I could potentially have a cheese, chutney and sprouts sandwich. This was my mum’s idea of a delicious sandwich, and perfect for a healthy growing-at- a-cracking-rate young girls lunch. At 9 years old though, enough was enough. My palate wasn’t that developed yet. Not developed enough for chutney and sprouts anyway.  Although I never threw my sandwich out, I did hastily eat it hoping it would just quickly fill me up and no one would see it and say ….ewww whats that? On the odd occasion it may have found itself under my bed…where it may have sat there, next to a book (The Secret Seven) and slowly grow its own penicillin…

Alright that only happened the once, but at 9 years old I decided that I would take over the reins of making my own sandwiches. No more chutney and sprouts thanks. Salami and cheese would be fine. Salami and tomato. Tomato and cheese. They were the three combinations I had pretty much throughout my school career. Until I got to my final year of highschool and I stepped it up a notch and had capsicum and cheese. They were certainly exciting sandwich times.

How things have changed now though. As an adult…phew. Bread and all its loveliness. All the wonderful concoctions you can have for a simple sanga. Since embracing the heady world of sourdough, those concoctions have got even more enticing. This Apple Walnut Rye included…

* So will The Monkeys be having white sliced bread with devon and tomato sauce for their school lunches? Hell no! Do you know what’s in that stuff?!

Apple Walnut Rye Sourdough

200gms starter

225gms of rye flour

225gms of plain flour

200mls water (approx)

1 1/2 tps salt

1/2 chopped apple

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

a shake of cinnamon

Mix up rye dough as usual, when it’s time for the first fold, add apple and nuts. Folding them carefully in. I did an over night ferment, then baked at 250C until top was golden looking. Then popped it out of the tin and baked a further 10 minutes, while turning the oven down to 200C.

The top came out a little messy, but I was happy with the consistency and it just feels so healthy when you eat it. I’m loving this one for breakfast at the moment. And to totally cancel out the health factor, slap some peanut butter on there- so thick you could walk on it…mmmm.

Light Rye Sourdough

350gms starter

300gms rye meal

300gms bakers flour

480 mls water

1/2 cup sunflower seeds

1 1/2 tps salt

Mix ingredients. Wait for 20 minutes, then add salt and mix again. Let it prove for 1 1/2 hours. First fold. Prove for another 1hour. 2nd fold. In oiled tin, rise for another hour. 11 hour ferment in fridge. Out for 1/2 an hour on the bench. Slash. Then baked at 250C for 20mins top shelf, (steam) then a further 15 mins on the second shelf.


*This post submitted to Yeast Spotting

Weaving bread and why its fun to play with your food

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I have this very fond memory from when I was a kid. Staying at my Nana’s house and being ‘let loose’ in the kitchen. She gave me a plate full of flour, sugar, milk, sultanas, an egg and spices. With these ingredients I could do what ever I wanted and then she would cook it. Blissfully happy, I have no idea how it tasted, but I remember vividly the pride I had that I could choose what ever I wanted to do with those ingredients. It never happened again, and if I was cooking at home I always had to follow a recipe. Mum said I had to learn the basics first before I tinkered. Actually she was right, darn right. Because I know a lot of the basics now, tinkering with food makes more sense then when I cooked that flour, milk, sultana  concoction.

Playing with food and its different flavours can be so much fun. The last few months I have been playing with sourdoughs, love it, love it, love it. The last few weeks I’ve been playing with plaiting sourdoughs, plaiting, plaiting, plaiting. Then just I was about to embark on a certain ‘starfish’ that needed an intricate amount of plaiting, my brain said oh oh oh…but what if we did this instead?…Cross this with that, then that with this…Oh ok…Lets give that a whirl.

sourdough woven bread

…and that dear people is why it’s fun to play with your food. As you never know what you’re going to get.

If you would like to weave your sourdough. Make up your usual dough and when its time to do the shaping make your self a large square. Cut equal strips to go down and across. (For this one I did 8×8 strips) Making sure the strips are well floured, otherwise they will just blob together when having the final prove. Then tuck and loop, tuck and loop. For the edges, trim and then gently tuck under to tidy the sides up.

This bread makes for a good addition to soup, as it easily pulls apart.

* This post submitted to yeast spotting.

Coconut Sourdough with lashings of Strawberry Jam

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Many many moons ago, when I was a footloose and fancy free youngster, I worked in England for a little old lady. Charged with looking after this delightful old lady, it was up to me to make sure she was cared for and entertained. Being a little old lady she didn’t like big meals but she sure liked lots of little ones. There was breakfast, morning tea, 11’ses, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner and supper…alright maybe it wasn’t that many. But it felt like it. Afternoon tea however was a must. At precisely 3pm, a cup of tea and a little something to tide her over until the next meal would be served. Now more often than not, she would be rather partial to a packet of crisps and a quick nod off in the comfy armchair. Only for her to wake up awhile later with fallen crisps surrounding her and only the backpacker carer to blame it on.

Sometimes though, she would like a piece of cake or bread and jam. Accompanied with a little recital from the poetry in “Alice in Wonderland”. As I  was always happy to make cake and love to read this was always a really nice way to spend the afternoon.

Winter sun peaking through the curtains, little old lady with jam and bread perched on her knee and footloose and fancy free backpacker reading… “will you walk a little faster? said the whiting to the snail, there’s a porpoise right behind me and he’s stepping on my tail…”

Coconut Sourdough with Strawberry Jam- just the thing for a little afternoon tea.

Strawberry Jam

750gms roughly chopped and hulled strawberries

750gms sugar

1 lime juiced

1/2 lemon juiced

Cook the strawberries and sugar together. As there is no water in this recipe, keeping stirring continuously until moisture comes out of strawberries (otherwise it will burn.) Add juice of lime and lemon and cook until gets to wrinkle stage or do the saucer test. Bottle it up or just keep in a bowl in the fridge, (it gets eaten pretty quickly round here.)

Coconut Sourdough Loaf

175gms starter

1 1/2 cups bakers flour

1/2 cup desiccated coconut

200-250mls water

2 tbs honey

3/4 tps salt

What I did was mixed, over night ferment, 2 folds over about 5 hours. Final prove in tin for about 20 minutes. Baked at 250C initially for about 15 minutes and then down to 180C for a further 10 minutes. This was only a small loaf as it was an experiment. I’m not sure whether it’s the honey or coconut which hinders the rising process for the sourdough, (or it could be both). There were a few holes, but it is a denser loaf compared to my normal sourdough.

A hit though for The Monkeys when they were whooping it up for a little something to tide them over until dinner time.

The Lobsters Quadrille Lewis Carroll

“Will you walk a little faster?” said a whiting to a snail,
“There’s a porpoise close behind us, and he’s treading on my tail.
See how eagerly the lobsters and the turtles all advance!
They are waiting on the shingle — will you come and join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?

“You can really have no notion how delightful it will be
When they take us up and throw us, with the lobsters, out to sea!”
But the snail replied “Too far, too far!” and gave a look askance —
Said he thanked the whiting kindly, but he would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, could not join the dance.

“What matters it how far we go?” his scaly friend replied.
“There is another shore, you know, upon the other side.
The further off from England the nearer is to France —
Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?

Travels with Sourdough

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Almond and Raisin Sourdough

The underside of the Almond and Raisin Sourdough. A toasted almond crunch to a slice.

Wholemeal sourdough.

Sunflower and Linseed Sourdough Panini.

Date and Pecan Sourdough

350gms starter

600gms flour

2/3 cup chopped medjool dates

1/2 cup chopped pecans

1 tbs raw sugar

good shake of cinnamon

1 1/2 tps salt

I made this sourdough on the warmest day so far that I have toyed with the sourdoughs. Consequence- a lighter sourdough then I would normally make as it rose so quickly. I did two lots of folds in between proves. Verdict- um yes please! (My mum liked this one too, and said that I could make some next time I came down to visit. Have starter…will travel.)

sourdoughs

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Sourdough tastes good. It tastes reaallly good. Give me a fruity sourdough, with a little butter and I’m a happy woman.

I had toyed with the idea of making a sourdough starter for awhile, but it just seemed too hard. Too time consuming and too confusing as to what I was supposed to be doing. I read and I read, so many different ways to ‘start’ the starter, that my head hurt. All the pages were rolling into one, the words a blur, and nothing was sinking in. I closed my eyes at night thinking of starters and woke again, only to find my first thought of the day was sourdough starter…. Now what do I need to do again? Slash before prove or after? Steam? Oven at the hottest setting or turn it down a tad? Feeds beforehand? Ratio of starter to flour?…..?……?

Enough! Just do it girl. Get cracking.

Yes, there are a number of different ways to do it. Does that mean its complicated or versatile? Lets hope with versatile. I went with the “Bourke Street Bakery Cookbook” method, and for the next 3 weeks diligently fed dear “Suzie” (she had to have a name if she was going to be a permanent fixture in my kitchen) and hoped for the best.

* Now it must be said before I go any further. I’m a hack cook and a hack baker. I look for short cuts, I change recipes, and sometimes it could be said I completely bastardize recipes. Lets put it this way…. I’m not a sifter. Now this can be a downfall at times as the impatient me wants to take over and the delicate french chef in me gets thrown to the back of the kitchen. However, most of the time it works. The food is edible, and The Monkeys go to bed with a full and happy tummy. So for me, hack works… that being said, I wasn’t so sure hack was going to work in doing a sourdough starter.


I decided to do a rye starter. The rye apparently gets going easier and then you can switch over to normal flour, it just gives it a head start,(it’s then just a white starter.) So with rye flour and water in a bowl sitting on top of my fridge, the feeding began.

According to the method I was following, the starter wouldn’t be strong enough until after 3 weeks. But in the mean time I did play around with the portions I was supposed to be discarding.

Batch made with 'ferment'- oops

First up, a batch made at day 5. A Light Rye and Apple. Yeast used as a raising agent. Starter used more as ‘ferment’ taste. I have since read that you shouldn’t be using it at all at this stage as the bacteria levels are not right….. oops. I did wonder about this, as at this stage it smelt weird. Not like vomit, as I had read it could smell, just different… vomit didn’t sound so good.

Sunflower and Linseed with a small amount of dried yeast for backup. Fermenting overnight in fridge

Seeing if it would work in the bread maker. Yep it did. No yeast added and rose beautifully. It did go dry quite quickly though, when used in sandwiches, but fine for toast. I did try and start the bread maker in the morning and then left it sitting for a further few hours to prove before continuing on to cook. It rose beautifully again but then I worked out there wasn’t a just cook button and it had reset itself. So won’t be doing that one again…. dense, (the bread not me…or maybe a little of both.)

no commercial yeast, 10 hour prove

Light Rye with no yeast, two bulk proving times, and cooked 10 hours after starting.

Sunflower and Linseed, one feed 8 hours before mixing ingredients, 2 x 1 hour proving times with a knock back in between, then a slow ferment overnight in the fridge for 10 hours.

I still have to try the Bourke Street Bakery method of feeding the starter 3  times in 24 hours before adding other ingredients, then a long ferment over night. Some people do the extra feeds to build it up and some don’t. It seems there are so many methods in working with natural yeasts, and it’s just a matter of finding what works for me. That being said, if by chance anyone that knows what they are doing reads this and sees something that screams out- No you shouldn’t be doing that! Please let me know. Or just a sourdough tip, and the best methods that work for you.

Overall- I am really happy with the outcomes. I should have done a bread making course so all of this makes a bit more sense, and am hoping to down the track. But until then, I have a starter bubbling away happily, I’m producing edible bread, (actually it’s more than edible it’s really tasty!) I don’t have to rely on commercially made yeasts. I’m saving a bucket of money by not buying shop bread. (For the same price of 2 shop bought sourdoughs, I am getting 12 kilos of flour which in turn makes…. lots more loaves.) Then just playing around with different flavours, etc. like sunflowers, rye, bran, pepitas, apple.

I’m finding it so satisfying to make these breads, it really does feed my soul. I’m truly amazed that they rise and taste good, I just wish I knew more of the how, where, why part of bread making with natural yeasts.

In the mean time though, hack is working.

Banana Honey Bread

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Honey is such a versatile ingredient for cooking. My pantry is never with out it, and no small jars of it for us. I have a 3 litre container of bush honey which my dad got for me from his local area and a pot of creamed honey I had bought at a local old lady charity shop down south. Both are delicious. Even though nobody in this household actually eats it straight, it is used in lots of different cooking. From smoothies, tea, coffee, chai, muffins, apple crumble, cakes, biscuits and for this recent recipe Banana Honey Bread.

Honey can be traced back to Egyptian times, used for the making of Mead, used medicinally, you can preserve  it for a really long time and as I like to use it- as a natural exfoliant when doing a facial. (Try it, the honey works really well.)

Today its for making bread though. Add some bananas that need to get used up, add a few more bready ingredients and you are away. A cheap, tasty snack or something different for breakfast.

 

Banana Honey Bread

* adapted from Jamie Oliver’s Happy Days with the Naked Chef

3 1/2 cups strong bread flour

100mls water

whizzed up banana- about 4 medium sized ones

1 tps cinnamon

1 tbs raw sugar

1 tbs salt

2 1/2 tps dried yeast

2 tbs honey

1/2 cup linseed meal

* extra honey and flaked almonds for the top.

Mix all ingredients with a dough hook in mixmaster, until combined well and pulls away from the edges. The dough looks quite wet and glossy. Cover with cling wrap and leave in a warm spot until doubled in size. Knock it back, quick knead, and leave to prove until doubled in size again. Shape the dough into small balls and place next to each other on a lined tray. Leave for half an hour. Drizzle more honey on top and scatter flaked almonds.

Cook at 210 C for about 20 minutes.

Easy thing to have for breakfast, a snack, or whack in the freezer and get out as needed. The Little Monkey loves these, and if he is having a fussy day eating, these always get gobbled down.

Honey Ricotta Bread

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“Mama, this tastes better than cupcakes!”

Recently while watching Italian Food Safari a few weeks ago, they cooked up a wonderful looking Ricotta Bread but they hadn’t laid out any recipes on the website- much to my disappointment. Not finding any other recipes elsewhere that seemed just right, I decided to venture out in to the unknown by myself.

It was a little nerve-wracking, there was a dash of timidness, and a sprinkling of hope. I have only been playing around with breads a relatively short time, and I wasn’t exactly sure it was time to be branching off and making stuff up just yet… hasn’t stopped me before though. So feet first (so to speak of course) I dove into that dough. I figured at worst, it will be stodgy little brick and I will still have to eat it. At best, it will be delicious bready loaf and everyone gets to eat it.

Celia from Fig Jam and Lime Cordial had given me the heads up on a place that sold bulk bakers flour. So with 12.5 kilos of strong bakers flour sitting on my kitchen bench, it was time to get crackin’.

Honey Ricotta Bread

1 cup polenta

2 1/2 cups strong bakers flour

2 tps dried yeast

2 tps salt

250g ricotta

4 tbs honey

400ml water

With a dough hook, mixed everything up in the mixmaster. Once thoroughly mixed through, I left it for 10 minutes. A gentle knead on a floured surface then put in slightly oiled bowl, covered with cling wrap for 1/2 an hour, (or until doubled in size.). Another gentle knead, flattening the dough to an inch thick, folding over into 1/3, then folding again from the other side. Back into the bowl and then repeating the process in another half an hours time. Form into the shape that you want to cook in and let the dough rise for another 20-30 minutes or until risen by about a 1/3. Cook at 240 C until golden and sound hollow when knocked.

(Time varies depending on the shape you have cooked it in, ie. Bread rolls vs loaf)

Outcome? It was delicious! Thats when Monkey Boy said “Mama, this tastes better than cupcakes!” Now, if that isn’t a tick of approval I don’t what is.

In my kitchen this weekend…

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Following on from Celia at Fig Jam and Lime Cordial. (A delicious blog where I know if I have any foodie questions, I’m sure she has the answers.) A look at what is happening in my kitchen this sunny weekend.

I made some butter after seeing it on Real Food has Curves. Oh, oh, oh… so soft, so delicate. That really was a something else. Will definitely be enjoying that one.

Getting to flick through my new subscription to Sanctuary magazine… ahhh, so many inspiring houses.

A little espresso action. Maybe, just a tad too much, as things are getting done a lot quicker than they normally would.

Made some bread, to go in a birthday hamper for my sister. I’m still toying with the olive oil dough from the Bourke Street Bakery Cookbook.

Frugal Friday

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Once more Friday rolls around and there is not much left in the fridge. Not quite so little as to go shopping but not quite so much as to have many options. What to do with some organic pumpkin, carrots, and some flaccid celery and still get the monkeys to eat it? Carrying on from the Indian theme from last Friday, I think it was going to have to be dhal. Add a little red lentils, vegetable stock, some garlic, a fistful of spices and I had myself a tasty, healthy, budget friendly, monkey friendly dinner. Add a little natural yoghurt on top, and some fresh naan bread and dinner was done for ‘Frugal Friday’.

Naan bread I had tried to make a number of years ago, with the end result being little hard round bricks. That was the last time I had attempted them. Naan bread being a firm favourite here and with an excellent little Indian take away around the corner to happily oblige us when the taste for naan over comes us.

But not today. I wanted to give it another crack…..

160ml warm water

1tsp dry yeast

1 tsp sugar

2 cups plain flour

1 tsp salt

2 tbls oil/or ghee

2 tbls yoghurt

Mix the water, yeast and sugar together in a bowl until dissolved. Leave in a warm place for 10 minutes. Add flour salt, half the oil and yoghurt. Mix to a soft dough then knead on floured  surface until smooth and elastic.

Place dough in a bowl with wet tea towel over the top in warm place for approx 1 1/2 hours or until doubled in size.

Knead dough on floured surface for 5 minutes, then divide into 6 portions. Roll out into rounds. I pulled one side to get the traditional ‘teardrop’ shape that you would get if cooking in a tandoor oven.

Cook in a very lightly oiled frying pan and pop the frying pan under the grill to get those distinctive brown puffy circles to finish it off. Brush naan with remaining ghee or butter.