April 20, 2008
that big batch bread that i make
this is a recipe i copied out of a book that holly got from the library months ago. i’ve been making it with great success. in fact brother scott in georgia got a loaf for christmas and their complaint was that they had to share it with so many people at christmas dinner instead of having it all to themselves!
be forewarned if you’re going to attempt this: it’ll take you 3 days and will require a Very Large Bowl, as in the Mega Bowl by Tupperware (42cup/10L capacity). I’ve put the timing in there for a Saturday firing of the oven.
a note on flour: we prefer to use is high-gluten unbleached flour. it’s hard to find unbleached, unenriched flour in massive quantities, so we are looking into buying a mill and grinding our own. stay tuned for that.
Step One. (Thursday evening)
Ingredients: 3 cups spring water (room or tap temp, doesn’t matter), 1/4 teaspoon yeast, 3 cups flour.
Use a 3-4 quart bowl. Sprinkle the yeast on the surface of the water and stir to dissolve. Add the flour and stir until a smooth batter forms. This is called a poolish.
Cover and let stand 8-24 hours, whatever is most convenient.
Step Two. (Friday morning, or right after work)
Ingredients: Poolish (above), 6 cups lukewarm water, 2 cups whole wheat or spelt or rye (or whatever) flour, 4 cups all purpose flour. Herbs if desired (I like to make “Simon and Garfunkel bread” with parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme from my garden. I use about a tablespoon of each one).
Add the water to the poolish in the same 3-4 quart bowl. Whisk it together well. Now transfer that to your Very Large Bowl and add the “special” flour and herbs if you’re keen to. Or just use 2 cups of your all purpose flour, that’ll work too. This is where I switch over to a big flat wooden spatula (aka risotta spoon I think). Add the 4 cups of all purpose flour (2 cups at a time) and stir (always in the same direction) until smooth. This stage is called the sponge.
Cover and let stand 4 to 12 hours, whatever is most convenient.
Step Three. (Friday evening)
Ingredients: Sponge (above), 3 Tablespoons of sea salt, 7-10 cups of all-purpose flour.
Sprinkle the salt onto the sponge and stir it in. Add the flour (2 cups at a time), stirring and folding the dough over to absorb the flour until it’s too difficult to stir and fold. Flour a work surface well (with another 2 cups of flour) and turn the dough out. Knead for 5-8 minutes, incorporating the flour from the work surface and adding a little extra to the surface if needed. The mass should be soft, smooth, and almost sticky. This is your dough.
Return the dough to the bowl and cover with plastic wrap and let rise until doubled, 3.5 hours or overnight, whatever is most convenient. If you live in a warm place and wait overnight your dough will be more than doubled and may actually take over your kitchen. 
Step Four. (Saturday morning)
Ingredients: Patience, time, appetite. Flour, tea towels, baskets or bowls.
Flour your tea towels and line your baskets. However many loaves you want, that’s how many baskets you’ll need. You don’t actually bake the bread in them, they are only used for “proofing” (rising) the dough.
Turn the dough out onto a well-floured surface and divide into 4 (or 6, or 
equal pieces. I find that I have a hard time fitting two loaves of a 4-batch in my oven at one time (on a 14×18″ pizza stone), but once that brick oven is done outside we should have no problem! Tuck the sides of each piece of dough under all around to make a large round boule. Pinch together underneath and transfer to the basket seem side up. Repeat with your remaining pieces of dough.
Cover with another tea towel and let rise at least 1.5 hours.
Start to preheat your oven to 500º F 45 minutes before you bake, with the stone already in place.
Step Five. (Saturday afternoon)
Place a sprayer bottle filled with water near the oven. Dust a peel (or the back of a cookie sheet or cutting board) with flour. Flip the first boule onto the peel and lift off the basket and the cloth. Use a sharp knife to slash 3 parallel deep cuts across the top of the loaf, then place in on the far back corer of the hot baking stone, jerking the peel out from under it. Use the sprayer to spritz water into the oven (spraying directly at the oven walls I have found to work best, do not spray the loaf itself, the goal is to create lots of steam). Repeat with the next loaf if you have room. Spritz another 3-4 times in the first few minutes of baking to attain a crackly crust.
Bake until domed and darkly golden, 25-30 minutes. To test for doneness, take the loaf out of the oven, tap on the bottom (it should sound hollow) and pinch the bottom edges to see that they are firm. Transfer to a rack to cool and repeat with the remaining loaves.
Alternative: Focaccia
Step Four.
Lightly grease two 12×18 baking sheets and sprinkle on semolina or bread crumbs if available. Using one quarter of the dough, divide it in half (so 1/8 each baking sheet). Flatten each piece on a lightly floured surface, stretching it using the backs of your hands (rings off!). Transfer to the waiting cookie sheet and gently press and stretch it out to the size of the sheet. If it’s springing back too much let it rest for several minutes and come back to it.
Dribble 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil over each one, and spread it with your hands. Dimple all over with your fingertips or knuckles, then sprinkle on a teaspoon or so of sea salt and rosemary or other herbs, or sun dried tomatoes, or caramelized onions, or…
Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rise about 45 minutes while you preheat your oven to 500º F with the stone already in place.
Step Five.
Bake each one 12-15 minutes, until very browned in patches. Transfer to racks to cool or put it right in front of your guests and watch it disappear before it’s even cool!
Alternative: Pizza
Step Four.
Flour a stack of tea towels. Divide the dough into small balls about the size of a small orange. One at a time, flatten each piece on a lightly floured surface, stretching it using the backs of your hands (rings off!) to about an inch thick. Transfer to the waiting tea towels, sprinkling top and bottom with cornmeal or semolina, and folding them over to hold each one in layers. Once you have them all prepped, they can rise there for an hour or so, then invite your guests in to assemble their personal pizza (from the toppings they all bring). The proofed dough rounds can now be stretched to the size and thickness you desire. Place them each on their own cutting board or peel (using generous amounts of cornmeal) so that you can slide them one by one into the oven when they are ready. Sprinkle cornmeal or semolina liberally on the peel to make sliding it off into the oven easier.
Step Five.
Preheat the oven to 500º F for about 45 minutes with the stone in place. Or fire your brick oven an hour or so until the walls and dome turn white. Floor of the oven should be at least 700F.
Bake each one 12-15 minutes, until your cheese is melting and the crust around the edge is browned and crispy. In a brick oven it will take about 4.2 minutes.
Use caution with the pizza and focaccia – remember it just came out of a 500 (or more!) degree oven!
your host for this episode : carrie; 07:59 PM | Comments (1)
The End Is Near…
Yesterday was spent working more on the brick oven… from the time I went to bed friday night, until about 4:30 when friends from out of town came over for dinner… Pizza, a trial run for the dough recipe that we will likely be using once the oven is complete (watch for the recipe on line soon).
I didn’t sleep much trying to figure out how to make the transition from the dome to the doorway arch, and how to make the doorway arch, since I had put the jam bricks on a 45 instead of 90… too many angles….
Here are some photos of the progress.
The end is near…
your host for this episode : dan; 11:28 AM | Comments (0)
April 19, 2008
House Work
So we’ve been working on the house the last couple weeks, but haven’t updated you all on our progress. We’ve been double hitting, actually too. Two Saturdays ago, on the 5th, the dog Nacoma went back to Wick and Kristen, and the rest of the day, Dan worked on the oven while I whittled away at the bathroom by the kitchen. We were all of 15 feet apart – if that even – and could talk through the open window.
I started by taking down the plastic that we’d hung over the window and drywall when we moved in. See, the paint was already peeling 2 years ago and we knew it was going to be some time before we could get to this project. We figure that the tub was an addition in/around the 1950s when the lady of the house couldn’t climb stairs anymore. There was an existing 1/2 bath there, with a window onto the back porch, a 4×12ish space fully within the square footprint of the house. So, in the 50s we figure they knocked out this window, poked a hole in the concrete porch slab for a drain to be run to the basement through the canning room, and enclosed the whole area, with a wall to separate the new mud room from the now-larger bath. The ceiling, however, over the tub was right at about 6′4″ and for my 6′ husband this made showering there a bit of a challenge, I’m sure you can imagine. And also increased the amount of moisture coming into contact with the drywall. Thus the plastic.
So I took down the plastic, the shower curtain, the fixtures and then started hacking at the drywall itself. I started with a utility knife, but found that just banging it with a hammer and then using a wonder-bar (that magical little flat crow bar deal-eo) was much more effective, not to mention fun. Once the drywall was out around and above, I removed the stinky old, smelly old, musty insulation and put it in a big garbage bag to await the enclosure of the oven. 
Recycled has a pretty good R-factor if you ask me. We’re going to try to go up to the old porch ceiling in the new shower enclosure, and tile it floor to ceiling, wrapping the header with tile too. The space is approximately 4.5 feet by 5, so it’s a rather large shower space, but for a husband who often finds himself in poison ivy during his work day, I’m happy to provide a roomy shower just inside the back door for him to hose off before coming into the rest of the house. And it’ll be great for washing the someday dog and the someday children, right?
Late Saturday, still the 5th, I got out the sledge hammer and started smacking the tub itself. Took me quite some time to get a whole beat along the top edge of the tub, and swinging a sledge has a tendency to make a novice tired quickly, and so I gave up. We ate, I showered (to get the sticky, smelly, musty bits of insulation out of my hair especially), and we went to bed. We took Sunday off, as is our custom, as a day of rest. We sat on the patio in the lovely, long-missed sun, grilled lunch, and read together (different books, but next to each other). It was Monday night when we (mostly Dan) finished sledging the tub to tiny bits and carried it outside to await a trip to the scrap yard. We got more than 40 bucks for a 4′ tub! But then spent most of it getting rid of the drywall and other stuff at the dump. Anyway, at least the tub didn’t get land-filled.
The 11th was my birthday and my parents came down for a visit and we put them to work. Dad and Dan finished the demo and wrote a shopping list and Mom had a coupon about to expire for 10% off your whole purchase at the Home Dot so, even though we’re weeks from ready for them, we went and purchased the tile and backerboard. We’re going with Subway tile, like we have upstairs, but in white instead of bone. Home Dot stocks these, and if we need to buy 3 more tiles, we can buy 3 more tiles. I had a thought to leave the brick exposed but we’ve decided no to do that because a) it wouldn’t “fit” the style of the house and b) if you slip in the shower and fall against that wall, you’d have some pretty serious road rash. Among other things at the Home Dot, we also bought water faucets for outside, so now we’ll have hot and cold water right at the bar sink on the patio. Our plan was to just run a hose from the outside spigot to the sink; it’s only about 8 feet. But then, having the tub out and that wall exposed, we decided to just go with it or we’d regret it later, and so we did. Now we have hot and cold water faucets outside. It turned out to be an expensive birthday but it was nice to spend it with family.
Mom and Dad took us out for dinner Friday and then bought things for dinner Saturday and we invited Dan’s parents over too, and surrogate siblings Dave and Nettie, and we had birthday dinner Again! Just yesterday we finished those leftovers!
Dan keeps slowly plugging away on the oven, a “chain” at a time. Each brick takes a few minutes to prep and set before you can move on to the next one. He had a lot of foresight to spend a few evenings in winter cutting the bricks all in half, so this has really sped up the process of prepping and setting. We are now at the point where the dome is meeting the arched doorway. The online forum he’s part of doesn’t have the details on how to make those two rounded and arched parts come together, so there has been a lot of head scratching lately. He’s out there already this morning in fact, but I thought it was time to bring you all up to speed.
your host for this episode : carrie; 08:07 AM | Comments (1)
April 07, 2008
Acorn Squash and Sweet Potato Soup
I adapted this one from a recipe I found on recipezaar.com.
Diane just asked me to make it when she comes over next week. I need to make sure I have all the ingredients in house and while I had the recipe up I thought I’d also put it on here.
5 servings – 1 1/2 hours 20 min prep
1 large sweet potato, about 400g
1 large butternut squash
4 shallots or 3 onions
olive oil
5-6 garlic cloves, unpeeled
850 ml vegetable stock or chicken stock (~1 1/2 pints)
125 ml milk or single cream
salt and pepper
nutmeg
1. Cut potato, squash, and shallots in half length-wise, brush cut sides with oil. Place in a shallow roasting tin, cut sides down. Add garlic cloves. Roast in preheated oven at 350f for 40 minutes or until tender and light brown.
2. When cooked and cooled, scoop the flesh from the sweet potato and squash and put in a saucepan with insides of the shallots (squeeze the edges to pop the insides out the end). Remove the garlic peel and add the soft insides to the rest of the vegetables.
3. Add stock and a pinch of salt. Bring just to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, partially covered for about 30 minutes stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are very tender.
4. Allow soup to cool then blend or puree until smooth. Return soup to saucepan and stir in milk or cream. Season to taste with nutmeg then simmer for 5-10 minutes until completely heated through. Eat with a spoonful of cream – swirled for effect – and a shake of nutmeg.
your host for this episode : carrie; 12:33 PM | Comments (0)