We're winning! Pitas

I often study at home, with my computer on beside me, blasting music. Sometimes I just happen to have my gmail account open at the same time. Incidentally, gchat is also often open (now how does that happen?).

Recently my afternoons go something like this: I'll be sitting at the table, my tax code to my left, computer to the right, big cup of glorious coffee in front of me. Brow furrowed, I try to decipher a legal text in a foreign language, as I hear a plinking noice coming from my computer. I look at my inbox and see that my sister E has sent me an instant message that reads : GOOOOOOO!!!! CALL NOW!!!!! WE'RE WINNING WE'RE WINNING! GOOOOO!

Now let me explain- E works in an office with the radio playing all day long. She has started to listen to 104.5 Chum FM, a Toronto station, while working. Now about a month ago Chum FM decided to give away free tickets to an upcoming Beyonce concert. They announce the giveaway suddenly, and the twentieth or so caller wins. Both E and I are complete suckers for contests, so I always call in, and have yet to win. I still get suckered in- I stop my studying, grab the phone, and make the phone call from Tel Aviv to Chum FM.

Needless to say, after such excitement it is always very difficult to get back to the tax code; my mind inevitabely starts to wander to other topics, such as bread baking. Yesterday my bread of choice was pitas, or pitot, as they call them here. I decided to switch it up a bit, thanks to the suggestions I found on The Fresh Loaf. I added some rolled oats, sunflower seeds, and whole wheat flour to make them interesting. Here's a copy of the recipe plus my additions. Do try the recipe out- they are easy to make and altogether delicious. I just hope I have more success with my tax exam than I do with free concert tickets!

I'm sending this one in to Yeastspotting.

Pita Bread

Makes 8 pitas

• 3 cups flour (I used two cups regular, one cup whole wheat)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 Tablespoon sugar or honey
• 1 packet yeast (or, if from bulk, 2 teaspoons yeast)
• 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups water, roughly at room temperature
• 2 tablespoons olive oil, vegetable oil, butter, or shortening
• handful of sunflower seeds
• handful of rolled oats
  

Mix the yeast in with the flour, salt, and sugar. Add the sunflower seeds and oats. Add the olive oil and 1 1/4 cup water and stir together with a wooden spoon. All of the ingredients should form a ball. If some of the flour will not stick to the ball, add more water.

Once all of the ingredients form a ball, place the ball on a work surface, such as a cutting board, and knead the dough for approximately 10 minutes.

When you are done kneading the dough, place it in a bowl that has been lightly coated with oil. Form a ball out of the dough and place it into the bowl, rolling the ball of dough around in the bowl so that it has a light coat of oil on all sides. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a damp kitchen towel and set aside to rise until it has doubled in size, approximately 90 minutes.

When it has doubled in size, punch the dough down to release some of the trapped gases and divide it into 8 pieces. Roll each piece into a ball, cover the balls with a damp kitchen towel, and let them rest for 20 minutes. This step allows the dough to relax so that it'll be easier to shape.

While the dough is resting, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. If you have a baking stone, put it in the oven to preheat as well. If you do not have a baking stone, turn a cookie sheet upside down and place it on the middle rack of the oven while you are preheating the oven. This will be the surface on which you bake your pitas.

After the dough has relaxed for 20 minutes, spread a light coating of flour on a work surface and place one of the balls of dough there. Sprinkle a little bit of flour on top of the dough and use a rolling pin or your hands to stretch and flatten the dough. You should be able to roll it out to between 1/8 and 1/4 inch thick. If the dough does not stretch sufficiently you can cover it with the damp towel and let it rest 5 to 10 minutes before trying again.

Open the oven and place as many pitas as you can fit on the hot baking surface. They should be baked through and puffy after 3 minutes.

Weirdest Looking Bread I've Ever Made: Dark Wheat Honey Bread

It's been about a week since I last made a loaf of bread, and besides running out of things to toast (which is basically all I eat, all the time), my hands were itching to bake. My brother-in-law (hereafter known as beloved BIL #2) recently told me that he is interested in adding whole grains and healthier bread to his diet. We came to an agreement pretty quickly- if he brought me a bag of rye flour, i would make him a loaf of bread.

BIL #2 came back a week later with a bag of dark wheat flour. well, not exactly what we had discussed, but have flour will make bread! So off I went trailing the net for recipes. I found a recipe for honey whole wheat bread courtesy of Floyd from The Fresh Loaf that looked great, and decided to try and adapt the recipe to the flour I have and use recently learnt techniques.

Notes on the method: I decided to let the dough rest for a while before kneading it, so I let it "autolyse" for a bit under an hour before kneading it for about ten minutes. Then I put the dough in the fridge while I went out. When I got home later that evening I stretched the dough and folded it, and put it back in the fridge. When I woke up the next morning I took it out of the fridge, stretched and folded, and let it rise a bit more.

After about an hour I divided the dough in two, let it rest for ten, and shaped the dough into loaves. I put them in the oven with a bowl of just-boiled water and let them rise for another hour. I left the house at this point- which goes to show you that bread baking is all about good planning! Note to self: If you know you are going out, put your dough in the fridge! Dont plan on baking it! Anyways, I left the bread in my Mom's care with instructions to turn the oven up all the way after about an hour of proofing (after taking out the bowl of water out of the oven and drying off the glass door), and then after about ten minutes turn the oven down. Bake until internal temp reaches 190.

I think the dough might have overproofed a bit at the end- so the loaves kind of flopped over the edges of the pan. Also, I should have known that when you let any dough rise slowly, you can use way less yeast. I used three teaspoons and found that the dough had tons of air bubbles, which made it slightly hard to form at the end. There wasn't enough flour at the beginning- the dough was really sticky. I should have just added more flour, instead of adding more later- which, combined with not such good forming skills made for this GAPING HOLE in the middle of my loaf.

I'm definitely going to make this again (gonna try for one without a giant hole :) ) . It was delicious! Hope you enjoy your loaf BIL#2! And thank you Floyd for the recipe!

Honey Whole Wheat Bread
makes two loaves
1 lb whole wheat flour
12 oz hot water
8 ounces bread or all-purpose flour
1 5 oz can evaporated milk (or milk, or more water or soy if you are vegan)
1/3 cup honey
2 teaspoons salt
3 teaspoons instant yeast
an additional 1/2-1 cup flour, as necessary, to achieve the desired consistency

Mix the hot water and whole wheat flour together in a bowl. Cover the bowl with plastic and set aside until around room temperature, at least 1 hour.

Add the milk, honey, salt, yeast, and bread flour to the original mixture and mix until well combined. Add additional flour and knead by hand or in a stand mixer until a tacky but not completely sticky dough is formed. Place the ball of dough in a well-oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and set aside to rise for 60 to 90 minutes.

Divide the dough in two and shape the loaves. Place the loaves in greased bread pans, cover the pans loosely with plastic (I put them in a plastic bag), and set aside to rise again for 90 minutes.

During the final 30 minutes of rising, preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Place the pans into the oven and immediately reduce the oven temperature to 375 degrees. Bake for approximately 45 to 55 minutes, rotating the pans once so that they brown evenly, until the internal temperature of the loaves is around 190 degrees and the bottom of the loaf sounds hollow when tapped.

Whole Wheat Bread

This week I felt like a baking rockstar.
I've only had my blog for about two weeks, but after receiving such positive responses about it, I just felt like handing out my URL to everyone I saw- "here, look at this, its my blog!" and "did you know I had a blog? well I do! check it out!"

So, i guess i got a little ambitious. I decided to try out Peter Reinhart's whole wheat bread. Even though I don't own any of his books (yet), I already know that Peter Reinhart is the bread baking master, with five books about bread baking published and a huge following.

I found this recipe online, and although the soaker/biga method looks difficult and strange, it is SURPRISINGLY EASY. all you do is mix the biga and soaker separately the night before you want to bake the loaf, and then the next day, mix and knead everything together. Even without a kitchenaid (*sigh, i hate being a poor student), it was simple:

Soaker:

• 1 3/4 c (8 oz) whole wheat flour
• 1/2 t (.14 oz) salt
• 3/4 c + 2 T (7 oz) milk, buttermilk, yogurt, soy milk or rice milk

Mix together in a bowl about one minute, leave at room temp. for 12 to 24 hours covered loosely with plastic wrap. Any longer than that, place it in the fridge.

Biga:

• 1 3/4 c whole wheat flour
• 1/4 t (.03 oz) instant yeast
• 3/4 c (6 oz) filtered or spring water (room temp)

Mix all ingredients into a ball then knead with wet hands 2 minutes. Dough will be tacky. Let rest for 5 minutes, then knead again 1 minute. Place in fridge covered tightly with plastic wrap for minimum 8 hours to 3 days. Remove from fridge 2 hours before mixing dough.

Dough:

• all the biga
• all the soaker
• 7 T (2 oz) ww flour
• 5/8 t (.18 oz) salt
• 2 1/4 t (.25 oz) instant yeast
• 2 1/2 T (1.5 oz) honey or agave nectar or 3 T sugar or brown sugar
• 1 T melted unsalted butter or 1 T vegetable oil
• extra flour

1. Chop up the biga and soaker into 12 pieces each and place in a mixing bowl. Add in all other ingredients except extra flour and mix together until combined-(if using a mixer- one min on low, then 2-3 mins. on med. low.)
2. Remove from bowl to a floured work area and knead for 3-4 minutes adding extra flour as needed to get a tacky, but not sticky dough. Let rest for 5 minutes, then knead another 1 minute. Place in an oiled bowl and let it rise for 45-60 mins until it's about 1 1/2 times the original size.
3. Form into whatever type of loaf you wish. If using a pan, use a greased 4x8 1/2" loaf pan. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rise again 45-60 mins. until 1 1/2 x's it's original size.
4. Preheat oven to 425° and place loaf pan in the oven. Immediately turn the temp. down to 350° and bake for 20 mins. Rotate the loaf a complete half turn and bake another 20 to 30 mins. or to 195°

wasn't as fluffy as i would have liked- might be because its 100% whole wheat, may be because of my inexperience with this technique... guess ill have to keep on baking to find out!

I'm submitting this to yeastspotting- http://www.wildyeastblog.com/yeastspotting

yay yeastpotting!

whole wheat sourdough loaf

new day, new loaf.

After royally screwing up my starter, I slowly nursed it back to full strength, and was ready to try it out. I found a recipe online for an easy looking sourdough loaf and decided to try it out. It was only after leaving it to rise that I noticed how many bad reviews the recipe got.... I changed the recipe a bit so while it was rising I still had hope that it would turn out....

• 1 c regular all purpose flour
• 1 c whole wheat flour
• 1 cup sourdough starter (100% hydration)
• 1/2 tsp (heaping) salt
• 1/4- 1/2 c warm water
  

mix all ingredients together, knead until smooth. Let rise until double- about four hours, punch down, smooth into a ball, and let rise overnight in the fridge. shape into a loaf, let rise again until double in size. slash loaf with a serrated knife, mist with water and place in preheated 400 degree oven.

The loaf was ok, could have used some more salt. Rose very nicely, and had a great crust.

Conclusion: keep looking for that perfect sourdough loaf, and must invite more guests to eat bread - because as my sister puts it- "If you keep eating all that bread, you'll end up looking like a loaf of bread yourself!"