Recent Blog Entries

I made croissants in honor of Bastille Day today. They actually turned out OK, better than I expected.

I'll try to post the recipe in the next day or two. Too tired tonight.

I was in a short trip to Geneva. A lot of Nice breads.

I bake a lot of sourdough bread. Over the past several months I have been trying a lot of new techniques and trying to perfect the quality of my loaves. The recipe below is how I am currently making my white bread. Next year I may have a whole different approach, as I am constantly learning and trying new things.

Deluxe Sourdough Bread

1 1/4 cups proofed starter
1 cup water
3 T. dry powdered milk
1 T. lemon juice
1/4 cup instant potato flakes
3 3/4 cups bread flour
1/4 cup white whole wheat flour
2 T. sugar
3 T. butter or margarine
2 tsp. salt

Combine the first 5 ingredients. Mix in the flour just until the mixture is a shaggy mass. Cover and let rest for 30 minutes. Add sugar, butter, and salt and mix until all is incorporated. Knead dough until it is smooth and satiny.

Cover and let dough rest for 45 minutes. Divide dough into 2 equal portions. Pat each dough portion out into a large, flat circle. Gently stretch and fold the left side over the middle, then the right side over the middle (like folding a letter). Pat down with the palms of hands and repeat the folding with the remaining two unfolded ends. Shape loaves, always keeping the folded side as the bottom. I do free-form oval loaves and place them on parchment paper.

Spray the loaves with Pam and cover with plastic. Place in the refrigerator overnight. The next day, take loaves out and let them finish rising at room temperature. They should be very light. Do not rush it or your bread will be dense.

While bread is rising, preheat oven and stone to 400� F. I also place a shallow pan of hot water on the bottom rack for steam.

When bread is fully risen, slash top and slide onto hot stone. If you don't have a stone, just bake on a baking sheet. After 10 minutes, turn the oven heat down to 375� F. When loaves start to show color, water pan can be removed. Bake until loaves are a nice golden brown. Time will vary according to the shape and size of loaf.

Cool on a wire rack. You can brush crust with butter while still hot if you like a soft crust.

The small addtion of white whole wheat flour that I use in this bread gives it an interesting depth of flavor that I like. It does not change the color of the bread. I don't know if white whole wheat flour is easily available just anywhere. I am fortunate to live in an area where wheat is grown and milled so I have easy access to various flours.

A week or two ago, I queried in my LJ about Ranger Cookies. Nobody chimed in, so I went off to google. I found several recipes and hacked one together from those. It was a reasonable facsimile of the ones sold here in the Vancouver-Portland area Fred Meyer stores. I'm going to record it with the adjustments that I'll make the next time, because the dough was super-stiff and all that stuff wasn't necessary for the cookie. The recipes all called for either corn flakes or crisped rice (rice krispies) cereal. I chose to use the rice, because that was an ingredient in the cookies that I like. Anyway, I'm only reducing the oatmeal and rice cereal quantities by 1/2 cup each in hopes that I can better stir them into the dough. Even my stand mixer wouldn't have been able to handle the original dough.

Ranger Cookies
about 3 dozen
greased cookie sheets, 350F, 10 minutes

1 cup shortening
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1-1/2 cups quick oats
1-1/2 cups crisped rice cereal
1 cup flaked coconut

Cream shortening and sugars until fluffy, add eggs and vanilla and blend until smooth.

Sift flour together with baking soda, baking powder, and salt and add half at a time into the creamed mixture, incorporating it thoroughly.

Add oats, rice cereal and coconut by hand, mixing as well as possible--it makes a pretty stiff dough.

Bake (above) 350, greased sheets, about 10 minutes. Just very lightly browned tops. Leave them on the sheet for a minute or two then remove to wire rack. Store airtight.