I generally follow trends slavishly, but I can’t get into the nine-pound-miche thing that seems to have taken TFL by storm. In fact my one and only complaint about miches is they are too large for my small (albeit voracious) family of only two carbovores. I know they can be divided and a piece frozen, but they’re never as good thawed as fresh.
I baked in pans this weekend. No, there’s nothing wrong with my baking stone. I just have freezers full of baguettes, miches and other hearth breads. Also, I was (and am always) craving scones (using Breadsong’s technique). My wife was urging me to make another whole grain-y sandwich bread. And I wanted a good accompaniment for Pollo Cacciatore. So, it was scones, Hamelman’s Oatmeal Bread and Reinhart’s BBA Focaccia.
Lemony-Cranberry Flaky Scones
This week’s baking—and cooking-- were inspired by Fresh Loaf masters proth5, Wally, SylviaH, Hansjoakim, and AW. There was duck confit, whole wheat bread, sandwich buns, and Pat’s “Getting the Bear” baguettes (aka “Bear-Gets”), including a Margueritte-shaped thing—"Le Fleur d’Ours".
I wanted to make a sandwich roll that had some substance both for chew and to hold up under moist sandwich ingredients, but something tender enough to be compressible. I’d been meaning to try a bread with some potatoes in it, as I’d heard that potatoes add some tenderness to the crumb (and every crumb needs a little tenderness).
Foodies (myself included) can be really annoying. Especially the obsession with details of the provenance of ingredients. I don’t need to know what species of leaves are in the mulch that fed the grass that fed the lamb that I eat.
One foodie principle that I endorse, though, is the locavore concept, the idea that it is beneficial to use local ingredients and to celebrate local cuisine. Well, we don’t grow wheat here in the Bay Area, but my bake today is decidedly local to the Bay Area.
My wife, Cat, is away in Australia on business. Yes, my wife’s name is Cat, which may cause some confusion because we also have a cat. But the cat’s name is not “Wife”, which would make it even more confusing…and be pretty weird. Especially since one of my wife’s many nicknames is “Wife”.
Anyway, I’m stuck in boring San Francisco while she’s off traveling the World. So, I have to find a way to entertain myself. And what entertains me these days is baking. So, here’s the plan:
Saturday 1/15/11. Today, I am musing on my bread-ucation. Sort of a milepost marking. I have been baking for five months. But I am beginning to feel somewhat knowledgeable about a narrow category of breads, due in large part to (1) The Fresh Loaf and readings recommended here and advice given here, and (2) an enthusiasm for baking that has me making lots of bread as often as I can. I learn stuff every time I handle dough and bake bread.
I joined in the Dutch Oven craze with a Pain de Campagne bake a few weeks ago, and the outcome was fine, but I think I get my best results with Sylvia’s magic towel technique. So, for my first try at a Tartine-like Country Bread, I baked two sloppy boules on the stone.
