My Spring Vacation: North Carolina (part 1)

"So what have you been up to, Rosie?"

Yes yes - I hear you.

Lots of things - but most importantly the hubby and I drove down to North Carolina for a convention. As a money making venture - it was a bust, but as an adventure it came out on top!

Yes we made the decision to drive to North Carolina because we wanted to take our time getting there, PLUS (and a big plus it was!) I wanted to stop and eat some North Carolina Barbecue. In retrospect, I am very glad we made the decision to drive - the first and foremost being that we were considering Skybus as our airline of choice. Everyone knows how that would have turned out. The second was - well I would have had to rent a car anyway to find my way into the wilds of NC to get my some que.

So which establishment should I eat at? That was a tough decision. I knew I would only have one shot at eating NCQ while I was there. Our schedule was pretty tight. After much research, I decided to go for Allen & Sons. It had received rave reviews online and was supposed to have a great all around menu.

The day started off overcast - and as we progressed South, the rain started to come down in buckets, then in cauldrons...it rained all the way down Rt 33, I-77 and into NC proper. As we traversed the state, we had to pull over several times because we could no longer read road signs. And as you all know - it's important to see when you need to get off the interstate and into the wilderness.

Ok here comes my first mistake - never trust Google maps for locations in the wilds of NC. Yup - I followed the directions to a T and guess what? It was wrong. No Allen and Sons. So we found a gas station here are the instructions - "So you go up two roads, turn right. Then you follow that road until it dead ends into 10-105 and turn left. Allen and sons is just before the bridge." So we drive and we drive and soon we are truly in the depths of the countryside surrounding Chapel Hill NC.

I finally break down and pull out the cell phone and call Allen & Sons. Turns out they have two locations - neither of which are at the location that Google maps gave us. The one the gas station attendant told us about is the slimmed down version of the main location. The main location is about 30 minutes to the North of where we were right then.



I looked over at the hubby. His left eye had developed a pronounced twitch. When he spoke - it was in tight controlled phrases. I knew I had about worn out his patience for the great BBQ hunt. We were now about an hour and a half off of schedule and we still had to make it to the hotel that evening - which was still 2 hours away - or lose our reservations.

To make things worse - Allen and sons closed at 8pm and it was almost 7 pm by then. I took the lesser of two evils - I chose the closer location "just before the bridge." It was actually right where the guy at the gas station had said - but we still went right past it in the pouring rain. We made a u-turn and hoped they were either legal in NC or no one would witness us breaking traffic regulations.

Tony was really unhappy by this time - well that is kind of an understatement - he was damn pissed off. He had been driving for ten hours by this time with only a couple extended breaks and he was ready to call it quits. The place looked like a walk up ice cream shack. So I walked up and waited behind a lady ordering burger and que for take out. While the waitress went in the back to place her order I asked her - "So IS this the best bbq in NC?" "Oh yes" she said, "I've eaten a lot of que and this is my favorite."


So I got some pulled pork, slaw and hush puppies for both me and Tony, plus a hunk of homemade cheesecake and some sweet tea. Now I can't vouch as to whether this was the best que in NC, but it was the best Que I have ever had. The flavor of the smokey pork shown through a minimal dressing of vinegar and pepper. I have always been used to people drowning out the flavor of the meat with lots of sauce - but here - it accentuated the sweetness of the slow cooked pork in ways I had never imagined. An added bonus was little crunchy bits of the browned outside mixed into the soft interior for a hit of dark smokiness. The slaw rocked - it was a very simple vinegar based dressing, but it matched the que perfectly and you could still taste the cabbage. The hush puppies were acceptable and the cheesecake was good, but of course you can always make better at home.

Tony was somewhat mollified - but still tired and cranky. If we were get down that way again I will definitely get better directions before we go. And to make matters worse - all the instructions I had printed off the internet were useless - as they had assumed we would be near Chapel Hill, which we no longer were. So armed with a flashlight and a road map - we proceeded South on 10-105 and got lost not once, not twice but you got it - three times before we pulled into Fayetteville.

Thank freaking goodness we only added 3 hours onto that supposed nine hour trip...

Ok more about my adventures in Fayetteville next time...

It's Time To Be Daring Once Again!

I missed doing last month's French bread challenge - which sucked. I had everything lined up and then the crap hit the fan.

Oh well.

This month it's cake! Woot! Perfect timing - as you know - for my daughter's birthday. I usually make her a nice dinner with the dessert of her choice. This time I told her I had to make this cake and she was cool with that. I figure she just wanted to rubberneck at the impending disaster.

The Daring Bakers' challenge this month was Dorie's Perfect Party Cake from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking from My Home to Yours. It was hosted by Morven over at Food Art and Random Thoughts. Thank you for giving us another wonderful challenge. And it was a challenge - I rarely if ever bake real cakes from scratch. My mother was never much of a scratch baker - she had had her fill of it when she was a younger woman. Imagine making butter cream icing with nothing but a hand whisk. *waits for the horror to set in* Yeah - you can see where my mom's generation thought that pre-made icing and cake mixes were a godsend. Personally, I usually stick to mixes - *gasp* - for things like layer cakes.

I jumped into the project with a lot of zest - lemon zest (har-de-har-har -nudge nudge wink wink). The whole flavor theme of the cake was lemon. Lemon zest and extract in the cake, lemon juice in the icing along with raspberry jam in between the layers.


The batter came together pretty dog-gone well. It was nice and silky looking as I put it in the pans and stuck it in the oven. However, it failed to rise properly. The layers came out flat - damn flat. Having read other bakers' comments I had used cake flour and made sure my leavening was very fresh. Personally, I am wondering if not flouring the pan had something to do with it. The recipe does not specifically call for greasing and flouring the cake pans. I thought that was in contrast to some kind of "cake wisdom" - I remember my aunt always flouring her pans. But being a neophyte cake person, I just went with the flow on this one. Also, I think my oven is running too hot again. I had my landlord adjust the thermostat about 6 moths ago, but its an ancient piece of crapola - and who knows if the adjustments need made again. Looking at the sides of the finished cake - plus the fact it was done about 5 minutes early suggest that this would be a factor.

You can see by the crumb that I also over-mixed the poor batter. Those tunnels - bad bad bad.

So basically I ended up with flat dry cake. Not good. In retrospect, I probably should have brushed on some raspberry liquor to help moisten things up some. Nothing I could do about the height. Because of the height issue, I decided not to attempt splitting the layers. That and I am a chicken. Cluck cluck.

So on to the icing. It sounded good - but the recipe calls for a meringue butter cream - lemon flavored of course! The first step is to heat the eggs and sugar over simmering water until all the sugar is melted. This went fine. I then beat the egg whites and sugar as directed. It didn't really fluff much. I was not sure if this was correct or not. I felt the recipe was a little short of "indicators" like - "after 5 minutes of beating, you should have stiff peaks" or " if your egg whites look flat you should just go buy a can of frosting, you git." It would have been a big help.

So, soldiering on, I starting dropping the butter in - 3 WHOLE STICKS!!!!!!!!! The icing looked great. All creamy and buttery... Assembly got a bit messy. I was never any good at icing my cakes - it is all a matter of practice and I just don't do it often enough to be proficient. A telling sign - my daughter came in while I was embattled with final coat and said" Wow Mom - I am sure it will taste better than it looks!"

So here is the final cake. It isn't very decorative. That's OK - we ate it up anyway.

The good news - Mom is much better at Photoshop than she is at icing a cake - so here is the cool cake I would have liked to have made....


Happy Birthday Annie!!

Like sands in an hourglass....

Well here I am!
The last three weeks have been very interesting. A funeral, a snowstorm, and a birthday - you have to learn to love the roller coaster of life.
I've been to a lot of funerals in my 40 years. My parents were older - so a lot of my relatives passed on when I was young. Many of my friends have only been to one or two funerals. Many of their grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and parents are still alive. And since funerals are for the living, I expect to attend a lot more funerals in the next twenty years. It's important to the people you know that you show up and say "I am sorry for your loss." And to bring a covered dish for the post funeral dinner. That was how I was brought up - you say good bye to the dead and fed the living. I still remember all the food at my dad's funeral - a ham, casseroles, salads, cakes and pies. The leftovers fed us for a week while we figured out that we could keep on going despite the huge hole that was left in our lives. Yes, funerals are uncomfortable - especially when you happen to run into that cousin you pissed off years ago - but they are as important as births, wedding and all the other happy times in our lives.
After being emotionally drained by the prior week, the snowstorm was a much needed vacation. Yes-vacation. It is really nice to say, "Sorry, I can't make it. Circumstances beyond my control." We sat around the house, cleaned out closets, watched movies together, cooked some fine pot roast and hash, finished novels that have been on hold, played games - it was fantastic. I loved it. Our family did not have one bad word to say to each other - we were just happy to be safe at home together. Saturday evening, I ventured outside to liberate my car from its snow drift, as I had to be at work on Sunday, and - bless their hearts - two of my neighbors joined me. We dug out our cars, snapped pictures of the interesting snow formations and I shared some homemade rolls. We were being neighborly. Everyone was happy - even when we should have been tired or worried. Why should kids have all the fun? We all need snow days as adult every now and then as well.
Here is a picture of my improvised wine and beer chiller (since no designated driver was needed!)...

My car (Couldn't have DWI'd if I wanted too)...

And the roof of our house ...

And at last - the birthday. My daughter turned a glorious 17 this past week. Scary, scary! I can truthfully say that it is very hard for me to come to grips with the fact that the tiny crying, poop-producing machine of seventeen years ago is the same creature as the large crying, poop-producing machine of today.
Annie's friends pitched in and bought her a cake from Mrs. Goodman's bakery here in Worthington. It was a pretty darn good cake. Of course I missed getting pictures of it - as the pack descended on it within minutes of arrival. Annie was sad that there weren't leftovers. She had wanted to eat it for breakfast the next day. I promised her another cake sometime this week. You'll see details of that soon...
I also took time to make one of George's favorite dishes - Italian Beef. I talked about making Beef way back in 2006 - it is a fairly intensive process - with the making of rolls and the slicing of beef, but oh so worth it.

See my battle scars from making the bread? I tangled with the 500 degree oven and lost. The hubby says that he is scared when I bake because I always burn myself. No - I do not burn my self every time. Usually only 30% of the time. Of course that doesn't stop him from eating his share of the goods.
So that is pretty much it on the homefront. I have been cooking a lot lately - so I hope to get caught up and give you all the steamy details. Cakes, casseroles, soups...making you hungry? Good.

Sorry for being absent

This last week has been pretty rough. I learned that my last surviving uncle has terminal cancer and a good friend's mother passed away last night. Needless to say I don't really feel like being funny right now. Funerals tend to do that to me....I am sure I will recover my sense of humor quickly, cuz' if you don't laugh, you'll only cry...

PS I did make some clam chowder for dinner and it was good.

Butter Me Up!!

Stopped by the Meijer on Sawmill Road while out shopping today and found pounds of salted butter for $1/pound. No shit - a single green back for a pound of butter. Hot Damn!

If cars ran on butter, it would be a hell of a deal. Since cookies do run on butter - I guess it's even a better deal!!

I immediately purchased 33 pounds of butter for Gail, Debbie and me.

My freezer overfloweth; my hips expandeth.

Ketchin' up

I know I have been lax in posting recently but boy do I have a lot to talk about.
Let me get my excuses out of the way first...
1) About two weeks ago, our car was broken into for the second time in two months. The culprits threw a cinder block through the passenger side window, sending millions of tiny balls of safety glass all over the interior of the car. Bastards. The loot: Two packs of cigarettes, a cheap lighter, an mp3 player from the glove box and most devastating for me - a new waffle iron. I had picked it up at New Uses for a song ($20) that afternoon, then gone straight over to gaming night without stopping home to take it out of the car. My thought is that the damn thing was big enough the thieves thought it was a laptop or something more exciting. HA! Joke's on them. Maybe they can get their moms to make them some waffles now - with ground glass syrup on the side...
Of course, that meant the whole next day was spent dealing with insurance, glass replacement and cleaning. I am still finding tiny balls of glass in the seat cushion - and in my pants cuffs, my washer and tons of other places. Sigh....
And a plug for my brother - who runs Integrity Auto Glass. If you even need your auto glass replaced, ask your insurance company to send him along. He does a great job! Thanks John!!
2) A record setting span for most viruses that one person can have in a two week period. Well probably not, but it has certainly set a record for me. I won't go into the gory details, but I will say I am so glad we bought a really comfortable mattress, as I spent a lot of time sleeping on it lately. That means I didn't spend a lot of time eating or even wanting to think about food. So I broke weak and let things slide.
I did buck the trend Thursday night by going out to dinner with the hubby for Valentine's day at Cananas Mexican Restaurant (5225 N. High St. Columbus 43214). I read a review in the Dispatch and decided to give it a try a few weeks ago. We have been looking for a good Mexican place close to our house. I figured the worse that would happen is that we would never go back. I've eaten at lots of bad Mexican places - so what would one more be?


I liked Cananas. Quite a bit actually. It's got the bright gaudy interior that you've come to expect of a small eatery. The waitstaff have been very nice both times we've visited. They do serve booze (despite what a Google Search will say) - having a cold frosty beer with my food is requirement when eating Mexican. A big chunk of the food seems to be homemade - the beans, rice and in particular the guacamole. Wow - great guacamole! Made fresh to order, it is some of the best I've had outside my own home. My recommendation is to stop in during happy hour - 6-8pm - and splurge on some $2 imports and get some tasty food. It definitely gets two thumbs up from our household!

The other part of our Valentine's outing included a viewing of Casablanca and The Princess Bride at Studio 35. If you live in Columbus and haven't been to Studio 35 - shame on you. It is the last of the independent movie theaters here in Columbus. The owners do a fantastic job of bringing their customers a great mix of movies - classics, first run, second run, documentaries plus lots of special engagements. An added bonus - they serve beer! Lots of good beer - plus pizza and subs. And most important to me and Tony - they have fat people seats!!! Yes, double wides just for those of us with extra cushioning! (And I can say the F-word being fat myself...) Next special event - The theater has been around for 70 years now and will be hosting a birthday party on Sunday (2-17-08) to celebrate. You must have a pass to get in - so you might want to stop by the theater to see you can score some passes before it's too late!

Another cool thing we did was stop at Sunflower Chinese Restaurant for Dim Sum. While I like Lee Gardens, I have never been 100% thrilled with the service. Several people had recommended Sunflower, including my boss who claims to have eaten there three times a week when he was a single man-about-town. Tony and I stopped in with some friends back in January to give their Sunday Dim Sum menu a run for its money. Boy - was it good. They had a least 5 carts running at all times - savory and sweet, meat filled and vegetarian. The food just kept coming and coming. They stopped by our table often - pretty soon a couple of them just started camping out.

Just to cap a few of the things that we really loved - the small-neck clams in black bean sauce, steamed pork buns, shu mai, beef meatballs with little bits of water chestnut mixed in, curried keel bone from chickens - damn the list kinda just goes on doesn't it? Sunflower serves Dim Sum all week long - but we love going on Sundays for brunch best. The service was great and the staff did their best to explain unusual dishes to us newbies. So check it out and let me know what you think...maybe this could be another destination for the Meetup group?

As for cooking at home - well I've been kinda keeping everything low key. The most exciting thing I've done recently was grab some excellent sauerkraut, pastrami and Swiss from Thurn's and make Rubens here at the house. I am sorry I didn't take pictures, they just didn't last long enough... I also pulled out some short ribs and threw them into the oven early last week so we could eat on them throughout the week - no pictures of those either I am afraid. I promise to reform and use my camera more often here at the house...
So that is it for the moment - I promise to try and be better. Really.

Oh one last parting shot - to the politicians in Mississippi who want to draw attention to how obese people are by proposing a state bill to prohibit fat people from eating in public - kiss my fat white butt.

Just a quick note to all you vultures - Sunflower Foods is pretty much picked bare with only a 25% discount. I stopped by today out of morbid curiosity and was shocked at how bare the shelves were already. True - they are closing down for good in about a week, but I did expect people to hold out a little longer for deeper discounts. I picked up some canned clams and sardines, a kilo of green beans and a couple chunks of cheese.

I had shopped at Sunflower only once since it open. I was underwhelmed by the store - especially after having been to Trader Joe's and Whole Foods just a few days before the visit. I think the owners of the chain really didn't understand the market...

Another quick note - The Meetup Food Group started by Becke is going to meet at Anna's this Sunday for brunch! If you want meet new people who love food like you do - please join us!

Well that's it for the moment. Last weekend was Magifest and we spent the whole time taking people out to eat - the two favorites were Smackies and MiMi's. I could tell you a lot of the magicians we hung out with - but I am saving all my stories for blackmail material. Those of you who know what I am talking about - I need those checks in the mail soon!!

This is a lesson on how not to make a lemon meringue pie

For some reason, I just never got the hang of meringues. Everything else - not too bad. My crusts are pretty darn tasty, my fillings always draw rave reviews but my toppings - well let's just say there is a lot of weeping involved.

With the help of the Daring Bakers, I had hoped that this time I would be the victor - but no! I failed again.



First lesson - don't bite off more than you can chew. I had decided that a lemon meringue pie would be the perfect dessert to a baked ham, macaroni and cheese and green bean dinner. Comfort food x 10000000000. Home made pie for dessert! Oh yes! I would score big time on the home front!

Ummmm yeah. Not how it turned out at all. Dinner came out fine - but I was so focused on the main meal I total ruined the pie.

That's the second lesson here - remember to set your timer. First, I took the weights out too early and the damn crust shrunk up. It wasn't deep dish - it was a shallow saucer crust. Then I forgot to take it out and it got a little too toasty. Sigh.

Next - the filling came out great. I loved how tart it was. Nothing like four lemons worth of juice to get your pucker on. Of course since my "tart" (that was now it's official designation) was so shallow, I had tons left over. So I have a couple of custard cups left in the fridge. I plan on eating that out of the fridge as a midnight snack later on tonight.

Lastly - Lesson number three - never rush the meringue. Yes - it looked great but it wept like a baby who wants its mommy. So I got it over with quickly - served it, and let everyone make fun of me. So there!

Humbled again! Ah well - I think I will try the suggestions from the Daring Baker's board about cooking meringue in Cookwise. Maybe - just maybe-I can have a happy smiling pie just once. A girl can dream can't she?

PS Thanks to Jen (Canadian Baker) for giving me the chance to try try again!

Screw the Colonel - I am hanging with the General!!

I want to say this right up front - I love my daughter. love her love her love her. I also love a little peace and quiet with the hubby - and that is a hard thing to get when you are parents. Tony and I joke about how your romantic life gets put on hold the moment the doctor slaps the baby's butt. And every parent out there knows exactly what I am talking about. When our daughter was little, we would hire a sitter occasionally - just to see a movie that didn't star a G-rated animated critter. When she got older, it became a little harder - she liked watching the same movies we did and - even worse - she loved eating out with us as well. No private time for mom and dad. Last year, when Annie finally joined a club that met twice a month - we were so happy! Two and a half hours of face time! To do what WE wanted! Squeeee!!

For a long time, we used to go to Gallo's and get a couple beers, a snack and play gin. Lately, we have been using the time as an excuse to eat out at various restaurants. There are lots of little restaurants here in Columbus - stand alones that offer all kinds of really great food. I think that the average diner is scared of these places - it takes them out of the comfort zone provided by the big chain restaurants. But exploring is all about getting out of that comfort zone and trying something new - and the hubby and I love exploring (food..get your mind out of the gutter!).

This week, we went to General Tso's on Godown Road. Lisa over at Restaurant Widow had mentioned it a long while back, plus it had received a stellar review from Gail - who is very picky on how she spends her dining out dollars. We have purchased carry out from the restaurant before and been very please with the results. This time, we decided to eat in.

I am going to warn you - this place looks just like any other hole in the wall. But it's not. It's in disguise. Once you sit down - you know you are in an excellent restaurant.


To start we picked out beef tendon kikil and crab shu mai. The crab shu mai were good - but the beef tendon was fantastic. It is not your normal kinda dish - the waiter kinda ogled us incredulously and asked "You sure you want the beef tendon?" It a very deep beefy flavor, but the texture is very odd. You ever had jello skin? You know, the stuff that sometimes forms on the bottom of a bowl of jello if you don't stir it fast enough? its kinda thick and rubbery, but melts in your mouth as you eat it. You either like it or you don't - I loved it as a kid. The texture of beef tendon kikil reminds me of jello skin. I know that is kind of a weird analogy - but it is really the best description I could some up with. I mean gelatin is made from the collegian in bones and the tendon is really just cooked connective tissue that eventually become meltingly tender gelatin - but beefy. Well, you have to try it to see what I mean.


For the main course, we chose to order the Shabu Shabu, a shared hotpot for two. A pot of broth is placed over an open flame - danger and excitement!! It comes in beef and seafood - we chose the seafood. The pot of broth came loaded with a variety of different meats (fish cake, squid, shrimp and chicken among others) veggies and other stuff - like bean curd skin. You also got a raw egg and some glass noodles on the side. The whole procedure is to eat the contents of the pot down, then the waitstaff top it off with a little more broth, beat the egg and then add the glass noddles and finish eating the soup.

It was a blast. I love interactive food - I never got over wanting to play with my food despite my mother's best efforts. I like searching out little morsels, trying them, then finding the next bit to share with the hubby.

The staff was very friendly and helpful - even giving us instructions on how to tackle our hotpot.

So - yeah - We'll be going back to the General's very soon. If you get a chance, grab a hotpot with someone you love and share away - it's a great bit of food romance.

Making Dough!

A couple fun things have been going on - the first is I got to meet lots of new friends at the The Columbus Food Lovers Meetup Group. We met at Lee Garden for Dim Sum. I love meeting new people - it was fantastic! If you don't believe me -check out what the good folks in our group have to say ! We are thinking of meeting up at Anna's Greek Restaurant next time - if you would like to join us and have restaurant suggestions for future adventures, let us know.

I also wanted to let people know to keep tuned to Lisa's Blog - she should be announcing her fundraising event soon. I know that money is tight this time of year, but please remember that people need assistance every part of the year - not just at holiday time!

I hope every one has been having a happy new year! Did you resolutions involve learning something new this year? (I also hope all my readers are avoiding the evil flu that is going around. It's had our house incapacitated for over a week now. I love missing three days of work! Yes yes I do!)
Being boring old people, we had people come over to our house for New Year's Eve. We had a couple of beers and I made pizzas from scratch. Ever since I made potato bread with the daring bakers, I've really rekindled my love of working with yeast raised dough. I made a multi-grain bread recipe from Cook's Illustrated and then the pizza dough.

The Multi-grain bread - sorry I was a total slacker and did not take any pictures of it. Mostly because I was pissed off. I usually have good results with the recipes from Cook's Illustrated. True, I think their recipes can be a bit too "fiddly" at times - requiring too many steps to achieve "perfect" results. Sometimes I might settle for less than perfect if it will save me a hour of time. I was intrigued by this recipe for multi-grain bread because it called for using a multi-grain hot cereal. I thought I can afford that! I really hate buying 5 or 6 different ingredients for a recipe, only to be stuck with lots and lots of leftover materials and no idea what to do with them. It crams my already full pantry to bursting and even worse, it deflates my pocketbook.

Being as I am going to discuss specifics, I can't really reprint the recipe. While the list of ingredients isn't copyrighted, the instructions are. You can obtain a copy by cruising over to the Cook's Illustrated site and getting their 14 day free trial. Look for Multi-grain bread in the search engine. However, I can tell you a little bit about how the recipe works. The recipe calls for a natural multi-grain cereal that is combined with boiling water and then allowed to cool until it reaches about 100 degrees. Then the rapid rise yeast is added along with the sugars. You then mix in AP flour and whole wheat flour and proceed with the kneading and rising from there. This is the part that didn't work for me. The whole raising part. Yup - it just sat there mocking me. Damn yeasts. It could have been a couple of things - the rehydrate cereal could have been too hot. I did measure the temp with an instant read before throwing the yeast in - so I do not think that was the problem. The yeast could have been bad - but the other four packets I purchased from the same lot have been fine. So I thought that was probably not it either. My suspect was the AP Flour. The dough just didn't have that smooth glossy feel you get when you are producing gluten during the kneading process.

To confirm my suspicions, I went and got Shirley Corriher's book, Cookwise. She is my go-to gal when things go bad for me in the kitchen. Reading up on her recipe for multi-grain bread, she mentioned that small rough particles can puncture the gluten strands during kneading. True, in this case the grains were pretty finely ground, but AP flour may have been so low in protein that it didn't take much to sabotage the whole mess. So according to Shirley, I could make a batch of new yeast with added flour and knead it back into the mess to salvage the bread. To insure the whole gluten structure, I added a couple of cups of bread flour when making up my "salvage dough". Whoo hoo! victory over microbes achieved! The bread was OK in the end. I think the whole recipe has potential, but will require me to re-work it so I know it will work every time. I will let you know if anything develops.

The pizza dough on the other hand is a tried and true winner - it came from my favorite book "Bread in Half the Time". However, instead of doing their micro-rise system that turns you microwave into a proofing oven, I tripled the batch of dough and did everything the old fashioned way. The reason I love this dough so much is the cornmeal - I know that is kinda nontraditional, but I like thin crisp crusts under my toppings and this crust fits the bill. Of course having a pizza stone helps a lot too.



I did try to make this same dough into calzones – but the cornmeal dough was just not right texture.So back to the drawing board on that. Here are some pictures of the calzones in progress.

A note - I made too much dough for New Year's Eve so I stashed it in the fridge for a couple of days until I could use it. It still rose like a champ. Next time I am going to try and freeze it in small amounts to see if it is something that can be made ahead then thawed for the next evening's dinner.

Cornmeal Pizza Dough

2 C. bread flour
1/2 C. cornmeal
1 t salt
1 T nonfat dry milk
2 t olive oil
3/4 C. hot tap water (120°-130°F)
1 1/2 -2 t. 50% faster active dry yeast
1 1/2 t. sugar
1. Place the pizza stone in the upper third of the oven and preheat to 500°F for at least 30 minutes before baking.
2. Mix the bread flour, cornmeal, salt and dry milk in the bowl of your mixer fitted with a dough hook.
3. Mix the water, yeast and sugar together and let proof for about five minutes. It should look all bubbly on top.
4. Slowly mix the yeast/water mixture and oil into the flour with the hook. The dough should start to come together into a ball. If it stays crumbly, add some warm water little bit at a time until it comes together. Knead until the dough comes away from the side of the bowl.
5. Turn dough out onto floured surface and knead by hand for a few minutes until the dough feels smooth and elastic. Form into a ball and put into oiled bowl; cover with plastic wrap or tea towel. Rise until doubled.
6. Remove the dough to a lightly floured surface and knead by hand a few seconds. Then roll out into a circle. (Here is the tricky part. The original recipe made one 14” pizza. I roll mine so thin it makes two 10-12” pizzas. ) Place this disk on a pizza peel or a cookie sheet with no sides that has been heavily sprinkled with cornmeal. The cornmeal should act like little ball bearings and slide the pizza off the peel/cookie sheet with no problems. I will “test” the dough before I put the toppings on by shaking it a little bit to see if it will move freely.
7. Apply sauce and other toppings. (Be sparing with the sauce, too much will make the dough soggy. For a 12” round I will use 3-4 tablespoons.) My current favorite topping is fresh mozzarella, crispy bacon and finely diced onion, Yum Yum.
8. Lower the oven temp to 425°F .Carefully slide the topped dough onto the stone in the oven. (Please be careful – I still have burns healing from New Year’s) Bake for 8-10 minutes or until the cheese is melted and bubbly and the crust is nice and golden brown on the underside when you peek.
9. CAREFULLY!!! Slide the peel/cookie sheet back under the finished pizza and pull it out of the oven. This is tricky – it took a couple of tries the first time I did it and I messed up the pizza. Trust me, it gets easier with practice.
10. Let cool briefly before cutting and serving.

Ok - enough boring stuff!!! Went to Thurn's this past weekend to stock up on bacon and lo and behold! They had awesomely cool hats that said "oink" on the back. Go buy one - NOW! I command it!
Here is Tony representin'

Lincoln, Lincoln I've been thinkin' - What in the World have you been drinkin?

I have always been interested in Absinthe. The mystery, the history - the name of it just conjures up images of sitting in a cafe in Paris hobnobbing with the artists and writers of the Belle Epoque... The thing that has always stopped me is the fact that it was impossible to get here in the states. Recently, the rules have become more lenient and I figured I would order a bottle to share with my friends Tate and Moose, who has expressed an interest in it as well. So when the folks who run Buy Absinthe asked me to review their site, I said yes. As part of the review, I ordered a bottle of the green fairy and had it delivered to me. For free. Yup, I received remuneration for the text that is about to follow. So take that as you will.

Buy Absinthe consists of the website for ordering, plus a blog that extols the virtues of drinking the product. The website offers a limited selection of products from Spain and France, but does not stoop to offering some of the lesser products from Eastern Europe - which are basically grain alcohol with flavoring and coloring included. Absinthe is made by macerating herbs into grain alcohol which is then distilled. After the distillation, the product can be left clear or colored with either a second maceration of herbs or artificially colored. The best liquors use the all natural approach.

Buy Absinthe Alcohol does offer a FAQ on their product, which discusses how to serve the liquor, the possible side effects of drinking absinthe, as well of the legality of purchasing said beverage. The site is easy to navigate and gives a brief description of each item along with the cost and a button to add it to the shopping cart. The cost of shipping is the same or cheaper as many of their competitors.

After looking at all my options, I elected to purchase Bitter Abisinthe 72°, which seemed to be a fairly traditional product. However, several of their products were out of stock - all of the Lemercier brands plus some of the absinthe spoons, which I had planned to purchasing separately as part of the "ambiance". I ended up purchasing a bottle of Versinthe la Blanche - which has the same flavors as the green variety, but does not have the second infusion of herbs that give the drink it characteristic green color.

I ordered my bottle of "the white fairy" on December 12 - and received notification that it was waiting for me at the post office on December 29th. I did have to go and sign for it as a registered package. And no one came out and interrogated me about importing alcohol - honest! The bottle was well packed and survived it trip intact.

So that's it! The site has a limited number of products, but for a novice such as myself, it helped me narrow the field. The blog and the FAQ were useful for provided basic information on the product and the ordering process was painless. I had a very positive experience with Buy Absinthe and would use them again to purchase some of the Lamercier products should they become available.

The best $15 you will ever spend in a restaurant...

That's what Moose told me.

No kidding.

Here is the tale of how we discovered Anna's Restaurant. We have a friend called Moose. Yes. For real. That's his nickname. Moose loves to eat. He had mentioned Anna's to us a couple of times, but our schedules being what they are, we never had a chance to go. Then our friend Eric called us up and said "It was the best Greek food I've ever eaten." So now we were suitably intrigued.

Anna's doesn't look like much from the outside. It sits in a strip mall on Sawmill road just south of Hard Road. If you know where Sunflower Chinese restaurant is - then you know where Anna's is.

Two weeks ago, we stopped in for their Sunday Buffet. We stopped in again this past Sunday. Yup - it is that good.

Most of the internet sources for this restaurant list the place as being closed on Sundays, but this is not true. They have a awesome Greek buffet from 11:00am to 2:30pm every Sunday and have for about a year.

Anna's offers a full menu the rest of the week - So why am I recommending the buffet? A couple of reasons.

1) Try it before you invest: Let's say you you never had patstisio before. Would you want to order a whole plate of it just to discover it sucks? Heck no! ( not that their patstisio sucks-far from it - but you get my meaning)
2) Grazing: I would rather eat a small amount of multiple items than a serving of just one or two items. It allows you to discover foods that you would not have ordered a full portion of. Think of it as a tasting menu - poor man style.
3) You can have it all: soup, salad, entree and dessert - and multiple choices for each.
4) Price: Buffets definitely give you bang for your buck. Especially if you have a family. Anna's reduces the buffet prices for kids from 5-10 yrs and free food for kids under 5. A sure way to get your kids to try something new without wasting a bunch of money or food.

The buffet starts off with appetizers. Two salads - a lettuce based "Greek salad" and another type that is chopped tomatoes with onions, cucumbers, olives, and feta. It is lightly dressed with a vinegar and oil dressing. They also have bread rounds accompanied by big bowls of hummus and tzatziki sauce. The tzatziki is definitely homemade with Greek yogurt, and lots of fresh garlic and cucumber. Greek yogurt is really thick and tangy and makes this the best tzatziki sauce I've ever had. The hummus was good - but I can't tell if it is homemade or not.

Soups- there have been two: avgolemono and lentil. The lentil was good, but if I had to choose - I would go for the chicken egg and lemon soup.

Omelet station - yes - you can have omelets cooked to order. With veggies, feta and gyro meat. I admit, the hubby was skeptical, but it turned out to be a great combination. He wouldn't even let me have any - bastard. And best of all - the eggs were cooked corrected - moist and set but not dry and flavorless. Don't like your eggs cooked moist? I am sure they could ruin the dish if you ask.

Entrees and side dishes - Wow. Here is an embarrassment of riches. There were several dishes that were on the buffet both times: Pitas and gyro meat (for those that insist), pastitsio and moussaka, Dolmathes in avgolemono sauce, baby squid and cod (lightly battered and fried), lemon potatoes, green beans, spanokopita and tyropita - it is a pretty extensive list. The first week we went there were the best meatballs I've ever had. No kidding. Light, flavorful...hmmmmmmm

And lastly, Dessert - Yeah they had baklava. They also had several other dishes that were great - such as rice pudding and Greek yogurt with honey and fruit.


I also have to mention the staff. Friendly! Right on the spot with service despite that we were eating a buffet. An example: My hubby got a bad creamer for his coffee. The waiter noticed it from across the room and brought him new coffee without having to be asked. That's service!

So yeah - it was a pretty great way to spend my $15. I am very interested in eating from the regular menu soon. I would like to try more seafood dishes - I mean Greece is made up of islands....

Anna's Restaurant

7370 Sawmill Rd
Columbus, OH 43235

(614) 799-2207

C is for Christmas Cookie...

Ah yes...Cookie time!

It's tough being a cookie lady. Everyone asks if you are bringing them a sweet treat - and could you just do one special kind - just for them, of course. "Please - just one little batch - and if you have any of those wonderful pumpkin rocks - ooooooooh those too...and maybe...."

Well guess what? The cookie ladies aren't working this year. No cookies for you..or you..or you! So don't ask! No! I won't make chocolate chip cookies for the last time!!!

It is not as though we lacked Christmas spirit - Gail had her Santa hat on all week, and Debbie and I were heard humming Christmas tunes the last few days. It's a money thing folks - pure and simple. We have no dough - literally and figuratively!

So in contrast with years past - we only baked a few of our favorites to share with our families - plus a few select outsiders.

Sunday the 16th was the big payoff for the cookie conclave - I had to do the lion's share my baking at Gail's since my oven was down until the Thursday before Christmas.

As with every Cookie Conclave, the morning started off with mimosas - to properly lubricate the cookie makers. You can't get in the cookie making spirit without a little bit of social lubricant! Then, as we baked up some of the dough Debbie brought, we sat down and started going through all the new cookbooks we had purchased over the last year.

It was relaxing. We talked, we laughed and we ate a leisurely lunch of chicken and dumplings that we made from scratch. We had so much food that we ended up sharing it with some of the older ladies who live in Gail's complex.

After lunch, Debbie and I started a recipe for candy. They were called Kentucky Creams. It sounded good. Like creamy pulled caramels. So we boiled and boiled -then we pulled and pulled. Here is a pic of me and Deb pulling ourselves some new muscles. And guess what? Having never pulled candy in our lives- we over-pulled it. I had no idea you could. Here is what happens to candy when you over-pull it. It literally went from being sticky and stretchy to crumbling off my hands in a matter of seconds. Well so much for the great candy experiment!!

After that I went back to something I knew - pecan diamonds. I keep trying new recipes every so often because I lost my favorite one years ago. So far none of them have lived up to the memory of my beloved diamonds. Aren't they pretty though? Almost like candy on a crust. They are a bitch to cut though if you don't have a long sharp knife. Gail went to look for her son's pizza blade and came back with - um- something different instead.

We also made some of Debbie's crack corn, "Pay Day" cookies, brown sugar shortbread, Gail's pecan sandies, peanut brittle, spritz, and toffee. I made these awesome chocolate short bread cookies with a nice huge chunk of candy coated dark chocolate. The thing that made these really great? Gail knows a lady who is a product developer for Godiva. (Am I connected or what?!) This lady was kind enough to give us the better part of a 5 pound bag of Godiva coco powder. It is much higher in coco fat than most powders and has to be kept in the freezer to prevent rancidness. It makes a simple cookie like these really shine. The simpler the recipe, the more important the ingredients.

So where was Gail all this time? Was she slacking? Was she just sitting on her behind swilling mimosas and ordering us around? Oh no - Gail had a special responsibility this year. She was the stroopwafle specialist. While Debbie and I were ruining candy, Gail was risking life and limb filling these fantastic cookies with homemade caramel.

Wait? You don't know what a stroopwafle is?! Well we better take care of that situation right away. It is not a command given in the German army. "Drop and give me 20 stroopwafle!" Nor is a the castle where the vampire resides - "Good evening. I am Baron Stroopwafle.". Or in the original Stroopwaflian tongue it would sound like this - ""Guten Abend. Ich bein baron Stroopwafle" In reality, a stroopwafle is a Dutch cookie. It takes two crisp cinnamon scented wafer cookies and sandwiches that around a rich buttery caramel. They are meant to be eaten with coffee. According to "a source" (meaning I can't remember where I read it!), they are supposed to be placed over top of the coffee cup where the heat of the coffee softens the caramel. I got hooked on these from Trader Joe's. They have blue bags of these little tiny ittie bittie stroopwafles. Man - are they good! But driving to Trader Joe's isn't always an option, so I found a recipe in a magazine about three years ago. After playing with it some, we gals felt that it has become our own. The cookies themselves have become a permanent part of our repertoire and waistlines.

There are some special requirements for making these treats. The first is a pizzelle iron. That's how the cookies are made. I will be truthful here - I was never really crazy about pizzelles. They were an "ok" cookie. So I never purchased an iron. Gail and Debbie both have irons - thereby doubling our production. The second is a candy thermometer. Yes - these do require you to actually make caramel. We tried cheating with caramel sauces and melting ready made caramels. It just doesn't give you the proper results. If the thought of handling hot gooey syrupy luscious caramel frightens you - make friends who are fearless - like Gail!

I hope everyone had a great holiday - with or without cookies...

So without further blathering - here is the star of this year's conclave - Stroopwafles!

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup butter, melted and cooled
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

1. Stir together flour, baking pow­der, and cinnamon; set aside. Beat eggs on high speed about 4 minutes or until thick and lemon-colored. Gradually beat in sugar on medium speed. Beat in butter and vanilla. Beat in flour mixture on low speed.

2. Heat up your pizzelle iron according to the directions that come with it. You can either make large cookies or smaller ones based on the type of iron that you have. Place a tablespoon or more of the batter in center of each grid. You will have to experiment to see how much will work with your iron. Close lid. Bake accord­ing to manufacturer's directions. Use a spatula to transfer warm cookie to paper towel; cool. Repeat with remain­ing batter. How many finished cookies you will get depend on the size of your iron and how many you can resist eating fresh off the griddle.

3. Prepare Caramel Filling. Imme­diately spoon about a tablespoon or so filling onto a cookie then quickly cover filling with a “blank” cookie.

CARAMEL FILLING:

1 cup butter
2 1/4 cups packed brown sugar
One 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
1 cup light-colored corn syrup
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

This recipe makes a lot – no way around it. You can do what we do and double the batch of cookies or you can make candy.

To prep for making candy line 8x8x2-inch baking pan with foil. Butter foil; set aside.

To prep for filling cookies, you are going to need to find a way to keep the caramel liquid while you are filling cookies. Gail uses a glass bowl and a hot water bath, replacing the water every so often to keep everything hot. And speaking of hot – this stuff will burn you if you are not careful! I bought Gail a large spatula to hold the bottom cookie while she was drizzling the caramel over it. Saved a lot of wear and tear in her fingers.

In a heavy, 3-quart saucepan, melt butter over low heat. Stir in packed brown sugar, sweetened condensed milk, and corn syrup. Cook and stir over medium-high heat until mixture boils. Clip candy thermometer to side of pan. Reduce heat to medium; continue to boil at moderate, steady rate, stirring frequently, until thermometer regis­ters 248°F, firm-ball stage (about 15 minutes). Adjust heat as necessary to maintain a steady boil. Remove pan from heat; remove thermometer. Stir in 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Transfer mixture into heatproof cup to use to fill cookies.

If you are making candy, immediately spread remaining mixture evenly in prepared pan. When firm, use foil to lift it out of the pan. Using a buttered knife, cut caramel into 1-inch squares. Wrap each caramel square in plastic wrap. Makes 64 pieces.

TO STORE: Layer sandwich cookies between waxed paper in airtight con­tainer; cover. Store at room temper­ature up to 3 days. (I’ve kept them up to a week and they really didn’t seem to suffer) Or freeze unfilled cookies up to 3 months; thaw and fill.

Wow! I am getting my 15 minutes of fame from the Columbus Dispatch today!

The photo shoot was a lot of fun and it was great hanging out with all my fellow bloggers. My daughter told me that the rolling pin was the prefect prop.

For those of you who haven't had a chance to take a gander - Check it out!

I just wanted to let you know that I am still working up my report on the 2007 Cookie Confab plus I am going to share a new restaurant with you a little later this week. I am just glad the holidays are done!!

For anyone who would like to have something tasty and hang out with some fellow foodies - check out the Meetup group that Becke started. Our next get-together is January 6th. See our Meetup page for more details!

I feel a rant coming on!!!

Just so that you have been warned: This is a rant. I just wanted all of you to be aware of that before you went any further. Don't worry though - we will be taking frequent pitstops to give you a chance to wee (mentally speaking) as we travel along.

I went to the library recently and checked out The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved: Inside America's Underground Food Movements by Sandor Ellix Katz. It was an interesting read. It got me to thinking - which is the purpose Katz had in mind.

Every person who gives a tinker's damn about what they eat and how it is produced is caught up in the same conundrum - how can I do the right thing? And an even bigger question is - What is the right thing?

Yes- what is the right thing? Is it eating healthy? Is it eating local? Is it minimizing our impact on the environment? Is it eating organic? Is it eating to fit your budget? Can we do all these things at once or do you have to pick and choose? Should we be concerned about what other people do? Can we force people to stop doing things that are "bad" (whatever that means)?

It's all pretty freakin' confusing if you ask me. I'm a pretty average Joe. I really think about me and mine first. (And if you know someone who says they don't - they are a liar. Everyone puts self-interest first.) I worry about money. I worry about nutrition. I worry about getting the best products for my family. I worry about the long run - sustainable agriculture, global warming, agricultural run-off, the global food network among many other nagging, and sometimes disturbing, issues.

However, it comes down to where I have to make some choices. I have to decide what is most important and what criteria I am going to use to justify those choices. Is cost my biggest concern? Is good taste? Is eating local? Do I have to pick one over the other? Can there be compromises that will allow me to feel good about my choices or will they just leave me feeling like I wimped out?

BREAK!




So I sat down and asked myself - what really drives what I buy?

First - cost. I set a budget. It has to be. With all prices on the rise, it's a juggling act. Can I mend these pants? Can this car go for another year? And because it is something we really deal with every day - how can I make my food budget stretch? How can I get the most for the least?

Second- nutrition. With a teenager grazing through the pantry and fridge, I need to keep an eye on the types of foods I have in my house - based on nutritional needs as well as cost. Is buying red peppers out of season a bad thing? Can I justify the cost based on nutritional need? Are there other things I can buy or make that would be cheaper and just as nutritious?

Third - quality. If it is cheap and it sucks - no one will wear/use/eat it. Then it's just wasted - it fills up the landfill and drains the pocketbook. If I buy an off-brand of cereal (cost) that is has vitamins added (nutrition) and it still taste like the box it is packaged in - then I obviously didn't make the right choice.

Fourth - local and sustainable. Yeah - all the way down here. These two consideration make the top three much more likely to be met - in season. I buy from the farmer's markets. I am considering adopting a chicken and maybe even having a hog raised. I plant my own garden and can/freeze what I have room for. But here is the rub - we live in Ohio folks. I wish I lived in California - fresh produce all year round, but I don't. That means being a locavore is much harder than if I lived in a warmer clime. It's true I could devote myself to preserving a large amount of locally produced veggies for the winter table - but I work. A lot. I know the amount of effort it takes to "put by" enough food to get a family of four through the winter. I also know that some of the local farmers can and freeze their items, so that we don't have to do the work ourselves. But the cost! It would blow my food budget - and a couple other budgets as well - to buy enough to get me through the winter. So yeah - I am willing to do as much as I can to "Support My Local Farmer" and to eat local, but not to the extent that I am willing to sacrifice the first three items in the hierarchy.

BREAK!!




Fifth - organic. This is pretty much at the bottom of my list for a number of reasons. "Organic" - What does it mean? A lot of different things to a lot of different people. The way the USDA defines it is written in government-ese. Some other folks define it a little more simply. The way I define it - expensive and in some cases - a smoke screen. I've heard reports of unscrupulous vendors slapping an "organic" sticker on items to jack up to price. Maybe that is true-and maybe it's not. I know it's human nature to "cheat" when you think you are not going to get caught - so I am inclined to believe that it does happen on a fairly regular basis. Let's take a look at the red peppers mentioned above. If I have a food budget of $60 a week and regular "grow with every chemical know" peppers are on sale for $1.99/lb and the organic peppers are available for $3.99/lb - is it worth it? If my budget is $40 a week? If my budget is $20/week? (And yes, I have been that poor in my life.) Is eating organic a chance for "those who have" to differentiate themselves from "those that don't"? How about the farmer's market - a chance to level to playing field. Regular peppers were 25 cents each. Organic were much higher - at one point 75 cents each.

I think as the the food production system re-aligns itself with consumer demand, the prices will drop somewhat. However, growing organic is a risk for many farmers. The consumer has come to expect flawless produce. Sometimes at the farmer's market, you will see people avoiding things like greens that have obvious bug damage to them. Without chemicals, produce will go back to looking like it did in our grandparents day (or maybe great-grandparents for you young 'uns). This means damaged goods will not make it to the grocery stores - and it means the items that do will be more expensive to cover the waste.

So, as for organic produce, I will buy it when I can but it is not something I go out of my way for.

BREAK!!!




There ya are. Love me, hate me - that is the way things stand today. A year from now, five years from now - things may change. It's the nature of the beast. So thanks for staying with me to the end.

For those of you who liked my wayside stops, check out one of my favorite comics, Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal. I think it pretty darn funny.

Just a quick note: my cookie production is at a stand still. My ancient oven is acting up and have to get my landlord in to see if it can be repaired. And who knows how long that will take. Hey Gail! I think I'll be over this weekend to use your nice new oven!!!

Chicken!

Just a couple of quick notes this week - I am trying to get the holiday baking excitement off to a start this week!

First - I finally got to meet Denise of 2Silos at the first Worthington Winter Farmer's Market. I love her! Its so great meeting people who have passion for what they do. We spent a few minutes chatting between egg sales and I am thinking about adopting a chicken. I would love to get some great eggs on a regular basis and the thought of a fat stewing hen at the end of the whole thing excites me. With a little luck, I hope to drive up to the farm sometime in the near future to see the chickens do their thing. If we do adopt, I already have a name for my chicken. It will be Henrietta - named after the famous 266 pound chicken from "The Hoboken Chicken Emergency" by Daniel Pinkwater. If you never read this book as a kid - get it now. Even if you don't have kids.

The Winter Farmer's market was OK. There was not a lot of fresh produce available - which I kinda expected. Pies, cakes and other baked goods, canned goods, wool goods, and Christmas decorations really dominated. There was a group selling hydroponic lettuce, Wishwell Farms had some greenhouse tomatoes and the folks (sorry can't remember their names off hand) selling fresh mushrooms were there as well. I ended up buying some eggs from 2silos, a small bag of the lettuce to see how it tasted (it was acceptable), a small pecan pie from Meade Farms ('cuz I love them so much!!) and a $4 box of mixed mushrooms. I ended up making omelets with the mushrooms and eggs along with a small salad for dinner that night.

I really like the idea of the Winter Market, but without more things like root veggies and other long storage veggies on site - I may just be going for the eggs! Denise said she will not be back at the Winter Market until after the first of the year - so stay tuned.

Also, just a note to let you know that some of the local foodies here in town will be eating at MiMi's next Saturday the 8th around 2pm. If you are interested in stopping by for a bowl of pho and some food talk - stop on in!

That's about it for the moment - I'll be back with more sweet talk later!

Where's my dough?!

Daring Blogger November Challenge - Potato Freakin' Bread!

A big shout out to Tanna from My Kitchen in Half Cups for picking a potato bread recipe for this month's challenge.

I went through a phase about 8 years ago where I made homemade bread every weekend. No shit. I loved beating the hell out of the bread dough - it was a great stress reliever. Actually - I just went through a yeast raised whatever phase - rolls, cinnamon buns, bread, coffee cakes - you name it, we were eating it. My family was in heaven. Then I stopped. I don't know why - most likely a combination of ennui and a crushing work schedule. My family was very sad - my hubby even tried to bribe me into making sticky rolls. So now - after that great hiatus - I decided that yes, I would make potato bread. There was much rejoicing from the peanut gallery!

The first thing I would like to say is - I found the way the recipe was written was confusing. I had to read it about 4 times before I got everything squared away. I even read the whole thing out loud to the hubby (a technical ghost writer by trade) who made me re-read parts so that he could make sure he understood everything. I will try to point out several items that I thought needed clarification from the get-go as we talk about the process.

If you haven't made bread before, I would say there are better recipes to explore first. Why, you ask?

First, it is an atypical recipe. It uses some unusual ingredients compared to most bread recipes - All Purpose flour and potatoes. The recipe calls for 6.5 to 8.5 cups of flour - but the initial dough only accounts for 4 cups of that flour. The rest of it gets processed into the dough as you knead it for 10 minutes. (BTW, that was one of the things the recipe was not specific about. I would have liked to have seen a specific breakdown of how the flour was to be used at the beginning rather than have to extrapolate the information by deduction.)

Second, the dough is unusually wet and sticky. It reminds me more of a cookie or cake batter than a bread dough at "the mix everything together" stage. (I would have taken pictures of this step, but my hands were coated in goo!!) This is also not typical of most bread doughs. Combined with the need to knead in the additional flour, it really makes it hard to tell when the dough has come together. With traditional bread, you can almost feel the dough get glossy and smooth under your hands as the gluten develops. Not so in this case. It was still sticky even after I had added an additional 4.5 cups of flour. This also effected the shaping of the loaves and rolls as well. I was not about to stick this stuff onto my peel and try to slide it off into the oven. True, I could have used parchment paper - but better safe than sorry. (It was scary!!) I opted to bake the loaf in a glass pan. (I also thought the recipe was vague on the handling of the finished dough. It also talks about using a pan - then it talks about putting your loaves on a baking stone- but these were never individually addressed.)

Another thing that kinda bothered me was that I could not bake the rolls and the loaf at the same time. My oven is pretty darn small. So I placed the dough in the fridge to retard its rise while the rolls went full speed ahead. I got the loaf pan from the fridge about 20 minutes before I wanted to bake it and it ended up being perfect. I might try doing a slow overnight rise at some point just to see if it can be done. As a beginner, I would have had no idea what to do in this case.

Two other bitchy points and then I'll shut - I mean - sum up:

The recipe also said to mash the potatoes well - but the description said it should have 'lil chunks of potato. That seemed a contradiction to me. Using russets, I ran the well cooked potatoes through a ricer so that the potatoes had a almost fluffy texture, then dissolved into the water when it was added. So no 'lil chunks of tater for me.

I also thought that 1 cup of wheat flour wasn't enough to really give any flavor to the dough. I would trade out more wheat for white if I were to make this recipe again.

So over all - how did this bread rate?

Well, the bread came out of the oven very bland. We started eating the rolls as soon as they were cool enough and were not impressed. My hubby was very sad. However, upon letting everything set overnight, the flavor of the bread really came out. We ended up toasting the rolls in the toaster and then eating them with cream cheese and jam. The bread is still moist and fresh tasting two days after it came out of the oven.

The texture was soft and it had lots of nice nooks and crannies for holding melted butter. Even made nice sandwiches as it held up to lots of turkey and mayo without sagging.


It really wasn't a hard bread to make once I had puzzled out the instructions. It was a little bit fussy compared to my everyday loaf and much softer than I was used to. I kinda doubt I will make it again unless specifically asked to - and even then I will be looking for shortcuts to make it more "schedule friendly".

So to give folks a little clarification on the base recipe:

If you plan on making this bread, four cups of white AP flour and one cup of whole wheat go into the dough during the initial stage- you then knead in the other 2.5 to 5.5 cups of white AP flour. The dough will still be soft and a little sticky after the remaining flour is worked in.

If you are covering your rising bowl with plastic wrap, I would suggest hitting it with a little oil first. The risen dough will stick like glue to the wrap if you don't.

Baking time for the 9 x 5 loaf pan: I started at 450 degrees for the first 10 minutes and finished the loaf at 375 degrees for about 35-40 minutes. I baked it until the loaf sounded hollow when tapped on the bottom. I could not say if the same times and temps would hold true if you were to throw this same amount of dough onto a baking stone. If using a baking stone - definitely use parchment.

So that's it! The November Challenge is OVER! Bring on December!!

Tender Potato Bread
(from Home Baking: The Artful Mix of Flour & Tradition Around the World by Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid; who also wrote Hot Sour Salty Sweet)
Daring Bakers Challenge #13: November 2007

Host: Tanna (My Kitchen in Half Cups)
Post Date: Monday, November 26

Makes 1 large tender-crumbed pan loaf AND something more; one 10X15 inch crusty yet tender foccacia, 12 soft dinner rolls, or a small pan loaf

Suggested Toppings:

For Loaves and Rolls: melted butter (optional)

For Foccacia: olive oil, coarse salt, and rosemary leaves (optional; also see variation)

For Anchovy-Onion Focaccia: Instead of oil, salt, and rosemary, top with onions slow-cooked in olive oil or bacon fat, a scattering of chopped anchovy fillets, and flat-leafed parsley leaves.

Alternate fillings, seasons, shapes are up to you.

Conversion Chart for yeast:
1 oz/ 1 Tablespoon of fresh yeast = 0.4 oz/ 1.25 teaspoon active or instant dry yeast = 0.33 oz / 1 teaspoon instant or rapid rise (bread machine) yeast. Reference: Crust & Crumb by Peter Reinhart

Ingredients:

4 medium to large floury (baking) potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks.
Tanna Note: For the beginner bread baker I suggest no more than 8 ounces of potato; for the more advanced no more than 16 ounces. The variety of potatoes you might want to use would include Idaho, Russet & Yukon gold, there are others.

4 cups(950 ml) water, reserve cooking water
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
6 ½ cups to 8 ½ cups (1 kg to 1350g) unbleached all-purpose
1 tablespoon unsalted butter, softened
1 cup (130g) whole wheat flour

Making the Dough (Directions will be for making by hand):

Put the potatoes and 4 cups water in a sauce pan and bring to boil. Add 1 teaspoon salt and cook, half covered, until the potatoes are very tender.

Drain the potatoes, SAVE THE POTATO WATER, and mash the potatoes well. Tanna Note: I have a food mill I will run my potatoes through to mash them.

Measure out 3 cups(750ml) of the reserved potato water. Add extra water if needed to make 3 cups. Place the water and mashed potatoes in the bowl you plan to mix the bread dough in. Let cool to lukewarm (70-80°F/21 - 29°C) – stir well before testing the temperature – it should feel barely warm to your hand. You should be able to submerge you hand in the mix and not be uncomfortable.

Add yeast to 2 cups all-purpose flour and whisk. Add yeast and flour to the cooled mashed potatoes & water and mix well. Allow to rest/sit 5 minutes.

Note about Adding Yeast: If using Active Dry Yeast or Fresh yeast, mix & stir yeast into cooled water and mashed potatoes & water and let stand 5 minutes. Then add 2 cups of flour to the yeast mix and allow to rest several minutes. If using Instant Dry Yeast, add yeast to 2 cups all-purpose flour and whisk. Add yeast and flour to the cooled mashed potatoes & water and mix well. Allow to rest/sit 5 minutes.

Sprinkle in the remaining 1 tablespoon salt and the softened butter; mix well. Add the 1 cup whole wheat flour, stir briefly.

Add 2 cups of the unbleached all-purpose flour and stir until all the flour has been incorporated.
Tanna Note: At this point you have used 4 cups of the possible 8 ½ cups suggested by the recipe.

Turn the dough out onto a generously floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes, incorporating flour as needed to prevent sticking. The dough will be very sticky to begin with, but as it takes up more flour from the kneading surface, it will become easier to handle; use a dough scraper to keep your surface clean. The kneaded dough will still be very soft. Place the dough in a large clean bowl or your rising container of choice, cover with plastic wrap or lid, and let rise about 2 hours or until doubled in volume.

Turn the dough out onto a well-floured surface and knead gently several minutes. It will be moist and a little sticky.

Forming the Bread:
Tanna Note: It is at this point you are requested to Unleash the Daring Baker within. The following is as the recipe is written. You are now free to follow as written or push it to a new level.

Divide the dough into 2 unequal pieces in a proportion of one-third and two-thirds (one will be twice as large as the other). Place the smaller piece to one side and cover loosely.

To shape the large loaf:
Butter a 9 x 5 x 2.5 inch loaf/bread pan. Flatten the larger piece of dough on the floured surface to an approximate 12 x 8 inch oval, then roll it up from a narrow end to form a loaf. Pinch the seam closed and gently place seam side down in the buttered pan. The dough should come about three-quarters of the way up the sides of the pan. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for 35 to 45 minutes, until puffy and almost doubled in volume.

To make a small loaf with the remainder:
Butter an 8x4X2 inch bread pan. Shape and proof the loaf the same way as the large loaf.

To make rolls:
Butter a 13 x 9 inch sheet cake pan or a shallow cake pan. Cut the dough into 12 equal pieces. Shape each into a ball under the palm of your floured hand and place on the baking sheet, leaving 1/2 inch between the balls. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for about 35 minutes, until puffy and almost doubled.

To make focaccia:
Flatten out the dough to a rectangle about 10 x 15 inches with your palms and fingertips. Tear off a piece of parchment paper or wax paper a little longer than the dough and dust it generously with flour. Transfer the focaccia to the paper. Brush the top of the dough generously with olive oil, sprinkle on a little coarse sea salt, as well as some rosemary leaves, if you wish and then finally dimple all over with your fingertips. Cover with plastic and let rise for 20 minutes.

Baking the bread(s):

Note about baking order: bake the flat-bread before you bake the loaf; bake the rolls at the same time as the loaf.

Note about Baking Temps: I believe that 450°F(230°C) is going to prove to be too hot for the either the large or small loaf of bread for the entire 40/50 minutes. I am going to put the loaves in at 450°(230°C) for 10 minutes and then turn the oven down to 375°F (190 °C) for the remaining time.

Note about cooling times: Let all the breads cool on a rack for at least 30 minutes before slicing. Rolls can be served warm or at room temperature.

For loaves and rolls:
Dust risen loaves and rolls with a little all-purpose flour or lightly brush the tops with a little melted butter or olive oil (the butter will give a golden/browned crust). Slash loaves crosswise two or three times with a razor blade or very sharp knife and immediately place on the stone, tiles or baking sheet in the oven. Place the rolls next to the loaf in the oven.

Bake rolls until golden, about 30 minutes. Bake the small loaf for about 40 minutes. Bake the large loaf for about 50 minutes.

Transfer the rolls to a rack when done to cool. When the loaf or loaves have baked for the specified time, remove from the pans and place back on the stone, tiles or baking sheet for another 5 to 10 minutes. The corners should be firm when pinched and the bread should sound hollow when tapped on the bottom.

For foccaia:
Place a baking stone or unglazed quarry tiles, if you have them, if not use a no edged baking/sheet (you want to be able to slide the shaped dough on the parchment paper onto the stone or baking sheet and an edge complicates things). Place the stone or cookie sheet on a rack in the center of the oven and preheat to 450°F/230°C.

If making foccacia, just before baking, dimple the bread all over again with your fingertips. Leaving it on the paper, transfer to the hot baking stone, tiles or baking sheet. Bake until golden, about 10 minutes. Transfer to a rack (remove paper) and let cool at least 10 minutes before serving.