Take time to stop at Putt4Fun Family Fun Center on Mentor Avenue and you will discover a treasure of treats. The Confectionary Cupboard makes it home in the same building as the mini golf clubhouse. Fantastic cupcakes made from scratch in an array of flavors are served everyday except Sunday.
My son who is a picky eater, LOVED the cupcake I purchased, that was placed in a box and tied with a ribbon.
www.confectionarycupboard.com

Almost too pretty to eat.

Way back in 1977, we travelled to the plumbers’ convention in Columbus. I always enjoyed travelling, so this trip was A-OK to me, despite the fact that it was a plumbers’ convention…in Columbus. When evening came, my parents told us they were going out without us. Frank and I could barely contain ourselves; we were going to be on our own in another city! But, being only 15 and 12 at the time, it was not to be. We watched our freedom slip away as cash was handed to the 19-year old son-of-a-plumber who was entrusted to take us out to eat that evening. Sorry, I need to correct that last statement, “the 19-year old vegetarian son-of-a-plumber who was entrusted to take us out to eat that evening.”

I don’t remember too much about the older kid. He was nice, but he wasn’t about to let us have any say in the choice of restaurant because, “I always wanted to try this one Mediterranean vegetarian restaurant that I’d heard about.” This was the first time I had eaten dinner with a vegetarian and I surely had never been in a Mediterranean vegetarian restaurant.

The tables were low and everybody was pretty close to the ground. The room was dark and the young man seemed to share a common bond with the people (read: hippies) close to us. Realizing that Frank and I were out of our element, he ordered for us. We had falafel, pita bread, hummus, and other Mediterranean vegetarian fare. I distinctly remember two things from that evening. One, we struck up a conversation with an older man who claimed to go entirely animal-free, including making his own shoes from hand-woven plant fibers. Two, I fell in love with falafels. I remember thinking this was the craziest, most awesome experience of my youth, and it really opened my eyes to a broader world of culture and cuisine that I otherwise never could have experienced. Not many people can say that their cultural boundaries were broadened by a plumbers’ convention in Columbus. I can.

As you might guess, I love Mediterranean food, and one of the challenges to making your own bread for a year is that you cannot just zip into Aladdin’s bakery and get a 5-pack of pita bread every time you want to make falafel. However, it turns out to be pretty easy to make. For those of you who wonder how to make the pita pocket, the answer is simple- it makes itself. You simply place a flat, round piece of risen dough in the oven and the internal steam expansion tears apart the inside of the bread, blows it up like a balloon, and allows it to cook rapidly (about 4-5 minutes). Like all breads, there is a subtlety to the recipe and there are a thousand variations. The basic pita bread can be made with 100% all-purpose flour, but this whole wheat recipe is for Sister Alice, who has been patiently waiting for me to post this.

Whisk together:
1 cup warm water (105-110F)
1 TBS Honey or Sugar
1 packet instant yeast (2-1/4 tsp.)

Allow to stand 10-15 minutes until foamy.

In the mixing bowl combine:

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup unbleached bread flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt

Fold liquid ingredients into dry ingredients until blended. Hand-knead or mix with bread hook on low or “2”. Continue mixing/kneading 10-12 minutes. Add flour or water as needed to get desired consistency. Dough should not stick to sides of bowl and should be only very lightly tacky to the touch.

Place dough in greased bowl, allow to rise 1 hour, or until dough expands 2X original size. Punch down, and lightly roll out dough to remove air pockets. Roll dough into a cylinder and cut into 8-10 pucks. Warm oven to 425F with a cookie sheet or (preferentially) a bread stone on the lower rack. Let the pucks rise another 10 minutes on a floured surface before rolling them out to a diameter of 6 inches. Place one or two rolled-out pitas directly on the sheet/stone and bake for 3-4 minutes. The flattened dough should blow up like a balloon during this time. Flip and cook another 1-2 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to rest. Repeat for all of the rolled-out pitas.

NOTE: The bread will be very stiff and puffed up when it comes out of the oven. Be patient. There is still steam inside the bread pocket. Letting each pita rest about 3-4 minutes will return moisture to the bread and will let it relax into a soft, flattened form. Do not rush this rehydration/relaxation process or you will ruin the texture and the pocket formation. Add homemade falafel, hummus, and tzatziki sauce, and now we can eat.

I haven’t been this excited about Thanksgiving since I was a little kid. We always had dinner early in those days, so early that you woke up to the smell of turkey cooking. Mom would start the turkey around 7AM and we would eat in the very early afternoon- the ultimate blue plate special. The bird was always enormous. In fact, I was probably 30 years old before I realized that most turkeys are actually under 20 LB, and that most cook in about 4 hours.

In those days, it was all Mom. She the baker, the roaster, the head chef, the pastry chef, the decorator, the organizer, the shooer of small children from her work area, supremely balancing the need to keep us out of her way while still keeping us close enough to take a share in the preparation. Now, my extended family’s meals are more community efforts, each bringing their own signature dish to the feast. Today’s Thanksgiving is many people vying for kitchen space, figuring out how to get one oven to produce eight hot dishes all at once, maneuvering massive amounts of food onto one small table, trying to sample a little bit of everybody’s offering, all the while stealing glances at your own offered dish, hoping that your bowl is being emptied faster than the others- the ultimate sign of success.

This year I am also the baker of dinner rolls, and I couldn’t be more thrilled. To put bread on the table is essential to Thanksgiving. It is as much a sacred passage as the first time you are asked to carve the turkey. These two tasks of tantamount importance are not given to just anybody, and I realize I have a great responsibility. If I fail, this will be taken away from me, and I will be like a starting quarterback who is asked to sit on the bench. To keep from being benched next season, I plan to make three types of dinner roll. The first is based on a Challah bread recipe, rich and slightly sweet. The second is a kimmelweck rye, potent and sweet with molasses. The third is a seasoned herbal egg bread that will float through the senses like an ether.

I will also make a vegetarian stuffing for Lisa and Alfred using home-baked, herb-infused rolls. The rolls were chopped into cubes, allowed to dry for three days, and will be incorporated into a recipe of wild rice, mushrooms, vegetable broth, toasted walnuts, chopped celery, and dried cranberries. The stuffing is baked for one hour at 350F. It sounds yummy. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

To my mother, my father, Frank, Belinda, and Cathy and to all my family, I wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving.

This always happens to me. I get halfway good at something, immediately think I’m an expert, and start getting way too complex for my own good. However, this time I think I actually pulled it off.

The philosophy behind this week’s bread comes courtesy of “The Bread Bible”, p. 30-39, and involves the making of a pre-ferment the night before. The recipe for a pre-ferment is very similar to the bread being made- yeast, water, flour, sugar- but it is made the night before and is folded into new bread dough the following day. The purpose of the pre-ferment is subtle, it adds a complexity to the taste and texture of the bread.

Here’s how it works. Pre-ferment is made, allowed to rise, and refrigerated for tomorrow’s loaf. The next day, new bread dough is made with new yeast eating new flour and sugar. The older pre-ferment is added in small pieces and folded into the new bread. The pre-ferment is now rising at a slower rate than the new yeast. The pre-ferment has also had plenty of time to break down its flour into flavorful byproducts. The end result is an added complexity of flavor and a unique combination of large and small cells as the new and old yeasts produce carbon dioxide at different rates.

I have only begun to explore this new sensation, but think I may be able to produce a bread similar to sourdough using this technique. My bread was very good, it had a nice combination of medium and small sized cells in the crumb, it held up very well through the week, and it seemed to be a very good start to exploring this technique.

The Chautauqua Institute is a very special place for me, especially at that time of year when the leaves are more red than brown, and the few people that are still here are busy zipping up their houses for the winter. I couldn’t be happier, a perfect view across the near-empty square, cooking breakfast for two in our suite, and reminiscing about the last time I cooked breakfast at the St. Elmo’s Chautauqua, the day after we got married twelve years ago. Well, I suppose one thing could make me happier…if I had some toast to go with my ham and eggs.

Even in this idyllic setting, with no toast to soak up the yolk, my thoughts turn to bread. So, even before we pack up the car, I’m already thinking about baking this week’s loaf.

We brought three bread books with us, my wife occasionally reading passages to me as we wind through the Western New York countryside. We’re in no hurry today, so we take local roads all the way home. We see some things we never saw before, and stumble across the Cross Roads Market in Westfield, NY. Among the local merchants, we find the ladies who run Spice Harbor. They have every herb, spice, rub, and seasoning under the sun, and their prices are very reasonable. When I spotted the big 3 oz. bag of caraway seeds for only $1.19, I knew exactly what was missing from this morning’s breakfast…rye toast!

The book recipe calls for 1-1/2 cups rye flour and 3 cups all-purpose or bread flour for a single loaf. No wonder rye bread weighs so much! Though still a novice, I know that rye flour has so much whole grain that it will crumble if mixed with standard A/P flour. I’m going to ignore this nonsense about using A/P flour and go straight to the higher gluten bread flour for this recipe. Otherwise, I’m sure the bread will be crumbly by Wednesday.

The resultant dough is so thick it is almost unnatural. Watching it mix on the KitchenAid, I think I must’ve done something wrong. I kept a close eye on the dough, just because I never saw my mixer work so hard and I wanted to make sure nothing went awry. Everything was fine but, as my mother just advised me this evening, it’s good to be on top of things in the kitchen.

The bread was fabulous. Before baking, I brushed the top with egg and sprinkled it with coarse salt and caraway to get a “Kimmelweck” effect. The caraway from the spice ladies was so pungent and so fresh. The bread held up nicely through the week and did not crumble, even when I made Friday’s sandwich with 5-day old bread. My Piece d’resistance was a vegetarian Patty Melt using Boca Burger, sautéed onions and Swiss cheese. I don’t ever remember chewing bread and having such a feeling of satisfaction.

I’m projecting my voice around the corner of my kitchen into the living room, to be sure I’m being heard, “I don’t mind hand-kneading dough in order to learn, but I get a feeling this is going to get old pretty fast. Maybe by the time Christmas rolls around I’ll have a KitchenAid with a bread hook, huh?” I’m dropping my usual, subtle hint regarding my preferred Christmas present, but my wife is (as always) a step ahead of me and already has the KitchenAid in the Christmas closet. She sees how much work it is to hand-knead bread every week, and decides that Santa needs to come a little early this year. So, the next morning, I come downstairs and find a ribbon wrapped around a brand-new KitchenAid. My wife is the best. Honestly, who could ask for anything more?

These KitchenAid devices can be used to make pasta, mix batter, knead dough, whip meringue, grind sausage, and anything else you can conceive, as long as you buy the right attachment. The bread hook, the whisk, and the batter-mixer come with the KitchenAid, so I was sold before I even took it out of the box. I knew this would be a superior way to make bread and that it would be useful in the kitchen in many other ways.

When adapting to a new technology, it is important to establish a home-base, so this week we make basic white bread. This recipe may seem pretty average, but it is a jump-off point to more complex recipes.

BASIC WHITE BREAD

Combine:
¼ cup buttermilk
¾ cup water
1-½ TBS sugar
1-½ TBS butter
Heat to dissolve, allow to cool to 100-105F
Add 1 packet fast-rising yeast, stir to dissolve

In mixing bowl Add:
1-½ cups All-purpose flour
1-½ cups bread flour
1 tsp. salt

Mix dry ingredients and slowly add liquid until all ingredients are blended. Hand-knead or mix in KichenAid on low. Continue mixing on “2” or hand-knead 10-12 minutes. Add flour or water to get desired consistency. Dough should not stick to sides of bowl and should be only very slightly tacky to the touch.

Place dough in greased bowl, allow to rise 1 hour, or until dough expands 2X original size. Lightly roll out dough to remove air pockets, roll-up, pinch in the ends, and place seam-side down in a greased bread pan. Allow to rise one hour or until bread crown is just cresting over the top of the bread pan. Optional: Brush with egg wash and coat with sesame seeds

Bake at 400F for 30 minutes. Two ways to check when bread is ready: 1) When thermometer reaches 190F. 2) Lift the bread out of the pan, thump the bottom, and listen for a hollow sound.

Buttermilk Honey Wheat Bread

Double-sift into bowl:
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 cups unbleached bread flour
½ tsp. baking soda
1 packet (2-1/4 tsp.) fast-acting yeast
1 tsp. salt

Whisk together :
1-1/4 cup buttermilk (room temp)
1 TBS olive oil
3 TBS honey

Fold wet ingredients into dry ingredients. If dough is too dry and crumbly, add SMALL amounts of water or buttermilk. If dough is too sticky, add extra flour as needed to achieve a non-sticky dough. Hand-knead or mix in KitchenAid on “1” or “2” for 15 minutes. Place dough in a well-oiled bowl and allow to rise to 2X volume, about one hour. Punch down dough, roll into shape that will fit into a greased bread pan, let rise another one hour, or until crest of dough just peaks over the top of the bread pan. OPTIONAL: Egg-wash top and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Bake at 375F for 30 minutes. Internal temperature should be 190F, or remove bread from pan and listen for a hollow sound when bread is thumped on the bottom.

Alternatively: This can be made as a loaf or divided into about 8 small rolls. If baking rolls, cut loaf into 8 smaller pieces, roll into shape, place on a pre-heated floured pizza stone and bake until internal temperature of rolls is 190F.

This week’s bread is a stretch challenge. We made a French onion soup, which calls for soup to be ladled over a toasted baguette. Gruyere cheese is layered on top and the soup crock is broiled until the cheese is brown and bubbly. I can’t make a baguette yet (yes, it’s on the list of things to eventually learn). I need a baguette substitute and need bread for the rest of the week. So, what do I do? My limited knowledge said to take last week’s honey buttermilk whole-wheat recipe and make rolls. I’ll have something for the soup and something for the rest of the week. I reconstructed the recipe using bread flour in place of all-purpose flour and reshaped the bread loaf into six individual rolls. The rolls are sliced horizontally, then toasted, and then placed in the soup bowls.

The soup was so rich I had to take a nap before I finished. I’m not kidding. I placed my half-eaten bowl of soup on the counter, laid down on the couch, and floated into a world of culinary-induced coma. The “toasted baguettes” had wonderful flavor and texture, and they held up pretty good despite being soaked in hot beef broth for the duration of my nap. The flavor of the bread was better than any baguette I’ve ever had in a French onion soup, and the earthiness of the toasted whole wheat complemented the deep, rich flavor of the soup and the intense Gruyere. It was a winner. Given a chance to remake this soup with my toasted roll slices or go to a bakery and make the soup with a fresh-baked baguette….I’ll take my version. It was really good.

As for the fate of the other rolls, they were made into sandwiches which held me for the remainder of the week. One super-sandwich on whole grain bread can go a long way. There was no need to pack more than one sandwich a day. We’re getting really close to publishing this recipe.

Sr. Mary Jeanne’s smile is a little wider than usual when she leans forward and says, “Once you learn to bake your own good bread, you’ll realize why they call it the staff of life.” I can tell she is amused by the tales told by the neophyte bread baker sitting across the desk from her, but I can also see she likes the idea that I’m diving head-first into this challenge. I’m eager to learn anything I can from Sr. Jeanne, because the Sisters of Notre Dame have a reputation for being handy in many areas of what we used to call Home Economics. They are taught to sew, knit, crochet, cook, garden, make jams and jellies, bake, and anything else to be as self-sufficient as possible. Sr. Jeanne’s knowledge of the subject tells me that she’s probably baked at least a couple hundred loaves of bread in her lifetime, maybe more. When I asked for some advice about baking breads with whole grain, this is what she said:
1) If you are making white bread, unbleached all-purpose flour is OK, but bread flour is better.
2) The more whole-grain flour you add, the more difficult it becomes to use AP flour.
3) Why? Flours contain gluten, which forms a connective network that bonds bread to itself. Adding whole-grain flour adds bran to the matrix and destroys the gluten’s connectivity.
4) To compensate, whole wheat breads need a higher-gluten bread flour to help bind the matrix.
5) Use bread flour any time you mix with a high-fiber flour like rye flour or whole wheat flour.
6) The differences in flour come from the type of wheat, how it is milled, and when it is harvested.
7) Some things you just have to figure out for yourself. Just keep baking and you’ll learn.

Day One
My bread challenge started as a side-experiment in my original quest for the ultimate homemade pizza. I make a lot of pizza. I’m constantly exploring new ideas, crossing my fingers that a certain new twist will bring me closer to my goal of being the best. Bobby Flay, do you hear the footsteps behind you? No? OK. Just checking.

My first “bread” was actually pizza dough re-shaped and baked like bread. It made a pretty decent sandwich, but it was not quite there. However, I learned two things from this first try: 1) pizza dough is not the same thing as bread, and 2) hey, I made edible bread on my first-ever try.

I reloaded and decided to try an actual bread recipe and forget about pizza for a while. After all, I need to learn how to make bread, not adapt pizza dough to a secondary purpose. My second loaf was a buttermilk honey wheat. Slightly complex, but not too crazy for a first-ever bread recipe. I won’t post the recipe until I am satisfied I’ve ironed out all the details, so be a little patient. Once I declare a recipe a winner, I’ll be sure to share it with you. The initial recipe called for 1 cup whole wheat flour, 2 cups all-purpose flour, honey, yeast, buttermilk, and a pinch of salt. I hand-kneaded the dough for 15 minutes, let it rise for one hour, punched it down, and let the loaf rise again in a buttered bread pan. The risen loaf is brushed with an egg wash, sprinkled with sesame seeds, and baked at 375 for 30 minutes. The Good: The finished product came out HUGE! Fresh from the oven, I could smell the buttermilk before I even opened the oven door. The fresh, hot bread had the subtle sweetness of the honey, the nutty flavor of the toasted sesame, and the rich texture brought on by the wheat flour. The end pieces were fiercely fought over. The Bad: Over the course of the week the bread became crumbly, telling me I missed some fine-tuning. Was it moisture content? Time of kneading? Maybe I need a special flour. Next Step: Explore flour types to see if I can learn something before next week’s loaf of bread.

This was the jump-off point to my second culinary quest of the year- learn how to bake bread. I hope you’ll have fun following along over the next year as a chemistry teacher stumbles through the learning curve of baking…not to become the best, but just to be able to put bread on the table for an entire year.

Next installment… A conversation about flour with Sister Mary Jeanne, S.N.D., and another bread recipe.