7/52: Leftover loaf

While tidying out my flour shelf I noticed a number of half-empty (or should that be half-full) bags of flour that had been ignored for far too long. Many years ago, when food preparation in our house was a little more haphazard, and cooking was minimal being only for two, I found an old bag of flour at the back of the cupboard. Eager to make something new, I pulled out a cake recipe and started measuring out the flour. It took a little time for me to notice that the flour seemed a little livelier than it should. On closer inspection, I noticed it was actually moving. There were weevils in my flour! Now, I always assumed that weevils were something only salty sea-dogs strained through their teeth on 18th century ocean voyages, but here they were, happily inhabiting my home. A frantic clearing, scrubbing and disinfecting followed. From that day on, I have a paranoia of leftover flour, and what might move in.

So to use up those half-bags, Ruby and I decided to make a leftover loaf. We amalgamated Dove’s farm malthouse flour, rye, and wholewheat, and topped it up with white bread-flour to make the required amount. The resulting dough seemed a little drier than usual, so not expecting much, we left it to rise for slightly longer than normal. What greeted us was a perfect dome of bread dough, something we’ve never achieved when trying much harder!

Leftover loaf .
(The flour measurements are a bit rough, and the recipe is based on Paul Hollywood’s basic bloomer)

350g malthouse flour
70g rye flour
50g wholewheat flour
30g bread flour
10g salt
7g fast yeast
40ml olive oil
320ml water

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl. Stir with your hand to get a claggy dough. Tip out onto a floured surface and knead vigorously for 10 minutes or so. Place back in the clean, oiled bowl and leave to rise for about 1 1/2 hours. When risen, knock the dough back and form into a oblong shape. Leave to rise again on a baking tray for about an hour (we always put our tray in a roomy plastic bag to stop a skin forming). Pre-heat the oven to 220 c, and place a small tray of water in the bottom. When the dough has risen again into a nice dome shape, spritz with water, dust wit flour, and cut 3 or 4 diagonal slits on the top. Bake in the oven for 30 minutes or until the base sounds hollow when you knock it. Leave to cool on a wire rack. Slather with butter. Eat smugly.

 “terrific! smelled beautiful! hope we can bake it again!!!!”

6/52: Pizza Friday

Everyone has their Best Pizza Ever story. That holy grail found once and never repeated. Ours was before Ruby’s time,  in a quaint little pizzeria in the Tuscan Hills on our first Italian trip. It was the perfect pizza, cooked in a wood-fired oven in front of us by the charming owner who spoke no English, a thin slightly chewy base smothered in fresh tomato sauce, dripping with mozzarella and locally cured meats. We gorged ourselves while child no. 1 slumbered on the banquette beside us. We talked about that pizza for years after.

On returning to the same area some years later with Ruby in tow, we resolved to find this pizza-haven but having forgotten its name and the village it lay in, we only drew puzzled shrugs from anyone we asked. No one had heard of this little pizzeria high up in the hills. Beginning to doubt our sanity we outwardly gave up, keeping only half an eye out as we drove around. One afternoon, having gotten lost yet again on the way back from the nearest town, we drove past it. What had fastened in our minds as a picturesque little trattoria was actually a mundane little bar called Il Passagero, with a handful of nonagenarians seated on plastic chairs outside. Skidding to a halt, we abandoned the car and raced inside. Sure enough it was the same place, with the same owner and his little wood-oven behind the bar.

Our memories hadn’t deceived us, it was still the best pizza ever. And the owner was as charming as ever, for while ours were merely round, Ruby got the  Best Heart-shaped Pizza Ever…

Best Homemade Pizza Ever.

Friday is always pizza night in our house. Back in the day when time was cheap Ruby’s dad made it, using the bread-maker to knead the pizza dough and piling on whatever toppings came to mind. Lately it’s been Dominos, which has become more and more uninspiring as a Friday treat. So much so that this week there was a cry for homemade once more. Ruby and I rolled up our sleeves and set to making our best handmade pizza ever. Incidentally, this is the first time child no. 1 (aka Jude) showed any interest in our baking endeavours, and made his own.

Pizza dough (compiled from many, many different recipes)

250g bread flour
5g quick yeast
5g salt
30ml olive oil
180ml water
semolina for dusting

Easy tomato sauce

140g tin of tomato puree
2 garlic cloves crushed
large pinch of oregano / basil
large glug of olive oil
tablespoon of water
large pinch of salt
grind of pepper

Put the flour, yeast and salt in a large bowl. Add the olive oil and water in a well in the centre. Mix all the ingredients together to form a claggy dough. Tip out onto a floured surface and knead vigorously for 10 mins. Place back in the clean, oiled bowl and leave to prove for about an hour or until doubled in size. Meanwhile combine all the ingredients for the tomato sauce, give it a good mix, and leave to stand.

When the dough has risen punch down and tip out onto a half floured, half semolina-ed surface. Pre-heat the oven to 220-230c with a pizza stone or baking tray inside. Divide into three pieces for small pizzas, or two for larger pizzas. Roll out each piece into a rough circle with a rolling pin. Or if you’re feeling brave squish each piece flat and then toss and twist to create a circle (we have yet to master this technique).  When the dough is nice and thin spread with the tomato sauce and top with mozzarella and any topping of your choice, followed by a sprinkling of olive oil to make it nice and oozy. Then remove the pizza stone/baking sheet from the oven and slide the pizza on very carefully!

Bake for 10-15mins in the very hot oven until the top is browned and bubbling, and the base is cooked.

Ruby stuck to plain Marguerita with onions, Jude topped his with salami, while the grown-ups threw caution to the wind and plastered on goat’s cheese, pineapple, sundried tomatoes and chopped onions, drizzled with chilli oil. While maybe not quite up to the mythical standards of Il Passegero pizzas, our offerings were deliciously decadent, far better than the expensive cardboard cut-outs delivered to our door.

And for the life of us, we still can’t remember the name of the the little village…

  “the best pizza I ever had”.

5/52: Pancake tuesday.

Now I know pancakes aren’t loaves, and the only relationship they have is a floury one, but as I’ve developed an addiction for another Shrove Tuesday tradition, we decided we’d have two Northern European Lenten staples together in the true spirit of ‘Fat Tuesday‘. I love the way that the penitential Britons and Gaels call their pre-Lenten blow-out after a guilt-ridden infatuation with sinning, confession and contrition, and everyone else gets to do Mardi Gras, but that’s just us.

Ruby insisted on making the pancake mix, so I concentrated on the Semla cakes. This batch turned out even better than the last, so I don’t think we’ll be restricting ourselves too much in the coming 40 days…..Tuesday’s not the only thing that’s going to be fat in our house.

4/52: Semlor

We’re falling a bit behind on our 52 project, not with baking as such, but recording it and posting it. It’s all quite challenging. So even though we’re halfway through February, we’re still only on loaf no. 4! Time to up our game.

Anyway, last week we decided we wanted something sweet, and as I’m obsessed with all things Scandinavian (must have some Viking blood in me somewhere) we pounced on the chance to make Semlor, little cardamon flavoured buns all the way from Sweden. Not strictly a loaf, I’ll grant you, but there’s yeast and rising involved so we think they qualify.

Semlor were originally eaten on Shrove Tuesday, or Fat Tuesday, at the start of Lent, as a last taste of luxury before the punishing 40 days of self-denial ahead. For us, they’re a little bit of Scandinavian indulgence on a cold February day.

Semlor (adapted from Donal Skehan’s recipe)

700g plain flour
140g caster sugar
Pinch of salt
2 tsp freshly ground cardamon
350ml milk
14g dried yeast
150g butter, softened
1 large free range egg

Almond paste
250g skinless blanched almonds (we used 2 packets of chopped almonds)
225g caster sugar
A few tbs milk
Icing sugar to dust
750ml cream, whipped

Melt the butter in a pan and add the milk, heat until it’s lukewarm. Mix in the yeast (we added the yeast to the dried ingredients instead).

Bash the cardamon seeds in a pestle and mortar until finely grinded. Add to the flour, yeast, sugar and salt. Make a well and pour in the butter/milk mix along with the egg. Bring together as a dough, tip out onto a floured surface and knead well for 5 minutes. Place in a bowl, cover with cling-film or a cloth and leave to prove for about 45 mins or until it has doubled in size.

Pre-heat the oven to 190c. Knock back the dough and divide into 18 pieces. Roll each piece into a ball and place on a baking sheet covered with baking paper (we forgot to do this and all our little buns stuck). Leave to rise again for 20 minutes. Brush with a little beaten egg and bake for about 10 minutes. Leave them to cool on a wire rack while you make the almond paste.

Blitz the almonds and caster sugar in a food processor. Add a few drops of milk to make a thick paste. Chill this in the fridge until solid.

Bring the buns together by cutting out a triangular piece from the top. Scoop out a little of the crumb and mix it with the grated or crumbled almond paste and some milk. Fill the insides of each bun with the paste and top with whipped cream. Put their little hats back on and sprinkle with icing sugar.

Ruby wasn’t keen on the almond paste and insisted on filling hers with raspberry jam instead. I subsequently found out that this is how they eat them in Finland (maybe there is a Viking gene in there after all). Either way, they’re meltingly delicious.

Oh and she discovered a great way to keep my phone clean too! And it’s still usable…..

Ruby says: “delicious, even with raspberry jam”.

3/52: Stout bread.

Well, this one didn’t turn out quite as well as it should. But I know my mistake (impatience) and hopefully I’ve learnt from it. We wanted to make a soda bread, supposed to be the easiest bread to make, but fancied making it a little more fancy than just plain old brown bread. So, we decided to make Paul Hollywood’s stout bread (bit of a Hollywood lovefest going on in our house at the minute). Ruby was slightly concerned she may get drunk from it, but during a lengthy explanation on the evaporation of alcohol in the cooking process, she decided she wasn’t that bothered.

We assembled our ingredients and after three additional trips to the shops, still managed to have the wrong flour. But we did remember the stout and buttermilk, which in my mind are the most important bits.

(Paul Hollywood’s Stout Bread)

550g/1lb 4oz wholemeal flour (I used half coarse wholemeal and half strong wholemeal due to a shopping list malfunction. Not sure if it really worked)
200g/7oz plain flour
2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp dark brown sugar
300ml/½ pint stout (us being Dubliners it has to be Guinness)
220ml/8fl oz buttermilk

Pre-heat the oven to 230c/450f. Get a 1kg/2lb loaf tin ready (mine is non-stick, but may need a little oiling).

Mix the flours, bicarbonate of soda, salt and sugar in a bowl. Pour in the buttermilk and stout. Mix it all up with a spoon. Turn out the dough onto a floured surface and fold rather than knead so that it all comes together smoothly. Roll up into a sausage about the length of the loaf tin.

Place the sausage into the loaf tin and smooth into the corners with wet hands (I didn’t do this. Probably should). Let it rest for 10-30 minutes.

Place in the middle of the oven and bake for 10 minutes, then turn the oven down to 180c/350f and bake for a further 25 minutes. Leave to cool completely on a cooling rack.

We took ours out, knocked the base which sounded hollow-ish, but when we cut into it the middle was not cooked through. Pity, because the flavour was incredible. So much more intense than plain old brown bread. Note to selves: hollow-ish is not hollow. Oh and the other best bit?