Category:

Pretzels and dip

8/4/2012

We're a bit bored with the same old ham-and-turkey-and-processed-cheese platters we've been getting for haustus, so recently I made sloppy joes (we haven't had them in ages) and last Thursday I made homemade pretzels and four different dips. I had to make pretzels to get a photo for the new book anyway, and in my casual cookbook reading I had been looking at sauces in The Joy of Cooking, so I put the two together.

          Pretzels can be made from just about any bread dough.  What gives them their characteristic color and flavor is a two minute bath in boiling water with baking soda added. You do the same thing to bagels but without the baking soda.  They drain for a few minutes on a cloth towel (paper towels adamantly stick to the pretzels) and then bake on sheet trays. I find that a non-stick surface is absolutely necessary, and a silicone baking mat is even better.
          For the dips, I made a cheese sauce with sharp cheddar, a mustard sauce with a little horseradish added, blue cheese dip, and a ricotta cheese dip:
        Drain 1 cup of ricotta for about 12 hours (place the cheese in a sieve lined
         with a coffee filter and suspend it over a bowl in the fridge).   Place the cheese in
         a medium bowl and mash it with a fork. Add 3 Tbs. olive oil, 2 Tbs. of white wine
         vinegar and 2 Tbs. dry sherry and whisk.  Whip a cup of heavy cream until soft
         peaks form and fold it into the cheese mixture.  Fold in 2 green onions, finely
         minced and 1/4 cup of chopped herbs (I used parsley, basil, garlic chives and
         oregano). Cover and chill for two hours before serving. Can be made the day
         before.
(This recipe is adapted from one I found in the Illinois Valley Herb Guild cookbook.)

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Cheesy Twist Bread--yum!

7/16/2012

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One of the best aspects of traveling around doing bread demos is that you meet lots of happy bakers who want to share recipes--and occasional samples! This couple attended a special class I taught for KETC/Channel 9 in St. Louis a couple years ago, and they showed up in Smithton as well, bearing a scrumptious cheese twist bread. Rachel was kind enough to share the recipe with me, and I pass it on to you with the highest recommendation. You can change the kind of cheese you use for the filling or use a blend.
CHEESY TWIST BREAD
Dough -
2 packages active dry yeast
1 cup warm water
3 to 3 ½ cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon onion powder
3 tablespoons oil
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon chopped sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil
Filling-
4 ounces soft cream cheese
2 tablespoons dry ranch salad dressing powder
¼ cup chopped onions
3 tablespoons chopped sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil
¾ cup shredded parmesan cheese

Stir yeast into warm water and let set a few minutes to dissolve. Attach flat beater to mixer. In bowl of stand mixer add 2 cups of flour, sugar, salt, onion powder, basil, and sun-dried tomatoes. Turn on stir speed to combine. Add the water and yeast mixture. Turn on speed # 4 for about 1 minute and beat. Turn mixer speed down to 2 and add oil. Continue to add the remainder of the flour a little at a time until the dough starts to clean the sides of the bowl and cling to the paddle. Switch to dough hook and turn mixer on speed # 2 only and kneed for 4 to 6 minutes until dough is soft and elastic and tacky to the touch. Take the dough out of bowl and knead into a ball. Cover and let rest for about 5 minutes. Roll dough out on a lightly floured surface into a 14x10 rectangle, spread with filling, sprinkle with ¾ cup of cheese over filling. Starting from the long side, roll dough up tightly, with scissors cut roll in half, lengthwise. Place halves, filling side up, side by side on parchment lined baking sheet. Twist together gently and loosely. Cover and let rise for 20 minutes. Uncover and bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for about 25 minutes. Take out of oven and brush with butter. Put on a cooling rack to cool for about 15 to 20 minutes.

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Three herbal bread recipes

7/14/2012

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I had meant to get back to the blog a lot sooner after my return from St. Louis, but shortly thereafter I developed some serious adominal pains and spent three days in the hospital. Still no diagnosis, symptoms have subsided considerably but still pesist. They have ruled out appendicitis, colon cancer, gall bladder, kidney stones, ulcers, and pregnancy. Please keep me in your prayers.
But enough about that. While I was in St. Louis I was privileged to teach an afternoon class to the advanced pastry students at L'Ecole Culinaire (website here) on Monday. We took a basic roll dough and made slab braids, bambino bread, and rose rolls. The students were enthusiastic and made some lovely breads, although some of them need to work on their rolling pin technique--a perennial struggle!

          Tuesday night I was in Smithton, Illinois for an herb bread demo sponsored by the Metro East Herb Guild in Belleville.  For that presentation I made bacon dill bread, herbal rose rolls, and tomato basil focaccia. I had hoped to give you links to those recipes, but I'm having trouble logging on to Google Docs, so I'll just post them here.
Bacon Dill Bread
½ cup warm water (100 to 110 degrees)
2 tsp. brown sugar
2 pkg. active dry yeast
1 c. milk
1 c. cottage cheese
2 Tbs. fresh chopped dill (1 Tbs. dried)
1½ tsp. salt
2/3 cup cooked, crumbled bacon, drained (about 14 to 16 strips)
5 to 6 cups of all-purpose flour
Proof yeast with water and sugar in a small bowl. Blend milk and cottage cheese in a blender until smooth and warm mixture to 100 to 110 degrees.   Pour milk mixture into a large bowl and add yeast, dill and salt. Stir in 2 cups of flour until thoroughly incorporated. Add bacon and mix thoroughly. Add 3 more cups of flour, one cup at a time, mixing thoroughly each time. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured board and knead for 6 to 8 minutes, adding small amounts of flour as needed to keep dough manageable. At the end of the kneading period, dough should be rather soft rather than stiff, but only slightly sticky. Oil the surface of the dough and place back in the rinsed bowl. Cover with a towel and allow to rise in a warm place free of drafts for 45 to 60 minutes, or until doubled. Punch dough down and knead briefly to work out the larger air bubbles. Dough may be formed into one large or two medium free form loaves and placed on a lightly greased baking sheet, or divided into two and placed in standard loaf pans. (if you make free form loaves, they may not rise as high as in a pan.) Cover and let rise for 20 to 30 minutes or until nearly doubled. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 40 to 50 minutes, until lightly brown and loaf sounds hollow when tapped. Cool on racks.
(Don't have a picure of this yet.)

Tomato Basil Focaccia
Dough
2 cups tomato juice
1 pkg. active dry yeast
2 tsp. salt
1/4 cup chopped sun dried tomatoes
1 cup whole-wheat flour
2 Tbs. olive oil
4 to 4 ½ cups white bread flour
2 Tbs. finely chopped fresh basil
    OR 1 Tbs. dried whole basil leaves
    OR 2 tsp. ground dried basil

Topping
olive oil
kosher salt

Scald tomato juice in a saucepan over low heat, but do not allow to boil. Add the sun dried tomatoes and cool to lukewarm. Pour into a mixing bowl. Stir in yeast and 1 cup of whole wheat flour and allow to rest for ten minutes. Add olive oil and salt and mix well, about 100 strokes by hand. Add flour, one cup at a time, until you get a soft dough that is rather sticky. Knead on a lightly floured board for about 5 minutes, until the dough is smooth and elastic but still a bit sticky (be careful not to add too much flour in the course of kneading). Give the mixing bowl a quick wash, oil the surface of the dough lightly and place it in the bowl. Let rise, covered with a towel, in a warm place free from drafts, until doubled---about 1 to 1 ½ hours. Punch down, and divide into two portions. Flatten each portion into a round, flat loaf, about ½ inch thick. Place loaves on a baking sheet that has been sprinkled with cornmeal (you may need 2 sheets). Brush on about 1 Tbs. of olive oil on each loaf. Allow to rise, uncovered, for 30 minutes. Dimple dough with your forefinger, each dimple being about ½ inch apart. Brush top with olive oil and sprinkle lightly with kosher salt. Bake at 400 degrees until lightly browned, about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and cool loaves for 10 minutes before serving.

I often make tomato basil kaiser rolls topped with parmesan for sandwiches or to accompany pasta with cream sauces, but you can also bake this bread into a regular loaf pan and use it to make the best grilled cheese sandwich ever!

Rose Rolls
Use any recipe for one dozen dinner rolls, preferably one that uses milk as the liquid.

On a lightly floured board, roll dough out into a rectangle 12” high by 15” wide. Brush the dough with the melted butter, leaving 1 inch of the top edge dry. Sprinkle on about 1/2 cup of fresh chopped herbs. Roll the dough up jellyroll style. Lightly brush the top edge with a little water, so it will stick to the roll; pinch to seal. Using a sharp knife cut the roll into 12 even pieces. Cut side down, place them one by one into the cups of a lightly greased muffin tin. Using a pair of scissors cut an “X” in the top of each roll---you should cut about 2/3 of the way through the roll. Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled, 30 to 45 minutes. Bake in the preheated 375 degree oven for 10 to 12 minutes, or until lightly browned. Remove from pans and place on wire racks to cool slightly. If desired, brush tops of rolls with more melted butter before serving warm.

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Bacon Dill Bread, canapes and cream cheese

6/11/2012

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If you read cookbooks from Country Living or Taste of Home, you've probably seen recipes for Dilly Bread before: a loaf baked in a casserole dish, using milk and cottage cheese for a rich, tender crumb, and accented with fresh or dried dill.   Here's a picture of my version (which I baked tonight) and those darker flecks you are seeing are bits of bacon.  Although bacon is becoming over-used these days, it certainly adds a lot to this bread. About two-thirds of a cup of chopped, crisp bacon (cooked) is added to a recipe that makes two loaves. You'll find the recipe at the end of this blog.
          You can see that I baked one loaf in a casserole dish and the other in canape bread molds. These molds used to be available from Pampered Chef and I believe Norpro still makes them. But evidently lots of people have bought them and never used them, because they turn up at garage sales for 50 cents, or $1.99 at Goodwill, brand spankin' new and still in the box. That's unfortunate, because they do make beautiful little sandwiches for a tea party or light buffet, and it isn't at all difficult to use them.
     Just in case you have some and have lost the instructions: You remove the ends and spray the inside with cooking spray, put on cap one and drop in a small portion of dough (9 or 10 ounces is perfect), put the top cap on and let the dough rise with the mold standing upright. They bake upright in the oven as well, usually in about two-thirds the time of a full loaf. Take them out of the oven and let cool with both caps off for 2 or 3 minutes, then tap one end of the mold lightly on the countertop. The bread loosens up and slides right out, or at least it always has for me.
          The molds come in three shapes---six pointed star, flower and heart--and thanks to garage sales and Goodwill, I own two or three of each shape. They are a bit awkward to clean (I use a brush or sponge on a long handle) and the best way to dry them is to put them back in the oven as it cools, rather than trying to get into all those corners with a dish towel.
          I put my star loaves in the freezer (see previous post) since I intend to use them later in the month for a "breads and spreads" buffet. A little star-slice of bacon dill spread with cream cheese and topped with a little deli ham or ham salad---yum!

Bacon Dill Bread
½ cup warm water (100 to 110 degrees)
2 tsp. brown sugar
2 pkg. active dry yeast
1 c. milk
1 c. cottage cheese
2 Tbs. fresh chopped dill (1 Tbs. dried)
1½ tsp. salt
2/3 cup cooked, crumbled bacon, drained (about 14 to 16 strips)
5 to 6 cups of all-purpose flour

Proof yeast with water and sugar in a small bowl. Blend milk and cottage cheese in a blender until smooth and warm mixture to 100 to 110 degrees.   Pour milk mixture into a large bowl and add yeast, dill and salt. Stir in 2 cups of flour until thoroughly incorporated. Add bacon and mix thoroughly. Add 3 more cups of flour, one cup at a time, mixing thoroughly each time. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured board and knead for 6 to 8 minutes, adding small amounts of flour as needed to keep dough manageable. At the end of the kneading period, dough should be rather soft rather than stiff, but only slightly sticky. Oil the surface of the dough and place back in the rinsed bowl. Cover with a towel and allow to rise in a warm place free of drafts for 45 to 60 minutes, or until doubled. Punch dough down and knead briefly to work out the larger air bubbles. Dough may be formed into one large or two medium free form loaves and placed on a lightly greased baking sheet, or divided into two and placed in standard loaf pans. (if you make free form loaves, they may not rise as high as in a pan.) Cover and let rise for 20 to 30 minutes or until nearly doubled. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 40 to 50 minutes, until lightly brown and loaf sounds hollow when tapped. Cool on racks.

Notes ---Dill is not a flavoring I much care for (except in pickles) but our Br. Nathaniel finds it irresistible. Monasteries are like other families---the cook can’t always make what he likes best!---so I developed this bread flavored with dill and bacon. You’ll often see recipes for “dilly bread” which use cottage cheese for moistness and sautéed onions for flavor, but I find that the bacon in my version is less overwhelming of the dill---I avoid adding caraway seed for the same reason. You’ll notice that there’s no oil in this recipe---between the bacon and the cheese, there’s plenty of fat to enrich the dough. If you use lo-fat or fat-free products, the dough will not be as soft and smooth, but the bread will still be delicious.
---You can fry the bacon, drain and then crumble it, or you can cut the bacon into small pieces and then fry and drain it. Either way works fine for the recipe, although with the latter technique I find myself more inclined to nibble!
---I often bake this bread in a 2 quart casserole dish, but there’s just a little too much dough to fit. So I divide out enough dough to fill a mini-loaf pan. That way I can have a sample loaf for my helpers when the bread comes out of the oven, and the large loaf to serve the community. A pair of 1 1/2 quart casserole dishes works fine, too.

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Italian Herbal Swirl

2/24/2012

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A dear friend has been drooling over the bread featured at the top of every page on the website and wants the recipe. It's Italian Herbal Swirl Bread, and the recipe is from the second edition of Bake and Be Blessed, but you can download the recipe from here. I was pruning herbs in my garden and came into the kitchen with 3 mason jars full of herbs and created the recipe on the spot to accompany the pasta on the menu for dinner.

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Baking for the Garramone Family Christmas

12/26/2011

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We had our family Christmas here at the abbey today, as we have for the past 25 years or so. It's usually the Sunday after Christmas, but since Christmas itself fell on a Sunday, we couldn't wait until New Year's! In recent years we've had a different theme for our celebration: pizza parties, Christmas Brunch, County Fair foods (celebrating Christmas with corn dogs, funnel cakes and lemonade shake-ups!). This year my sisters chose "Merry Little Christmas" so all our food was miniaturized. The buffet included, among other things, Little Smokies, little sweet and sour meatballs, mini-quiches, bite-sized ravs with homemade sauce, mini-eclairs (made by my talented cousin Gina), and tiny and exquisitely decorated Bundt cakes made by my endlessly creative sister Angela---I only wish I had taken a picture, because they were totally blog-worthy.

My contribution was Pull-Apart Garlic Bread, a family favorite I've been making for decades. The orginal recipe came from Rhodes frozen dough, and Mom won first prize at the Heart of Illinois Fair several years with her version. I've tweaked it slightly (mostly by adding more garlic!) and you should feel free to do the same. Download the recipe here.

My other contribution was Italian wedding soup, another family favorite. I had never heard of it until a salesman showed up on the set of Breaking Bread at KETC in season three and told me about this traditional soup made with tiny beef and veal meatballs in chicken stock, with vegetables and a few chiffonade-cut greens (escorale, endive, spinach or cabbage) to garnish. The name of the soup is a bit of a mistranslation: the original Italian name is minestra maritata ("married soup"), which is a reference to the fact that green vegetables and meat go well together rather than to any wedding tradition. Small pasta like ditalini, orzo, or stars are usually added, although I use acini de pepe pasta, which look like little beads or BB's and can be found in some larger grocery stores (I've gotten them at Hyvee and at Walmart, but they don't always stock them) or Italian grocery stores. Unfortunately, I can't offer a recipe, since I make it grandmother-style--you know, a little of this, a handful of that--in large batches for my families, both biological and monastic. But there are plenty of versions online: Giada De Laurentiis' recipe is one of the most tradition ones I've seen.

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Pretzel Bread? Check!

10/12/2011

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A few days ago a friend contacted me on Facebook to ask if I had ever made pretzel bread. I had made lots of pretzels, but pretzel bread was at that time still on the bucket list. But as of Sunday evening, it's been checked off. Here's a link to the recipe I used:
http://allrecipes.com/PersonalRecipe/62291173/Mikes-Signature-Pretzel-Bread/Detail.aspx

The inside of the bread is incredibly soft, but the outside was not as crusty as I hoped. Next timeI think I'll turn the oven off once they reach the appropriate interior temperature (190 to 195 degrees F.) but leave them in the oven for another 10 minutes or so to make the crust a little chewier.
Special thanks to Lynn for the photos!

We tested the bread with butter, as well as cheddar cheese, but I think it cries out for a garlic beef and smoked provolone sandwich, or maybe mortadella, genoa salami. and deli ham with sweet hot mustard, or maybe roast turkey with cream cheese and chutney or maybe . . .

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Harvest Braid

9/28/2011

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This is called a Harvest Braid. It uses the lattice braid technique, but instead of the customary sweet filling, it uses ham, apples, sharp cheddar and nuts. Here's what you need:
Any dough, enough for one loaf of bread
1 ½ cups coarsely chopped ham
1 ½ cups sharp Cheddar cheese
½ cup chopped walnuts
1 ¼ cups peeled and chopped apples (tart baking apples are best)

Prepare dough though the first rising. Punch dough down and knead briefly to expel larger air bubbles. On a lightly floured board, roll out to a rectangle about 18 x 10 inches. Prepare filling by combining ham and cheese in a medium size bowl and tossing to mix. Spread filling lengthwise in the center third of the dough, pressing it together lightly.

Using a sharp knife or a small pizza cutter, cut each outer third of the dough (the part not covered by the filling) into 5 to 10 diagonal strips, cutting from the edge of the dough to about 1 inch from the edge of the filling. Lightly brush strips with water.

Fold strips over filling, alternating left and right, being careful not to stretch the dough. Tuck in the ends of the last strips and pinch to seal. Carefully transfer to a lightly greased 13x9x2-inch baking pan. Cover and let rise in a warm, draft-free place for 30 minutes or until doubled.
Bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for 30 minutes or until golden brown and the temperature of the filling is at least 160 degrees. Allow to cool on pan for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool slightly before serving.

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Forward>>

Pretzels and dip

Cheesy Twist Bread--yum!

Three herbal bread recipes

Bacon Dill Bread, canapes and cream cheese

Italian Herbal Swirl

Baking for the Garramone Family Christmas

Pretzel Bread? Check!

Harvest Braid

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