Steam and hugs and bread, oh my!
I spent yesterday wandering around Austin and San Marcos with Marchelle. Had a great time - we went up there to check out the Mysterium and get some ideas for our steampunk projects (I've decided to try and make up an airship crew member/sky pirate character) and eat at the Rose Garden (best steamed dumplings EVER, IMO.) I wound up seeing a guy that looked like Hipster Basch at the restaurant. Seriously, this guy was tall, lanky, had the same blonde hair in a similar style and wore Buddy Holly glasses. I expected him to say "Assuming your brother's identity to assasinate the king? That's so cliche." or "You probably haven't heard of Rabanastre's resistance group. They're underground." or something.
While in the Mysterium, while I didn't find anything that looked like it would go for my outfit, I did buy a bottle of Steam Bath body spray in Full Moon. It has a very strong lemon scent right off the bat, then a nice sandalwood mid-tone that fades into a great lavender that lasts for hours. I put some on this morning and I can still smell it. The store is in the middle of this market that houses a FANTASTIC antique shop where I bought a vintage handbag from the '50s and an owl pendant that looks like it came from the late '30s, early '40s that I love to pieces.
It was a very fun day. The Mysterium is doing Steampunk Saturdays every 4th Saturday of the month, so we might go check out what they have then.
It was Laura's birthday Saturday, so the office celebrated it on Friday. The plan was that she would get cake downstairs in Admin, but I wanted to do something for her upstairs too, so I baked two loaves of bread. One of them was cranberry orange and the other was plain. Both of them came out better than my previous loaves I've made, which made me happy.
Here's what I did:
I'm using the KitchenAid recipe that came with George. This is a cool-rise bread, which is sort of like training wheels for beginning breadmaking, which so far is all that I've gotten gutsy enough to try. You don't have to worry about putting the yeast in a warm spot to proof or the bread falling flat with this method. This also makes two loaves of bread when everything is all said and done.
The hardware: George, the stand mixer, parchment paper (for rolling out dough), bench scraper, rolling pin, two 9 x 4 loaf pans.
The software:
6 to 7 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
3 1/2 teaspoons salt
3 packages active dry yeast
1/4 cup butter or margarine, softened
2 cups very warm water (it says 120-130 degrees F, but I just zapped mine in the microwave for 2 minutes and 45 seconds without taking its temp)
For the orange cranberry bread:
1/2 cup dried cranberries, chopped (just eyeball it)
enough orange zest to cover the rolled out bread (it took about half a large orange to do the job here)
Optional, 1 capful of orange extract, kneaded in later
Step One:
Place 5 1/2 cups flour, sugar, salt, yeast and butter in mixer bowl. Attach bowl and dough hook to mixer. Turn to speed 2 and mix about 20 seconds.
*Note: check the expiration date on your yeast! If it is bad, IT WILL NOT RISE! You know that you've got a good batch when as soon as the hot water hits the dry ingredients, you get this wonderful fresh-baked bread smell from the mixer. Breathe deep, my friends. Breathe deep.
Step Two:
Gradually add in warm water and mix about 1 1/2 minutes longer. Continuing on Speed 2, add remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, and mix until dough clings to hook and cleans sides of bowl, about 2 minutes. Knead on Speed 2 about 2 minutes longer.
*Note: the amount of flour you add depends on the humidity and temperature outside. The day I made this was perfect baking weather and it wound up taking only 6 cups of flour total instead of 7 like the recipe calls for.
Step Three:
Cover kneaded dough with a towel (I used plastic wrap and a clean towel, which helps to keep any sticky dough off your linens after it proofs) and set aside. Normally, I would say to keep any Canadian mutants off the bread at this time to prevent the dough from falling, but Logan was demanding to be included in the shot.
Step Four:
Let the dough rest for 20 minutes. However you wish to spend your time is up to you, but I decided to work on my Amell playthrough.
Step Five:
Remove the plastic wrap/towel and note that the dough has doubled in size. Using the bench scraper, (or spatula or whatever you have on hand) half the dough so that you have two equal globs of dough to work with.
Step Six:
Take one half of the dough and put it on a floured surface. Dough will be very sticky at this point, so you might want to flour your hands too before handling. Cover the remaining portion of dough with the plastic wrap/towel combo so it doesn't dry out.
Step Seven:
Using your floured rolling pin, roll dough out until it is reasonably thin. I didn't really measure, but you want it flat enough to work with and sort of all the same size all the way around. If you can roll it out into a semi-rectangle shape, all the better.
*Note: here is where you might want to add in that capful of orange extract. You don't have to; I didn't, but I'm thinking that it would have made the bread taste even more orangey after it was all said and done. If you want to, add it in and then knead the bread by hand so that the extract gets evenly distributed. After you're finished kneading, roll out into the rectangle shape described above.
Step Eight:
Sprinkle chopped cranberries onto dough and using a microplane or a zester, grate off enough orange zest (but only the orange part of the peel; the white pith is bitter!) to cover to your liking. Keep a border around the edge free of filling, or else it will fall out when you shape your dough into a loaf.
Step Nine:
Shape dough into a loaf. Place loaf in a greased (I used Pam spray) pan and drizzle olive oil on top. Rub oil over the surface of the bread to prevent drying out. Loosely cover loaf with a new sheet of plastic wrap.
To form the loaf:
Starting from the bottom, roll upwards until you have a long log, just like you would with a jelly roll. Tuck the short ends underneath so that nothing falls out and pinch the seam together. You want to place the dough seam side down in the pan.
Step Ten:
Follow the same steps for your second loaf. I wanted one plain, so the second loaf took a lot less time than the first. Place both pans in the fridge and chill anywhere from 2 hours up to 12 hours. I normally do this the night before bringing it to the office, but I've made bread where I chilled it only for the minimum 2 hours and it came out okay as well.
Step Eleven:
Preheat the oven to 400. Logan is grumpy because he was dragged out of his bed at 5:30 AM in order to be added to this shoot. I figured that if I had to be awake, someone else had to be as well. *smirk*
Step Twelve:
While the oven is preheating, take your pans out of the fridge and remove the plastic wrap. The dough will have doubled again in size. Let the dough come to room temperature for about 10 minutes, or until your oven is heated.
Bake at 400F for 35-40 minutes. I left this batch in for 35 minutes.
Step Thirteen:
Remove from pans immediately and cool on wire racks (or a baking tray, which was all I could find at 6:15 in the morning.)
When they were cool enough to handle, I wrapped them in plastic wrap to take to the office and then left it out with a bread knife and butter so people could slice off as much as they wanted. You can add whatever you want to for the filling, or you can just have them plain. I think my next batch is going to be sausage links with jalepenos and cheese, but whatever the filling is depends on your own personal tastes.
Mmm, crunchy on the outside, soft and warm on the inside!
While in the Mysterium, while I didn't find anything that looked like it would go for my outfit, I did buy a bottle of Steam Bath body spray in Full Moon. It has a very strong lemon scent right off the bat, then a nice sandalwood mid-tone that fades into a great lavender that lasts for hours. I put some on this morning and I can still smell it. The store is in the middle of this market that houses a FANTASTIC antique shop where I bought a vintage handbag from the '50s and an owl pendant that looks like it came from the late '30s, early '40s that I love to pieces.
It was a very fun day. The Mysterium is doing Steampunk Saturdays every 4th Saturday of the month, so we might go check out what they have then.
It was Laura's birthday Saturday, so the office celebrated it on Friday. The plan was that she would get cake downstairs in Admin, but I wanted to do something for her upstairs too, so I baked two loaves of bread. One of them was cranberry orange and the other was plain. Both of them came out better than my previous loaves I've made, which made me happy.
Here's what I did:
I'm using the KitchenAid recipe that came with George. This is a cool-rise bread, which is sort of like training wheels for beginning breadmaking, which so far is all that I've gotten gutsy enough to try. You don't have to worry about putting the yeast in a warm spot to proof or the bread falling flat with this method. This also makes two loaves of bread when everything is all said and done.
The hardware: George, the stand mixer, parchment paper (for rolling out dough), bench scraper, rolling pin, two 9 x 4 loaf pans.
The software:
6 to 7 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
3 1/2 teaspoons salt
3 packages active dry yeast
1/4 cup butter or margarine, softened
2 cups very warm water (it says 120-130 degrees F, but I just zapped mine in the microwave for 2 minutes and 45 seconds without taking its temp)
For the orange cranberry bread:
1/2 cup dried cranberries, chopped (just eyeball it)
enough orange zest to cover the rolled out bread (it took about half a large orange to do the job here)
Optional, 1 capful of orange extract, kneaded in later
Step One:
Place 5 1/2 cups flour, sugar, salt, yeast and butter in mixer bowl. Attach bowl and dough hook to mixer. Turn to speed 2 and mix about 20 seconds.
*Note: check the expiration date on your yeast! If it is bad, IT WILL NOT RISE! You know that you've got a good batch when as soon as the hot water hits the dry ingredients, you get this wonderful fresh-baked bread smell from the mixer. Breathe deep, my friends. Breathe deep.
Step Two:
Gradually add in warm water and mix about 1 1/2 minutes longer. Continuing on Speed 2, add remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, and mix until dough clings to hook and cleans sides of bowl, about 2 minutes. Knead on Speed 2 about 2 minutes longer.
*Note: the amount of flour you add depends on the humidity and temperature outside. The day I made this was perfect baking weather and it wound up taking only 6 cups of flour total instead of 7 like the recipe calls for.
Step Three:
Cover kneaded dough with a towel (I used plastic wrap and a clean towel, which helps to keep any sticky dough off your linens after it proofs) and set aside. Normally, I would say to keep any Canadian mutants off the bread at this time to prevent the dough from falling, but Logan was demanding to be included in the shot.
Step Four:
Let the dough rest for 20 minutes. However you wish to spend your time is up to you, but I decided to work on my Amell playthrough.
Step Five:
Remove the plastic wrap/towel and note that the dough has doubled in size. Using the bench scraper, (or spatula or whatever you have on hand) half the dough so that you have two equal globs of dough to work with.
Step Six:
Take one half of the dough and put it on a floured surface. Dough will be very sticky at this point, so you might want to flour your hands too before handling. Cover the remaining portion of dough with the plastic wrap/towel combo so it doesn't dry out.
Step Seven:
Using your floured rolling pin, roll dough out until it is reasonably thin. I didn't really measure, but you want it flat enough to work with and sort of all the same size all the way around. If you can roll it out into a semi-rectangle shape, all the better.
*Note: here is where you might want to add in that capful of orange extract. You don't have to; I didn't, but I'm thinking that it would have made the bread taste even more orangey after it was all said and done. If you want to, add it in and then knead the bread by hand so that the extract gets evenly distributed. After you're finished kneading, roll out into the rectangle shape described above.
Step Eight:
Sprinkle chopped cranberries onto dough and using a microplane or a zester, grate off enough orange zest (but only the orange part of the peel; the white pith is bitter!) to cover to your liking. Keep a border around the edge free of filling, or else it will fall out when you shape your dough into a loaf.
Step Nine:
Shape dough into a loaf. Place loaf in a greased (I used Pam spray) pan and drizzle olive oil on top. Rub oil over the surface of the bread to prevent drying out. Loosely cover loaf with a new sheet of plastic wrap.
To form the loaf:
Starting from the bottom, roll upwards until you have a long log, just like you would with a jelly roll. Tuck the short ends underneath so that nothing falls out and pinch the seam together. You want to place the dough seam side down in the pan.
Step Ten:
Follow the same steps for your second loaf. I wanted one plain, so the second loaf took a lot less time than the first. Place both pans in the fridge and chill anywhere from 2 hours up to 12 hours. I normally do this the night before bringing it to the office, but I've made bread where I chilled it only for the minimum 2 hours and it came out okay as well.
Step Eleven:
Preheat the oven to 400. Logan is grumpy because he was dragged out of his bed at 5:30 AM in order to be added to this shoot. I figured that if I had to be awake, someone else had to be as well. *smirk*
Step Twelve:
While the oven is preheating, take your pans out of the fridge and remove the plastic wrap. The dough will have doubled again in size. Let the dough come to room temperature for about 10 minutes, or until your oven is heated.
Bake at 400F for 35-40 minutes. I left this batch in for 35 minutes.
Step Thirteen:
Remove from pans immediately and cool on wire racks (or a baking tray, which was all I could find at 6:15 in the morning.)
When they were cool enough to handle, I wrapped them in plastic wrap to take to the office and then left it out with a bread knife and butter so people could slice off as much as they wanted. You can add whatever you want to for the filling, or you can just have them plain. I think my next batch is going to be sausage links with jalepenos and cheese, but whatever the filling is depends on your own personal tastes.
Mmm, crunchy on the outside, soft and warm on the inside!