HEY SPIDER, WHAT TIME IS IT?
It's time to BAKE LIKE AN ARACHNID!
Usually I don't like to bake or cook anything that the other Summanullites don't or can't eat. I love to feed people and I love cooking and baking so much that I want to share. But sometimes there are tastes that I miss so much that I just have to have to say fukkit, MORE FOR ME!
So today I'm starting a batch of Old Skool Rye, which is probably my favorite bread on earth. Boy won't eat it because it has caraway seeds, and the Mad Engineer can't eat it because he can't eat any seeds at all. MORE FOR ME!
Because I love baking and I love this bread and I love y'all, I need to share the love. Therefore, behind the cut, I'm going to share the recipe and the process(*).
--> (*)
cluegirl has told me I never share a recipe; I share the whole process in my own idiosyncratic way. I can't think of why other people don't -- a recipe isn't complete to me without the love and joy and process of getting your hands dirty. The only other person I know who projects all that into a recipe is MFK Fisher, who of course is one of my role models. She's the one who I stole from when I talk about why I write smut. What she said is:
People ask me: "Why do you write about food, and eating, and drinking? Why don't you write about the struggle for power and security, and about love, the way the others do?" The easiest answer is to say that, like most other humans, I am hungry. When I write of hunger, I am really writing about love and the hunger for it, and warmth and the love of it and it is all one.
Read everything she ever wrote. Srsly.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAANYWAY.
My Old Skool Rye is based on the "Heavy Sour Rye" from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads. My copy of this book is dog-eared and stained and has globs of dried dough all over it (as all beloved cookbooks should be). Every bread book by Bernard Clayton is essential to an insanely obsessive baker. Or so I've been told. *shifty eyes*
Naturally, my take on Clayton's recipe is cranked to eleven.
Note: You probably don't want to make this bread unless you have a heavy duty stand mixer. You could make it by hand -- I've done it -- but the dough is heavy and gloppy and ridiculously difficult to handle. It even makes my Kitchen Aid whine and cry and try to escape by skidding across the table. And don't even think about using a bread machine unless you're trying to kill it.
However, we won't need the heavy equipment until tomorrow, because today we're only making the starter. It'll only take a minute.
This is ultimately going to make 2 medium loaves. I make two at a time because the first one is pretty much gone within a couple of hours out of the oven. That's how much I love this bread.
You need:
1 onion, chopped. I use Vidalias.
2 cups rye flour. Mostly I use King Arthur, which is more than adequately awesome, but when I have it I use hotsy-totsy stone ground rye flour because I'm a geek.
2 teaspoons instant (or regular dry active) yeast. Supermarket packets contain "one scant tablespoon", but as I've said before, that's too much.
2 cups hot water. Usually you want water that's just over body temperature when you stick your (CLEAN!) finger in it, but in this case you want it a bit warmer than that. If you're insecure, go for 115F.
Caraway seeds and poppy seeds.
LOOK! AN ACTUAL MISE EN PLACE!
OMG I feel like a real cooking writer now!
Dump the flour into a big bowl. If you're using instant yeast, add it now. If you're using "dry active", don't. Instead, add the yeast to the hot water, give it a stir and let it bloom.
Think carefully about how seedy you want your bread to end up. Clayton's recipe says "one tablespoon caraway seeds". HAHAHAHA! Silly Clayton! You want to add half the amount of seeds you want the finished bread to have in now. I put in both caraway and poppy. How much? Like I said, half the amount of seeds you want in the finished loaves. I sprinkle in about 2 tablespoons each. Approximately. Oops.
Add the water (or water and yeast mix). Stir until it's all mixed and sticky. Dump the onions in and stir until the whole thing is as smooth as it can be what with all the onions and seeds. Clayton says "tie the onion pieces into a bag made with cheesecloth... push the onions down into the center of the sour." He'll want you to remove the onions tomorrow. HAHAHAHA! Silly Clayton! Why use onions if you don't want them in the finished loaf? Trust me, it'll be yummy!
When you're done stirring, the starter (Clayton calls it a sour) will look like this.
See? It's already starting to bubble. That's not air, that's instant yeast happily nomming on the sugar from the onions and burping up carbon dioxide and ethanol. Good little yeastie beasties!
Then, cover it with plastic wrap, put it somewhere dark and warm, and walk away until tomorrow.
Tomorrow: Kitchen Aid torture! Don't miss the exciting conclusion!
This entry was originally posted at http://spiderine.dreamwidth.org/545226.html. There are
comments over there. I've disabled LJ's Facebook and Twitter cross-posting idiocy as much as I can, but if you're especially concerned, feel free to comment there.
Usually I don't like to bake or cook anything that the other Summanullites don't or can't eat. I love to feed people and I love cooking and baking so much that I want to share. But sometimes there are tastes that I miss so much that I just have to have to say fukkit, MORE FOR ME!
So today I'm starting a batch of Old Skool Rye, which is probably my favorite bread on earth. Boy won't eat it because it has caraway seeds, and the Mad Engineer can't eat it because he can't eat any seeds at all. MORE FOR ME!
Because I love baking and I love this bread and I love y'all, I need to share the love. Therefore, behind the cut, I'm going to share the recipe and the process(*).
--> (*)
cluegirl has told me I never share a recipe; I share the whole process in my own idiosyncratic way. I can't think of why other people don't -- a recipe isn't complete to me without the love and joy and process of getting your hands dirty. The only other person I know who projects all that into a recipe is MFK Fisher, who of course is one of my role models. She's the one who I stole from when I talk about why I write smut. What she said is:
People ask me: "Why do you write about food, and eating, and drinking? Why don't you write about the struggle for power and security, and about love, the way the others do?" The easiest answer is to say that, like most other humans, I am hungry. When I write of hunger, I am really writing about love and the hunger for it, and warmth and the love of it and it is all one.
Read everything she ever wrote. Srsly.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAANYWAY.
My Old Skool Rye is based on the "Heavy Sour Rye" from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads. My copy of this book is dog-eared and stained and has globs of dried dough all over it (as all beloved cookbooks should be). Every bread book by Bernard Clayton is essential to an insanely obsessive baker. Or so I've been told. *shifty eyes*
Naturally, my take on Clayton's recipe is cranked to eleven.
Note: You probably don't want to make this bread unless you have a heavy duty stand mixer. You could make it by hand -- I've done it -- but the dough is heavy and gloppy and ridiculously difficult to handle. It even makes my Kitchen Aid whine and cry and try to escape by skidding across the table. And don't even think about using a bread machine unless you're trying to kill it.
However, we won't need the heavy equipment until tomorrow, because today we're only making the starter. It'll only take a minute.
This is ultimately going to make 2 medium loaves. I make two at a time because the first one is pretty much gone within a couple of hours out of the oven. That's how much I love this bread.
You need:
1 onion, chopped. I use Vidalias.
2 cups rye flour. Mostly I use King Arthur, which is more than adequately awesome, but when I have it I use hotsy-totsy stone ground rye flour because I'm a geek.
2 teaspoons instant (or regular dry active) yeast. Supermarket packets contain "one scant tablespoon", but as I've said before, that's too much.
2 cups hot water. Usually you want water that's just over body temperature when you stick your (CLEAN!) finger in it, but in this case you want it a bit warmer than that. If you're insecure, go for 115F.
Caraway seeds and poppy seeds.
LOOK! AN ACTUAL MISE EN PLACE!
OMG I feel like a real cooking writer now!
Dump the flour into a big bowl. If you're using instant yeast, add it now. If you're using "dry active", don't. Instead, add the yeast to the hot water, give it a stir and let it bloom.
Think carefully about how seedy you want your bread to end up. Clayton's recipe says "one tablespoon caraway seeds". HAHAHAHA! Silly Clayton! You want to add half the amount of seeds you want the finished bread to have in now. I put in both caraway and poppy. How much? Like I said, half the amount of seeds you want in the finished loaves. I sprinkle in about 2 tablespoons each. Approximately. Oops.
Add the water (or water and yeast mix). Stir until it's all mixed and sticky. Dump the onions in and stir until the whole thing is as smooth as it can be what with all the onions and seeds. Clayton says "tie the onion pieces into a bag made with cheesecloth... push the onions down into the center of the sour." He'll want you to remove the onions tomorrow. HAHAHAHA! Silly Clayton! Why use onions if you don't want them in the finished loaf? Trust me, it'll be yummy!
When you're done stirring, the starter (Clayton calls it a sour) will look like this.
See? It's already starting to bubble. That's not air, that's instant yeast happily nomming on the sugar from the onions and burping up carbon dioxide and ethanol. Good little yeastie beasties!
Then, cover it with plastic wrap, put it somewhere dark and warm, and walk away until tomorrow.
Tomorrow: Kitchen Aid torture! Don't miss the exciting conclusion!
This entry was originally posted at http://spiderine.dreamwidth.org/545226.html. There are
comments over there. I've disabled LJ's Facebook and Twitter cross-posting idiocy as much as I can, but if you're especially concerned, feel free to comment there.