In which, okay, I know I’ve posted too much about bread lately, and some of these pics are recycled, but this is my adaptation of someone else’s adaptation of the ‘Artisan Bread In 5 Minutes A Day’ method.

I think I’ve got my dough recipe dialed in! This has amazing crust and crumb. Here we go!

One part hot tap water (3 cups).

One packet yeast.

Two parts flour (about 6 unsifted cups):
– 50% King Arthur all-purpose
– 25% atta (whole wheat flour, used to make Indian chapati)
– 25% grocery store white all-purpose flour

Salt (a tablespoon or so).

In a large bowl, place the water (100F or so, no hotter) and the yeast. Dump in all the flour, then the salt. Stir together into a shaggy, wet mass (I use the handle of a spatula, it’s chrome and sort of like a dough hook).

Cover loosely and let rise at room temperature for two hours (I put mine in the oven with the light on, and use one of those plastic bowl covers with elastic) and then refrigerate.

When you remember it’s there later (as soon as a few hours, as late as ten days), use kitchen shears to cut off a chunk of the dough, maybe the size of an apple. It’ll be really sticky, so flour your hands. Shape it into a ball with the tuck-and-turn method shown here (I do mine on a pastry mat, but you can do it anywhere, really).

Put a metal bowl or pan into your oven, big enough to hold at least a cup of water, but larger is fine (I use a stainless dog bowl). Also place a baking stone or cast iron (shallow frying pan or griddle) into your oven.

Set the oven temperature to at least 450 (I do most of my baking between 450 and 500F).

When your dough’s warmed up some (you don’t want it super cold in the center as that will affect how it bakes, especially with boules, but you don’t need to bring it all the way to room temp), put it on a piece of parchment paper. Then score the top with a serrated knife. This is to allow for oven spring, but you can get all fancy decorative if you’re like that.

Get a cup or so of hot tap water.

Open your oven, and quickly put the bread on its parchment directly on the hot stone or cast iron, pour the hot water into the pan or bowl, and close the door.

If you have a clean spray bottle, fill it with water, and spray the inside of the oven thoroughly at least three times during the first seven minutes to keep the loaf moist and encourage oven spring. After 7 or 10 minutes, you can quit spraying and let the crust develop.

Bake your bread until it’s a light golden brown, somewhere between 20 and 30 minutes depending on the size of the loaf.

Cool on a wire rack.

To make baguette, I let it sit in a round for about ten minutes, dust it with flour again, and roll it out gently with the palms of my hands. Sometimes I pick it up and let its own weight stretch it out a bit. You want to handle it gently so you don’t pop all the air bubbles inside, so getting an even baguette is tricky; mine usually have a big lump somewhere but they taste fantastic.

To make pita, flour the hell out of the dough and roll it into thin rounds. Bake at 500F on the hot stone or cast iron; no water pan or misting is needed. The moisture in the dough will be trapped by the flour cloak, and the pita will steam inside. Keep in a tea towel so it doesn’t dry out.

For pizza, let it sit in a ball for ten minutes, then roll into a thin round and top. Bake on the stone or use a separate cookie sheet or pizza pan. I do the water pan but it’s not strictly necessary.

For naan, roll it into an oval and cook in a hot, dry pan on the stove top. When it’s done, brush with ghee. Keep in a tea towel until service.

In which there are things I’ve cooked. (Or baked! I guess baking is a different category.)

I cook a lot, for a variety of reasons. Eating out is expensive. I live in the middle of nowhere and can only go out to eat if he (and his car) are home. I’ve become an experienced cook and it’s enjoyable. I feel vaguely guilty about the massive amounts of Doordash I had while living in Uptown (as in, I was personally a major contributor to the immanent collapse of restaurant culture and the rise of the shitty gig economy). There’s nowhere to get what I want to eat so I have to make it myself. And so on.

Anyway, I cook a lot! Here’s a bunch of stuff from the past week or so. A lot of it is bread-based because now I always have bread dough in my fridge!

Here’s dal makhani and naan:

The dal makhani was made in the Instant Pot and I sort of winged it, after reading about three different recipes, based on the ingredients I had on hand. It has a fuckton of Kashmiri red chili powder in it but is somehow rich rather than spicy-hot?

Here’s kachumber with masala eggs (sorta followed that recipe but not really), papadam, and chai:

Here’s a French carrot soup, potage crécy:

And a brie sandwich to eat with it because I fucking love a brie sandwich on good baguette:

And pizzas. Three kinds of pizzas! On homemade dough!

Red: tomato sauce, ricotta, white mushrooms, aged gouda, dried oregano, red pepper flakes
Bianca: olive oil, flake salt, sliced garlic, ricotta, parm-reg, fresh thyme, black pepper

(I’m going to try the bianca with marinated artichoke hearts and post-bake dollops of garlicky tomato sauce next. It’ll be epic!)

And this one, which I made only because I had all the ingredients and did not expect to enjoy but freakin’ LOVED:

Brie: apple, brie, honey, slivered almonds, fresh thyme

(Himself was going to make himself a green olive and hamburger pizza, too, but never got around to it.)

Here’s boule with fromage blanc, olive oil, and black pepper — a new favorite snack:

So much so I incorporated it into my Sunday brunch:

Buttered eggs, tomato and mushrooms, baguette with fromage blanc, cafe au lait.

(The cheesemaker at work says he knows how to make fromage blanc, so hopefully now that I know I love it I’ll be able to talk him into making it from time to time!)

I eat well, supremely well, buuuuut mostly by myself. My better half is in a junk food phase these days, and eats a lot of delicious pre-prepared garbage (frozen stuff like burritos, tots, and chicken wings, boxed mac ‘n’ cheese, ramen, shit like that) and, like, a ton of bacon sandwiches.

Half the time he refuses to eat what I’ve cooked, but I’m pretty sure I did a similar thing when I was his age, like, Fuck it, I’m an adult, and I’m going to eat what I want and not what I SHOULD. I mean, he did eat some of the pizzas and the carrot soup; it’s not like he’s not getting any vegetables (plus he says he eats salads at work most of the time because they’re preferable to whatever’s on the hot table). In other words, there’s a lot of stuff in the freezer lately because I get bored of it before it’s gone!

The complete lack of Mexican food in this post can be read as implying that I ate lunch at Patty’s a couple times last week, because that’s what actually happened!