Friday, January 15, 2010

The bread maker in our house

Recently the question of “what counts as food” has been on our minds. It started with an interview Michael Pollan gave on The Daily Show. Pollan is the author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma as well as In Defense of Food and Food Rules. His basic thesis is that most of what Americans eat isn’t real food, but actually food like substance, mostly corn based and with an unreasonable shelf life. As such, he promotes people moving away from mass produced foods to sustainably grown produce and meat. All this isn’t new, but it just brought the topic top of mind again.
It was top of mind for Uri when he was looking at for bread crumbs. To his surprise, all the breadcrumbs he found included corn syrup as one of the top 3 products. With that, I decided to start making bread from scratch – something I’ve been promising myself for a while now.
To ease myself into the whole thing, I decided to start with the famed “No Knead Bread”, or more precisely, Cook’s Illustrated version of it – “Almost No-Knead Bread”.
One final anecdote before the full recipe. The bread itself is baked in a Dutch oven (ie a large heavy pot with a lid). It calls for pre-heating the pot in the oven at 500 F. Before doing so, the thought crossed my mind – will this China made plastic handle survive 500 degrees Fahrenheit? Luckily, Uri stepped into the kitchen at that moment – so I asked him, and he assured me that it will.
20 minutes into the preheat process the smell of burned plastic filled the house, followed by a "pop” sound. So, baker beware - take the knob off before starting!

Almost no-knead bread
Makes 1 large round loaf. Published January 1, 2008. From Cook's Illustrated.

An enameled cast-iron Dutch oven with a tight-fitting lid yields best results, but the recipe also works in a regular cast-iron Dutch oven or heavy stockpot. Use a mild-flavored lager, such as Budweiser (mild non-alcoholic lager also works). The bread is best eaten the day it is baked but can be wrapped in aluminum foil and stored in a cool, dry place for up to 2 days.

INGREDIENTS
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (15 ounces), plus additional for dusting work surface
1/4 teaspoon instant or rapid-rise yeast
1 1/2 teaspoons table salt

3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons water (7 ounces), at room temperature
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons mild-flavored lager (3 ounces)

1 tablespoon white vinegar

INSTRUCTIONS
1. Whisk flour, yeast, and salt in large bowl. Add water, beer, and vinegar. Using rubber spatula, fold mixture, scraping up dry flour from bottom of bowl until shaggy ball forms. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature for 8 to 18 hours.
2. Lay 12- by 18-inch sheet of parchment paper inside 10-inch skillet and spray with nonstick cooking spray. Transfer dough to lightly floured work surface and knead 10 to 15 times. Shape dough into ball by pulling edges into middle. Transfer dough, seam-side down, to parchment-lined skillet and spray surface of dough with nonstick cooking spray. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature until dough has doubled in size and does not readily spring back when poked with finger, about 2 hours.
3. About 30 minutes before baking, adjust oven rack to lowest position, place 6- to 8-quart heavy-bottomed Dutch oven (with lid) on rack, and heat oven to 500 degrees. Lightly flour top of dough and, using razor blade or sharp knife, make one 6-inch-long, 1/2-inch-deep slit along top of dough. Carefully remove pot from oven and remove lid. Pick up dough by lifting parchment overhang and lower into pot (let any excess parchment hang over pot edge). Cover pot and place in oven. Reduce oven temperature to 425 degrees and bake covered for 30 minutes. Remove lid and continue to bake until loaf is deep brown and instant-read thermometer inserted into center registers 210 degrees, 20 to 30 minutes longer. Carefully remove bread from pot; transfer to wire rack and cool to room temperature, about 2 hours.

2 comments:

lior said...

I read an interview with Mr. Pollan too (I think someone shared it on the reader). His message "Eat Food, Not too much, mostly plants" is spot on and I think I'm more or less following it. Well, maybe not the "not too much" part, and I do love steaks... I'll try harder

lior said...

The ingredients in Osem's breadcrumbs (perorit):

Wheat flour, vegetable oil, sugars, salt, yeast, soy products, sesame and some other stuff