5 second rule

I seek an idea at the bottom of the bread bowl.

Can't rush it, I know.

This I've learned, having been here before.

That void, that space, that ugly, gaping hole.

Twixt one project and the next it shows up, unbidden.

I'm back, it howls, all echoes and sneers.

It's you again, I say, almost bored this time. 

Nonchalant for a day, but soon, I'm pissed.

This time, I'll fight it. This time, I'll win.

Grab an apron.

Tie it tight.

Hair back, rings off, clogs on, book open.

I seek an idea at the bottom of the bread bowl.

So, I gather. First flours, then yeast, a bowl, cool water.

I stir with conviction, not messing around. Dump out the contents, preparing for battle. 

Knead, knead, knead, knead.

Knead, mother&^%$. You're going down.

I seek an idea at the bottom of the bread bowl.

I knead the dough and need to keep busy. Need to keep moving, keep working this out. I need, above all, for my hands to ache, for my efforts to yield -- something -- at the end of this day.  

I seek an idea at the bottom of the bread bowl.

It's sticky, this dough. Feels wet, not yet right. More flour, more muscle, gears turn as I go.

Soon, it's smooth.

I stretch it like taffy, examine its pores. You're pretty, I tell it, then fear I'm insane.

I give it a rest and head out the door.

.

It bubbled! It toiled! All risen and plump!

I'm proud, strangely so, though my efforts were minor. 

I punch down the dough.

A whistle escapes.

I upend the bowl and scrape out its contents.

Shape a soft loaf and set it to proof.

I look at the bowl now, hard and stern.

It's empty again.

There's nothing inside.

I sought an idea at the bottom of the bread bowl.

And came up short.

And yet,

tonight,

we'll have bread.

Winding roads and brown sugar kisses.

The road curves this way and that.

I wind right, careen left, and bank the steering wheel along a good 20 minute stretch of highway.

The route's a pain. The rocks jut up and the traffic slows and if you stop paying attention for even a minute, you'll have to stomp on your brakes, shortening the distance between you and the car in front, landing so close you can whisper and the other driver will feel your breath on his cheek. 

But we're orchard-bound, and the day is bright. When we arrive, and I park horribly -- really, you'd be embarrassed for me -- I relax. We spend a good hour picking apples, ringing a silvery windchime, and swinging on a bench suspended from a tree. Then we eat apple turnovers warmed in a toaster by the check-out.

Only Fujis are available for picking on this day, but that's okay. What the small family orchard lacks in variety -- no Cortlands, Empires, Macs, or Pippins, no gourds, no scarecrows, no hayrides here -- it makes up for in friendly folk, fresh pastry, and cool, clean air. That the all-organic apples are riddled with cosmetic imperfections makes them taste better, somehow.

Driving home (swerve, careen, left, right) is simpler. As the radio blares, I get lost in plans: apple butter, apple sauce, apple galette, apple rings, even fresh apple cake. I taste them all in my head while cruising the curlicue road.

We make it home.

I bake a cake.

And that first bite tastes just like fall, cloaked in a tender, sweet, brown sugar kiss.

...

I've started pinning apple recipes, including those mentioned above, to this board.

...

Recipe for Fresh Apple Cake with Crumb Topping

There are three things you should always have in your freezer: peas, ice, and crumb topping. I make big batches of these crumbs and pull out handfuls whenever I need them. You should, too.

For this dessert, I started with Emily Luchetti's Fifty-Year Apple Cake in her wonderful cookbook, A Passion for Desserts. My goal was to shove as many apples in there as possible, so I took out the raisins and nuts and threw in more apples. And then more still. I left their skins on for texture and subbed in some brown sugar, which gave the cake a caramellike chew. If you make the crumb topping ahead, and store it in your freezer, this will be one of the simplest, no-need-for-a-mixer fresh apple cakes you'll ever make.

Makes 20 squares

2 eggs
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup (packed) brown sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 cup vegetable oil
4 medium Fuji apples (1-1/2 pounds total weight), or other variety you fancy, peels on, chopped (5-6 cups chopped apple)
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup cold (or even frozen) crumb topping 
Powdered sugar, for sifting over (totally for show, totally optional) 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease the sides and corners of a 9x13-inch rectangular cake pan and line the bottom with parchment.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk the eggs, two sugars, cinnamon, and oil. Fold in the apples. In a separate bowl, sift the flour, baking soda, and salt. Stir the dry ingredients into the wet, folding and mixing until all the white, floury bits are completely incorporated. The batter will be extremely thick. Carry on.

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan, using a small offset spatula to work it into the corners. Sprinkle with the crumb topping. 

Bake in the center of the oven for 45 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean. For neat slices, let cool for as long as you can stand it before cutting. If desired, sift over a little powdered sugar, but go easy -- the cake's plenty sweet.

(I found cutting it with a metal bench scraper made the neatest squares. After 24 hours, store any leftover cake in the refrigerator.)

printable pdf

 

Along life's crooked divide.

Last week cleaved my life in two.

It wasn’t as violent as it sounds. But things of enormous significance happened to people in my world, and the confluence of events in a short span of time startled me with their lack of subtlety. Life hit me upside the head, then blared a foghorn in my face.  I paid attention.

First, my son, under Jewish tradition, became an adult. Now 13, this formerly shy child of mine commanded the bima at our temple with authority, confidence, and grace. He read fluidly in another language, beautifully moderating the highs and lows of his voice, a voice near-complete in its transition.

Wasn’t I just on that bima myself, reading Torah, looking out on the faces of my own parents and grandparents, a 13-year-old girl in an ill-fitting dress?

But no, that was long ago.

When I offered the tallit to my son, he said a blessing, then swung the prayer shawl around his shoulders. I stepped off the bima.

I ceded more than the stage in that moment. I passed him a torch, and afterwards, I took more than my seat. I took my first tentative steps across an unmistakable divide. It felt good in that instant, but my throat catches now when I think about it. 

The next day, a dear friend’s father died. Cancer of the pancreas. 

The day after that, two close friends – utterly disconnected from each other, but both so important to me -- had babies. I got the news of one, then the other, in quick succession. Daughters.

Life split in half last week: birth on the left, death on the right, and me, straddling the crooked divide.

...

Recipe for Tender Whole Wheat Zucchini Bread (updated)

I’ve gently reworked this zucchini bread recipe from 2008. It’s not so different from my earlier version, but it’s better, and therefore worth sharing in its new and improved form. The center will crack, cleaving the cake partly in two. That’s just the natural order of things.

Makes one loaf.

1-1/2 cups white whole wheat flour
1/2 cup almond meal
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Pinch nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
3/4 cup (packed) dark brown sugar
1-3/4 cup grated, unpeeled zucchini (use the smallest holes on a box grater and pack lightly into the measuring cups)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Coat a 9x5 inch loaf pan with nonstick spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, almond meal, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the eggs on medium-high speed for 5 minutes. Turn off the mixer, add the oil and brown sugar, and beat slowly for 1 minute. Add the zucchini. Beat on low speed for 1 minute longer. Dump in the dry ingredients. Beat just until combined.

Remove the bowl from the mixer. Give the sides and bottom of the bowl a good, solid sweep with a rubber spatula, making sure all the floury bits are incorporated. Scrape into the prepared loaf pan.

Bake for about 55 minutes, until a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool for 15 minutes, then turn out and finish cooling on a wire rack. Don't attempt to slice until the bread is fully cool.

printable pdf

...

This Sunday, 8/26/12, I'll be signing books from 12p-2p at New Seasons Market (Sellwood) in Portland, Oregon. I'd love to meet you.

 

Chain Link Bread

Moments whir by in an instant, barely registering. You catch the eye of a stranger, hear a riff, smell a spice. Then nothing happens. Less than nothing, sometimes.

Except when something does happen. Occasionally, the smallest of moments, the quietest of gestures, the most humble of offerings return later in ways both unexpected and delightful.

Years ago, while he was in college, my brother dated a fellow student named Marilyn. At some point, she brought (or mailed?) a walnut bread to my mother. I didn't bake much back then -- cookies, brownies, that was pretty much it -- so to me, this gift was both homespun and unique. I can't recall what my mother thought of it, but I was still living at home, and I thought it was wonderful. And I adored Marilyn. And then I finished the bread and went on with my life. Days came and went, I moved around, got married, bought socks, had babies, swept the floor. Just kidding! I hate sweeping!

My point is that the bread didn't exert a conscious pull on me. It was one moment, one item, in a lifetime of tastes and gestures and moments and banalities that all strung together in a long chain, a chain so filled with moments that each one became almost invisible. 

Marilyn and my brother have remained close friends for decades. She's an absolutely lovely woman, a pediatrician, and leads a rich, full life with her husband and two sweet children.

A few months ago, she emailed me after seeing a recipe here for my mother-in-law's date nut cake. She'd made it to bring to her family in Boston, and wanted to say hello. "Dates always make me think of your mother, the person who introduced me to good dates."

My mother introduced her to good dates?!?

One of the moments on my momentchain started twinkling. It buzzed and jostled, clinked and swirled. Marilyn's resonance with my mother-in-law's date nut cake rekindled her memory of my mother's love for dates, which, in turn, rekindled my memory of Marilyn's own walnut bread, which, it turns out, was her German great-grandmother's recipe. Our chains were linked, across generations of women, across continents, across all notions of improbability.

She shared her recipe with me, and I, in turn, am sharing it with you. We are now linked, you and I.

We are linked.

...

Brown Sugar Toasting Bread with orange peel, clove, and honey butter

This recipe is lovingly adapted from my friend Marilyn's Great Grandmother Oehler's Nut Bread, a very simple recipe with only 7 ingredients (white sugar, milk, egg, flour, baking powder, salt, nuts). I've added some additional flavorings and made some tweaks as you'll see below, but the spirit of the bread remains the same. This is a hard, rustic, craggy-topped quick bread, meant for toasting rather than for eating straight up. I slather my toasted slices with honey butter. Marilyn likes hers with butter and salt. It keeps for several days wrapped in foil.

Makes 2 squat (1-1/2-inch high) loaves

For the bread:

Soft butter, for greasing the pans
1 scant cup dark brown sugar
1-1/2 cups milk
1 egg, beaten
2 to 3 tablespoons honey
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups whole wheat flour
3/4 teaspoon ground cloves
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Zest of 2 oranges
1 cup chopped walnuts 

For the honey butter:

Additional softened butter, honey, and sea salt

To make the bread: Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease two standard-size (9"x5") loaf pans very well with soft butter. In a large mixing bowl, stir together all the bread ingredients, except the nuts. No fancy equipment or techniques are necessary here, but make sure the ingredients are fully incorporated, especially any floury bits at the bottom of the bowl. (I sometimes find it easier to whisk the honey into the eggs, but the choice is yours.) Stir in the nuts at the end.

Bake for 50 to 55 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Cool completely.

Meanwhile, blend the salted honey-butter together with a spoon. I make a little at a time, using a ratio of 2 tablespoons soft butter to 1 teaspoon of honey, plus a generous pinch of salt, scaled up as you like. You can always make more later.

When the bread is cool, slice it, toast it, and slather it with honey butter.
printable pdf

Down the block, and around the world.

It took an American-born, Guatemela-raised North Carolinian and a grocery clerk with a Puerto Rican dad to lead me to a Mexican tienda twelve blocks from my California house.

What the?

Sandra Gutierrez and I met a few years ago at a food writing conference, and her smile stayed with me even after I'd crawled into bed, shut the light, and closed my eyes that first night. Hers is a big, warm, sincere smile, the kind that lingers and makes the world a sweeter place.

Sandra's first cookbook, The New Southern-Latino Table, fuses her Latin American roots with her Southern sensibilities, and the results are steeped deeply, and equally, in both traditions. Biscuits meet chiles, grits meet loroco (an "edible vine flower" common in Central America), and peach cobbler meets mango and tequila.

You'll find a solid introduction to ingredients with which you may be unfamiliar -- from chayote (a squash) to chiltepan (a fiery pepper) to yuca (a popular tuber). I'm game to try them all. That said, Sandra also seems quite fond of the Southern staple pimiento cheese, and I'm afraid I need to draw the line somewhere. Lo siento.

Happily, however, the two recipes I've made so far were wonderful. Sandra's Chile-Cheese Biscuits with avocado butter were rich, flaky affairs. I served them with a potful of her Nuevo Red Beans and Rice, thick with andouille sausage and meaty pork ribs. My Texas-bred husband -- a man who knows a thing or two about biscuits -- and my children, who enthusiastically welcomed all the bold flavors -- gave firm seals of approval to both.

The biscuits call for queso seco and the stew called for achiote oil, a mixture of achiote seeds steeped in olive oil.  My local supermarket had neither the cheese nor the seeds, but the young clerk whispered that his Puerto Rican father shopped at a small Mexican market that -- it turned out -- was just a few blocks from my house. I'd driven by it a thousand times without noticing it.

Later that evening, I had everything I needed.

Thanks to him -- and thanks, too, to Sandra, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Guatemala, and North Carolina.

It takes a village, and sometimes the whole world really is right outside your doorstep.

...

For the past several weeks, Sandra's friends and colleagues have been helping her spread the word about her book. More recipes from The New Southern-Latino Table are aggregated on Sandra's blog and on the website of her publisher, The University of North Carolina Press.

...

Recipe for Chile-Cheese Biscuits with Avocado Butter
from The New Southern Latino Table by Sandra Gutierrez

[[csr notes: This recipe yielded 17 biscuits for me, rather than the 12 indicated in the recipe. They freeze beautifully. If you have trouble finding the queso seco, take the time to look for a Latin or Mexican market in your neighborhood. You'll love knowing where it is. Also, if you don't have self-rising flour, simply add 1 tablespoon of baking powder and 1 teaspoon salt to 2 cups of all-purpose flour and proceed as directed.]]

Excerpted with permission of the University of North Carolina Press (2011).

For the biscuits:

2 cups self-rising flour
1 cup grated queso seco (use Parmesan cheese in a bind)
1 teaspoon ancho (or pasilla) chile powder
1/4 cup chilled lard, bacon fat, or shortening
1 poblano chile, roasted, peeled, seeded, deveined, and finely chopped
1 to 1-1/4 cups buttermilk
3 tablespoons heavy whipping cream

For the avocado butter:

2 Hass avocados
2 teaspoons lime juice
1/2 teaspoon salt, or to taste
Pinch freshly ground black pepper
Pinch dried Mexican oregano (optional)

Preheat the oven to 475°F. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cheese, and chile powder. Using a pastry blender (or two knives), cut the lard into the flour mixture until it resembles coarse sand. Stir in the chiles.

Gradually add the buttermilk, mixing the dough with a wooden spoon or your hands just until it holds together (you may not need all of the buttermilk). Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead it gently a couple of times.

Pat it into an 8-inch circle (about 1/2 inch thick). Using a well-floured 2 1/8-inch biscuit cutter, cut out 12 biscuits (you'll need to gather up the dough and pat it down again lightly after the first biscuits are cut to get all 12).

Place the biscuits, with sides touching, in a 10-inch springform or cake pan. With your knuckle, make a small indentation in the center of each biscuit; brush the tops of the biscuits with the cream. Bake for 18-22 minutes, or until the tops are golden brown.

To make the avocado butter, halve and pit the avocados; scoop out the flesh with a spoon into a medium bowl and mash into a smooth paste. Add the lime juice, salt, pepper, and oregano (if using) and stir until combined.  Serve the hot biscuits with avocado butter.

printable pdf

Light the way. That's just how you do it.

It's tempting to write about these oat cakes. To crow about how substantial and belly-filling they are. To hail the sweetness of the maple and the crunch of the walnuts and the cakes' sheer, delicious, grain-filled heft.

But what I really long to talk about isn't the cakes so much as their creator. 

First, though, consider the following:

I'm no stranger to being snubbed. None of us is, right? And sometimes, someone who really has no reason to look down on you will make you feel small or unworthy. I generally don't have time for crap like this, but it still hurts when it happens, as I imagine it does for you, too.

And then sometimes, other people, people whom you might expect to snub you because they've enjoyed great success and earned widespread admiration, people who seem to have it all together, will embrace you without a single ounce of snootiness. These people quietly kick stones out of your way as you forge your own path.  They take the time to share what they know, to give a boost, to lend a hand.

And you may wonder: why does this first person turn her back, while this other person lights your way?

You may have been reading a lot about Heidi Swanson's gorgeous new recipe collection, Super Natural Every Day (Ten Speed, 2011).

I'm no different from the countless others who are genuinely enthralled by this understated, serene cookbook, a cookbook filled with uniquely conceived and beautifully photographed all-natural recipes. It's a book that's gauzy and light, that tiptoes, and it's all the more effective for its quiet power.

What you may not know is that Heidi Swanson, its author, has every reason to be a first class diva, and yet she's not.

And I want to thank her.  Because although she may not realize it, when we met, she lit a paper bag luminaria for me, set it down gently, and made my own path a little easier to see. She has helped me and inspired me, with kindness, warmth, and personal and professional gestures both large and small.

So.  Now it's my turn.  In the spirit of paying it forward, I'd like to introduce you to a few of the people I spent time with at Camp Blogaway this weekend. These are people you may not know, and that's precisely the point.  Folks like Shefaly Ravula and her sister Amee Meghani, folks like Andrew Wilder and Dr. Jean Layton, folks like Jeanne Fratello, Amanda Opaluch, Stacy Spensley, Julie Grice, Kim Burnell, Sara O'Donnell, Kelly Anderson, Bree Hester, Patti Londre, Nancy Eisman, and Gina Girardot Melton. There are many more, of course, and I hope those I didn't mention forgive me. I simply can't mention them all, and some I've left off because I've featured them here before.

My suggestion to you?  Make an oat cake, consider adding Heidi's beautiful book to your collection, then sit back, click around, and take a moment to discover someone new.

Then, when you're full-up, light the way for someone else, online or off.

That's just how you do it.

...

Recipe for Oat Cakes
oats, flax seeds, walnuts

Reprinted with permission from Super Natural Every Day: Well-Loved Recipes from My Natural Foods Kitchen by Heidi Swanson, copyright © 2011. Published by Ten Speed Press, a division of Random House, Inc.

[csr notes: This recipe jumped out at me as soon as I saw it. What I didn't expect was the hearty texture, one without the wimpiness of a standard muffin or the dryness of a classic scone. Instead, they're sweet and heavy, filling and satisying.]

3 cups / 10.5 oz / 300 g rolled oats
2 cups / 8 oz / 225 g spelt flour or whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 teaspoon aluminum-free baking powder
2 teaspoons fine-grain sea salt
1/4 cup / 1.5 oz / 45 g flax seeds
3/4 cup / 3 oz / 85 g chopped walnuts, lightly toasted (see page 219)
1/3 cup / 2.5 oz / 70 g extra-virgin coconut oil
1/3 cup / 3 oz / 85 g unsalted butter
3/4 cup / 180 ml maple syrup
1/2 cup / 2.5 oz / 70 g natural cane sugar
2 large eggs, lightly beaten

Preheat the oven to 325°F / 160°C with a rack in the top third of the oven. Butter a standard 12-cup muffin pan.

Combine the oats, flour, baking powder, salt, flax seeds, and walnuts in a large mixing bowl.

In a medium saucepan over low heat, combine the coconut oil, butter, maple syrup, and sugar and slowly melt together. Stir just until the butter melts and sugar has dissolved, but don’t let the mixture get too hot. You don’t want it to cook the eggs on contact in the next step.

Pour the coconut oil mixture over the oat mixture. Stir a bit with a fork, add the eggs, and stir again until everything comes together into a wet dough. Spoon the dough into the muffin cups, nearly filling them.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until the edges of each oatcake are deeply golden. Remove the pan from the oven and let cool for a couple minutes. Then, run a knife around the edges of the cakes and tip them out onto a cooling rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.

makes 12 oat cakes
printable pdf

Leather

At some point, the fruit roll-ups of my youth were re-christened; now they're fruit leathers.  This makes me think of furniture. And that makes me want to sit on them.

"Cheryl, why are you sitting on that fruit roll-up?"

"Don't be ridiculous.  It's a fruit leather."

"Oh. Okay."

"You want to join me?"

"I guess."

Then we lounge side-by-side on the fruit leather, perfuming our bums with the sweet scent of apricot.

Speaking of apricot, I thought you might like a recipe for this apricot quick bread, or tea cake.  (FYI: I used real dried apricots. No fruit leathers were harmed in the making of this recipe.)  I adapted it from the lovely cookbook The Perfect Finish (W.W. Norton, 2010) by Bill Yosses and Melissa Clark.  Yosses is the executive pastry chef at the White House (as in) and Clark writes a dining column each week for the New York Times. 

Underachievers, the pair of them. 

The original recipe is actually for Chewy Brown Sugar Date Walnut Loaf, but I -- having worked neither 1) for the President of the United States, nor 2) for the country's preeminent newspaper (unless you count Metro Silicon Valley) -- nonetheless took it upon myself to screw around a little.  This was due mostly to the presence of dried apricots in my house and the lack of presence of medjool dates.  The coconut was just something I tossed in because -- do I need to explain it?  It's coconut. 

Also, pecans may have gotten involved.

Look, if Bill Yosses and Melissa Clark don't care for my version, I'll just invite them over, and we can sit down together and resolve any hard feelings.

"Welcome to my home," I'll say.  "Pull up a fruit leather, and let's see if we can't make this right."

...

Apricot Pecan Tea Cake

This recipe was inspired by, and adapted from, the Chewy Brown Sugar Date Walnut Loaf in The Perfect Finish by Bill Yosses and Melissa Clark.  I made several swaps, including apricots for dates and pecans for walnuts.  The coconut adds moisture and sweetness (I halved the brown sugar called for in the original recipe), but its flavor is subtle, so coconut non-fans may not even know it's there.

Makes 1 loaf

1-1/3 cups (packed) diced dried apricots (about 6-1/2 ounces)
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup sweetened flaked coconut
8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter, cut into rough chunks
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 egg, at room temperature
1 cup chopped toasted pecans
Pinch salt

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Butter a 9 x 5-inch loaf pan.

Combine the apricots, brown sugar, coconut, butter chunks, and 1 cup of water in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil.  Once the butter melts, remove the pan from the heat and add the baking soda.  Using a wooden spoon or heatproof spatula, give a few quick stirs.  The mixture will foam up like a crazy science experiment.  It's really, really foamy.  Scrape into a mixing bowl and let cool for about 5 minutes.

Stir in the vanilla, both flours, egg, pecans, and salt and mix well (by hand) to combine.  Scrape into the prepared pan.  Bake for about 55 minutes, or until the cake is set and a skewer comes out clean.  Cool for 10 minutes, run a knife around the sides to loosen, and unmold onto a rack.  Cool completely, then slice and serve.

printable pdf

Wanted

 

The bad moodometer tick, tick, ticks.  Faster and faster, louder and louder, the pulse accelerates, crescendos, as the lunch hour nears, arrives, passes.  This is my downfall.  This, my Achilles heel.

If I could hire an assistant, it wouldn't be to file, pay bills, answer calls.  It would be to drag me like a caveman from my desk to the kitchen at noon each day for a superquick lunch.  No frouffy food's necessary -- just some cheese slapped on bread'll do fine.  On fancy days, yeah, we could expound on the theme, adding small porky nibbles or a slather of condiment, but the goal would remain thus: to get some food from the fridge to my belly in under 10 minutes, before I turn from a perky human into a fiery bloodsugarolopolous.  I'll even do the cooking.  My assistant's sole job would be to peel me from the laptop and shove me, hard, down the stairs. 

Any takers?  The pay stinks, and you'd have to deal with me, but otherwise it'd be a pretty sweet gig. 

...

Recipe for Gooey Mozzarella Toasts with pancetta and quince

Here's what you need when you're starving and teetering on the edge of a moody cliff.  I know you may not have pancetta and quince paste hanging around, but if you do, you'll end up with a few exceptional little bites.  If you don't, melty cheese on bread is nothing to scoff at on its own.  Stop being such a snob.

Serves 1 or just maybe 2

1/4 cup finely diced pancetta
1 ounce quince paste (membrillo), available at some cheese shops and Whole Foods
4 ounces dense, dark German bread (about 3 slices)
2 ounces mozzarella, cut into slices
Coarse black pepper and quartered lime, optional

Crisp the pancetta over medium high heat.  Drain on paper towels.

Spread a thin layer of quince paste on each slice of bread.  Top with cheese.  Broil for a quick minute or two until cheese melts, and turns golden and bubbly, watching carefully to prevent burnage.

Sprinkle with crispy pancetta and a little coarse ground pepper, and squeeze with a little lime, if desired.

printable pdf

Bread

He kneaded and punched it
And pounded and pulled 
Till it looked okay
                -Maurice Sendak, In the Night Kitchen

I know perfectly normal people who are terrified of making bread.  I can't tell you why, honestly.  It's like they think the dough is going to up and attack them, or glom onto their faces and nibble their eyeballs. Like the yeast will prance around their heads like lice, or nestle in their pores and suffocate their skin cells. I don't get it.

Making bread can be an ordeal -- I will admit.  But it certainly doesn't have to be, and since the invention of no-knead breads a few years ago, any former excuses now just sound wussy.  

In a culinary landscape where so much is recycled and pilfered and built upon the work of those who have come before, there's very little that's genuinely new. But the no-knead method, immortalized in the cookbook Artisan Bread in Five Minutes A Day (Thomas Dunne Books, 2007) by physician Jeff Hertzberg and pastry chef Zoë François, really simplified things.  If you've got a big bucket, a refrigerator, and some time to chill out and do nothing while the gluten relaxes and the yeast works its magic, you can make this bread.  The happy corollary is that each batch yields multiple loaves, so you can bake up fresh bread from a single bucket of dough over the course of two weeks.

A few months ago, the pair came out with a second book, Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day.  This version makes use of whole grain flours, seeds, and a mysterious substance called vital wheat gluten (so scary!  no, it's really not) to produce crusty, chewy, bakery-quality loaves.  See pictorial evidence above.

Zoë even said I could share the book's master recipe with you here, which I was going to do, but the fact is, I think it's only fair that you get the recipe from their site directly.  Plus there's a super cool video (h/t Jennifer!) of Jeff demo-ing their method and Zoë making pizza lollipops, so why don't you go there and show them some love instead.  Here's the recipe, and here's the video.

It's Friday anyway, so no excuses.  It's not like you've got a hot date.