Rustic Sourdough (w/Roasted Garlic & Parmesan)

today's recipe comes from king arthur flour. it's a rustic sourdough loaf--a sourdough bread spiked with yeast. i decided to add roasted garlic and parmesan cheese to one of the loaves (the one on the left). i'm so bloody clever :)

this wasn't a "fed" dourdough--i just used the 1 c. that i was going to throw out to feed the dough with. i let it sit out a while, then used it in this recipe. hey, it worked! who said breadbaking is a proper science? pshaw! i'm winging it! in fact, i used a combination of instant yeast & regular active yeast because i didn't have enough instant. you can see how good they look, and they tasted as good as they look.

oh, and as a "side-dish" for the bread, i made emeril's chicken & dumplings (minus the jalepeno). do you know how long it's been since i had chicken & dumplings? i used a leftover grocery store-rotisserie chicken carcass i had to make the stock. so good. so very, very good.

Pain de Mira

this is actually the Potato, Cheddar & Chive Bread from reinhart's BBA, a recipe i've been eyeing for quite a while, but since mira is a notorious (and self-confessed) potato ho & cheese ho (not to mention ham ho), i thought the above name more appropriate :)

it's a sourdough-spiked-with-yeast loaf, and it's as good as it looks. what you do is roll out a hunk of dough after it's risen, lay slices of cheddar cheese on it, then roll it up. after it has proofed for an hour, you slash (or score) it to the depth of the cheese so that when it bake, the cheese comes out and forms that brown, bubbly grigne that you see there. so good, and perfect with the ham i baked today (sorry, mira. i'll make it up to you).

Sourdough Biscuits

yep, yet another way to use up sourdough starter rather than throw it out. i used this recipe. if were to click on and read said recipe, you'll see that after you cut into the round biscuit shape, you're supposed to dip them in warm bacon grease, place them in a pan, and let them rise another 1/2 hour. i used melted butter instead. but i gotta tell you, they didn't rise much, and the didn't get any oven rise, either. and with 1/2 of starter, baking soda, and baking powder, i expected them to rise more than they did and be a little fluffier than they were. so, they were a little flat and a little tough. they certainly weren't maddog's red sage biscuits, nor did i expect them to be. if you read the recipe, you'll see that there is no butter, lard, or shortening cut into the dough (just the dip at the end). when will the bizarre sourdough experiments stop? probably soon.

Sourdough Ciabatta

this is the fourth different ciabatta recipe i've tried. they've all been good, including this one today, though it's my least favorite of the four (my favorite being this one). i didn't include the optional sun-dried tomatoes because, frankly, i don't care much for sun-dried tomatoes. so many people seem to love them, but...i don't. love tomatoes, though. love 'em. anyway, this was on okay bread, just kind of bland. i'll find another sourdough ciabatta recipe somewhere and try it. i'll bring some into work tomorrow.

(Don't Look, Ben!) Baked Sourdough Corn Dogs

yeah. in my quest to find interesting things to do with sourdough, i was thinking about sourdough cornbread, and then i remembered this post (don't look at that post either, ben; they put ketchup on it *shudder*) i saw about baked corn dogs. you'll note that i'm calling them "corn" dogs like the rest of the non-texan world does, rather than the texas preferred "corny" dogs. that's because these were not very good. that's just a step above awful. check out the great homesick texan's posting (if you're still here, ben, look at this one. you'll cry tears of yearning and joy.) about corny dogs for what they should really look like, and to learn a little about them. i don't like to fry, and i held out hope that, while it wouldn't be anything like Fletcher's, it could still be good (the way those baked donuts i made were good). wrong. i shan't be doing this again. incidentally, it was the second bread disaster today. the other was using leftover sourdough bread i had to make cheesy bread pudding. that was awful, which is just a step above revolting. blech. there was one success, though. i used some of the other leftover sourdough bread i had to make pappa al pomodoro, or bread & tomato soup. this was very good, and worth doing again.

Walnut-Blue Cheese Sourdough Bread

when is it blue cheese and when is it bleu cheese? i suppose i could look it up--i am on the internet, after all--no, i don't see a quick answer. i don't guess it matters. this recipe comes from reinhart's BBA. in his section on sourdough breads, he claims this particular version is his favorite variation of sourdough bread. it seemed a bit unusual to me, but i decided to try it. since i'm the only one in the house who would eat such a bread, i made a smaller loaf for me and a larger one to take in to work tomorrow. i have to say i'm quite happy with this bread; peter reinhart was right (he isn't always, though. i've had a few BBA experiences that i wasn't happy with, and i'd rather blame him than me). it's a lovely color (though the crust got a little dark as i waited for the crumb to finish baking) and has good texture and taste. i had a version of a ploughman's lunch for supper tonight with this bread, some apple slices, pickles, and a porter. i hope my buddies at work like it. it's a bread that's best used in that fashion, i think, rather than as an accompaniment to a meal or as a vehicle for sandwiches or spreads. it should be the main star of a ploughman's lunch, or a part of an appetizer platter or just served with beer or wine as a snack.

No-Knead Sourdough Bread

on the heels of the very successful NY Times No-Knead Bread last week, i wanted to try a sourdough version. very simple. 1/4 c. sourdough starter, 1 1/2 c. warm water, 3 c. flour, 1 1/4 tsp. salt. stir. proceed as with previous recipe. you could actually smell the sourdoughness of it while baking. i cut into it almost immediately after pulling it out of the oven; i was anxious. if it had waited a bit longer, the nice holes in the crumb would've probably been more developed. don't care. tasted great :)

Multigrain Sourdough Pancakes

good morning! since the kids like chocolate chip pancakes (i can't type that without a shudder), i thought i use some more of my chocolate-covered sunflower seeds and throw them into some sourdough pancakes and see how they liked them. i didn't use a recipe for these. i used sourdough starter, egg, oil, salt, sugar, baking soda & powder, all-purpose flour, whole wheat flour, wheat bran, and corn meal, adding enough milk to get the batter to the consistently that i like (some ground pecans or walnuts or even almonds would've been nice, too, but i didn't have any). anyway, they were fine. i've had better pancakes, but i've had worse, and i like the multigrain texture. i even tried one with the chocolate sunflower seeds for the sake of this blog and you, dear readers. this is a FAR better application for the seeds than the pretzels were. the crunch of the seeds came through nicely adding to the nice texture of the pancakes, and the chocolate wasn't as noticeable (thank buddha). still, i'd rather not have the chocolate in it at all, but would welcome normal sunflower seeds in my multigrain pancakes. yeppers.

Sourdough Pretzels (topped with chocolate-covered sunflower seeds)

it's a day of experimentation. i saw chocolate-covered sunflower seeds at whole foods and remembered peabody making cookies with them once, so i thought i'd buy some and play around with them. i was planning to make sourdough pretzels, so i thought "how about topping the pretzels with some of these?" the pretzels have a mix of all-purpose and whole wheat flour, so i thought the sunflower seed would compliment it nicely, and hoped that the chocolate (and nice autumn-colored candy coating) would be diminished by the flavors of the sourdough, whole wheat flour, and sunflower seeds since i am generally not a fan of chocolate breads. alas, it was not. fortunately for me (and the other adults), i only topped half of them with the seeds; the others got a simple sprinkling of salt. as far as the pretzels themselves are concerned, they were quite good, with the sourdough evident but not overpowering. i tinkered with the recipe some, substituting 1 Tbsp. of the sugar with 1 Tbsp. of malted barley syrup (any excuse to use that stuff!) and retarded the dough in the fridge over night after the initial rise, then took it out and let it sit at room temp again for about 5 hours before shaping them into pretzels. the kids liked the chocolate sunflower seed-topped pretzels, though, so it wasn't a total loss. tomorrow, i'm gonna try 'em in sourdough waffles. the kids like chocolate chip pancakes (yuck), so they should like these. i think peabody's cookies may be the best application for these pretty things, though.

Sourdough Croissants

huh huh huh!!! ze french, zey know bread. now i'll be the first to admit, these are not very sourdough-y as there is only 1/2 cup of starter and it's spiked with yeast. but if you eat one and want to eat another one right away, who cares?! and i did want to. okay, and i did eat another one. they're buttery and flaky and buttery and light yet buttery and...well, they're worth the effort. and they aren't very difficult at all. and i need to make them more often 'cause i need practice shaping them. those three above? they turned out best (and i drove them over to maddog & chris so they could try 'em, since they're Sir Toby's surrogate parents). others partially unrolled, completely unrolled...i need practice, man! and, you may notice that they seem a little flat at the top...that's because they were getting browner more quickly on the bottom, so i turned them over for a bit before they were done so i didn't wind up with cajun croissants. yep....i need to practice :)

Sourdough Blueberry Muffins

following on the heels of the very successful sourdough english muffins, i decided to make these blueberry muffins using the cup of starter i had to take out to feed my starter (which i've yet to name. many people do name their starters, which is a natural thing to do since it is a living thing and requires regular feeding and maintenance. all the names i've seen so far are male names--Herman, Joe, George, Ebeneezer--but i don't know why that is....perhaps because they are rather stinky....at any rate, i'm going to give some thought to this weighty issue today and the next time you read this blog, dear reader, you will see a proper name for my starter. i know it must've been weighing on your mind). i liked the sound of this--using some starter instead of throwing it away, blueberry muffins, whole wheat, not very sweet. and what have we learned? just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should. these weren't terrible (some in the house would disagree with me here), but they certainly weren't very good, either. my blueberries didn't taste very sweet themselves, for one thing, so i opted for the optional 1/2 cup of sugar instead of 1/4 cup. didn't help. ah, well. still very happy with....Toby. yep, Sir Toby, to be exact. this is a heavily shakespearean blog as you know, and sourdough starter is indeed rather beer-y smelling, so why not name my starter after the aristrocratic swill Sir Toby Belch from Twelfth Night? (who also influenced the popular toby jug) all hail Sir Toby, and may his next adventure be much more successful than this one!

Sourdough English Muffins

i'm really enjoying the sourdough starter (thanks chris!). it's easier to make stuff mid-week with sourdough than with yeast, i think. i can do a little bit one night, refrigerate or leave out, shape the next night, refrigerate, and bake the next and not use up a lot of time any of those nights. at least, that's what i did with the english muffins. i played fast & loose with the recipe, and i think that sourdough is much more forgiving to experiment with than yeast breads are. anyway, i got this recipe from the King Arthur Flour website (whence came the starter). put the dough together tuesday night, refrigerated; shaped into muffin rounds wednesday night (refrigerated); woke up early thrusday morning to cook on the electric griddle and bring some to work. and they were really good. i thought so, anyway, and since several people came back for seconds, i guess others agreed. not overly sour, but distinctly sourdough. i substituted one cup of whole wheat bread flour for one of the 6 cups of all-purpose flour i added to the starter (though the recipe calls for 7-8 cups!). the goofy directions have you flipping after 2 minutes on each side, then again after 6 minutes each side, and after 6 each side again, then 4 each...i stopped after the second 6 minutes, and they were perfect. i'll definitely be doing this again.

Sourdough Bread

actually, it was supposed to be sourdough bread bowls, but i didn't make them large enough. oops. i thought the dough was supposed to double in size after i shaped them, but....yeah, it was the recipe's fault. so, they're just small sourdough loaves, or...large dourdough rolls. yeah.....anyway, it's football day so i decided to use the crockpot to make a beef stew from Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook. the recipe says to cook it on high for 5-6 hours, or low for 8-9 hours. i cooked it on low for 9 hours. the potatoes were underdone. even the onion was still crisp after 9 hours! the brothy part was fabulous, the meat a little tough. so, either the recipe was waaaaay off on the time, or my crockpot is on the fritz. i'll try something else next week and see what happend. the bread, though, was very good! and the bread-sopping provided by the stew was excellent :)

Sourdough Waffles

a huge thank you to maddog and, especially, her indulgent boyfriend for ordering sourdough starter from KAF and getting more than they expected, which they graciously shared with me after my failed attempt to develop my own starter (i'll spare you the humiliating details). and, a big thanks to them for mentioning this waffle recipe to me. the nice thing about it is that it lets you use that 1 cup of starter you would throw out when feeding it. well, that's one nice thing about it. the other nice thing is that they're darn tasty. then one thing you have to be wary of is that they don't stay crisp for very long at all, so i'd advise you to eat each one as soon as it comes off the iron.