Meringues

According to the internet meringues take 15-18 minutes to bake.  Or maybe 45.  Or maybe 2 hours at 225 and another hour with the oven off and the door cracked open so they coast down.  But the differences don't matter too much, right?

I made meringues.  Piping was done with a plastic bag so shaping was hard.

I think meringues must have been a major luxury before electric mixers.  So much work to do by hand!  Fortunately for my arm, I mostly stood there and held a mixer while it turned egg whites into fluffy deliciousness.

6 egg whites = many meringues

Poof!

Nathan blowtorched this round

Bonus picture of a fancy dinner cooked by NHS tonight

Plain white bread

I've been continuing to work on getting good crusts from my breads.  The way I'm doing this is by using the same dough and making a loaf with it each day.  For high hydration I'm using a no-knead dough; for additional moisture I'm putting a pan in the bottom on the oven before baking and filling it with boiling water.

The cool thing about this dough is that I went a full week without using more yeast.  I put the no-knead dough into the fridge overnight, then pull it out in the evening when I get back from work.  I take about a quarter of it and put it aside, then split the rest in halves, roll them in flour (it's sticky!) and put them on the counter or in the oven to warm up.

The remaining dough goes back in the bowl with an additional cup of warm water and a bit of flour.  It sits on the counter until the dough dissolves slightly in the water and starts to smell of yeast.  Then I add more flour and water until I get the consistency I want, and an appropriate amount of salt.  That becomes the dough for the next day!  I let it sit out until it looks happy and yeasty, then cover it and put it back into the fridge for a day or so.

I did notice that the yeast became less active over time.  This isn't a full starter, so I would probably add yeast periodically to refresh it if I wanted to do this for more than a week.

Pretzels!

Some friends came over with food-grade lye and we turned out some unbelievably tasty real pretzels.  Can't wait to make more and take them to work!

Ingredients ready

So ready

Artsy angle by Adem

Almost ready to knead

Sasha with the lye

Bam!

Pretzels.

Made some bread.  Was pretty stoked.

 Recipe approximately from smitten kitchen.

Matcha Cookies

Nathan: "I like matcha cookies."
Rachel: "I don't like matcha."
Nathan: "But Greg and I like matcha cookies."
Rachel: "Okay, I'll make matcha cookies."

Recipe:
http://www.humblebeanblog.com/2013/03/matcha-sable-cookies/

Nailed it

Halloween cookies.  They're supposed to look like this:



And instead they look like this:

Aw yeah.

Recipe here: http://www.marthastewart.com/356428/ladies-fingers#Halloween%20Cookie%20Recipes|/275516/halloween-cookie-recipes/@center/1006805/halloween-recipes|356428

If you want to cheap out and use frosting for the fingernails it may be worth applying the frosting after baking.  Just a thought.

"I would pay money for this" bread

Today I pulled out 2/3 of my bowl of no-knead dough from the fridge, set it to rise, and then patiently waited almost an hour for it to bake to crusty perfection.  The result was beautiful and delicious.

Blurry picture.  Sorry.

Reviewers said such lovely things!

"I would pay money for this bread"

"Holy mother of god"

"Oh my god this is amazing"

"I think I just ate a loaf and a half of bread in fifteen minutes"

That last is essentially true--two loaves disappeared in under 20 minutes.  The first loaf was gone in five.  

Pre-empting the comments: yes, my camera is bad.  But look at that floury, beautiful crust!

This was a great success.  I'll be making more tomorrow.  Nothing else to say here.

This weekend in baking

Two set of whole wheat loaves: buttermilk whole wheat and molasses whole wheat.

The buttermilk recipe said I could divide the dough in two before baking.  This was not a good idea.  I got two very flat loaves, because I really only had enough dough for one loaf.

No pictures of the molasses bread, but it is the tastiest bread I've made relative to effort.  I've made it three or four times, always to great reviews.

Last but not least a tasty no-knead bread with a hint of sourdough tang.  I wanted to get back to working on making crusty breads.

Delicious, open crumb.  Beautiful.



Recipes:

Buttermilk whole wheat
The neat trick for this bread is to mix the flour and water and let it sit for five minutes before fully mixing and kneading.  This lets the whole wheat flour absorb enough water that you don't have to fight it through the whole process of kneading.

Molasses wheat: Here are the ingredients.  Use half of the whole wheat, half of the white flour, and everything else to make a thin batter and beat it together.

Pictures courtesy of Adem, who did the mixing so I could wield a camera

Then add in the rest of the whole wheat, beat it again, and add white flour until you have a kneadable ball.  Remember that the amounts of flour are approximate.

 No-knead bread