Thursday, January 26, 2012

Day 9: Boule (Artisan Bread)

Today I didn't make any recipe to share and was mostly eating leftovers, so I figured that I would share the recipe to the bread that we have been making lately. The recipe is below!

Breakfast:
Steel-cut oatmeal with brown sugar and blueberries.
Tea with honey

Lunch:
Leftovers of the Quinoa, Butternut Squash, and Kale salad
Turkey sandwich-Big Bubs said that he wanted a Turkey sandwich (1/2 size), so I made him one and then he didn't want to eat it, so I did.

Dinner:
Sweet Italian Sausage with some quick-cook brown rice and kale.

Snacks:
Goldfish
Hard boiled egg
Popcorn (from a microwave bag)
**I still need to eat something else to increase my calories, but I haven't decided what.

Recipe:
Boule Artisan Bread
I had heard about this book Artisan Bread In 5 Minutes A Day and I was intrigued. I looked it up on Amazon and it was rated 4.7 stars out of 5, which is pretty impressive. My husband and I also used to make our own bread, but had stopped doing that once Little Bubs was born. This book made the bread making seem easy and fast and I wanted to start baking our own bread again, so I put this book on my wishlist for Christmas and received it! I definitely recommend getting this book because it has been really easy and the bread has tasted delicious!

This is their Master Recipe: Boule (Artisan Free-Form Loaf)
They are all about making a lot of loaves at a time, so this recipe makes four 1-pound loaves.

Ingredients:
3 cups lukewarm water
1 1/2 tbsp granulated yeast (2 packets)
1 1/2 tbsp kosher or coarse salt
6 1/2 cups unsifted, unbleached, all-purpose white flour, measure with the scoop & sweep method
Cornmeal for the pizza peel (or in our case the cookie sheet)

Directions:
1. Warm the water slightly, to about 100ºF.

2. Add yeast and salt to the water in a 5-quart bowl or, preferably, in a resealable, lidded (not airtight) plastic food container. Don't worry about getting it to disolve

3. Mix in the flour--kneading is unnecessary. Add all of the flour at once. Mix with a wooden spoon or the dough hook attachment on a food processor or stand mixer until the mixture is uniform. You can use wet hands to mix the dough too. You are all done with there are no more "dry" spots in the mix.

4. Allow to rise. Cover with a lid (do not use screw-topped lids because the trapped gases could cause it to explode). Allow the mixture to rise at room temperature until it begins to collapse (or at least flattens on the top), approximately 2 hours (if you go up to 5 hours it will not harm the results). You can use a portion of the dough any time after this period. Put the dough in the refrigerator and let sit overnight or at least for 3 hours.

5. "Cloak" and shape a loaf in 30-60 seconds. Prepare a pizza peel (or cookie sheet) by liberally sprinkling cornmeal on it, so that the loaf doesn't stick to the peel. Sprinkle the surface of your dough with flour. Pull up and cut off a 1-pound (grapefruit size) piece of dough, using a serrated knife. Hold the mass of dough in your hands and add a little more flour as needed so it won't stick to your hands. Gently stretch the surface of the dough around to the bottom on all four sides, rotating the ball a quarter-turn as you go. The bottom of the loaf may appear to be a collection of bunched ends, but it will flatten out and adhere during resting and baking. The correctly shaped final produt will be smooth and cohesive. The entire process should take no more than 30-60 seconds.

6. Rest the loaf and let it rise on a pizza peel. Place the shaped ball on the cornmeal-covered pizza peel. Allow the loaf to rest for about 40 minutes (it doesn't need to be covered).

7. Twenty minutes before baking, preheat the over to 450ºF, with a baking stone placed on the middle rack. Place an empty broiler tray for holding water on any other shelf that won't interfere with the rising bread.

8. Dust the top of the loaf liberally with flour, which will allow the slashing knife to pass without sticking. Slash 1/4-inch-deep cross, "scallop," or tic-tac-toe pattern into the top, using a serrated bread knife.

9. After a 20-minute preheat, you're ready to bake. With a quick forward jerking motion of the wrist, slide the loaf off the pizza peel and onto the preheated baking stone. Quickly, but carefully, pour about 1 cup of hot water into the broiler pan and close the oven. Bake for about 30 minutes or until the crust is nicely browned and firm to the touch. Remove the loaf from the oven and allow to cool completely, preferably on a wire cooling rack.

10. Store the remaining dough in the refrigerator in your lidded container and use it over the next 14 days.

**I left out some things that they talk about in the book that aren't crucial to the baking process, but they might be useful. They also have pictures in their book. So I would definitely suggest to get their book! They also have tips and other useful information at the beginning of the book**

Nutritional Information:
Serving Size: 1 oz slice (16 oz-1 pound loaf)
Calories: 46
Carbs: 9
Fat: 0
Protein: 2

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