Jan 01, 2007 | From the kitchen of Rose
in Announcements
I'm off to S.F. to make a wedding cake for my dear friends Daniel Patterson (chef/owner of Coi) and his bride to be Alexandra Foote. Another dear friend, Diane Boate (gee maybe i should put an e at the end of Beranbaum(e)?) aka "The Cake Lady of S.F." will be helping me to pull this off (this is a the first time I'm attempting a wedding cake away from my home kitchen) and also will be documenting it with photos (she's an award winning photographer). So this is QUITE an adventure.
I may not get a chance to answer any postings until then but plan to catch up on questions and to post photos of the cake at my earliest opportunity!
Happy New Year!
Jan 17, 2007 | From the kitchen of Rose
in Wedding
This is the first time I’ve ever made a wedding cake away from my own home kitchen so back in August I started compiling long lists of essential ingredients and equipment necessary for the task. I forgot one indispensable item, however, until 2 days before I was due to fly out to S.F. as I was visualizing the whole process in my mind’s eye—a heavy duty turntable. Luckily my friends Caitlin and Meg from Miette Bakery jumped in generously loaning me their best, most smoothly turnable turntable. Caitlin also managed to find me the Green and Black cocoa which is my favorite and had been sold out at Whole Foods.
Continue reading "Deep Chocolate Passion Cake/The Foote-Patterson Wedding" »
Jan 21, 2007 | From the kitchen of Rose
in Bread
Friday night UPS delivered my new little Lodge cast iron 2 quart Dutch oven and within minutes I mixed a half recipe of the no-knead bread and set it to ferment for it’s 18 hour visit in the 70ºF/21ºC bedroom.
This is the way I’ll do it from now on as with just two of us and the limited shelf life of the bread it’s the perfect amount for dinner and the next day. It was so delicious I ended up making an open-faced butter and grated chocolate dessert after dinner!
The preseasoned pot is so adorable and so easy to lift in and out of the oven I’m going to use it for all sorts of other things as well. I happen to adore cast iron and have a sizable collection of odd shapes and frying pans of all sizes. I even have my grandmother’s which is about 100 years old!
Here’s the recipe for the little loaf as I did it:
Continue reading "Baby Bread--A Great New Technique" »
Jan 22, 2007 | From the kitchen of Rose
in Savory Cooking
Having fallen in love with my new cast iron pots with the intended use of baking bread, I found myself gazing admiringly at the lids when inspiration struck. Why not cook on the inverted lids ?! And why not borrow the technique of preheating them from the no knead bread recipe?
So I preheated the lid with the oven to 450ºF./230ºC. tossed some quartered little potatoes and a few mushrooms with olive oil, rosemary, salt, and pepper.
The lid handle fits right through the opening in the oven rack keeping the lid stable. After about 30 minutes, turn the potatoes and remove the mushrooms. Sprinkle the potatoes with chopped garlic and continue roasting for 10 to 15 minutes or until the potatoes are browned and tender.
Jan 25, 2007 | From the kitchen of Rose
in Bread
Charmed as I was by the stellar performance of my little Lodge cast-iron 2 quart Dutch oven, I set out to see how it would work with my basic sourdough bread (a 500 gram Dough). I made it exactly as I always do (it's in the Bread Bible) and the finished size of 6 by 3 1/2 inches was exactly the same as before although the shape seemed more perfectly smooth and rounded like a pebble. After eleven no knead breads the beautifully complex and tangy flavor of this one was a relief from the ordinary.
Curious to see if I could arrive at the same lovely open crumb texture of the no knead bread with a sourdough bread I increased the hydration to 80% for my next trial. My husband dubbed the bread an anomaly, which I found to be the perfect descriptor. On shaped rising, it puddled from 6 inches to 8 inches and stuck mercilessly to the heavily floured Silpat while transferring it into the hot pot. The baked bread was pasty on the inside with streaks of flour in the middle where some of the upper crust landed while trying to get it into the pan. I seem to remember that I may have tried making a sourdough with higher hydration several years ago because it seems very familiar. Some lessons we have to learn more than once.
So what I learned from the first experiment is that the hot pot technique works wonderfully with the rustic breads other than the no knead (as I suspected). And that the best way to transfer sour dough bread into the hot pot, after it has risen in the banneton, is to sift flour lightly on the top of the dough, invert it onto the removable bottom of a tart pan with a nonstick surface, or coated with baking spray. It will spread out to about 7 inches, but don't worry. Simply slide it into the hot pot. During baking it will draw in and rise up perfectly. Here's proof of its survival!
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