Real Baking with Rose Levy Beranbaum

Awwww...too late.

:-(

Reply to this      Posted by: sherry | May 6, 2008 9:38 AM #

Hi Sherry, ohhh, it is food safe to consume for about 1 week refrigerated, so if you haven't so, don't discard it.

Just that when you rise it on the pan, it may not rise that much as the yeast may have been exhausted or killed during refrigeration. It isn't poison, and a thin pizza is actually great!

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | May 5, 2008 7:57 PM #

Yes, the pizza dough is from the Bread Bible. I made two and only used one...I'll toss it. Thanks for your help!

Reply to this      Posted by: sherry | May 5, 2008 6:17 PM #

Sherry, which recipe? From Bread Bible? If so, a maximum of 24 hours.

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | May 5, 2008 2:20 PM #

How long will the pizza dough keep in the refrigerator?...just mixed and setting in the oiled cup.

THanks.

Reply to this      Posted by: sherry | May 5, 2008 12:24 PM #

Barbara, yes, the wonders of my tropical weather. Good luck on your farmers markets, it is a nice place to be nowadays where people are starting to appreciate locally grown or produced.

The volunteer plant seems to be hosting some white flies now, but it is thriving and still edible. I think the white flies will be gone when the next pest takes over!

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | May 4, 2008 1:23 PM #

Hector, that "volunteer" tomato plant looks mighty healthy to me, and the tomatoes are darling!

This is one of those times I really envy you folks who live in warmer climes. My tomato plants are only about 6 inches high, still under lights in the basement. In a few more weeks they will move outside, under protection...looking to hold my plant sale on May 24th.

Our small Wisconsin town seems to be going from "no farmers' market at all" to "two competing farmers' markets." Ah, the joys of small-town politics and egos! I hope we can settle down to just one market. Well, I will certainly be at one or the other of them, depending on how it all shakes out...

Reply to this      Posted by: Barbara A. | May 3, 2008 9:38 PM #

Tomatoes is one of those savories, I have been paying CLOSE attention in my part of the country. A lot of local production has started to pop up, not far from excellent, but most all greenhouse grown. Hawaii has excellent weather for tomatoes (sun and warm), but we also have all the pests and diseases you can think of. When greenhouse grown, we can grow fairly unsprayed plants. When not in greenhouse it is near impossible even if you spray with the entire periodic table of elements.

I have lost track in my life what a tomato should be until I went to Italy. There, tomatoes are enjoyed as seasonal, and the greenhouse ones are considered the junk tomatoes. Indeed, direct sunlight (without going thru a greenhouse glass) contributes tremendously to the flavor. I have tried ALL my local greenhouse grown tomatoes from all sources and at ALL restaurants, my favorite is in capresse, but have concluded to save my money instead that indeed would pay by itself for a ticket to Italy.

I went to agriculture college for 3 full years, and I can grow just about everything, but since I found my true call (baking) which accounts for my second full time job (and perhaps third), I don't grow much of what doesn't grow with minimum effort. About 2 month ago, a little "weed plant" sprouted in my front driveway, and I immediately identified it as a tomato plant. I wanted to know how long it will live, plus it was covering nicely a bare dirt spot. I didn't do anything to it, except for occasional staking since it is outgrowing into my walking path. It gets a gentle mist from my random placement of irrigation, plus an additional drop or two of water from a leaking faucet I use each time I change my dog's water bowl. I haven't fertilize it, except for a mountain of leave that accumulate from nearby trees. My dog goes there about twice a month, when I make the crime of not taking her for a walk.

One of the things I try to get when in the USA Mainland is tomato, only during the summer, and if locally grown! Of course, not greenhouse grown.

It is April 28th, and this will be my dinner. My turntable is 12" wide, on it some vanilla beans.

http://www.hectorwong.com/roselevy/tomato.html

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | April 28, 2008 11:02 PM #

Roseanna, you are my favorite friend! In fact, I am down to my last 3 cubes of frozen caramelized onions!

I keep BB stiff starter, feeding weekly. I don't discard old starter each week, instead I add more flour/water to proportion. If I start with 125 grams (50 old starter, 50 flour, 25 water), in about 2 weeks I have more than 300 grams. I take about 300 grams or week old stiff starter and use it exactly as if it was pizza dough from BB. What I do often, is use my 15" copper pizza pan, brush it generously with olive oil, flatten the "dough" ball starting from the middle, using my fingers, until it has stretched to about 10", let rest 15 minutes, then stretch more until about 13", then rest again, and stretch till covering the pizza pan. Bake on a preheated oven 400oF, pre bake as doing the pizza crust from BB.

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | March 2, 2008 3:29 AM #

Hector, Yes, please post the recipe! I was reading some old posts and love your idea of freezing the carmelized onions. I enjoy your posts so much Hector. Roseanna

Reply to this      Posted by: Roseanna | March 1, 2008 9:41 PM #

Hector, I may have missed it, but can you describe how you convert the sourdough (old?) into the pizza crust? The day you originally wrote about it I tried sauteeing some old starter in some olive oil to see if it would taste like a "gnoccho" di Modena. Not a complete success, but the crispy, oily outside part was good.

Beth

Reply to this      Posted by: Beth | March 1, 2008 9:21 PM #

Second take, I think I am loving making pizza by using 100% stiff starter as 100% pizza dough. Pre-bake following BB pizza recipe.

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | March 1, 2008 8:02 PM #

Thanks Hector. I'm going to roast it this morning.

Reply to this      Posted by: Rozanne | December 6, 2007 8:53 AM #

Rozanne, I've been using grape tomatoes. Cherry tomatoes will work, too. Don't use big tomatoes.

Patrincia, thanks for finding the 'recipe'

I've never tried to freeze them. But I am sure it will work since I make mine's ahead of time, about 2 weeks prior and let sit on its own juices in a glass jar in the refrigerator. They taste better than just made! I do sprinkle the tomatoes with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil prior to oven.

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | December 6, 2007 2:34 AM #

Patrincia, not sure if that was my original recipe, but I do make killer caramelized onions following Rose's recipe for Focaccia Primo.

I make huge batches and freeze them in ice cube trays. Any recipe calling for sauted onions, shallots, and or garlic, gets the frozen caramelize onions! I no longer need to buy and deal with fresh onions each time any more! I sauted some fresh mushrooms with it, and it is just as good as fresh!

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | December 6, 2007 2:31 AM #

Rozanne - My pleasure! (I actually had it stored in a file on my computer)

Oh Hector - I made your oven caramelized onions and they were fantastic!

Reply to this      Posted by: Patrincia | December 5, 2007 10:32 PM #

Thank you so much Patricia. I remember seeing something like this on the blog but couldn't find it and began to think I was imagining it.

Reply to this      Posted by: Rozanne | December 5, 2007 10:09 PM #

I'm not sure what tomatoes Hector uses, but I found this on the blog:

Rose's Oven-dried Grape Tomatoes

i'm not sure i ever actually posted the recipe bc it's such a non recipe! all you do is cut the tomatoes in half horizonally and set them cut side up on a sheet pan. sprinkle with salt and a little sugar if they are not sweet and in season, maybe some herbs such as time, and let them sit in an oven until they start to wrinkle. you can use 200F for several hours or 350 for about 45 minutes.
i store them frozen in canning jars all winter.

Posted by: Rose Levy Beranbaum | May 22, 2007 8:15 PM

Reply to this      Posted by: Patrincia | December 5, 2007 9:34 PM #

Hector, I need a favour. Can you please tell me what type of tomatoes Rose uses for her Oven Roasted tomatoes? I know you have made it several times and was wondering if you could help me out. I don't have the book that has the recipe and know you cannot post the recipe here due to copyright laws but if you could answer these questions for me I would be very grateful. Also does she cut the tomatoes in half? I got about 10 pints of grape tomatoes and the only way to preserve them is to oven roast them. They are so sweet and flavourful that it would be a waste not to preserve them. I am sorry to trouble you. Thank you.

Reply to this      Posted by: Rozanne | December 5, 2007 9:04 PM #

Oh yes bucatini is another favorite - I love the little hole - the long fusilli has the hole too.

Reply to this      Posted by: Patrincia | July 20, 2007 3:22 PM #

I love fusilli!!!!!! and bucatini too!!!!!!!!!!!!

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | July 20, 2007 1:43 PM #

I've never met a pasta I didn't love. You know how you had rice at every meal growing up? Well, we had pasta at nearly every meal - it's a total comfort food for me. My favorite shape is the long fusilli - they're like 18 to 20-inches long and are shaped like a cork screw (folded in half and dried) - hard to find where I live so I stock up when I find them. Most people bring souvenirs home from their travels, I bring home pasta. If you live near a Trader Joe's, they have an extra-extra-long spaghetti that's not folded before they dry it - it's kind of fun (takes longer to twirl onto your fork though).

Reply to this      Posted by: Patrincia | July 20, 2007 8:31 AM #

Thanks Patrincia. I use that much salt, too! and I agree that people don't know what is good pasta until they try the brands you mention. YOU CAN TASTE THE DIFFERENCE is what people said once converted!

My favorite pasta is fresh pappardelle, hand cut.

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | July 20, 2007 1:59 AM #

Hi Hector - The two biggest mistakes a person can make when cooking pasta are 1) over cooking it, and 2) under salting the cooking water.

I suppose commercially make pastas might contain some salt, but not enough to effect how much salt you should add to your boiling water (unless you're on a sodium restricted diet of course).

I have a family of 6 (including 3 teens) so I cook big, but here's what I usually do:

I cook 2 lbs. of pasta at a time - I bring 12 quarts of water to a full boil, lower the heat before adding my salt so the water doesn't violently boil over, add approx 4 tbsp of salt, stir until the salt is dissolved because salt grains can pit the bottom of your pot, turn the heat back up and re-boil the water (just takes a minutes or two), add the pasta, stir after a few minutes, drain when "al dente", put pasta directly into your sauce, or if you like to serve the sauce separately, drizzle the pasta with extra virgin olive oil and toss to coat.

I have one super picky eater, so I almost always serve the sauce on the side. To help reduce the amount of dirty dishes I have to wash, I serve the pasta directly from the stockpot I cooked it in, but only after I've cooled the pot down with cold water (this is easy to do while the pasta is draining in the colander) - if you put the pasta back into the hot pot, you'll have a gummy, over-cooked mess on your hands.

(I know it sounds like a lot of salt, but keep in mind, I'm using a huge 12-qt stockpot. You'd only need about 2 tbsp of salt to cook 1 lb of pasta in a 6-qt stockpot)

They say - if you don't salt your pasta water enough to begin with, there's no amount of salt you can pour on afterwards to make up for it.

As for making my own pasta - I have on several occasions, but it was years ago when I had more time on my hands. I truly love homemade raviolis, but for unstuffed shapes I honestly prefer store bought. There are some excellent brands available - DeCecco, Barilla, and Ronzoni to name a few. There may be others, but I would definitely stay away from "store brands" and "off brands" - they are hideous to say the least.

Reply to this      Posted by: Patrincia | July 19, 2007 10:09 PM #

Patrincia, I always have a hard time estimating how much salt to add in the pasta boiling water. It depends on how much salt was used to make the pasta right? Making the water taste like the sea sounds like a good guideline to follow, thank you for the tip.

Also, I was told that even if your pasta was made with lots of salt, you still need to put salt in the boiling water! And, when that is the case, lower the amount of salt in the pasta sauce!

Do you roll your own pasta? I make my own flat pasta: linguini, fettuccine, pappardelle, lasagna. I also make my own tortellini, but that is only if my dinner guests don’t mind having a tortellini making party; I have a photo of such party with about 300 tortellini, it was a one time deal because now my guests won’t attend when I try to organize another such event again!

I’ve just saw in a book, a spaghetti struding device pointing down. It is made of bronze and permanently attached to a wood bench. You sit on the bench, and hand crank the dough thru the device. The spaghetti falls downwards onto a sieve. I very much like the idea to strude your spaghetti downwards so they don’t stick with each other. My mixer spaghetti attachment shoots them horizontally.

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | July 19, 2007 3:11 PM #

Hector - sounds Delicioso! Now you're talking my area of expertise (I'm Irish/Italian) - I salt my water until it tastes like the sea, and I always remove my pasta before the cook time stated on the box - even for DeCecco (my favorite brand). Oh, and I use tons and tons of basil too!

Reply to this      Posted by: Patrincia | July 19, 2007 1:57 PM #

http://www.hectorwong.com/roselevy/BakersCarbonara.htm

Baker's Carbonara:

In a small bowl, combine 1/2 cup of 100% extra virgin olive oil mayonnaise, 1/2 cup of left over whipping cream (with sugar as usual), 1/2 cup of left over egg yolks (from so much Mousseline Buttercream making), and 1 tbsp of finely chopped basil.

Cook 750 gr of spaghetti al dente, preferably De Cecco #12 or Garofalo #9. In the meantime, on a small sauce pan, bring to a simmer 2 cans of tomato sauce (preferably organic, wine ripened) with 1 tb of salt. Drain the spaghetti and return to the pot over low heat; immediately add the tomato sauce, stir. Turn the heat off and add the mayonnaise mix; stir; cover for 15 minutes and serve.

Prego!

Tips for Success: It is important that you time your spaguetti cooking so when it is done, it will be drained and transfered immediatelly to sauce.

Tips for Success #2: The proper way to boil spaghetti, is to use a tall stock pot, on high heat. When the water is boiling, uncover and add 1 tb of rock salt (don't use table salt). When the water comes into a boil again, add the spaghetti, stir gently, and continue to cook uncovered for the exact number of minutes indicated in the box. In this carbonara recipe, subtract 3 minutes to achieve al dente.

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | July 19, 2007 12:43 AM #

I made today the banana bread from your Bread Bible and it is delicious!!!
I still have to try to make the pizza again, but, I don't feel like pizza - I feel like Challah Bread :) I will be starting to make it on Friday night. I will let you know what the results were, and I will take pictures.

Reply to this      Posted by: Delia Daza | February 21, 2007 10:19 PM #

I've tried the crumpet recipe from the Bread Bible twice now and I'm evidently doing something wrong because the dough that emerges is a sticky and stiff, not something that I could pour into rings. Not even close. In fact, I cooked some of it on the griddle without rings and I had to actually press it down and try to spread it to keep them from being two inches thick.

I'm replacing the water with scalded milk and skipping the dried milk. I measured the flour by weight and used gold medal unbleached. The last time I tried adding the minimum amount of water to the batter to get something somewhat pourable but I still didn't get the expected pattern of holes.

So my question is should I just keep adding water until I get something I can pour? What is the proper texture for this batter? I would guess that I might have to increase the liquid a lot, like by 50% or more to get a really pourable texture.

I'm also curious about the idea of making crumpets out of 100% whole grain flour (wheat, kamut or spelt). Is there any reason this wouldn't work? Is there any general approach to follow if I want to adapt a recipe for 100% whole grain flour? Any limitations? Could the rosemary foccacia from the Bread Bible (with the 20 minute beating time) be made to work, for example?

Reply to this      Posted by: Adrian | February 21, 2007 8:57 AM #

Thank you, Rose, for re-posting the whole wheat focaccia recipe. I had seen it but forgot to print it out. I had intended to make the recipe in the Bread Bible but I am very excited to try this one first. I just received the grain mill attachment for my Kitchen Aid and I will try it out today.

Reply to this      Posted by: joan | February 19, 2007 11:53 AM #

I have been making pizza on Sunday nights for about a month and a half. Tonite I made the dough with Harvest King and it was the best yet. It's funny that you mentioned that it was a No-Knead recipe--I was just thinking about that today. I'll be very interested to know how the long rise works.
What do you think about using HK for the focaccia recipe? Would you use the same amount of water?

Reply to this      Posted by: joan | February 18, 2007 9:38 PM #

I just celebrated 50 years of marriage, and I have used Gold Medal flour all
these years.I have 4 children and I have
made bread all these years also. I have
used The better for bread, flour, and
now I haven't been able to find it in
any store. Have you taken off the market? I thank you for letting me
vent.... Jean Odland

Reply to this      Posted by: Jean Odland | February 18, 2007 6:31 PM #

I finally made chocolate pizza for Valentine's day and served it with French Vin Mousseux (bubbly not from the Champagne district).

The basic recipe is from Giadia DeLaurentis, but I made a different dough. She makes it with a pizza dough, flour, water, yeast and salt, plus a LOT of olive oil and some sugar. But olive oil is NOT my favorite with chocolate, so I used for the crust a German coffee-cake recipe from Hewitt's NY Times Heritage Cookbook, except replacing the milk with water. For some reason, my first attempt at this didn't work ()the recipe has worked for me twice before)

1/2 packet of yeast (3.5 gms; 1 1/8 t)
4 oz water (1/2 C; 112 gms)
3 T butter (1 1/2 oz, 42 gms)
2.6 oz sugar (74.4 gms) (3 oz--6 T-- by volume)
1 3/4 C all purpose flour (8.75 oz, 248 gms)
yolk of 1 large egg.
1/8 t salt. (about 0.8 gms)

Normally, one doesn't bother with a sponge with a rich dough, but after my failure, I mixed flour, water, and (instant--bread machine) yeast to make a stiff rough dough, kneaded by hand and let it rise until it was clearly active. (I should have held out some of the flour to make it easier to knead.)

When it was clearly active, swelling a little, I put the sponge in the food processor, added the sugar, melted butter, egg, and salt and processed until it formed a dough (about 1 minute after it formed a ball) I let it rest 5 minutes, broke up the ball, and then processed again for 1 minute (steel blade).

I then put it in a bowl sprayed with oil and let it rise a bit. It was nowhere near doubled, but it had been a couple of hours. I then knocked it down and roughly shaped it to fit my largest quiche pan (12.5 inches, about 31 cm). Pan was sprayed with oil, and I covered with plastic and let it rise a couple of hours, till it had risen to about half-fill the pan.

I dented it with fingertips, as DeLaurentis says and then I baked it about 30 minutes at 325. F (162 deg C), until it was nicely brown. I removed it and immediately turned the oven up to 450 deg (23deg F)

I then followed DeLaurentis's recipe, using some Nutella and some Trader Joe. I used Valrhona 70% chocolate and Giradelli white chocolate. I had to chop the hazelnuts (filberts) myself--they seem hard to get just now.

http://www.epicurious.com/images/recipes/recipe_results/full/photos/237341.jpg
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/recipe_views/printer_friendly/237341

CHOCOLATE PIZZA
[]
For the true pizza lover: a dessert version.

Pizza dough
2teaspoons butter (1/4 stick), melted
1/4cup chocolate-hazelnut spread (such as Nutella)
1/2cup chopped bittersweet or semisweet chocolate
2tablespoons chopped high-quality white chocolate (such as Lindt or Perugina)
2tablespoons chopped toasted hazelnuts

Preheat oven to 450°F. Line large baking sheet with parchment. Roll out dough on lightly floured surface to 11-inch round. Transfer dough to prepared sheet. Make indentations all over dough with fingertips. Brush melted butter over. Bake until pale golden, about 20 minutes.

Smooth chocolate-hazelnut spread over hot crust. Sprinkle chopped bittersweet chocolate and white chocolate over. Bake until chocolate begins to melt, about 2 minutes. Sprinkle chopped hazelnuts over, cut into wedges, and serve.

Makes 6 servings.

Bon Appetit
March 2007
Giada De Laurentiis

---
[Chefs are] whacked out moral degenerates, dope fiends, refugees, a thuggish assortment of drunks, sneak thieves, sluts, and psychopaths.
--Anthony Bourdain

Reply to this      Posted by: David Chessler | February 16, 2007 10:10 PM #

Dear Rose:I am trying to start my own baking and cake decorating business from home, I have tried some of your cakes and I love them, you have made me think about going back to learn more about chemistry too, lol.
Since I love your Cake Bible so much my daughter gave me for Christmas the Bread Bible, well, here is the problem, I tried to make the Perfect Pizza Dough from page 189 and it did not rise, my son in law, who has worked in a pizza place since he was 14 years old, helped me and we made it again with some variations and that time it worked.
I don't understand, everything I make from your books comes out perfect, what happened here? Instead of mixing the yeast as you said it he mix the oil, salt, sugar, water and yeast first for about 10 minutes and then we added the flour.
I need your experienced advice here PLEASE!!!!

Reply to this      Posted by: Delia Daza | February 16, 2007 10:41 AM #

Hello all, this is another of my baking marathons. Use Rose's pizza recipe from The Bread Bible. Because I only have 5 pizza pans and I had to bake 30 pizzas, I used heavy duty aluminum foil as pizza pans. It works and it saves you time. Use the wide rolls. I made rectangular pizzas, about 16 x 8 inches, the size of two of my quarry tiles (pictured). Lay 2 tiles on the middle rack of your oven. My oven have convection, so I also used the top and the bottom racks, thus baking 3 pizzas at a time. Cut as many sheets of foil as pizzas you need to make; give an extra 2 or 3 inches of foil on each side for easier handling. Stretch and proof your pizzas in groups; each group is how many pizzas you can fit in your oven at once; in my case 3. So, I grabbed enough dough to fill 3 "pizza pans;" cover with some plastic wrapping or more aluminum sheets; then after 10 minutes I do the second group. And so on 10 minutes apart until you are done. I label each group and after about 30 minutes I start baking my groups 10 minutes apart =)

Reply to this      Posted by: Hector | February 15, 2007 2:12 PM #