The Bread

Did you notice that I capitalized "bread"? Because it is that good.

Let me start this blog entry with a prolonged reasoning why I think that making bread is a good idea. First of all, I am the queen of bread, cheese and wine. In a sense that I like to eat it. I could live on it. And homemade bread is always the best but it is soooo much work! See, I am a fan of McGregor's Theory X and Y that I learned in business school. (Who would've thought you use this stuff in real life, right?) A part of the theory, the X part, states, among other things, that people are lazy and in order to make them work you have to provide incentives. Well, duh. Let it be money, health insurance or delicious product to eat (they're all in same category, in my book). But another incentive is that it is very easy. No kneading, no messing around. You don't even have to touch the dough if you don't want to, I promise, just try.

Directions:

First of all, you need just 4 ingredients. Mix 3 cups of bread flour (not all purpose, but it's on the same shelf in the store) with 1 packet of instant yeast and 1.5 teaspoon salt. Add 1.5 cups of water and stir until somewhat blended. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for 4 hours. Open the wrap and fold the dough couple of times, cover again and let rise a bit for 30 minutes. 

In the meantime, heat oven to 450 degrees and heat an empty pan that you'll use to bake the bread in - in needs to have a cover. I used a Pyrex bowl. Once it's heated, take it out and place the dough in the pot. I just "poured" it out of my bowl into the dish. Cover with a lid and bake for 30 minutes. Then, take the lid off and bake for 15-30 more minutes.
And I have to tell you, it tastes as the European bread I grew up on does.
You can find the original recipe HERE.

The bread

I often buy the Tuscan bread from Target, as I love my carbs. But making your own bread is not very hard. It may be a little time consuming, but the majority of time required is spent on letting it rise, when you can also do other things. That's why I often will pull out this old recipe that a friend's mom gave me and make my own and healthy batch of goodness. I can just visualize the fresh and steamy piece of bread with butter on it... Now, let's get to work! You will need:
1/2 c hot water plus 2 T active dry yeast
2 1/4 c hot water
1/3 c olive oil
1/3 c honey
2 Tablespoons molases
1 Tablespoon salt
7 1/2 whole wheat flour and 2 Tablespoons gluten

Combine water and yeast in a bowl, cover, set on top of another bowl with hot water in it, this will keep it warm. Give it a few minutes to bubble. In the meantime, combine the wet ingredients together. Add 2 c flour and mix. Add the bubbly yeast. Then add 4 c of flour and 2 T gluten ( don't add gluten if you're using bread flour) and mix. Keep adding flour in 1/2 c increments until you reach 7 or 7 1/2 c , the dough will be pretty sticky! Cover the bowl and let rise for 20-30 min, in the winter you can set it on top of a preheating over, in the summer I just set it outside. After the time lapsed you will see the dough seemingly larger, take it out of the bowl and knead it again on a floured surface, cut in half and place in 2 bread pans. They will seem flat:
...but after covering them in a plastic wrap and setting them in a warm place to rise for 20-30 min they will look just like the ones on the photo below.
Bake the raised dough at 350 for 36 min!
Warning: Please try not to eat it right away when out of the oven. It's still hot. Restrain yourself until it cools for few minutes and then you can devour it...

Great Harvest

Right after visiting Utah I stayed with my in-laws in Jackson, WY where I admired the mountains, ran the trails until I was out of breath (which didn't take long - I blame it on the elevation!), and ate delicious and natural food. One of the places I visited was The Great Harvest on Center St, which is famous for the bakery and everyone knows I am a sucker for bread!

So many choices today!Upon entering the waitress gave me a free, huge piece of bread with natural almond butter on it. Tasty appetizer for me and a great way to advertise their bread!

The fruit bar reminded me of the one at the Mary's Kitchen Port in Traverse City, MI, where I once worked as a salad girl... Memories!
Tempting... Who could say no to taking one of these home?

Super leftovers

Leftovers never taste as good as the meal on the night it was cooked. With one exception!
Since the Spring refused to make her way to North Dakota, I needed a hearty and comforting meal for the cold and windy days ahead. I decided to make a chicken and black bean stew using the highly rated recipe of Giada DeLaurentiis, which you can find here. Quick and easy is what I was looking for on a lazy, rainy day...
But you can only eat leftover chicken stew for so many days, right? This is when Jeff's creative mind came to my rescue, as he drained the fluid from the stew keeping all the solid parts, and mixed it with raw celery, mayo and mustard, basically making a chicken salad. This I have not heard of before! Put the salad on a baguette, cover with your favorite cheese, Havarti in my case, and throw it in the over for a couple of minutes for a quick broil!

Grzanki

The favorite meal of my childhood! And so simple to make, too!
Get a piece of good quality bread, I like to use baguettes. I usually put some butter on it for extra flavor, Jeff likes to add some garlic powder. Next, add tomato slices on top of it and at the very end slap some delicious cheese; muenster, some buttery havarti. Bake for a few minutes and broil to get the nice cheesy crunch on top. And voila! A perfect snack or even lunch!