"Delivery" pizza

I was out on a shopping trip at Sam's the other day and managed to talk to the people in the cafe they have inside the store. I noticed they were selling pizza by the box at the place, fresh baked, and I had a funny idea. I asked if I could buy some of their bulk pizza boxes off of them, and they agreed. Ten dollars later, and I had a huge load of fifty large pizza boxes, which I promptly threw in my trunk and sped away back home, laughing maniacally. It doesn't make much sense when you think about it. It's just a cardboard box. It doesn't make pizza any better than you already make it yourself. The tipping point for me is that I can not only send whole pizzas wherever they need to go, but I also have the silly delusion of grandeur that I can deliver pizza...to myself!


As much fun as it is to serve pizza straight off the peel or on a cooling rack or any little platter on the table, it really made me giggle to be able to open a box, pull out a slice, and pretend. On top of that, think of the last true delivery pizza you had, and it's never going to compare to a pizza that's made exactly how you like it. I wanted pizza margherita with buffalo mozzarella, big fresh leaves of basil, a slightly spicy, slightly sweet marinara, and a perfectly golden crust. I don't know of a single pizza joint in town that'll deliver that pizza to me.

Well, now I do.

Newcastle rolls

Beer is liquid bread. It's made from grain, yeast, water, sound familiar? So we should be able to make bread with beer! Let's do it!


Standard blah blah setup for double batch of bread loaves. 6 1/2 cups bread flour, 2 tsp yeast, 2 tsp salt, blah blah we've done this to death. Normally would use about 3 cups of water give or take. I use one cup to bloom the yeast on this, and the other 2 cups is going to be Newcastle Brown Ale, one of my favorite beers! Anyway, pour the yeast into the well of flour and salt, let sponge, then add (lukewarm) beer:


Oh no, party foul! Nobody spills beer in my h- well, okay maybe this once!

Mix it up, keeping it as wet as you can and still keep it together. It was tough for me and I had to flour my work surface for once, but I got it to behave for the most part. Knead for ten, cover and rest for 90 minutes, punch, and then cut into eight roughly-equal balls of dough. Pinch the key to seal them, arrange them on a pan so that they're easily resting against each other, and let proof for 45 minutes. From there, rub some flour on the top, slit with a knife, and let them bake in an oven at 425 for 25 minutes, misting like an obsessed person.


Cool em on a wire rack, and put the next batch in. Makes for eight big (as in huge) rolls.


Here's where the insanely moist dough pays off. Short bake time + steam makes the crumb as moist as you can get without still having dough. Give it a whiff, and it smells of wonderful brown ale!

Now stay tuned next week and we'll take this bread and turn it into beer, hahaha I'm just playin'.

Borscht: Dasvidanya, hunger.

Borscht has always fascinated me, and I've always wanted to eat it. Never have, mind you, but it seems like such a phenomenon. It's a soup that's eaten all across Eastern Europe, as well as Russia and the former Soviet states. The variations on making it are almost as numerous as the people who eat the stuff, and the only thing I've been able to nail down is that (1) it has beets in it, and (2) it probably has cabbage.

I found a wonderful posting on a message board I frequent for the stuff, and it finally got me off my tuchus so I could make my own. Good time to do that sort of thing with my vegetarian eats mode on. There are lots of recipes for borscht online with meat in them, but also just as many are vegetarian. In that way, it's sort of like chili I suppose.

Here's what I started with, all arranged in the new enameled dutch oven my mom gave me, yay!


This isn't everything, as I was kind of going on a rough idea and added stuff as the mood carried me. In the end, this is what I used:

• Three quarts vegetable stock, or more if you need it
  
• Two yellow onions, chopped
• Two carrots, chopped
• Three beets, peeled and chopped
• Three Yukon Gold Potatoes, peeled and chopped
• Head of cabbage, chopped
• A big handful of parsley, chopped
• Four cloves of garlic, crushed and minced
• Dill (fresh if you've got it, I used dried) to taste
• Three tablespoons olive oil
• One tablespoon brown sugar
• Two teaspoons salt
• Lemon or Lime juice, or whatever acidic ingredient you prefer to taste (I use citric acid)
• Cracked black pepper to taste
• Dollop of sour cream (optional)

Heat the stock in your pot to a heavy simmer, and add your veggies. Beets go first, cook for about ten minutes or more, then add everything except the cabbage, cook for another 35 or so, stirring as you go. Add the cabbage & everything else sans pepper and sour cream, and cook for another 10-15. Basically you want to make sure the veggies have a little body to them, but aren't raw. Taste & adjust for seasoning, serve in a soup bowl, and if you like it, add a big spoonful of sour cream, and add pepper and dill to that.


This is a sweet & sour soup, and the cabbage, mushrooms, and garlic keep it just savory enough to keep your feet on the ground. Make sure your veggies aren't overdone and mushy. You want just a little resistance to the tooth. This makes a ridiculous amount of food by the way. Make sure you have a lot of people eating, or a big leftover capacity. It'll freeze well if you need to do that.

Who are restaurants feeding, anyway?

Okay, the reason I haven't been posting much lately is because I haven't been cooking all that much. I've had a few days of Indian take-out, partially because it's incredibly tasty, but also because they give those little re-useable plastic bowl things with their curries and I like those things way better than the glad-lock or whatever crap you can actually buy. My wife's not down with eating every bit of rabbit food that I crank out, so for things like a butternut squash soup I made earlier, its nice to have modular food containers I can break batches into. Win-win, right?

It got me thinking about the state of food in America, which I guess is ironic to get that epiphany over Indian food, but that's where I am. I got an order of chana masala (tomato and chicpea curry) one day, and began bharta (eggplant curry) the other. For meals that are supposedly for one, I've broken each of them down into at least three individual meals in their own right. Part of it is that I've gotten accustomed to eating small portions (at least by American standards) and the other part is that what's being doled out IS that much. It's bizarre to see the rituals people will go through in order to make sure they have the gastronomic endurance to clean their plates. There may be starving kids in China as your parents say, but there are obese kids in America. If you try to finish all of that just for the sake of finishing, you're going to eat way too much food and you're going to feel terrible. We really have to re-learn how to handle the dinner table here as a society I think. If you really have to put your body through that kind of binge and discomfort to "finish the meal", then maybe think about how much is on your plate to start.

I've had some pretty downer thoughts about this, and I think that a lot of people have abdicated any demands they have on food quality and food taste, in exchange for a bigger portion. Food is getting bigger, fattier, saltier, or more sweet conversely. Instead of making sure that the meal is something made of a few ingredients that are carefully chosen to make the best out of a dish, people are out for the best value, ignorant as to what that might mean exactly.

Focaccia alla Salvia e Formaggio and other Italian words as well!

(Aka, Italian hearth bread with sage and cheese for y'all anglophones)

I've been baking a lot of bread to sell to friends and coworkers, and the big hit lately has been my focaccia bread, so I figured I'd share the love here.

This is the yield for one loaf, but I always double up and bake two at a time. If you have people over, the first one will be half gone before it gets cool.

• 3 1/4 cups bread flour
• 1/3 cup olive oil
• 1/3 cup pinot grigio
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tsp dry yeast
• About 30 fresh sage leaves
• Extra virgin olive oil, for topping
• Coarse salt for topping
• Small handful of a hard cheese for topping (I use either manchego or asiago, whichever is on hand)
  

Basically, combine the salt and flour in a big mixing bowl and form a well. In another bowl, combine yeast and a half cup of water, and let the yeast wake up for 5 minutes. Mix the yeast solution up and add to the well, then stir in a little flour to form a watery paste, and cover for about 20 minutes.

In the meantime, set aside ten sage leaves, and finely chop the other 20. Add those to the mixing bowl, and add the olive oil, wine, and remaining water, and mix until fully combined. Turn out onto your work surface and knead for ten minutes. If you need to flour it, go ahead, but I never do. If the dough is sticky, it shores up after kneading, and comes together nicely. After kneading, put the dough into a greased bowl and cover for about 90 minutes, or until doubled.

Punch the dough down, chafe it into a smooth ball, and let it rest for ten minutes, then come back with a rolling pin and spread it out until its a flat circle about a foot in diameter, and around an inch and a half to an inch thick. Cover that, and let proof for 50 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 400, and spread a little extra virgin olive oil on the dough until coated. Spread out the sage leaves remaining on top, then press them into the dough about halfway deep with your little finger. Continue to poke the dough with your pinky until there are dimples all over the surface, then add salt evenly.

Pop the dough into the oven. I like to steam the oven with a spritzer bottle, but its up to you if you want steam. It helps make the crust a little crispy, so do what you want. Let it bake for about 20 minutes, then open it up, and sprinkle your cheese on top, and let it bake for another ten minutes. Remove and let it cool on a wire rack.


Now, I used manchego on this, which doesn't melt like other cheese. It crisps and browns a little, so it's going to be a little different than melty stuff. Either is good, it's up to you.


Rough crumb shot. I don't bother cutting this, just tear a bit off as you go. People like to dip this in olive oil,but I think its rich enough really, with all of the oil used in baking. You don't really need any extra, but go hog wild if you like that.

This stuff pairs with other dishes pretty well, but it's even more fun just as a party pass-around. People just take a plug out and go along.

Farewell to the Flesh

Today is Mardi Gras, or as people more than a two hour drive away from the coast call it, Tuesday.

As I hinted in the salsifried gumbo post, I have been making plans to give up meat for Lent, so tomorrow I begin my forty day foray into vegetarianism. To keep with the spirit of the day, I didn't party, wear beads, or anything super fun, but I did have a farewell to the flesh dinner:


A roast beef sandwich on my homemade rosemary buttermilk bread, with horseradish dijon mustard, arugula, heirloom tomato, red onion, and smoked Swiss Grüyere, washed down with a Chilean merlot.

As good as it was, I'm actually looking forward to this. I'm sure it will be difficult at times, but cooking 40 days without meat should force my hand and give me an excuse to go down culinary paths that might otherwise be less traveled. I'll probably be making a lot of South Indian food until the weekend, when I can get a good grocery shopping trip done.

Wish me luck!

Pretzel & Bagel, baking soda edition.

After my recent blog postings on bagels and pretzels, a Jewish buddy of mine and another fellow foodie made a suggestion of adding baking soda to the simmering water to dunk both in. The idea is that the shiny dark brown edge you get on classic pretzels and bagels really shines through with that kind of treatment.

Seemed like a good idea, so I did a big double batch of pretzels and bagels, using the dough setup for the bagel recipe rather than the pretzel one, so I got the same super stiff dough. I essentially treated them identically, and the only difference may be that I let the pretzels proof before parboiling about 20 to 25 minutes opposed to the bagels ten minutes. It's still a drastic cut from the 45 minutes I used last.

So the water goes on for a boil and back to a good simmer, and I add half a cup of baking soda. I'm not sure of the science behind it, but the heat activates the alkaline nature of the baking soda, so when you dunk your pretzel or bagel in, it gets all fizzy and kind of looks like soapy water with bubbles. Parboil only momentarily, then set aside for topping, then bake like normal.


See how dark? It's almost ridiculous. And no, not burnt at all. That's just the effect of the baking soda to get that wonderful color.

Unrelated, but I got cool art!

A friend of mine made me a piece of art. I've been listening to a lot of Red Army choir and band music when I've been baking (one of my many musical fads, whatever gets me moving) , and she drew this very motivational bit for me:


The cryllic font says "DELICIOUS BREAD", though I don't think it's in actual Russian. I think it's just the english typed using the Russian font, but either way, it's very motivational!

Now, back to the doughy gulags!

Pretzels, what a tweeest!

If people can have Christmas in July then I can have Oktoberfest in Februrary. I wanted an excuse to drink beer, and since I really only drink with food these days, I figured this was a great time to bust out some Salzbretzeln.

What you'll need:

1 packet (2 tsp approx) dried yeast
1 1/4 cup lukewarm water
1 1/2 tsp salt
3 1/4 cup bread flour
1 egg for egg wash, plus 1 tablespoon water
Topping of choice (I use poppy seeds, sesame seeds, and coarse sea salt)


Combine your yeast & half a cup of water. Let sit for five minutes, then stir it up. Add the flour and salt to a large mixing bowl and combine thoroughly. Form a well in the flour, and pour in the yeast solution:


Stir a little of the surrounding flour into the yeast to form a thick paste. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and let it rest for about twenty minutes. It should be a bit frothy:


From here, mix the rest of the flour toward the center, adding water when needed to moisten the dough. Once it's thoroughly mixed, take it out of the bowl and begin to knead on your work surface for about ten minutes.


Once that's done, grease a bowl lightly and chafe the dough down until it's roughly ball-shaped. Add it to the bowl, and cover with a damp towel to let it rise about an hour and a half, or until doubled. Didn't get a picture of it going in, but here's the shot of it after the rise:


Punch that down, chafe into a ball, and let it rest about ten minutes. Take a sharp knife, cut that down into eight even pieces, and chafe those into ball shapes as well.


Each of these, slowly start to work into a long rope shape, I'd say about a foot and a half long, with the center be slightly thicker than the ends.


This next part I didn't really have an in-process shot or anything, so I'll try and describe it. Bring both ends up, and cross them with about an inch or so sticking out each way. Then twist once, and turn the ends over so that the ends are facing the thick center of the dough. Raise up the bottom, and tuck each end underneath.


Arrange each finished pretzel on your baking sheet and let them proof under a damp towel for about 45 minutes. Once that's done, uncover and mix your egg with a tablespoon of water to make an egg wash. Brush this lightly over your pretzels (too much and you'll basically get scrambled egg on your bread, so keep it light) and sprinkle your toppings on each. I put salt on all of them, and poppy seeds on three, and sesame seeds on three more. Go ahead and preheat your oven to 425 degrees.


Bake for 15 to 20 minutes. I steam the oven every five minutes or so with a spray bottle. If you want to steam, go ahead, it's just my preference. Should come out a little something like this:


Booya! Pretzels are so awesome. Some people like cream cheese on them, but I like the biggest, grittiest mustard I can find. It goes so damn well with beer. Either as a snack:


Or, with a meal:


At any rate, it's an excuse to drink beer. Mission accomplished, me!

Valentine's Day!

I got a real treat yesterday, as my wife decided she was going to cook her spaghettini alla bolognese. It's one of the things she makes, and I have no idea how she does it. All I know is that it takes about six hours to prepare the sauce, and that trotters are involved somehow. Since she'll never tell me how, I'll just be a happy recipient of her good graces. I love it any time she decides she's going to cook, because she's a lot better at it than she'll admit.

So, to keep me from going insane by smelling bolognese all day, I decided to make few light little munchies in the afternoon to tide us over until dinner was ready.


This is a great way to give an appearance of classy food without really spending anything. The caviar on top is whitefish roe, which tastes great and really doesn't cost anything. You can get a jar that'll make about twenty of these things for around three dollars at Target. The spread beneath is crème fraîche I picked up at Whole Foods for about $2.50. Then again, you can pretty much make the stuff at home with a little heavy cream and milk, but I've never done it. Beneath that are little crostinis from the baguettes I made in a previous blog posting. Crostini are such a great way to get rid of bread endbits that you don't want to go stale. A little quick toast on thin slices and they're up.

My wife made me a blue vodka drink thing, so I served it up with the caviar because vodka just goes like that. The blue thing is a bit of nerdiness in that we used to pass an aisle with an electric blue hurricane mix at the liquor store. I would pause, and in my best Shatner stutter-lilt, would say "Romulan Ale? Why Bones, you know this is illegal." It's something only really funny to us I think, so for V-Day, she gave me a decanter of blue vodka. I love her!

After many hours of waiting, my wife's dinner was served, with a toasty & buttery glass of Merlot:


The best part of the dish is that some tomatoes are fully sauced, and some of the (San Marzano?) tomatoes are essentially in big halves or something. They fall apart against the flat of a fork, and you get that really big burst of sunny tomato coming on strong in the midst of the rest of the sauce. I have no trouble admitting that my baby makes better spaghetti than I ever will. I guess it's a Sicilian thing, but I won't question it. The only thing I ask now is that I get this treat more often than not.