Tag Archives: bread

Mushrooms on Toast with “Limon Tuzu”

Last week I received a mysterious parcel. The box read “alternating pressure pump”, but inside was neither pressure pump, bicycle pump nor breast pump. Instead, this was box recycling at its best: what once held a pressure pump now bore a wonder of delights from my friend Tim Clinch, that rad peep photographer I met in Gascony last summer and who runs stellar food photography workshops in beautiful places like France, Bulgaria and Spain.

A few weeks ago I sent Tim a sample of the life-changing salsa macha, along with some dried chillies so he can make his own. In return, he sent me some of his homemade “oh fukkah it’s really good” dukkah along with an array of Turkish delights like date syrup, the best sumac ever (so far), dried gooseberries, a curious “raisin sausage” and this “limon tuzu”, aka lemon salt. Foodie pen pals are the best pen pals, don’t you think?

I’ve been having fun experimenting with the dukkah and spices (I’m saving the “sausage” for a special occasion). The dukkah is quickly becoming one of those “good with everything” sort of foods (much like salsa macha, and Chicago-style giardiniera since we’re on the subject). Today, it was time to tap the tuzu.

It was a spontaneous act, adding the lemon salt to the mushrooms. I was in a hunger-induced, post-swim, post-dog-walk panic, hastily frying the mushrooms, toasting the toast and barely finding the will to wash the rocket. It was time to salt the shrooms and I saw the tuzu before the sea salt, so in it went, and it totally transformed this fairly common breakfast into something totally tart, fresh and “fukkah yeah awesome”. A bit of thyme would have been great in here, but I couldn’t be bothered going outside so settled for a pinch of za’atar, which actually worked a treat.

In one sentence, here’s how it all came together: sautéed mushrooms with lemon salt and black pepper, served on sourdough toast with avocado, rocket and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar.

It took maybe 10 minutes to make, and I had to fight myself not to devour it in the same short amount of time.

My next mission is to photograph the dukkah as well as Tim photographed my chillies (see his blog – seriously, Tim, I will pay you for a print). Maybe Tim can help on this front, too… in fact, I know he can. And besides, I’ve always wanted to go to Bulgaria (I hear they have good cheese…and great photographers).

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Baking with Nimo: Assyrian “Eight Day” Bread

Last January my mother introduced me to her friend, Nimo, an Assyrian woman who’s managed that rare thing in America: to migrate to the states without losing her cultural food tradition. My mom’s been raving to me about Nimo for years, often sending me photos and scribbles from their cooking sessions, making such things as tabbouleh, lentil dumplings, Turkish bread, and stuffed aubergine. Given my propensity for Middle Eastern cuisine, it was no wonder why I “had to meet this woman”.

Assyria is an ancient territory that dissolved in the mid-seventh century and is now part of several nations including northern Iraq, part of southeast Turkey and northeast Syria. Though Nimo now lives in Chicago, her roots are firmly in her heritage, and this especially applies to her cooking. Nimo bakes from her tradition, using the recipes that her grandmother taught her how to make, rarely measuring anything and often not knowing the English words to describe them, which made follow-up research a tad challenging, but also hugely educational.

One such dish that Nimo taught us is what she called “eight day bread”, a sweet, egg-enriched braided bread that is eaten across the countries of the former Ottoman empire and in Greece and Armenia has specific associations with Easter. In Armenia it’s called “choereg” and in Greece it’s called ”tsoureki” or “lampropsomo”, derived from the Greek words for “Easter” and “bread” and refers to the light Christians believe is given by Christ’s resurrection.

There are many varieties of these festive breads, but what gives it its distinctive flavour and aroma is mahleb, an aromatic spice made from the seeds of a type of cherry. When ground to a powder, mahleb produces a flavour that’s much like a combination of bitter almond and cherry. The spice has several associations with Easter, not only in Greece, but also in Cyprus where it’s a used in a special Easter cheese-filled pastry called flaouna.

I’m still trying to navigate the landscape of Nimo’s food stories. Her food crosses several cultural landscapes and her methods are not recipes, but simple truths about cooking ingrained in her brain by tradition and repetition. The worktop must be clean. The ingredients must be good. The cooking must be done with care and respect. And the food must be enjoyed slowly and mindfully.

As to “eight day bread”, “Choereg”, “Tsoureki”, or whatever you wish to call it, I enjoy it best sliced and toasted with butter, during Easter time, or any time of the year.

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Baking with Nimo: Assyrian “Eight Day” Bread

Ingredients

6 cups flour
1 cup butter, melted
1 cup milk, warmed
½ cup sugar
3 eggs
1½ teaspoons salt
2¼ teaspoons yeast
½ teaspoon mahleb, ground seeds
1 egg yolk
sesame seeds or sliced almond, for topping (optional)

Instructions

Dissolve yeast in warm milk, then add the sugar and melted butter.
Beat the eggs eggs and add to the milk mixture, along with salt and ground mahleb.
Add flour gradually, one cup at a time until dough comes away from sides of bowl. Knead 10 minutes until soft, shiny and no longer sticky.
Place dough in oiled bowl. Turn the dough ball in the bowl to coat the outside with oil. Cover the bowl and put in a warm place to rise until doubled.
Divide the dough into two or three balls. Divide each ball into three and roll out with your hands to three long ropes.
Pinch all three ends together and braid loosely. Pinch ends and tuck under.
Cover and allow to rise again until doubled.
Preheat the oven to 400 F / 200 C. Brush the braids with beaten egg and sprinkle with sesame seeds or sliced almonds.
Bake for 20 minutes or until nicely golden brown all over.

This post first appeared on Great British Chefs blog.

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Multigrain Bread

I haven’t been baking very much bread lately, partly because I already have a freezer full of bread, and also because I’ve been carbing it up on all the winter root veg I’ve been getting in my organic box. In truth, I feel better when I’m not eating so much bread. I don’t think it’s a gluten thing, I think it’s a self control thing: when good bread is around, I tend to eat lots of it.

The trouble is, I miss baking. And last week, I really felt like I needed to bake. More than that, I needed to Comfort Bake. I got the idea in my head that I wanted multigrain bread, and of all people, Martha Stewart came to the rescue with her Multigrain Bread recipe which ticked all the right boxes: rye flour, oats, flax seeds, sunflower seeds.

The only substitution I made was to use quinoa rather than bulgur wheat. I could definitely smell and taste the quinoa in the resulting loaf, but I loved it. I also didn’t need as much flour as the recipe called for (I had about a cup leftover), which may be partially due to quinoa not holding as much water as bulgur. This picture makes the crumb look a little, well, crumbly, but I think that’s due to my slicing the bread before it was totally cool.

I loved this bread and will certainly be making it again – with the quinoa. That is, once I get through my freezer stash.

Recipe: Multigrain Bread

Brown Bread and Guinness Ice Cream

Last weekend I had a few friends over for an Orchard Cottage slumber party / food fest. Among them was Kavey of the blog Kavey Eats and her latest stack of cookbooks. One of the themes of our visits has been to trawl through these books and pick out recipes to make. Then we head to the shop and return home for a weekend of cooking and eating. It’s basically my ideal way to spend time.

Kavey and I share many mutual foodie interests, one of which is ice cream. Kavey runs a monthly blog meme called Bloggers Scream for Ice Cream (aka BSFIC), so I always like to use Kavey’s visits as an excuse to try a new ice cream recipe. It also helps that her chosen theme for this month’s BSFIC is BOOZE, which made my mission to make ice cream all the more inviting.

Convenient to my cause, one of Kavey’s cookbooks was The Icecreamists: Vice Creams, Ice Cream Recipes & Other Guilty Pleasures by Matt O’Connor. I wasn’t sure if I liked this book at first, totally based on the cover whose bright pink / black design is really hard on my eyes. Inside the book, I continued to find other aspects of the design off-putting: lots of light-coloured text on dark backgrounds and pseudo punk rock motifs. I get what they’re going for, but it doesn’t make for user-friendly reading, which is pretty crucial for recipe books.

The photographs, however, are another matter – here the dark and brooding style really works. These days, too many pictures of ice cream involve pastel colours and frilly props. Not so in The Icecreamists. I reckon a man took the pictures – indeed, his name is Anders Schonnemann - and he definitely has balls (or should that be scoops?).

Having perused the book, it was obvious which recipe needed to happen: Brown Bread and Irish Stout Ice Cream (pictured in a very manly Guinness glass, though oddly looking more like a milkshake than an ice cream – but nevermind). I’d never heard of “brown bread ice cream” before but it seems to be a “thing” in these parts. It goes back to 18th-century Victorian times and has been a popular flavour in England and Ireland ever since. The premise is this: take ice cream, and mix in crunchy caramelised bits of bread crumbs. Sounds good, right? And this version is a particular tribute to the Irish, made with brown Irish soda bread and Irish stout (Guinness in my case).

The ice cream base is a basic custard, kicked up with cinnamon and nutmeg (a LOT of nutmeg, which I loved). For the brown soda bread, I followed the recipe in Bread: River Cottage Handbook No. 3 which includes dark treacle for a sweet, molassesy kick – basically perfect for this ice cream. The recipe only calls for 50ml of stout, which leaves plenty left over for drinking, but also makes me question whether the stout flavour comes through, particularly with the high flavour spices. Regardless, the final result was a total win. Caramelised bread crumbs in ice cream – or in anything for that matter – might be my new favourite thing.

Brown Bread and Guinness Ice Cream

Author: Matt O’Connor

Adapted from The Icecreamists.

Ingredients

250 ml (1 cup) full-fat milk
½ teaspoon allspice
½ teaspoon nutmeg
125 ml (1/2 cup) double cream
2 egg yolks
88 g (1/2 cup) dark brown (muscovado) sugar
20 g (1/3 cup) brown Irish soda bread (or other brown bread)
50 ml (1/4 cup) Guinness or other stout
30 g (1/2 cup) brown Irish soda bread
30 g (1/4 cup) dark brown (muscovado) sugar

Instructions

Pour the milk, spices and cream into a large saucepan and heat gently, stirring occasionally, until the mixture begins to steam but not boil.
Meanwhile, whisk the egg yolks in a heatproof bowl until smooth. Add the sugar and whisk until slightly fluffy. Gradually pour the hot milk into the egg mixture while whisking continuously to prevent the eggs scrambling. Return the mixture to the saucepan and place over a low heat, stirring frequently until the custard thinly coats the back of a wooden spoon. Do not allow to boil.
Add the crumbled soda bread and mix with a stick blender, then pour the mixture back into the bowl and set aside for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until cooled to room temperature. For more rapid chilling, half-fill a sink with cold water and ice and place the bowl in it for 20 minutes. Never put the hot mixture straight into the fridge.
Once cooled, boil the stout until it is reduced by about half and add to the custard. Cover the mixture and refrigerate, ideally overnight but at least for 6 hours, until thoroughly chilled (at least 4°C/40°F). Pour the chilled mixture into an ice cream machine and churn according to the manufacturer’s instructions (you can also make this without an ice cream maker).
Meanwhile, prepare the caramelised crumbs. Combine the crumbled soda bread and sugar and spread over a shallow baking tray lined with parchment paper. Place under a medium-hot grill, stirring frequently, until the breadcrumbs are softly caramelised. Allow to cool a little.
Fold most of the toasted bread mixture into the ice cream, then use a spoon or spatula to scrape the ice cream into a freezer-proof container with a lid. Freeze until it reaches the correct scooping texture (at least 2 hours).
Decorate each portion with a few of the remaining caramelised bread crumbs before serving.

Recipe posted for Kavey’s Bloggers Scream For Ice Cream December challenge.

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Turkish Style Flatbreads

My bread mojo has been lacking lately. I feel like I’ve had a long string of loaves that are too flat, flatbread that is too dry, lacklustre sourdough starter and cardboard-esque pizza bases. It has me feeling a little ho-hum about bread, while desperately craving something great.

I decided to try two things: first, a new recipe. I opted for the Turkish flatbread from the River Cottage Bread Handbook. The second thing I tried was following the recipe exactly – no cutting corners, no experimenting with different flours. Instead, I paid attention to what I was doing and put my faith in the recipe. It didn’t let me down.

The dough includes yogurt and olive oil to create a soft pillowy flatbread. The dough wasn’t as wet as what I’m used to, but I resisted the urge to add (very much) extra water and let it do it’s thing. It rose as it should, and it was very easy to roll.

I love flatbread because you can roll the dough into whatever size you want – big ol’ flatbreads for sharing with friends, or little mini breads to stack and freeze and keep on hand for whenever you need it. I rolled mine into about 4″ diameter, 3mm thick (do you like how I’m mixing my measurement systems?) and then got on with the baking.

The recipe calls for the rolled-out dough to be baked quickly on a hot skillet, and then finished in the grill. You can imagine my delight as I saw the dough puff and rise on the stovetop.

What you don’t see, however, is the bread rapidly burning underneath! Lesson learned: these flatbread bake VERY quickly, and it’s a little fraught working with the skillet and then the grill. I ended up making most of the flatbreads on the outdoor BBQ because it’s much cleaner, harder to burn and you can make more than one flatbread at once!

The resulting flatbreads weren’t so “flat” at all, but they were exactly what I was hoping for. I’ve been eating them with gusto with raw kale salads and beetroot and walnut hummus (another River Cottage recipe). Most importantly, however, I feel relieved to have had a baking success. The mojo is returning. Next up, sourdough?

Turkish Style Flatbreads

Ingredients

500g plain white flour, plus extra for dusting
500g strong white bread flour
10g powdered dried yeast
20g fine salt
325ml warm water
325ml natural yoghurt, warmed
2 tbsp good olive oil, plus extra for coating

Instructions

Mix the flours, yeast, salt, water and yoghurt in a bowl to form a sticky dough. If it seems really dry, and you’re having trouble working all the flour into the dough, add more water, a little bit at a time. Add the oil, mix it in. Knead until smooth and silky (either by hand or with a machine – I use a mixer with a dough hook and knead for about 5 minutes).
Shape the dough into a round, then place in a clean bowl. Leave to rise, covered with a plastic bag, until doubled in size.
Deflate the dough, then if you have time, leave to rise a second, third, even a fourth time (this improves the dough but is by no means essential).
Tear off pieces the size of small lemons (or smaller, or larger, if you like) one at a time, shape into a round, then using plenty of flour, roll out to a 3-4mm thickness and leave to rest for 5 minutes or so.
To bake on the stove / grill: Heat a large heavy based frying pan over the highest heat and set the grill to maximum. When the pan is super-hot, lay the first bread in it. After a minute or possibly less the bread should be puffy and starting to char on the bottom. Slide the pan under the hot grill, a good 15cm from the heat, and watch your creation balloon magnificently. Remove the bread when it starts to char on the top, brush on some olive oil, then server.
To bake on a BBQ: Make sure the BBQ is good and hot. Lay the rolled out dough directly on the BBQ. You’ll see it start to bubble and puff. When it starts to char, flip it over and cook until it starts to char on the other side, too. Remove, brush on some olive oil and serve.

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The Art of Chapattis

I’ve been making chapatti for a while now, but with only average results. My chapatti are often too dry, without that nice foldable quality you get in restaurant chapatti. They also seem to acquire a shell of “flour”, inherited from the rolling process, making them almost stale by design. But today I had a major chapatti breakthrough that I wanted to share.

These chapatti were a total case of “who you know”: they wouldn’t have come together if it weren’t for input from a few key players.

At the top level there was The Essential Madhur Jaffrey cookbook, whose chapatti recipe I used for the basic ingredient proportions, kneading and cooking techniques. But as all bread bakers know, even the best recipes are hard pressed to convey the subtleties of the cooking process. This is where I’m grateful for the experience of a few baker friends I know.

First, Toddy Peters told me a thing or two about chapatti flour and how to work with it. First of all, not all chapatti flour (aka “atta”) is made equal. There are whiter varieties, and “cheaper versions that are more wholemeal and therefore going to produce a coarser, thicker bread”. I’ve been using straight up Shipton Mill wholemeal flour, the same I usually use for wholemeal bread, which is indeed rather coarse. So today I decided to lighten it up a bit by sifting the wholemeal flour, and adding the same amount of white spelt flour.

Toddy also told me: “when rolling out, I have a small plate or thali of flour and I never flour the rolling surface, and I dip the ball in the plate of flour, but also shake off excess.” Now I see why my chapatti of yore were always so floury – I went waaay overboard on flouring my work surface. Toddy’s tip basically solved that problem.

Once rolled, there was the question of cooking chapatti. Ms. Jaffrey recommends a tava, which I totally don’t have. And further, I don’t really trust my electric hob to do the job. Fortunately, Trevor from Hobbs House Bakery offered a hefty tip at last week’s Foodie Bugle Lectures: Use the grill. For home bakers, the grill is really the only way to get a high enough heat for successful chapatti, pittas and flatbread. And happily, it’s spring and perfect weather for cooking outdoors.

One last thing: I also added a few ajwain seeds to the dough, courtesy of The Botanical Baker, Urvashi Roe, who gave me some during our epic foodie weekend to add to my chickpea pancakes. Don’t know why but I felt compelled to try them in chapatti – loved it!

So here’s how it went down:

60g white spelt flour (Dove’s Farm)
60g wholemeal flour, sifted (Shipton Mill)
90g water (from the tap)
small pinch of ajwan seeds (thanks Urvashi)

I started with the 90g water and 90g flour, adding more flour until I had a soft, kneadable dough (so, just beyond the realm of “sticky”). I kneaded the dough for five(ish) minutes then let it rest for an hour or so while I attempted to be productive.

I then divided the dough into 8 little balls (using my hands to pull the dough apart and then shape them into cute little compact balls).

I dipped each dough ball in flour and then rolled them out into a thin round (I had to add a bit of flour as I went to prevent sticking).

I heated up the outdoor gas grill on high. My gas grill has two sides – one open to the flame, the other not (you can sort of see this in the picture up top).

To make the chapatti, I first put the chapatti on the non-flame side and cooked for about a minute on each side, so that little brown spots started to form. Then I moved the chapatti to the flame side for about 30 seconds, where they really began to puff (I got this no flame / flame idea from the Madhur Jaffrey cookbook – though I reckon you’d do just fine with or without the flame, or even in the grill of an electric oven).

The chapatti made for a seriously happy-making lunch of yellow pea dahl and spinach with pickles and chutney.

I’m sure I have more to learn about chapatti and I’m open to any ideas or suggestions from you chapatti experts out there. I’ll probably experiment with other flour types and combinations in the future. But today’s effort made me really happy. They were soft, pliable, and extremely tasty! I loved the occasional hit of ajwain seed. And they are happily foldable, so don’t be surprised to find them doubling as tortillas in my breakfast tacos and fajitas.

Related reading: Mark Bittman’s Recipe and Video for Grilled Chapattis in The New York Times.

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