Spinach gnocchi.

Lewisburg.

We wanted vegetables for dinner last night.¹ So, in a moment of "well, duh," I went with spinach gnocchi, fresh asparagus, and green garlic:



Lots of green. Plus a realization that there's no reason I can use just about anything moist, flavorful, and puree-able to make dumplings. Ricotta and pumpkin have been standards for quite some time. Why not parsnips and carrots? Kale? Sweet basil? Red peppers? Roasted garlic? Smoked apples?

For the spinach version, I simply blanched a large bunch in boiling, salted water for about a minute, then drained and rinsed with cold water. A few squeezes removed excess water, and then the food processor turned them into a more-or-less smooth paste. I added an egg, which helped along the blending, and offers a bit of structural assistance during cooking. Then just enough flour, lightly kneaded to make things workable, and they're ready to boil.

Or, in brief: Flavorful, moist food + egg + flour = colorful, flavorful gnocchi.

Plus, they freeze and cook up like a dream. What's not to like?

* * * * *

¹Pizzas the night before, and tacos the night before that. Delicious, but generally light on greenery.

Bread, with pictures.

Lewisburg.

Yesterday was, among other things, a bread-baking day. A short trip into work, followed by a casual breakfast, then a retreat from the ice, rain, and damp. Despite the fact that the entire process takes several hours, it only occupies the hands and mind for brief intervals, and so really lends itself to a day of chores and minor tasks about the house. In addition, I've been doing what I can to teach my friend Seth to bake bread - from a thousand miles away - and figured that a little photography was in order.

The day before, I started things in motion. I scribbled down a recipe, to start.¹ Cleaned up, it looks like this:

Total:
585g AP flour (65%)
225g whole wheat flour (25%)
90g whole rye flour (10%)
45g bulgur wheat (5%)
45g rolled oats (5%)
45g polenta/grits (5%)
725g water (81%)
20g salt (2.2%)
1-¼ tsp. yeast, plus a pinch

Poolish (35%):
315g AP flour
315g water
Pinch yeast²

Soaker:
45g bulgur wheat
45g rolled oats
45g polenta/grits
20g salt
410g water

Final add:
270g AP flour
225g whole wheat flour
90g whole rye flour
1-¼ tsp. yeast

The soaker and poolish need sixteen-plus hours' worth of a head start, so I try to get them going around lunchtime the day before baking.



The poolish is a high-moisture pre-ferment, which gives the bread more flavor and more staying power. I prefer poolishes to a thicker pate fermentee or biga, because they're easier to mix. But I'll use whatever suits. As it ripens, the poolish looks like the top of a pancake:



It's just flour and water, in equal proportions, with a little bit of yeast. The rest of the dough's water and the salt are in the soaker:



This ensures that the large grains in the loaf are well integrated, which isn't guaranteed otherwise. Notice how the rolled oats have plumped? And how the bulgur is exploded almost like popcorn? They're full of moisture, and won't rob it from the dough. They also won't remain firm and crunchy in the crumb, or threaten to tear the dough as I work it.

After a long rest, I combine these with the remaining flours, and more yeast to raise the dough. I like using an electric stand mixer and dough hook for kneading, especially for a batch with multiple loaves, or very wet doughs.³ So after about five minutes with the dough hook, here's the shaggy mass of dough:



There's no form to it, but the gluten structure is apparent. As I don't like oiling bowls, like a lot of bread recipes suggest, I prefer to give a fold here, which adds enough shape and structure that the dough slides easily from bowl after the first segment of its rise.



To fold, there are a hadful of different methods, but I use Jeffrey Hamelman's. It's a little more involved, but I find that it does an excellent job of strengthening the dough. Since it folds over dough from four directions, 90 degrees apart, everything's very evenly balanced when going back into the bowl. I don't find it necessary to reshape the dough into a ball after this, since the primary fermentation time really seals up the edges.

Here's after the second fold, 50 minutes later. There's been a slight increase in volume, more noticeable to my hands than my eyes.



You might notice the brush sitting on the board here. I use it to brush excess flour from the dough, as it does a much more thorough and much gentler job of it than my fingers.

After another 50 minutes, the third fold. There's a significant volume increase here, even after degassing. The strengthening dough is also pulling itself closer to a sphere.



The last 50 minutes of primary fermentation pass, and it's time for a fold, dividing, and pre-shaping. I wanted to use my small, round bannetons, so I've divided this batch into three loaves. Two will do their final rise in the bannetons, and the other will just be a boule.



These sit on the board, seam side up, and covered, for about 15 minutes. Since they've been through a bit of handling - a fold prior to dividing, and another after - the gluten's tight. If I work them too much, I'll tear the smooth skin that's forming the surface of the loaf. So they sit until the gluten relaxes, and I can finish shaping them.



The floured bannetons hold the loaves upside down, lending them some shape and the distinct spiral flour pattern. The boule - sitting upright here - will rest upside down, wrapped in floured linen to prevent it from drying out. The final rise will take about and hour and a half in the cool kitchen, before they're ready for baking.



Note that the banneton loaves are a little taller, a little less sprawled than the boule. They're all the same, within a few grams, but the difference in form is umistakable.



A few moments later, the loaves with scoring. These are fairly deep cuts, made with a standard hardware store single-edge razor blade, because I know they're going to expand significantly. For larger boules, I tend to make an X shape across the top, which provides more room for expansion, but the single slash does make them easier to slice later.

The loaves proofed in the bannetons have been scored with the blade perpendicular to the loaf's surface, to nearly an inch at the deepest point. The other boule is a test, using the blade at about 30 degrees up from the surface, making just a shallow cut. Maybe a bit over a quarter inch. When this works properly, it forms a lip that continues to expand, giving more room for oven spring than it would seem to suggest. It's a trick used for long loaves, but there's no reason it won't work here.

That waviness along the edge is a result of me trying to match the curve with a stiff wrist. I find that my scoring is far more effective when I keep my hand and wrist stable, letting my whole arm move. The blade seems to cut so much better this way.



Then it's into the preheated oven. This is my best attempt at creating a baking hearth at home. Six firebrick splits - half-thickness refractory brick⁴ - to serve as a base hearth, with space for air circulation around. A cast-iron skillet filled with lava rocks for steam generation. An oven thermometer. A (slightly damaged) pizza stone that lives on the bottom, permanently, for a little more thermal mass.

The bricks hold a great deal of heat, and are able to absorb moisture from the baking bread, resulting in a superior crust. They need a while to preheat, so I'll give them at least an hour to get up to the 450°F that I prefer for most breads.⁵ They also stay hot for some time after the oven is turned off, so I do need to plan dinner after baking accordingly.

The skillet and lava rocks - intended for gas grills - are there to generate steam early in the bake. They preheat with the oven, so that water poured over top has plenty of surface to evaporate. This gives better oven spring, and a nicer, thinner, crispier crust. I also use a spray bottle to hit the sides of the oven immediately before loading the loaves in. Another trick - for loaves without a flour pattern on the surface - is to brush them with water just before scoring.

The breads go in on a peel dusted with cornmeal or semolina flour, and bake for about 34 minutes in this case. Shape, size, and temperature determine that. Whole grain flours sometimes darken quickly, too, so I need to watch throughout the bake so that I can turn the oven down if necessary.



Removed from the oven, and cooled on a rack, they're ready to slice. Note the difference between the two scoring methods. Also note that my scoring wasn't quite enough to accommodate the full oven spring. The crust has torn beyond the edge of the cut on all three loaves. I could have avoided that with a longer or deeper slash, additional score marks, or by allowing the loaves additional time for their final rise.

Still, a little tearing there isn't a problem. More of an issue is when there's a blowout along a weak seam - often one not apparent earlier - which just looks a little uglier. It'll still taste great, of course, but those are the loaves I avoid giving away.



Inside, it's a soft, tender crumb, without any large pockets. For a grain-filled loaf like this, that's my preference. When still very fresh, I like a slice plain, or with a spread of butter. It's also great for sandwiches, just lightly toasted. Any remaining after a few days will end up as croutons, French toast, or a bread pudding.

* * * * *

¹I don't always do this. My default is to start a poolish with 450g flour, then figure out the rest the next day, depending on what my schedule looks like.

²It should be about 1/8 tsp., but I didn't bother measuring.

³Exceptions include pizza dough and English muffins. The former gets only folding, but no kneading. The latter gets virtually no handling at all.

⁴This is important. Refractory brick is intended for high-temperature applications, so it won't explode in the oven. Common brick, which is cheaper and easier to find, can't promise that. The smaller thickness is nice because it's not as heavy. Too much more weight on here, and I wouldn't be certain the oven rack could take the strain.

⁵Enriched breads, with milk, eggs, and sugar that mighty burn, bake at lower temperatures, and generally not on the hearth. Bagels usually go in around 475-500°F, directly on the stone. Pizzas bake at this oven's full blast, 550°F, on a pizza stone. (It's a more level surface than the bricks.) At that temperature, a pizza is ready in 8 minutes. If I could bake them hotter and faster, I would, but this oven cost enough that I'm not monkeying with it.

Jeow.

Lewisburg.

Summer! It means ripe tomatoes - including the first Green Zebras from the vines today - and chillis and eggplant, all just right for Lao-style jeow. The word means something akin to sauce or dip, particularly in the salsa vein. Something very thin, like fish sauce¹, has nam in there someplace, which is the word for water or water-like stuff.

Anyhow. Jeow is a dip that you eat with balls of Lao/Thai sticky rice², and it's made from whatever's at hand. Start with some good fresh vegetables:



Here: tomatoes, eggplant, chillis, and garlic, all on skewers. Scallions and holy basil for later. Not pictured: fish sauce. If I'd had shallots nearby, they'd be ready to go, too.

The key, as far as I'm concerned, is fire. Not just the gas flame at the stove, but charcoal. I don't even bother with the grill, but cook it all right over the chimney starter, which is insanely hot. The trick is to cook the vegetables until soft enough to pound in a mortar, and the high heat works to char the hell out of the skins. For one, it makes them easy to peel. Even better is the glorious smokiness that results.



Tomatoes don't take but a few moments, and the chillis just a hint longer. Garlic and eggplant, though, take enough time to get awesomely smoky. I keep going until the skins are turning to ash at the tips, until they feel soft to the touch. If I could manage it with the tomatoes, I would, but there's a limit to how long I can watch before fearing they'll plummet to the coals, irretrievable.

Then it's peel skins, mash coarsely in a mortar, season with fish sauce, basil, cilantro, etc. Eat with sticky rice. I could pretty much call this a meal:



Eggplant on the left, with chillis, garlic, scallions, holy basil, fish sauce. Tomato on the right, with garlic, scallions, holy basil, fish sauce. These are the new summer standards.

* * * * *

¹Which is a condiment, really, and not a sauce. But "fish condiment" sounds even less appetizing, or else just confusing.

²Not to be confused with sushi rice, which is somewhat sticky, or Japanese sweet rice - since it's also sometimes called sweet rice - which is stickier than sushi rice. Lao sticky rice is super-sticky, requires hours of advance soaking, and must be steamed. But it's unique and delicious, and maybe my favorite rice. Which is really saying something.

Strawberry booze.

Lewisburg.

We've had many a strawberry this year. Last time I checked in, we'd picked sixty-two quarts out of the patch. The final count - as of two weeks ago - ran up to seventy-two. We could have picked more, but after traveling out of town for a few days, the appeal of picking through lots of overripe berries had faded. There were still a few to pluck for nibbling as we walked the dog past - much like our raspberry picking for this season - but at least we could consider it done.

Plus, we'd moved into blueberry season, and they're easier to pick.

With so many strawberries, we've managed to preserve them in just about every way that comes to mind, from drying to making jam and syrup to freezing. And infusing¹ into alcohol. Now we can enjoy the flavor of the fruit without the constant vigilance for spoiled berries.



On the left, with its brilliant ruby red, is the first² batch of strawberry liqueur. The other is a strawberry ratafia made with white wine, which is distinctly colored, but nowhere near to the degree that the liqueur is. Part of that is due to using a smaller quantity of berries for the amount of liquid, though I've no doubt other factors play into it. In both cases, the strained-out berries were pale pink, worse than any off-season California strawberry you've ever seen.

Both sets had also given up a fair bit of flavor to the liquid. The ones from the liqueur had also picked up a kick of booze. Nibble a bowl full of them, and you'll feel it.

The color is a good indicator of the strength of strawberry flavor, with the ratafia having a subtle but unmistakable strawberriness, and the liqueur being like liquid strawberry candy. Both are sweet, but the latter is very much so. Which, considering its alcohol content, isn't such a bad thing.

They're both easy to make, and I'm assuming that the ratio I've used for this will work well for other fruits, too. (It had better; I have blueberry and sour cherry versions pickling away as I write this.) So:

Ratafia
Take one bottle of wine - red, white, what have you - and put it in a quart jar with a quarter cup of vodka, a quarter cup of sugar, and a cup of something with flavor. Fruits are lovely, but so are herbs and vegetables, too. Don't underestimate the appeal of cucumber. Store in the refrigerator for three weeks. Strain, bottle, and drink before the flavor fades.

Liqueur
Per 100g of fruit, use 60g of sugar and 125mL of vodka. Place in a large glass jar, and store in a cool, dark place for four weeks. Turn and shake every so often to help the sugar dissolve. Strain and bottle. Pay particular attention to the changing color as the fruit's pigments dissolve into the alcohol.

Presumably other flavors - such as herbs - would make for lovely liqueurs. Unripe walnuts are a fine choice, too. Only time, experimentation, and excessive quantities of fresh foods will tell.

* * * * *

¹As opposed to fermenting directly. I suppose that, if I'd planned for it, I could have juiced a good portion of our berries to make a strawberry wine, but I have to draw a line someplace.

²The second is due for straining and bottling tomorrow. They're essentially the same recipe.

Yogurt.

Lewisburg.

Harold McGee makes his own yogurt. Now, so do I.

The process is so wonderfully simple that it doesn't even merit a recipe sidebar:

• Heat milk until it reaches 180° to 190°F. I picked up a gallon of whole milk, and ladled out half for ricotta when it hit the 160°F mark.
  
  
• Cool to 115° to 120°F. Mix in two tablespoons of live yogurt per quart.
  
  
• Keep warm for the next four hours, or until it's set and appropriately tangy. I poured the cultured milk into - of course - old yogurt containers, wrapped them in kitchen towels, and set them inside an insulated cooler.¹

Then it's either eat or refrigerate. I can't imagine how this might get any easier. (Or cheaper.)

* * * * *

¹It's insurance against accidental dog collisions as much as anything.

I'm just crackers for...

Lewisburg.

Do these count as bread?



In addition to the usual breadmaking around here, I've been making crackers. Lots and lots of crackers. I'm trying to keep a jar of crackers full at (nearly) all times, because they're a real treat to snack on occasionally. The ones pictured above are whole wheat with celery, which we devoured with a vegetable soup; the next set, on the counter now, are made with rye flour and poppy seeds. Other versions have been topped with a variety of seeds - fennel, caraway, cumin, etc. - and flavored with spices like smoked paprika or sweetened with a little sugar. They're extremely easy, and flexible to boot.

I'd made less-than-special crackers every great once in a while, but mostly before I really got into baking bread. Before I started paying close attention. Besides, in Madison, I could just pick up Potter's Crackers at the Willy St. Coop. Why mess with success?

Now I no longer have that luxury. And then I spotted this article in the New York Times. More specifically, I watched the little video that accompanies it, which made the whole process look easy. Too, too easy. So I had to try again, only with a little more precision.¹

Important note: crackers are easy. I've adjusted the Times recipe to make things more consistent, but a little care and attention will definitely turn out fine crackers every time.

Here's the general process, which is as close to a recipe as I follow:

1. In a small bowl, mix together 200g of flour. I tend to use at least 50-75% bread flour, with something more flavorful - whole wheat, barley, rye, etc. - to top it off, but anything with some gluten in it should work on its own. I'm certain that 100% whole wheat will turn out well; all-barley and all-spelt should be okay, too. Not sure about cornmeal yet, but it might be the next experiment.
   
   For lightly sweet crackers, try adding 30g of sugar. The dough's more difficult to work, as most sweet breads are, but they're especially crisp when done. Dusting the tops with sugar also makes for a fantastic gloss.
   
   
2. Include salt, ground spices, and herbs in the bowl. Poppy seeds work, too. I use about 6g of salt (a scant half tablespoon of kosher salt), and plan to use more for the top. Mix it all together well.
   
   
3. Stir in 120g water (60%). Or so. It just has to be a kneadable dough. Stir to bring it together, then knead smooth-ish. There's no need to overdo it.
   
   
4. For consistency's sake, I roll mine out with a pasta machine. (Number 6 on my Atlas, which is a slightly thick and chewy linguine size.) That way, I can cover two half-sheet pans² without crowding. If you're rolling by hand, just beware of thick spots, especially around the edges.
   
   
5. Brush the tops of the sheets of dough with water, the sprinkle with salt, seeds, etc. Score into whatever shapes suit - a pizza cutter or pastry wheel is handy here - and slide into the oven.
   
   
6. Bake at 350°F for 20-25 minutes. I usually switch and rotate the trays after 10 and 20 minutes to bake them evenly. When they're brown and crispy, they're done. Move them to a rack to cool - which only takes a few minutes - and break them along the score marks. In an airtight container, they'll last... until they're all eaten, I guess. It doesn't take very long around here.

* * * * *

¹In short: I'm using fewer and fewer volume measurements in baking, instead swapping them out for weight, which is far more reliable.

²The usual size in a home kitchen. Full sheet pans won't fit in my oven.

Pizza.

Lewisburg.

We had pizza for dinner last night. It's been an evolutionary process to get here:



Let me note that getting a pizzeria-like crust from a home oven is far more difficult than you'd expect, for one reason: professional pizza ovens (and wood-fired brick ovens) hang out in the neighborhood of 700° to 800°F. Sometimes up near 900°F. Mine only threatens to get near that range during the self-clean cycle, during which the door latch safety mechanism makes it really tough to get the pizzas in and out. So even cranked up to full blast, a home oven can't get a traditional pizza crust, well, crusty.

At least not beneath the sauce, cheese, and other various toppings. It'll still taste good, of course, but it's just not quite right. It's frustrating.

I stumbled across a key bit of information on Baking Bites, in a post for the Perfect Pizza Crust. Higher-protein flours absorb more water, which helps keep the crust from drying out in the professional oven... but results in a soft crust at home. Switching to all-purpose flour is an improvement, but still not quite perfect. The Baking Bites solution - from a recipe in Cook's Illustrated - uses a combination of all-purpose and cake flours to achieve crispiness.

Problem: I don't like cake flour. Yes, I do have some in the pantry, but I avoid it whenever I can. It's undergone some serious bleaching and other treatments, which I'd just as soon not rely on for situations that don't demand it. I'll even make cakes with all-purpose flour, which still makes for a delicious dessert, though with a slightly denser and drier texture.

Solution: pastry flour. It's low-protein flour, with great flavor if you've got a whole wheat version, like most organic brands.

In brief, here's how I'm making pizzas these days:

1. Make the dough for the crust with a mix of all-purpose and pastry flours. I like 225g total for a 12-inch pizza, and, though it may need some tweaking, I think 175g all-purpose and 50g pastry flour works well. Add 5g salt, an appropriate amount of yeast¹, and 157g water (70% hydration). Mix together, knead briefly, and set aside to rise.
   
   
2. Make the sauce, with whatever tastes good. Cook it down until the tomatoes have completely lost their structure and a lot of moisture. Puree and set aside.
   
   
3. For toppings, I keep it very simple. A small amount of thinly sliced or shredded cheese when we're not feeding vegans. Perhaps some mushrooms sauteed until crispy, or a few caramelized onions. Fresh herbs, in season, can wait until the pizza comes out of the oven.
   
   
4. Stretch the dough into a 12-inch round. If necessary, set it down during the stretching process to let the gluten relax. You'll want it thin, but avoid tearing it; fold over holes and pinch together to patch them. I like to grab about an inch in from the edge to create a rim of crust and pull apart gently while rotating the dough. It's not nearly as impressive as spinning and tossing, but a lot safer. I also think it's even easier than laying the dough flat and stretching, because you're letting gravity do a lot of the work.
   
   
5. When the oven's as hot as it'll get - 550°F here, with the pizza stone well preheated² - lay the crust on a peel dusted with cornmeal. Make sure it's not sticking. Brush on a light layer of olive oil, then spread with just enough sauce to almost cover. Top with cheese or whatever, and slide into the oven. Bake until it's brown and crispy. I find that seven to eight minutes works. Allow to cool on a rack for a few minutes, which'll help keep the underside from getting soggy after all that work.

Years of fighting with pizzas and home ovens, and it's that simple. The most difficult part, I think, is stepping back enough to treat the entire process with a light touch. Don't work the dough too much; a minimum of effort gives maximum rewards. Resist the temptation to embellish with too many toppings. A good crust just can't handle it, and gets lost underneath.

Enjoy the fact that it's good, simple food. But no less impressive for it.

EDIT: Mis-typed the quantity of salt for the pizza dough. It's a lot less over-salted now.

* * * * *

¹Half a teaspoon works for a one- or two- hour rise; scale it back to a quarter or an eighth for overnight, depending on how long it'll go. Or use the fridge to retard the rising. I pretty much never do, though it's mostly a function of lack of space.

²The oven beeps (or whatever) to say it's preheated? It's lying. They all do. Give it at least another half an hour, especially to ensure that the pizza stone is up to temperature, too.

Walnut brandy.

Lewisburg.

I have a backyard full of edible things. Some of those I've planted, like the multitude of vegetables in the annual - and slowly expanding to year-round - garden.¹ Then there are the existing fruit bushes and trees, like the blueberries and pears that were so productive that we weren't prepared for it all.

Then we have the apples and walnuts. The apple trees, it seems, have never been pruned², which means we won't have a chance at harvesting anything halfway decent until I'm able to bring them back under control. And the walnuts? Well, I never did find any ripe ones. My hunch is that the squirrels managed to swipe them all well before I could.

It's okay, though. I have a backup plan: walnut brandy. In addition to making use of the nuts months before the squirrels are even paying attention, it handily solves the issue of preservation. Plus, it's potent mojo.

In short, the process goes like this: harvest unripe walnuts; steep in vodka or brandy with spices for several months; add sugar to take the edge off; drink when the weather's turned cold and damp. I have English walnuts handy, but I don't see any reason it wouldn't work with the black walnuts that grow like weeds around here. There's no doubt that the flavor will be different - black walnuts being especially strong-flavored - but probably worth the (minimal) effort.

The recipe comes from Elisabeth Luard's European Peasant Cookery, a real gem of a find from the library. I've tweaked it slightly, reducing the quantity of sugar³, but it worked so well that I fully intend to work up multiple batches next year.

Walnut Brandy (Broux de noix)
Makes 2 liters
Time: Start 6 months ahead

Ingredients

• 10 fresh green walnuts
  
• 2 liters eau de vie or vodka
  
• 2 sticks of cinnamon
  
• Zest of 2 lemons
  
• Scrap of mace
  
• 2 cloves
  
• 500g sugar

Directions

1. Pick the walnuts in early July, when tender enough to pierce with a needle. Cut them in half and remove the outer husks; wear gloves, as the flesh will stain fingers for days. Chop the nutmeats as finely as possible, using a food processor if possible.
   
   
2. Place the walnut paste, cinnamon sticks, and alcohol in a large jar. Seal tightly and set in a warm place to infuse.
   
   
3. At the beginning of September, strain the liquor through a cheesecloth and discard the walnuts and cinnamon. Return to the jar and add the lemon zest, mace, cloves, and sugar. Set aside to infuse for another month. Strain again, bottle, and set aside until late December. Serve in small glasses, preferably in front of a burning Yule log.

* * * * *

¹I intend to post some significant chunks of the garden planning information this year, but I'm still hammering out the details. I hope to be ordering seeds very shortly.

²Our neighbors can pretty much confirm this.

³Maybe. There's a typo in the recipe, such that it calls for either 500g or 1kg of sugar, depending on where it's noted. I opted for the smaller amount, which is still undeniably sweet.

Bread Upon The Brain!

Lewisburg.

I've been on a bread-baking kick of late. The primary reason, I suppose, is that finding decent bread¹ around here is nigh impossible. So it's either this:



Or nothing.

Funny thing about bread: it's very easy to make your own, but it's maddeningly difficult to master. It seems, in fact, that the more time spent attempting to master it, the more I realize the immense complexity and depth of the whole endeavor. Even choosing to restrict the ingredients to the basic four² - flour, water, yeast, salt - leaves the budding baker with a wide range of options. Personal example: bread was one of the first things I taught myself to make, about ten years ago. I haven't struggled with anything else for near that length of time.³

What I have learned about breadmaking is as follows:

1. Measuring by volume will drive you mad. Get a good scale and use it for everything. (Exceptions for small quantities, such as fractional teaspoons and tablespoons of yeast, salt, herbs, etc.) Varying the weight of the added liquid - as a percentage of the flour's weight - produces a wide range of results. Try 50% for bagels; 85% for an open texture full of irregular holes; 65-70% for everyday loaves. Corollary: Work in metric; it makes the arithmetic far less headache-inducing. Second corollary: Generally speaking, you'll want to learn the approximate weight of flour that best fits your chosen baking container(s). There's some flexibility here, influenced in part by the specific ingredients you choose, but it helps a) produce well-shaped loaves, and b) reduces the number of times you'll need mentally calculate 65% of 450g.
   
   
2. Novice breadmakers use too much flour. Always.⁴ You'll almost have to be teetering across the dough/batter divide before kneading becomes impossible. Caveat: Kneading takes longer than you'd think to get the knack for. Fortunately, it's not as critical a step as most cookbooks seem to suggest.
   
   
3. Bake at higher temperatures. 350°F may be essential for especially rich or sweet breads - brioche, cinnamon rolls - to prevent scorching, but it makes for an unimpressive crust on most loaves. I'm currently baking most breads in the 425° - 450°F range, though pizza crusts get as much fire⁵ as the oven'll give me.
   
   
4. Don't use sugar. Unless you want the sweetness (sweet breads) or flavor (bagels and pretzels), of course. There's plenty of food for the yeast in the flour, and giving them refined sugars only reduces the fermented flavors in the finished bread. Some people seem surprised by this, which itself surprises me. After all, refined sugar's pretty new on the culinary scene; leavened bread's leaning to the ancient side.
   
   
5. Less yeast, more time. Makes it taste better. Plus, the timing's more forgiving. The refrigerator can be a fine tool.
   
   
6. Use enough salt. It improves both flavor and texture. I use a scant tablespoon - 15g or so - of kosher salt for 450g of flour, which suits me.
   
   
7. For a lovely, shattery crust, an enclosable baking container works wonders. A cast-iron dutch oven (preheated, of course) is the best I've found, though I bake sandwich loaves with a pair of loaf pans. One sits upside-down atop the other, held in place with binder clips. A tent of aluminum foil, tightly crimped around the edges, works well, but you need to be careful to leave enough space for the oven spring.
   
   
8. Make bread frequently. I don't often repeat the same precise recipe, but each time is a variation on a few different themes, and the experimentation makes for a fine teacher.
   
   
9. Finally: those who don't bake bread are inevitably impressed with all but the most spectacular failures. (That would be the great majority of everyone you know.)

There's probably something I've neglected to mention, and even more that I'll continue to learn through trial and (edible) error. But until then:

Walnut bread
This loaf's becoming a favorite treat around here, fueling the need to buy walnuts in bulk. (The squirrels get every single nut off of the trees in the backyard.) It makes a fine loaf bread, though I made a wreath-like epi version for a holiday gift. Rich and tender, it's lovely stuff.

The following quantities suit my 9-¼" x 5-¼" loaf pan, which is how I'm most inclined to make it. To grind the walnuts, I give them a quick trip through the food processor. The result is fairly fine without becoming oily.

Ingredients:

• 600g bread flour
  
• 100g ground walnuts
  
• 20g salt
  
• 3/8 teaspoon yeast
  
• 420g water

Directions:

1. Mix together the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Stir in the water, and turn out onto a lightly floured board. Knead briefly, until it is all incorporated together. A shaggy dough is just fine. Shape into a ball and return to the bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and allow to rest 18-24 hours.
   
   
2. Punch down the dough and shape into a loaf; allow to proof, covered, in a lightly greased loaf pan for at least an hour. Bake in a 425°F oven for about an hour; if possible, keep the loaf tightly covered for the first half hour. Allow to cool on a rack.

* * * * *

¹As in "good enough", not "especially good" or "great".

²Which I'm certainly not doing.

³Even something like roasting a Thanksgiving turkey, that once-a-year-and-only-once process, is coming along at a better clip.

⁴Note: This will not happen if you adhere to two simple rules.

1. Weigh your ingredients. Do not use volume measures.
   
   
2. Use a minimum of flour on your board when kneading. Using a dough scraper helps, particularly for doughs with 70% hydration and up.

Also: Kneading the dough will help even out wet/dry patches, as will rising time.

⁵550°F. Getting the right crust at that temperature, about two hundred degrees below a professional oven, is really tough. Really tough. I'm not quite ready to build a wood-fired brick oven, but it's really tempting to hunt for the right excuse.

Orange bitters.

Lewisburg.

I love a good martini:



As I make 'em, the recipe goes something like this:

Martini

Ingredients:

• 3 parts good gin (such as Hendrick's)
  
• 1 part dry vermouth¹
  
• Dash orange bitters
  
• Olives
  
• Ice

Directions:

1. Add three or four ice cubes to a shaker, then pour in the gin and vermouth. Add a drop or two of orange bitters, to taste. Cover and swirl about for a moment, or shake if you're really feeling it.
   
   
2. Strain into a glass, and garnish with a toothpick loaded with olives. Like, say, three. Taste and add another drop of bitters if it needs a sharper edge.

Pretty straightforward, as long as you can find orange bitters. Which, living in Pennsylvania, is something I can't do easily. Next best thing? Make my own, of course.

To be honest, I have no idea if this is what orange bitters are supposed to be like, though I rather like them. Enough that I add a drop here and there to give a cocktail a nice edge. In a margarita, for example, it adds an extra dimension to the sweet and salty character, and the orange aroma fits in nicely. Ain't so bad in a Manhattan, either, though the traditional angostura bitters suit best.

A little Google work turned up one orange bitters recipe in a handful of places. It goes like this:

Orange bitters

Ingredients:

• ½ lb. dried bitter seville orange peel
  
• 1 pinch cardamom
  
• 1 pinch caraway
  
• 1 pinch coriander seeds
  
• 2 cups grain alcohol
  
• Water
  
• 4 tablespoons caramel food coloring

Directions:

1. Chop the orange peel finely and mix it with the herbs and alcohol. Let it stand for 15-20 days in a sealed jar, agitating it every day.
   
   
2. Pour off spirits through a cloth and seal again.
   
   
3. Put the strained off seeds and peel in a saucepan, crush it, cover with boiling water and simmer for 5 minutes. Pour into another jar, cover, and let stand for 2 days. Strain this off and add it to the spirits. Add caramel coloring, filter again and let it rest until it settles perfectly clear. Target: 45% alc.

Sounds easy enough, except for a few minor details:

1. I can't get grain alcohol in Pennsylvania, and the drive to New Jersey, or whatever other state might have it readily available, is awfully hard to justify.
   
   
2. Dried bitter orange peel isn't cheap. At about $2.50 per ounce, it's better to pick up a pound ($12) at a homebrew shop.
   
   
3. Food coloring? Seriously? (Some versions of the recipe call for burnt sugar, i.e., caramel.) I don't like the way the angostura bitters pinken up a martini, and it seems like a concession to aesthetics.

So I swapped those out for Bacardi 151 and some fresh sour orange peel - why not? - from the grocery store. And skipped the caramel. At least this way, should it turn out nasty, I'm only out a few bucks. Fortunately, it worked out perfectly:



My modified recipe, for an aromatic, boldly orange-colored orange bitters is as follows:

Orange bitters

Ingredients:

• Rind of three sour oranges, finely diced
  
• 1 pinch cardamom
  
• 1 pinch caraway
  
• 1 pinch coriander seeds
  
• 1 cup Bacardi 151 rum
  
• ¾ cup water

Directions:

1. Pack the diced orange peel - with the white pith - into a pint glass jar with the spices. Pour in the rum to cover, seal the jar, and set aside for at least two weeks, shaking at least once a day. Smell and taste every few days to see how it's progessing; the aroma and bitterness really build.
   
   
2. Strain off through a fine sieve, then through a coffee filter, saving the peel and spices. In a pot, crush the peel and spices, cover with the boiling water, and simmer for five minutes. Strain this liquid through the sieve and another coffee filter, and add ½ cup to the spirits. Seal tightly.
   
   
3. Allow the cloudiness to settle. This will seem to take forever; this batch sat for about a month until the cloudiness had sunk to the bottom. Strain through a coffee filter, bottle, and enjoy.

* * * * *

¹Or, for a sweet martini, swap out the dry vermouth for sweet, and the olives for a twist of orange peel.

English muffins.

Lewisburg.

It's taken a couple rounds of recipe tweaking, but I think I can finally say that I've got a pretty good recipe for English muffins:



This all started when I was researching the baking classes. I made notes on a variety of different bread recipes that I wanted to try for myself at some point - not necessarily for the class - and I've been fiddling with some of them, off and on, for a while. The most important adjustment I've made is to shift most of my breadmaking to weight measurements instead of volume, which means I'm able to produce more consistent results, and I'm more easily able to refine a recipe that's close but not perfect.

English muffins are the perfect example of that. The original recipe came from The World Encyclopedia of Bread and Bread Making by Christine Ingram and Jennie Shapter, a British book with lots of pictures that I'd picked up, years ago, in the bargain section of a Borders or Barnes & Noble. It calls for a cup and a half (or a little more) of milk per four cups of flour¹ with a little added sugar - presumably for the yeast. The dough isn't kneaded, but is beaten together for several minutes to make it smooth and elastic. Roll, cut, proof, and cook on a lightly greased griddle.

What puzzled me, though, was that the accompanying picture, of a split English muffin, looks like a flat dinner roll. The interior has the soft, slightly ragged crumb of a kneaded, milk-based bread. Perhaps it's because I've only ever seen the standard Thomas' version, but I expect that crater-like interior. The nooks and crannies, as they say.

So I adjusted. The half-teaspoon of sugar's gone; I don't need it with instant yeast. My electric griddle's non-stick, and easier to clean if I leave it ungreased. And I don't feel like beating the dough for five minutes, so I stop after a minute. If that much.

Most importantly, though, I've increased the amount of milk used, which makes it easier to get those big air pockets inside. As additional insurance, I work the dough as little as possible - so no more punching down to get the bubbles out - and for all of this simplification and work reduction, I'm getting better and better results. This might be the simplest bread recipe I have.

These English muffins are great with butter or jam or both, though my personal favorite is to make egg sandwiches. Fried eggs over easy, with a little bit of a runny yolk, make a fine version, and cheese is definitely a plus. A bit of bacon and a dash of vinegary hot sauce can only improve things. The best, though, is to make little frittatas: scramble together an egg with some milk, cheese, and whatever additional stuff sounds good - last time it was mushroom and onion - and cook on the griddle in egg rings. Less messy than trying to layer it all on top, for one, and they look pretty sharp when stacked up.

English Muffins
Makes six or seven

Ingredients

• 270g bread flour (approx. 2 cups)
  
• 225g milk, lukewarm (approx. 1 cup less one Tablespoon)
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
  
• 3/4 teaspoon instant yeast
  
• Cornmeal or flour for dusting

Directions

1. Mix together the flour, yeast and salt in a bowl, whisking thoroughly to combine. Add the milk, stirring until fully incorporated; there is no need to work it until smooth. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise until doubled in size, about an hour and a half.
   
   
2. Turn the dough out onto a floured board, and dust the top with flour. Be sure to use enough flour to prevent the dough from sticking to the board or the rolling pin; this is a time when extra flour is not necessarily a bad thing. Roll out to about 3/8-inch thickness. Cut into rounds with a biscuit cutter. Gently press scraps together, kneading as little as possible, to cut additional English muffins. As with biscuits, the subsequent muffins may be a little more misshapen than the first set.
   
   
3. Let the muffins proof on a sheet liberally dusted with cornmeal or flour, covered with plastic wrap, for half an hour. Meanwhile, preheat a griddle to 325°F (medium heat). Cook the muffins for about eight minutes per side, and allow to cool on a wire rack.

Since I'm one for toasted English muffins, I'm more likely to make these in the evening, but they're easy enough to prepare fresh for a morning brunch. Just reduce the quantity of yeast - a scant half teaspoon, say - and use the milk at refrigerator temperature. Start them before you go to bed, and they'll be set for cutting and proofing come morning.

* * * * *

¹Most of the recipes in the book make large quantities of bread, so I've tended to scale them down for my own use.

Baking Class - Cakes.

Lewisburg.

Well, the baking classes are finished for the semester. Definitely fun while they lasted, though it'll be nice to have Wednesdays back again. Until next semester, anyhow; I've already been offered the chance to do another class then. This time, I think I'll focus on basic cooking techniques.

Which definitely includes a session on how to read a recipe. And another on knife skills. Boy, won't those be interesting.

CAKES
Baking 101 – Spring 2008

ABOUT SPONGE CAKES

The sponge cake, with its variations and eventual reduction to boxed mixes, is the quintessential birthday cake. Though the specific variations are many, they tend to fall into two distinct categories: American and European. The former, which is by far the most common in the United States, has relatively high proportions of eggs and sugar, and rarely contains butter. The texture is moist and tender, and they’re quite good eaten plain, lightly frosted, or with fresh fruit. The European versions, biscuit and genoise, are drier and less tender than the American sponge cake, and are generally components of elaborate desserts. They are often soaked with liquor syrups and layered with rich buttercreams and sliced fruits.

THE INCREDIBLE, EDIBLE EGG

In a traditional, unleavened sponge cake, eggs are primarily responsible for the light, airy texture. This is due to some of the unique characteristics of egg whites and egg yolks, especially when separated. Eggs, perhaps more than any other ingredient, are responsible for some of the most spectacular tricks in the kitchen.

Although it’s possible to find duck, turkey, quail, ostrich and all sorts of other eggs if you know where to look, American cooking depends on the everyday chicken egg. Generally, unless otherwise specified, this means “large” eggs, but it’s possible to adjust quantities if you only have medium or jumbo. Most general purpose cookbooks have conversion charts for just that purpose.

The Yolk. About a third of the contents of the egg, the yolk contains a variety of useful chemical components: water, for the most part; fats; proteins; some cholesterols; and lecithin, a phospholipid that’s remarkably handy for making emulsions like mayonnaise. In most baking recipes, egg yolks provide a rich, eggy flavor; though it’s not apples to apples, think of a sponge cake (with yolks) compared to an angel food cake (whites only). There are exceptions, such as zabaglione and sabayons, which use heated, whisked yolks to create a silky foam, but egg yolks are primarily a source of flavor and a texture enhancer.

The White. The other two thirds of the egg, the white contains: lots of water, around 90%; trace amounts of vitamins, minerals, fatty materials, and glucose; and several different proteins that help produce, set, and stabilize foams, among other culinary tasks. Whole eggs can be used in custards, where the proteins, when carefully cooked, will set into a smooth gel; they can even be used to create an airy foam when heated properly, as for a genoise cake. But egg whites alone are capable of producing foams unlike anything else in the kitchen.

It’s a simple experiment to create foam from egg whites. Just whisk vigorously in a bowl, and they will first start to foam with large bubbles that soon multiply into smaller and smaller bubbles. Eventually, the bubbles themselves become too small to see, and the foam expands and expands, reaching eight or more times its original volume. Like any foam, from soap bubbles to whipped cream, this will settle and separate over time, and so needs to be consumed quickly or set, either with the addition of starches or gelatin, or by the application of heat. Heat, in particular, is a permanent change, as the proteins unfold and coagulate, reinforcing the bubbles walls into a solid, airy form.

Aside from the difficulty of whipping an egg white foam by hand, there are several basic chemical components that can help or hinder the creation of the foam. The basics are:

• Egg yolk. The fats within the egg yolk will prevent the formation of a foam by competing with the egg white proteins in the spaces where they want to connect, without offering any structural support. When heated, the yolk’s proteins can overcome some of this problem, but as a rule it’s best to whip an egg foam in a clean bowl, free of traces of yolk. Yolk doesn’t pose a problem once the foam has formed, but only at the outset.
  
  
• Oils and fats. These have the same effect as egg yolk, so it’s best to be careful. They won’t absolutely prevent foaming, but they’ll make it much, much more difficult.
  
  
• Detergents. Chemically similar to fats, which is one reason they’re so great at removing grease, detergents cause the same problems with foam formation, so be sure to rinse and dry bowls well. Plus, they taste truly awful.
  
  
• Salt. Salt weakens the overall foam structure by competing with proteins for bonding sites, making it harder to whip and less stable. Salt should be added to the other components of a dish, rather than the foam.
  
  
• Water. Though very few recipes call for water, it can be used to create a lighter, airier foam by diluting the egg white proteins. These foams are less stable, however, and too much will keep them from forming.
  
  
• Sugar. Sugar can both help and hinder. If added at the start, it will delay foaming and reduce the overall lightness; some recipes call for this, in order to create a firm, dense foam, but it doubles the work. If added once the foam has started to form, often at the soft peaks stage, sugar can help to stabilize a foam. It does this by holding on to water, preventing it from draining away.
  
  
• Acids. Although proteins are responsible for foam formation, they can also cause its downfall by swapping out the existing sulfur-hydrogen bonds in the egg proteins for sulfur-sulfur bonds with adjacent proteins, squeezing out the air. Adding more available hydrogen, in the form of a little acid, greatly minimizes that process. Per egg white, use ½ teaspoon of lemon juice or 1/8 teaspoon or cream of tartar, a salt made from tartaric acid, a winemaking byproduct.
  
  
• Copper. Cooking tradition sometimes calls for whipping egg whites in a copper bowl, which produces a more stable foam. This works because the copper binds to sulfur, doing the same work as a little added acid. Silver works, too – but since bowls made from either are inordinately expensive, you’re best off with a pinch of cream of tartar.

One last note on eggs: the proteins in both the yolk and white are temperature-sensitive. Too much heat will cause them to curdle, which is undesirable in just about every instance except scrambled eggs. When recipes call for mixing a hot liquid with eggs, they need to be tempered first. To do this, add a small amount of the hot liquid to the eggs, whisking thoroughly. This will help raise the eggs’ temperature without overcooking them, so that they can be added to the hot liquid without curdling.

CAKE FLOUR

Cake flour is an innovation from the early 20th century, made from very finely milled, low-protein wheat flour. It’s strongly bleached with chlorine dioxide or chlorine gas, which enables the starch to absorb water much more readily in the presence of large amounts of sugar, and allows fats to bind more readily. It isn’t directly interchangeable with pastry or other low-protein flours, although it is possible to use all-purpose or pastry flour mixed with corn, potato, or arrowroot starch. Some cakes are even made with no flour at all, but use only pure starch or similar ingredients, such as chestnut flour.

ICINGS

Icings originally began as a means to keep the food underneath from drying out. The first were simple syrup glazes, though they’ve now evolved into a more elaborate variety of choices. Typical icings are made from powdered sugar, a little water, and sometimes some added fat, often butter or cream. Some may include corn syrup, which helps prevent the sugar from forming coarse crystals, creating a glossy surface; the added fats will also help reduce sugar crystallization.

Some simple icings may simply take a fat (solid at room temperature) such as butter, cream cheese, or vegetable shortening, and whip in air and sugar to create a sweet, light, spreadable mass. In this case, the sugar crystals must be ground fine to keep them from feeling grainy on the tongue; the finer grades of powdered sugar are the common choice. Other frostings require cooking, and typically use egg proteins or flour starches to create body. In these kinds, sugar crystal size is unimportant, because the sugar is dissolved in liquid during the cooking process.

Some of the common types of cake icings and frostings include:

• Fondant. A version of fondant candy, which is often used as a filling or a coating for other candies. It produces a translucent, satin glaze typical of petits fours and some European cakes. The icing differs from the candy filling in that it is warmed and thinned with a simple syrup to a pourable consistency. Given the clarity of the finished glaze, it cannot be used to hide imperfections; it is sometimes applied over a layer of buttercream or other frosting that gives a smooth, even appearance.
  
  
• Buttercream. One of the classic frostings for decorative cakes, buttercreams require mixing a cooked sugar syrup into beaten eggs (or egg yolks), then working in a large quantity of butter to produce a smooth, spreadable frosting. Due to the large proportion of butter, the consistency of buttercreams varies with temperature.
  
  
• Ganache. The same as the center of a chocolate truffle, a ganache is a mixture of chocolate and heavy cream. Butter can be included in addition to or in place of the cream, with similar results. Typically, the chocolate is chopped into fine pieces, and hot cream is poured over, melting the chocolate; different proportions of chocolate and cream will give different consistencies. Most versions are pourable when warm and spreadable when cooled to room temperature.
  
  
• Quick. “Quick” icings rely on the thickening ability of the cornstarch in powdered sugar. The typical ratio is approximately a quarter pound of butter to a pound of powdered sugar, with just enough added liquid to thin the consistency to the desired point. These icings may be cooked or not; cooking is done in a double boiler to avoid melting the sugar, which would make the texture grainy.
  
  
• Cream cheese. Cream cheese frostings are essentially sweetened, butter-enriched cream cheese, beaten to a smooth texture. Quick and easy, they are prone to overmixing, which can break down the cream cheese and make the frosting too soft to hold its shape. Cream cheese frostings, since they don’t depend on the chemical properties of sugar to form their structure, can be made anywhere from barely to very sweet.
  
  
• Royal icing. Unlike most other icings, royal icing is primarily for decoration, rather than for eating. A mixture of egg whites and sugar, it is extremely stiff and traditionally used to create ornate detailing for wedding cakes. It dries hard and pure white, which looks elegant, but it tastes like hard, chalky sugar.
  
  
• Sugar glaze. Sugar glazes are basically simple sugar syrups, which can be used to create a thin, translucent glaze over the surface of a cake. These are typically used for plain, rich cakes that need little extra adornment, such as pound cake, to provide a shiny crust and a hint of additional sweetness.

TYPES OF CAKES

The term “cake” may describe any of a wide variety of baked goods, ranging from quickbreads – such as coffee cake – to unleavened, egg-foam mixtures like a true sponge cake. Even dense confections, such as flourless chocolate cakes and fruit cakes fall into the general category. Cheesecakes, despite the name, are cheese and egg custards, not cakes; only the general shape and typical wedge servings are cake-like.

Just some of the possible examples of cakes include:

• Quick cakes. Quick cakes are, as the name suggests, quick and simple to prepare. Though considered cakes, they are prepared in much the same manner as quickbreads. Sometimes baking in a cake pan or the addition of a layer of icing is all that separates the two groups. Some examples include apple cake, carrot cake, and virtually all vegan cake recipes, which cannot include any dairy or eggs.
  
  
• Gingerbread. Gingerbreads are some of the oldest varieties of baked goods, with the exception of breads. Like quick cakes, they are easy and fast to prepare, and there are a wealth of different ways to make it. What all have in common is the use of spices, including ginger – sometimes dried, sometimes fresh – and molasses, which provides much of the characteristic color and flavor. Gingerbread batters also tend to be thinner than many other cake batters, which can make them more prone to overmixing and toughness, so it’s best to use a light hand when mixing.
  
  
• Pound cakes and butter cakes. Pound cakes, known as quatres-quarts in French (four quarters), are so called because the original recipe called for four ingredients: a pound each of flour, sugar, butter and eggs. Since the invention of baking powder in the mid-nineteenth century, recipes for pound cakes and the related butter cakes have become much more varied, including a wide range of ingredients in the lighter, much easier to prepare, versions. Due to the high proportion of butter in these cakes, the taste and quality genuinely suffers when replaced with shortening or margarine.
  
  
• Foam cakes and sponge cakes. Foam cakes, of which sponge cakes are a subset, are based on a high proportion of eggs. Beating eggs (or just whites) into a stable foam provides the delicate structure and most, if not all of the leavening; some recipes call for additional baking powder for added lift. American sponge cakes are light, delicate and moist; European sponge cakes, such as genoise and biscuit, are drier and less tender, though no less flavorful.
  
  
• Chiffon cakes. Chiffon cakes are a variation on foam cakes invented in 1927 by Hollywood insurance salesman Harry Baker, who catered cakes for private parties on the side. The key difference is that the fat used is oil, rather than butter or shortening, which can’t hold onto bubbles like solid fats can. The egg foam, bolstered with baking powder, gives a chiffon cake its lift and lightness; oil lends it moistness, even when refrigerated.
  
  
• Angel food cakes. Angel food cakes are essentially sponge cakes without the egg yolks or butter. This makes for an exceptionally delicate and airy cake, and fat-free to boot. Angel food cakes are cooked in a specific pan just for the purpose, a tube pan with a removable bottom.
  
  
• Cupcakes. True cupcakes can be made from any cake recipe, baked in muffin pans; most have a top layer of icing, though this isn’t strictly necessary. As cakes will go stale more quickly than muffins of the same size and shape, paper liners do a good job of keeping them moist and fresh longer.
  
  
• Fruitcakes. Fruitcakes are essentially butter cakes liberally studded with fruit, either dried or candied, and nuts, then often soaked and preserved by soaking in spirits. When made from good ingredients, a fruitcake can be a rich, intense dessert for a holiday or other special occasion. Some recipes are even intended to mature over a period of a year or more; they’re often recipes surviving through generations, originally intended as a way to preserve a bountiful fruit harvest throughout the year.
  
  
• Flourless chocolate cakes. Like sponge cakes, flourless chocolate cakes or tortes rely on egg foams to provide leavening. Without the structural backbone of flour’s starch, however, these cakes are much denser and moister. They also tend to be extremely rich, with large amounts of eggs, butter, cream and chocolate, though often not overly sweet.

AMERICAN SPONGE CAKE
Adapted from The Joy of Cooking
Serves 8 to 10

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup sifted cake flour
  
• ¼ teaspoon salt
  
• 1 cup sugar
  
• 7 large egg yolks
  
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
  
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
  
• 1 teaspoon orange zest
  
• 3 tablespoons water
  
• 7 large egg whites
  
• ½ teaspoon cream of tartar

DIRECTIONS

1. Have all ingredients at room temperature. Preheat the oven to 325° F. Have ready an ungreased 9-inch springform pan. Sift together the flour and salt three times, then return to the sifter.
   
   
2. In a bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, 2/3 cup sugar, and the vanilla until thick and pale yellow. Beat in the lemon and orange zest and water. Sift the flour mixture over the top, but do not mix in.
   
   
3. In a large bowl, whisk together the egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks form. The add the remaining 1/3 cup sugar and beat until the peaks are stiff, but not dry. Using a rubber spatula, fold one quarter of the egg whites into the yolk mixture. Then fold in the remaining whites.
   
   
4. Scrape into the pan and spread evenly. Bake until the top springs back when lightly pressed and a toothpick comes out clean, about 40 to 45 minutes. Allow to cool upside down for at least an hour and a half. Unmold by sliding a thin knife around the edge to detach the cake from the pan; remove the pan side and bottom and allow to finish cooling right side up on a rack.

NOTES

• This cake must cool upside-down for at least ninety minutes to retain its delicate texture. Until the protein/starch network has cooled, it cannot even support its own weight and will deflate. Likewise, the cake pan must remain ungreased, lest the warm cake simply fall out while cooling upside-down.
  
  
• Store this cake covered, at room temperature. A layer of icing will help prevent the cake from drying out.

QUICK ICING
Adapted from The Joy of Cooking
Makes about 1 cup

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups powdered sugar, sifted if lumpy
  
• 4 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
  
• 3 to 4 Tablespoons milk
  
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
  
• 1/8 teaspoon salt

DIRECTIONS

1. Beat together the sugar and butter until smooth. Add the milk, vanilla, and salt and beat until smooth. Adjust the texture with additional powdered sugar or milk if necessary.
   
   
2. To store, cover the surface directly with plastic wrap. This will keep for three days at room temperature or three weeks refrigerated. Before using, soften and stir until smooth.

NOTES

• The icing will thicken as it stands, so it’s best to work quickly when icing cakes, especially those with a delicate texture. Thorough stirring will help loosen it up, as will the addition of a little extra liquid to thin it out.

Baking Class - Cookies.

Lewisburg.

Sharon asked me, as I was headed out the door to teach my students how to make chocolate chip cookies, if I thought we'd even make it past the cookie dough stage. I'm pleased to say that we did make quite a number of cookies, though at least one student went home feeling woogy from eating too much dough. Here're the baked results:



Those are all student-baked cookies, in their chewy, crispy, and cakey variations (left to right). Granted, they do seem to have a little trouble with reading and following simple directions¹, but everything still worked out pretty well. Especially when I'm leaning over shoulders so that I can call things to a quick halt if necessary. In the next series of classes, it looks like I'll need to spend some time discussing how one is actually supposed to read a recipe.

COOKIES
Baking 101 – Spring 2008

ABOUT DROP COOKIES

Although there are many, many different kinds of cookies, drop cookies are some of the most common ones in America. Usual examples include oatmeal raisin cookies and the ever-popular chocolate chip cookies. Like almost all cookies, they contain significant amounts of fat and sugar in proportion to flour, which make for a distinctive rich and sweet flavor. Beyond that, however, a range of ingredients and mixing techniques can produce cookies with a great diversity of textures. Drop cookies constitute a group – one with a wide range of flavors and textures in it – made from a soft dough that is scooped onto a baking sheet by the spoonful. During baking, these round balls of dough spread out into the characteristic cookie shape.

THE CREAMING METHOD

Creaming is essential to making a good drop cookie. Unlike in yeast breads, where the kneading process develops lots of tiny air pockets to be filled with expanding leavening gases, cookies need to have air bubbles worked inside without creating gluten. This process, called creaming, mixes the cooking fat, usually butter, with sugar; as the two are mixed, the rough edges of the sugar crystals tear tiny holes into the fat. As these holes seal over, they trap in tiny bubbles of air. You can see the effect of this as the volume of the sugar/fat mixture expands by up to a third and the color of it lightens. During baking, these pockets expand, raising the cookies and giving them their characteristic lightness.

Creaming can be done by hand, or with an electric mixer. If creaming by hand, always be sure that the butter is fully softened before working it; softened butter is at the stage, about room temperature, where it is soft and malleable without melting. Electric stand mixers work best, and can effectively cream even cold butter, although they’re quite expensive. An electric hand mixer doesn’t do the best job, due to the shape of the thin metal beaters, but is a fair compromise between cost and arm power.

DROP COOKIE VARIATIONS

Drop cookies are easy to make, and easy to adjust to your particular taste. Here are a few ways to modify the basic chocolate chip recipe below to get different final results:

• Flour. Cake flour can hold less moisture than all-purpose, which leaves more of the water in the recipe available for steam; hence, cake flour produces puffier, cakier cookies. Bread flour is more likely to produce gluten, and so will make chewier cookies. It also holds on to more moisture, resulting in a slightly moister cookie.
  
  
• Sugar. White sugar, for various reasons, helps cookies to spread while baking, and produces a crispier cookie once cooled. Brown sugar, due to the presence of molasses, holds on to much more moisture, resulting in a moister, chewier cookie. By tipping the ratio of white to brown sugar in one direction or the other, you can change the final cookie texture.
  
  
• Fat. Butter has a relatively low melting point, which allows cookies more time to spread before setting during baking, making for flatter, crispier cookies. Margarine and shortening melt at higher temperatures, allowing more time for the cookie to rise, and less to spread, producing cakier cookies. Melting the butter before mixing with the sugar will produce very few bubbles during creaming, making for a denser, chewier cookie.
  
  
• Leavening. Baking soda raises the pH of the dough, resulting in a higher set temperature during baking; this gives the cookies more time to spread. Increasing the quantity of baking soda by up to fifty percent will make for crispier cookies. Baking powder, on the other hand, doesn’t affect the pH of the dough, which allows for a lower set temperature. This, combined with its extra leavening power, causes cookies to rise more, producing a cakier texture. Replace the baking soda one-for-one with baking powder for this effect.
  
  
• Eggs. Eggs tend to produce puffiness in baked goods, so replacing one egg with ¼ cup of milk will make for a flatter, crispier cookie. Egg whites also tend to dry out baked goods, so replacing one egg white – while keeping the yolk – with 2 Tablespoons of milk will make for a chewier cookie.
  
  
• Other ingredients. Chocolate chips can be replaced with nuts, raisins, or anything else that happens to sound good. Likewise, the vanilla can be replaced with an equal quantity of another extract, spirit, or liqueur; the use of orange extract, bourbon, or even strong coffee can add a subtle but interesting variation to the usual chocolate chip cookie flavor. Finally, it’s simple and easy to add ground spices to the dry ingredients to change the flavor. Anything that goes with chocolate, from cinnamon to chilli peppers, works well.
  
  
• Temperature. Cold dough will spread less in the oven, as the exterior sets quicker compared to the center of the cookie. For a cakier cookie, place the mixed cookie dough in the refrigerator to cool before baking.

TYPES OF COOKIES

There is a near-endless variety of cookie recipes available, with many, many different ways of preparing them. American cookies tend to fall into five basic categories:

• Drop cookies. Chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies, among others. These are made from a soft dough that is scooped onto a baking sheet by the spoonful.
  
  
• Cut-out cookies. Sugar cookies and butter cookies. Made from a stiffer dough than drop cookies, which allows it to hold shape while baking, these are rolled out and cut into shapes with cookie cutters.
  
  
• Hand-shaped cookies. Ladyfingers and madeleines. These are made from batters that are stiffened by chilling, then piped or molded into shape before baking.
  
  
• Bar cookies. Brownies and nut bars. These cookies are shaped after baking, when cut from a pan. They are baked from a batter spread in a shallow pan, and have a cake-like quality.
  
  
• Icebox cookies. These cookies are pre-formed into cylinders, often wrapped in parchment or wax paper, and kept in the refrigerator or freezer. Cross-section slices can then be cut and baked as needed; many cookie doughs can be treated this way.

CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES
Adapted from the classic Nestle Toll House recipe
Makes five dozen cookies

INGREDIENTS

• 2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
  
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
  
• 1 cup butter, softened
  
• ¾ cup granulated sugar
  
• ¾ cup packed brown sugar
  
• 1-½ teaspoons vanilla extract
  
• 2 large eggs
  
• 1 12-ounce package chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 375° F. Cream together the butter and sugars in a large bowl, until the mixture has increased in volume and lightened in color. Add the eggs, one at a time, incorporating each fully before adding the next. Add the vanilla.
   
   
2. Combine the flour, baking soda and salt in small bowl. Mix into the butter mixture in three parts, making sure each is fully incorporated before adding the next. Stir in the chocolate chips. Drop rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased baking sheets.
   
   
3. Bake for 9 to 11 minutes or until golden brown; when the edges start to brown, but the cookie is still slightly soft in the center, they’re done. Cool on baking sheets for a moment to firm a bit before removing to wire racks to cool completely.

NOTES

• When spooning out cookies onto baking sheets, make sure that all of the scoops are the same size to ensure all the cookies finish at the same time. If possible, use a disher scoop to be sure. Larger and smaller cookies will bake up just fine; adjust the cooking time appropriately.

CHOCOLATE CHIP BISCOTTI
Adapted from How To Cook Everything
Makes fifteen to twenty biscotti

INGREDIENTS

• 2 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened, plus more for greasing baking sheets
  
• ¼ cup plus 2 Tablespoons granulated sugar
  
• 1 large egg
  
• ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
  
• 1 cup plus 2 Tablespoons all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting baking sheets
  
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
  
• Pinch salt
  
• ¼ cup chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 375° F. Cream together the butter and sugar in a large bowl, until the mixture has increased in volume and lightened in color. Add the egg and vanilla, stirring until fully incorporated.
   
   
2. Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in small bowl. Mix into the butter mixture in three parts, making sure each is fully incorporated before adding the next. Stir in the chocolate chips.
   
   
3. Butter a baking sheet and dust with flour; turn it over and tap gently to remove any excess. Shape the dough into a log approximately 3 to 4 inches wide, and about an inch thick. Place onto the baking sheet and bake for about 30 minutes, or until it is golden and beginning to crack.
   
   
4. Remove from the oven, and lower the temperature to 250° F. Allow the loaf to cool until easy to handle, and cut along the diagonal into ½-inch slices with a serrated knife. Place the slices back on the baking sheet and return to the oven to dry, about 15 to 20 minutes, turning once. Cool on a wire rack.

NOTES

• Not all biscotti recipes call for butter; here, it helps to tenderize them. Butterless (or other low-fat) biscotti recipes are quite crunchy, and often need to be dunked in coffee to be eaten.
  
  
• A single cookie is called a biscotto. Biscotti is plural.

* * * * *

¹Sharon confirms that this is often the case in math classes, too.

Baking Class - Biscuits & Scones.

Lewisburg.

I love biscuits. Probably because they're like butter made crispy and flaky, but I see no reason to hold that against them. It isn't as though I make them every day. (But if I could...)

BISCUITS & SCONES
Baking 101 – Spring 2008

ABOUT BISCUITS

Biscuits are a lot like quickbreads: rich and buttery, flaky and crumbly quickbreads. This is due, for the most part, to a much higher ratio of fat to starch, and to how that fat is distributed throughout the biscuit. Though the process for making them is both quick and simple, it requires careful attention and good technique. Their proper texture depends on the fat being dispersed properly throughout, with leavening provided by baking powder. When made without eggs, the starch structure can be very delicate; the addition of eggs gives a softer, cakier texture, thanks to the egg’s proteins.

Biscuits are made from a very soft, moist dough, generally with as little handling as possible to minimize the gluten. There are occasional exceptions: some use a small amount of kneading to create layers of dough and fat for a flaky texture; beaten biscuits are worked so thoroughly that they develop and then break the gluten, making the texture delicate again. Most, however, are quick, last-minute preparations that don’t store well. When making biscuits, it’s best to make just enough.

BUTTER, LARD, AND SHORTENING

Biscuits don’t have to be made with butter; most fats that are solid at room temperature will do just fine. Butter, lard and shortening are all commonly used. Butter and lard each have their own unique flavor to bring to the biscuits, while shortening is essentially bland. Butter works well all around, with both sweet and savory variations; lard adds a subtle flavor that’s especially good with savory recipes. You can, of course, always mix different fats together to reach the total amount a recipe calls for.

Oils, which are liquid at room temperature, are no substitute in biscuit recipes. In the biscuit-making process, the fats are not fully incorporated into the flour and other dry ingredients. By remaining solid, fats remain intact in chunks, whereas oils will be absorbed into the flour. It’s the method of combining the ingredients, of cutting instead of mixing, that gives biscuits their special texture.

CUTTING VS. MIXING

Most baking methods require mixing of the ingredients, which produces a homogeneous mass. The ingredients in it, sometimes affected by the method of mixing, determine the texture of the final product. In biscuits, however, the mixing method intentionally leaves sizable particles of fat intact throughout the dough. Referred to as “cutting in” the fat, this intersperses fats between layers of dough. When melted by the heat of the oven, it creates small pockets that fill with evaporating liquid and the carbon dioxide of baking powder, giving lift to the biscuit and creating an irregularly flaky structure. When the fat is completely mixed into the flour, there is no opportunity for lift, leaving a dense biscuit.

There are several different methods for cutting in the fat, all of which attempt to break up the fat into smaller pieces, leaving some whole and incorporating some of the rest into the dry ingredients. Pastry blenders, food processors, a pair of knives or even rubbing with the fingertips; all of these can work. The only essential part is that the fat never melt. Chill it ahead of time and work quickly.

The size of the remaining fat particles will determine the final texture of the biscuit, and is usually described by the size of the largest remaining pieces. When they resemble peas, the biscuits will have a flakier, more layered structure; when they resemble breadcrumbs, the texture will be fluffier. Pieces that are too large will leave gaping holes inside that can then cause the biscuits to collapse or tip sideways.

After the fat has been worked into the flour, the liquid is added, and worked in just enough to moisten the dry ingredients. The fat is still susceptible to overworking at this point, so a light hand and cold ingredients will help keep the biscuits from becoming dense. If the kitchen is warm, or the process is taking too long, slide everything into the refrigerator to cool off for a time.

PIE CRUSTS, PUFF PASTRY, CROISSANTS

Pie crust is essentially a variation on biscuits. Made without leavening and a bare minimum of liquid – unlike biscuits, a pie crust should be flaky but not risen and airy – the process is nearly identical. Done properly, a skill that takes a few attempts to get under control, a homemade pie crust is worlds apart from the dull, flavorless, mealy-textured variety from the supermarket freezer section.

Puff pastry, on the other hand, is quite distinct. Though light, buttery, and flaky, it derives its texture and rise from very careful and finicky preparation. To start, a dough is made with flour and ice water, and worked as little as possible to prevent gluten from developing. Rolled out into a square, it is topped with a large amount of softened but still solid butter – about half the dough’s weight – and repeatedly folded over onto itself and rolled out. Frequently returning the dough to the refrigerator and varying the direction of the rolling keeps the butter solid and allows the developing gluten to relax. After six “turns,” each of which folds the dough into thirds, the puff pastry has become a sandwich of extremely thin layers of dough and butter: 729 layers of dough separated by 728 layers of solid butter.

Rolled out to the usual thickness of about one quarter inch, each layer of the puff pastry is around one thousandth of an inch thick, roughly the thickness of an individual starch granule. When baked, the butter melts and its water content evaporates, puffing up the dough into a remarkably airy, delicate texture. The volume can increase by four or more times, depending on the heat of the oven. Shortening, with its much lower water content, can also be used, and produces a crisper, less flavorful puff pastry.

Croissants and Danish pastries are made in much the same way as puff pastry, except that they use a yeast-risen dough. The basic dough is made with flour, yeast and milk, and allowed to rise for one or more hours before deflating and rolling out with butter like puff pastry. The dough is more delicate than that for puff pastry, and so can be more difficult to work with, but is still folded and rolled out to produce hundreds of layers of dough and butter. Danish pastry doughs are often made with even more butter and rolled out only three times, rather than six, producing thicker layers.

BASIC ROLLED BISCUITS
Adapted from The Joy of Cooking
Makes about twenty two-inch biscuits

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
  
• 2-½ teaspoons baking powder
  
• ½ to ¾ teaspoon salt
  
• 6 Tablespoons unsalted butter, cold, cut into pieces
  
• ¾ cup milk, cold

DIRECTIONS

1. If baking, preheat the oven to 450° F. Whisk together the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Drop in the butter and cut into the flour, tossing as you work. When the largest pieces resemble peas, the biscuits will have a flaky, layered texture; when they resemble coarse breadcrumbs, the texture will be fluffier. Stop when you reach the desired coarseness, and do not let the butter melt or form a paste with the flour. Refrigerate if necessary.
   
   
2. Add in the milk and mix with a rubber spatula, wooden spoon or fork just until most of the dry ingredients are moistened. With a lightly floured hand, bring the dough into a ball and knead gently against the sides of the bowl 5 to 10 times, pressing in any loose bits until they adhere.
   
   
3. Turn out onto a lightly floured board and roll or pat out into a square about ½ inch thick. (Roll to ¼ to 3/8 inch thick if cooking on a griddle.) Using a sharp knife or biscuit cutter, cut into the desired shape. Squares produce virtually no scraps. The scraps from cutting rounds may be re-rolled to cut a second batch, but these will not be as tender as the first-cut biscuits.
   
   
4. To bake, place biscuits on a baking sheet. Keep them at least one inch apart for separate biscuits with crusty sides; set them close together for biscuits that will join and remain soft on the sides. Bake until golden brown on the top, about 10 to 12 minutes. For browner tops, brush with milk or melted butter before baking.
   
   
5. To cook on a griddle, preheat the griddle (or a frying pan) over medium-high heat. Cook until brown on the first side, 3 to 4 minutes, then flip and cook until the other side is brown and the middle cooked through.

NOTES

• Always serve biscuits as soon as possible. They do not keep well. If you have any leftover the next day, split them in half with a fork and warm in a toaster oven. Storing them any longer, especially in a sealed container, generally results in mold growth by the second day.
  
  
• Like quickbreads, biscuits take well to additional ingredients. As a general rule, keep any extras to 6 Tablespoons or less. Cheese is an exception: add up to ½ cup of hard Parmesan-style cheeses; add up to ¾ cup of semi-hard Cheddar-style cheeses. When adding cheese, you may wish to reduce the salt and lower the baking temperature to 425° F.
  
  
• For whole-wheat biscuits, replace ½ cup of the flour with whole-wheat flour.
  
  
• For buttermilk biscuits, replace the milk with buttermilk, reduce the baking powder to 2 teaspoons, and add ½ teaspoon of baking soda.

CRANBERRY SCONES
Adapted from The Joy of Cooking
Makes eight scones

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
  
• 1/3 cup sugar, plus more for dusting
  
• 1 Tablespoon baking powder
  
• ½ teaspoon salt
  
• 6 Tablespoons unsalted butter, cold, cut into pieces
  
• ½ cup dried, sweetened cranberries (or raisins)
  
• 1 large egg
  
• ½ cup plus 1 Tablespoon heavy cream, plus more for brushing tops
  
• 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 425° F. Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl. Drop in the butter and cut into the flour, tossing as you work, until the largest pieces resemble peas. Do not let the butter melt or form a paste with the flour. Refrigerate if necessary.
   
   
2. Stir in the cranberries. Whisk the egg, cream and zest together in a small bowl, and add to the dry ingredients all at once. Mix with a rubber spatula, wooden spoon or fork just until most of the dry ingredients are moistened. With a lightly floured hand, bring the dough into a ball and knead gently against the sides of the bowl 5 to 10 times, pressing in any loose bits until they adhere.
   
   
3. Turn out onto a lightly floured board and pat out into an 8-inch round of even thickness. Using a sharp knife, cut into eight wedges. Place on a baking sheet, at least ½ inch apart, and brush the tops with a light layer of cream. If desired, sprinkle with a little additional sugar.
   
   
4. Bake until the tops are golden brown, 12 to 15 minutes. Cool on a rack or serve warm.

NOTES

• For flakier scones, omit the egg and increase the cream by ¼ cup. Proceed with the recipe as above.
  
  
• For a simplified version, omit the butter and egg, and increase the cream to 1-¼ cups. Proceed with the recipe above.

Baking Class - Quickbreads.

Lewisburg.

The quickbreads class was as popular as one might expect. Students made their own recipes from start to finish - without all that waiting around for yeast - and went home with plates of buttermilk cornbread and applesauce muffins. Plus, there's this little spark in their eyes whenever they get something loaded with sugar... it'll be interesting to see the reaction to a real sponge cake in the final class.

Of course, there were a few little mix-ups, now that the students were doing all the work. Recipe-reading skills could use some honing, for example. But that came with some good questions, too - including ones about what I'll be teaching next semester. Overall, a good sign.

QUICKBREADS
Baking 101 – Spring 2008

ABOUT QUICKBREADS

Unlike yeasted breads, quickbreads don’t rely on yeast to produce leavening power or gluten to harness it. And rather than being made from doughs, which have enough character to be picked up and shaped, quickbreads are made from batters. Quickbread batters are typically thicker than those used for pancakes; they’re easier to spoon than to pour. And, since they’re stiffer and hold their shape better, they can be made into various shapes, usually loaves or muffins.

Quickbreads get their rising power from chemical leavening agents, and don’t need to wait on the activity of a colony of yeast before baking. Their moist, dense, somewhat coarse texture is due to, in most recipes, moderate amounts of sugar, fat and egg. Since the process for making quickbreads isn’t much more complicated than stirring together the various ingredients, these types of recipes are easy to modify, generally forgiving of mistakes, and can be made in larger or smaller batches simply by scaling ingredient amounts.

Just about any quickbread loaf recipe can be baked as muffins, and vice versa. Though times may vary depending on oven temperature and the actual quantity of batter used, loaf quickbreads usually take 50 minutes to an hour in a 350° F oven. Muffins, in a 400° F oven, take about 15 to 18 minutes for standard-sized, 10 to 12 minutes for miniature, and 22 to 25 minutes for jumbo. Lower oven temperatures are more forgiving for overcooking, but will not crisp up the edges as much.

CHEMICAL LEAVENING

In lieu of yeast, various chemical compounds provide the lift for quickbreads. There are two general types: baking soda and baking powder. Some recipes may call for one or the other; many call for a certain amount of both. They aren’t interchangeable, so be careful.

Baking soda is also known as sodium bicarbonate, and works by reacting with acids in the batter to produce carbon dioxide. Add some vinegar to a spoonful of baking soda in a glass and watch it foam. It reacts immediately, which means that recipes that call for it alone must be baked as soon as they are mixed. As the batter sits, the leavening bubbles will escape, leaving you with a particularly rock-solid muffin. Common acids used to get this reaction include buttermilk, yogurt, molasses, fruit juices, and vinegar. If a recipe calls for buttermilk and you have none, you can make clabbered milk by mixing about two teaspoons of vinegar with a cup of milk and resting it for a few minutes. The taste isn’t the same, but the effect in the recipe will be.

Baking powder is a mixture of sodium bicarbonate and one or more dried, crystalline acids, with some dry starch to prevent the two from prematurely reacting. When dissolved in liquid, the acid-base reaction takes place, producing the carbon dioxide gas needed for leavening. Most available baking powders are referred to as “double-acting,” meaning that not all of the acids present will react as soon as a batter is mixed. Some of the reactions won’t occur until the heat of baking initiates them, thus giving a second rise while in the oven. Recipes that call for both baking soda and baking powder often rely on the baking soda as a means to neutralize the acidity of other ingredients in the batter. The baking powder, in these cases, is intended to provide much of the lift.

Due to humidity in the air, the ingredients in baking powder will slowly react and lose their leavening power over time; it’s best to replace your supply once a year, regardless of how much is left in the container. You have a choice when purchasing baking powder, between those containing aluminum – in the form of sodium aluminum sulfate – and those without. There are concerns that even small amounts of aluminum intake can have negative health effects, though the science so far is inconclusive. “Aluminum-free” baking powders also seem to be free of the “metallic” and bitter taste baking powder can sometimes lend to baked goods. The choice is up to you.

Occasionally, you may find a recipe that calls for “self-rising” flour, particularly in British cookbooks. This type of flour contains approximately 1-½ teaspoons of baking powder per cup. Avoid using it. You can simply adjust the recipe to work with all-purpose flour and baking powder, and thus avoid having a too-specific ingredient taking up shelf space.

GLUTEN-FREE TEXTURE

The distinctive texture of quickbreads and muffins – dense and moist, with a coarse crumb that breaks apart into irregular chunks – is due to the ingredients and mixing method. Or, rather, the near lack of mixing. As in breads, starch is still a key structural player, sometimes buttressed by egg proteins, but in this case it isn’t the formation of gluten that’s desired. In quickbreads, the ingredients are brought together quickly, often with the dry ingredients mixed together in one bowl, and the wet ingredients in another. (Sugar, since it dissolves so easily into liquids, is often considered a “wet” ingredient.) Recipes stress avoiding “overmixing,” which can be difficult to judge without experience. Generally, lumps in the batter will bake out, as long as there are no large clumps of flour remaining unmixed.

Overmixing is a problem because it begins to develop gluten. Although the various fats, proteins and sugars in the other ingredients do a fair job of minimizing that, it can still happen. The texture then changes to something less tender, with a finer crumb – except where there are large pockets of air space. Where gluten starts to develop, it traps the leavening gases inside, producing large tunnel-like cavities. If you see those as you slice through a muffin, make a note to stop mixing a little sooner the next time.

The goal is to thoroughly mix the dry ingredients and the wet ingredients while in separate containers, so that very little mixing is required when the two are combined. Another reason to be thorough in the pre-mixing is to ensure there are no clumps of leavening agents left in the dough. These will taste decidedly bitter if anyone bites into one, and have a tendency to produce funny colors in the presence of certain ingredients: blueberries, carrots and sunflower seeds turn green; walnuts turn blue. This can also happen if there’s too much baking soda in the batter, regardless of how well it’s mixed in.

THE ROLE OF FATS AND OILS

Fats function as tenderizers in baked goods, and also help to maintain a moist texture; although they don’t hold on to water in the finished product, the fats themselves give that sensation. Fats aren’t as effective in slowing staling as they are in other baked goods, however. Because they’re minimally mixed, the fat remains unevenly distributed, and doesn’t protect much of the starch from losing its moisture.

Temperature can also be a concern. As with most baked goods, quickbreads are usually best kept at room temperature, not in the refrigerator. This is a particular issue with those that use butter; because it solidifies at a higher temperature than vegetable oils, refrigerated butter-based goods can develop a distinctly unpleasant texture. Long-term storage in the freezer is a different case, however. Wrapped so that they’re airtight, quickbreads can be frozen, then reheated in a 350° F oven until hot, without any unpleasant changes.

It is possible to make quickbreads with less fat, yet keep that same sense of moistness. Low-fat quickbreads will not keep as long as the regular sorts, and so should be eaten within a day or so. Some recipes simply reduce the butter or oil and replace it with some extra milk or orange juice; these are more prone to overmixing than usual, and will stale quickly. Others, such as the muffin recipe below, use applesauce to provide moisture in place of some dairy and fat. They are a little more forgiving, and tend to resist staling almost as well as other muffin recipes.

BUTTERMILK CORNBREAD
Makes one 9-inch round loaf

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup cornmeal
  
• 1 cup flour
  
• ½ Tablespoon baking powder
  
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
  
• ½ teaspoon salt
  
• 1-¼ cups buttermilk
  
• 2 eggs
  
• 4 Tablespoons butter (½ stick)

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 425° F, with a 9-inch cast iron skillet in the oven. In a large bowl, whisk together the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
   
   
2. Melt the butter in a small saucepan. Beat the eggs into the buttermilk into well combined, and mix in the melted butter. Stir into the dry ingredients until just combined, being sure to break up any clumps of flour. Avoid overmixing; a few lumps aren’t a problem.
   
   
3. Pour the batter into the hot skillet, and return to the oven. Bake for twenty minutes, or until the top has turned golden brown. Allow to cool for a moment in the pan, then transfer to a cooling rack.

NOTES

• Any oven-safe pan will work in lieu of cast iron, including muffin tins, though the bottom crust may not form quite as nicely. Adjust the cooking time as needed for different shapes.
  
  
• Like most quickbreads, cornbread takes well to additional ingredients. Include up to ½ cup of grated cheese, fresh corn kernels, diced onion and chilli peppers, or anything else that seems good.

APPLESAUCE MUFFINS
Adapted from 7th grade home economics class, Lionville Junior High
Makes about one dozen

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup sugar
  
• ½ cup butter (1 stick), softened
  
• 1-½ cups all-purpose flour
  
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
  
• ¼ teaspoon baking soda
  
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
  
• ½ teaspoon salt
  
• 2 eggs
  
• 1 cup smooth applesauce
  
• ½ cup cinnamon chips (optional)

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Grease a 12-cup muffin tin or line with paper cups. In a bowl, mix together the dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger and salt.
   
   
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light-colored. Mix in the eggs, one at a time, followed by the applesauce. Add in the dry ingredients in three parts, stirring to combine each completely before adding the next. If using, gently fold in the cinnamon chips.
   
   
3. Spoon the batter into the muffin cups; each should be about 2/3 full. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove to a rack to cool.

NOTES

• As these muffins are relatively low-fat, they will go stale more quickly than standard muffins. Eat them as close to freshly baked as possible.