Let's Bake Bread!

It's been decidedly wintry in northern Arizona in the days after Christmas; we awoke to 19 degrees this morning.  We have had the woodstove going pretty much non-stop lately.  (The copper scuttle was a $5 swap meet find!  I LOVE the swap meet!)

It was perfect weather for baking bread.  I enjoy baking bread, not just because it's such a thrifty thing to do, but because I love the elemental nature of creating something so sustaining to life.  No one says, "Give us this day our daily rutabagas" or "Give us this day our daily potato chips."  Of course not - it's bread, and always has been.  Whenever I bake, I feel a strong connection to all the millions of women before me through the centuries who did the same to feed their families.  

And baking your own bread is indeed a money saver.  A loaf of whole-grain bread will cost you nearly $4.00 in a supermarket, and much more at a farmer's market or artisanal bakery.  How much did it cost me?  Around a dollar a loaf - and that's because I used honey for sweetener.  Had I used sugar, the cost would have been around 85 cents!  It's a win-win all the way around:  better taste, better for you, and much cheaper. 

This recipe makes four loaves, or two loaves and two dozen rolls.  These are not dinner rolls, but a flatter version we use them for sandwiches and burgers.

With the kids out of the house, we will go through about a loaf and a half dozen rolls a week.  This way, I only need to bake about twice a month.

Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread or Rolls
5 c. lukewarm water
1 c. vegetable oil
1 c. honey, molasses, or sugar
7 c. whole wheat flour
7 c. white flour
3 T. + 2 tsp. dry yeast
1 c. powdered milk
1 T. + 2 tsp. salt

I buy my yeast in bulk at Costco and keep it in the freezer.  Take a look at the expiration date on this package:

 

June of 2010!  Oops.  Well, it worked marvelously, with no loss of potency. 

 

Empty your water into an oversized mixing bowl.  Sprinkle the yeast on top and let it dissolve for about five minutes or so.  Add all the other ingredients and stir well.  Add the whole wheat flour and mix.  It should look like this:

 



You have just made a sponge.  Doing so allows your bread an additional rising (three versus two), and makes for an exceptionally light loaf, always an important consideration when you're baking with whole wheat. 

Cover the sponge with plastic wrap and let it sit undisturbed for about an hour.  It should rise dramatically!  Actually, I let this rise a bit too long; it shouldn't touch the plastic.

Add five cups of white flour, mixing in as much as you can with a spoon before switching to your hands.  Knead to a rough mass in the bowl . . .

. . . . then sprinkle your counter with some of the remaining white flour, kneading in the remaining two cups.  Use more flour if you need it.  It should take about 10 minutes for the dough to become smooth and satiny (kind of like a baby's bottom).  It should no longer be sticky.

Wash out and dry your mixing bowl.  Spray it with cooking spray or lightly grease it with vegetable oil.  Place the dough in the bowl; cover with plastic wrap or a damp dish towel and let it rise another hour.  It should look like this:

 

Uncover and punch it down.  Tip the dough out onto the counter and knead it a couple of turns to remove any bubbles.  Cut the dough into four sections.  Each section will be either a loaf or a dozen rolls.  For loaves, stretch the dough into a rectangular shape.  You can use a rolling pin, but the dough is so tender that you should be able to use your hands to shape it right on the counter.

 





Fold in the sides and roll it up.  Pinch in the ends and the seam.

Put the loaf seam side down in a greased bread pan.  (I use Crisco.)  Make a fist and use your knuckles to flatten the loaf and make if fit evenly and smoothly in the pan.  I usually make a depression down the middle.  It seems to help the loaf make a pretty, rounded shape when it bakes.

Cover with the sheet of plastic wrap or towel that you used for the second rising and move the pans out of the way so that you can shape the rolls.  Adjust your oven racks so that they are both in the middle.  Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Using your hands to shape, make a long, narrow rectangle of dough. 

Fold the sides in, roll up and pinch the seam like you did for the loaves.  Except this time you want a long snake of dough.  Roll it around a bit with the flats of your palms to get an even shape and smooth out the seam.

Use a serrated knife to cut disks of dough about two inches wide.

Flatten and widen the disks with your fingers to about 4-5 inches.  Lay them on a greased baking sheet.

If you're doing more rolls, shape them quickly.  The loaves rises fast!  Put the rolls in your hot oven as soon as you're done shaping them.  Bake for about 20-25 minutes.  They're done when they're golden on the bottom and just starting to brown on the top.  I try to switch the pans around half-way through for even browning, but if you forget, it's no big deal.

Finished rolls:



 

Adjust your oven racks so that the loaves have room to expand in the oven (put them on the same oven rack).  They should have risen just above the tops of the pans:

Pop them in.  They should bake about 50 minutes.  The tops should be a lovely nutty brown and the bottoms should be golden.

Yum!  Homemade bread is truly one of life's greatest gustatory pleasures.

A Christmas Blessing

Yes, I know, no posts for over a month.  But I have a good excuse.  We found our homestead property!

In the year or so since we've been actively searching we must have viewed dozens of prospects.  We looked at land without a well, land with a well, manufactured homes, trailers, old houses, new houses, cargo containers and sheds.  But much like meeting your future spouse, none of them were "the one."  They either lacked something non-negotiable like acreage or included a feature we simply couldn't live with, like high-voltage power lines.

Until this property.  From the moment we pulled in the long driveway it felt like...well, home.  It had everything we were looking for and then some.  I could see my furniture in the house, our animals in the pastures.  This was it!  The only drawback that gave us pause was its location, set back off a minor highway.  But since the area itself is remote, sparsely populated and not a destination we decided it was not a significant issue.

What else?  Nearly five acres, a combination of grass pasture and a strip of pinon pine forest that borders Forest Service land at the back.  Our well is excellent; when it was drilled, water was encountered at 10 feet. (In Arizona, this is exceedingly rare.)   There is a creek across the highway, dotted with springs that flow year round.  The soil is rich.  There are outbuildings:  a greenhouse, a chicken coop, a workshop and a barn.  It has fencing, and the remains of an apple orchard.  Since the power goes out occasionally, the house is hardwired to a propane generator.

It's a gem of a property.  And the reason it was still available in a market where the triple-digit desert dwellers of Phoenix (nearly four hours away) snap up such pretty ranchettes in the pines is because it needs work.

Lots of work.  New fences.  Paint - gallons and gallons of paint.  New wiring, new carpets, new countertops, and a complete bathroom remodel.  New screens.  (Paint - did I mention paint?  And fence - acres of fence.)  There are mice in the house and rats in the barn.  The reason the orchard has disappeared is due to marauding elk.  Horses boarded over the summer have torn up the pasture.

But....it has a cold room, a room built of huge timber rounds and concrete, shelved with thick slabs of rock-hard Douglas fir from the original homestead that held the canned bounty from the garden and the orchard, sacks of potatoes and onions.  It has a long front porch that spans the house, and a back porch too.  There's a huge fireplace lined with native stone.  The place is as hushed and quiet as a cathedral.

We absolutely and completely love it.

When we were expecting our first child we were wildly thrilled...and then equally terrified.  What were doing?  How could we manage this huge responsibility?  But perhaps most importantly, how could we afford this?  So it went with this property purchase.  After all, we already own a home.  What were we thinking?

We're past that now - scaring ourselves with the import of this huge decision.  We're on a strict budget to enable us to pay two mortgages:  no more eating out, going to movies or anything, really, at all now - it all goes to the farm.  And somehow, I'll find a new teaching job; there are schools within driving distance.  Gary will transfer.  We'll make it work.

The birth of our daughter, and later, our son were the greatest blessings God ever saw fit to give us.  So too is the serendipitous acquisition of this property, which will help see us through the hard times that lie ahead.

 

It's Pumpkin Time!

Well, obviously I didn't get to that bread recipe.  Smoky (the hubby - he works for the Forest Service) had some meniscus tears repaired in his knee and is on the couch with his leg elevated for a few weeks.  So I have taken over his chores in addition to my own. And while he may have time off from work, I don't.  At any rate, I've been a busy gal.

We love going to our local swap meet or flea market.  In the summer I can pick up locally grown produce we don't grow in our own garden.  In September, I bought some sugar pumpkins.

They've sat cheerfully on the counter for two months.  Pumpkins and hard squashes like butternut will keep beautifully through the winter months.  Usually I store them in the garage where it's cooler, but I knew I would be processing the sugar pumpkins for Thanksgiving pies.

 

The stems snap off easily.  Splitting them in half is pretty simple too.

 

 

I LOVE roasted pumpkin seeds!  They are high in zinc and very tasty.  Just scoop them out with your hands.

 

 

 

Give them a good rinse . . .

 

 



 

 

. . . add a small handful of salt . . .

 

 

 

. . . and let them set overnight. Then drain them, rinse, and stir in a few teaspoons of vegetable oil.  Roast at 300 degrees till they just turn golden, about 50-60 minutes. Yum!

 

Back to the pumpkins.  Put them cut side down on a lightly greased baking sheet, add two cups of water, and cover with aluminum foil.  Bake about an hour.  They should feel soft and give when you poke them.

 

 



 

Let them cool.  Scrape out any remaining membrane with a spoon and put it in the chicken bucket.  Scoop out the flesh.

 

 

Use a mixer to beat the scooped-out pumpkin smooth.  Some strings and odd hard pieces will remain, so I like to press it through a colander.

 

 

 

Just a little over 2 cups of delicious sugar pumpkin.  It's more work than opening a can, but oh so worth it! 

 

 





 

 

I have a half day on Wednesday, so I will bake pie that afternoon.  Happy Thanksgiving all!

 





Nippy November Nights

Forgive the alliteration of the post title.  I'm an English teacher.  It happens.

We had our first storm of the season pass through here in northern Arizona.  We're in the mountains - about 5300 feet - so we do get snow.  We only got a dusting, but boy, the temperature sure did drop.  Forty degrees for a daytime temp is chilly for us.  Factor in the wind, and it was a good day to stay inside and make....soup!

I had picked the last of the garden green beans ahead of the storm's hard frost on Friday.  We harvested potatoes last week, and the garden still had chard and some herbs.  All things were pointing toward a big pot of minestrone. 

This recipe uses link Italian chicken sausage, but pork would work too; so would breakfast sausage, though I would drain it well on paper towels.  The prep is easy (though all the dicing takes a bit of time), and it makes plenty to feed a crowd or to have for leftovers.  (We are big on leftovers in this house.  I work a four-day week, which means 10-hour days of middle schoolers plus a 45-minute commute.)  Any small pasta (orzo, broken angel hair, etc.) could substitute for the Ramen.  I needed to rotate the food storage ...so in the Ramen went.

Harvest Minestrone
3 links sweet Italian chicken sausage, around 1 lb
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 quart chicken stock (I usually use homemade, but I was out!)
1 quart water
1 pint tomatoes - I used my own - or a 14.5 ounce can of diced or crush between your hands
3 medium potatoes, diced
2 c. fresh green beans, strings removed, cut into 1-inch pieces
2 stalks celery, diced
1 large carrot diced
small bunch Italian parsley (I made mine into a bouquet garni, but you could also chop it)
1/4 tsp black pepper
1 large bay leaf, broken in half
1 small bunch Swiss chard, ribs removed
1 can cannellini or white beans, drained
2 packages Ramen noodles

If using link sausage, remove the sausage from the casings.  Heat a large kettle; swirl in a little extra virgin olive oil around the bottom.  Add the sausage, breaking it up as it browns.  Add the garlic near the end.

 

When the sausage has lost most of its pink color, add the chicken stock.  Stir well to get all the lovely brown caramelized bits off the bottom of the pot.  Add the water and the tomatoes.

 



(On the left is the last of my homemade chicken stock.  See the sugar pumpkins in the background?  They are destined for Thanksgiving pie and another post!  But back to minestrone...)

Add the remaining ingredients except for the chard, beans and noodles.  Let the soup simmer and fill your home with the tantalizing scent of cozy soup goodness for about 90 minutes.  In the meantime, cut the chard into ribbons.  I do this by stacking the leaves, rolling them like a cigar, and thinly slicing the roll.  (Sorry; more photos and better sequencing next time...still getting the hang of blogging!)

 

Add the chard, drained beans, and the Ramen.  Simmer another 15 minutes.  If you used a bouquet garni of parsley, remove it.  Salt to taste. 

 

Lavish steaming bowls of your minestrone generously with grated Parmesan cheese.  Serve with crusty bread and a nice bottle of Chianti.

 

 

I'm embarrassed to admit that the photo shows leftover soup ready to store in the frig.  We were starving, and I forgot to take the pic. ( Like I said, I'm working on it.)  At any rate, this recipe makes a very thick soup - more like a stew.  Watch it as it cooks down, and add more water or broth.

 

I actually made some delicious whole wheat bread to go with this soup, but the fire has died down and it's my bedtime.  4:00 a.m. comes all too soon.  I'll try to post the bread recipe tomorrow.