. No bread is an island: July 2011

Saturday, 23 July 2011

Home made vegan chocolate spread

I've been meaning to have a go at this for ages. So often I make a bread with chocolate spread - and I can't eat it because it isn't vegan.

I googled several recipes and got an idea of what I could use. Most were about making a nutella-type spread, using a food processor - which I don't have, but it gave me the basis. In the end, by adding a bit of this and a bit of that, I ended up with these ingredients:

100g soya cream
50g olive oil
55g cocoa powder
55g icing sugar

I blitzed the cream and oil together and added most of the dry ingredients - then I stirred in a dessertspoon of each until I finished up with a thick spread. I've got this in a jar and we'll see how much of this I use in the morning.

I used just over half in making a chocolate and cherry swirl loaf [recipe and pics to come].

I took the jar into work the next day and invited three friends to taste the spread. Two of them said that while it was very nice, there was an underlying 'off-flavour' they detected, which I put down to the olive oil. However, when the other friend - a chef - tasted it, she only said it was too chocolaty for her.

Both these problems are easily solved - firstly by using a bland vegetable oil, such as sunflower oil instead of the olive oil, and secondly by adjusting the amount of cocoa powder.

It's now firmly established in my repertoire - and I shall play with the ingredients no doubt every time I make it.

One thing I will try next time is to add some ground almonds I found lurking in the cupboard - then it will be my own version of nutella!

Friday, 22 July 2011

Ciabatta

Ingredients:

300g strong white flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

250ml lukewarm water with 1 rounded teaspoon fresh yeast

2-4 tablespoons olive oil

Plus, if desired:

1 dessertspoon each, sun-dried tomato paste and pesto; 25-50g sun-dried tomatoes (in olive oil) chopped; and 25-50g olives, halved. Use all, or any, or none of these. If using, add them with the olive oil and liquid.

Method:

1. Place the flour and salt into a large mixing bowl. When the yeast liquid is ready, add to the mix and pour the olive oil into the liquid. This dough is mixed and beaten entirely in the mixing bowl and should be halfway between a dough and a batter. Have some extra water to hand to add if necessary, to achieve this. Mix by holding the bowl with one hand and stirring the ingredients together with the fingers of the other. Beat the dough for two or three minutes –as vigorously as you can!

2. Cover with a dry tea towel and check after about ten minutes. It should not have spread out too much in the bowl – if it has, beat in another 25g of flour. Leave the dough, covered, for about another hour. If you intend leaving it longer than that - and you can leave it all day if you wish - place the bowl inside an oiled plastic bag.

3. When you are ready to proceed, don't knock the dough back, but scrape it carefully out onto a baking sheet lined with baking parchment. Don't worry about the final shape; it should be fairly rough looking. However, you can smooth it out a little with wet fingers, if you wish.

4. Leave it to recover – it should have risen appreciably from when you first began proving. Bake at 220C, 425F or gas mark 7 for between 20-25 minutes.

5. Look for some colour underneath to see that it is done.

The wetter this is, the more it spreads out on the baking sheet, and the less wet it is, the more it will stand up. You may need to try this several times to get the right consistency – but anyway this turns out, it’s a tasty loaf!

Ciabatta is a technique as much as anything. I think it’s one of the easiest breads to make. Try a ciabatta fruit loaf with chopped dried apricots, chopped walnuts and a little nutmeg.

Tuesday, 19 July 2011

Williton June-July 2011 - Student pics

When I conduct a breadmaking course I often give the students some homework, which is to go home and teach someone what they've just learned.

Here's Annette's proof:

Annette's 7-year-old daughter plus a pizza and some pain au chocolat they'd made together!

Pane Casereccio and Apfel Kuchen - Annette reports that half the apple cake went in one sitting between her and her husband

Annette again, this in preparation for a coffee morning.

Sunday, 10 July 2011

Bethesda baking

Here are some pics I took at the Bethesda Bakin'5 event (5 because this is the 5th time these get-togethers have been held), which took place in Bethesda, North Wales between 1st and 4th of July this year. I was only able to attend on the two middle days, but it was worth every second.

20 or so keen, enthusiastic bakers gathered together over the four days and just made bread - swapping recipes and sharing knowledge along the way. We had a variety of ovens to play with - 3 commercial, one wood-fired oven on a trailer, and my small chiminea.

It was very pleasing to meet my old friend (from the BBC Food board and the WFO forum) Terry - also known as Cannyfraddock (great name, that!) who introduced me to everyone.

To make the event possible there had to be some terrific organisational feats - we had two large ovens, 3 long stainless steel tables, huge racks, over 20 mixing bowls, scales, jugs. There was a myriad of containers of different sourdoughs - I never got to check all these out - great sacks of different flours: Doves wholemeal and white; spelt; rye; millet; and more. There was a huge rack full of all the different additives you might want to include in a loaf: dried fruit of all description; seeds - poppy - sesame - pumpkin - sunflower - flax, etc; olives; olive oil; sunflower oil - and much more I've forgotten.

We had several cooks pitching in over the weekend (mainly wives, you won't be surprised to hear) and the food was of high quality. Knowing I was vegan, the cooks made every attempt to make sure that anything that could be made vegan was done so. I remember a fine minestrone soup (more like a stew!) which I had with some wonderful bread for lunch one day.

All in all it was a wonderful occasion and one I can't wait to repeat!

Thanks must go to Mick Hartley of the Bethesda Bakers who was the prime mover behind all this. I'd like to thank everyone who helped Mick, but I'm not going into names in case I leave anyone out.