Alpha Bakers: Babka

I love bread making. I don't know why and can't really explain it. There is just something calming about it. Perhaps it's working with the dough part? Though now with stand mixer there's not much of active hand working on the dough vs. watching the machine working the dough. Lazy 21st century? :). In any case, I was excited to make this bread and was also excited to eat it and share it with some friends. I made 1/2 a recipe, using 6 cup bundt pan and I think I overbaked it by 5 minutes or something like that because it came out a bit more dry than I expect. It's still good though and none of my friends said anything to the contrary. Al in all, a win!

Alpha Bakers: Cranberry Christmas Bread

This bread rocks.

That is how hubby and I feel when we took our first bites. We couldn't even wait for the 2 hour cooling period as instructed by the recipe. We waited an hour, then he got hungry and I grew impatient. Together, we ate 1/3 of the bread.

With bread, I make full recipes. If it's vegan, which this is, I know it will be eaten in no time. I made a few modifications though. I omitted the oil and I used less cranberries. Hubby prefers raisins than cranberries - he finds cranberries sour so I used 80 grams. I was planning on using sugar since I don't want to buy barley malt syrup only to use a bit of it and then accidentally forgot to add sugar. Oh well, can't really tell from the way it turned out whether sugar would have made a difference.

This bread is easy to put together. I was a bit apprehensive about it because usually breads that has nuts, ground nuts, and some berries filling turned out too dense to my liking. But I was surprised to see how fluffy and big it is. And I love the use of hot water to plump up the cranberries and using the cranberry-soaked water (even though the water looked disturbing in its pink form).

Alpha Bakers: Sugar Rose Brioche

As I am trying to fit baking back into my weekend life, it occurred to me that I might be out of practice. Rose's recipes, as much as I love them and I love the author herself (she is a sweetheart), does require multiple steps. Knowing that Sugar Rose Brioche, from the name itself, is brioche, which does require extra steps and probably a course of 2 days, I read the recipe ahead of time to make sure that I would not miss anything.

I was so busy concentrating on the steps and the days (i.e. I have to start on Saturday for Sunday baking) that I completely and totally missed one of the first sentences on page 476 that clearly stated to double the recipe.

Rats!

So again folks, I made 1/2 recipe, albeit unintentionally this time. It seems that 1/2 recipe is maybe my fate? I am okay with that :).

It was Sunday morning when I realized I had made 1/2 recipe, right before I start the Sugar Rose Brioche instructions on page 476. Oh well, damage is done. I went back to the storage room where I kept all my cake pans and took the 8 1/2 inch round spring form that I have.

It was quite fortunate that I have a smaller spring form pan, otherwise there might be more cussing in this blog post.

Bread Bible: Pita Bread

My hubby is vegan. He has been vegan for several years now and he's doing a version where he's not eating any added oil. So no olive oil. When I baked things from The Baking Bible, he has allowed himself to taste a bit. A taste. That is one bit of 1/2 recipe or 1/4 recipe that I have been making. So since we are making pita bread this week and I want him to eat more than one small bite, I omitted the olive oil in the recipe and added more water instead.

I have to confess I am not motivated at all in this baking club. Even though this recipe is easy to put together. And I have made this before too! Back in 2011! (blogged here).

The dough came together really quick. But 2 days later I feel too tired to proceed to the next time. It's not helping that work has been busy. Crazy work getting in the way.

Alpha Bakers: Caramel Buns, round 2

This is a redo of the caramel buns. I made another 1/2 recipe of the brioche and the caramel. The purpose is to try to redo the caramel. This time I paid attention and not suffering from ADD or KDD (knitting deficit disorder) or distracted with other things while the caramel is cooking. I had the heavy cream in the microwave ready to go. Even punched in 20 seconds on the microwave keypad thingy for the the cream, all I gotta do is press start. I have the butter soft, kitchen thermometer, pyrex cup sprayed with cooking spray, all next to me. Once the sugar mixture started turning a bit brown I stood watch, then heat up the cream, measure the temperature on the sugar mixture, it's 340'F - I took it off the heat (not just turn off the heat but actually moved the pot to the side - thought I'd clarify, having read earlier Michelle hilarious rendition of conversation with her husband). I poured the heavy cream onto the pot, it is bubbling super furiously (sorry no photo, tried to concentrate to much), put it back on the heat and mix until all is blended. Then poured into the pyrex cup and it's still liquid, no toffee in sight. The butter must be too soft because as soon as I add it to the caramel, it melts quick and won't blend (arrghh!) I then nuked the whole thing, probably too long because it then bubbled. When I add the vanilla it went nuts (first time seeing vanilla boiling....). And then onto cooling, well they still look liquid. I was still dancing hurrah, and then 15 seconds after adding them to onto all the buns, they are TOFFEE!!!!!!!!! what the hell?!?

I think next time (yes there's next time) I should just make the toffee caramel. At least I'm getting practice for Christmas cookie baking!

I am going to serve this with warning, please nuke it and eat at own risk. I am not gonna be held responsible for any damage to dentures.

Alpha Bakers is a group of bakers who are baking through The Baking Bible, Rose Levy Beranbaum's latest cookbook. Come check out the rest of the group at Rose's Alpha Bakers.

Click here for a full listing of all the recipes we are baking.

Alpha Bakers: Caramel Buns

These are fantastic. They are better than anything I have ever had or have ever made. They are not too sweet, even with the caramel on top. The fillings taste wonderful - the rum-soaked raisins really adds to the taste.

I keep thinking we are making cinnamon rolls or cinnamon buns because of the photo on page 473. I've made cinnamon rolls several times and that photo reminds me of it (sans the mason jar in the middle). But no, we're making caramel buns, which is basically sticky buns, or a fancy cinnamon rolls is how I think of it. We first make a brioche a day ahead. Anything that uses brioche is fancy, especially Rose's brioche. It's airy and soft and has a very nice taste. I've made the version in Bread Bible several times in a loaf pan.

I never like sticky buns. They are also super sweet and hurts my teeth. But I love these so much. So now I can say: I only like RLB's sticky buns.

Bread Bible: Rosemary Foccacia

Oh dear, what have I gotten myself into...

In addition to baking through The Baking Bible, the Alpha Bakers decided to bake through The Bread Bible as well, with a once a month frequency. It took me about 5 minutes to decide to join. In that 5 minutes a lot of thoughts went through my head. Pros: I really want to improve my bread baking skills. I want to bake through The Bread Bible after Rose's Heavenly Cakes but lack motivation. This is my chance. Cons: I have already a lot of things going on. Can I really take on one more? My knitting is a tad neglected nowadays- which makes me sad sometimes. Now adding baking through the Bread Bible into the equation. Pros: I really want to do this and can't say no (this is not a legitimate reason, but it is according to that baking-loving-evil-voice in my head). Cons: Who's gonna eat it?

I am here now, which means the baking-loving-evil-voice won. As to who's gonna eat it, we'll eat some and give away some.

Glori said we are going to follow Marie's adventure and her schedule as a template. Reading through Marie's experience on making Rosemary Foccacia has me worried. Marie's first attempt at this bread didn't turn out. But then I take comfort in the fact that Marie is a super awesome baker now and has nailed recipes from various other books including Tartine Bread. Tartine Bread! I borrowed it once from the library, leafed through it and returned it promptly. It was too intimidating to even attempt.

I am not a big fan of foccacia. It always seem super oily in restaurants that I always feel like I'm eating oil. I have nothing against oil, especially olive oil, except I always thought if I'm gonna eat oil I might as well skip the bread. Why add carbs to it when I have to burn walk it off later. So my plan is to make 1/2 recipe and then take it to my local yarn store to share.

Alpha Bakers: Swedish Apricot Walnut Bread

Aye, we are making full recipe this week, matey!

We are making this bread to celebrate Tu B'Shevat. As our fearless leader, Marie Wolf said, "we are nothing if not ecumenical in this group, and so it is not surprising that we mark Jewish Arbor Day." It's a day that is today's time is used to mark ecological awareness, trees are planted in celebration, and marked by eating things that grows on trees.

We got 6 inches of snow last night, so no tree planting this weekend. But we are going to eat this bread.

I love baking bread. It is right up there on my list of favorite things to make alongside cakes and pastries. Bread making is magical. You combine flour, salt, yeast, and water together. Mix it, knead it. Gluten formed. Place in a warm place and somehow it rise and double in size. And then you bake it and after it comes out of the oven it sings!!!

I bake Jim Lahey's No Knead Bread once a month for my husband. It's the same recipe every time and I have been making it for 3-4 years now. My version is slightly tweaked from the original recipe of 400 grams of bread flour. I use 320 grams of bread flour and 80 grams of whole wheat flour. I have all the steps down to a T and never gets bored making it. And every time it came out of the oven it made me so happy. The shape is always different, the cracks in different place. But I can always expect it to fill my kitchen with a wonderful smell and it sings every time.

This bread is pretty easy to make. It does require making biga 3 days before making the dough. But it doesn't take long to do. I made a couple of mistakes on this bread. I added the apricots to the dough with raisins and walnuts. And I rolled the dough the wrong side on the shaping part so my bread was higher and shorter.

I didn't do any altitude adjustment for this bread. Everything is feeling/behaving as described by the recipe. The dough was sticky/tacky. There's no leavening used for bread and I made no adjustment to the yeast or water.

Alpha Bakers: Golden Orange Panettone with Chocolate Sauce

I love panettone. Before I knew how to bake, a long time ago when my oven was used for pots and pans storage, I used to get panettone at Whole Foods. They always have a huge tower of it around the holidays. I thought it was the best thing. It hails from Italy so it must be the best, si? (little that I know that years later I would learn that it is the best when it hails from Rose Levy Beranbaum). Back in 2011 Hanaa and I wanted to do a virtual bake a long and we made a recipe from allrecipes.com (Hanaa, do you remember? :). For comparison, I also made Rose's Panettone recipe from the Bread Bible. The allrecipes version was not good but Rose's was awesome.

The panettone recipe in the Baking Bible is different than the one in the Bread Bible. Both recipes uses golden raisins, but the Bread Bible version used chestnuts vs. this version using candied orange peel. The Baking Bible version uses golden syrup and has an extra step of making a biga 3 days beforehand and also has more steps in the dough preparation. It was too long ago for me to remember which one is better, but I can't imagine anything better than the Baking Bible's version. My husband said it best, "it is perfect." Funnily, he asked why I made the full recipe. I told him it is because I know it is going to be really good so I have to.

Soft Pretzels

Now that it's getting cooler I am finding myself baking more on the weekends. This weekend I wanted to make these soft pretzels from Peter Reinhart's Artisan Bread Every Day. I think I am slowly baking through this book. This is my 7th recipe from it.

As with all the other recipes in this book, the dough requires overnight resting and fermentation in the fridge so I started it on Saturday. It is a simple recipe, just mix all the ingredients in the mixer.

Fruit-filled Jam Thumbprint

This is fruit-filled jam thumbprint from Peter Reinhart's Artisan Bread Every Day. I made 1/3 recipe.

Bagels

I have been wanting to make bagels for a while now and finally did a couple of weekends ago. It is an easy recipe but it does take two days as it requires overnight resting.

The recipe I used is from Peter Reinhart's Artisan Bread Every Day. I found the recipe online at Epicurious. Epicurious has printed the recipe from the book with permission so I would not print the recipe here. But I am going to regal you with step by step photos.

ABC: Raspberry-Almond Braided Bread

Hello ABC-er! I'm sorry I've been so absent lately. I actually made the Blueberry Hand Pies last month but never got around to processing the photos and posting! I will add the photos to my next ABC post.

For this bread, the recipe yield 2 breads and they looked huge! So I made 1/2. I was so excited about it. It looked and sounded so good and I figured I could use my stash of homemade lemon curd that I made earlier this year. Except, the lemon curd had turned bad. The top part has turned brown and the consistency is more like lemon butter. Also, the lemon smell is totally gone. So I had to throw it away. Sniff sniff....

I didn't feel like going to the store just to get lemon curd, so I improvised. I cooked a couple of handfuls of frozen raspberries with some sugar. I didn't measure any of them, just sort of eye-balled it.

Walnut Bread

This bread is my new love. I have been making it for several weeks now. Another winner from Jim Lahey's My Bread book. This is called Walnut Bread but it actually has raisins as well.

ABC: No-Knead Cherry Pecan Bread

I can't believe it's been a month since the Boston Cream Pie and is now time to bake again for ABC. I do love this monthly schedule though. And Hanaa, I love the mix between dessert/sweets and breads.

I was really looking forward to this bread! I love love love No Knead Bread. have been making the basic version of the No Knead Bread for several weeks now. This one from King Arthur is a bit different in that it uses a combination of AP flour, rye flour, and WW flour. I wonder why it uses AP instead of bread flour (which is what the original No Knead recipe uses).

No-Knead Bread

I have tried this bread before, back in 2009 when I first started baking. It turned out terrible! I can't remember the specifics now but it was bad enough to make me think that this is not the bread/method for me. I'm sure I did something wrong. Yes you may laugh here. This is supposed to be the easiest bread and I mess it up. I do have a tendency to mess up easy things.

But I didn't have enough knowledge to know what it was and at the time I was more concerned about finding a recipe that works for me. I want a good bread that I could make every week so we don't have to buy bread from the store anymore. A bread baking friend once told me that homemade bread is so good and so much better than store bought. I always wonder about this and secretly jealous. The bread that I made does not taste as good as the store-bought.I am talking about hearth type breads, bread that has only a handful of ingredients: flour, salt, yeast, water.

Ciabatta

I have been making Ciabatta from Peter Reinhart's Artisan Bread Every Day several times now. The recipe makes 2 large loaves of ciabatta but I've been halving it and making 1 loaf at a time. It is super good and pretty easy. I think it's a much simpler method than the Ciabatta in his Bread Baker's Appretince book. This version does not require poolish and everything can be done in one bowl, no mixer required. I don't own Peter's BBA book but I am curious how the 2 ciabatta compare, tastewise. So one of these days I will try the BBA recipe and blog about it. But for now, let me show you how this one from Artisan Bread Every Day is.

Transitional German-Style Many Seed Bread

We had our first snow last week.

It was cold.

I am so not ready for the cold and the snow.

Though it does make for pretty pictures...

The Wooden Spoon Adventure: Zucchini Bread

Last week, ECL asked me if I want to come out of retirement to be a part of the travelling spoon.

What is the travelling spoon?

A fellow blogger, Kate of A Merrier World, is celebrating her blog's 5th year anniversary and is sending a wooden spoon on a journey around the world. Sort of like the pants in the Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants, :)).

Banana Bread

This is my go-to banana bread recipe. I like it so much I have never tried any other banana bread recipes.

I got this recipe from a friend a long time ago. She and I has since lost contact but the recipe remained.