Tasty Flour Tortillas

Living in the desert southwest, everyone assumes you know how to make tortillas.  I was taught by one of my husband's cousins several years ago (a Texas girl, herself), but I didn't actually work out a recipe I liked until recently.

My biggest issue was the consistency.  No matter what I did, if the inside of the tortilla was cooked, the outside of the tortilla always seemed to come out crunchy, which is not what you want if you intend to use the tortillas in soft tacos or any other situation where they need to be folded.  I even tried increasing the amount of shortening in the recipe in the hopes it would soften the dough, but to no avail.  For a while, I completely gave up and refused to make them at all.

Fast forward several years later, when my husband and I discovered a tortilleria in Silver City, New Mexico, with the most heavenly flour tortillas.  We made special efforts to stop by every time we were in the area, and at least two tortillas never made it back home.  (Home?  I'm not sure those two tortillas made it to the next stoplight . . .)

One day, I was speaking with a co-worker about these wonderful tortillas.  "You know why their tortillas are so good?" he asked me.  "It's because they use lard."

Lard?  Well, I knew the Mexican ladies I worked with used a lot of lard, but I personally couldn't stand the idea of stocking the stuff, myself.  Then one day, when I had a daughter shopping for me, a glorious mistake happened.

Instead of buying all-vegetable shortening, which is what I normally pick up, she grabbed regular shortening off the shelf and brought it home.  An idea pinged in my mind.  If the lard was what made those tortillas so wonderful, then maybe using the shortening with both animal and vegetable fats, rather than all-vegetable shortening, would make the difference.

The secret ingredient!!

It did.  It really did!  I couldn't believe how easy it was to have soft, pliable, fluffy tortillas with just this one simple ingredient change.  I think the people in the tortilleria still make them better than I do, but you wouldn't guess it by how quickly they disappear off the table.

Ingredients for about a dozen tortillas:

2 cups flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
2 teaspoons salt (Reduce this if you think they come out too salty.)
4 Tablespoons shortening
Hot tap water to make the dough--a little over 2/3 a cup is about right.

Mix the dry ingredients together, then cut in the shortening.

Add hot water and mix the dough with a fork until it gathers and forms a ball around the fork.  If you add a touch too much water, I as I did in the following picture, it isn't the end of the world.  It will just be a little sticky until the flour from your hands or from the rolling process incorporates into it a little.

With lightly floured hands, divide the dough and roll into balls about 2 inches in diameter.  (Smaller if you want smaller tortillas.)  I was told when I first learned that it is better to work quickly, while the dough is still a bit warm from the hot water.  I think she was right; if you wait too long, bits of the dough will dry out and it will be difficult to get a smooth tortilla.

Heat a skillet or griddle on the stove on medium heat.

I tend to use a normal rolling pin to roll out the tortillas, but many people use one looking more like the one on the left, which is made from a piece of sanded dowel.  I haven't practiced with it enough to be able to roll things out at a consistent level.  (By the time I'm done with rolling a tortilla using the dowel, it has wave patterns or something . . .)

It is very easy to get too much flour on tortillas in the rolling process, making them taste more like . . . well, flour.  But if there is not enough flour on the tortillas as they are rolled, they will stick to the board and end up forming very interesting shapes.  I remembered a trick the ladies from showmethecurry.com had used when making parathas--dipping the dough into a bowl (or pie plate) of flour as they went--and so decided to try it out this time.  I found it really did help to keep just the right amount of flour involved in the rolling process.

I probably shouild have slightly flattened the ball before dipping it.

Roll the tortilla, dipping into the flour lightly if necessary, until it is round and very thin.  (I confess not all mine are quite this round . . .)

If you have rolled out a tortilla and your pan is not ready to bake it yet, you can hang it on the side of your bowl or something while you roll out another tortilla--but not too long, or it will dry out.

Place the tortilla on the skillet or griddle (no oil necessary), spinning it around as it cooks if you are worried about it sticking.  (I've never had them stick.)  The surface will get bubbles on it as it cooks.  If a bubble gets too big, lightly press it down with your turner.

You can see toward the top left where I pressed down a large bubble.

After the surface has bubbles and the underside has lightly browned spots, flip the tortilla.

Cook until the next side has lightly browned spots, then remove and keep warm.

Continue with other tortillas until they are all cooked.  If flour starts to accumulate on the skillet or griddle, use a paper towel or kitchen towel to wipe it away.  (Otherwise, it will burn and you'll end up with burned flour on the next tortilla you cook.)


Yummy!  These are good for soft tacos, quesadillas, or just eating with butter.  (Or, as the Kitchen Artiste In Training likes to do, eating with butter and cinnamon-sugar.)

Southwest Salsa

(Yea, yea, I know . . . This isn't a bread.  But I have tortillas coming down the pike, so it is relevant.  Besides, who doesn't like a nice snack of salsa and chips every so often?)

When I first moved here, everyone raved about the salsa made by the ladies at the local grill.  But until I got a job working there, I had no thought of ever making salsa myself.  Then I saw how easy it was . . .

Salsa is most definitely not rocket science; flavors can be added or subtracted depending on taste.  For example, when I first got there, the lady who usually made the salsa put in canned tomatoes (What? Canned tomatoes? Really?), onion, jalapenos, and Mrs. Dash seasoning.  Another lady who sometimes took a turn put in salt instead of Mrs. Dash.  And when a lady who owned a restaurant in Mexico began making the salsa, she completely omitted the onion, using only the tomatoes, jalapenos, and salt.  (Until she persuaded the manager to order cilantro . . .)

Nowadays, I can't eat jalapenos, which is a real shame.  When I worked at the grill, I greatly enjoyed the salsa the other ladies made, even if I used it sparingly, while they ate it with a spoon.  But it was during that time I developed a geographic tongue, and so became very sensitive to anything very spicy or acidic.  (The ladies used to laugh at me eating cottage cheese after whatever delectable spicy dish they had made in an effort to neutralize the effects of the jalapenos.)  I finally came to the disappointing realization there was nothing I could do to help the situation but to avoid the foods which caused me pain, regardless of how delicious they looked and smelled.

So when I set out to make salsa for my family taco night, I changed the ingredients to suit our taste.

Ingredients:

Can of tomatos.  (Doesn't matter if they are chopped or whole.  I use unsalted, because I prefer to control the amount of salt myself.)
Onion (About a half of a large onion.)
Green chili or jalapenos (I used mild green chili--only about 2/3 the can shown.)
Cilantro (I used about a quarter of the cilantro pictured.)
Salt to taste (I used less than a teaspoon here.)

In a blender, toss in the can of tomatoes, including the liquid.  Add onion, green chili, and cilantro, as desired.  Turn it on and blend as much as you want--less for chunkier, more for more uniform.  Add salt to taste.  This made about 2.5 cups of salsa when I did it.

And there you have it!  Fresh salsa, ready to enjoy!  (Pass the chips!)

This will keep in the refrigerator for about a week.  (Possibly longer if you used jalepenos, because of the chemicals involved, but I wouldn't push it past two weeks.)  The flavors will blend over time, so be cautious if you choose to use jalapenos.  What may be tolerable today may turn out very hot in a couple more days.

Alien Bagels!!

I know what you're thinking:  "Alien bagels?  Bagles don't come from outer space!"  Keep reading . . .

When I found my brother-in-law was making bagels a thousand miles away, I got hungry.  I had tried making bagels some eleven years before, but they hadn't turned out to my satisfaction, and they seemed too much work, so I hadn't tried again.  But if my brother-in-law could make them, I figured, then I certainly could!

I found a recipe on-line which seemed to have good reviews and which was pretty simple.  So with renewed hope, I set out to try again.

Ingredients:

4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3 Tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 package active dry yeast (a little less than a Tablespoon for my yeast)
1 2/3 cups warm water (lukewarm--about 100-110 degrees Fahrenheit)
2 Tablespoons margarine, softened

Have 1 Tablespoon sugar and 2 teaspoons salt ready to add to the water for boiling.

First, mix the dough according to standard methods of mixing yeast doughs.  This recipe is actually sized so a bread machine can mix it for you, if you have one, which I don't, you can skip ahead to after the rising part.  I use my stand mixer usually, so my description follows that process.  If you have a stand mixer and need more details on mixing, you can check here, and if you don't have a stand mixer, try here.
Start by dissolving the yeast in the water with the sugar.  While waiting for the yeast to dissolve, put the salt and a couple cups of flour into the stand mixer bowl.  Mix them a little with the bread hook and add the margarine.  Add the yeast mixture when it is dissolved, and continue mixing in flour until the dough cleans up the side of the bowl.  Allow the bread hook to knead the dough for a few minutes.

Add a little oil to the bowl, turn off the mixer, and remove the bread hook and bowl from the stand mixer.  Take out the bread hook, swirl the dough around in the bowl to spread the oil around, and flip it upside down.

Cover, and allow to rise in a warm place until about doubled in size.



This is a little more than doubled, but I was busy making aloo paratha while it was rising.


Punch down the dough, cover, and let sit for another 15 minutes.  It's a good idea to get your pot or skillet for boiling water started sometime during this time.  Add the 1 Tablespoon sugar and the 2 teaspoons salt to the water.

(Welcome back, bread machine users.  Hope your water is boiling.)

You'll want your oven ready at 375 degrees Fahrenheit when you are finished with the boiling process, so it's a good idea to go ahead and preheat it when you start shaping the dough.

Divide the dough into 12 pieces.  Shape 3 pieces into smooth balls.  (Smooth?  How do I do that?  I'm going to have to do some more research on this.)  Poke a 1-inch hole in each.  (I poked it initially with the end of a wooden spoon, then used my fingers to stretch the hole larger.)

Here they are after stretching.

Drop the bagels into the simmering water and cook on medium low heat for 3 minutes.  Turn the bagels and cook 2 minutes, then turn again and cook for 1 minute more.

Remove the bagels from the water and drain on towels.  Repeat for the rest of the dough.

This was the point at which I dubbed my bagels "alien bagels".  The shape was awful, and the texture looked like something you really didn't want to view or touch right after dinner.  (Who knew half-cooked bagels might look like some sort of odd gelatinous substance?)

I found that 4 bagels fit fine in my pot without crowding, so next time, I'll probably just boil them in groups of 4 and save myself some time.

Place the bagels on a greased baking sheet and bake for 20-25 minutes.  Remove from the sheets and cool.  If you want, before baking, you can mix 1 egg white and 1 Tablespoon water, brush it on the bagels, and sprinkle on sesame, poppy, or caraway seeds.  I was going for plain this time, so I didn't.

It took a lot longer than 25 minutes for my bagels to develop anything which looked like browning, and they didn't brown as much as I really wanted, so I think next time, I will raise the temperature.

I wasn't impressed with how they looked, and I wasn't impressed with the texture and such when I tested a not-quite-cool one.  But the next morning, when my husband ate one while heading out the door, he came back and commented, "They might be alien bagels, but they sure taste good!"  The texture was much better than it had been the previous evening, so maybe they just needed to sit overnight and completely cool.

All in all, they were a success with the family, especially my husband, who liked the texture better than store-bought bagels.  I am not completely satisfied with the results, so I think I will be tweaking this a little more--doing some research on the proper shaping of bagels and raising the baking temperature, for starters.

Then, perhaps, I will manage to produce something which looks like it belongs on Earth.

Aloo Paratha

I have cilantro!!

This is only significant because every single recipe I have found for any paratha whatsoever seems to require cilantro.  Unfortunately, it is one herb I do not have growing on my windowsill.  (I'm not sure it could be grown on a windowsill, as it tends to get very large.)  And as our nearest decent grocery store is about 70 miles away, I can't just drive around the corner and pick it up anytime I want it.

But after last week's excursion to . . . well, I'm not going to say where I went, but it was on business . . . I was able to stop by a store on the way home and pick some up.

The first time I heard of paratha was through the showmethecurry.com ladies, while browsing potential Indian bread recipes.  But I ran into a problem when I started seriously thinking about making paratha:  they wanted chaat masala in their fillings.  I don't have chaat masala, and while I recognize I could order it on the Internet, and probably will, eventually, I wanted to stick with ingredients I could easily pick up locally.  (Yes, around here, 70 miles is considered local shopping.)  I finally stumbled on vahrehvah.com, after discovering this video on YouTube.  In this chef's recipe, garam masala is used instead of chaat masala. And garam masala was in my cupboard, purchased some time ago as a "just in case" spice.

But Vahrehvah.com's recipe is a little ambiguous on the quantity of ingredients for the dough or how it is to be made.  (I think he depends on his videos.)  So I turned back to showmethecurry.com for the dough.  In their aloo paratha recipe, they refer readers to their chapatti recipe for the dough.  (Wow, the effort it takes, sometimes, to get a recipe put together . . .)

After a little juggling, I finally had my working recipe, consisting of the dough from showmethecurry.com and the filling from Vahrehvah.com.  I ended up reducing some of the spices because my kids aren't used to something quite that full-flavored.  (And, sadly enough, my tongue won't handle extra-spicy things anymore.)

Ingredients:

Dough:
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (good thing I just ground some)
3 teaspoons oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup + 2 Tablespoons warm water (In case anyone is interested, this makes 5/8 cup of water.)
1/2 cup whole wheat flour in which to dip the dough while rolling
Oil for pan frying

Filling:
3 Tablespoons fresh coriander leaves (This is cilantro.)
3/4 teaspoon garam masala (I used 1/2 teaspoon.)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 Tablespoon cumin/coriander powder (This can be either/or or blended to taste. I ended up with a touch over a 1/2 Tablespoon cumin.)
Hot red pepper powder to taste (I put about 1/16 teaspoon.)
3 cups large potatoes, boiled and grated or mashed (Grated is recommended.  I wonder if riced would be even better.)
3/4 cup onion

First, the dough!

In a large bowl, mix the flour and the salt.  Add the oil and mix again.  Slowly add warm water and knead to form a dough.  (You might not need all the water.)

Shape the dough into a ball and rub a little oil on it to coat the outside.  Then cover it and let it stand for at least 15 minutes.

While the dough rests, it is time for the filling.

I learned something about grating potatoes right after cooking them . . . After boiling the potatoes, I put them into some cold water to cool them to the point where I could handle them.  This happened surprisingly quickly, or so I thought.  As I grated the potatoes, I realized that while the exterior was cool enough to touch, the interior was still very hot.  It was kind of amusing to see the grated potato steaming beneath my grater, but it was not so amusing when the potato became small enough I kept accidentally touching the hot part.  Note to self:  next time, prepare the potatoes a little earlier.
 

The recipes I had read emphasized that everything in the filling needed to be chopped very fine, or minced.  If you have a chopper similar to this, finely chopping onions becomes a snap.

In his video, the chef at Vahrehvah.com states the ingredients can be either mixed uncooked or cooked.  But, he said, the cooked version "always turns out tastier."  So I decided mine would be cooked.

As the potatoes were already cooked, the only things which really needed to be cooked were the onions and spices.  First, I added just enough oil to the pan to prevent sticking, then added the onions.  I cooked for a minute or two over medium heat, then added the spices, stirring to make sure they were evenly cooked.

Once everything was nicely cooked, it was time to add the potatoes, just to mix them in.  Since they did not need to be cooked, I took an alterate tack, adding the cooked ingredients to the bowl where I had the potatoes waiting, then mixing.

The filling definitely does not look like it is rocket science.  The chef even said you could add pretty much whatever spices--or even green chilis--you want to the filling.  This is reassuring, as it seems it will be difficult to completely mess it up by any method except, perhaps, over-spicing it.

Divide the filling into 8 equal size parts.  You will be rolling/smushing these parts into balls.

Now that the filling is ready, back to the dough!

Knead the dough and divide it into 8 parts, rolling each part into a ball.  Keep a bowl with some whole wheat flour handy for dipping the dough if it should start to stick.  Slightly flatten the dough a little and dip it briefly in the flour.

 

Using a rolling pin, roll out the ball to about 4 inches diameter.  Take one of the balls of filling and place it on the dough.

Gather the dough around the ball to cover it, pinching at the top to hold the dough closed.

Slightly flatten the stuffed ball and dip it into the whole wheat flour on both sides.

 

 Using a rolling pin, roll out the stuffed ball into a disk.  Don't make it too thin.  (You still want your potato filling to be surrounded by bread dough.)

See?  You can see the cilantro through the dough.  (Isn't that cool?)  The hope is to be able to roll this out without any potato sticking out.  I did not completely succeed in this:  every one of the 8 parathas I rolled ended up with a tiny bit of potato sticking out somewhere, usually along the edge or at the pinched seam.  I may be able to prevent this by putting in less filling, but I'd rather not do that.  I suspect that a little practice will go a long way.

I found this rolling out process worked better if I did not attack the paratha as I would have attacked a tortilla or a pie crust.  (Seriously, I get violent with tortillas.)  Rolling by gently rocking back and forth, changing directions as I went, seemed to be more effective than trying to pick up my rolling pin, place it in the center, and roll out each time.  (I think people who are really good at tortillas actually roll back and forth, too . . .)

Place the paratha on a skillet preheated to medium or medium high.  When bubbles start to appear, it is time to turn it over.

Hard to see, but it is puffing up in some places around the edges.

I actually didn't follow the directions here, because I forgot to reread them as I was working.  Instead of spraying it lightly with cooking oil after turning it over, then turning and spraying with oil again every 30 seconds, I just turned it over and let it cook.  It would probably have had more crispy results if it had been sprayed with oil, but as it was, it still cooked and browned nicely.  (See the little golden/brown spots?)

Nicely puffed!

I did remember to roll out the next paratha as the previous one was cooking, just to save time.

And here they are!

I had some daughters who were very dubious about this whole "potato-filled unleavened bread" thing.  At least, they were dubious until I started tearing one into pieces for tasting . . .

In the end, all four of the daughters at home ended up loving it.  The reduction in the spices seemed to be about the perfect blend for us, although the heat built up over time to the point where the two youngest weren't sure they wanted to finish their halves of aloo paratha.  (Now we know why the Indians would most likely eat this with chutney or yogurt . . . I gave the girls pineapple rings, as I was out of yogurt.)  I've been told these freeze well, when separated by waxed paper, so the three I had left over after dinner will find their way there until the Senior Master Kitchen Helper is ready to have some in her lunchbox, as she requested.

I'm looking forward to trying paratha stuffed with other fillings.

Baking With Love

Things have been very busy lately.  Between the end of the holidays and the winter sickness which accompanied it, along with the girls going back to school and encountering extra challenges, I haven't had much time for bread.

This is distressing.  I have found myself frequently fretting that I am making no headway in my goal.

The other day, I went home with a recipe, fully intending to work on it.  But when I entered my kitchen, what good spirits I had sank.  The counter was covered in things and the sink had dishes--some left over from the previous busy evening and some from my girls' efforts at home.  There was no way I could work on any bread until the kitchen was cleaned, so I set aside my plan and cleaned.

The next day, I came home again, intending to make bread, but something someone said popped my "happy bubble", as my kids call it.  My husband noticed I wasn't exactly feeling my best.

"I have to make ****!" I told him as I changed out of my work clothes, throwing my sweater on the bed and snatching a t-shirt out of my drawer.

"No, you don't," he said.  "Right now, you couldn't make **** with love."

He was right.  I took a deep breath and turned off my smartphone display where I could see the bread recipe.

He offered to cook dinner for me, so I could work with the kids on their homework, instead of having to juggle both.  As he looked in the pantry and began planning, he came over to where I was standing.

"Honey," he said.  "I can make dinner, but there is one thing I can't make.  Could I persuade you to make some of your strawberry muffins?"

How could I say no?

I mixed up the muffins as he worked on the main elements of dinner.  Kids coming in and out of the kitchen smelled the muffins cooking and smilingly exclaimed, "Strawberry muffins!"  Every so often, he would taste and offer me a taste of what he was cooking, so we could ponder together alterations in seasoning.

Dinner that night was a kind of stew over rice, with strawberry muffins.  It was simple, hearty fare--good food for a winter evening.  But more importantly, there was peace in the home and everything was made with love.

I am so blessed to have a wonderful, patient husband who works hard to serve in the family and keep peace in our home.

I will get back to making more new breads; I have plans for this weekend.  (And larger plans in a couple of months . . . I heard someone is going to make a tandoor!!!  I'm so excited I could jump up and down if it would do any good.)  But I need to remember to keep it all in perspective.

Italian Christmas Bread

Last month, in between baking cookies, making candy, and generally preparing for the Christmas holiday, I felt it would be a shame not to take advantage of the marvelous breads out there specifically baked at Christmastime.  Unfortunately, time got away from me, until I found myself on New Years Eve, determined to make one more bread before the year was out.

When it comes to traditional European holiday breads, however, I have a problem.  You see . . . I do not like raisins.

Do you know how many traditional European holiday breads out there call for raisins??

I did finally manage to find a few raisin-free holiday breads, and this recipe for Italian Christmas Bread happens to be one of them.  In addition to its lack of raisins, what attracted me to this bread was the selection of more unusual ingredients.  Eggnog?  Anise seed?  Hazelnuts?  I'm in!

I already had eggnog in my house, so that was easy, but acquiring some of the other ingredients was a bit of an adventure, as my shopping alternatives in this more remote area are rather limited.  To get the hazelnuts, for instance, my Senior Master Kitchen Helper and I picked through the loose mixed nuts in the produce section at the supermarket, creating a mixed nut mixture which was 80% hazelnuts by weight and 20% other nuts so as not to totally freak out the cashier.  Finding anise seed also proved a bit of a challenge, as there was none in the usual spice section.  But when I happened upon the cheap bagged spices in the Hispanic foods section, looking for something else entirely, lo and behold, there was anise seed.  (Yay!! Sometimes there are certain advantages to living close to the Mexican border . . . I can buy refills for some of my spice containers for very reasonable prices, indeed.)

This recipe ended up being more than just a flavor adventure, it ended up being a test of my general bread-making knowledge.  You see, the recipe I found was intended for a bread machine.  I do not have a bread machine, on purpose, as I do not like the crusts produced by bread machines.  (Besides, square bread is unattractive.)  But, given that the recipe consisted of little more than "put everything in the bread machine and press this button", I knew I would have to draw on my experience and a little speculation to make the bread successfully.

Ingredients

(For the bread)

1 cup eggnog, plus 1 Tablespoon eggnog (Alert!  I changed this to 1 cup eggnog, plus a separate Tablespoon of lukewarm water.)
2 Tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 Tablespoons butter, softened
1 egg
1 egg yolk
3 cups bread flour (I had some sitting in my cupboard doing nothing, so I used it.  Otherwise, I would have just used all-purpose.)
1 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast (I just used my normal yeast.)
2 Tablespoons anise seed
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup hazelnuts, shelled (My husband actually shelled mine using a hammer. Isn't he great?)

(For the glaze--I'm including it doubled, because that's what I ended up doing.)

1 cup powdered sugar
2 Tablespoons eggnog

Preheat an oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  Spread out the shelled hazelnuts on a baking sheet and bake for about 5 minutes or until lightly toasted.  Remove them from the baking sheet and let them cool.  (Yes, you can turn off the oven now, as it will be a while before you are using it again for the bread.)

When my hazelnuts cooled, I decided to very coarsely chop them, figuring that whole hazelnuts in the bread might be challenging to deal with.



As I was going to need to dissolve my yeast, instead of just throwing everything into a bread machine, I substituted 1 Tablespoon of lukewarm water for that extra Tablespoon of eggnog in the recipe and used it for dissolving my yeast.  I figured that one Tablespoon less eggnog in the recipe was probably not going to make as much difference as adding extra liquid.  To be honest, it might not have been a terribly big deal to just add the extra Tablespoon of liquid, as the actual amount of flour added when mixing in a stand mixer depends entirely on how much the bread wants to take that day.  But I was feeling a little nervous when I made this recipe, knowing I was calling upon my experience instead of following directions and not knowing if my results would be acceptable.

In the bowl of my stand mixer, I added the eggnog, sugar, salt, egg, and egg yolk, then mixed them to break up the eggs.  (This is more easily done with the regular beater of a stand mixer or just by using a wisk.)  I softened the butter in the microwave, which had to be done very carefully, as the Master Kitchen Helper and Junior Taste-Tester had managed to shatter the carousel plate and we were waiting for a replacement to arrive.  Then the butter was added to the mixture and mixed in.

I added one cup of flour just to give the mixer something more solid to work with when I added the anise seed and cinnamon.  I poured in the yeast mixture and started mixing with the bread hook, adding more flour in intervals until the dough cleaned up the side of the bowl.

I was not exactly sure when I should add the hazelnuts.  The recipe said to add them to the bread machine between Knead Cycle 1 and Knead Cycle 2.  What on earth are these knead cycles?  So I guessed.  After I had mixed the bread enough for the gluten to activate, I added the nuts.  This proved to be very interesting, as they wanted to just stick to the outside of the dough and required a certain amount of coaxing to get them to mix inside.  I finally accomplished it with slow mixing and frequent stops to scrape the dough off the bread hook with a spatula, before allowing the bread hook to pick up the dough again.

Finally the dough was placed in an oiled bowl, twirled around, then turned over so the oiled surface was on the top.

Not knowing how long it would take to rise, but knowing a bread dough with eggs takes longer to rise than one without, I covered the bowl with plastic wrap and a dishtowel, then placed the bowl on a mat on the back of our pellet stove.

In the mean time, I agonized.  Should I have waited to add the hazelnuts until after the first rise?  I found other recipes for breads with nuts or fruit which added the goodies after this rise, before shaping and rising the second time.  Would the hazelnuts break up the texture of the dough enough to prevent the bread being able to form air pockets correctly?  Would the nuts absorb too much moisture and end up tasting soggy?  I finally stepped away from the computer and figured it was too late to worry about it now.  All that was left was to wait and see.

And it rose!!  (There was a serious happy dance going on in my kitchen at that moment.)  The dough rose and fluffed up nicely.

The next big question was about the pan.  I wasn't exactly sure how big a pan should be used for a recipe sized for a breadmaker.  The picture someone had posted on the website showed bread which had been baked in something like a Bundt pan, but looking at the dough, I wasn't sure there was enough quantity to justify my baking it in a Bundt pan.  However, there was definitely too much dough to fit in my normal 8"x4" loaf pan.

After staring at the dough for a while, I decided to break in one of the two new 10"x5" pans my husband had given me for Christmas.  (He was so sweet:  he called me the "Top Chef" in his life.)

Accordingly, I shaped the dough on a lightly floured board and placed it in the greased pan.

I covered the pan with plastic wrap and towel again and allowed it to rise in a warm place.

Looks like I didn't quite make my loaf evenly.

My research on converting bread machine recipes indicated that a good rule of thumb was to cook the bread for 30-40 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit, so this is what I did.  (Closer to 40 minutes.)  And at this point, I could return to the original recipe, where it said, "Remove from the pan as soon as it is done baking and cool on a rack."  (This, I could do.)

When the bread was cooled, it was time to make the glaze.  I started with 1/2 cup powdered sugar and 1 Tablespoon of eggnog, as the recipe said.  After mixing, I thought the glaze was too thick, but then I realized it was probably because the eggnog had just been taken from the refrigerator.  So I decided to let glaze sit, covered with plastic wrap, for a while to get it up to room temperature.

I placed a plate beneath the rack on which the bread sat to catch drips, then drizzled the glaze on the bread.  When I was finished, I decided it needed more glaze, so I mixed up a second batch and drizzled most of that, as well.



I probably should have let the glaze sit and dry longer before cutting the bread, but I was in a hurry, so my fingers got just a bit sticky when I cut the bread.  Surprisingly enough, the larger nuts sliced nicely along with the bread, so perhaps my concerns about having whole hazelnuts in the bread were unfounded.

I had cringed just a little when I had seen how much anise seed was called for in the recipe, wondering if it would end up tasting like licorice or something.  But by the time the bread was finished, and even better, by the time it was a day or so old, I found the spice did not actually dominate the flavor of the bread.  Between the cinnamon, the hazelnuts, the anise seed, and the eggnog glaze, there was a nice blend of flavors which actually seemed more subtle than I had expected.

My husband was a little disappointed in the flavor.  After eating the "in your face" spice bread from the Netherlands, he felt the Italian Christmas bread couldn't hold a candle to it.  But I actually preferred this one to the Dutch bread, mostly because I prefer a medium texture in bread to a more dense texture.

I took the bread to the community New Years Eve party as part of our contribution to the snack table (along with cupcakes, brownies, and cake balls dipped in chocolate my Kitchen Artiste in Training insisted on making from the round cake pop molds she got for Christmas.)  Food was plentiful enough the bread wasn't all eaten (no surprise, really, as some people avoid bread on principle), but that meant my daughters and I were able to snitch pieces for snacks over the next few days.  Yum, yum!

Dutch Spice Bread

Every so often, the children's magazine published by our church contains recipes, and each time, the kids beg me to make something from it.  Very rarely, I do.

So it was no real surprise to hear the Master Kitchen Helper beg me to make something--anything--from the list of recipes included in the December issue.  With a sigh, I looked at the magazine she held spread before her and started evaluating the offerings.

"Actually, kiddo," I finally said, "I think we can make something this month."

"Really?!"  she asked me.

"Yep, and it can count for 'Around the World In 80 Breads'."

She was a little puzzled until I pointed to the recipe called "Dutch Spice Bread".  "If it's Dutch, it's from a European country called the Netherlands," I told her.  "That means it can count."

Excitedly, she helped me go through the ingredients and wrote down the one we were missing--dark corn syrup--on the shopping list.

And a few days later, we met in the kitchen to gather the ingredients and make our foray into Dutch holiday bread.

I think the hand is the Junior Taste-Tester.

Ingredients:

1 cup dark corn syrup

1/2 cup brown sugar, packed

1 egg

2 1/2 cups flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon ginger

1/2 teaspoon cloves

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup milk

Preheat the oven to 325°F (163ºC). Grease a 9 x 5-inch loaf pan with butter or shortening.

Put the corn syrup, brown sugar, and egg into a mixing bowl, and mix them well.
In another bowl mix the flour, baking soda, spices, and salt.

 

I realized when I was about to mix everything together I had goofed: I had put the dry ingredients into the larger bowl. There was no way I would be able to add the flour mixture and the milk alterately to the egg mixture, as the recipe said to do. However, never fear, this recipe is not "rocket science," or they wouldn't be including it in a magazine geared toward children. This just meant I had to be a little tricky.

I began by following the instructions. I added some of the flour mixture to the egg mixture and mixed. Then I added some milk and mixed. When it finally looked like I would spill if I tried to actually mix anything more, I poured the mixed portion back into the bowl with the rest of the flour mixture, added the rest of the milk, and mixed it. 

Voila! 

Pour the batter into the greased loaf pan and bake the bread for 80–90 minutes or until a toothpick poked in the center comes out clean. I ended up baking it closer to 90 minutes than 80.

Cool the bread in the pan for 10 minutes, then remove it and place on a wire rack to cool completely. Amazingly enough for me, who has recently had inexplicable trouble with banana bread breaking apart, it came out of the pan very nicely. (How can someone mess up banana bread?  Ok, ok, so I ended up with the dreaded crack in the middle of the top . . .)

The girls wanted to eat it right away or take it to the Christmas party that evening, but I reminded them the recipe said to wrap the bread in plastic wrap or aluminum foil and let it stand for 24 hours. "Sorry, girls," I told them. "We'll be tasting this bread tomorrow."

The next day, I finally pulled out the bread knife to slice the bread. At first touch, I was astounded how hard it was to cut, because of the density of the bread. This was somewhat disturbing, and I wondered if it would really end up being as good as it looked and smelled. But I remembered the description in the magazine had said parents hung up slices of this bread on strings at birthday time for the children to try to eat blindfolded, so it stood to reason it would necessarily be a dense bread. The real test would be when it was handed to the taste testers at lunchtime.

As it turned out, everyone enjoyed it. They liked the flavor, although the kids enjoyed it better with butter, as the recipe suggested. (They firmly declined trying it with the other option--cream cheese.) My husband really appreciated the flavors of the spices, saying it was one of the best spice breads he had eaten.

All in all, it was a good experiment. I'm not sure we'll end up adopting the tradition of blindfolding our children and hanging slices over their heads, but we will probably end up making it again next year at Christmastime.  (If I can squeeze it in between all the other things I'm already scheduled to make each year at Christmastime . . . I was so busy making cookies, candy, etc., I didn't have a lot of time to try new breads!)

Why my 2nd daughter is called the Kitchen Artiste in Training . . .