My favorite breakfast treat

Let me say this upfront, this recipe is adapted from “Sesame Street B is for Baking.” It’s a cookbook for baking with kids. Originally, I got this book so that I could bake with my niece. To be honest though, I don’t think my niece has seen this book since I first got it. (In [...]

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bao attempt #3

So very close!  Recipe will come once I determine final ratios and steaming issues. (sorry for the suck-tastic photo… it was 8pm and I only have CF bulbs in my kitchen)

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bao attempt #2

The chewiness came out better… but then it turned out that this batch had too much water in it. It was too sticky. A few of them were made into scallion buns for fun.

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bao attempt #1

Many childhood breakfasts, for me, involved mantou (饅頭). The little soft pillows of steamy goodness cycled in and out of my eating rotation, but mostly appeared during weekends. My family never made them (my mother and my grandmother were never interested in cooking anything that seemed complicated). So, we always bought them frozen in Chinatown [...]

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a “duh” moment

I realized last night, that amid all of my experiments with bread, I completely forgot about the autolyse technique, which I learned about several years ago. I’d like to try it with spelt (I’ve been working on spelt bread recently) but I’ve run out of spelt flour.  Regardless, this is something I must work with.  [...]

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I haven’t forgotten this blog… so here’s a bread post

I have things I want to try… a restaurant review that I should be posting for Addis Red Sea… and I just haven’t had time lately for everything.  Or least it feels that way.  Maybe I’m just being lazy? So, in the meantime, here’s the bread recipe post that I’ve been promising since the winter.  [...]

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Victorian milk bread, with quinoa flour

The weather here in Boston has been slowly getting warmer.  Better temperatures for rising dough, but less ideal for turning on my oven.  On top of that, my weak/bad wrist is tempermental whenever I’m kneading. I think this might be my last loaf for the season.  I might try some no-knead recipes, but the bulk [...]

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A white bread with mahleb

I made another loaf of bread – a white bread from Beth Hensperger’s “Bread Made Easy” book. And it was the prettiest loaf I have ever made. I fiddled with Ms. Hensperger’s recipe a little by throwing in some mahleb. Mahleb is the pit of the sour cherry. Once crushed, it’s often thrown in to [...]

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invasion of the SAF yeast

Just in case anyone is curious, I only use SAF instant yeast when I make my doughs. And I’ve been making a lot of doughs lately. Sorry I couldn’t come up with a wittier title. Anyway! So, challah #2 wasn’t all that special to me. Challah #1 was courtesy of Beth Hensperger’s book “Bread Made [...]

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A cold weather summary

Eek! I have several photos to share and yet I have been so lazy about making a post. My punishment? Doing one big post as concise as possible. gah! Well, let’s do it in months: October – the household and a couple of friends went to Mack’s in New Hampshire for apple picking and squash [...]

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