Best Bread Ever (and Butternut Squash Soup)

This is quite possibly the best homemade bread recipe, ever.

I think I would be able to sell this in the Cambridge market square.

In 2006, Mark Bitmann aka The Minimalist of the New York Times published a recipe for No Knead Bread by master baker Jim Lahey. Apparently it created an enormous amount of hype amongst foodbloggers worldwide...

So I may be 6 years late to the party, but now it's my turn to jump on the No Knead bandwagon. This recipe is amazing! I love the fact that the method is so simple, the ingredients don't have to be weighed out precisely, and most of all, the end product looks and tastes so good.

Since it's been documented everywhere, I'll be brief with the recipe. For more details, check out the original article here, the video here, and the ever so slight modification that I used here.

No Knead Bread

Ingredients:
3 cups flour (I used bread flour - it has a high protein content)
1 1/2 cups water
1/4 tsp regular instant yeast
1 tsp salt

1. Add flour, yeast and salt to a bowl and give it a swirl to mix. Add the water and mix until roughly combined. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and leave at room temperature for 12-18 hrs.
It will look like a shaggy mess - this is fine.

2. At this stage, the mixture will have grown and be very soft and bubbly. Move onto a floured surface and bring the edges into the centre. Flip over onto a floured cotton towel (so that the side with the gathered folds is at the bottom). Place towel with dough into a bowl and let rest for 2 hrs.

3. After waiting 1.5 hrs, place a heavy pot into the oven and heat to 220-230 deg C. When the 2 hr rise is over, throw the dough from the towel into the superhot pot, (hopefully the folded side will now be back on top). Immediately put the lid on the pot and put back in oven for 30 mins. After that, take the lid off and bake for another 15 mins or until browned nicely.

In summary, you dump stuff in a bowl, leave it, leave it some more, dump it into a pot and bake it. Done. How much easier could it be? I've decided to make this bread on a fortnightly basis at least, starting the dough on Saturday night, and baking on Sunday night so that I have fresh bread for the start of the working week!

Whilst I'm at it, here's a recipe for butternut squash soup we made the other day:

Butternut Squash Soup

Ingredients:
2 medium-sized butternut squash
2 carrots and 2 onions chopped finely
300 mL double cream
1 chicken stock cube
random herb/spice assortment: nutmeg, sage, thyme (salt and pepper)

Fry carrots and onions in olive oil and/or butter over medium heat until soft. Then add chopped chunks of the squash, together with the nutmeg, sage and thyme. Fry for 10 mins or so, until the squash starts to soften.

Add enough water to just about cover the squash pieces, throw in the stock cube and boil for 30-40 mins or until squash is soft.

Blend the whole mixture with a stick blender, then mix in the cream. Salt/pepper to taste. Serve topped with some cracked black pepper and a bit of cream, or with some freshly baked bread!

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First blog post in months - finally found the motivation thanks to this bread. I've been bread crazy lately... feels more like biochemistry than normal cooking, with all the talk about % hydration and gluten. So many interesting factors, actually it might be more like methodology, optimising a reaction. Speaking of optimising, I still haven't nailed Focaccia Pugliese despite several attempts. I think I have to increase the hydration significantly.

Hope you're all well!

Simple Doughnut Balls!

Hi I'm Francis, the host of this show, "Cooking with Dog".

It's not what you think.

Today, we are going to prepare simple "doughnut holes" following a youtube recipe from Francis.

Sift 100 g of plain flour and 2 tsp of baking powder into a bowl.

In a separate bowl, whisk 1 egg, 2 tbsp brown sugar, roughly 1/4 cup milk and 1 tbsp melted butter. Add this mixture to the dry ingredients and mix to form a batter.

The milk/flour ratio is important - you can adjust it so the batter is liquid enough to be mixable, but not runny.

(I tried this once with the 2 tbsp milk in the original recipe and ended up with what looked like dry chicken nuggets...)

Heat oil to 170 deg C. Drop a little bit of batter into the oil - it is the right temperature if it bubbles but not too vigorously. When ready, take a half spoonful of batter and scrape it into the oil to form small balls.

A little misshapen sometmies - the batter was slightly too runny.

Once the dough balls have grown in size and are browned on the outside (a few minutes), leave them to cool on a rack.

These doughnut balls are delicious when still warm and crisp on the outside. Eat as many as you like at this stage - they taste surprisingly like those asian fried dough things "haam jim beng???" (咸煎饼) or even "you tiao".

Once cooled completely, place them in a plastic bag and shake together with your desired coating (sugar, cinnamon, matcha etc.)

Identify the magazines for 10 points.

Serve with your favourite ice-cream!

Matcha doughnuts with black sesame ice-cream.

For a black sesame ice-cream recipe, it was basically the same as my green tea ice cream recipe, except with ground toasted black sesame seeds.

SMBC Season 1 Finale - Homemade Pasta

All good things must come to an end.

Move aside Epic Meal Time, this has to be the most epic video of pasta making you've ever seen.

This is SMBC time and we're making pasta from scratch. The Shok's bringing along a few of his mates and we're going to rock Blue Boar R top floor kitchen with some serious dough rolling. Wholemeal style.

There are no bacon strips in here.

Starting with 800 g strong flour (high protein content for pasta), 8 eggs and salt, we smash it all together into a proper dough. Easy as pie. Or pasta. PC can't find regular pasta flour so he goes for strong wholemeal flour instead. It's good for you.

Homage to Xinmei at Pudding Pie Lane

We're rolling Rick Astley style because we're students and never gonna give up. Who needs a rolling pin when you have empty wine bottles? In Cambridge, there are always empty wine bottles. And empty port bottles. And empty sherry bottles. And empty gin bottles. But gin bottles aren't cylindrical, and so would be bad for rolling dough.

When the wine bottle is useless, we throw it out the window. Defenestration is the only way to dispose of wine bottles. Then the dough goes through our brand spanking new pasta roller, increasing the settings until it's the right thickness.

Then we cut the dough like a boss. Are we finished? Think again. We cut the dough once more, this time with the pasta roller. Like a boss.

This is pasta madness.

It only takes a few minutes to boil as fresh pasta cooks quicker than the dry stuff. In the mean time, we blitz a ton of basil, extra virgin olive oil, parmesan, pine nuts and garlic into submission for a smooth pesto. We also heat through some passata for extra variety.

But wait, I bet you didn't see this coming.

It's the motherquacking Italian flag... buon appetito.

Next time on Epic SMBC, we roast a pig on a bonfire.

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If you were wondering why there hasn't been an SMBC in quite a while, it's because with the new academic year, the three of us (PC, Hangman and The Shok) have moved into separate housing...! OK so it's only like 3 minutes walk between all of us. We'll do something again soon!

Lemon and Blueberry Cake

My goodness it's been far too long since I did this blogging thing. Life is busy etc, you all know how it is. Just a fantastic little recipe I found at Joy of Baking which I whipped together (literally) at 12am today, since I had two spare lemons and Wednesday is Problem Session day (aka Cake day) in our research group.

Despite not having a bread-loaf tin, I have a cake tin of the same volume as described in the recipe, except far flatter and wider... still came out lemony and delicious! Joy of Baking is amazing. (It's like the Organic Syntheses of the baking world)

Protip: I made extra of the lemon glaze - strangely delicious on vanilla ice-cream

Ingredients:
Cake Batter:
1 1/2 cups (195 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons (85 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup (150 grams) granulated white sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
1/2 cup (120 ml) milk
1 cup fresh blueberries

Lemon Glaze:
1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated white sugar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Recipe:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C) and place the oven rack in the center of the oven. Butter (or spray with a non stick vegetable spray) the bottom and sides of a loaf pan (9 x 5 x 3 inch) (23 x 13 x 8 cm).   In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.

In the bowl of your electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, beat the butter until softened (about 1 minute). Add the sugar and continue to beat until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the vanilla extract and lemon zest. With the mixer on low, add the flour mixture (in three additions) and milk (in two additions) alternately, starting and ending with the flour. Mix only until combined. Gently fold in the blueberries.

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and bake for about 55 to 65 minutes, or until the bread is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, bring the 1/4 cup (50 grams) of sugar and the 2 tablespoons of lemon juice to a boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves.  When the bread is done, remove from oven and place on a wire rack. Pierce the hot loaf all over with a wooden skewer or toothpick and then brush the top of the loaf with the hot lemon glaze. Cool the loaf in the pan for about 30 minutes then remove from pan and let cool completely on a wire rack.

This bread is best served on the day it is made.

SMBC #7 - Homemade Pizza

After the ridiculous excesses of our previous SMBC, M&M decided that it would be a fantastic idea if we all made him pizza all made pizza together from scratch. As our usual kitchen didn't have an oven, we packed our things and headed to the communal BA kitchen to bake up a storm.

Going on a recipe from PC's mum, the pizza dough was made by mixing:
- 600 g flour
- 1 cup milk
- 1/2 cup lukewarm water
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 sachet of dried yeast (or cube of fresh yeast if available)
- salt

Disclaimer: PC says this isn't the traditional Italian recipe for pizza dough - the real thing has a specific type of flour and no milk... apparently you can google it.

Once the dough has risen, it can be rolled out and shaped to your hearts desire.

We tried two different methods after this:
- either baking the bases first, then adding the toppings and rebaking, or
- adding the toppings to the raw bases and baking all at once
The first resulted in a crispier lighter base, but the second is easier, so I can't recommend one over the other.

Baking the pizzas bases first really makes them puff up, almost like lebanese pita bread.

The tomato sauce was simply a mix of tinned tomatoes, lots of garlic, rosemary, oregano, olive oil, salt and pepper.

Our collection of toppings included traditional ingredients like mozarella, basil, olives, red onion and peppers capsicum, as well as some less typical ingredients such as tuna, feta cheese and (heaven forbid) sweet corn.

Baked until brown, then best eaten immediately! Few things are better than melted mozzarella straight from the oven...

Here are some mugshots from the pizza gallery:

The old favourite, the margerhita.

A few more toppings: olives, zucchini, capsicum, red onion, capers.

Tuna. Is that weird?

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We haven't had an SMBC post in ages - we actually did this quite a while ago, plus one other thing that I'm going to post up next in a back-to-back of SMBC posts! And this next one is going to be the last SMBC for the academic year 2010-2011, so don't miss it! (especially the awesome video in the next one, courtesy of M&M...)

The Big Bake-Off (Part 2)

Last time on The Big Bake-Off...

Tasting and Judgement
On the panel today we have eight mathematicians including The Shok, a physicist (PC) and the chairman M+M himself.

Cakes can be awarded a maximum of 100 points: 50 for taste, 25 for creativity and 25 for presentation.

And now for the verdict. In this chocolate, fruit and cream cake battle, we've seen both chefs go at it for hours to create M+M's dream dessertland. Will it be the defending champion, the express precision of the TGV, or does the food blogger steal a win from left field? Who takes it? Who's cuisine reigns supreme?

...


And the scores for YH are as follows:
Taste = 423/500
Creativity = 188/250
Presentation = 191/250
Total = 802/1000

Now for the TGV:
Taste = 452/500
Creativity = 233/250
Presentation = 216/250
Total = 901/1000

The winner is TGV with her amazing croquembouche!

The Twist
But wait, did I not say that there were 8 mathematicians on the panel, including one statistician? A quick t-test on Excel revealed that in fact the results were not statistically significant (p > 0.05).

Does this mean TGV didn't win/I didn't lose? Well, even if statistically there's more than 5% doubt about the result, it was quite clear to everyone that  TGV definitely won the day, no doubt about it! Although clearly this calls for further experiments (ie. bakeoffs!) to increase the sample size and get a statistically significant result...

The Recipes
Alrighty, enough fooling around... here are the recipes for the different parts of the cakes, mostly adapted from a bunch of different food blogs!

The Secret Picture [kinda like the Secret Sound on old radio shows]... What is it? (10 points)

1. Chocolate Cherry Cake based on Not Quite Nigella
Melt 180 g butter, 140 g dark chocolate, 1 cup water, 3/4 cup vegetable oil and 60 mL coffee in a pan until melted.

Mix 3 cups flour, 3 cups caster sugar and 3/4 cup cocoa. Add melted chocolate/butter mixture to this dry mixture.

Mix in 3 eggs, one at a time. Then add 3/4 cup buttermilk (I used regular milk + juice of half a lemon)

Fold in a splash of vanilla essence, 2 tsp cinnamon, 2 tsp baking soda, 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper, pinch of salt and 20 chopped cherries.

Pour into baking tin and bake for ~50-60 minutes at 180 deg C.

(If I had 2 baking tins, it would be easier to split the batter into two tins rather than have to cut the cake into layers layer. Plus, the amount is too much for one tin - it overflowed in mine!)

2. Buttercream Frosting from Sweetapolita
Place 5 egg whites and 1 cup caster sugar into a very clean (any traces of grease will kill the egg whites) mixer bowl. Heat over a pot of boiling water whilst whisking until the sugar dissolves and the foam is hot. Keep whisking until thick and glossy.

Then with 450 g butter softened at room temp, add it in small chunks whilst whisking until a silky smooth texture is achieved. Add a splash of vanilla essence and pinch of salt. Refrigerate.

3. Candy Floss from Cooking Books
Add 400 g sugar, 1/2 cup water, and 1/4 cup honey in a saucepan and heat the bejeezus out of it.

Meanwhile, set up two skewers over the edge of a table, weighed down at one end. Place some newspaper or similar on the floor to catch the mess...

When it starts becoming thick and very bubbly, test it out by dipping a fork into the caramel. Bring it over the skewers and shake it back and forth. If the dripping liquid caramel forms strings which solidify over the skewers, all good!

4. Chocolate Cherries
Heat 125 mL cream in a saucepan until almost but not boiling. Pour over 250 g of chopped up dark chocolate. Mix with a fork until smooth. Leave in fridge to cool.

When cooled but still workable, take a spoonful of ganache, stud with a hazelnut, shape into a ball around the nut. Roll the ball in icing sugar. Stick a cherry stalk into the top.

Heat chopped cherries and sugar in a saucepan until reduced to a thick liquid. Use this liquid to coat the fake cherries.

5. Raspberry Jam
Heat raspberries and sugar in a saucepan with a squeeze of lemon juice until reduced to a jam consistency.

6. Ganache Drizzle
Same as the ganache in number 4, except use equal amounts of cream and chocolate (1 cup, 250 g).

7. Assembly
Cut the top off the baked cake so that it is flat. Then cut cake horizontally into 2 layers (difficult!). Coat the first layer with raspberry jam, then sandwich with second layer. Coat the whole thing with some of the frosting. Refrigerate for 10 minutes. Then use the rest of the frosting to do a second coat. Refrigerate again for 20 minutes.
 
Drizzle cake with ganache until it drips down the sides. Top with fruit, chocolate cherries, candy floss and some chocolate shavings (scrape a chocolate block with a knife).

Breathe a sigh of relief.

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Hope you enjoyed this two-part Bake-Off series!

On a totally different note, I'm in the process of writing BA dinner menus for the Michaelmas term. If you have any ideas, let me know!

The Big Bake-Off (Part 1)

Allez cuisine! The heat will be on...

The Intro
Five weeks ago, a man's fantasy became reality in a form never seen before: Pearce Hostel Kitchen Stadium, a giant cooking arena. The motivation for spending his fortune (*cough cough*) to create Kitchen Stadium was to encourage others to bake cakes for him, true artistic creations which he would then devour himself. To realise his dream, he started choosing the top student chefs from all Cambridge, and he named his students the Iron Grad Students, invincible grads of culinary skills.

The Contenders

In the red corner, we have yours truly, food blogger with Hungry the Ate, and a self-confessed novice at baking. Quite the expert at eating though. Semper Eat'em!
Pre-bakeoff quote: "The last thing I put in an oven was some round bottom flasks in my lab which needed drying."

And in the blue corner, it's the defending champion, known only as the TGV. She's travelling at the speed of light, baking at 200 degrees, that's why they call her Miss Farenheit. Reputed to be able to execute a recipe perfectly the first time she tries dominates it.
Pre-bakeoff quote: "Tell him I'm using tomatoes. Tomato is a fruit. Psyche!" (may be fictional)

The Theme Ingredient
Chairman M+M unveils the theme ingredient for this battle... kyo no tema wa, kore desu:

As it happens, blackforest cake is vetoed as a theme for being too restricted. So the theme is reannounced:

Any cake with chocolate, fruit and cream!

The Battle
It's 3pm on a Saturday, so bang a gong and we are on in this epic cake battle! The early going seems to be a little rough for the challenger. It appears that YH has underestimated just how much his cake will rise - it's like a little vomcano giving rise to a second smaller cake at the base of the oven. Incredible!

YH: And then I just chundered everywah... disgusting.

Meanwhile on the human bullet train, the TGV appears to be making plenty of noise with an electric mixer. Out comes some wonderfully coloured raspberry panna cotta:

TGV panna cotta in a box

Back to the challenger, and he seems to be making faux cherries! I can report that the 'seed' is a hazelnut, hidden within chocolate truffle ganache and coated with cherry glaze.

Faux cherries by YH

Returning to the other side, it looks as though TGV's plans are starting to become clear after a serious profiterole manufacturing task. The choux pastries are filled with the panna cotta we saw before, and coated in chocolate. My mouth is beginning to water already...

TGV is a profiterole-making machine

In YH's kitchen, some serious layer action going on - it looks like a coating of raspberry jam is going down.

YH lays down the law, and the raspberries

TGV is almost done with her croquembouche, assembling the profiteroles with fruit and caramel.

TGV's tower of yum

The last minute decorations are happening on YH's side as well. It's a case of situation substitution with the candy floss, using honey instead of corn syrup, but it looks like the bet has paid off!

Shiny sugar strings on YH's side

And that's it, the cake baking battle is O-VAH!!!

The Final Products!
The challenger YH presents a dark chocolate cake flavoured with a hint of coffee, cayenne pepper and cinnamon, sandwiching a layer of fruity raspberry reduction. The whole affair is coated in vanilla buttercream frosting, doused with liquid chocolate ganache and topped with a sugar nest of faux cherries.

TGV counters with an immaculate croquembouche of chocolate profiteroles filled with a raspberry panna cotta. The entire profiterole stack is studded with cherries, raspberries, mulberries and strawberries, and wrapped up together in golden strings of caramel floss.

The Verdict
What do you think the result will be? You'll have to wait until next time, on Part 2 of the Big Bake-Off!

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I figured this was pretty long so I've split it up into two. Part 2 will have the judging criteria, scores, statistical analysis (yeah baby) and recipes for my cake at least (I don't have TGV's recipe unfortunately).

Apologies if you aren't familiar with the original dubbed Japanese Iron Chef. Wait, why am I apologising? Shame on you! Go watch it now. It's awesome, I promise you.

Stay tuned!