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[BakerAunt]

Lunch meat is a quandary. After all the discussion on nitrates, I switched to nitrate-free lunch meats--fine, if refrigeration is close by--but not a good idea if it is not. I then worried about the salt--and the fact that it usually took at least three slices to make a decent sandwich. I finally gave up on lunch meat but will buy the nitrate-free salami for pizza (but the salt is still an issue there).

The healthy choice is to cook your own meat and slice it--and to watch out for whether it has a sodium solution injected into it.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 3 months ago by BakerAunt.

[aaronatthedoublef]

There are two Whole Foods (WF) in town, one with a more skilled butchery than the other. The more skilled butchers have always had bistro steaks and they are labeled as such without the teres major designation. When I was working there I tried finding it on the internet only to find recipes for how to cook steaks like in a bistro - not very useful for helping customers. My more knowledgeable colleagues told me where the cut was located and using diagrams of cattle I figured out where it was from and what it was called.

The second Whole Foods only began carrying this cut recently and they actually have it labeled "teres major" bistro steak but they do not know what the "teres major" is. The people there are good people who try to provide customer service but very few of them go home and study after work (a few in the specialty department do).

I bought roasted turkey and roast beef for my kids lunch. Now I am buying chicken breast and bistro steaks and roasting them myself. It saves some money and I have a little more control over what I am feeding them. And they do not know the difference.

[BakerAunt]

On Tuesday morning, I baked a new recipe, Hearty Barley Muffins, which is in the KAF January 2018 catalog. I made some changes: I reduced the brown sugar from 1/2 to 1/3 cup, and I deleted the ubiquitous tsp. of vanilla. I do not, have and do not want to purchase the "Jammy Bits." Instead, I used 1/3 cup of cinnamon chips. Instead of a cup of nuts, I used 1/2 cup pecans. I baked these as six "Texas-sized" muffins, rather than twelve standard-sized. (I know that I'm going to eat two standard-sized for breakfast, so why not save on greasing small muffin wells? 🙂 ) I baked for 25 minutes. The muffin I ate was excellent warm. I'll see how they are at room temperature tomorrow.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 3 months ago by BakerAunt.

[Mike Nolan]

I get annoyed when stores label cuts with non-standard names that don't give you any idea what primal it comes from. I once saw a big hunk of meat in one of the local stores called a 'steamship roast'. It was in the evening after the butchers had left for the day, so I couldn't ask anybody what it was. I did eventually find it but it is not a recognized cut. (It's the round with the rump cut off, which explained why it was so big.)

I looked in my meat cutting books and did not see bistro steak as a recognized cut from the teres major muscle in the shoulder. It is sometimes called a petite tender or the shoulder tender.

Here's a page on the teres major.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I roasted a chicken. I stuck an orange in the cavity (usually I use a lemon but I didn't have any lemons) and I rubbed butter and salt on the skin.

I also made a bistro steak. Bistro is what they call the cut and not a "bistro" recipe. It's kind of confusing. It is from the teres major which is from the shoulder and sometimes called a shoulder tender. It looks a lot like a tenderloin but is a third the price. The only place I have seen it around here is Whole Foods. It's a nice, tender piece of steak that has good flavor.

I use these for dinner and then use the leftovers for lunches.

Then I made pizza for dinner. Pizza has become our standard Sunday dinner. I usually will make a big batch of dough that will last for two to three pizza nights. I make five pizzas and save some for lunches on Monday.

My wife has a ground turkey recipe for me to make tonight. I hate the texture of raw ground turkey so shaping patties will not be pleasant.

[aaronatthedoublef]

A couple more things... I once worked for a couple of phenomenal pastry chefs. We would all work in the back around a wooden table and one time a half cup of sugar sat in the middle of us. No one knew who it belonged to so the head chef picked it up and dumped it into one of our recipes. And everything was fine. All our product came out tasting good. I only worked there on Saturdays (this was not my paying job but more to learn and for fun) but I watched them experiment on a regular basis to create new things.

Some more tips - when it comes to clean a bowl you've mixed dough in, use cold water. I think this came from Mike and BA (if I'm leaving anyone out, apologies) but I remember a very long thread about it on the old KAF Bakers Circle. But it comes down to the fact that heat activates gluten and makes it harder. I now soak my bowls in cold water for a few hours (or overnight if I'm feeling lazy) then wipe them out with a paper towel and then wash them with soap and warm water.

I, too have started using an instant read thermometer to test for doneness. It has helped quite a bit.

I let my dough do its first rise in plastic roasting bags. I spray them with cooking spray and put them in bowls or buckets. I keep my used bags in a freezer bag with my yeast and when I make a new batch of dough I clean off the frozen bag. I will reuse a bag many times. But recently as I've started making rye with caraway I've noticed the bag taking on the smell of the seeds and the sour rye so I try not to use those bags for other breads that have a more neutral flavor. I'll also cover subsequent rises with the same bags. I started using them because once I was in a hurry and put some bread covered by plastic wrap into a hot oven. The roasting bags won't melt.

I'm looking to see if I can find a spiral dough hook for older KA mixers but it seems they are only available for the 7 qt size (I have 4.5 and 5 quart mixers) and it looks like it has a different locking attachment.

[Mike Nolan]

As someone wrote a while back, keep practicing your breads, eventually you'll eat well, in the mean time the ducks will eat well. 🙂

Seriously, don't be afraid to make mistakes. Eventually you'll learn to recognize problems before they get serious and you'll know what to do to fix them.

That's what professional bakers do every day, because conditions are not the same all the time and mistakes do happen, so you need to be prepared to deal with problems.

I've had a few total disasters, one was probably due to putting in 1 1/2 teaspoons of salt, as the recipe specified, and then putting in ANOTHER 1 1/2 TABLESPOONS of salt instead of sugar! It was a brick and even the birds wouldn't touch it!

The suggestion to use an instant read thermometer is another good one, knowing when the desired internal temperature has been reached is one way to improve your success rate. Eventually you'll recognize by sight, smell or touch (thumping) when your bread is ready.

[wonky]

Blanch...we have all had "failures" along the road to making great breads. But my thought is that it is not a failure if you learned something from it. I do have a professional Kitchen aid, and the recommendation for kneading is speed 2. My old KA, which is more than 40 years old had the "J" hook, but my new machine has the "S" hook. I really like this hook, because the dough does not crawl up the hook like my old machine. I usually knead at speed 2 for 6 to 8 minutes.

Due to limited oven capacity, I usually make two four loaf batches, and hope that they are not all ready to bake at the same time (which has happened) To avoid this, I will often have one batch in the oven, and the other 4 loaf batch in the frig to retard the rise.

If I had to choose only one tool that I would never give up, it would be a scale. Most of King Arthur recipes are now printed by weight and volume. You can also find a very good conversion chart there, so you can convert your volume recipes to weight. You will be amazed at the difference a scale makes.

Most recipe's recommend 2 rises, the initial rise after kneading, and the second rise once you bread is panned. I almost always do 2 initial rises (let your dough rise until doubled, deflate, and let it rise the second time. Portion your dough, let it bench rest for 15 minutes, shape, pan and let rise a third time in the pan. Each time you add an extra rise, your dough will develop more flavor, and will be a more tender, finer crumb. This works especially well for whole grain and partial whole grain breads.

I also add vinegar to my dough, about 2 TBS. to a four loaf batch. Lemon juice works as well. Some bakers use a crushed vitamin C tablet also.

As far as yeast, I also use IDY, added to the flour. No need to "bloom", although that works perfectly well. IDY just eliminates that step. I buy it by the pound transfer it to a freezer container. When I am baking, I take it out of the freezer, measure the correct amount, and place it back in the freezer immediately. Do not let it thaw and freeze, thaw and freeze etc.

The other thing I would recommend, is to add instant dried milk to your dough, about l/4 cup to a 2 loaf recipe.

My other recommendation is to use an instant read thermometer. It takes the guess work out of trying to determine if your loaf is properly baked. Many use the the method of thumping on your bread to determine if it is properly baked, but a thermometer speaks for itself. I usually bake my loaves to about 195 to 200 degrees. it depends on whether you like your bread a little bit more on the moist side, or a little more on the dry side. Some bakers choose to bake to 205 degrees, totally your perferance.

You have gotten some wonderful advice from some of the most experienced, wonderful bakers. We all hope you do well in your new endeavor and enjoy the fruits (or breads) of your labor. .....Wonky

[BakerAunt]

The folks at KAF sent me a list of the known errors and corrections for the KAF Whole Grain Baking cookbook, which is now in its third edition. Mike will likely have to notify them of the one that he has now found, as it is not included. I have copied and pasted the corrections below for those of you who have this baking book (one of my favorites!).

Page 19, Hazelnut Waffles with Pear Compote:
Add to list of ingredients 1 1/2 cups (12 ounces) buttermilk
Add the word buttermilk to the instructions, after the words "melted butter", to read:
...whisk the sugar into the eggs, and whisk in the melted butter, buttermilk and vanilla.

Page 44: Vegetable oil amount should be 1/3 cup, not 1/8. The weight is correct.

Page 45: Moist Bran Muffins; weight for whole wheat flour is incorrect; it should be 10 ounces.

Page 133: change word “Measure” in first line instructions from capital “m” to lower case.

Page 269: Eliminate center paragraph of assembly instructions (It repeats the last two sentences of the paragraph above).

Page 239: Olive and Onion bread: Second paragraph under “prepare the dough” change “knead the olives into it.” To “knead the olives and onions into it.”

Page 347: Soft ‘n Chewy Date squares: no caffeine should be listed in the nutritional info; the recipe has none.

Page 350: Granola Bars: Change baking temperature in heading to 375°F.

Page 378: Cranberry-Cornmeal Cake buttermilk volume should be 2/3 cup, not 1/3. Weight is correct.

Page 412: At the top of the page, add this line: “Gently fold in the flour mixture, using a rubber spatula or whisk.

Page 421: Ingredients reads: "3/4 cup (1 1/2 ounces, 6 ounces) unsalted butter..." should be "3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks, 6 ounces) unsalted butter..."

Page 427: in preheat line, center of page, now reads “Lightly grease and the pan”. Change to “Lightly grease and flour the pan or pans of your choice”

Page 430: Instructions, second line from bottom of page: “fresg” change to “fresh”

Page 583: Grains chart. Change heading that reads “Grain” to Grain (1 cup).

[BakerAunt]

I do not have a Kitchen Aid mixer. I have a Cuisinart (not made anymore). I am hoping some of the people who use the Kitchen Aid to knead wholegrain breads will jump in with their kneading wisdom.

My thought is that speed 2 is fine for mixing but too low for kneading, and that is where you need to be developing the gluten. Of course, it may depend on the age of your KA and what kind of "kneading" attachment it has.

My mixer recommends "2" for initial mixing, then four minutes at 3 for kneading, and I think that the newer KA is similar. Regular dough is kneaded when you can "pull a windowpane." That means you take a small piece of the dough--about the size of a large marble, then use your thumbs and first finger to stretch it out. You should be able to get a thin membrane through which you can see light. I find this works for me with my 50% wholegrain loaves, although not with a rye bread, which has a different texture.

I usually incorporate half the flour (and if it is wholegrain, I start with that half) using the mixer blade. I then let the dough rest for 15 minutes. I switch to the spiral bread hook (Cuisinart pioneered the style that KA now uses, which is one reason that it for a time was Cooks Illustrated top choice), incorporate the rest of the flour, then knead. You may need to experiment to find out what works best with your particular mixer.

[Mike Nolan]

There's a step that some authors recommend called autolyse. This is is a rest during the mixing stage, usually before adding the yeast, that allows the flour to be fully hydrated, ie, absorb all the liquid.

Autolysis was encouraged by Prof. Raymond Calvel, a French baking researcher/instructor who was instrumental in re-energizing the French baking industry after World War II. His book "The Taste of Bread" is an interesting read, but it really isn't a cookbook, there are very few complete recipes in it. He spends several pages just on salt and the role it plays in bread!

The book was written in French ("Le Goût du Pain") but later translated into English. It is fairly expensive, especially in the original French edition.

The variance in steps between recipes and authors is interesting, some of them are probably more a matter of tradition or preference than science. There are baking sites on the Internet that tend to be rather fussy about them, insisting that there is only one RIGHT way to do things. We aren't like that, we don't all follow the same steps, even when making the same recipe. We're happy to share what works for us, and encourage experimentation to find what works best for you.

[chandos]

Thank you both for clarifying the yeast/sugar connection. I mix bread dough at low speed (2 out of 10 speeds) for 5 to 7 minutes. I have never let the dough rest but it makes sense. It sounds like BakerAunt's rest is at the beginning before kneading and Mike's is closer to the end. Should I do both? I only bake one loaf at a time so I would just let all the dough rest before shaping it into the pan? I don't divide the dough into loaves or rolls.

[Mike Nolan]

As BakerAunt says, a little sugar in the proofing water is fine, many recipes even recommend it, as it gives the yeast some sugar to feed on to help it grow. It's only when you have a dough that is very sweet (6% or more sugar relative to the flour weight) that you can start to see sugar inhibiting the yeast growth by depriving it of the water it needs. My mother-in-law always used to put a pinch of flour in the water, that accomplishes pretty much the same thing, though the starch in flour needs to be broken down before the yeast can access the sugar it needs to grow. There are enzymes in yeast that will break the starch down.

An old baker's trick is to add a little vinegar to a recipe, it helps it rise. The acid in the vinegar has the same effect as the enzymes of breaking down the starch into sugar, but is a bit faster.

Here are the steps that Jeffrey Hamelman gives in his book. (Each step is explained in great detail in the book.)

1. Scaling of ingredients
2. Mixing/Kneading
3. Primary (Bulk) Fermentation
4. Folding
5. Dividing
6. Pre-shaping
7. Bench Rest
8. Shaping
9. Final Fermentation
10. Scoring
11. Baking
12. Cooling

Several of these steps can be broken down into multiple stages. For example, it is not unusual to see a recipe that divides the primary bulk rise up into several stages, punching down or folding the dough between each bulk rise period. As I recall, Julia Child's French Baguette recipe has a rise, a punch down, a second rise, a second punch down, and then a third rise.

Different recipes (or different authors) will vary these steps quite a bit. There are some authors/recipes that recommend you fully deflate the dough before dividing it and pre-shaping it, and others that recommend you treat the dough very gently to avoid deflating it.

So, bench rest is the step that comes after you divide the dough up into individual loaves or rolls and pre-shape them and when you do the final shaping. This rest gives the dough time to relax, which helps the final shaping.

[BakerAunt]

I'm making soup on the wood stove for a late lunch, and for lunches throughout the week. It's my usual throw together of carrots, onion, celery, (yellow) bell pepper, garlic, ground turkey, Bob's Red Mill Vegi-Soup (mixture of lentils, split peas, and a bit of barley), along with additional pearl barley. I use my own chicken/turkey stock from the freezer. The seasoning this time is Herbs de Provence from Penzey's (salt-free, by the way). I'll add some minced parsley near the end of the cooking time.

[BakerAunt]

Blanche--it's ok to proof the yeast with a small bit of sugar. The problem only comes in high sugar recipes, as with coffee cakes, sweet rolls, etc.

I guess the next question to ask is how long are you kneading your bread and at what speed?

Also, do you use a rest period when you are mixing? Whole grain flours, once you add liquid take a while to absorb it, so the danger is that you may add too much flour or too little liquid. You might want to give your dough about 15 minutes, after its mixed, to sit covered (I put a towel over the mixer), and then knead it.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 3 months ago by BakerAunt.