[aaronatthedoublef]

Hmmmm... Potato chips and French fries cause cancer... Hmmmm... sounds like a way to scare people out of eating junk food!

[aaronatthedoublef]

Sorry BA. I read through the whole article.

Yes Mike, we should aim for aa National Cake Week. I could actually use Instagram for something for a change.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I see it in the word "article but I'll put it in here:

I just registered for the Clandestine Cake Club. The closest club is in Boston (there are only three in the US) which would be a two hour drive but it might be worth it to stretch my cake muscles again.

[aaronatthedoublef]

BA, Chocomouse, I also have a hazelnut tart recipe. My wife gave it to me many years ago for Thanksgiving because she does not like pecan or pumpkin pie. She actually does not like pie. I think it is from Real Simple.

It uses a chocolate cookie/hazelnut/butter crust that is dead simple to make - just crush everything in the food processor and push it into a tart pan.

The filling is a chocolate ganache which is different from BA's recipe. The measurements are volume not weight so I use volume. I would probably follow whatever is in the recipe I am using. If a recipe has weights and volumes, these days I would probably use weights.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Amazon has had grocery stores and even produce stands I Seattle for a while. They may have had them other places as well. And in big cities (or so I hear because I don't live in one of those places) Amazon which do same day delivery to your door of just about anything they sell. In Seattle and NYC Amazon has restaurant delivery as well (maybe Chicago and LA?).

Whole Foods just started a Peapod-like delivery service here (and if they are doing it here they must be doing it other places).

Walmart still has a better selection and better pricing than either Amazon or WF.

Interesting times. Interesting times.

[aaronatthedoublef]

When I make pie crust I use heavy cream instead of water. It's something a friend of mine taught me and 3-4 tbls sounds about right.

It you were making a ganache with the chocolate chips and cream that usually calls for a 1 to 1 ratio chocolate to cream so it would need a 1/2 cup to go with the 1/2 cup of chocolate. Not sure what the other ingredients would do to that though.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Happy belated birthday KP. Your missives are always entertaining and educational!

[aaronatthedoublef]

Mike, Not sure about the caraway seeds either but in Jewish Deli Rye from Secrets of a Jewish Baker they also add the caraway seeds in the starter not when making the dough. Maybe, as you say, it absorbs some of the water. Maybe it flavors the sponge/starter which gives a stronger flavor in the final product.

BBGA being coastal-centric is fine for me as I am on the East Coast.

BA, I do not use my mixer for bread anymore. It's just too small for anything over four cups of flour (KA rated it for 10 cups), it overflows, and I have to play with it too much and the clean up is way too much. Also, when I was teaching the kids to make bread they all went home and asked their parents to buy a KA mixer. So for the next class I started to do it by hand and now I just have continued that.

The only thing I've used my KA mixer for in recent memory was making whipped cream.

So it is as consistent as I can make it doing it by hand.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Thanks Mike. I am not a BBGA member although it may be a worthwhile investment at this point. And you're right about side-by-side comparisons. I just haven't had the time or the space to make and store multiple doughs at once.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Cass, Mike, BA, Thanks. I appreciate the help and wisdom.

I did not know about patent flours so that is new. I can always use bread flour instead of clear since that is what the original recipe called for. I subbed in clear because reading Secrets of Jewish Baker he recommends clear. I also like the bran left in clear.

I should probably try using bread flour to see the difference in taste and texture.

Also, I made five loaves and only one - the two pound batard - had a blow out. I made three, one pound, round loaves that came out fine.

This is what KAF says about clear flour:

First clear flour is what remains after milling patent flour, giving it a darker color and higher mineral content. Traditionally, Jewish bakeries used first clear flour to bake their rye breads – the protein in first clear balances the lack of gluten in rye flour to give rye breads loftier rise and better chew.
Combine first clear flour with flours that typically produce denser loaves (like whole wheat, rye, or spelt). It'll improve the rise and final texture of your baked goods.

[aaronatthedoublef]

The recipe is at least 20 years old as I've had the cookbook that long. It does not use packets of yeast. It does use a sponge.

Sponge:
1 cup water (increased to 1.5 because I let the sponge go longer and it seemed dry)
1 TBL dry yeast (I use SAF Red)
1/4 cup bread flour (I subbed in first clear)
1 1/4 cups rye
2 TBLs caraway seeds

Dough:
All of the sponge
1/4 cup water
2 tsps. sugar (I used honey)
2 1/2 tsps. salt (I use Morton Kosher)
Approx 3 cups bread flour (again I used first clear)

I doubled all of the above. The taste, color, and texture are good. I made one, big two pound loaf and three smaller one pound loaves. Three slashes in the one ponders and five slashes in the two pounder just to see the aesthetics.

Thanks

[aaronatthedoublef]

Looks good. It sounds a little like a profiterole in a cannoli shell which sounds tasty.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Never tried mini-pies although I keep meaning to. One of my pastry chef friends started a whole individual pie trend in Seattle. I think it would make for a nicer dessert but at Thanksgiving my people want to see a whole pie that is cut into and served. Also if you have different slices of pie on your plate - our family tradition is a little of everything - they run together and so people end up with pecan mixed with pumpkin mixed with chocolate hazelnut all with whipped cream.

KAF's big pecan pie calls for blind baking in their baking book. And I found a good article on blind baking here.

Please let me know how your mini-pies turn out. Maybe I'll try some pies this summer.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I made more rye bread. This time I doubled the recipe and doubled the yeast. TOO MUCH YEAST! The bread has good flavor but my loaves had blow outs.

I made pizza and today I'm making strawberry shortcakes.

[aaronatthedoublef]

The bread is not the star but have you ever had a corned beef sandwich on wimpy, tasteless rye. My goal is to find the happy medium.

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