[aaronatthedoublef]

Thanks everyone. I thought I had a line on it from a site called thekitchn.com but it's not there. Still they have some interesting recipes and techniques.

I was in New York yesterday with 10 minutes before my train and did a quick run through Grand Central station. The three bakeries I saw all appeared to have the six strand braid but there is something they do that give them more variety in height than I can get.

I'll try and contact the deli in Houston. I may also see if I can spend a week with a bakery in New York or Boston learning how they do it.

I have some challah defrosting and I'll try a six strand braid sometime this weekend (even though it should be for tonight).

Thanks again

[aaronatthedoublef]

Thanks BA. I don't have that. I have several books, one even dedicated to challah. I think I'll just have to keep watching the movie on Amazon until I figure it out.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Whole Foods makes there challah a couple hours from me. I may head up there to see if they will show me unless I can find a place that does it closer.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Thanks IC. I tried YouTube and have not found it yet. That doesn't mean it's not there, just that I have not found it.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I had a challah class at the temple this morning. It's interesting. This was with adults and they were more nervous about this than the kids. It was funny to see them carefully measuring the length of their ropes. Of course their braids were tighter and loaves prettier but I had enough dough to make six loaves and they only wanted to make three. Add that to the dough I made for the demo in class and I have enough challah for a couple of months (actually three months because Passover starts in a couple weeks).

I made pancakes and waffles this morning. I switched up my recipe which used to be white pastry flour and put in half WW pastry flour. No one complained. My 13 year old ate two waffles at one time and I am not sure he even tasted them he ate so fast. And he is too skinny to buy pants for to boot!

I'm making pizza tonight with my regular dough and a modified St. Louis style crust. It's half WW pastry flour and half bread flour. I subbed in honey for the corn syrup and used two tablespoons of olive oil instead of two teaspoons. I'll let you know how it turns out.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 5 months ago by aaronatthedoublef.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I salvaged my unrisen challah from a few weeks ago thanks to the suggestions from everyone. I mixed some yeast with some water and sugar, let it activate and then kneaded it into the dough. I should have done this in a bowl and not on the counter. Or maybe added some flour to thicken it first.

But the dough rose nicely and I made 18 four ounce rolls from it.

After tasting, apparently I left out the salt too! Oh well...

[aaronatthedoublef]

My parchment says it's rated to 500. Until I adjust the thermostat I can only get my oven up to about 475. It still browns up quite a bit where it is not covered with pizza. I usually pull it out after the crust has set and I am currently down to using two sheets of parchment to make five or six pizzas. Each pizza is about 14 inches in diameter.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Another interesting article here. Grocery prices are going down. Across the board.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Well, at least we aren't Venezuela (yet).

[aaronatthedoublef]

Len, how did the pizza taste? I'm trying new things to push my family beyond the usual. But my wife does not like rye. One of my sons does and the other two kids are ambivalent.

Here is an article I found about Ron Santo's Pizzerias... Doesn't talk about the frozen pizzas though. I remember Mr. Santo well but have no recollection of his pizza. But then I'm a fifth generation South Side White Sox fan!

[aaronatthedoublef]

I made what we refer to as chicken maggots (chicken nuggets). The bread crumbs were crumbs we made from leftover, stale bread and my three year old turned up her nose at them. Her big brothers both liked them though. Of course they're at the age that they like anything with enough catsup.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Len, I think you are the king of the rye bread!

So far all I've done this week is pizza again. The one thing I changed was I added some fontina to the usual mozzarella. I expected big complaints but no one noticed one way or the other.

Next week I will try a St. Louis style crust again. I have few ideas I want to try and I'll report the results back here.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 6 months ago by aaronatthedoublef.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Here is a very comprehensive list of food days.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Amazon has it for $3/lb. Kind of expensive...

[aaronatthedoublef]

BA, what a cool idea to bake off extra pancake batter as muffins. I just always make extra pancakes and freeze them.

How sweet are the hotcakes? My batter has just a tbl of sugar at this point because I know my kids will drown them with syrup.

Mike, I will look for first clear flour. I've never seen it in the grocery store but I'll check Walmart (which actually has a huge baking aisle) the next time I'm there. My chef friends will get me things too.

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