Mike Nolan
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Donuts is one of those things I've not attempted, because we don't have a deep fat fryer and LaMars makes such great donuts, why mess with them?
I remember my sister making donuts back in the 50's, but the nearest bakery was some 15 miles away. While I"m sure they made donuts there, what I remember were the cream horns, puff pastry filled with what was probably stabilized whipped cream and covered with powder sugar that left a dusting of powdered sugar on your hands, face and clothes when you ate them, but they were good! They also made a Vienna bread that you could smell a half block away.
Unless you make a trip to Canada or other places where they are sold, you're not likely to be aware of this. People caught sneaking them into the US can be fined and the Kinder Eggs seized by Customs agents.
Buttermilk does seem to be thicker than whole milk, although according to the USDA both are around 87% water.
Here the flour shelves aren't empty, the last time I was at Hy-Vee they had lot of KAF AP but I didn't see any KAF Bread flour, and they had several other brands including two house brands.
My older son has been doing baking out of the updated 'artisan bread in 5 minutes a day' book. Yesterday he baked a boule and a loaf out on his gas grill. The boule might have been a little underdone in the center, but our granddaughter thinks both are pretty good.
The last wheat storage report said wheat supplies were fairly normal. This article is forecasting a record wheat crop this season:
wheat supplyThere may continue to be intermittent channel shortages, as this is the time of year when home flour usage is usually at a low point.
We picked up some lettuce at the farmer's market, along with some gyros for lunch, so we'll have salad and leftover gyros for supper, and left-over pizza if that's not enough.
My stuffed pan pizza came out pretty good, but I should have used the shorter skillet. The flat pizza stuck to the baking stone, I probably didn't use enough cornmeal under it. Next time I'll do it on parchment.
The pizza bread was really good, the baguettes I've been making work very well for that. The pepperoni was a bit strong, though, I need to look for a milder brand. (We used to use Oscar Meyer, but I think they changed the formula a year or so ago, adding garlic.)
I thought the virtual pizza party was a big success, I think we should plan another virtual gathering. One possibility would be a virtual brunch, another would be a virtual afternoon (low) or early evening (high) tea.
Stuffed pizza and pan pizza have one thing in common, they aren't flat, so they need a pan with sides. But a stuffed pizza has at least two layers of dough, and I've seen a few that had three. (Beyond three and it is more of a lasagna, IMHO.)
The original Nancy's claimed to be the originator of the stuffed pizza, but at least one other north-side Chicago pizzeria had a similar pizza in the late 60's. The first time I went to Nancy's was after they had moved, because of urban renovation of their original location. A lot of the old crowd (including, reportedly, some Chicago gangsters) didn't follow them to the new location.
I don't remember Giordano's being in a house, I do remember a three hour wait for a table at a place on the far South side in 1969, but all I really remember was we had to park about 4 blocks away in mid-winter. (For us North-siders, it was a really long trip, especially when you pack 6 college students in a car.)
I was always more of a fan of thin crust pizza, which was more common on the North side. There was one place near south campus that Northwestern students favored that had a cracker-like crust that tasted a bit like matzoh, but my favorite was a hole-in-the-wall place in south Evanston that would deliver to campus. I think they had just one table, and it was mainly for those who were walk-in customers waiting for their pizza to get done so they could carry it out. I've never duplicated their sauce or crust, not sure what made them unique.
Chicago Magazine had a feature story on the '5 types of Chicago Pizza' back in the early 70's, I remember reading an early draft of it and having discussions with their features editor (a chess buddy) over whether it should be 5 or 7 types! (I was in negotiations to do 'casual dining' restaurant reviews for them when we decided to move to Nebraska, the person who eventually got that position was probably a better writer than I am anyway.)
I picked up some garlic-free Hillshire Farms pepperoni yesterday, I'm hoping it is fairly mild. (Most of their sausages are.)
It may have been what everyone else calls SAF Red, I don't normally buy SAF yeast, so I'm not familiar with their packaging.
I recently learned that there is a SAF Purple yeast, intended for fast rise commercial uses. I doubt it shows up in stores.
I made some levain in preparation for making baguettes tomorrow, and I also made the pizza dough for tomorrow night's pizza party.
It's a Chicago thing, even more decadent than pan pizza.
Divide the dough into 2 parts, one of them using 2/3 of the dough.
Take a deep pan (a deep cast iron skillet works well), line it with the larger piece of dough all the way to the rim, put in sauce, cheese and other toppings, cover that with the smaller piece of dough, poke some vent holes, then put on more sauce, toppings and cheese.
I like to put ricotta cheese and spinach in the lower layer of sauce.
Bake until the top edges are well done. Let cool before slicing. One slice is usually plenty, even our sons had trouble getting through a full second slice as teenagers.
Chocolate, if it is stored properly, lasts a very long time, several years. Even if the outer surface develops a white powdery look (fat bloom), it is still edible and if melted, as would occur when you bake pain au chocolat, you won't know the blooming had occurred.
Like any fat, cocoa butter can go rancid, but it is not common. A bigger problem is bugs, they like chocolate. (So do mice, as I found out a few weeks ago.)
Cocoa butter has six states, alpha-1 through alpha-6; the higher the number, the higher the melting point.
The normal state of the cocoa butter in well-tempered chocolate is alpha-5, which is solid at room temperature but melts in the low 90's, so it melts on the tongue. The alpha-6 state can develop if chocolate sits for many months, it is a bit harder than alpha-5, so the chocolate can lose its ability to have a clean 'snap'.
We are having burgers on the grill.
Hy Vee had SAF Blue (IDY) in a 1 pound package today, they also had Red Star cake yeast in 2 ounce packages in the butter section. I bought one even though it was insanely overpriced ($2.99), just because I've got one or two recipes I'd like to try with cake yeast.
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