STIR THE POTS

Bostock

Leavng the army as a cook, my first lessons in a traditional working kitchen was as a prep cook. My duties were repetetive and monotonous, not the glamour I had imagined. Thankfully the army gave me that experience of just following orders, a mindset that allows you to pick your battles for independence. All to say, even as a lowly prep cook, I managed to absorb some interesting tidbits in between screams from the chefs, pots clanging at my feet, and the stove's hot fire always threatening to burn one's skin. 

One day I was promoted, to breakfast cook, besides learning how to make a real French omelette over the course of days, my first duty was to get my chefs morning breakfast, which included something called "bostock"  

The head of the kitchen, Chef Jean Michel, was strict about having a daily Bostock, a classic recipe from the pastry chef, Clive Ramsey, who made these amazing confections. A slice of rich brioche covered in almond paste, flaked almonds and drenched in a shiny simple syrup.Try one, and that simple set of ingredients leaves a delight that is unforgettable. Here's a batch I made in the last week. 

Tamales

Fall is the season for tamales, hallacas or humitas, three more treats from our South American cousins.  I could eat any of these, year round. Made from corn meal mixed to a masa, they are filled with meat, vegetables and steamed for a comforting meal. Below are some pork tamales I made for my wife's friends. 

The recipe was loosely based on my favorite masa recipe from Rick Bayless's book, and the filling was inspired by Norman Van Aiken's rendition for  Venezuelan hallacas from The Cook's book. This is a versatile and forgiving food, very easy to make. Fillings can be customized without feeling you have to be culturally or politically correct. It's food for heaven's sake!

Olive bread, part two

Since my last olive bread, I decided to give Chad Robertson's Tartine version a try. Lately I've experimented with various feedings, hydration levels ranging from liquid levain to drier 50-80 percent levains. Recently, I settled back to my old stand by from Mick Hartley's early lessons in levain maintenance; a ratio of one part levain, one part water, and one part flour.

I didn't have lemons for this dough like was suggested in Tartine book, but I thought oranges would work, as  the French oil cured olives were from Provençe. I tossed in some flax seeds along with toasted walnuts, so this loaf isn't just olive flavors. I may even try some lavendar next time.

Olive bread, Part 1.

The olive bread above was made with a formula originating from my short summer stint at Bouley Bakery, a great place now defunct. Those late night Fridays after a regualar eight hours at work were difficult, but I was able to get some insight on a totally different perspective - the baker's shift. Just watching the bakers pitting endless amounts of olives for the next day's batch of bread, all the while tending the nights bake, was a lesson and a reason to go back and try this loaf.

 

Olive bread

 levain

My levain build is a two stage feed. 100 Percent flour, water and 50% starter.

Dough

20% levain

90% Bread flour

10% rye (medium or whole grain)

50% water

2% salt

35% Olives

10% Olive oil

 

Quark Früchte küchen

Whenever I visit my sister Rachi in Switzerland, there is always for a new treat to discover. One summer we were welcomed to the table, and after a wonderful dinner a huge square cake pan appeared. Within minutes, four adults and three children had devoured the creation, which turned out to be a cheese cake. Only this had virtually no sugar, save a pinch of vanilla sugar and some Dr. Oeteker pudding powder, and a dough that was equal parts, sugar, flour, butter and only one egg. Besides spelt, the most interesting aspect of it was its central ingredient, quark.

Quark is like yogurt, ricotta, and American cottage cheese which are produced with lactic acid and cultures, the whey is removed to arrive at a soft creamy texture. Quite often the curd is stirred to get the right consistency, creamy and soft resembling fromage frais, farmer cheese to you and me.

 

 

Quark Früchte Küchen

Dough

250g Flour (I used spelt)

250g Butter

250g Sugar (granulated)

1 Egg

Rum to taste.

Beat butter and sugar till soft and sugar dissolves. Add in egg till incorporated. Fold in flour till well amalgamated and chill for 1 hour.

10" Sqaure or Round Spring form pan, no butter of flouring pan.

Filling:

500g Quark

2 eggs

Vanilla sugar

Vanilla pudding poweder (Dr. Oeteker)

1Tblsp. Cornstarch

180 gr Whipped cream

Mix all ingredients till homogenous except the cream, which is folded into the quark mixture. Fruit or Rhubarb can be folded in or as I did, baked on top.

Bake 1 hour 220 C 430 F

Cool on wire rack, serve at room temperature.

Spotting some quark at Costco, I set about to make this wonderful treat. My only adaption was to take some ripe Bartlett pears, slicing them to layer once the cheese started to set.  I covered the cake with slices and sugared them up a bit, hoping for some caramelization. Right away the butter riche spelt dough started to fall over itself. But the cheese puffed and wiggled a bit and the dough set brown, and it turned out fine. 

Danke kleine schwester!

Bakes: Pictures

Pumpernickel

 

Pumpernickel is quite often in American baking a different creature then it's forebearer in Germany. For instance the addition of coloring in the form of molasses, cocoa, coffee, and even caramel. Rather then the long cooking in low temperatures that rely solely on the maillard reaction, a non-enzymatic browning similar to caramelization. Or even the addition of an old piece of dough that is toasted and soaked. This particular formula I found amongst my notes from school, (FCI), with lots of parenthesis and half scrawled notes, I reduced the amounts from the usual 10 kilo base recipes we used to make for our classes, which provided for the schools restuarant. This only called for a liquid levain, and just a hint of caramel as far as coloring, the rest was some caraway powder. Quite often, American Pumpernickel is just a rye, with a bit of high gluten wheat to make it a chewier loaf rather then the loaf pan version of many of it's German counterpart. This is all of the above and I am still working out minus better notes on times for bulk, final proof. The majority of hydration is in the wheat liquid starter, and the first effort was minus commercial yeast, so it tended to be a bit dense without that extra quick rise, it's a work in progress for sure.

 

Hurry up and wait....

Often life is filled with parrallels sort of life lessons....one in particular which I learned while serving as a army cook, was the saying, "hurry up and wait." This particular line can be superimposed to my life as a chef and part time baker.... Most often I have to hurry up, then while waiting to finish my work, so I can rush home and mix some bread. And all in weird ways, without a standardized scheduling, without the usual lessons, of slow knead or long proofing, most often it's mix, proof a bit and pop into fridge. I've moaned about this for so long, I never can get accustomed to not having time to make my favorite or new loaves in perfect time. This loaf just above in the photo is an example. It's an old levain bread formula from my days in school, standard, some white flour, bit of wheat, a firm starter. I've made it over and over, but it had a strange feel from out of the oven, almost spongy and too soft, and since I had no bread, I sliced it, and wasn't too impressed. In hindsight I forgot a lesson in bread, slow it down, let it cool, bread needs to mature, let the crumb set and it's a lesson, just like hurry up and wait! Good food takes time.

Casareccio like Bonci

If you haven't heard of Gabriele Bonci, investigate! He's the guru of Roman style pizza, as well as a bread baker. He truly knows dough. Hes' something of a star on Italian daytime TV, with a segment doing all sorts of different things with dough. While imposing in stature, but delicate with dough, his hands express themselves poetically, manipulating the dough with accent and panache.

Since my mind (or hands) haven't yet quite captured his pizza style yet, I'd venture in making a Pane Casareccio, or home style bread. My only adaption was with 100 percent levain, and also discarding commercial yeast. Take a look at the video here. As the maestro says, "Pane (bread) saves lives." So true.

While preparing this early in the morning, I had to go out to shop for what I thought would only be an hour or two, sufficient time for a bulk proof. Not so lucky. It was more like 3.5 hours when I got back. So I knocked back the dough, shaped and retarded it overnight in the fridge.

Next morning, straight into the oven it went even with some trepidation, I decided to leave it without a slash of my lame, giving a rustic look, instead I got a shiny round and brown thing..... Crumb, sensational, even though a bread friend commented about crumbs, " you male hole obsessed bakers should judge a bread by taste and mouth feel rather than just big holes!" Well, taste was amazing, sweet and just a slight acidity, this is a keeper and just worth smearing or layering with good things!

Roggenmischbrot

I have failed baking landbrot bread. All to say, I went 100 percent roggenmischbrot, (100 percent rye, with mixed grains).  Maybe becasue I've been having an omega craving - satisfying it with everything from  pickled herring to Spanish bouquerones. I needed that familiar tang of rye to superimpose on my bites into smoked fish.

The loaves below were baked with a straight-forward formula from that amazing Roggen book by Ines Gromes/ Olaf Bauerman. It's a bit intimidating with German formulas; first the language, the long and short fermentations, the all rye quotient. But I think I did well, even if the crumb is a bit tight. This bread was marvelous, and allowed me to indulge my impatience, quickly slicing off some for a snack of pickled herring and smoked meat with cheese. A great nosh, indeed!

This roggenmisch uses all sorts of different grinds of rye, and is mixed for about 10 minutes, then given a short rest of 20 minutes bulk fermentation. From there I used small loaf pans to make little misches about 360g weight, designed for friends and neighbors. Using a bit of yeast (pretty common in German baking along with the sauerteig), the final ferment was about 70 minutes. Very hot oven, close to 460 F and with some steam.

I baked it for  45-50 minutes, then lowered the temperature to about 420 F until the loaves were nicely brown colored.

 

Quite often with rye, you want to let it rest a day or two wrapped in a towel so the crumb can set.....Not me, this needed something on it, and I was craving a good rye!