Mini brioche bread

I haven’t been so excited about food for a long time. The reason why…

Little brioche molds! I’ve found these last Friday and I spend all Saturday looking for a brioche recipe! I even look at some videos online and I never do that! So I knew it was serious. Even though the hubby said no more cooking I had to do it.

My sister in law got me these super cute measurement cups. No more converting cups to grams! Thanks sis!

I’ve found several recipes, some very easy (mix all the ingredients together and you’re good to go) some more time consuming. As much as I would like to go for an easy recipe the pictures of the end product didn’t look as airy and fluffy as I wanted it to be. I wanted to have a brioche that didn’t need like 8 eggs and a ton of butter but still turned out light and fluffy. So I picked this one because most recipes talk about making a sponge first and this recipe seems to describe the steps the easiest:

http://www.food.com/recipe/brioche-51546

I know the 38 steps on the site are quite intimidating, but I’ll break it down in lesser steps to make it easier. Everything is mixed in a stand mixer with a dough hook so there’s really no need to knead it by hand. Also it takes a lot of (resting) time before you can bake the brioche so make sure you either have plenty of time or make one day ahead.

For the about 50 mini brioches or 3 loaves you’ll need to make the sponge first:

Put 1/3 cup of lukewarm milk, 2 1/4 teaspoons of active dry yeast, 1 egg and 1 cup of all purpose flour in a bowl and mix it till everything is blended. There will be lumps of flour in there but don’t worry, this will all smoothen out. Then cover the mixture with 1 cup of flour and set it aside uncovered for about 30-40 minutes.

 

After the resting time you should see some cracks indicating that the yeast is active and doing what it has to do. If you don’t see any cracks this means your yeast is dead and you’ll have to make a new batch.

Now it’s time to add the rest of the ingredients:

-       1/3 cup of sugar

-       1 teaspoon of salt

-       4 room temperature eggs slightly beaten

-       1 package of vanilla sugar (about 1 teaspoon)

-       1 ½ cup of all purpose flour

-       185 grams of unsalted room temperature butter (I know the recipe talks about 6 ounces (about 170 gram) but I use a bit more)

Add everything to the sponge mixture except for the butter and ½ cup of flour. Mix it in your stand mixer with the dough hook on low till medium speed till all the flour is incorporated then add the ½ cup of flour and mix it again for about 15 minutes till you have a smooth dough. Make sure you stop every now and then to scrape down the sides and the hook. A lot of dough will get stuck and try to work their way up, just stop and push it back down. I don’t think I made the 15 minutes since my stand mixer was bumping up and down like crazy and I didn’t want to overwork the machine. So I stopped when they dough got together and wrapped itself around the hook. At this point the dough won’t be stuck to the sides either.

Now it’s time to incorporate the butter. Since it is room temperature it’s easier to mix it in the dough. Mix it tablespoon by tablespoon till all the butter is incorporated. Mix it till the dough wraps itself around the hook again and slaps to the sides of the bowl. If needed add some more flour.

Butter a big bowl and pour the dough in. It should be elastic and shiny. Cover it with plastic wrap and let it rest at room temperature for about 2-2 1/2 hours or till it doubles in volume.

Then leave the dough in the bowl but use your fingers to tuck the sides in. Work your way around the dough till you tucked it all in and all the air is out. Then cover it again and let it rest in the fridge for at least 4-6 hours, but preferably overnight.

The next day the dough double in size again and is ready for baking.

Since I had so much dough there was room for experimenting. I made 20 mini brioches in a brioche mold and 20 in my trusted mini muffin molds. And even then there was some dough left, so I chopped some dark chocolate and filled the dough to make some chocolate brioche.

After forming the bread it had to rest for about 1 hour or till it doubled in volume again.

 

Brush it with some egg wash and bake it in a preheated oven (190C degrees as in the recipe is way too hot, 170C degrees is better) for about 15-25 minutes till they are golden. By now the house smells like a French bakery!

The brioche was so light and fluffy. This recipe is a winner! I’ve never made brioche before so if can do it…everyone can!

PS: if you like your brioche sweet you should add some more sugar. For me it wasn’t sweet enough!

Pesto Artisan bread

The other day Akheela from Torview won this great book “Artisan bread in five minutes a day” and she was so kind to share an artisan bread recipe with us. She also included a video from the authors showing how to make this very easy master dough. After seeing the video I was blown away. Could it really be this easy to make homemade bread? Can it be; no more fiddling with kneading and difficult ingredients?

I have to admit. I’ve see so many wonderful recipes and some I actually want to try myself...but I’ve never got to do it. This bread was just calling my name. So I decided to give it a try. If it’s really this easy, I will have homemade bread on the table more often.

I used the same recipe, but modified it to make it more convenient for me as European and American measurements are different.

All you need for about 4 loafs of bread is:

- 1,5 tablespoon yeast (1,5 package)

- 1,5 tablespoon salt

- 750 ml lukewarm water (* 3 cups of lukewarm water)

- 1 kilo flour (* 6,5 cups of flour)

- flour for dusting

- optional: cornmeal to put on the bottom

- 1 tablespoon of pesto

Four loafs of bread might be a bit too much to bake in one time, but if you refrigerate this dough you can use it up to 2 weeks. How great is that?

I put all the ingredients (flour in last) in a big bowl and use a wooden spoon to mix the flour in. The dough will stay very wet and that’s what it supposes to be.

Although it looks very lumpy and wet resist your adding more flour. Things will be ok, I promise.

As I wanted to experiment a bit with the dough I put about half of it in a different bowl. To this half I added one big tablespoon of homemade pesto.

 

I stirred it around a little, not incorporate it completely.

Then it was time to sit back and relax for about 2 hours so the dough could rice. I left it uncovered on the counter.

 

After 2 hours the dough almost doubled in size and was still wet, but dry enough to form some loafs. As I had way too much dough I stored the plain half in the fridge. It will continue to rise so make sure there is plenty of room for them to do so.  

 

I sprinkled some flour on top and on my hands and pulled off a piece of dough as big as a grapefruit. According to the authors this should be enough for a small family. By tucking the top to the bottom I formed a round loaf. On a flat surface I put some flour (as I didn't have any cornmeal) and place the dough there so it could rise for another 20-40 minutes. I don't have a pizza stone or any other flat surface so I use the bottom of a cake pan. Also I used a rectangle cake pan to put the rest of the dough in.

I preheated the oven on 230C degrees and put an empty tray on the bottom so I could create steam. Before the bread went in I dusted it with some flour and used a scissor to cut an “X” the top of the round dough and to make some cuts in the rectangle dough. Right after the bread is in the oven (in the middle) I poured a cup of hot water in the bottom tray and trapped the steam in.

The round bread was done in about 25 minutes. I baked the square loaf a bit longer; 35 minutes. When the round bread came out the X was completely gone. Next time I should cut it deeper.

They say not to cut the bread when it’s warm…and they were right. I cut it straight out of the oven and although it had a nice hint of pesto, the inside was a bit dense. But the crust was wonderful! So crunchy! It reminded me so much of a ciabatta bread.

This recipe is definitely a keeper. Akheela thank you so much for sharing this recipe and for showing us that it’s a piece of cake to make homemade bread!

Steamed French bread

Ooho I did something stupid and now I lost the whole post!! I will try to redo it, but if it looks different then the first time you all know why…

I bought some French bread but didn’t have the time to eat it yet. Well I did have the time, but I didn’t feel like eating it. And it’s been sitting here since Saturday. So you can imagine how hard it is by now. As you all know I am not a big fan of wasting food so I’m glad I remembered this dish I had in Vietnam. It was steamed French bread topped with meat. I though I’d give it a try.

I have a steamer that I rarely use so this was a good opportunity. I sliced the bread in about 3-4 cm pieces and piled them in the steamer. They were in there for about 30 minutes. This gave me enough time to prepare the rest.

I soaked a handful dried mushrooms in hot water and when they were dehydrated I gave them a rough chop.

I had 3 hamburgers and deicide to use them for the stuffing. I started with sautéing one chopped onion and 3 gloves of garlic. When they started to brown I added the hamburgers and I used a spatula to break them up in little pieces.

Then I added some salt, pepper, some dashes of worcestershire sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil and some sweet soy sauce. The mushrooms went in and half a cup of water. Last taste test before I let it cook till the water reduced a bit.

In the meantime I sliced one onion in half rings and fried them in some oil. When they crisped up I drained them in a strainer and reused the oil to sauté some chopped spring onion.

By this time the bread should be done. As I pilled 2 or 3 layers of bread in my steamer the bottom ones came out a bit soggy. Just remove the soggy part and place that piece bottoms down.

I started to put a layer of meat right on the bread. Make sure you get all the sauce on the bread as well. Then it was time for the crispy onions and top it off with some sautéed spring onions.

It tasted great! The bread was soft and went really well with the meat and the onions.

It was a great way of using your 1, 2, 3 days old bread.

Ps: This is the steamer I use. Of course it had a lid so all the steam can come out. I had it sitting in my pantry catching dust. I guess I need to find new ways to use it more often.