Category: Bread

Bread

• In a small bowl combine 1/4 cup water, yeast and one teaspoon of honey. Stir and let it stand until it is foamy. This takes around 5 minutes.
• In the bowl of your mixer, with a dough hook, combine bread flour and salt. With the mixer on low slowly pour in the yeast mixture. When combined, add the rest of the honey, remaining water (1 1/2cup) and half a cup of the olive oil. Mix it on medium speed for 3-4 minutes.
• Grease a bowl with olive oil. Place the dough in the greased bowl. Cover and let it rest in a warm, draft free area until it is doubled in size. This takes around an hour.
• Drizzle 2 tablespoon of olive oil in a rimmed sheet pan that is about 17×13 inches.
• After the first rise, punch the dough down to release the air. Place the dough on the prepared sheet pan and shape the dough into a rectangle. The dough should be a 1/2 inch thick.
• Cover the dough with cling wrap and place it in a warm draft free area on your counter until it is doubled in size. This takes about 1 hour.
• Preheat your oven to 400 degrees Farhenheit.
• After the second rise, use your fingers to poke and create deep dents in the dough. Then drizzle with a tablespoon of olive oil and top with fresh rosemary and sea salt. You can bake it now or add extra toppings.

Topping

• Cook your bacon to a crisp and let them rest on a paper towel.
• Thinly slice your potatoes and grate your cheese. Add your extra toppings to the bread.

Baking.

• Bake the focaccia until it is slightly golden and cooked through. This takes around 20 minutes.
• Let it cool on the cooling rack.

Night before

• Mix salt and flour in a big mixing bowl
• Add the starter and gently mix in with spatula.
• Stir in the water and mix with hand until the dough is well combined. Around a minute.
• Cover the dough with cling wrap and let it rest for 30 minutes in a draft free and warm place.
• After 30 minutes gently stretch each corner out and fold the dough onto the opposite corner. The dough is sticky so it helps to have a little bowl of water next to you that you can wet your hands in throughout the folding process. After each stretch, fold and rotate the bowl to continue going around. Do this for 1 minute. See instruction video for additional explanation.
• Cover and let the dough rest overnight on the counter, 8-12 hours. When it is doubled in size you are ready for the next step.

Baking

• Preheat your oven ,with the Dutch oven and lid inside it, to 475 Farhenheit.
• Dust your counter with a little flour and carefully scape the dough out onto it. You want to keep all the air bubbles in the dough. Shape the dough gently into a ball. See instruction video.
• Place the dough into your proving basket dusted with flour and cover. Let it rise for 30 minutes. Don’t overprove. It is best to set a timer for this one. If you don’t have a proving basket, place the dough on parchment paper and cover with cling wrap.
• Carefully turn the dough onto a large piece of parchment paper. Both the dough and parchment paper will need to fit into the Dutch oven so keep that in mind when cutting the paper. Now it is time to get creative with a sharp knife or a lame to score the dough. See video for example.
• Remove the Dutch oven from the warm oven. Remove the lid and carefully place the parchment paper with the bread into the pan. Replace the lid back and place in the oven.
• Reduce the oven to 420 Farhenheit and bake for 20 minutes.
• After 20 minutes remove the lid, set oven to 425 Farhenheit and bake for another 20-25 minutes. Until it is golden brown and the bread sounds hollow when softly knocking on the bottom.
• Once done remove the bread from the dutch oven and let cool on a cooling rack.

• Cook your bacon to a crisp and let it drain on a paper towel. Wash your herbs and chop. Set them aside.
• Preheat the oven to 375 Farhenheit.
• Combine in a bowl: flour, pastry flour, baking soda, cream tartar and salt.
• Add the chopped herbs, bacon and the grated cheese to the flour mixture and combine well.
• In another bowl combine the buttermilk with the egg, butter and honey.
• Slowly add the liquid to the flour and fold it in. Be careful not to overmix or knead the dough or the bread will turn out dense.* When it is just combined place it on a baking sheet with parchement paper and form a circle of around 6 inches in diameter and about 2 inches thick. Score your dough with a sharp knife by cutting a cross shape in the top of the loaf.
• Bake the loaf in the preheated oven until it is golden brown and sounds hollow when you softly knock on the bottom of the loaf. If prefered you can also check by inserting a skewer inside the loaf and see if it comes out clean! This takes around 40-45 minutes.
• Let it cool on a cooling rack

• Preheat the oven to 350 Fahrenheit. Grease a 9” baking dish or cast-iron skillet with avocado oil.
• Combine flour, corn flour, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl.
• Combine heavy cream, milk, maple syrup, eggs, avocado oil and melted butter in a second bowl. Mix until it is well combined.
• Add the wet mixture to the dry and mix it gently with a spatula. Be careful not to over mix.
• Pour it in your prepared baking dish and bake for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean and dry. If you are using a cast iron skillet, the skillet will stay warm and continue to cook once out of the oven.

• Freeze your butter.
• Combine unbleached all purpose flour, pastry flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Mix till combined.
• Combine the buttermilk with the honey in a separate bowl.
• Grate the frozen butter into the flour mixture and cut it in with a pastry cutter. Alternatively you can use two knives to cut it in. Work quickly so the butter stays cold.
• Add the buttermilk mixture into the flour/butter mixture. Combine with spatula or fork. Be careful not to overmix it.
• Preheat the oven to 400 Fahrenheit
• Transfer the dough to a lightly floured countertop. Roll it out into a rectangle. Sprinkle half of the cheese onto the dough then fold it into thirds. Repeat this one more time with the rest of the cheese. Make sure you have some cheese left to put on the biscuits before you bake them.
• Roll out your dough into 1/2 inch thickness and cut out the biscuits. I did circles but you can simply cut squares so you don’t have to roll out the leftover scraps into a rectangle again. The left-over scraps will not bake as nice as your first batch. It won’t get the same height and will have less layers.
• Place your biscuits on a baking tray lined with parchment paper. Brush them with a little buttermilk and top with the left-over cheese.
• Bake them in the preheated oven for 15-20 minutes, or until they are nice and golden brown. Once they are done, let them cool on a cooling rack.

Raisins

• Soak the rasins overnight in lukewarm water, in a closed container, on the counter.

Almond paste

• Combine all the ingredients in a food processer or blender. Pulse to combine.
• On a counter, lightly dusted with powdered sugar, place the combined ingredients. Gather them into a ball. Roll it and then shape it into a log that is about 2” in diameter.
• Wrap it in kitchen plastic wrap and allow it to chill for at least 1 hour and up to one week.

Raisin bread buns

• Sift the flour.
• Warm up the milk. Mix the yeast and brown sugar into the warmed milk until dissolved. Let it stand for 5 minutes to activate the yeast.
• Add the lemon zest to the flour, ensuring it is mixed in evenly.
• After the 5 minutes, add the flour to the yeast mixture. Mix till combined.
• Let is rise for 20 minutes.
• Mix in the melted butter, 1 egg yolk, 1 whole egg and raisins.
• Knead until it is combined and elastic. It shouldn't stick to your hands. Add more flour when needed.
• Let is rise again for 20 minutes.
• Form 24 balls out of the dough. Weigh out each dough ball of 35 grams. Gently, with your fingers, make the dough into a flat round circle. Into the circle place a small ball of almond paste. Gather dough around the paste and pinch it together. With the seamside down, roll the ball in your palm and gently press it a little while rolling it. This makes a beautiful ball shape.
  
• Place each ball on a baking tray, covered with parchment paper, and let is rise for another 20 minutes.
• Preheat the oven at 460 Fahrenheit.
• Mix the saved egg white with a little bit of water and powdered sugar. Gently brush this on the buns before baking. It gives it a nice shine.
• Bake the buns in the warm oven for 12-15 minutes or until they are a nice golden brown.
• Cool on a cooling rack.

Filling

• Warm up the milk and butter in a pan.
• When it is warm, take it off the heat source and add the 2 tablespoon of flour. Whisk to combine.
• Put the pan back on the heat source, warm until it is thickened up.
• Let it cool before you add it to the rest of the filling.
• Put the rest of the filling ingredients in a bowl and combine gently. Don’t over mix.
• Add the cooled roux and combine.
• Make rolls of filling from about +/- 1 oz. (30 gram). Let them rest covered in the fridge while you prepare the bread.

Bread

• On your work surface place the flour making a little well in the middle where you put in the egg, light brown sugar, yeast and a little of the warm milk. Let the yeast dissolve.
• Slowly mix by hand the flour with the milk mixture from inside out. Little by little combine the milk into the flour.
• After the milk is incorporated in the flour, knead in the salt and softened butter. Knead untill everything is combined and you have an elastic, but not too dry, dough. *
• Knead the dough for 5 minutes.
• Put the dough in a bowl and cover. Let it rest for 30 minutes, until it is doubled in size.
• With a scale divide the dough into equal parts with a weight of 1.3 oz (35 grams). Shape each dough part into a ball. Gather up the dough, with the seam side down, roll it in the palm of your hand and on the counter to form balls. Make sure you put enough pressure on it with your hand.
• Place the dough balls on plastic wrap and cover it with it as well. Cover the whole thing with a clean tea towel. Let it rest for 15 minutes until it is doubled in size.
• After the second rise, roll out each ball of dough into a flat rectangle using a rolling pin.
• In the middle of the rectangle place a roll of the filling. Fold the dough at the short end over the filling, then the long ends over that. Pinch the dough to close it and roll gently. Place it seam side down on a baking sheet.
• Gently brush some egg over the rolls twice. Cover them and let rest for 20-30 minutes.
• Preheat the oven to 465 Farhenheit.
• Bake the worstenbroods in oven for 10-15 minutes.
• Let them cool on a cooling rack.

• Combine the water, honey and the yeast in a mixing bowl. Cover the bowl and let it rest for 10 minutes to activate the yeast.
• After 10 minutes add the rolled oats and other preferred ingredients like chai seeds etc. Add the coconut oil and salt too. Mix this in gently.
• Add one cup of wheat flour at a time while the mixer is on. Adding in the next cup of flour after the previous one is completely incorporated into the dough. Next, add the bread flour one cup at a time until the dough pulls away from the mixing bowl and doesn’t stick to your hands. It should not feel too dry. If you have added too much flour and it feels dry, don’t worry, just add a little extra coconut oil or warm water. You want the dough to be stretchy and slightly tacky.
• Once the dough has the right consistency knead it for 10 minutes with the machine or by hand.
• After 10 minutes, cover the dough and let it rest for 1 hour and 30 minutes. You want it to rise until it is doubled in size in a warm draft free location.
• After the first rise, cut the dough in half on a dry floured surface. Shape each half of the dough into loaves and place them in oiled bread loaf pans. 
• Cover them with a clean dish towel and let them rise for around 1 hour and 15 minutes or until they doubled in size.
• Preheat your oven at 350 Fahrenheit.
• After the second rise, place your loaves in the warm oven and bake them for 30-35 minutes until they are nice golden brown. The should sound hollow when you knock on the bottom. 
• Take them out of the loaf pans and butter the top right away. Let them cool completely.