Sourdough Bread

I shadowed this wonderful women at Blackberry Farm about a month ago, and she let me take home some of their 10 year old starter. I brought the starter up to Cincinnati and baked some delicious bread with it!!! I didn't have a baking stone or a proofer. So instead we put it in the bathroom and made a hot bath that made the room hot and steamy. Perfect large proofer. We made two loaves and they worked out great! It's quite easy to make too!

It's based on a baker's Percentage. I made two 1 kg loaves which is the gram measurement. um um good!

Ingredient Percent Gram
Flour 100 940g
warm Water 70 658g
Salt 2.54 24g
Yeast .1 2g
stiff 40 376g
total 212.64 2Kg

Feeding: 25% starter
50% water
100% flour
*I've found that for me equal parts of everything works better

to make liquid start : equal parts flour and water
- feed couple times between converting from liquid to stiff and visa versa
- feed about every 8-12 hour outside and 1/per week in fridge

I realized I forgot to say how to actually make the bread...
Mix together dry ingredients. Then add stiff and gradually add water. Sometimes you'll use less water so just work with it. It'll take practice. Start kneeding bread for about 10 minutes until everything is worked together and the dough is very elastic and cohesive. Place dough into a greased bowl and cover loosely. Place in an area that is preferably 80 degrees F. Let rise for about 2 hours. Take out dough onto a table that is lightly floured. With fingers punch down bread. Form into a tight ball (for shaping you should read some books or articles about it). sprinkle flour on top and Let rise again for about an hour loosely covered with syran wrap and flat on the table. Then punch down again and mold into whatever shape you want boule, baguette, loaf, etc. Let rise another 45 minutes covered in a humid place. About 20 mins in start to preheat oven and place a metal pan in broiler and baking stone in the oven. Cut slits on top of bread with seratted knife and place on baking stone in preheated oven. Also put three icecubes in the pan so that it'll moisten the oven and set the bread crust. After about 35 minutes check the bread. It should be golden and the bottom should sound hollow when you tap it. Let it cool, and enjoy.

Rollinia and Malay Apple

I was looking through my posts and realized I didn't blog about this craziness. It kind of feels like a turf ball, but the inside taste like a keylime pie. It's found in Belize, but you won't ever get this in the states because after a couple hours after you pick it, it wilts and isn't edible anymore. It's called a Rollinia... The little red thing in the back ground is a malay apple (not sure how to spell that). That is kind of sweet with a white center.

JaCeKa - Mediterraen Vegetable Couscous

Saddest thing... my dad and I decided to play chef about 2 months ago, and I wrote the recipe down, but now.... 2 months later, I lost the sheet and forget what was on it. It was DELICIOUS!!! Incredibly rich and just umm good. Here is a picture of it. I'll try to tell you what was in it, but it could be completely wrong, and I don't remember the amounts.

Diced eggplant
artichoke hearts
onions
canned tomatoes
kalmata olives
cumin
olive oil
lemon juice
cayenne pepper
allspice
Parmesan cheese on top (this was VERY VERY STRONG cheese. I found out later that I'm allergic to it. It makes my geographic tongue act up. Sad because this was some incredible cheese.)

on top of garlic and pine nut couscous.

Man it was so good. I'll see if I can duplicate it.

Caramelized Fry jacks

Not quite the fry jacks in Belize, but I tried... Next time I suggest that the sugar sprinkled on after they are fried.

3 c flour

1 1/2 tbsp baking powder

2 tsp sugar + sugar to cover tortilla

1 tsp salt

water

2 tbsp coconut oil  + coconut oil for frying

Mix together flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder well

add oil and mix well

add water until ingredients are wet but dough still sticks together and doesn't stick to you hands

knead until dough gets kind of elastic

pat out into a tortilla

cut in half

heat oil until almost smoking

cover tortilla with sugar (after doing it.. it's better if you do this step after frying)

place in oil until puffs up and is golden

yum yum!

In belize they make them without sugar and serve with refried beans and eggs.  They seem to puff better than mine. It's a work in progress!

Sweet pepper Quiche

Another Guatemalan trial with not many ingredients.

Ingredients:

7 packs of club crackers

1 stick butter

2 red sweet pepers

6 eggs

1 cup cream

salt

crunch up the saltine crackers with butter and water around the outside of the pan

Put pepper and onion in crust

Mix eggs, salt, pepper, and cream

pour over veggies

bake at 350 degrees until golden on top about 45 mins.

pepper

Pad Thai Guatemalan Style

It's really not Guatemalan style, it's just we didn't have any ingredients really. So I made it just with what we had and it actually tasted good.

Ingredients:

3 c cooked rice

2 garlic cloves

1 onion chopped

1 c chopped broccoli

2 carrots chopped

2 tbs ketchup

1/4 c soy sauce

2 tbsp mustard

3 tbsp peanut butter

1 tbsp vinegar

1 tsp hot sauce

parmesan as decoration

saute veggies until slightly softer but still crunchy.

Mix wet ingredients together

put cooked rice in pan

put in sauce

cook until everything looks mixed thoroughly

serve

Chuchitos

While I was in Santa Maria de Jesus, Guatemala, I helped make these with a Mayan family for the campesinos that were going to come and hopefully join a coffee cooperative. It was so much fun. Hard to understand. They went between speaking Kaqchikel and Spanish which I know only slightly. They gave me a traditional Mayan apron. It was so great!

Makes 140

Ingredients:

10 lbs Masa 

salt to taste

pepper to taste

8 Red sweet peppers 

6 tomatoes

4 green chilies

msg (yikes.. don't use that)

2 packets chicken bouillon

140 corn husks

140 pieces  of pork/chicken/carne

boil ground sweet peppers, tomatoes, green chilies, msg, chicken bouillon, salt, and pepper. Mix about 1/4 of Masa in boiled mixture

pat left over masa into tortillas

scoop tomato mixture onto tortilla, and make tortilla look like a taco

place in corn husk and wrap like the picture.

boil chuchitos for about 3-4 hours

Also good if you take it out of the corn husk and grill.

yumm... but don't eat local pork in Guatemala. pork = crazy rash and giardia... fun times!