Wheat, White and French Bread

I need to share more bread recipes!  These are from my friend Andy's blog.

Lydia’s Favorite Bread Recipes

100% Whole Wheat Bread

Makes 5-6 loaves

Blend or mix for 2 minutes.  (Speed 2 if using a Bosch)

·      6 cups Warm Water

·      2/3 cup Oil  (Canola)

·      2/3 cup Honey

·      2 TBsp. Salt

Add:

·      2 TBsp. SAF Instant Yeast

·      2 cups Freshly Milled Whole Wheat Flour

Blend and Knead:

·      Add slowly 8-12 cups whole-wheat flour until sides of bowl are clean, mix on speed 1-2 for 8 minutes.

Shape and Bake:

·      Shape into loaf pans and let rise until double.

·      Bake at 350° F for approximately 26-33 minutes.  Should be light golden brown.  I have glass loaf pans and bake for 26 min.

I have made this bread by hand and it turned out amazing.  I cut the recipe in half because it was too much dough to handle by hand.  Make sure you knead on a floured counter or table top for at least 8 minutes with your hands.

White Bread

Makes 4-5 loaves

·      5 cups warm water

·      1 cup sugar

·      2 TBsp.  Salt

Stir

Add and let Rise 15 minutes

·      3 TBsp. Yeast

Mix in

·      1 cup oil

·      Slowly add 10-13 cups flour (I prefer unbleached flour)

Knead 7-8 minutes

Shape into loaves and let rise until double.

Bake at 350° F for 25-30 minutes.

French Bread

In a large mixing bowl combine:

3 cups warm water

2 TBsp.  Yeast

2 TBsp.  Sugar

1 TBsp. Salt

2 TBsp. Oil

When yeast is softened add 6 c. flour and mix thoroughly with wooden spoon.  Turn out onto floured surface and knead 100 times.  Place in greased bowl, cove tightly, and let rest 10 minutes.  Punch down.  Repeat 4 more times.  (Takes 50 minutes in all.)  Divided in half and roll out on oiled surface to 12”x 14”.  Roll up tightly and place diagonally on greased cookie sheet with seam side down.  With sharp knife score four or five times on top.  Let rise 1 ½ hours (until doubled).  Bake at 400° F. for 20 minutes. 

To make soup bowls:  follow above directions but divide dough into 12 pieces.  Shape and place on Well Greased jar lids and arrange six on a cookie sheet.  Let rise for 1 ½ hours.  Bake at 400° F. for 20 minutes.

Artisan (aka "Man" Bread) Bread

I found a very delightful bread recipe thanks to my former roommate.  It only takes 6 ingredients and is very delicious and very easy to prepare.  This is the original recipe.  I have copied it below so you don't have to scroll for 20 minutes to the recipe at the bottom.  Someone from the comments in the original post suggested doing the final raise on parchment paper.  This makes transferring the dough to the pizza stone (which needs to be pre-heated in the oven) so easy.  Brilliant!  As another added note, I used regular flour and it turned out fine.  If you want a crispy crust, place the broiler pan in the bottom of the oven with 2-3 cups water.  Remember not to burn yourself with the hot steam when you open the oven!

90 MINUTE MAN BREAD

PRINT

INGREDIENTS

• 1½ cups of warm water (105-115 degrees)
• 1 Tbsp honey
• 2¼ tsp active-dry yeast
• 2 Tbsp coconut oil, melted
• 4 cups bread flour
• 1½ tsp salt

INSTRUCTIONS

1. If your kitchen is not warm, turn your oven to low. This is simply to warm your kitchen up a little bit (since it’s cool where we live).
2. In your mixer bowl add warm water, honey and yeast. Stir a few times until honey dissolves. Once yeast starts foaming (5 minutes or so), add flour, melted coconut oil, and salt. Using dough hook, knead for 10 minutes on low/medium low. Leave your dough ball in the bowl and cover with a towel. Let rise for 30 minutes.
3. After the first rise, lightly flour a surface and scoop your dough ball on it. Knead your lump of dough by hand a few times, until it forms a firm ball. Cover this ball of dough with a towel.
4. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. If you have a pizza stone, make sure this is in the oven to warm up. Alternatively, you can use a cast iron skillet while the oven is preheating - as one reader had great luck with! (Note: We have only tested this recipe with a pizza stone.)
5. Let rise for 30 minutes.
6. After the second rise, place dough ball directly on pizza stone, cut two slits on the top of the dough ball and bake for 25 minutes at 400 degrees. If you are using a loaf or cast iron skillet, the cook time may need to be increased an additional 10-15 minutes. (bread is done when the internal temp is 220 degrees).
7. Let cool and enjoy.

NOTES

*We move this dough from the counter to the pizza stone, but if you don't feel confident in that transition, flour a piece of parchment paper and shape the dough on that for the second rise. Then move the entire paper with the dough to the oven for baking.

ADDITIONAL RECIPE TIPS

If you don’t have bread flour, you can make your own. Add 1 Tbsp vital wheat gluten to 1 cup of all-purpose flour.

If you don’t have or want to use coconut oil, you can use melted butter or olive oil, although the flavor will be slightly different.

If you’re on the hunt for a great pizza stone, we use this super-thick one. It’s over 5 years old, been through hundreds of pizza nights and is still going strong.  Plus it makes your pizza and bread taste pro-artisan (a.k.a. makes you look like you know what you’re doing).

Chicken Parmesan

I never liked chicken parmesan.  Turns out, I never had a good chicken parmesan.  I was watching this when I decided to try to make it.  It was amazing!  

Make your marinara.

Take flattened chicken breast and dip in beaten eggs then coat with bread crumb/parmesan cheese mixture.  

Heat butter in pan and saute chicken breasts until golden brown.

Place in foil lined baking sheet.  Sprinkle mozzarella/provolone/parmesan cheese mixture on top of each breast.  Bake at 400 until no longer pink in center about 30-40 minutes.

Remove from oven and allow to sit 10 minutes before serving.  Plate over marinara and fettuccine.  

Marinara Sauce

Forget about the Ragu, homemade is so much better!

Start by sauteing onion and roasted garlic in olive oil.

In large pot, pour 28 oz can of stewed tomatoes (fresh chopped tomatoes are even better if you have the time) and 12 oz can of tomato paste.  Add onion and garlic to sauce along with: fresh basil, parsley, sugar, salt and pepper.

Simmer for as long as you can stand (I put mine all in a crockpot so I didn't have to babysit it as much) 1-2 hrs at least.  Then, using an immersion blender, puree the sauce until smooth.

You can use this for spaghetti and meatballs, chicken parmesan or whatever your taste buds are craving!

Meatballs!

It is so fun to say.  I found the following recipe here.  The best thing about Italian food is how amazingly delicious it is with such a simple preparation.

First mix your dry ingredients. Measure to taste:

Parsley, red pepper flakes, oregano, kosher salt, basil, parmesan cheese and bread crumbs.  

Hand mix together:

1 lb hamburger
1 lb italian sausage
1 egg

Add dry ingredients to meat, then add a few dashes of worcestershire sauce and about 1/4 cup water.

Mush it all together until well blended then roll out your balls.  I used an ice cream scoop to get large uniform meatballs.  They can be placed closely together on the cooking sheet as they will shrink during cooking.  

Bake 400 degrees 20-30 minutes depending on the size of your meatballs.  Just make sure they are no longer pink in the middle.