Whole Wheat Honey Bread

It's been years since I've baked bread. I used to love giving away challah loaves and baking sandwich loaves, but I stopped when everyone started eliminating carbs and gluten from their meals. It's hard to eat an entire loaf by myself, although I have done that with a few baguettes in France :) 

Since I'm cooking and baking more lately, my friends have sent me lots of yeast and organic whole wheat flour, so it was time to revisit breadmaking. Like an old friend, it was a sweet warm reunion!

I used the AllRecipes whole wheat bread recipe which had over 2000 positive reviews. The online recipe allows you to decide how many servings you wish to make, so I halved it to make one bigger loaf (the original recipe makes 3 loaves). I didn't modify it much so here's the pictorial process:

The recipe didn't specify, but I warmed the water to body temperature (like a baby bottle), then dissolved the honey into the water before adding the yeast, stirring until everything was dissolved.

I added the unbleached white flour and stirred with a spoon until mixed.

 After covering with a towel and letting it rest for 30 minutes, it grew into this: 

I added the melted butter (I used salted Kerry Gold), honey (I used a local artisan raw rose honey), salt (Guerande fleur de sel), organic wheat flour flour, and kneaded in the bowl adding about another 1 cup of whole wheat flour as I kneaded for about 10-15 minutes until the dough was smooth and elastic. Then I placed it in the buttered baking pan.

 until it rose over the 1" above the baking pan that the recipe suggested.

I baked for about 50 minutes, not the 25 or 30 the recipe recommended, at 350, covering the top with foil to prevent over browning. All ovens vary and I had obviously set mine on a rack that was too high and next time I may turn off the convection feature so that it browns more evenly.

 But the loaf turned out to be quite good for a first try after over a decade :)

Bit of an air bubble was good nook to nestle some extra butter :)

Maya Angelou Quote

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First Focaccia

Now that flour is finally back on the grocery store shelves and a friend sent me 2 lbs of yeast, my first foray was focaccia :) I followed Daniele Uditi's recipe with just two variations.

This is the active dry yeast and water dissolved and rested for 8 minutes.

 I added the flour and used a wooden spoon.

I miscalculated my start time, so after the 1st hour proofing at room temperature, I ended up letting the dough proof in the refrigerator for 24 hours (otherwise I would have had to wake up at 3 am to knead and proof for another few hours).

After taking the dough out of the fridge, I slowly added in the flour, salt, and olive oil, mixing by hand for 9 minutes. It was a work out! After proofing again, folding, and repeating 3 times, it was finally time to let it proof in the sheet pan with LOTS of olive oil!

As you can see there was a sea of olive oil in the pan which pooled a bit at the corners.

I used a spoon to scoop it up and sprinkle it over the top into my finger tip punches.

Because I had plenty of fresh rosemary from the garden, I chopped some up and sprinkled it on top along with the fleur de sel.

After all the time in preparation, the actual baking time was only 15 minutes!

My first focaccia was enough to share with two neighbors warm from the oven! It was wonderfully light, savory, and delicious!

Fudgy Brownies

Now that flour is back on the grocery shelves, I thought it was time to make some brownies :) It's been so long since I've made brownies, I went looking online for a recipe, and chose the one from Inspired Taste. I loved their blueberry muffin recipe and I liked this recipe, so I think they will be on my recipe search list now for anything sweet.

I followed their recipe exactly except for the amount of sugar (I halved it) because I generally like far less sugar than most recipes suggest. The batter was beautifully thick and looked good enough to eat unbaked!

After allowing it to cool completely in the pan then in the freezer, it was much easier to cut!

The end result was more like fudge than brownie, but the flavors were fantastic and I love fudge, so I consider this a lovely brownie!

Ricebox

The Stay at Home mandate for Los Angeles has some silver linings, like restaurants that are normally not delivering to West Los Angeles, making deliveries (and not via an app). I've been wanting to make a trip to DTLA to eat at Ricebox for some time, but did not have the energy to battle DTLA traffic and parking. 

Since the change in how restaurants do business, many are now offering curbside pick up and/or delivery with their own staff (in this case for no extra charge on orders over $50), so when I saw I could get delivery not having to use an app, I immediately DM'd them on Instagram and placed an order for delivery! They take Venmo, but will also take a CC# over the phone, which is what I did. I ordered one of every rice box (except the duck which is only available for pick up or app delivery on Sat). They deliver to the West side, SF Valley, and SG Valley about once a week, although the day may change.

They use Duroc pork so I had to get the triple roasted porchetta crackling with five spice for $12.75, served over jasmine rice with a side of steamed vegetables and pickles. You can sub brown rice, quinoa, salad, or fried rice for slightly more. It was still a bowl of crunchy crackly deliciously spiced pork belly after it was delivered! I think this was my favorite, but since I haven't tried the duck yet, I will reserve that designation until I have eaten their duck!

The soy sauce chicken for $11.95 is made with Mary's chicken and comes with the usual sides, and the ginger scallion sauce was fantastic!

The OG pork char siu for $10.95, again made with Duroc pork had the perfect tenderness, char, and sweet savory glaze.

The mapo eggplant for $10.50 was just the perfect balance of spice with tender eggplant and the usual accompaniments.

I also ordered the beef curry for $11.50, but I was so hungry that I forgot to take a picture of it before I ate it! It was the perfect comfort curry with chunks of carrot, potato, and a warm curry that was not spicy at all.

After tasting all their rice box offerings, I can't wait to try their duck, made with Mary's duck (of course) so a trip to DTLA may be in my future...