Category: bread

even though we ate it a lot growing up, at some point i stopped buying white bread and moved completely to whole wheat. today, white bread is frowned upon by many because of its perceived lack of health benefits, but for me, the change to whole wheat was for taste alone. whole wheat has a more rounded and nutty flavor, and it’s come to replace and enhance things like grilled cheeses and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. this was my first experience using whole wheat flour, and i was pleasantly surprised at how easily this bread came together.

this bread has both a soaker and a poolish. a soaker is a pre-ferment, which means it helps the bread taste like the dough fermented for much longer than it actually did. the soaker does not have yeast in it; the purpose is to help soften the coarse whole wheat grain and also activate the enzymes in the grains to break out some of the trapped sugars from the starches.

the poolish is another type of pre-ferment that is made up of flour, water and yeast. there is yeast in a poolish (very little), but it goes a long way in a very wet flour/water mixture (it’s easier for the yeast to work it’s magic in this state). when the poolish is added to the dough before baking, it not only helps fermentation but also adds incredible flavor.

the trick with whole wheat breads is making sure the flavor is hearty and delicious and not bitter and grassy. increasing the fermentation time helps balance the flavors, and for this reason, you’ll often find pre-ferments in these types of recipes. and while the amount of steps in a recipe like this can look intimidating, it’s really much simpler than it seems. at it’s core, bread has always been just flour, yeast, water and (often) salt.

i decided to test out my bread on an overstuffed grilled cheese with bacon, tomatoes and red onion. needless to say, it passed with flying colors.

i’ll be honest, i’m not much of a morning person. i’m much more likely to be up until 3 or 4 in the morning and then sleep until lunchtime – except for weekdays, in which case I go to bed around 3 or 4 and drag myself out of bed for work at 8:30. it doesn’t sound too healthy, but it works for me. on days when i actually wake up early enough for breakfast, i’m still not very hungry for it. but one of the few things that can interest me in the morning is an english muffin.

there’s something about melted butter flooding over the crispy toasted peaks of warm nooks and crannies that is completely irresistible. even commercials for thomas’ english muffins have me salivating. luckily, this recipe was even easier to tackle than i thought, and i probably won’t ever buy them from the store again.

it’s so rewarding to see a recipe come out to look and taste like the real thing. there was a moment when i was cooking them on the skillet and i got giddy seeing the perfectly toasted cornmeal crusted english muffins really take shape. it’s a moment that makes you think “why isn’t everyone making their own bread?” please, please, please try these out this weekend.

is there anything better than smothering an english muffin (or three) with butter? maybe adding delicious grape jelly is your thing. or topping with a fried egg. or maybe you want an open face ham and cheese sandwich? i forgot how little self control i have around these little fluffy muffins. i’m going to have to make more before the week is out.

i’ve got a confession that will either make me seem really cool or really lame: i’m an eagle scout. i spent most of my teenage years camping and tying knots with my fellow boy scouts, learning the skills i would need to survive in the wilderness. and although i’ve never actually been lost in the wilderness (yet), i still use a lot of what i learned in the scouts every day. one of the coolest things about camping is figuring out how to cook gourmet meals with greatly reduced means. no oven, microwave, mixer, toaster, or *gasp* panini press.

the dutch oven quickly becomes one of your best friends when camping, despite it’s weight. a dutch oven is basically a giant cast iron pot with a lid. it’s traditionally placed right on hot coals (hot coals are placed on top as well) to fire up whatever amazing concoction you’ve put inside. there are literally thousands of sites dedicated to dutch oven cooking featuring recipes for anything from pizza to gumbo to cobbler. i was lucky enough to get a dutch oven for my birthday last year from the girl (ain’t she great?) but the only thing i had used it for up until now was slow cooking apple and pumpkin butter. luckily, it also works flawlessly in the oven.

when we camped, the dutch oven monkey bread was made with ready-made biscuits that were torn up into smaller pieces and rolled in cinnamon and sugar. this recipe actually uses a sweet yeast dough that you let rise, but instead of baking it in a tube pan, i doubled the recipe and used my dutch oven so it would be brimming with gooey cinnamon sugar goodness.

why is it called monkey bread? no one seems to know the real answer, but i’ve always assumed it had something to do with the bread being easy to pull apart and eat by little hands – for instance the hands of monkeys or small children. whatever the origin of it’s name, monkey bread has a few rules: it can and should be eaten with every meal, and it will disappear a lot faster than you think. maybe you should think about tripling or quadrupling that next batch.