Baking queen

Baking up until recently has been an uncommon occurrence in my household, mainly because I love savoury food, and I just kind of get mystified with flour and all the different types, don't get me wrong, I have used all sorts of flours in my time, and I have a good knowledge of weird flours, lol, but I have been trying to replicate certain dishes like a very thin Romanesque style pizza with not much success for years, i.e. can't get it really really thin.

So I decided to get scientific about it, after all, I hate not understand why things don't work. So I went on amazon, and I purchased 4 books which I felt might help me on my journey to becoming a better baker.

I think the two worth mentioning are the following: Ottolenghi which does have some really nice baking in it, but I think what I loved was the fact that for most of the recipes I had the ingredients in my cupboard, I did have to invest in some sumac and pomegranate molasses, but more of that in a later post.I LOVE this book, it made my stomach turn over with excitement, and I planned my first recipe, which was the ricotta ravioli with sage butter and aubergines, there are no pics, but this turned out to be a gorgeous dish, and the vegetarian claimed it as a favorite.

Then I decided to make brioche, I had it in my head this would not work, I don't know why, and then when I couldn't use a mixer because mine broke and I only have a blender, I thought it was even worse, but I tried anyway, and I tried to use my blender to mimic the way the mixer works as closely as possible. You have to leave this overnight to rest in the fridge, but this was the result before cooking, it looks a bit lack luster and sloppy:

BUT this is the result after cooking:

And this after cutting:

It was absolutely beautiful and soft and buttery, I ate it warm with butter, warm with jam, warm with cream and jam, and toasted, lol, it was absolutely fabulous, I suspect it could have risen a bit more, but I shall try it again and perfect it. I also made some bread, and adapted the recipe a bit, and again it was really really good!!

Then came to Easter baking, I purchased another book, which I feel is going to turn my cooking around, because it has science in it, it explains about protein contents of flours and why they are suited to certain types of cooking, especially with Italian cooking, which for me is v exciting.
Its called The Italian Baker.

I shall talk more about this in a separate post, but I made pizza dough, and it was the closest I have ever got to one of those wonderful pizza's in Rome, lol, but its a story/recipe in its self.

Finally I made hot cross buns using this recipe and they turned out beautifully, so soft and moist inside, they were the best hot cross buns I have ever had, they were great toasted next day too, I can highly recommend this recipe; (by the way, I couldn't be bothered to put crosses on, lol)

 

Finally I made cookies from this recipe for the children, I had to stop stuffing myself, they were so so good!

Hope you had a great easter too ;-) xx

Comments

[Yogicknitter]

OK now I am starving after looking at this. It all looks so good. Emilie loves the butterfly biscuits.