Dans La Boulangerie

There are a lot of hobbies I plan to take up in the future, as I find the room (and the funds) for them, like making artisan cheeses, for example. One hobby that I don't have to wait to work on is developing my bread making skills.


I decided to pull out my Le Creuset and revisit the Cooks Illustrated recipe for Almost No-Knead Bread which I tried ages ago. The loaf I made on Tuesday turned out much like the one I made, last time: round and small and slightly overdone. I found that the dough was a bit dry when I initially mixed it and when I formed the loaf, and it didn't rise as much as I'd hoped. Of course, this is not to say that we didn't eat the whole loaf, anyway.


For my second try, I added more yeast and more liquid (more beer, to be specific) and I found that it rose better and gave a lighter loaf. The dough was also less dry to begin with, and I adjusted the heat slightly and the cooking times to give it less time uncovered in the oven. You probably can't tell the difference, but this one is taller and broader than the first one. It seems to have improved the loaf significantly, but it is still a work in progress.

Come on over -- there's bread and jam for everyone!

A Doughy Saga and a Balloon

So various places in blogland have written about their adventures with the No Knead Bread recipe from the NY Times... I ran into some modifications of the famous recipe on the Cooks Illustrated website, who have also made a video podcast for their mods. Well, I don't have a fancy cast iron dutch oven (yet) but I took a stab at it with a little ceramic casserole dish I have. I say "little" because it's about half the size of the one called for in the recipe.

Well, my loaf turned out small and round and totally adorable -- and yummo. It was ridiculously easy and I will do it many more times to perfect it. Since this is theoretically a cooking blog, too, here are a couple of pretty pictures of it. It is by now mostly consumed, but remains adorable. I am exceedingly proud of it.

In other news, I have finished the little lacy hat. It is the one called Bonnie from Kim Hargreaves Heartfelt Collection. I eliminated the slouchiness by leaving out one repeat of the lace pattern. (Doesn't it seem like it should take more than just one out of five repeats to take away slouchiness? I am a bit skeptical that the original as written would be very slouchy.) I did sub the yarn, using Debbie Bliss Merino DK rather than the Rowan Bamboo Soft that it calls for (perhaps the drape of the Bamboo would have provided the slouch?) I also used a slightly smaller needle to get gauge.

Overall, I am very happy with it, since the merino gives it more sproinginess. Since it wouldn't fit over my massive dreads (and I couldn't convince my HLM to model it) I had to use Ms Balloon Head to show it off. Trust me, it looks absurd when it isn't stretched out to display the lace pattern. Hopefully my coworker will like it.