Mamaliga

Kaiser Roll Sandwich

Look, this is not the healthiest breads of all, but sure makes a killer sandwich. Also thought it was time to dust off my Bread Baker’s Apprentice book and take on a new bread baking challenge. Summer is slowly tapering off with scattered bearable temperatures when I can finally heat up my oven to 425 without roasting everyone in the house. Who would have thought that this Kaiser roll bread would bring flashbacks of my childhood in Romania! I remember risking being late at our chemistry class (no one cared of) only to run and buy a couple of these Kaiser rolls being sold at our corner bakery. I am sure back then they called these something other than Kaiser Rolls, since little rolls baked in honor of Franz Joseph I of Austria would have gone against the grains of communism. Maybe they called them Lenin Rolls? Don’t remember…

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 1% [?]

The Bagel

I had this next chapter in the BBA challenge on my list for a very long time but only now I got to actually get my hands dirty (literally!): Bagels! Partly because of my quest of finding the highest gluten content flour, and partly because of the residual insanity in my life that never seems to clear up. Here is my first adventure in baking Bagels, hope it’ll inspire you.

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 51% [?]

Panettone

Merry Christmas! This is the second time me baking the Panettone from Peter Reinhart’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice for the BBA Challenge. I didn’t blog about it since there were some things I wanted to tweak and adapt from his original formula (that, with all respect to the man, doesn’t even come close to the quintessential Panettone Milanese). Quite a few changes. Now I know why Nicole calls the BBA Challenge a ‘challenge’…

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 92% [?]

Since it started, I’ve been wanting to spin off my participation in Nicole’s Bread Baker’s Apprentice Challenge – an ambitious project to bake myself through Peter Reinhart’s book with the same name. Finally, I have my hands full of sticky dough up to my elbows. This week’s challenge is Ciabatta Bread, a North-Western (Liguria) Italian invention that literally means carpet slipper because of its typical shape that resembles it.

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 51% [?]

Le Baking – (Bread Day 3)

This was the Happy Day! The day when everything came together. The fun. The Grand Finale. The day you can hug everyone on the street, then get arrested for being weird.

Started off by taking the two baskets out of the fridge to a warm spot for more room temperature rising for about 4-5 hours. I left them in their plastic bags to prevent any crusting.

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 18% [?]