Whipped Cream Difficulties

This requires some background.

One of my Christmas presents was a box of smoked meat from Goode Company Barbecue in Houston. The meat itself has been very good so far. But included with the meat was a loaf of Goode Company’s Jalepeno Cheddar bread.

I was warned in advance: “This stuff is addictive. You’ll find yourself eating the whole loaf in one sitting.” Well, I wasn’t quite that bad (it took two sittings to finish the loaf), but it is very very good bread. I wouldn’t put it at the “crack cocaine” level; that’s reserved for Caramel deLites (or Samoas, depending on which part of the country you’re in). It is even better if you toast it and spread some of Trader Joe’s Pub Cheese on the toast, but that’s a digression.

(And by the way, Girl Scout cookie season is upon us again.)

Anyway, after I finished the loaf, I found myself saying the following: “Hey! I have a bread machine! How hard could it be to replicate their bread?”

Of course, being S-M-R-T smart, I didn’t do anything like go out and look for recipes before I started baking. Instead, I used the “Basic White Bread” recipe from the manual that came with the Zojirushi as a starting point, adding cheddar cheese and half a jar of Trappey’s Sweet N’ Hot Jalapeno Slices during the fruit and nut cycle.

How did it turn out?

Still a little misshapen (notice that one end is lower than the other) but not too badly so.

You can’t see it as well as I’d like in this picture, but this is the sort of top crust I’m looking for; fairly even all the way across, no big dents.

Good even texture on the loaf. No gigantic holes or anything like that. Notice the color striation; I think that’s from the cheese mostly settling to the bottom of the loaf.

And how does it taste? Well, this was a surprise: it tastes really, really good. If I had been working from a recipe, I’d be happy with the way it came out; given that this was an improvised bread, I’m even happier. It has a nice jalapeño tang to it, but not an overwhelming one. The cheese gives it some good body and a subtle background taste, too. I cooked up some more of the meat that was in my freezer and ate it with several slices of this bread. The two go very well together.

I’d happily make this again. It is a very good bread. But it is not a Goode bread.

The bread from Goode Company has a lighter, more airy texture; I want to describe it as being almost “cotton candy” like, but “brioche” may be a better description. Goode’s bread is a really soft bread, while mine is a bit more substantial.

When I try this again, I plan to use a more brioche style recipe, perhaps the brioche au fromage recipe linked above. I also want to use a little more cheese and divide it into two parts; adding one part during the fruit/nut cycle, and then sprinkling the other part on top of the loaf at the start of the third rise. Finally, the Trappy’s jalapeños worked pretty well, but I’d like to try something different; some people suggest roasted fresh jalapeños, or if I can find them I might use candied jalapeños instead.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 14th, 2014 at 6:42 pm and is filed under Beef, Bread, Christmas, Food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.