Whipped Cream Difficulties

This time, another bread from Laurence Simon, Shiner Bock Cheddar. And another recipe closely adhered to, even to the point of brushing the bread with butter and sprinkling in jalapenos and sesame seeds.

How did it come out?

Yeah, I didn’t get a good even shape on that. I’ll talk about that in a bit.

The top crust problem is still there, I think, but covered up by a layer of butter, sesame seeds, and jalapenos. The big problem with that topping was that it didn’t stick; the seeds and peppers sort of slid off the bread every it was moved. That was my fault; I did the brush of butter and added the seeds and peppers right before baking. If I had been smart, I would have added them at the start of the final rise and let the dough rise around them. I’ll remember that next time.

The bread itself has a good texture. The taste comes closer to what I’m looking for; you can tell there’s some cheddar in the bread, but it isn’t a strong cheese taste. I blame that on using pre-shredded Kraft cheese. I’m planning to make this bread again: I may omit the seeds and peppers, or I may not, but I want to use a sharp cheddar from Cabot Creamery instead of Kraft. I’d give this a C+, entirely due to my mistakes, and put it on the schedule for improvement.

*******

Why did I specify Cabot Creamery cheddar above? Because they’re partnered up with the King Arthur Flour folks.

Last Sunday, KAF (as they’re called by people who don’t want to write out “King Arthur Flour” all the freaking time) came through town with their roadshow and did two two-hour long seminars: “Perfect Pies & Savory Scones”, and “Baking with Yeast & Whole Grains”.

If you have any interest in baking, you need to go see the KAF roadshows: a schedule is here.

Why should you go? Number one reason: it is free, as in beer. Literally; KAF doesn’t charge for this.

Secondly, the shows are a lot of fun. Robin (who did the actual demo), Julie, Amy, and Tom were all very nice people and made everyone feel welcome and comfortable. All of them have wicked senses of humor, too. And they’re very well organized; everything ran with the precision of a good watch, there wasn’t any stumbling, fumbling, or bumbling.

Thirdly, you might actually learn something. Pies and scones haven’t really been in my baking repertoire before now, but after attending the KAF demo, I’m thinking about trying some savory pies. (I’ve got an idea for a crawfish pie….) I picked up some techniques that I think will help when I go to make a crust. Specifically, Robin’s technique of cutting in half the butter to get crumbs, and then adding the other half in large pieces which are then smashed with the flour, sounds like something worth a shot.

If you’re interested in Robin’s technique, and KAF isn’t coming your way anytime soon, don’t worry: they have a YouTube channel, and the entire “Pies and Scones” demo is there. (There’s about 10 minutes at the start that’s taken up with administrative stuff that you can skip.) The “Yeast Breads” demo is here, too.

Other things I learned between the two demos:

• what pie crust dough should look like before adding the water.
• proper kneading technique.
• measuring flour: you’re doing it WRONG! (That’s the general “you”, not me specifically. I plead the Fifth on my flour measuring.)
• measuring liquid: you’re doing it WRONG! (Not me, man. Back off; I’m a scientist. Okay, I took high school and college chemistry, and I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night; close enough.)
• use spring water or bottled water instead of tap water for baking; the chlorine in tap water is bad for yeast. I’ve actually been using tap water run through a Brita, but I’m going to try some spring water in the next bread cycle.

If the videos are on YouTube, why go? Other than the fun factor? Free stuff. The KAF people gave everyone a book with all the recipes and some additional backup material. They also gave everyone plastic dough scrapers, which I personally appreciated. Also: free samples of Cabot Creamery cheese, and free samples of Red Star Platinum yeast. (Red Star is also a KAF partner in the roadshows; the Platinum yeast is so new, I haven’t been able to find it in stores locally. Even the downtown Whole Foods doesn’t have it.)

And that’s what everybody got (in addition to knowledge). They also have a drawing for door prizes; depending on how many people show up, you make get lucky and win some KAF flour. Or a set of KAF cookbooks. Or a really snazzy KAF apron. Or a pair of Dansko shoes (Dansko is also a partner; I’d never heard of them before, but Dansko shoes are apparently the choice of culinary professionals and other folks who spend much time on their feet.)

(I didn’t win any of the door prizes. But I had so much fun, I didn’t really care. Though I do like that apron.)

AND the KAF folks, especially Robin, are real good about hanging around afterwards and answering questions. I had the chance to ask Robin about my top crust problem, and her suggestion was to try giving the dough a longer rise. I plan to do that with the next batch of bread. I think a longer rise will also help with the “low at one end, high at the other” shape problem. (The nice thing about the Zojirushi is that it has three programmable custom settings. So you can give your bread a longer rise, and still have two settings left for other breads as needed.)

Go if they come near you, watch the vidoes if they aren’t coming any time soon. Next bread in the hopper is a ranch onion bread from Brody and Apter; I’ve made this several times before, but have never been able to quite get it the way I wanted it, so I’m giving this one another try.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 17th, 2013 at 8:25 pm and is filed under Bread, Endorsements, Food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.