Day 147: Peanut Butter Beer Bread

Another great beer bread! This recipe is pretty basic except for the fact that you heat up some beer, butter, and peanut butter into a smooth mixture before adding it to the dry ingredients. It can be a little gross when the hot beer starts foaming into chunks while you try and stir it down, but other than that it was pretty smooth sailing. I cut a piece and tried it and thought it was delicious. It just tastes like peanut butter, but not a ridiculous amount of peanut butter, which I'm happy with. I do love me some peanut butter, but I don't know if I'd like it in bread form. I did not toast this (the preferred way to eat it according to the book) nor did I add any jam or jelly to it, but making small sandwiches is exactly what I'm going to do next. 

Day 146: Potato Bread

Now this is some amazing bread. Potato bread has always been one of my favorite and this one might be the best I've ever had. Potato breads are usually really light and chewy. and this one excels in both of those categories. The flavor is incredible and right out of the oven this loaf is to die for. It's amazing with butter, and even better toasted. I haven't made any sandwiches out of it yet, but that's inevitable. This also the first recipe in a while that I didn't halve. I knew what I was getting into when I started this bread. I could easily eat an entire loaf of this, its just too good. I'm still hopping around in the section, but just couldn't resist this one when I saw it. 

Day 145: Pumpkin-Walnut Bread

Made another quick bread today, this time with pumpkin. I thought it would be a lot like pumpkin pie, but it isn't nearly as moist. The walnuts in it add a lot to the flavor and texture. There is also a lot of cinnamon and nutmeg in it, which also helps a lot. Its a little on the drier side, but nothing a little butter can't fix. I was expecting it to be as good as banana bread, but it didn't really stack up. There isn't a whole lot more to say about this one, other than it's just alright. I might make these later in the Fall and modify the recipe to improve it. 

Day 144: Bao (Steamed Bun)

The first and only time I had a bao was when I went to New York for the Governor's Ball Music Festival last summer with my friend Nguyen. He had wanted to go to the BaoHaus, a tiny hole in the wall bao place in NYC, to get some of the best bao ever. It was right across the street from a Michelin three star restaurant, so I already had some high expectations. They used flatter bao that was folded over ingredients (I got some bomb tofu) and eaten like a sandwich as opposed to being a stuffed dumpling. They were incredible and I was super excited when I found out there was a recipe for bao in this book. The same buddy Nguyen is here in town visiting me right now, so I thought that it was only right if we make some bao from scratch. Neither of us had made them before so it was quite an adventure. They turned out delicious and I would love to make some legit stuffed ones. I didn't know they were so easy to make either. I'm still skipping around in the recipes, but I had to do this one for the sake of my friend. 

Day 143: Rosemary-Garlic Bread

I made a different garlic bread a few days ago and, while that one was delicious, I think this one is better in every way. First off, it's not a soft sandwich bread, so it's a lot easier to eat in my opinion. Second, its loaded with rosemary and parsley, not just garlic. Lastly, I baked it in a steam bath, so it's got the same crispy crust and chewiness of a good French bread. This bread is incredible toasted, and even better with some pasta. I've been skipping around on the recipes because I don't want to dive into a single section yet, and I think I'm going to keep doing that. It keeps everything fresh, and thse few sections are very similar in recipes. 

Day 142: Strawberry Walnut Bread

You really can't ever go wrong with a fruit batter bread. If it's banana or blueberry, or even strawberry, it's always delicious because they're basically just cake. There is a strawberry rhubarb bread recipe in this book, but I just wanted to make a regular strawberry one for now. I wanted pecans in it, but I just went with the classic walnut for this loaf. This bread is so delicious. Everything with strawberries in is just heavenly. There isn't a whole lot more to say about this bread, other than it is amazing. I'll still be making the strawberry rhubarb bread later, but I just wanted some strawberry bread right now. 

Day 141: Dilly Casserole Bread

I tried to make a different bread today, and it turns out it's one of the more difficult breads to make, so I looked for a quick bread to make and this one caught my eye. I'll talk about that other bread once I can finally get it, but this bread was another one in the herb and spice breads. Apparently Dilly Casserole Bread used to be the thing to make back in the day, and now it's nonexistent. How it got that name exactly, I can only assume it's from the fact that it has dill in it and you typically bake it in a casserole dish. This bread starts with cottage cheese that is heated, then mixed with yeast, dill, sugar, salt, and powdered onion. I halved this recipe but it could have easily been the regular size, and obviously I didn't use a casserole dish. This is a light fluffy bread that tastes very oniony and not very dilly. If I make it another time I'd definitely up the dill and lower the onion. 

Day 140: Sourdough Pumpernickel

What a bread to end the sourdoughs on. This might be the last one but it's one of the best. I love rye breads and caraways seeds, but making pumpernickel breads is one of the biggest pains ever. This one was nowhere near as big of a pain to make, and tastes much than most. It has the best things of of both sourdough and rye worlds. You get the intense flavor of the sourdough mixed with the irreplaceable taste of caraway. I cut the bread in with a tic-tac-toe shape on the top and  one side turned out fine and the other side kind of exploded. It all still tastes so delicious though, so I don't really care about one side. That just gives me the excuse to eat that side first. I'm really happy how all of these sourdoughs turned out, and I'm definitely going to be hanging onto the sours I made so I can whip up a sourdough whenever I feel like it, or as a gift for someone. 

Day 139: Starter White Bread

I used the same starter for yesterday's bread as I did for this one. It was just a yeast starter that had to ferment for 5 days. There wasn't any yeast in this bread besides the one used in the starter, so it took forever for it to rise. I think that's why this bread is named Starter White Bread and not just another sourdough bread. The recommended way of baking it is to make a twin loaf, which just means that you split the dough in half, roll the two halves into long mini loaves, and put them into the same pan. They'll bake together, but look better than simply slicing down the top of the loaf. This one was also really delicious, so I can't complain about anything! 

Day 138: Sourdough Loaf

This bread is incredible. It turned out a lot bigger than I thought it would, but I'm okay with that because it is so fluffy and delicious. I used a yeast starter that took about 5 days to ferment. Like I said, this bread has a lot going for it. It's got some great flavor, the texture is top notch, and the dark color is amazing. I'm really happy with how this one turned out, especially after how the potato bread turned out. This was more from what I was expecting, and I'm glad this one tastes so incredible. This is definitely some sandwich bread of the highest quality. 

Day 137: Sourdough Potato Bread

I'm not sure what happened to this bread, but it just did not turn out. The sour turned out fine overnight, and when I made it into a dough it was okay, when I was done kneading it, it was just fine, but after that it was game over. The dough was meant to rest for 20 minutes, which it did, but it never started rising after that. I let it rise for about an hour and it didn't move at all. This means that this bread is extremely dense. Since there's a lot of mashed potatoes in it though, it actually tastes really good and has an interesting texture. It does not look like its baked when you slice it, but it is actually totally okay. Still, I'm not sure what happened to this bread, but it is definitely still edible. 

Day 136: Homecoming Sourdough French Bread

Now this is what I'm talking about. Sourdough and French bread? Hell yes. I used a yogurt sour for this one, and that sour is probably the most foul. It started as some runny yogurt, but the more the sour developed, the more it resembled actual yogurt and got extremely pungent. This bread was the first sourdough in the section, and it actually takes two days of prep, in addition to the five or so days of making the sour. It was all worth it because this bread is amazing. Even though it kind of looks like a sloppy mess, it's delicious. It has some awesome sour taste with the excellent texture of steamed French bread. I wish this loaf would have turned out larger, but I'm okay with this size because if I eat the whole thing today, I won't feel as bad. There's even more sourdoughs on the horizon!

Day 135: Sourdough Whole-Wheat Bread

Now this sourdough has some flavor! It didn't rise very much, so it came out a bit smaller, but it still tastes delicious. The whole-wheat flour adds some great taste and texture to every bite. I used a honey sour for this one, and damn that thing was rank. It pays off though, because like I said, there's some serious sour flavor in this one. I don't think I can eat a whole loaf of this bread, the flavor is a bit too overpowering, even for me. I love sourdough on it's own, but this one is a bit much. I can't wait to taste the other sourdoughs and see what the different sours add to each bread.

Day 134: Sourdough Oatmeal Bread

Sourdoughs! This bread turned out amazing. My friend Michael and I have already eaten half of the entire loaf. I used a raw potato starter in this one, so it's part potato bread part oatmeal sourdough, making it to die for. The oatmeal in the bread add a chewiness and texture that I'm familiar with, but the sour gives it so much flavor it's insane. I usually cut recipes in half and only bake one loaf, but I think these sourdoughs are going to be good enough to make as many as possible. I've talked to countless people who just want me to make sourdoughs because they're everyone's favorite. They're mine too, which is why I've eaten so much of this bread already. The wait was definitely worth it folks. 

Day 133: Pain D'ail (Garlic Bread)

I've never made garlic bread before, so I was interested in how this book made it. A lot of recipes simply put garlic butter on the bread after it is done baking, in order to turn it into garlic bread. This recipe actually uses garlic that has been blanched, crushed, and then put into melted butter. You take that and throw it into the mixer while adding your usual ingredients. It was very easy to make and even easier to add more garlic if I wanted to. I used three loaves in this bread and it doesn't have as much garlic flavor as I wanted, but it's not over powering either, which I'm happy about. The aftertaste of this bread has a lot of garlic however, so maybe that's where all the secret garlic flavor lies. We'll be getting to sourdoughs here in a bit, don't worry. 

Day 132: Blueberry-Pecan Bread

I tried something different this time and made this bread gluten free! I used coconut flour, and I don't know if I used too much or if I used too little (I think with alternative flours you need to adjust your ratios and stuff). It tastes fantastic, but it is a very crumbly mess. I didn't want to take it out of the pan because once I did it broke it half and got extra crumbly. I've only ever heard of blueberry muffins, but it does make a lot of sense to just go the extra mile and make a blueberry bread. Pecans, like walnuts, are just good in everything, so it was no surprise that this bread tastes amazing. I'm going to have to keep working on gluten free breads though, because they're still impossible.  

Day 131: Butter-Beer Batter Bread

I'd never heard of beer bread until a few years ago when my buddy Cody made some. It blew my mind that you can use beer to not only give the bread flavor but to help it rise. This bread turned out amazing, and I'd forgotten how easy beer bread was. I did modify this recipe a bit because it called for an ENTIRE stick of butter to be melted over the top, baked, then once the bread comes out of the oven, you invert it to let the butter seep through the bread all over again. I melted about a table spoon of butter over it and it came out just fine. An entire stick of butter is way too extreme. Bernard Clayton grew up in the south, so I can see that being chill down there back in the 70's, but now a days I just can't get behind that. Another weird thing about this bread is that there is a ton of oregano in it, but you can't tell at all. It doesn't really add to the flavor, and you can't see it in the texture either, so I don't really know why it's in here. This bread is still delicious and I continue to be impressed by beer breads. 

Day 130: Tomato-Cheese Bread

Like it or not, this bread is basically pizza. But no where near as good as real pizza. I feel like just making a pizza dough with the cheese and tomato in it would have been a much better replacement for this. In fact, that sounds a lot better than how this bread turned out. There were both mozzarella and Parmesan cheese in this, but you could barely tell at all. You didn't get any of the gooey cheesiness that comes with pizza. I love the color of this bread, and it's not bad, but there's really no mistaking it for what it is: wannabe pizza. 

Day 129: Hana Banana-Nut Loaf

I skipped ahead to the fruit and nut breads and surprise surprise the very first one was a banana nut bread! You can never go wrong with some good banana bread and this one is no exception. It usually uses macadamia nuts, but I didn't have any on hand so I just used the standard walnut for it and it tastes just like every other walnut banana bread I've ever made. I don't know how much macadamia would have changed it, but next time I make a banana bread I'm definitely going to throw some of those in. These sours are taking a while so I think I'm just going to start Sour Dough bread next week and have a glorious week of delicious bread! 

Day 128: Onion Twist Bread

Another awesome onion bread! I used to hate onions as a kid, but now I'm fine with them in almost everything. Unlike the other onion breads I've made, this one doesn't use any chopped up onion. It just uses a packet of onion soup mix instead. This makes it very oniony in flavor. An almost overpowering amount of onion is in here. I think I left the loaf in the oven for a few minutes longer than ideal, because while it's not burnt, it is still a little crispy. It was meant to be a golden brown but came out a lot more brown. I've been decreasing the baking times for a bit now, but I might need to keep decreasing it and checking on it. We're almost to sourdough season! 

Day 127: Tomato-Caraway Bread

Another fantastic vegetable bread! I never thought that an only tomato bread existed, let alone one that adds caraway seeds to it. The main ingredient in this bread is some awful tomato juice. I love tomatoes with things, on thing, ketchup, and all tomato sauces, but I just don't like tomato juice. I'm not one of those people that can just snack on a whole tomato, they're just too gooey inside and the flavor just kills me. I can't even do cherry tomatoes. They have to be accompanied with something. I was wary when I saw this bread and the only thing it had was tomato juice and caraway, but I am pleasantly surprised. The small amount of tomato juice in this recipe just gives the bread a hint of tomato flavor before getting kicked out of the picture by the incredible taste of all the caraway. Caraway is just too good that I'm glad it steals the show and overpowers the flavor of this bread. 

Day 126: Carrot Bread

I was not really looking forward to this bread until I actually started making it and realized that it was basically carrot cake, the best kind of cake. This was a batter bread so it had the same texture and consistency of banana bread and was extremely easy to throw together. The only hard part of this bread was grating a cup of carrots. Grating anything is usually the biggest pain in the butt. Other than that is fairly basic. A little bit of cinnamon helped the loaf a ton in the flavor department. This one was also from the vegetable bread section, obviously, and I think I will be making this more often in the future. Carrot cake is just too hard to resist. 

Day 125: Onion Lover's Bread

We're going to be skipping around a bit, making different breads here and there while I wait for the sours to ferment. It'll hopefully take about 5 more days, and then we can dive into the sourdough bread section. This one is from the vegetable bread section. It's an awesome braided bread that is actually stuffed with cooked onions in each of the braids. It tastes like a giant dinner roll chock full of onions. This is amazing to eat, especially hot out of the oven. I think I might move some of the bread sections around, namely moving the festive breads further back in the year when there are some actual holidays. I'm not sure what to bake after this one, but I think I'll keep checking out some more of the vegetable breads and herb breads. Those all sound incredible while I wait for some delicious sourdough. 

Day 124: Pain De Compagne Madame Doz

This last French bread was a doozy. It took about 3 days to ferment before I could actually start working on it. It starts with a starter, then a levain, and then you actually make another ball of dough and combine them together. It took forever and was a giant pain, but eventually they combined and became a regular piece of dough. They rose a little funky and got a weird shape but they taste okay. Definitely not as good as any of the other French breads, but this one needed a lot more salt. It is an incredibly bland bread, but the texture is pretty top. It might just be best as a sandwich  bread, or at the very least, not eaten alone. That wraps it up for the French and Italian breads and it was awesome! Next we're moving onto Sourdoughs and starters, so I think because it'll take a while to make all the starters I'm going to chill this weekend and just let them do their thing and talk a bit about each of them. 

Day 123: Pesto Bread

Another fantastic bread for another cheat day! I underestimated the amount of time it takes to ferment this last French bread, which is why I've had to make up these past two days on bread. It takes a lot of time to make some good French bread it turns out. This bread is a swirl bread, but I didn't have enough pesto (with the left over basil from the pizza) to cover the entire swirl. It is still delicious, but the pesto does not go all the way through the loaf and into every bite like I wished it would. This bread was actually in the book but super far ahead in the herb bread section. After the last French bread is going to be a lot of starters before the sourdough section, so I think I might take a bit of time to go through those while they actually ferment this weekend before actually diving into the sourdoughs next week. 

Day 122: More Pizza Dough

I was listening to the Bon Appetit foodcast and they just had to talk about pizza and pasta. And it just happened to also be about what fresh vegetables are great in both. And it just happen to be a beautiful sunny day out. So obviously, the pizza was calling my name. I decided to wing it on the dough, and use a lot of stuff I learned from the podcast. Like what to put on the pizza before it goes into the oven and what goes on right after it came out. I also learned a highly advanced technique of not cooking the hand made tomato sauce at all before using it for pizzas, in order to give it a fresher taste. If you don't like tomatoes it's definitely not for you, but it was delicious! But the stars of the show were the fresh basil and the pizza dough. I just threw some flour, water, yeast, salt, and olive oil together to make it and it turned out great. I'm constantly amazed by how easy bread can be to make and how terribly difficult it can be. We'll probably get to finishing the French and Italian breads really soon! 

Day 121: Blue Ribbon French Bread

This bread gets it's name from when Bernard Clayton won a state fair back in the 50's with this French bread. It's a lot flatter than the other loaves I've made so far, but I think that might be my fault for letting it rise for too long. This bread still tastes delicious though, and that's all due to the amazing steamed crust. Steaming the bread gives it s nice chewy texture, while still being a bit crisp. It's such a game changer it's insane. I don't know why every bread recipe doesn't use steam for the crust. Maybe more complex breads don't benefit as much from it as these simple breads. That would be something worth checking into for the long haul. We only have a few French and Italian breads left, but they've all been so delicious! 

Day 120: Braided Peasant Loaf

Another easy and delicious French bread. The only hard part about about this bread was the actual braiding. The rising was quite an adventure though because you had to let it rise for an hour and a half, but punch it down every 10 minutes. Instead of my usual walk away and forget about it I actually had to sit with the dough to beat it up every once in a while. Other than that it was smooth sailing for this bread. I know I've said this before but all of these French and Italian breads are just too incredible. I definitely think I'm going to be making a lot more of these breads later down the road, because they're just so easy as well. We only have a couple left unfortunately!