11/10/17 Down East Rolls Again

11/10/17
Down East Light Rolls never cease to please. These are for a Mother and daughter that are members at my church. They are both unable to cook and my Early Bird Prayer Group is taking dinner tonight.

To photo these rolls, I used natural lighting and a basket and vintage linen cloth. Taking pictures under fluorescent light produces a poor quality shot and doesn't display your final products at their best.

11/717 Sprouted Multi Grain and Cinnamon Rolls

11/7/17
Our Artisan Bread Class has two assignments for class today. We will use a soaker and pate ferment prepared from yesterday's class to make Multi Grain Bread. And, in addition, we will bake off Cinnamon Rolls from dough prepared yesterday.

Cinnamon roll log prepared 11/6. Ready for measured cut.

Chef Summers demos cutting and panning rolls

 

Panned Rolls

 

My rolls panned

 

Patrick's rolls are perfectly round

 

Multi Grain Bread is shaped and topped with sesame seeds

The multi grain loaves are couched and proofing

 The Cinnamon Rolls join the proofing party

Final Results

Sprouted Multi Grain Bread

Cinnamon Rolls

11/6/17 Cream Cheese Braids

11/6/17
The weeks are rolling by so fast. Anther Monday and another Prayer Breakfast. Today I have made three Cream Cheese Braids: for Prayer Breakfast, one for my friend Anita, and one for class. The dough for the braids is a rich dough with much sugar, butter, and eggs. The dough is rolled out in a rectangle and the sides are cut into strips to braid leaving the center uncut. A mixture of sugar, cream cheese, and vanilla is spread down the center and the strips are braided over the cheese. The braids are baked and glazed,very sweet and decadent.

So pretty!!

10/30/17 Laminated Dough

10/30/17

My ambition has been to finally make a laminated dough. Our Artisan Bread class is making Croissant dough.  Here we go......

Chef Summers encases the butter block

Encasing the butter block

 Dough rolled and folded for the cooler

Look at the layers of dough and butter

My dough ready for the cooler!

My dough sliced into two parts

Cutting the Croissants

Rolled and panned

Sheila rolls her dough

Chassitity perfects her croissants

Nicely done

Rolling out the 2nd half

Chocolate filling

Apple cinnamon filling

Multiple fillings

Baking croissants

Goodness gracious

It has been a good day!!

10/30/17

For Prayer Breakfast and my class, I made Monkey Bread.  This is a very sweet wonderful sweet and pairs perfectly with coffee!! The preparation takes extra time, but is worth the effort.

The dough is cut into small balls, dipped in butter, and rolled in cinnamon sugar.

Turned out of pan just out of the oven.

Isn't it beautiful?? Magazine worthy!

10/28/17 Fresh Pizza

10/28/17

Oh my goodness, there aren't many foods in the world better than pizza, and we are not talking Digiorno. Made from scratch dough and special toppings rue the day. In class on 10/28, our Artisan Breads class made dough and shaped the dough into individual pizzas. We topped, and baked them off.  We shared them with our partners up in the culinary building. Here is the dough with a bit of an edge to keep in the ingredients!!

We top the dough

 Creativity is a plus!

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie!!

10/23/17 Redo Alabama Orange Rolls

10/23/17
And I am off to another Prayer Breakfast meeting with a sweet bread. The choice this week is a repeat of Alabama Orange Rolls. I have come across several versions of this treat. My fave has orange juice in the dough, orange zest in the filling, and orange juice in the glaze. And, that would be from fresh oranges. We  are not messing around here!

And here is the final result:

10/20/17 Baguette Practice

10/20/17
Our Artisan Breads class will be making baguettes for our practical exam. Chef Summers has been encouraging us to practice!! Unlike Alan Iverson, a famous and infamous NBA player, I do believe in and need to practice!!

On this day, I decided to drag out my couche and my baguette pan and give it another try! I was very happy with the result!! I would be nice if I could send these photos in for the final!!!

Love my couche

Nestled and sung in their bed

Now, these a beautiful baguettes. Bon jour France!! 

10/16/17 Garden Bounty

10/16/17
My daughter Mary Margaret and I have a small Fall Garden in our back yard. We are learning how to grow vegetables and what is involved. We planted tomatoes, romaine lettuce, broccoli, chives, collards, butternut squash, rainbow Swiss chard and mesclun mix. We have met quite a few challenges: bugs, rabbits, and squirrels. we have tried many remedies to eliminate the pests including, cayenne pepper, human hair, wolf urine, sprays, and sulfur. Cayenne pepper seems to have kept the rabbits and squirrels at bay. We tried several  "organic" sprays to kill bugs. Finally we had to use Sevin Spray.

So far we have harvested chives, a few cherry tomatoes, romaine lettuce, rainbow Swiss chard, and lots of mesclun mix.

Here is a photo of our rainbow Swiss chard. Note the name is derived from the multi-colors of the stems. We sauteed the chard in olive oil and a little garlic.

Using the mesclun mix, we have prepared many salads and have shared with Chef Clarkson and friends. The mesclun mix was purchased from Beaufort Ace Hardware store. The Wyatt-Quarles company in Garner mixes these seeds for the mix: Prizehead, Oak Leaf, Red Salad Bowl, and Cimmaron Lettuces, and Arugula, Endive and Cress. We added eggs, apples, and blue cheese for this particular salad. 

CCC Library Culinary Resources

Our library at CCC has many resources for Culinary and Baking and Pasty students. It is enjoyable to go there and look through the shelves at the available books covering many epicurean subjects.

My Artisan Bread class will soon assist Chef Summers in creating a gingerbread house in the image of our new culinary building. For some basic understanding of gingerbread house construction, I found this book in the library. Although published in 1999, the basic techniques described apply to current construction.

Hans Welker of the Culinary Institute of America published Professional Bread Baking this year (2017).  This is an excellent resource for a baker or student. Typically, the book opens with wonderful and useful information such as functions of ingredients, needed equipment, global breads, and history of breads. Of most interest to me were the Baguettes made with pate ferment, poolish, and levain. It would be interesting to bake baguettes with the three different pre-ferments and compare the differences.  The recipes are designed for production of large amounts. The student or home baker would need to carefully reconfigure the yield.

At the library is a small collection of Art Culinaire: The International Magazine in Good Taste. This urbane magazine is published in New Jersey, recipes, chefs, and ingredients from around the world are explored. From peacock eggs to dabbawala, someone interested in the unusual and trendy in the food world, this might be the book for you. The food photography alone is worth the time to investigate this collection of books.