Tag: bread

Snow day! Top ten (fun) things to do

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, family, italian, Karen's Kitchen, movies, recipes, writing

I have not had a snow day for quite a while  (the Christmas Blizzard doesn’t count because I was too worried about my husband and son driving home from work in it to enjoy it). I decided to plan ahead for the next one, so I was ready to dive into distraction at a moment’s notice.

Stuff to do:

  1. a.Crack out the crock pot. The big one. Make soup. Here’s a recipe for Minestrone using whatever you have in the pantry and fridge. Whatever is left over can be frozen to bring to work to eat for lunch during the week.  b.Pull out the frozen gravy, meatballs and sausage from the freezer; place in crock pot. Add whatever odds and ends of meat you have leftover. Supper is almost ready!
  2. No crock pot? Here’s a great recipe from Stephen Lanzalotta (author of The Diet Code, and baker extraordinaire at Micucci’s on India Street in Portland) that uses stuff (once again) that you have in the pantry right now. Really. I’ll wait while you go check. It’s for Tomato and Tuna Soup for one. Not alone (or just really hungry)? Just employ a little math to double or triple the recipe. Done.
  3. Got Netflix? Load up your instant queue so now that the flakes are flying, all you’ll have to do is hit the “play” button.
  4. Bake! You can mix up a bucket of bread dough (keeps in fridge for up to two weeks) so it’s ready when you are. Not much gets those endorphins going like the smell of fresh bread baking.
  5. Read! Got a stack of books by (or under) the bed? A stack of magazines you’ve had no time to read? A Kindle? Go for it.
  6. Write! Keep a file that you toss your little scraps of napkins, post its, notebook paper on which you’ve jotted down ideas that came to you while driving, watching TV, listening to a boring lecture at school so you will always have your own prompts and projects ready.
  7. Got kids? Play Wii! (or Uno, or checkers, or whatever!)
  8. Take a nap. You know you want to.
  9. Virtually  visit with friends and relatives via FB or email. In other words…DON”T DRIVE!
  10. Be grateful the fam is all safe and sound.

🙂

Baking bread

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, baking, books
Bread!

 

Years ago I had tried baking bread from scratch. It was a many-houred affair, what with the kneading, and the punching down, and the multiple rises (unless you’re making beer bread, but that’s another story)…well, I discovered that this is not the only way to make bread at home.  A coworker told me about a book that explained a different approach. http://www.artisanbreadinfive.com/ is the author’s website, and you can even find a video of the process (if you search around a little) there. 

Well, I’ve never looked back. I’ve been making bread this way now for more than a year and it’s fantastic. There are several different recipes (there’s even a second book now, recently released by them and a third book in the works) in the first book as well as on the website, but even if you only make the basic recipe boule, I predict that you will be happy. My niece Ariana loves it so much that every time she visits me (or I visit her!) I have a bread freshly baked, ready to give her. 

The book is:  Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois. 

Have any of you heard of this book? Have you tried the recipes?