I'm sure, unlike perhaps casatiello, most of you have heard of foccacia. WELL WIPE YOUR BRAINS CLEAR OF THAT. Peter is amazed focaccia caught on in the US b/c every version he's encountered has been subpar. TODAY WE ARE MAKING PAR FOCCACIA. And I will stop using caps now. But, I hope you realize how important today's bread baking venture is. Oh no! I ended in a participle! Or whatever it's called -- "is."
Foccacia = flour + salt + yeast =
+ oil + water =
Speaking of +s, I had to do math today for this recipe. Like real math. Like the area of a circle. Why? Remind me to tell you when it's actually relevant to the progress narrative that is baking. Hopefully. I guess burnt bread is nonnormative bread. Refusing the progress narrative. That makes me feel better about burning bread or otherwise ruining it. Just refusing the baking progress narrative -- nbd.
So, this bready-bread is all stirred and stuff:
Ooh! Yay new camera taking a cool picture. Dough is all sticky-like. Luckily this bread involves no kneading (although a lot of annoying stirring was involved). Instead a bed is involved. That's right! Another bed of flour. I'd like to sleep in a bed of flour now. I always wanted to go swimming in flour. TMI? Or really, not. Ha. Maybe today will involve nap instead of grading the thirty-five papers I have to grade before my master's exams! Ah! I'm becoming a Grown-Up Baking Bread! GUBB! Noo!
Anyway, back to the bed:
The dough gets to take a five minute nap on it's bed before it gets tortured. It's kind of like the rack. Except then it turns into an envelope. But, I'm getting ahead of myself.
See, after five minutes, it gets stretched to twice its size:
Look! I'm demonstrating for you! Then, it gets folded like an envelope so it becomes:
This is a weird recipe. Like weird timings. But, anyway, this sits for half an hour, then gets stretched-enveloped again. It's kind of like working in an office again. Except baking. And no Aziz Ansari or Jim from The Office:
So, after half an hour, we get to play office again!
This is the envelope. The envelope again gets stretched and re-enveloped, so it looks like this:
I am running out of spray oil. FML. What will I do with myself? It will be like old times when I didn't have spray oil.
Anyway, this re-enveloped dough sits for an hour. Meanwhile, I make herb oil, which will make another appearance later! This is olive oil + basil + oregano + garlic + salt + pepper.
I figured I'd make it early so that the herbs can flavor the oil, even though dried herbs have as much flavor as paper does. At least the garlic is "fresh." Gettin' fresh.
So after and hour, both the dough and I are lookin' fresh. Me for the lie-bury, the dough for the fridge. But, first! The dough!
Did it get bigger? Idk. Hopefully. So, foccacia time! Oil time! Hot.
So this is where the math came in. Peter bakes his bread in a 17x12 pan. I cut the recipe in half, and I needed to figure out the area of the appropriate pan. Yes, I am serious about breadbaking. This pan is a little small, but that's okay. The focc will just be thicker, which is all the better for sandwich making.
The way you blowin' up my phone won't make me leave no faster. But, it will make me bake faster. Okay, nm. It won't make me do anything. Tonight I'm not takin' no calls cause I'll be dancing.
Breadz!
Herb oilz! Sorry for no witty banter. I left my head and my heart on the dance floor. Come get them! Boo-ya!
So this gets all dimple-y.
Having two radios on in two different rooms is like having surround sound. Like surround apartment sound.
So, this dough sits overnight in the fridge! And I attempt to work before spending my whole weekend regurgitating two years of women's studies knowledge. Yuck. I feel like I should be able to spend today watching episodes of Glee, not working. Stupid kids needing their papers graded. I don't care about your horrible analyses of movies! J/k . . .
Good night! <3
No comments:
Post a Comment