Stollen

Fruit breads, always out to fuck you up, bitches.  However, unlike the EIGHTY MILLION other fruit breads in this book, this bread is "different."  Why?  B/c "Germans who grew up on stollen . . . were adamant that stollen is nothing like panettone."  Right, but pita bread is just like lavash, Peter.  GEEZ, the Orientalism of this book grates on my nerves.

I will say that fruit breads have cute stories, if you're into that kind of thing.  For example, the bread in this "bread symbolizes the baby Jesus, and the colored fruits represent the gifts of the Magi."  Cute!  Someone make a bread about my birthday!

Another cute thing about this bread?  You can make it in one day!  Gasp!  Okay, on to the pictures and whatnot.

This bread starts with a sponge:

which is whole milk + flour + yeast.  PS: So if I add water to whole milk, does that make skim milk?  Fuck, I should have just used evaporated milk like normal.  Now I have 1 3/4 c whole milk for which I have to find a use.

And fruit!

This is raisins (supposed to be golden raisins, but I already had regular ones.  I figured it wouldn't make a big difference, unless golden raisins signify a particular gift of the Magi.) + dried fruit mix (supposed to be candied fruit, but where do you find candied fruit and also Peter says dried's okay, he guesses.) + brandy (caucasian gentleman wasted) + orange extract.

Both of these sit for an hour.  I also napped for an hour.  Friends!  Until!

It's amazing what warm milk and a shit ton of yeast will do.  Barm, I do not miss your face.

So, this is flour + sugar + salt + orange zest (clementine, anyway.  Are they the same?) + cinnamon + egg + butter + water + sponge.

Bugs.  My camera is getting buzzed from the brandy, which smells horrible.  I then had to pour all of it out onto the counter to knead obvs, so my kitchen will forever smell like a frat house and/or cleaning facility.  I don't wear tight jeans like the white boys.

But it resulted in this!  Sits for forty-five minutes.  This is like bread via time travel, it's so fast!

After 45, this bread gets laid out.  Ha.

More fruit!  And nuts!  I'm giving this bread away, PS, in my dislike of fruit breads.  So, I'll be making the next bread soon.  Look out.  And, I don't have to eat french toast for the next eighty mornings.  Yay!

So, this gets rolled up.  Omg.  There are so many relationships between this bread and Gucci Mane's Wasted, which will now be stuck in my head for the rest of the day.  Remember when I didn't like this song?  I had such taste then.  You can have it stuck in your head now, too.  Twins!

Gucci Mane has to be the ugliest out.  Also has the dumbest name.  AND makes the dumbest music.  Poor Gucci.  Anyway, bread gets shaped:

Look!  Here's me!  A German bread!  And it's crescent-shaped now!  Such hybridity.  Bhabha would be proud.  Say that last part in an Indian accent.  This sits for an hour, kids.

Okay, so I thought this got huge, but the pictures don't lie.

Almost donez!

+ vegetable oil + powdered sugar =

A tea strainer is like the most useful, versatile tool in the kitchen.  For future reference, it also works as a mini sieve.  Powdered sugar makes everything look pretty!  Except this bread in this picture, which looks like a dead dog covered in snow.  Like seriously, am I the only one that sees a dog lying on its side?  It even has ears.

Tada!

This was you know, bread with fruit and nuts in it, basically.  4/5.  The rest goes to Shaad and his gf gf Andrea, who should try it anyway.  <3