Monday, March 26, 2012

It is a gorgeous day here in Vermont!  I wish I could show you a picture but my camera is packed in preparation for the Big Move come Sunday.  It is going to be so nice to be back in a kitchen of my own with room for all of my pots, pans and gadgets.  I can even unpack all those pretty dishes I haven't seen in a couple of years.

Earlier, one of my friends on an Amazon Discussions  thread mentioned that she had made her first loaf of bread and that it had taken twenty minutes  to knead the dough.  Here's a video from Epicurious that might help cut that time down some:



Many of you have heard me talk about the Windowpane Test to tell whether or not your bread dough has been kneaded adequately.  Here's another video showing just how to do that.  If you were standing on the other side of the dough she is holding that center area would be very translucent.  The way this was photographed with the light shining on the dough from the camera side makes it a little hard to see.



Feel free to drop me an email!

6 comments:

  1. Thanks, very helpful to those of us who've never done this before. --Ketta

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  2. I'm glad Ketta. I really enjoy baking bread and sharing that with other people.

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  3. Thanks so much for starting this blog grandma. I'm a lurker on the thread but SO interested in baking (especially bread) and can't get enough of all the information you so wonderfully give us. - Kathy

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    1. Nice to meet you Kathy and I hope I'll be seeing lots more of you. I think the first thing I'm going to do Monday (assuming I have unpacked my new kitchen) is bake a batch of bread. I had to suffer through store-bought bagels a couple of days ago. I have to wonder what I ever saw in them.

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  4. I got Secrets of a Jewish Baker today! I'm so excited. Do you have one recipe you especially like you'd recommend starting with? And you're right, his way of laying out the three different methods is much clearer and less cluttered and confusing than Clayton's.

    Becky (beckygardens)

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    1. Hi Becky! One of the recipes I use most often is the very first one in the book - Milk Bread. I use the sponge method recipe. Makes two very nice loaves of a good sandwich bread similar to Brick Oven or Pepperidge Farm. If you want to you can substitute whole wheat flour for about 1/2 the flour the recipe calls for.

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