Baking at the Lake

While in Tennessee with my family last week, I was a baking machine. I think my brothers and my dad wondered who this girl in their kitchen was, making honey whole wheat bread for sandwiches and homemade pizza dough for dinner. But it was so fun to come in from the lake and work in the kitchen while people were milling around and talking. I enjoy cooking and baking when people are home.

First, I made the honey whole wheat bread. A-MAZ-ING.

I have to admit that last month's recipe for English Muffin Bread didn't turn out perfect.

(Thank you to Kara and Allison for accepting it anyway...it's okay, you didn't have to eat it.)

I talked to Laura and it seems as though I didn't let the dough rise long enough.

(One of my frustrations with baking is that you can try to follow the directions exactly and it still doesn't turn out the same every time...at least not yet for me...)

(But Laura also says that you have to be okay with failing sometimes and that she throws away a lot of things that she tries because that's the only way she learns.)

(I like her.)

I did not make that mistake this time. This bread was PERFECT. And you MUST make it.

This recipe makes 3 loaves and we ate it all week for egg and cheese sandwiches, hummus and veggie sandwiches, just with butter....all delicious.

Honey Whole Wheat Bread

Ingredients

3 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)

2 (.25 ounce) packages active dry yeast

1/3 cup honey

5 cups bread flour

3 tablespoons butter, melted

1/3 cup honey

1 tablespoon salt

3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour

2 tablespoons butter, melted

Directions

1. In a large bowl, mix warm water, yeast, and 1/3 cup honey. Add 5 cups white bread flour, and stir to combine. Let set for 30 minutes, or until big and bubbly.

2. Mix in 3 tablespoons melted butter, 1/3 cup honey, and salt. Stir in 2 cups whole wheat flour. Flour a flat surface and knead with whole wheat flour until not real sticky - just pulling away from the counter, but still sticky to touch. This may take an additional 2 to 4 cups of whole wheat flour. Place in a greased bowl, turning once to coat the surface of the dough. Cover with a dishtowel. Let rise in a warm place until doubled.

3. Punch down, and divide into 3 loaves. Place in greased 9 x 5 inch loaf pans, and allow to rise until dough has topped the pans by one inch.

4. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 25 to 30 minutes; do not overbake. Lightly brush the tops of loaves with 2 tablespoons melted butter or margarine when done to prevent crust from getting hard. Cool completely.

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Next I made pizza dough from scratch. 

The recipe wants you to put it in the refrigerator for 3 days so it takes a little advance planning, but then 3 days later you have a super easy meal.

Keeping on my track of honesty, this one still needs some tweaking. I got it from another master chef friend, Jess, who swears by it so I definitely know it's user-error and not the recipe. My problem is that the dough ended up really sticky when I was ready to use it, making it hard to work with, so I think I should have added more flour (even though I followed the recipe...sigh).

It was still delicious, we scarfed it down, and even scoffed at the frozen pizza we also had (we had lots of people and had to supplement), in comparison.

But getting it from the refrigerator to a flattened state on a pizza stone wasn't easy ;)

Homemade Pizza Dough

Ingredients

• 1 teaspoon Instant Or Active Dry Yeast

• 1-½ cup Warm Water

• 4 cups All-purpose Flour

• 1 teaspoon Kosher Salt

• ⅓ cups Olive Oil

Directions

Sprinkle yeast over 1 1/2 cups warm (not lukewarm) water. Let stand for a few minutes.

In a mixer, combine flour and salt. With the mixer running on low speed (with paddle attachment), drizzle in olive oil until combined with flour. Next, pour in yeast/water mixture and mix until just combined, and the dough comes together in a sticky mass.

Coat a separate mixing bowl with a light drizzle of olive oil, and form the dough into a ball. Toss to coat dough in olive oil, then cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and set it aside for 1 to 2 hours, or store in the fridge until you need it.

Note: it’s best to make the dough at least 24 hours in advance, and 3 or 4 days is even better.

When you are ready to make the pizza, let it come to room temperature, and grab half the pizza dough (recipe makes 2 crusts) and squeeze the dough toward the bottom to form a nice, tight, pulled ball. You can roll out the pizza with a rolling pin if you’d like, but sometimes it’s just as easy to throw it around and pull and stretch till it feels right.  

..."pull and stretch" ??? I don't think so. More like, "push onto pizza stone with as little of your hand as possible, then scrape off all the dough that stuck to your hand, return it to dough ball, and repeat."

more flour??

And when the crust is nice and thin, lay it on an oiled baking sheet or pizza pan. Drizzle a little olive oil on the dough and spread it with your fingers. Very lightly sprinkle some salt on the crust.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Top your crust with your toppings of choice. Then bake for 15 to 17 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and toppings are bubbly.

See? It still turned out great, my mom and I didn't tell anyone about our troubles, they doused me with compliments, and thought I was just Betty Crocker...mission accomplished.