Focaccia, Antipasto, Burrata Bliss

I don't mean to gush but I feel I must over two wonderful items in this post. Number 1, I have a glass of wine in my hand right now and I am raising it to The Bread Maker's Apprentice cookbook. I am an unabashed lover of bread. I love to make it (see Whole Wheat post), smell it in the oven, look at it and savor that buttery taste hot from the oven. There is no way I could ever follow the Atkins diet, I love carbs too much to give them up. Now, make bread with a ton of olive oil, caramelized onions and other delectable toppings and you have focaccia or one of the most sinful of all sinful carbs.

The second item that goes so wonderfully with homemade focaccia is burrata cheese. I will never forget tasting this mound of creamy goodness for the first time at Cafe Spiaggia in Chicago on a truly unforgettable date. He, (said date), ordered the antipasto platter which included the burrata and although we were still getting to know each other, he encouraged me to taste the cheese. Taste I did and it was as if I had just eaten a piece of high quality mozzarella with heavy cream and slight lemon undertones. In other words, it was mozzarella with the volume turned up and soon my date's plate was empty with only a drop of olive oil remaining from my ravenous siege of his appetizer. Burrata is difficult to find but if you come across it, please do pick it up and use it as a wonderfully flavorful and creamy alternative to mozzarella.

To compliment the two items above, I also added in marinated olives and tomatoes, salami and roasted red peppers. I am posting the recipes for the olives, tomatoes and peppers as those are the three items for which the recipes are mine. I think posting the focaccia recipe would be a disservice to The Bread Maker's Apprentice cookbook which includes so many tips, hints and different methods for making this focaccia as well as so many other bread recipes. If you have any interest in proper bread making, in my humble opinion, this book explains better than others how to make quality breads of all kinds and I highly recommend it. Enjoy! AJ

Marinated Olives

Ingredients
24 large unpitted Spanish olives
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons coriander seeds, crushed
2 teaspoons thyme
1 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed
2 garlic cloves, minced

Combine all ingredients in a bowl. Cover and marinate in refrigerator at least 8 hours. Serve at room temperature.

Marinated Tomatoes, recipe adapted from Fine Cooking

Ingredients
2 pints cherry tomatoes
2 scallions (white part only), chopped coarse
1/4 cup finely chopped parsley
1 tablespoon finely chopped rosemary
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 Tbs. balsamic vinegar
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method

In a shallow bowl, mix the tomatoes, scallions, parsley, rosemary, garlic, olive oil, and vinegar. Season with salt and pepper. Cover the bowl and let the tomatoes marinate at room temperature for at least 1 hour, but preferably 3 to 4 hours. Stir them occasionally so that all the tomatoes are marinated. If the tomatoes are very ripe and marinate long enough, they will crack and burst, allowing their juices to mix with the marinade.

Roasted Red Peppers

Ingredients
4 large red bell peppers, seeded and cut in 1/2 lengthwise
2 tablespoons olive oil, plus 1 1/2 cups
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Method

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees F.

Pour 2 tablespoons of olive oil on a baking sheet and place the peppers, cut side up on the oil. Turn the peppers over, season them with salt and pepper, and roast in the oven for 20 minutes. Place the warm peppers in a bowl, and cover with plastic wrap. Set aside to cool for at least 30 minutes.

When the peppers are cool, remove and discard the skins. Slice the peppers and arrange them on a plate. Pour garlic or basil oil over the peppers and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Whole Wheat Bread with Wheat Germ and Rye

What is it about baking bread? For me, it is part nostalgia, part therapy, part loving the smell of bread baking in my kitchen and part just liking the idea of eating homemade bread.

For the nostalgia part, I remember coming home from church when I was growing up and having my Mom’s bread baking in the oven. The smell was intoxicating as we entered the kitchen through the garage door. I could not wait to change out of my “church clothes” which usually consisted of some combination of pink, lace and ruffles with tights, always with the white tights and shiny white patent shoes. I have no memory of what we feasted on at those Sunday suppers; all I remember is that bread. My Mom would ritualistically take the bread out of the oven and place it in the center of the table on a cutting board. She would slice into it and I would hear the crunch of the outer loaf and watch the knife slice through the floured top and into the warm doughy middle. The steam from the insides would billow out of the center of the bread like a geyser. She would cut me a generous slice and top it with a pat of butter that would melt from the middle of the slice and down the sides. I would take that first bite and feel the butter and bread come together and melt in my mouth. After polishing off the slice, I would lick all of my fingers clean that were, at that point, completely slathered in butter.

Now that I am all grown up (in theory anyway), I also get to make the bread which can double as therapy. Not the same sort of therapy that comes from pounding meat until it is completely flattened but that’s an entirely different blog post. Sometimes kneading bread soothes the soul more than my workouts or a glass of wine after a tough day. Once you make your own bread, you will never get it from the grocery store again.

Recipe from “The Next Best Recipe” from Cook’s Illustrated.

Recipe:

2 1/3 cups warm water
1 1/2 tablespoons instant yeast
1/4 cup honey
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 cup rye flour
1/2 cup toasted wheat germ
3 cups whole wheat flour
2 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting work surface

In the bowl of a standing mixer, mix the water, yeast, honey, butter, and salt with a rubber spatula. Mix in the rye flour, wheat germ, and 1 cup each of the whole-wheat and all-purpose flours.

Add the remaining whole-wheat and all-purpose flours, attach the dough hook, and knead at low speed until the dough is smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes. Transfer the dough to a lightly floured surface and knead about 30 seconds.

Place the dough in a very lightly oiled large bowl and cover with a towel. Let rise in a warm, draft-free area until the dough has doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

Heat the oven to 375 degrees. Gently press down the dough and divide into two equal pieces. Gently press each piece into a rectangle about 1 inch thick and no longer than 9 inches. With a long side of the dough facing you, roll the dough firmly into a cylinder, pressing down to make the dough stick to itself. Turn the dough seam-side up and pinch it closed. Place each cylinder of dough seam-side down in a greased 9x5 inch loaf pan and gently press the dough so it touches all sides of the pan. Cover the shaped dough with a towel and let rise until almost doubled in volume, 20 to 30 minutes.

Bake 35-45 minutes. Transfer the bread immediately from the baking pans to wire racks, cool to room temperature.