Rosemary, Currants & Browned Butter Bread Loaf

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breads, breakfast, citrus, rosemary

Decided, on a whim, to make bread. That was until I discovered that there wasn’t any more yeast left! So I went with an Irish soda bread (Okay, inspired by masterchef again) and tweaked the flavours a whole lot. Here’s a combination of sweet and savoury – rosemary infused into the browned butter, or beurre noisette, with it nuttiness and richness. The loaf was brightened with citrus notes from the orange zest and the currants gave it little pockets of sweetness. Finally, a little black pepper and sea salt to round off.

I like that the loaf wasn’t too heavy or fluffy with an almost-perfect slightly chewy texture, thanks to the whole wheat flour. This particular one must be toasted before eating. Lightly golden, crisp just around the edges and oh the difference it makes to the flavour! The combination of rosemary, black pepper, citrus and currants is magical. Now let me rave about the wonders of browned butter – it’s so freakin’ amazing. Sure, it requires some extra effort to make and careful attention to prevent it from becoming all burnt and bitter. But it is soo soo worth it! The depth and nuttiness, makes everything taste better. The loaf was gone so quickly that I had to make a ‘cake version’ the following night to take to school, as promised. 

Cinnamon Rolls

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baked, breads, breakfast, buns, cinnamon, healthy, recipes, rolls, yeast

Those swirls of tender, pillowy soft rolls with ooey-gooey swirls of cinnamon-sugar, walnuts and raisins. Pulling apart fluffy layers dripping with caramelised goodness. Who needs therapy when you’ve got them? After having one-too-many cinnamon rolls/sticky buns from bakeshops around, I was convinced that these golden brown deliciousness can never enjoyed as often as I would like, without bursting a coronary or even a button for that matter.

Instead of unknowingly shovelling an insane amount of butter, white refined sugar, bleached flours into our mouths (Cinnabon, i’m looking at you!), I decided to make my own.

First, was to work out a recipe that would produce soft, fluffy base without being laden with fat or filled with weird food additive (like bread improvers, softeners, etc.. wth, really?) A tablespoon of fresh orange zest added a little extra something to the dough. Then, for the filling: cutting down the unnecessarily large proportion of butter. (Side note: an obscene amount of butter in a recipe seems to give most people an assurance that it would turn out ah-mazingly good. So wrong!!). To up the flavour quotient, I finally settled on a mix of spices + good french butter + dark brown muscovado sugar. Cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, ginger, and a little black pepper. Unorthodox, but it works. Lightly toasting the walnuts and pecans greatly enhances their nutty aroma. Oh, then there are rum-soaked raisins. I also skipped the signature cream cheese icing – no way was I going to douse all those rich, warm, earthy flavours with a blanket of sweet frosting. After a number of tweaks and alteration to my recipe, here it is — Cinnamon rolls/buns (my way)

Italian Herb & Onion Focaccia

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baked, bread, focaccia, recipes, savoury, yeast

It seems like I hardly feature anything savoury over here. Apart from having an incredibly sweet tooth, I rarely gravitate towards baking savoury items like quiches, meat pies, etc. For a change, here’s something that I’d made some time back during my bread-making phase. After several attempts (and filling the pantry with all sorts of flours for breads) I decided to take a rest from the usual crusty artisan free-form loafs and bake these Italian Focaccia instead.
Aromatic with a nice bite, they were even better dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar. However, these were a little dry the next day and not as chewy as we’d liked (maybe my proportions were a little off?) Well, at least they did make an awesome sandwich when lightly toasted with some Emmental cheese, smoked ham and peppery arugula/rocket leaves!

Artisan Boule

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baked, bread, breakfast, food, healthy, recipe, yeast

The idea of bread making has always been intimidating. I’ve played around with yeasted baked goods like doughnuts, cinnamon rolls and pretzels but never the real crusty breads since we usually buy them from speciality bakeries. It was not until I came across a book by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François which promised artisan breads in less than 5 minutes a day (remember the no-knead bread craze?) As crazy as it may sound, it did work! After mixing the starter and an overnight rest in the fridge, all it took was about 5 minutes to form and shape the loaf before a second rise.

Finally, the taste test! As the loaf cooled, there was a crackling sound which guaranteed a crisp and chewy crust. Thanks to the high-moisture dough and slow overnight fermentation, the interior was airy, chewy and holey. Flavour-wise, there was a faint sourdough flavour which I hoped had been more intense. The mix of wholegrain and bread flour gave it a pleasant nutty taste too! Nonetheless, it was really satisfying to be able to make your own bread, especially one that looks way more complicated that it really is.