Cinnamon Pull-apart Bread

Oh, the joys of browing food blogs--the list of things I've bookmarked to make gets longer and longer every day, with no end in sight. And it's not very often that I actually get around to making things (although I have good intentions!) But sometimes you come across a photo or recipe that is so compelling that you must make it immediately--so it was with the cinnamon pull-apart bread from Joy the Baker. Actually, I first made this weeks ago, but it was so good that I kept craving it (and cursing myself for having given half of it away) and this weekend, I finally gave in.


I always think of yeast breads as being too time-consuming to make, but honestly, that's kind of silly. Most of the time involved is waiting for the dough to rise, so it's not like you have to sit around babysitting it. This dough comes together really quickly, especially if you have a handy implement like the dough whisk! I stirred this up by hand in about 5 minutes.


It's a very wet, sticky dough, which is why it looks so rough here. That's just the way it should be, and I left it to hang out near my radiator for an hour or so while I went on with my normal Saturday morning tasks (and by tasks, I mean knitting my sock).


Here it is after an hour! Nice and puffy. This gets turned out onto a floured surface and then a bit more flour is kneaded in, just until the dough is smooth and loses its stickiness. It's actually a pretty nice dough to work with and didn't resist being rolled out (much). I got too floury to take more pictures, but basically you roll the dough out into a rectangle, cover it in butter, then sugar and cinnamon, and slice into strips which you stack and slice again! (Just go look at link above for the recipe and much better photos!)


The stacks of dough squares get layered into a loaf pan (or multiple loaf pans, depending on size). You'll notice the smaller pan on the right; this one was the experimental loaf, and rather than buttering and sugaring the dough, I spread the layers with my new favorite thing in the entire world:


Biscoff spread aka speculoos spread! Okay--if you haven't had this? You have to go out and buy a jar RIGHT NOW. Think Nutella, except instead of chocolate, this is made out of GROUND SPICE COOKIES. Yeah, that's right--it's a spread made out of COOKIES. It's GENIUS!!


Oh, what the heck--here's another gratuitous shot of my speculoos-spread loaf. I was a little afraid of the spread burning so I wasn't as generous with it as I would have liked. I should have added more! Fortunately I can just apply as I eat...


Here it is baked! The spread baked into a crusty kind of topping, which was good, but wasn't as good as caramelly sugar and butter in the original loaf.


See all those gorgeous layers? As the name implies, after you turn this out of the pan, you eat it simply by pulling off layer after layer. But I highly recommend you invite someone to eat it with, because this can get addictive and before you know it, half the loaf has somehow disappeared....


Now if you'll excuse me, there's some bread calling my name!

Happy Halloween!

Well, I didn't get around to carving any pumpkins this year, but here is some pumpkin-ginger bread instead! Happy Halloween!!

In closing, here are two of my favorite pictures from the annual Ghoul's Procession at St. John the Divine, one of my favorite NYC Halloween events! The full set is here.

Irish Soda Bread

Just a quickie posting today--argh, my brother and I went to the Village Choice Eats festival last night and I don't think I want to eat ever again. I'm soooo full! Pictures/post to come, as soon as I can think about looking at food again. I'm going to have to rethink my food festival strategy...in the meantime, Totoro wants to know what the fuss is about soda bread, to which I say:


How could you NOT want to eat this? Mmm, currants and buttermilk. Want to make your own? Try this recipe here!

Ok, back to my current regimen of ginger tea and lots of vegetables...

My Brother the Bread Baker

Hey, did you know that I'm not the only baker in my family? My brother is something of a genius with bread (to me, at least--I am okay but not great at yeast, so I am always super impressed with what he makes. I hope he is as impressed with my pastries, hehe.) and lately he's been experimenting with sourdough, and more importantly, finally taking pictures of the stuff he bakes (I will consider that to be my influence...can it be long before he starts his own blog??) So, anyhow, I thought I'd show off some of his bread here. All of these photos are his.


And here's the sourdough starter--I believe all of the breads on this post are sourdough based (well, maybe not the melon pan, but I'll have to confirm). He gave me some a couple of weeks ago that I used for sourdough pancakes and the rest is languishing in the back of my fridge. I should probably feed it...yeah, I'll go do that, you guys look at the rest of these photos :)


Bad lighting, good breads!


Oh, I lied--this is the one photo I did take. It's a little blurry because man, he works fast with shaping the dough.


Check out the lovely texture on this bread...this is a fig loaf. Actually he made a new loaf of it today, and I TOTALLY FORGOT TO BRING SOME HOME. Because I am an idiot :(


Speaking of texture, how's this for a crackly crust?


Fruit loaf.


I think these maybe are rye?


More nicely textured bread innards.


Melon pan, before baking! (Melon pan, if you've never had it, is a sweet bread baked with a thin layer of cookie dough on top. Popular in Japan (but also in the rest of Asia).


And here's what they look like baked. I had one this morning for breakfast and they are deeeelicious.


One more gratuitous shot, just because I love the way these look. I keep joking with my brother that we need to join forces and open a bakery, if only we could come up with a catchy name. Anyway, maybe I will give him some pointers in lighting when he takes his photos, but what do you think, shouldn't he start his own blog?

Schoggibroetli

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to spend fairly lengthy periods of time in Switzerland. I really enjoyed the trips I took there, I mean, what's not to like? Hiking? Mountains? Beautiful old towns everywhere you look? Chocolate?? Need I say more? There was also the Linde, near the Mister's apartment, where we drank many a seasonal beer (my favorite? The fruehlingsbier! Yum.) and had toooo few plates of apfelkuechlein. Oh my gosh, that was the best dessert ever. Wait, I have to show it to you:


Not a great photo, but mmmm. Apple rings, battered, fried, covered in cinnamon sugar, and served with ice cream? YES, PLEASE. Whoops, I'm getting sidetracked here! One of the other nice things about his place was Hausamann, an awesome bakery/cafe. It's right by the tram stop which means it's great for running in and grabbing a quick snack, but I always enjoyed perusing the racks of treats, and trying out my really, really rudimentary German on the ladies there. (And by try out, I mean, I was thrilled when I bought a Kartoffelbrot, and they understood me. Of course, they then asked me something else which I could not for the life of me understand. I think I realized like, 2 years later, that they had asked me if I wanted it sliced.) They have a nice little seating area inside, if you want a coffee and some cake, but I particularly liked their sandwiches (like the Fischli! A fish shaped fish sandwich? Yum.) and learned to buy one to take on the plane back to the States. (Don't ever ever eat the chicken "cordon bleu" on Continental. Trust me.) Another thing that I loved there? The Schoggibroetli! It's basically a soft, sweet bun studded with bits of chocolate and sugar chunks, and I have been craving them lately. Of course, there are no Schoggibroetlis to be found, so I had to try my hand at making them myself.


I started with a basic sweet yeast dough, let it rise once, and then kneaded in some finely chopped chocolate and a handful of pearl sugar, then set it aside to rise again.


This is how it looked after about an hour; good rising! I love the way yeast dough smells. After the second rise, I formed the dough into buns, and left it to rise for a 3rd time. Actually I think that was probably overkill, and you could probably just mix the chocolate in during the first rise, and the second rise will be after you form the buns.


Just before baking, brush the buns with butter and sprinkle more pearl sugar on top. Pearl sugar is great! It doesn't melt, looks pretty, and adds a nice crunch, and when you actually fold it into dough, you get little pockets of sugar. Yummmmmy.


20 minutes later? Schoggibroetli! Looks good? I can tell you they SMELLED great.


Tasted great, too! Actually, I must pat myself on the back--these are pretty close to the Schoggibroetlis I remember. I would just switch up the chocolate and use one that was slightly less bitter next time (maybe 60% instead of 72%). Also, I would be more careful and knead the chocolate in more evenly. But oh, these do take me back....now I want to take another trip to Zurich. Besides, there are those lovely Luxemburgerlis waiting for me....

What's your favorite food memory from a trip? Tell me :)

Schoggibroetli (Swiss Chocolate Buns)
2 3/4 cup bread flour
2 teaspoons instant yeast (or one envelope)
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup warm water
1/4 cup warm milk
1 egg
2 tablespoons butter, softened (plus another tablespoon, melted for brushing the buns)
about 1/2 cup of chocolate chips, or finely chopped chocolate from a bar (or to taste)
1/4 cup of pearl sugar, plus more for the top of the buns

Combine flour, yeast, sugar, and salt, and whisk briefly to combine. Add the water, milk, and egg, mix until a dough starts to form. This is easiest in a mixer, but can also be done easily by hand. Just prepare to get messy! Knead the butter in until thoroughly incorporated, then turn out onto a lightly floured countertop and knead until the dough is smooth and no longer sticky. Pat the dough out into a rough square, and sprinkle the chocolate chips and pearl sugar evenly over the surface. Roll up, and knead again briefly, just to make sure all of the chips and sugar are incorporated into the dough. Place in a greased bowl, cover, and let rise until doubled (1-2 hours, depending on how warm the room is).

When the dough is risen, deflate it, and form 18 evenly sized buns. Arrange on a parchment lined baking sheet, leaving about an inch and a half between each bun, and cover with a damp tea towel. Allow to rise until puffy and almost doubled, which should take about 40 minutes to an hour. Preheat oven to 350 F. Melt a tablespoon of butter and brush the tops of the buns, then sprinkle a bit of additional pearl sugar on. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the buns are nicely browned top and bottom. Remove to a rack to cool; they are most delicious when they are still slightly warm, but are also good microwaved for 15 seconds or so.

Late adopter--No Knead Bread

Several years ago, I made not making resolutions my resolution for New Year's. (Well, with the exception of my ongoing "be more positive!" drive.) Anyway, I didn't exactly make a resolution this year, but I did kind of vow to get more into yeast baking this year. I'm not really sure why I hadn't been doing any yeast baking at all in the last few years--I guess mostly because of the time factor (I like instant gratification) and the fact that my brother is a very talented bread baker. I mean, why bother when I can eat his delicious roasted tomato focaccia?

Well, be that as it may, what could be a better bread to start off with than the completely no-fuss, completely famous, blogged to death No Knead Bread?* After all, I'm only two years late jumping on the bandwagon. The good thing about being this late to the party is that I had ample evidence that this recipe did, in fact, work--and no kidding! It really is the simplest yeast bread I've ever tried--dump a minimal number of ingredients in a bowl, stir, cover, ignore for the next 20 hours (I stirred it up and let it sit overnight), remember the rising dough somewhere around hour 24, shape (very haphazardly and with great mess), despair over getting it into a ball, fling into hot pan, consign to oven with crossed fingers--and hey, presto! The best textured bread I've ever baked by myself!


I mean, look at that slice. It's a far cry from the dense brick that my last loaf of bread turned out to be. And I couldn't believe that it ended up shaped so nicely, despite the fact that I literally just dumped the entire lump of dough into my pan (I just could not get it to form a ball) willy-nilly. The crust is delightfully...crusty, almost shattering when you bite into it, and the interior is nice and tender, but with a nice resistance. Basically, I have no complaints, only praise for this recipe, and if you're just starting to experiment with yeast baking, I highly recommend this.

*Okay, I guess the actual first yeast recipe I made this year was cinnamon rolls, but they were not very pretty.