Cause I Ain't No Challah-back Girl

For some reason recently I've been fighting the urge to make bread. I've always been a little... intimidated, perhaps, of yeast. It seems so finicky, and that scares me. However, I found a recipe in one of my Martha magazines from last fall, and it was always hanging in the back of my mind. It was this beautiful circular loaf of bread, and it had apples and honey kneaded in. So delicious. Cut to last week, and I can't hold back any longer. I need to knead. I remember the recipe, and decided to give it a chance. Or, rather, decided to give myself a chance to make it. I made 2 loaves and gave them to neighbors. Of course, that didn't stop me from trying it. I made a tiny loaf for myself to try. I quite liked it! It's a Jewish bread, called 'Challah'. The apples are sliced with a mandoline, and provide a bite of sweet tartness to the bread. The honey is used as more of a glaze, and brings a beautiful color to the load. Now, this is time consuming, but solely because of the letting the bread rise. You can do your normal daily tasks while letting the bread puff itself up. I will tell you that the picture makes the bread looked burned- which it wasn't at all. It was a deep golden brown. Eh.



Recipe: Apple-Honey Challah Bread

Makes: One 9-inch round loaf

Recipe originated from: Martha Stewart Living (http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/apple-honey-challah)

Compliments: Early morning and coffee

Ingredients:
- 4 ounces (1 stick) unsalted butter or nondairy margarine, plus more for bowl, pan, and plastic
- 3 1/2 cups unbleached bread flour, plus more for surface
- 3/4 cup warm water (100 degrees)
- 2/3 cup honey
- 2 large eggs plus 3 large egg yolks
- 2 teaspoons active dry yeast (from one 1/4-ounce envelope)
- 2 teaspoons coarse salt
- 1 1/2 tart green apples, preferably Granny Smith, peeled and cut into 1/4-inch-thick slices (about 1 3/4 cups)

Directions:
1. Butter a large bowl, and melt 4 tablespoons butter in a saucepan over medium-low heat; let cool. Combine 2 tablespoons melted butter, the flour, water, 1/3 cup honey, the eggs and yolks, yeast, and salt in a large bowl. Mix until dough forms. Turn dough out onto a floured surface, and knead until smooth, about 10 minutes.
2. Transfer dough to buttered bowl, and brush with 1 tablespoon melted butter. Cover with plastic. Let rise in a warm place until dough almost doubles in volume, about 1 1/2 hours.
3. Turn dough out onto a floured surface. Pat into an 8 1/2-by-14-inch rectangle. Top with apples; knead to incorporate. Return to bowl. Brush with remaining tablespoon melted butter; cover. Let rise again in a warm place until dough almost doubles in volume, about 1 hour more.
4. Preheat oven to 375 degrees, with rack in lowest position. Butter a 9-inch round cake pan. Roll dough into a rope (about 24 inches) on a floured surface. Coil into a circle, and transfer to pan. Butter plastic wrap, and cover dough. Let rise again until dough almost doubles in volume, about 45 minutes more.
5. Heat remaining 4 tablespoons butter and 1/3 cup honey in a saucepan over medium-low heat until butter melts. Brush dough with half the honey-butter. Bake until golden brown and firm, about 35 minutes.
6. Brush challah with the remaining honey-butter. Let cool in pan on a wire rack for 30 minutes. Turn out loaf from pan, and let cool.

If you don't have a mandoline (which a lot of people dont) then just slice the apples as thin as you can. Grab a hunk of this for breakfast, and drink it with your piping hot coffee. Doesn't get much better than that.

Abby xx

.:EDIT:. I feel like I need to say that this bread isn't hard. The yeast actually is very easy. Just make it happy. Let it rise how much it wants and put it in when it says to. I'm not so scared/intimidated by yeast so much anymore. You shouldn't be either. Lets face it- it makes some delicious things!

The Mushier the Better

So as I pad into the kitchen this morning to make my toast- what do I spy? Over-ripe bananas! I mean, these things are pretty much mush at this point. Perfect! I go look over some of my favorite recipes, and decide to go for banana bread. I've made so many muffins/cupcakes recently that I thought a loaf would be a nice change of pace. This recipe that I use is great because it's so basic. You nearly always have the ingredients on hand (the bananas being the thing you probably won't have), and it's so simple it's really fun to play with. You can add nearly anything and it's delicious.

Recipe: Banana Banana Bread

Makes: 1 loaf

Recipe originated from: Allrecipes.com ( http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Banana-Banana-Bread/Detail.aspx )

Compliments: When you cut a piece stick it in the microwave for a few seconds to get it warm. Honestly it doesn't need any butter or honey on it because it's so moist as is, but if you want to make it dessert then try that.

Ingredients:
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup butter
- 3/4 cup brown sugar
- 2 eggs, beaten
- 2 1/3 cups mashed overripe bananas

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.
2. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl, cream together butter and brown sugar. Stir in eggs and mashed bananas until well blended. Stir banana mixture into flour mixture; stir just to moisten. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 60 to 65 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of the loaf comes out clean. Let bread cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack.

So this time I added grated chocolate (probably about 8 oz), a handful of raisins, and made a streusel topping (1/4 cup flour, 1/3 cup brown sugar, 1/4 cup chopped nuts, 2 tbsp butter cut in). It's really yummy. Oh, and I used 6 bananas. I usually don't measure out the mush, but just use what I have. It's not necessarily how many bananas you have, but how ripe they are. Sometime you can buy a bag of brown bananas at the store for a discounted price. Get them! They have tons of flavor and can be frozen to store! That way when you want to make banana bread or banana turnovers or banana ice cream or bananas foster you can just pull out how many you need and let them defrost for 15-20 minutes. Then you're set to go!

Abby xx