What's Baking: Peach Bread

Time for another What's Baking post!  This month's challenge was to make a quick bread.  Quick breads are breads that are not made using yeast--since there's no rise time, they're quick to make!  I made this one in one bowl, so the cleanup was quick, too!

I have been subscribed to Horse and Buggy, a CSA, since the spring.  Basically, I pay a set amount to have whatever produce the lovely folks at H&B are currently harvesting delivered to my door each week!  The freshest local produce, delivered right to my door!  It doesn't get any better than that!  We also get meat and eggs from them, too.  If it weren't for dairy, I'd never have to go grocery shopping any more!  It has been a fun challenge trying to come up with meals that use up the produce, and it has been really interesting seeing how the offerings change seasonally.  Colder-weather veggies, like winter squashes, have started to appear in the box, and last week was the last week for fruit boxes.  I took advantage of the opportunity and used my end-of-the-season peaches, nectarines, and raspberries in a delicious quick bread to fit the What's Baking challenge!

I forgot to soften my butter, so I swapped it out for canola oil.  I don't recommend this.  I could REALLY taste the difference, and the butter is SO important to complement the delicate flavor of the peaches and raspberries.  So, don't forget to soften your butter!  You can always throw it in the microwave for 10 seconds, in a pinch, if you forget, though!  Also, the original recipe called for orange juice concentrate, but I wanted to make it really peachy, so I substituted peach wine.  You could use milk, a sweet white wine, syrup from a can of peaches, peach nectar, or the original orange juice concentrate, instead!

Peach Bread (adapted from Food.com)

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 3 tablespoons peach wine
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 medium peaches, diced
• 1 clamshell raspberries

Cream together butter and sugar.  Beat in eggs, one at a time.  Beat in vanilla extract and peach wine.  Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Stir dry ingredients into the wet ones until mostly combined.  Gently fold in fruit.

Pour batter into a 9x5" loaf pan that has been greased and floured.  Bake at 325* F for 60-75 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.  Cool completely.  Wrap up and deliver to friends!  ;)

You could also bake this as muffins, for a change!  That's the great thing about quick bread batters--they're very versatile!

What's Baking: Challah and Pain Polka

It's that time again--another What's Baking? post! The challenge this month was to bake something involving yeast. Despite having made pizza dough last night, I decided to bake TWO things with yeast because I just love carbs that much.

And I have a confession to make--despite that love of carbs, I had never eaten challah before today. This presented a slight problem as I was making it--I knew that it was going to be a rich, brioche-like bread, but having never tasted it, I had to just trust in my recipe *gasp* with no intuition for texture. I've also only braided dandelions before, having only ever had fairly short hair, so doing a 4-plait braid took a couple of attempts. But if I can do it, you certainly can!

Without further ado, the recipes:

Challah
Recipe from Christine Ingram and Jennie Shapter's The Bread and Bread Machine Bible

1.25 pounds flour (you should use bread flour; I was out of vital wheat gluten so I used plain AP)
2 tsp salt
.75 oz fresh yeast (I used dried and cut the amount down)
1 cup lukewarm water
2 Tbsp caster/superfine sugar (I used normal granulated)
2 eggs
6 Tbsp butter/marg, melted and cooled slightly (I used marg because I'm a cheapskate)

Proof yeast in a bit of the water with the sugar.  Stir the flour and salt together.  If you're doing this by hand, make a well and start adding the liquid ingredients to form a soft dough.  If you're doing this in a mixer, you can just start off with the dough hook (no paddle necessary) and add the yeast-water, eggs, and butter (make sure it's not still hot).  Knead for 10 min by hand or 6 min by mixer (low to medium speed).
Let rise 1 hour, then punch it down and let rise another hour.  This is a good time to go grocery shopping, say, if you used up your last eggs on the dough and need another for the glaze.

Divide the dough into 4 equal pieces (if you're doing a 4-plaited braid; you can do more or fewer if you wish).  Stretch/roll them to about 18 inches in length--I just went by the length of my cookie sheet (smaller than a half sheet); I think they were about 1.25 inches in diameter at this point.

Squeeze one end of each strand together to form the end of the braid.  Now imagine that going from right to left, your strands are A-B-C-D (so D-C-B-A).  Move A over B and C over D.  Then take D (your original D, not the new left-most strand) and pull it over top so that it's between A and B.  Now relabel the strands A-B-C-D (D-C-B-A) and repeat.  Squeeze together the ends of the braid (it's okay if one strand is longer; it brings it to a nice taper) and let proof another 30-45 minutes.

Mix an egg yolk with 1 Tbl water and brush onto your proofed plait.  Sprinkle with poppy seeds if you like and bake at 400 degrees for about 30-40 min, until just browned.  I usually poke my breads with a thermometer to be sure--if they've hit 200 degrees, they're done (99% of the time).  Soft breads like challah and brioche are done at a lower temp.

The verdict?  I'm not sure if this is what challah is supposed to taste like, but it's darned good.  I cut off a bit of the end to check out the crumb, and upon trying said piece, I was surprised to see how light it is.  It's not that much butter in there, and although the crumb looks dense it's quite springy and soft, like a nice dinner roll.  I've heard that challah makes killer French toast, so if there are leftovers, that's where this is going!





Pain Polka
Recipe from Christine Ingram and Jennie Shapter's The Bread and Bread Machine Bible

8 oz leftover dough (I used some leftover pizza dough from last night), divided into pieces
.25 oz fresh yeast (again, I used dried and cut this amount down)
1-1.25 cups lukewarm water (I used just over 1 but my pizza dough was pretty hydrated)
16 oz bread flour (again, I used AP)
1 Tbsp salt

I neglected Christine and Jennie's directions for mixing and just went on the basic "flour + proofed yeast-water + other ingredients," mixed it a bit, then threw in my dough pieces and kneaded for 4-5 minutes in my mixer until the dough became smooth.

Let rise in a bowl for about 1.5 hours, then punch down on a lightly floured surface and shape into a ball.  Place on baking sheet and let rise for another hour until doubled.

Sprinkle flour over the top of the loaf and cut the boule fairly deeply in perpendicular direction. Be careful with your slashing motion to get a consistent depth across the loaf.

Because I didn't.

Let rest for 10 minutes, then bake on a baking stone (if possible) in a preheated 450 degree oven for 20-30 minutes or until browned.  If you have a spritzer bottle, spray the oven several times in the first 15 min of baking.  If you don't you can put a dish with ice cubes/cold water in the bottom of your oven to generate steam.  Using the baking stone cut the time down to about 20 minutes for me. 

You probably noticed that both these recipes come from the same book.  I bought it several years ago (2009 edition) when I started baking bread.  There's a new edition coming out in July which you can preorder on Amazon for $13 at present.   I've only made a handful of recipes from this book as I rarely use cookbooks, but the Georgian Khatchapuri recipe is another one that is to die for--I think I've made it 6 times now.  Disclaimer: I don't know the authors and don't profit personally from the sale of the book or you clicking the link provided.  I just think it's a informative, well-illustrated book with some great formulas in there.

Orange Cranberry Bread

This is somewhat of a departure from desserts. But, it's baked, so I think it can still be posted. I made some orange cranberry muffins for my mom a while back, but I wasn't that pleased with the texture of them, and I still had some leftover ingredients. I always seem to have more luck with yeast breads than quick breads (go figure, right???), so I thought of making an orange cranberry bread. I looked at this cinnamon raisin bread recipe for inspiration, but I HEAVILY adapted it and made enough changes that I feel comfortable labeling this an original recipe. This bread is moist, light in texture, and heavy on flavor! It's nice and hearty because of the copious add-ins and would make a great breakfast! Please enjoy!


Orange Cranberry Bread (a Blondie original)

• 1/3 c. warm water (110 degrees F)
• 4 Tbl. honey, divided
• 2 tsp. yeast
• 3 Tbl. butter, softened
• 1 egg
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 2 2/3 c. bread flour, divided
• 1/2 c. plus a little more thawed orange juice concentrate, divided
  
• Ground cinnamon
• Ground cloves
• Ground nutmeg
• 1/4 c. brown sugar
  
• 1/2 c. chopped walnuts
• Handful dried cranberries
• Handful golden raisins
• Melted butter (optional)
  

Mix the warm water with 1 Tbl. honey in a large bowl. Sprinkle the yeast over this and let proof until foamy, about 5-10 minutes.

Whisk remaining honey, butter, egg, and salt into the yeast mixture until pretty thoroughly mixed. If you still have some lumps of butter, that’s ok. Add 1 c. bread flour, and whisk until the mixture is smooth and no lumps remain. Whisk in 1/2 c. thawed orange juice concentrate. Using a spoon (it’ll get too thick to whisk), stir in remaining flour a little at a time until dough pulls away from the edge of the bowl. Turn it out onto a lightly-floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes, adding more flour as necessary to prevent sticking.

Coat a large bowl with cooking spray. Form your dough into a ball and coat it in cooking spray. Put the dough into the bowl and cover the surface of the dough with plastic wrap. Let rise in a warm place for 1 hour, or until doubled.

On a lightly-floured surface, roll out the dough into a rectangle that is 1/2-in. thick and 9-in. wide (it will end up being about 11 to 12-in. long). Brush the dough with a little more thawed orange juice concentrate, just to moisten it. Sprinkle liberally with cinnamon, lightly with cloves, and very lightly with nutmeg. Sprinkle the brown sugar over the dough. Sprinkle the dough with the walnuts, cranberries, and raisins, distributing them evenly. Roll up dough jelly-roll style, TIGHTLY, folding in the ends. Place in a well-greased 9x5-in. loaf pan. At this step, you can either put it in the fridge to rise overnight, or put it in a warm place to rise for an hour. If you let it rise overnight in the fridge, be sure to let it sit at room temperature for about a half hour to warm up before baking.

Bake at 350 degrees F. for 30 minutes, or until the bread is lightly browned on top and sounds hollow when knocked. You can brush the top with melted butter at this point to ensure a soft crust, but my house is super humid and things always get soft anyways, so I didn’t.

This would also be fantastic topped with a glaze of powdered sugar and orange juice concentrate, but it's not necessary.