Substitutions to use Fresh Yeast where Instant or Active Dry is Specified

The bread recipes I encounter most often assume the baker does not have fresh yeast. Because I have a ready supply of fresh yeast, I use it. To substitute:

1. Instant yeast is 40% of fresh yeast
2. Active dry is 50% of fresh yeast, but requires hydration

Thanks, Stan, for this info ...

KitchenAid Artisan Mixer

What I like:

1. Fairly strong
2. Easy to use
3. Doesn't take up a whole lot of space

What I don't like:

1. The dough hook and paddle don't reach to the bottom of the bowl, so I have to stop and scrape from the bottom of the bowl. With a typical bread dough, the ingredients are gather up much more quickly so it is not an issue.  But it is a problem with cake batter.
2. The motor oil gets into any batter that wraps around the top of the beater.
3. The tilt-head lock always works it way up, so I have to hold the lock when mixing bread dough.

Requested "Recipe" for Vegan Roasted Squash Pasta

Someone requested the recipe for Roasted Squash Pasta, which happens to be vegan. Not much of a recipe, really. It is simply roasted winter squash and flour, but the ratio used must work with your pasta maker.

Step 1: Roast Squash. I use an unglazed clay roasting pot by Romertopf (http://www.romertopfonline.com/). In this case I used a portion of a Tahitian squash that my friend, Leynette, grew in her backyard. A Tahitian squash is like a butternut squash, only really, really big. The piece I roasted was 10 inches long, but was only half of the top of the squash! I also have beets in the pan for another pasta. Olive oil has been added to prevent sticking.

 

 

Step 1: Roast Squash.

Step 2: Remove roasted vegetables when knife or fork can be easily inserted in multiple places.

Step 2: Squash is done when soft throughout as indicated by inserting a fork.

 Step 3: Peel Squash; discard peels but do not discard caramelized brown areas, which will add lots of flavor.

Step 3: Peel Squash.

 Step 4: Puree Squash. In this, I had 489 grams of roasted squash.

Step 4: Puree Squash

 Step 5: Add flour and mix with dough hook until dough forms a tight ball and cleans side of bowl. I add flour (GM Durum Patent Flour, 12.2% protein, 99% ash) until I could get a good tight ball, which was 582 grams of flour, which was roughly 6 parts flour to 5 parts squash. This will vary based on the moisture content of the squash. However, the final test is not the dough moistness in the bowl, it is the ability for the pasta maker to extrude and cut without tearing. I use an Atlas 180 pasta maker, which does NOT have any of the attachments of its "150" cousin (at least it has a motor!). However, I just found out that my Kitchenaide Artisan does have pasta attachments like a ravioli maker. (Hint to Santa)

Step 5: Add flour and mix until dough forms tight ball

Step 6: Extrude and Cut. The first picture below shows what happens when more flour is needed as both extruded sheets and cut noodles will tear and bunch up if not enough flour is added. The dough can be re-mixed with more flour, but in this case I simply dredged the malformed pasta sheet in flour and re-extruded. I extruded these sheets first on "1" a couple of times, then "2" and ended with "3", as I was making Fettuccine. For Angel Hair pasta, I usually end with "5".

Step 6: Extrude (This dough requires more flour)

Step 6a: This sheet had enough flour to properly extrude.

Step 7: Hang noodles to dry. These noodles can immediately be boiled, but I like to dry them slightly whenever possible. Add salt and oil to the water prior to boiling.

Step 7: Hand noodles to Dry (optional)

These noodles are being packaged as gifts.

Packaged noodles (8 ounces each).

Where to get Fresh Compressed Yeast in the San Diego Area

Where to get Fresh Compressed Yeast in the San Diego Area: Stan at NY Bakers ships fresh yeast from his warehouse located South of San Diego. I pick some up every 1-2 months. Refer to http://nybakers.com/index.html

From http://www.food.com/library/yeast-62:

Substitutions: 1 (1/4 oz) package dry active yeast = 2 1/4 teaspoons = 1 (1 oz) cake compressed fresh yeast

More of NYB's Farine de Campagne Flour

I've decided that a staple in my pantry is NYB's Farine de Campagne flour. The flavor, the color, the crumb, the rise, etc. I picked up my order of flour from Stan (my bread mentor) and mentioned to him how much I love this flour. It is, after all, his own private blend. This flour contains rye, whole wheat, and other great ingredients in perfect proportions. (http://nybakers.com/)

Bread to Share with the Encinitas Ale House

I promised Tomas at the Encinitas Ale House that I would bring him some bread. I used two different Artesin flours, Guistos's and NYBs, with 25% of added hi-gluten and 60% hydration, but after recently using NYB's Farine de Campagne Flour, the bread was at best underwhelming. However, they formed well and browned nicely. I will next work on getting a crisper crust.

Little Loaves

Most of my recent doughs have been made with the same recipe: 1000 grams of flour, 60% hydration, 2% salt, 2% fresh compressed yeast. This make 2 really good sized loaves (820 grams of dough each) or 4 little loaves (410 grams of dough each for a final 336 gram loaf).

Formed and Final Rise

Baked

Sliced

I Love NYB's Farine de Campagne Flour!

This flour has 12.0% protein and a whopping 66% ash (typically Artisan flour is up to 65%). Ash is an indicator of the milling process. A higher ash content indicates that more minerals are in the flour, which provides more food for the yeast. This impacts, among other things, crumb, color, leavening, etc. Stan's NYB Farine de Campagne flour really performed well, and the bread has great color and is very tasty.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flour: The word "flour" is originally a variant of the word "flower". Both derive from the Old French fleur or flour, which had the literal meaning "blossom," and a figurative meaning "the finest." The phrase "fleur de farine" meant "the finest part of the meal," since flour resulted from the elimination of coarse and unwanted matter from the grain during milling.^[1]

Looking at the cuts, I would call this bread a little over-developed.

Next Try at a Cake for a Wedding

The last attempt at a wedding cake was good, just not great. Here is my next version using a non-standard cake recipe, a filling of my own design, a chocolate/coffee frosting, while still making tiers that look similar to a wedding cake.

Findings: taste is good, needs better appearance, reconsider white frosting and fresh flowers and ribbon to replace chocolate frosting for actual wedding cake.


Details:
The filling consisted of Rocotti cheese, cream cheese, powered sugar, and cream.
The frosting consisted of chocolate, coffee, butter, and powdered sugar.
In each of the cake layers where I sliced and added filling, I added small amounts of chocolate chips and dried cranberries.
I used a cream cheese pound cake recipe from http://www.joyofbaking.com/CreamCheesePoundCake.html (See chart below).
I did not use a bundt pan, but instead used two 8x2-inches pans and two 10x2-inch pans.

 

	Egg	t	T	Oz	C	Total (Cups)	Cream Cheese Pound Cake:
Flour					3	3	3 cups (390 grams) all purpose flour	Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C) and place rack in center of oven. Butter and flour a 10 inch (25 cm) bundt pan.
Baking Powder		0.5				0.01	1 teaspoons baking powder	In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
Baking Soda		0.5				0.01	1/2 teaspoon baking soda	In the bowl of your electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, beat the butter and cream cheese until smooth. Add the sugar, in three additions, beating well after each addition.
Salt		0.5				0.01	1/2 teaspoon salt	Continue beating on medium-high speed until light and fluffy (about 3 - 5 minutes). Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Add the vanilla and lemon zest and beat until incorporated.
Butter					1.5	1.5	1 1/2 cups (340 grams) (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature	Add the flour mixture and mix just until incorporated. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top.
Cream Cheese				8		1	1-8 ounce (226 grams) package cream cheese, room temperature	Bake for 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes or until the cake is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
P. Sugar					3	3	3 cups (600 grams) superfine or castor sugar	Remove the cake from the oven and place on a wire rack to cool for about 20 minutes. Remove the cake from the pan and cool completely.
Eggs	6					1.5	6 large eggs, room temperature	(The cake is cooled in the pan first for about 20 minutes so the cake has time to set. The cake may collapse if you try to remove it from the pan too soon.)
Vanilla			1			0.06	1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract	This cake will keep several days at room temperature and one week when refrigerated. Can also be frozen.
Lemon Zest						0	Zest of a lemon or orange	Serves 10 - 12 people.
Total Cups per Batch						10.09
# Pans	Pan Sizes
	6	8	10	12	14	16	18	Inches
1	2.5	3	6	8	15	22	24	Cups
2	5	6	12	16	30	44	48	Cups

 

 

General Mills Purasnow Cake Flour (8.2% protein)

 Powdered sugar escaping the mixing bowl and Sticking to the Cabinet

After the cake was baked and cooled, I sliced open the layers and added filling, then placed the layers back in the pans and put filling between the layers, covered tightly with with plastic wrap, and placed in the freezer for 2 days (see smallest tier left of bowl in background). To assemble, I unwrapped the first tier, placed on the serving plate, and frosted.

Prior to adding the second tier, I positioned the dowels and put coconut shavings on top to prevent the plastic tray from sticking.

Add plastic tray

Unwrap next tier and remove parchment

Position top tier on plastic tray

Add Frosting

Not the prettiest cake, but I still have 10 months to work on that.

Part of our Thanksgiving Desserts --- Oh My!

Acme Flatbread

Poolish

This is a Poolish from a Recipe for Acme Flatbread. This poolish fermented overnight.

The fermentation process produced very large bubbles and a distinctive sheen.

Per the recipe, 30 grams of oil was added.

Next, 170 grams of warm water.

Mix poolish into remaining dough ingredients.

Turning the Dough

Wrapped in plastic and rising

Formed and rising on an improvised couche

Croutons for Turkey Stuffing (or Dressing)

I like to make stuffing from bread made with lots of flavor. First I either saute or roast chopped onions and celery with ground sage, butter, and olive oil.

Cool the roasted veggies prior to making into bread dough.

 I used a high-gluten flour because of the amount of veggies.

 Mixing the dough (500 g each flour and veggies, 300 g water, 10 g each fresh yeast and salt per loaf)

 A very slack dough due to the moisture in the veggies.

 Turning and resting.

More resting (and growing)

Formed for the final rise

Baked ...

Sample slice ...

Cubed and toasted for use in Turkey Stuffing or Dressing.