What to do with Dough Balls

I made five 820-gram dough balls at the beginning of the weekend. Dinner tonight was pizza - one with left over "Italian Salsa" with cheese, the other with garlic, red onion, and basil.

Yet Another Cake

Assembling a filled cake requires that the cake be made in advance and the layers are assembled with the filling at least two days prior to frosting and serving. This didn't happen in this case and the cake was un-cuttable and difficult to plate. Regardless, pound cake filled with marscapone and cream, covered with frosting made with cocoa powder and butter, tastes really great.

Focaccia

Using the dough balls from the day before, which I refrigerated overnight, I rolled the dough out and let rise in 1/2 sheet pans. From there, I added different toppings. For the dough made from NYB Farine de Campagne, I added basil and garlic. For the KS Sir Galahad dough, I added chopped red onion. For the Pivetti Type 00 Rinforzato , I added chopped Kalamata olives.

By Request: Italian "Salsa"

To make Italian "Salsa", mix stewed tomatoes with fresh basil, fresh garlic (crushed or shaved), sea salt, olive oil, and a small amount of Balsamic vinegar. This is used for dipping sauce for Focaccia.

Pound Cake

I'm making a pound cake from a new recipe that someone gave me. It calls for shortening, which I don't normally have, so I bought some. It also calls for powdered milk, but since I don't want to buy, and then store, powdered milk, I excluded the powdered milk and exchanged the water for half-n-half. I think it was an OK compromise -- we'll see.

Stan (my mentor from NYBaker) told me once that, when mixing sugar and butter, you need to mix them for a very long time until the sugar dissolves into the fat. So for this recipe, I let the mixer run quite long until I had a really fluffy batter.

Since I wanted to make this into a layer cake, I used round cake pans instead of loaf pans. I used parchment on the bottom and butter on the sides. As usual, I weighed the cake pans to ensure even distribution.

Baking the Cake (wait for it ...):

Now done:

Make Filling:

After slight cooling, remove and cut, place first layer back and add filling. Top, cover, and chill overnight.

 

Bunches of 820 Gram Dough Balls for this Weekend's Baking

Making dough balls for this weekend's baking. Used KA Sir Galahad (great bread flour), NYB Farine de Campagne (my favorite), Pivetti Type 00 Rinforzato (such a smooth dough), and one big mistake, "1st clear", which I grabbed in haste.

Rosemary Foccacia Sheet from Rose Levy Beranbaum's "The Bread Bible"

Rosemary Foccacia Sheet (page 205).

First Observations (not necessarily related to this cookbook):

1. My scale does not go to a 1/10th of a gram, so quantities like 1.2 grams and 5.2 grams are difficult to make accurate. In other recipes, for small amounts of yeast, you multiple the yeast to a whole number and add water such that a portion of the wet mixture provides the right amount of yeast. For example, 1.2 grams of yeast x 10 is 12 gram of yeast plus 88 grams of water for 100 grams of mixture. Mix well, and use 10 grams of the mixture in your recipe.
2. This recipe was the first recipe to cause my mixer to "walk". Use a towel under the stand to prevent a roving mixer.
3. I made a second batch of this bread, but because the salt is added after a 20 minute mixing to enable proper development, I made sure I completely washed the bowl and paddle to remove all salt.

Making the Recipe:

1. Mix flour, yeast, and water, which starts as a soupy batter, with a paddle until it becomes a shiny ball, then add salt and sugar.
   

   

   Soupy Batter

   

   After ball forms, batter is still very "thin" ...

   

   ... but strong!!

2. Let rise until double, preferably at 75-80 degrees

   

   Place in oiled rising tub

   
   

   

   Mark line to indicate when doubled

   
   

   

   Let rise in warm area (75-80 degrees)

3. Place in pan

   

   Pour into pan

   
   

   

   Gently spread dough and cover with plastic wrap

4.  Let Rise

   

   Dough rising - front one getting ready to bake with rosemary and sea salt topping

5. Bake 
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6. Figure out what went wrong
• Apparently, oiled pans placed on a hot stone can fuse the bread to the pan.
• Next time I will use my typical method of parchment on a pan or dough directly on a stone.
7. Eat (regardless of my mistakes, it tastes great)

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