Pain de Campagna

I miss good bread.

When I lived in New York, it seemed like there was  a bread shop in whatever direction you happened to be walking.  The loaves would be stacked up in wicker baskets that lined the window and the scent of fresh bread would lure you in.  You would soon learn to buy two baguettes.  One to munch on your way home, and the other to show your room mate you had some self restraint.

We lived for a year in a small town called Bend, OR.  At the time we were there, the downtown was maybe a square mile.  But I had three wonderful bakeries within walking distance.  Artisanal bakeries with hearth ovens.

Where we live now, nothing.  Our local grocery stores carry bread from all the wonderful bakeries in Seattle, but it’s not the same.

I decided to take matters into my own hands…Pain de Campagna.  The recipe I used is in Peter Reinhart’s “Bread Baker’s Apprentice.”  I am working my way through this book.  Slowly.  I have to repeat recipes because the results  often times get inhaled.

This recipe starts with a pate fermentee.  Peter recommends that you let the pre-ferment rise overnight in a refrigerator or up to three days.  If he recommends it, I do it.  I let the pre-ferment do it’s thing for three days.  On Saturday morning I pulled the dough out of the fridge and let it come to room temperature.  You have the option of adding either whole wheat flour or rye flour to the dough.  I happened to have a bag of Fairhaven whole-grain 100% organic rye flour.  I really like the taste of rye.

The dough behaves beautifully.  I tried to degas as little as possible when forming the baguettes.  I am not sure whether I actually accomplished this.  I weighed out the dough for three baguettes and the remaining dough was formed into rolls.

I don’t have a baking stone and my oven is on the old side.  I preheated to 500 degrees and placed a heavy duty baking sheet in the lower third of my oven.  One of the baguettes was turned into an epi.  I didn’t lower the temperature of the oven to 450 degrees as suggested.  I had to do the baking in batches.  First the baguettes, then the epi, then the rolls.  I did check the progress at the 25 minute mark.

The baguettes took thirty minutes.  My son came in from playing outside and was ready to rip into one.  He obviously hasn’t mastered the art of patience.  I can’t blame him, the scent of the bread was heavenly.  I set the timer for 40 minutes.  The recommended cooling time for the loaves per Peter.  I distracted Oliver by giving him the task of steaming the oven for the next batch of dough.  This seemed to keep him quite occupied.

My daughter came in just as the rolls came out of the oven.  The timer had gone of and we tore into one of the baguettes.  The other we gave to a neighbor.  The crust was crispy and the interior had that wonderful chewy quality.  The rye flour gave it a really nice taste.  We ate the first baguette in 30 seconds flat.  My dad walked in on us munching away at the counter.  He had a piece and then proceeded to pack up two of the rolls for his breakfast the following morning.

A few of the rolls did survive for breakfast the following morning.  We ate them up with butter and home made raspberry jam.  Delicious.

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Potato Rosemary Bread

A few years ago I worked for a kitchen-ware company.  In several of their stores they had a built in kitchen and taught cooking classes.  We were lucky enough to get Peter Reinhart to do a hands on bread class for us.  Unheard of at the price we were charging.  The classes sold out in 15 minutes.  I wasn’t lucky enough to get a spot in the class, but I did treat myself to his wonderful bread book, “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice.”  I would thumb through the book reading the recipes.  At the time, I found some of his recipes intimidating.  I didn’t have the time to understand the pre-ferment process.

I pulled the book out at the beginning of the year and read through the bread tutorial.  Several times I might add.  There is quite a bit of helpful information in there.  The kids urged me to make a potato bread.  Sure enough, there is a wonderful recipe for one in the book.  You do need some forethought before embarking on this recipe as there is a biga involved.  A biga is made for the express purpose of lending an aged flavor to your dough.  The author recommends allowing the biga to ferment overnight in the refrigerator.  I actually let the biga ferment a little longer.

When you are ready to make the bread,  pull the biga out of the refrigerator.  You need about half the amount to make one recipe of Potato Rosemary bread.  Trust me, the bread gets eaten really fast once it is baked and you will be glad that you have the starter for another batch.

While the biga was coming to room temperature, I peeled and cut up a large russet potatoes and placed them in a microwave safe bowl.  I added a little bit of water and microwaved them for 5 minutes or until they were tender.  I did cover the bowl with a plate.  I let them steam with the cover for a few more minutes then mashed them.  Measure out one cup for the recipe, the kids will probably munch on any left overs.

Peter recommends shaping these into a boule.  The secret to the boule is creating surface tension so that the bread rises up rather than out.  I guess I wasn’t tense enough as my boule did flatten.  The results were still quite tasty as we only had three slices left over.  The bread is absolutely delicious toasted the next day.  That is if you are lucky enough to have some left over.

The next batch, the kids requested rolls.  I baked them at night so the kids could have them for breakfast.  I sprinkled a little kosher salt on them before baking.  The house smelled so good.  I did resist the urge to gobble one up hot out of the oven.  As stated in Stage 11:  Cooling (Patience Is a Baking Virtue).  But my tummy did rumble all night long as I dreamed of potato rolls floating in the air.

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Pike Place Market

When my father chose to retire from his day job, my parents decided to sell our house and move further away from the city.  The city, however, would not cooperate.  This was the late eighties and real estate prices in the New York area were astronomical.  In an effort to not bankrupt themselves and use up all our inheritance money they decided to head West, Washington State to be exact.  The only thing that we New Yorkers had heard about Seattle was that it rained, A LOT!

At the time my parents visited, the housing prices were quite reasonable and so was the traffic.  My mother was bidding on houses as soon as they got of the airplane.  The houses they were considering were on the large side, 4 bedrooms etc.  I kept wondering who was going to live in all those rooms.  My parents were under the assumption that we would migrate west with them.  At the time, I couldn’t imagine living anywhere but New York City.

My parents purchased a lovely new home in one of the suburbs.  It had a peek-a-boo view of Mt. Rainier which my mom loved to point out.  My brothers and I would come to visit during the holidays and it was always sunny.  Where ever you drove you could see the snow covered mountains in the distance.  And it seemed to take twenty minutes to get anywhere, Seattle, Mt. Rainier, the peninsula.  Twenty minutes, I swear.

I was on a business trip in California and decided to swing up to visit with the parents for the weekend.  And yes, it was a sunny weekend.  We decided to head into Seattle for lunch, Pike Place Market to be exact.  We drove over the 520 floating bridge.  The lake was sparkling and in the distance you could see the snow capped mountains.  You can’t beat Seattle on a sunny day.

I am not sure what it was about Pike Place Market, but at that very moment I thought to myself, “I can live here.”  We had lunch at Cutter’s and sat facing Elliot Bay.  We watched the ferry boats coming and going as we dipped our focaccia bread in the juice from the steamer clams.  We wandered through the market checking out the booths.  Pike Place Market became one of my favorite places to visit whenever I came to Seattle.

Oliver had a day off from school and he was due a mommy/son day.  The morning started out cloudy but as the day progressed the sun came out and Oliver decided he wanted to cash in.  I asked him where he wanted to go and he said, “Pike Place Market and let’s take the bus.”  Why not?

Our first stop was the French bakery for a croissant for Oliver and a variety of maccarons for Priya.  Oliver ate his croissant as we meandered through the craft tables.  He looked at some of the paintings, a lot of cats in various and sundry poses.  Oliver just took up painting and he was feeling pretty good about the art he was churning out.

Around the time he was finished with his croissant we were approaching Sosio’s produce market.  My favorite produce market.  On the front table were the prettiest raspberries.  Oliver stared up at me and without saying a word we bought a pint to tide us over until our next stop, De Laurentis.  At De Laurentis, Oliver stakes out a place by the cheese counter.  He is allowed to pick out three cheeses that we will take home and have after dinner.  His first choice was a cheese made in Oregon with flecks of rosemary.  That made the cut right away.  The second was D’ Affinois and the third, a basil goat cheese.  Happy with his purchases we headed over to the Pike Place Chowder for lunch.

Oliver was looking forward to a bread bowl.  When it was our turn to order, I took one look at the bread bowl and thought there was no way he would be able to eat all the soup, let alone the bread bowl.   But this was the reason for our Pike Place trip…

As we sat outside eating our chowder and chatting, I noticed Oliver chomping on the bowl.  I guess all that exercise he’s been doing lately is starting to kick in.

He wasn’t ready to call it a day yet.  “Let’s keep exploring,” he said.  So we ventured down stairs and perused the magic store and the book store across the way.  We found a store with collectible trading cards and Oliver looked for his favorite players.  Tucked away on one of the levels was a used book store.  Serendipitously, the comic books and food books were in the same aisle.  I found a nice copy of The Food of Italy by Waverly Root.

I started reading it that evening and it’s quite good.  It’s part history lesson, part regional cuisine break down, and really well written.  So I think I will be spending quite a bit of time in Italy this month…I have a feeling pasta is on the menu for dinner tonight.

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