Frog bread

I stumbled onto a recipe to make frog bread. I thought it would make the perfect lunch time surprise at preschool. So set about the enormous task of making 4 bread doughs, adding colouring to them, splitting, shaping and laying in the correct order to create the awesomeness of the picture directly below.


On our diet we can only use natural coloured food dyes. Things rose oddly and so my frog bread was far from idea. Hmmm I would like to try it again one day though.




ETA: the recipe I used no longer exists on the web so the link has been removed and a picture added instead. It was just a regular bread dough recipe so whatever you normally use just add food dye.

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Shes turning 1

My sweet beautiful little baby girl is about to turn. It has been an amazing year with her. She has grown up so fast. She is cheeky, oh so cheeky. She is clever, and gentle and beautiful in every way. She still loves her mummy cuddles and her mummy milk. We snuggle all day and all night. I am so blessed to have her.

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Goat Cheese and Whey Bread

Cheese making is a whole world of its own as I am beginning to discover.  Ive been making cheese weekly with our goats milk.  Two out of the four of us in our home are enjoying it.  I suppose there are many ways you can use fresh goat cheese but the only way it has been consumed at our house thus far is spread on freshly baked bread, lightly toasted with olive oil.  It almost makes your taste buds explode.  I have mainly been making chevre and fromage blanc, although I did try mozzarella, which did not turn out aesthetically pleasing but tasted good and melted successfully on our pizza.  We are very interested in trying the harder, aged cheeses in the near future.   A great resource for supplies, recipes, etc. is New England Cheesemaking Supply Company.
If you want to try a soft, fresh cheese yourself, it is pretty easy.  There are basically only four steps involved. 

Start with at least a gallon of unhomoginized milk of any kind (cow, goat, sheep, yak, whatever you have)...
1)  In a large non-aluminum pot, heat your milk to between 86-92 degrees.  You dont even really have to use a thermometer, if you dont have one just heat the milk until warm but not so hot it burns your finger (in the old days this was called blood warm).

 
2)  Either add your packet of culture for the cheese you want to make (fromage blanc, chevre, etc.) or add 1/2 cup of white vinegar per gallon of milk.  Stir for about a minute or two, cover and set in a warm place overnight or for half of the day.

3)  Uncover the pot and you should see that the curds and whey have separated.  Strain the curds into a cheese cloth (I always use a cloth napkin or a piece of clean cotton fabric).  Catch and save the whey to use later.  Hang your cheese to drain in a clean place for another day or so depending on how hard/dry you want your cheese to be. 
 

4)  Unwrap the cheese and turn it into a large bowl.  Add cheese salt or sea salt to taste and whatever herbs you prefer, our favorite is with lots of dill.  Mix well with a fork and refrigerate, eat right away, or label and give to friends as a homemade holiday treat.

As for the by product, I have been very satisfied using the whey we have left over after hanging the cheese.  I usually get quite a lot from each batch and have been either mixing it into the chicken feed or using it to make bread.  The chickens egg production goes up significantly when they are fed whey and the bread comes out moist, as well as with a higher protein content. 

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Both of these are jars of whey are from the same batch of cheese. 
The milkier jar is from the first 12 hours of straining, the clearish jar is the second 12 hours.

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I finally found a great bread recipe using 100% whole wheat flour.  I know lots of you out there are going gluten free so this is obviously not for you, but for those of us that like to grind our own wheat berries into flour or are just averse to using white flour, this bread comes out surprisingly moist and light. 

Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread (adapted from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, by Deborah Madison)

The sponge                                                                      The bread
2 1/4 c whey, warmed                                                    1/3 c olive oil
1 tbls. active dry yeast                                                    2 1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 c unsulfured molasses                                              3 1/2 c whole wheat flour
1/2 c gluten flour
2 c whole wheat flour


Stir warm whey, yeast, molasses, gluten flour, and 2 c whole wheat flour until smooth.  Scrape down sides of the bowl, cover, set aside in warm place for an hour until foamy and double in volume.

you can buy yeast in bulk and store in the refrigerator

Gently stir down sponge, add oil, salt, and one cup of the flour and beat until smooth.  Add the remaining flour in one cup increments until you have a shaggy, heavy dough.  Turn out onto floured counter and knead in flour, a few tbls at a time, until dough is smooth but still a little tacky. 

Place dough in an oiled bowl, turn it to coat the top, cover and set in warm place until doubled, about 1.5 hours.  Punch dough down, divide into two loaves, shape and place into greased bread pans, cover again and set aside until dough has rises to edge of pan, about 45 minutes.  Preheat oven to 375 and bake in center of oven until browned, 45-50 minutes.  Cool completely before slicing. 
Enjoy!

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Pumpkin Bread

For each new morning with its light,
For rest and shelter of the night,
For health and food, for love and friends,
For everything Thy goodness sends.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

I was recently reminded by an aquaintance that it is a very good thing to feed my chickens flax seeds (for the Omega 3s of course!).  I had forgotten all about that, so after an expedition to the store to purchase some flax I felt like doing some baking.  Here is what came of the urge, a new recipe I had not previously tried but have to say it is, hands down, the best quick bread I have had, maybe ever.  I imagine you can use any squash for this but I stuck to pumpkin for the flavor and because it is what I had in the pantry. (My suggestion is to double the recipe.)

Pumpkin Bread, adapted from William Sonoma Thanksgiving Entertaining

1 1/4 c flour
1/3 c cornmeal
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamin
1 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground cloves
2 large eggs
1-1 1/4c sugar
1/3 c olive oil or buter melted
1/3 c plain whole milk yogurt
1 c pumpkin puree
1 c raisons (optional)
flax seeds and butter to line botom of pan

Preheat oven to 350.  Butter pan.
In a large bowl whisk together flour, cornmeal, baking soda, salt, cinnamin, ginger, and cloves. 
In a seperate bowl combine eggs, sugar, oil or butter, yogurt, and pumpkin.  Beat until smooth, about 1 minute.  Stir in raisons.  Stir in dry ingredients being careful not to over mix.
Melt some butter and pour onto bottom of the pan then sprinkle with flax seeds.  The flax seeds make a yummy crust on the bottom.  Pour in batter and bake until knife or toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.  Cool and Enjoy!

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Banana bread with Mr Thermie

I bought some almond milk as it sounded so delicious, in truth its the nastiest stuff Ive ever drunk. Who in their right mind drinks such a horrid concoction Id rather starve.

Got me thinking on needing to use this horrible yuck and thought it might go alright in some Banana bread.

INGREDIENTS

• 1/2 cup Rolled Oats
• 150ml Milk
• 150ml Almond milk (or 300ml normal milk if you too think almond milk is nasty)
• 3 overripe bananas, mashed
• 240g Self Raising Flour (You Can Use Wholemeal)
• 1 teaspoon Baking Powder
• 1/3 cup Soft Brown Sugar
• 1 teaspoon Mixed spice
• 3 tablespoons Honey
• 1 Egg
• 100g of nuts I used almonds, cashews and macadamias

True Thermomix style (or is it Tracey Style?) chuck in all in the bowl in the order listed then mix on 6 for 30 sec. Use a lower speed if you want chunkier nuts but I have kids so wanted things well blended. Add the oats at the end and mix slowly if you want them whole.

If you dont have a Thermie well you miss out. No not really you may need to soak your oats, mash your banana by hand and chop your own nuts but then you should be right to mix in a bowl. Sweat and love makes a cake taste better right?

Pour into greased and lined loaf tin and bake for 45mins on low to moderate oven try around 180C

NB I forgot the weigh as I went so I will update the recipe with weights next time I make it.

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