Posts tagged daring bakers

Blog-checking lines: Audax Artifex was our January 2012 Daring Bakers’ host. Aud worked tirelessly to master light and fluffy scones (a/k/a biscuits) to help us create delicious and perfect batches in our own kitchens!

I was so excited for this challenge because it included an Australia recipe for biscuits. One of my closest friends is studying abroad in Aussie right now and trying to get permanent residence there. Although I never got the chance to make that recipe I tried 3 others and will make that one as soon as possible.

The first recipe I tried was the basic scones recipe. It was just okay, nothing so special. Almost tasted like bisquick biscuits.

Basic Scones (a.k.a. Basic Biscuits)
Servings: about eight 2-inch (5 cm) scones or five 3-inch (7½ cm) scones
Recipe can be doubled

Ingredients:
1 cup (240 ml) (140 gm/5 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour
2 teaspoons (10 ml) (10 gm) (⅓ oz) fresh baking powder
¼ teaspoon (1¼ ml) (1½ gm) salt
2 tablespoons (30 gm/1 oz) frozen grated butter (or a combination of lard and butter)
approximately ½ cup (120 ml) cold milk
optional 1 tablespoon milk, for glazing the tops of the scones

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to very hot 475°F/240°C/gas mark 9.
2. Triple sift the dry ingredients into a large bowl. (If your room temperature is very hot refrigerate the sifted ingredients until cold.)
3. Rub the frozen grated butter (or combination of fats) into the dry ingredients until it resembles very coarse bread crumbs with some pea-sized pieces if you want flaky scones or until it resembles coarse beach sand if you want tender scones.
4. Add nearly all of the liquid at once into the rubbed-in flour/fat mixture and mix until it just forms a sticky dough (add the remaining liquid if needed). The wetter the dough the lighter the scones (biscuits) will be!
5. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured board, lightly flour the top of the dough. To achieve an even homogeneous crumb to your scones knead very gently about 4 or 5 times (do not press too firmly) the dough until it is smooth. To achieve a layered effect in your scones knead very gently once (do not press too firmly) then fold and turn the kneaded dough about 3 or 4 times until the dough has formed a smooth texture. (Use a floured plastic scraper to help you knead and/or fold and turn the dough if you wish.)
6. Pat or roll out the dough into a 6 inch by 4 inch rectangle by about ¾ inch thick (15¼ cm by 10 cm by 2 cm thick). Using a well-floured 2-inch (5 cm) scone cutter (biscuit cutter), stamp out without twisting six 2-inch (5 cm) rounds, gently reform the scraps into another ¾ inch (2 cm) layer and cut two more scones (these two scones will not raise as well as the others since the extra handling will slightly toughen the dough). Or use a well-floured sharp knife to form squares or wedges as you desire.
7. Place the rounds just touching on a baking dish if you wish to have soft-sided scones or place the rounds spaced widely apart on the baking dish if you wish to have crisp-sided scones. Glaze the tops with milk if you want a golden colour on your scones or lightly flour if you want a more traditional look to your scones.
8. Bake in the preheated very hot oven for about 10 minutes (check at 8 minutes since home ovens at these high temperatures are very unreliable) until the scones are well risen and are lightly coloured on the tops. The scones are ready when the sides are set.
9. Immediately place onto cooling rack to stop the cooking process, serve while still warm.

Next I tried the Perfect English Scone recipe because my in-laws are from England. This is our new favorite scone recipe. We have made it three times in 2 weeks. Its that good!

Perfect English Scones

55g Butter (2oz)
30g Caster sugar (1oz)
150ml Milk (1/4 pint)
1 egg (maybe…depends on later steps..)
1/2 teaspoon salt

First off, preheat the oven to 220 deg C 425 deg f.
Speed is of the essence so you can’t be hanging around waiting for the oven to heat up or you’ll get flat, hard scones.

Cut up the butter into smallish chunks (2-3cm cubes) and rub into the flour with your fingertips until its loose and breadcrumby. Don’t do this in a blender or food processor as the texture will become to fine and the scones will go flat and hard again.

stir in the sugar if you want sweet scones or not if you don’t.

Make a big well in the centre of the flour and pour in the milk.

Mix together quickly with a table knife, NOT your hands, until you have a big gooey lump

Once the milk hits the flour a reaction begins which needs to also be happening in the oven, so speed and a light touch are required.

Then, sift all the flour and salt into a large bowl.

grab the dough out of the bowl and slap it on a floured surface.
Kneed it into a square(ish) about 2.5cm (an inch) thick and the stamp out circles with a cookie cutter.
If you twist the cookie cutter while cutting you’ll end up with wonky scones like mine, but I think that makes them look more rustic and cool.
Lay the circles out on a baking tray lined with grease proof paper, giving each one 2cm of room to grow…

To finish the scones before the oven we now have 3 options….

1)Brush with a beaten egg to produce a glossy glaze.
2)Dust with flour for a soft finish
3)Brush with milk for a light gloss AND soft crust

as soon as they’re glazed, slam them in the oven near the top for 20 to 25 minutes. Don’t get curious and open the oven door, you’ll just spoil them

After they’re done (tops are brown), let them cool a bit on a wire rack covered with a teatowel. This lets the centres go from doughy to crumbly, although it is kinda hard waiting.

IRISH SCONES

Last but not least I tried my hand at making some Irish Scones.

1-1/2  c. wholemeal self-raising flour **
1/2     c. white self-raising flour
          pinch salt
1        tbsp. sugar
1/2     tsp. baking soda
1        tsp. carroway seeds
1/4     c. currants
1        egg
2        oz. melted margarine
2/3     c. buttermilk

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Mix flours, salt, sugar and baking soda. Stir in seeds and currants.

Beat egg, margarine and buttermilk. Mix dry mix into wet mix until just combined. Turn out onto floured board and knead about 10 times until surface is smooth. Flatten to 1 inch thick. Cut scones with a 2 inch biscuit cutter and place on ungreased cookie sheet. Brush tops with a little milk and sprinkle sugar on top. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until they sound hollow when tapped on the bottom. Yield: 12 Scones

** There is no substitute for self-rising flour but you can easily make your own out of all-purpose flour. To make 1 cup of self-rising flour: to a 1 cup measure, add 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Add enough all-purpose flour to make 1 level cup.

All of the scones were delicious. My favorites were the English and Irish scones because they have the sweet sugary taste in them. I apologize for the delays with this blog lately. I have so many great things planned for the future.

Blog-checking lines: Our Daring Bakers Host for December 2011 was Jessica of My Recipe Project and she showed us how fun it is to create Sour Dough bread in our own kitchens! She provided us with Sour Dough recipes from Bread Matters by AndrewWhitley as well as delicious recipes to use our Sour Dough bread in from Tonia George’s Things on Toast and Canteen’s Great British Food!

I was so excited for the daring bakers challenge this month. My fiance is a baker for a living so the thought of making bread without yeast seemed totally wrong to him. But he absolutely loved the bread after the five days it took to make it. I want to try the rice flour bread as soon as the holiday season is over.

French Country Bread
Stage 1: Refreshing the leaven
Ingredients
1 cup less 1 tablespoon (225 ml) (160 gm/5 ⅔ oz) wheat Leaven Starter
6 tablespoons less 1 teaspoon (85 ml) (50 gm/1¾ oz) stoneground bread making whole-wheat or graham flour
1 cup plus 2 teaspoons (250 ml) (150 gm/5 ⅓ oz) unbleached all purpose flour
1/2 cup (120 ml) water
Production Leaven Total 2¾ cups plus 4 teaspoons (680 ml) (480 gm /1 lb 1 oz)

Directions:
1. Mix everything into a sloppy dough. It may be fairly stiff at this stage. Cover and set aside for 4 hours, until bubbling and expanded slightly.

French Country Bread
Stage 2: Making the final dough
Ingredients
3/4 cup less 1 teaspoon (175 ml) (100 gm/3 ½ oz) stoneground breadmaking whole-wheat or graham flour, plus more for dusting
2 cups plus 2 tablespoons (510 ml) (300gm/10 ½ oz) unbleached all-purpose flour
1¼ teaspoons (7½ ml) (7 gm/¼ oz) sea salt or ⅔ teaspoon (3⅓ ml) (3 gm/⅛ oz) table salt
1 ¼ cups (300 ml) water
1 ¾ cups (425 ml) (300 gm/10 ½ oz) production leaven – this should leave some (1 cup) for your next loaf.
Total 6 cups less 2 tablespoons 1415 ml (1007 gm/35 ½ oz/2 lb 3½ oz)

Directions:
1. Mix the dough with all the ingredients except the production leaven. It will be a soft dough.
2. Knead on an UNFLOURED surface for about 8-10 minutes, getting the tips of your fingers wet if you need to. You can use dough scrapers to stretch and fold the dough at this stage, or air knead if you prefer. Basically, you want to stretch the dough and fold it over itself repeatedly until you have a smoother, more elastic dough.

3. Smooth your dough into a circle, then scoop your production leaven into the centre. You want to fold the edges of the dough up to incorporate the leaven, but this might be a messy process. Knead for a couple minutes until the leaven is fully incorporated in the dough.
4. Spread some water on a clean bit of your work surface and lay the dough on top. Cover with an upturned bowl, lining the rim of the bowl with a bit of water. Leave for an hour, so that the gluten can develop and the yeasts can begin to aerate the dough.
5. Once your dough has rested, you can begin to stretch and fold it. Using wet hands and a dough scraper, stretch the dough away from you as far as you can without breaking it and fold it back in on itself. Repeat this in each direction, to the right, towards you, and to the left. This will help create a more ‘vertical’ dough, ready for proofing.
6. Heavily flour a banneton/proofing basket with whole wheat flour and rest your dough, seam side up, in the basket. Put the basket in a large plastic bag, inflate it, and seal it. Set aside somewhere warm for 3-5 hours, or until it has expanded a fair bit. It is ready to bake when the dough responds to a gently poke by slowly pressing back to shape.
7. Preheat the oven to hot 425°F/220°C/gas mark 7. Line a baking sheet with parchment, then carefully invert the dough onto the sheet. I like to put the baking sheet on top of the basket, then gently flip it over so as to disturb the dough as little as possible. Make 2-3 cuts on top of the loaf and bake for 40-50 minutes, reducing the temperature to moderately hot 400°F/200°C/gas mark 6 after 10 minutes.
8. Cool on a cooling rack.

Verdict: The bread was delicious and moist. My progress with bread (my biggest challenge to work with) has really improved since joining the daring bakers. I am really proud. I am also excited for all of the daring baking/cooking challenges that the new year will bring. In the New Year I hope to have more money so I can experiment and post on here more.

Coming soon: chicken brocolli stir fry, daring cooks January 2011, holiday cookie recipes, daring bakers January 2011.