Extra Recipe #1 - Whole Wheat Bread

As part of the healthy eating we've been doing, we are only eating whole wheat/whole grain bread. It's healthier and, I think, tastier than white bread. White bread is all the Husband and I ate when we were kids - but didn't everyone? There may be some crunchy granola kids out there whose parents only fed them organic soy beans and tofu smoothies, but not us. We ate white bread and we loved it. We had no idea it wasn't the best thing for you to do, like riding on the handlebars of your friend's bike while not wearing a helmet and then getting scratched and scraped all over when she crashed into a blackberry bush. But anyway, we ate white bread and did crazy things and we all survived.

But now we see all of these healthy foods come out with a huge emphasis on whole grains and how they're so much better for your body. And something I don't understand is that whole grains are the original form of these little buggers that haven't been refined. Once the grains are refined, they're used for white bread. So why did everyone go through all that trouble to remove the husks and refine these grains to turn them into white bread? Why weren't they just left in their original form? It would have been much less work.

So, armed with this information we are now eating whole wheat/grain breads. They're a little expensive at about $3.50/loaf and the loaves are smaller than what you'll get for a loaf of white. We were in a new Kroger in town recently and found this brand of flour:

First of all, it says organic - the magic word that makes everything healthier, right? Ehh, not so much, but this isn't a post about organic vs. non-organic food. Anyway, this whole wheat flour sounded like the perfect excuse to make my own bread. Plus, there was a bread recipe on the package which was reason enough to make it. Recipe to come soon.

The recipe indicated it would be about two hours to make the bread from beginning to end. This was somewhat bad timing because I didn't begin this process until about 7:45pm, but I figured 'what the heck.' This dough called for yeast, which was something I haven't used in a while when I make bread. I've been using a bottle of light beer for the yeast, which actually really works well. Corona has been my beer of choice. The only problem with using beer as yeast is that the bread really develops that yeasty beer taste after a few days. You have to eat it quickly or it will start to ferment. You don't want that.

The dough went into the oiled pan and as I searched in vain for a warm place in our drafty positively air tight, lovely 75-year old house, I suddenly remembered our pseudo laundry room right off of the kitchen. I plopped the bread pan on top of the dryer, laid a damp cloth over the bread, set the dryer for 40 minutes, and went off to watch TV. Foolproof, right? Well, the dough did rise but not quite enough. The recipe called for it to double and it was probably another 40 minutes from completely being doubled, but at this point it was approaching 9:30 and I knew it still had 45-50 minutes to bake. That was probably the downfall of this whole experience - the fact that it didn't rise all the way. Must be a better steward of time next time I do this.

I also put some sesame and sunflower seeds on top of the dough before it went in the oven to emulate the store bought brands. Next time I may try to bake those into the bread because when it came out of the oven, the seeds and nuts hadn't adhered at all. When I inverted the bread onto the cooling rack, all of the seeds and nuts fell off onto the counter top. Lesson learned. It absolutely smelled heavenly, though! I immediately cut it into slices to let the heat escape so I could store it and get to bed - it's about 10:30pm by now and I'm fading fast. The Husband worked late and had just arrived home when the bread came out, so he was the first to try a piece. It was good but kind of dense. The full rise definitely would have prevented that.

I do want to try to make this bread again, though. I'll do a few things differently: full rise, seeds and nuts in the bread, and mix in less flour even if it's really sticky. It called for an initial 2 cups of flour but up to 2-3 more to add in to the final dough. I used a little more than 5 because the kneading process was becoming a sticky mound on my cutting board. Thank heavens for my bench scraper or I would have been totally lost. This was a good first attempt and I'm going to give it another shot.

Beer Cheese Soup

There are a few truths that we hold fast to in life:

1. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
2. The only sure things are death and taxes.
3. If you see this Beer Cheese Soup in a dark alley, train your sights and shoot to kill, leaving no survivors.

Beer Cheese Soup

1 T butter
½ C chopped onion
½ t minced garlic
1 t Worcestershire sauce
1 (12 fl oz) can or bottle light beer
1 (14.5 oz) can chicken broth
3 T cornstarch
2 C half and half
2 C shredded sharp Cheddar cheese

Melt the butter in a 4 ½ quart soup pot over medium heat. Add the onion, garlic and Worcestershire sauce and stir well. Add the beer and raise the heat to high and boil for 3 minutes to evaporate the alcohol. Add the chicken broth and bring the soup
back up to a boil. Lower the heat to medium-low and simmer.

Combine the cornstarch with 3 tablespoons water and stir until smooth. Set aside.

Add the half and half and shredded cheese to the soup. Stir constantly until the cheese melts. Then stir in the cornstarch mixture. Stir constantly until the soup is thick, about 2 minutes.

When I got home last night, I was pleasantly surprised to see the Husband was already in the kitchen chopping onions, measuring butter and pouring beer. He looked so happy and I was forever grateful for him starting dinner. I even went to a great bakery in town to pick up some small bread bowls to put the soup in. I was prepared for this to be a feast!

Boy, was I wrong.

The soup was thin, grainy, totally uncheesy and all I tasted was onion. It also never really thickened up. I know we followed the recipe to a tee. And then when I pulled the bread bowls out of the bag, there was a trace of mold on the bottom of the loaves. I had to cut off the bottom crust, therefore leaving no reliable barrier from keeping the soup from leaking out the bottom. Good thing the soup never even left the pan, huh? We tried a few spoonfuls each, added Tabasco sauce and more cheese and debated adding more ingredients before deciding there was no use in wasting more cheese/half and half/Tabasco if there was no guarantee those items would make the soup palatable. So we made burritos instead.

And to top it all off, soup doesn't photograph well. And yes I'm sure it has nothing to do with my photographic skills - what are you trying to say? At any rate, I took that as a sign that the soup must be evil and wouldn't stand for its picture to be taken.

My rating - this soup was a colossal failure. But I still love the Husband for trying and I know this wasn't operator error. The recipe just sucked.