Oops, I'm supposed to be talking about my Day 4 bread. I basically followed the recipe from Day 3 which was a beautiful loaf and it was consumed by my men as a bedtime snack. Day 4 was an up hill climb for me emotionally. It was raining outside, too. Since the only mistake from the day before was the egg incident, I had pretty good hopes that today would yield better results. I even remembered the measurements and ingredients by memory. But I double checked to be sure. (whew!) The mixing was uneventful, all went well. I even got the dough into the not-quite-the-right-dimension loaf pan and had it rising in the 200 degree/hot pot of water oven/sauna. I threw a tea towel over it for good measure. So far, a whole string of good events happening. My emote-o-meter reading was at 50 and I was going to take another spin to go for the green, glittery 100. I can hear the beep, beep, beep now and feel the anticipation of the little arrow landing on just the right number.
The tea towel became the problem. My bread rose really tall, like 4X the height of my loaf pan. I opened the oven door after an hour and went to remove the tea towel. There.Was. A. Sticky. Place. On the dough. I finagled the towel gently. *phfffff* a hole was created when the towel tore off a piece of dough from where the sticky place had been. 1/3 of the loaf deflated, then, the weight of the 4X -as- high -as- the- sides -of- the- pan caused the other side to slip down and it was cut off by the edge of the pan and I watched the dough *plop* right into the hot pot of water.
I muttered a few words under my breath (and maybe not so much under my breath. but just maybe. I, after all, have learned to bridle my foul tongue; source of evil that it is). I heard the big buzzer from my emote-o-meter wheel go off. I over spun. Anyway, I grabbed the loaf pan. I... with beady, narrowed eyes, and a puckered mouth with a looks-could-kill scowl, put the loaf pan down on the counter (nicely, with much control). I took out the dough, reformed it and placed it back into the loaf pan for yet another hour in the oven/sauna.
It rose beautifully. Again. Okay, I was back to a 50 on the emote-o-meter. I cranked up the temperature and waited patiently for 45 minutes today (to help compensate for the under-baked, holey bread from yesterday). I pulled out from the oven this beautiful loaf. The aroma of fresh bread is one of the most superb aromas of all ( up there with leather and new car. Oh, and cookies). I turned the loaf out onto the wire rack to cool and the lovely (read that with terseness) loaf wouldn't pop out of the pan. The rounded top was doing the muffin top thing and sticking to the side and edges. I took a knife to wedge the edges loose. The bread was so soft on the underside of the muffin top part, that the knife slipped into the bread. Then, I had to get the knife between the pan and sides of the bread (like you do with brownies). I was mutilating my loaf. It was sad. I turned the pan upside down. Nothing happened, just a few crumbs...I shook the pan... and THE TOP FELL OFF! I flip the damn pan back over and there's still bread in it. I wedge the knife around (it was easier now that the top was removed). I turned the pan over. NOTHING! HOW was I going to get the stupid bread out?!
I took the knife and hacked and scraped and tore and sliced the remaining bread to pieces until it begged me to just turn the pan over and let it fall out. It fell out. I threw the pan into the sink. I told the men there would not be anymore knives taken to the bread, we would just use our hands and rip whatever we wanted off. And that's what we did.
1 comment:
LOL. Personally, I like to rip bread off the loaf and drag it through butter or spinach dip. Isn't that how bread is supposed to be eaten?
Post a Comment