Jim Lahey's No-Knead Bread

                                   

                        I've mentioned this method and recipe before, but I'm feeling the need to post the recipe. Why? Because every time that I bring this bread to a party, people rave about it. I tell them that I made it, and they say things like: "Oh, I hate you. I could never do that." Or: "I don't have time to do that."
But I promise them, and I promise you that you can totally do this. It's so easy and takes almost no active time. All you have to do is plan ahead a little bit.


And I've promised this before, but I swear that if you bring this to a party, people will love you.


Here's a little recap of Jim Lahey's explanation of the science behind this miraculous bread:


The long, slow rise brings the gluten molecules into side-by-side alignment, to maximize their opportunity to bind to each other and produce a strong, elastic network. The wetness of the dough is an important piece of this because the gluten molecules are more mobile when there is a sufficient quantity of water, and so can move into alignment easier and faster than if the dough was stiff."
Basically, this results in a bread with far more flavor than any bread you'll find in a supermarket or in the Baltimore area. The bread has structure, chewiness, a large airy crumb, and a substantial crust. It's really worth a try.

THE BASIC NO-KNEAD BREAD

-3 cups or 400 grams bread flour
-2 teaspoons table salt
-1/4 teaspoon or 1 gram instant or other active dry yeast
-1 1/3 cups or 300 grams cool (55 to 65 degrees F) water
-wheat bran, cornmeal, or additional flour for dusting


In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, salt and yeast. Add the water and mix until you have a wet, sticky dough, about 30 seconds. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature, out of direct sunlight, until the surface is dotted with bubbles and the dough is more than doubled in size. This will take at least 12 hours and up to 18, the longer the better.

When the first fermentation is complete, generously dust a work surface (I like to use a large wooden cutting board) with flour. Use your hands or a spatula to scrape the dough onto the board in one piece. The dough will seem very sticky and wet at this point, and you may think that it doesn't seem right. It is, though, so don't add more flour.

Using lightly floured hands, lift the edges of the dough in toward the center. Nudge and tuck in the edges of the dough to make it round. Place a cotton or linen (not terrycloth) tea towel on the work surface and generously dust it with wheat bran, cornmeal, or flour. Gently lift the dough onto the tea towel so that the seam side is down. If the dough is tacky, lightly dust it with the bran, cornmeal or flour. Fold the ends of the towel over the dough and place it in a warm, draft-free spot to rise for 1 to 2 hours. The dough is ready when it's almost doubled. If you gently poke it with your finger, it should hold the impression. If it doesn't, let it rise for 15 more minutes.

Half an hour before the end of the second rise, preheat the oven to 475 degrees F with a rack in the lower third of the oven, and place a covered 4-6 quart heavy pot in the center of the rack. If your pot has a rubber handle, cover it with a double layer of tinfoil with the dull side facing out.


Using pot holders, carefully remove the preheated pot from the oven and uncover it. Unfold the tea towel, lightly dust the dough with flour, cornmeal or bran, lift up the dough, and quickly but gently invert it into the pot, seam side up.


The pot will be very hot , so be very careful when you replace the lid and put the pot back in the oven. Bake for 30 minutes with the lid on. Remove the lid and continue baking until the bread is a deep chestnut color but not burnt. Use a heatproof spatula to carefully lift the bread out of the pot and place it on a rack to cool thoroughly. If you're not sure if it's done, hold the bread with a tea towel and knock on the bottom--if it makes a hollow-sounding thump, it's done.


You'll be tempted, but don't slice or tear into the bread until it's completely cool, which usually takes about an hour.

CIABATTA

-3 cups or 400 grams bread flour
-2 teaspoons table salt
-1/4 teaspoon or 1 gram instant or other active dry yeast
-1 1/2 cups or 350 grams cool (55 to 65 degrees F) water
-additional flour for dusting
-optional: 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh rosemary


In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, salt and yeast. If you're using the rosemary, add it at this point. Add the water and mix until you have a wet, sticky dough, about 30 seconds. Cover the bowl and let sit at room temperature until the surface is dotted with bubbles and the dough is more than doubled in size, 12 to 18 hours.


When the first rise is complete, generously dust a work surface with flour and scrape the dough out of the bowl onto the work surface. Dust the dough with flour and, with lightly floured hands, nudge the dough into roughly a 14 inch square. Fold the dough in half, then crosswise in half again, so you have a square, roughly 7 inches on each side.


Place the dough in a warm, draft-free spot, cover it with a tea towel, and let rise for 1 hour. The dough is ready when it's almost doubled and it holds the impression when poked with your finger. If not, let it rise another 15 minutes.

Half an hour before the end of the second rise, preheat the oven to 475 degrees F, with a rack in the center. On the rack should be a pizza stone and your 4-6 quart heavy-bottomed pot, without its lid.


Using pot holders, very carefully remove the hot pot from the oven. Using a dough cutter or sharp serrated knife, cut the dough in half. Shape each piece into a long flat loaf. Generously dust each loaf with flour.


Pick up 1 loaf with both hands, and quickly but gently stretch it to almost the length of the heavy pot, and place it on the stone. Using pot holders, carefully cover the loaf with the inverted pot and bake for 20 minutes.


Inverting the heavy pot is the trickiest part and must be done very carefully. I haven't yet burned myself while performing this maneuver, but I figure it's just a matter of time. So please be careful.


Uncover the loaf and place the pot on another rack in the oven in order to keep it hot for the next loaf. Continue to bake the first loaf for 10 to 20 minutes, checking the color of the loaf occasionally. It is done when the crust is a light chestnut color and it makes the hollow knocking sound.

Transfer the ciabatta to a rack to cool completely, and cook the second loaf the same way.

Daring Cook's Challenge: Pate and Baguettes

Blog-checking lines: Our hostesses this month, Evelyne of Cheap Ethnic Eatz, and Valerie of a The Chocolate Bunny, chose delicious pate with freshly baked bread as their June Daring Cook’s challenge! They’ve provided us with 4 different pate recipes to choose from and are allowing us to go wild with our homemade bread choice.
 

I have to admit that I wasn't too crazy about the prospect of making this Daring Cook's challenge. Don't get me wrong--I love liver, as I discussed in a previous post. It's just that I knew Nick wouldn't want to eat it and there was no way I was going to be able to eat a chicken liver terrine the size of a whole loaf of bread.

Luckily, the perfect opportunity to dispose of said loaf came along in the form of a family party. As I've said before, my family loves liver, so they were quite willing to dispatch a whole lot of liveriness, no matter that it looked and smelled like dog food. No, seriously. It did.

Happily, this little experiment tasted better than it smelled. I might even consider making it again, particularly because the leftovers (and I promise you that there will be leftovers) can be divided into smaller portions, frozen, and defrosted at any time. I might even take a less sucky picture of it.

So what would I not do next time? Forget the Cognac. As I was tasting for seasoning, I kept thinking "Hmmm...Something's missing, but I can't quite put my finger on what it might be." It wasn't until it had been taken out of the oven to cool that I realized my error. I think that the Cognac would have perfectly provided that missing Something, but that's just too bad.


You know what else I wouldn't do? Taste for seasoning and decide that it needs a bit more cloves. The finished product tasted overwhelmingly of cloves, although nobody else seemed to mind. Note to self: the seasonings are perfect. Do not mess with them.


Part of the challenge was to make baguettes to serve as the plate-to-mouth vehicle, although my brother dispensed with such niceties. I of course decided to make Jim Lahey's recipe, which I've previously discussed here, and a post with the recipe is in the works.


The result? Curiously underwhelming. Next time I'll probably stick with either his standard recipe or his ciabatta recipe. Nonetheless, like I've said before, this bread will still impress your friends and family and buy you some love.

Chicken Liver Terrine

Yields one 25 by 12,5 cm (10 by 5 inch) terrine or loaf pan

-1 tablespoon duck fat, or butter
-2 onions, coarsely chopped
-300g (11 oz) chicken livers, trimmed
-3 tablespoon brandy, or any other liqueur

-100g (3 1/2 oz, 1/2 cup) smoked bacon, diced
-300g (11 oz) boneless pork belly, minced
-200g (7 oz) ground pork-2 shallots, chopped
-1 teaspoon quatre-épices (or 1/4tsp each of ground pepper, cloves, nutmeg and ginger is close enough)
-2 eggs
-200 ml (7 fl oz, 3/4 cup + 2 tbsp) heavy cream
-2 fresh thyme sprigs, chopped
-Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Melt the fat or butter in a heavy frying pan over low heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes, until softened. Add the chicken livers and cook, stirring frequently, for about 5 minutes, until browned but still slightly pink on the inside.

Remove the pan from heat. Pour in the brandy, light a match and carefully ignite the alcohol to flambé. Wait for the flames to go out on their own, carefully tilting the pan to ensure even flavoring. When the mixture has cooled slightly, transfer to a food processor and cop until finely minced.

Put the minced pork belly and ground pork in the food processor, then add the onion-liver mixture and the chopped shallots, and pulse until you obtain a homogenous mixture – make sure not to reduce it to a slurry.

Transfer to a bowl, and gradually stir in the chopped bacon, quatre-épices, cream, eggs, and thyme. Season with salt and pepper, and mix well. Spoon the mixture into a terrine or loaf pan, and cover with the terrine lid or with aluminum foil.

Prepare a water bath: place the loaf pan in a larger, deep ovenproof dish (such as a brownie pan or a baking dish). Bring some water to a simmer and carefully pour it in the larger dish. The water should reach approximately halfway up the loaf pan.

Put the water bath and the loaf pan in the oven, and bake for 2 hours. Uncover and bake for another 30 minutes. The terrine should be cooked through, and you should be able to slice into it with a knife and leave a mark, but it shouldn’t be too dry. Refrigerate, as this pâté needs to be served cold. Unmold onto a serving platter, cut into slices, and serve with bread.

NOTE: This pâté freezes well. Divide it into manageable portions, wrap tightly in plastic film, put in a freezer Ziploc bag, and freeze. Defrost overnight in the fridge before eating.

By the way--this guy was for another meal, but I'm wondering if maybe some people out there have some answers for me.

I seasoned him with some salt and pepper and stuffed him with some herbs (summer savory, oregano, and epazote) and lemon, brushed him with some oil, and attempted to grill him.

The meat was properly cooked and ultimately edible, but my problem was the skin sticking to the grill grates. I oiled the fish, which was apparently not the solution. Does anyone know how to prevent this? My other problem is a recurring one--the fish tasted a bit like propane. I don't have this problem with meats, just fish. Again--why? Help!

Green Pasta with a Goat Cheese and Scallion Filling in an Olive Butter Sauce, Hot Italian Sausage, Broccoli Rabe, and Lemon Bars

If you can call an event of two years standing a tradition, then you could say that my family has a Valentine's Day tradition; namely, we make a nice dinner and hang out. Not a big deal, but a fun change from the usual depressing restaurant scramble.

It started last year when, for the first time in forever, Nick and I both had off on Valentine's Day, and we didn't know what to do with ourselves. We didn't especially want to make a nice dinner and stay at home because we do that all the time, and we were certainly not going to go to a restaurant.

Why do I say that? Because we both worked in restaurants long enough to know that if you go out on Valentine's Day, you'll be fighting your way through hordes of amateurs in order to be given sub-par food from the too-busy kitchen by a server who just wants to get you the heck out of that table because you're just a lousy two-top, and there are a million more behind you.

I don't mean to sound all anti-Valentine's Day, and I'm not going to whine about how it's a Hallmark holiday invented exclusively for commercial ends. I think it's a cute idea, but it seems rather silly when you've been together for over a decade.

On the other hand, maybe that's when you most need days like Valentine's Day, but I frequently find that days like Valentine's Day and New Years inherently come with so much pressure to make a special day out of them that it oftentimes backfires and you're left broke, grouchy, and disappointed.

Thus, the family V. Day was born. We figured that we wouldn't be sitting home doing the ordinary thing, we would be with people we love (which is, after all, the point), it's bound to be fun, and there's no pressure.

Here are some pictures from last year:

Super fun.

So this year, I wanted a meal that was special without being expensive, rich without being overly fancy, and highly portable.

This is what I came up with:

Hot Italian sausage, broccoli rabe sauteed with garlic, green pasta with a goat cheese scallion filling tossed in an olive butter, and gateau a l'orange chat.

Kidding. She's not dessert, she just likes to sleep in the bowl, and we disturbed her. I don't know why she likes to sleep in that bowl, but she does. Call the Health Department!

Did you know that female orange tabbys are very rare?

So I started prep the night before and I started by making the dough for the real dessert--Lemon Bars from Ad Hoc. I know that lemon doesn't exactly scream Valentine's Day, but Whole Foods once again had Meyer lemons for a great price, so I had some sitting in a fridge. And while this isn't an anti-Valentine's Day sort of night, but I figured there was no need to go with the usual chocolate dessert. I once again wanted some bright, sunny lemony-ness in the snow-covered depths of winter.

Back to the dough--this dough was quite unlike anything I've ever made before; it was sort of half cake and half tart. It started with creaming sugar and butter together in the stand mixer.

Which, by the way, I was actually able to do. You see, I had the bright idea to buy a stand mixer on eBay because I'm too broke to pay the retail price. I not only managed to buy two stand mixers and thereby establish a self-imposed ban on eBay buying, I bought one without the paddle attachment because I thought that the dough hook and whisk would be just fine.

Not so. It turns out that the paddle attachment is way more useful than the dough hook. Remember how I bent the whisk this past Christmas? Well, when it came time to get my birthday present, Nick thoughtfully went to get me a new whisk. This, however, turned out to be a complicated endeavor, so he ended up with the paddle attachment. Little did he know that it was exactly what I needed, and I had been putting off buying one.

Not that you care, though.

So I creamed together the butter and sugar, added some vanilla and a bit of flour, and that was that.

The dough was wrapped up and put in the fridge for later assembly. Now it was time to make the lemon curd. This process involved mixing together eggs, sugar and lemon juice, then adding butter.

I've mentioned before that I like really tart lemon desserts, so I was perturbed by the lack of lemon zest. I know, I know--I've also said that I like to make recipes the way they're written the first time, and I've said that Thomas Keller is The Man, and I'll do whatever he tells me to do.

So I went looking for the microplane zester, but it was nowhere to be found. And I mean nowhere. I looked for that little bugger for a long time, but it was to no avail. I think that Thomas Keller is such a mad genius that he knew I was going to attempt just such a move, so he snuck into my house and stole my zester.

So I tried using the tiny little holes on the side of the box grater, and this is what happened:

The zest just got all stuck in those little holes. What are they for, anyway?

So no zest went in the curd. Mr. Keller, if I promise not to mess up any more of your recipes, can I have my zester back? I like it a lot. Thank you.

When the curd was finished, its top was covered with plastic wrap, and it, too, was set aside to await later assembly. Or at least most of it was. It was so delicious that I just could not help taking the occasional spoonful or three, partially because it was so deliciously tart. I'm sorry, Master Keller; I'll never doubt you again!!

I should also mention that when I woke up that afternoon, yes afternoon, I mixed together some flour, water, salt and yeast for Jim Lahey's ciabatta bread and let it sit there because that's all you have to do. On Valentine's day, the first thing I did was dump out the dough and push it around in order to get its second rise started.

In the meantime, I made the green pasta dough by blanching some spinach (I read the directions properly this time), and mixed the chopped leaves with the eggs.

This all went into a flour well, and the egginess was spun around until it was combined with the flouriness.


The resulting dough was then kneaded for 10 minutes. There are times when 10 minutes go by in the blink of an eye, but not so much when you're pushing some dough around. It really does take 10 minutes for the dough to achieve the proper texture, though, so no slacking here.

When I finally finished and the dough was resting, I made the pasta filling by mixing together the goat cheese and scallions, olive oil, Parmesan, eggs, salt, pepper, and a pinch of nutmeg. Oh great. I need the microplane zester for the nutmeg.

Can I please have it back, T.K.? The box grater sufficed for this task, though.

At some point the bread was baked, and it was then time to roll out the tart dough. Eeesh. It was super-dry and crumbly when I first made it, but I had been hoping that the rest in the fridge would alleviate this problem.

Not so much. I did manage, though, to roll it out into an almost-rectangular shape. It was then flipped over into a half sheet pan, and the bits that broke were kind of smooshed back over to the edges. Like I've said before, that's the good thing about tart-like desserts--when you mess up the dough, it's not noticeable in the final product.

The tart shell was baked until golden, cooled, the lemon curd was poured in, and the whole thing went into the freezer. Thomas Keller states that freezing the dessert provides the curd with a lovely texture, "Somewhat firm but amazingly creamy." I wouldn't really know because my last-minute butt had this in the freezer a little too late, but more on that later.

Now it was time to roll out the pasta dough.

Every time I make pasta, there is some point at which I become fearfully convinced that this time, it's just not going to work. Sometimes it's when I'm swirling the eggs into the flour. Sometimes it's when I'm kneading the dough, but this time it was when I was rolling it out.

Actually, when I make pasta there are times when I think that none of those steps are going to work, but the necessary alchemy does somehow transpire.

The pasta was cut into "squares" and filled. I say "squares" because it turns out that I lacked the ability to cut the dough into uniform shapes that even remotely resembled squares, and my ravioli were therefore of wildly different sizes and shapes. Whatever. They'll overcook in the same time.

That's right, I overcooked the pasta. It's the penguins' fault.

I was just about ready to pull the pasta out of the boiling water when this penguin picture fell Splat! right in. I suppose they missed their usual watery environment. When I yelled, "F*&$!" my Dad probably thought that I had wrought massive destruction in his kitchen. Not quite massive, but I am sorry about the picture.

By the time I had fished out the penguins and run in a couple circles, the pasta was overcooked, and it didn't help that it was then tossed in a warm olive butter sauce. Oh, well. It was still delicious enough for Hunter to state that he could eat it every night of the week. That's quite a review from the guy who claims not to like pasta.

"That's not pasta," he says. Okay.

I liked it, but goat cheese is one of those things that's difficult to eat after you've been smelling it for hours. More problematic for me was the fact that it got a bit grainy when cooked. It's probably my fault somehow, though, and it still tasted quite delicious.

The sausage were excellent, and the broccoli rabe was awesome. Broccoli rabe is another one of those supposedly simple things that I just can't ever seem to cook properly. I've tried big-pot blanching and steaming followed by sauteing, and I've ended up with water-logged florets, even after thorough draining. I've tried just straight-up sauteing both the whole spears and the spears in pieces, and I end up with textural issues both ways. This time, however, I was inspired by a recipe that instructs you to peel the stalks. I think it was from a Mario Batali recipe, although it's a very Frenchy thing to do.

I don't know if it was the peeling that did it, or if the trick was to understeam them, but the broccoli were perfect. Yay, me.

After dinner, it was time to assemble the lemon bars. Thomas Keller instructs you to loosen the edges by running a knife around the edges of the sheet pan, and to lift the whole thing out and transfer it to a platter. Yeah, right, I said. This whole thing is totally not coming out in one p...ummm...it totally did.

Okay! I'm sorry I doubted you! Again!

You're then supposed to cut the whole thing into squares, which you are to reassemble. I did this part, but I didn't cut off the crust edges like he told me to. Sorry! I really like crust and couldn't bear to part with it. I don't care if it's not pretty. I probably shouldn't have admitted to that, though, because I'm totally not getting that zester back now.

I had previously made meringue, which I had brought with me in a plastic container. The recipe states that ideally, the meringue is to be made right before serving the bars. I know that, but it just wasn't going to happen.

You know what else wasn't going to happen? Piping the meringue onto the reassembled bars in pretty little spirals.

I might have done that if I had been at home, but it was so not happening at someone else's house. What I did instead was make quenelles, and placed one or two on each of the bars. Good enough.

It was then time to brown them. T.K. says that you can skip this step it you must, but I decided not to be a slacker for once, so I broke out the torch. There's no need, by the way, to get a fancy $30 torch from some place like Williams-Sonoma. A $10 torch from the hardware store works just as well.

Okay, almost as well. My particular torch cannot be turned horizontally, or it extinguishes itself. No problem--just hold the food at an angle.

This is what Hunter thinks of the torch:

I had mentioned before that the lemon bars never had a chance to freeze all the way. Therefore, they sort of started oozing almost right away, and I didn't get a chance to experience what Keller describes as a "great" texture.

That's okay, though, because they were still delicious, and satisfyingly lemony in a way that kept me eating more and more of them. That's why I got Nick to take them to work the next morning--I didn't trust myself to be around them long enough to take them to work that night.

Nick's coworkers loved them, and one person even knew that they were made with Meyer lemons rather than regular lemons. These bars are another example of how contrasting textures create a dish that is just impossible to stop eating. In this case, the crisp shell filled with the oozy lemon curd and the fluffy meringue made a compulsively edible team.

I have to say, though, that I might prefer plain old lemon meringue pie, because the bars, while delicious, were just a bit too sweet for me. They weren't a pointless saccharine, though, as they were also rather rich, which helped support the sweetness.

Overall, I would have to say that this dinner was much better than a restaurant dinner would have been, and it was pressure-free. Who cares if what you cook for your family isn't perfect? They'll love you anyway, right?

Goat Cheese and Scallion Ravioli with Black Olive Butter

(From Molto Italiano)

Makes 6 servings

• 1 1/4 pounds green pasta dough
• 2 cups fresh soft goat cheese (about 1 pound)
• 1/4 cup freshly grated Pecorino Romano
• 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 6 scallions, thinly sliced
• Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
• Slat and freshly ground black pepper
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons olive paste
• 1/4 cup freshly grated Pecorino Romano

Divide the pasta dough into 4 pieces. Roll each piece through the thinnest setting on a pasta machine and lay the sheets on a lightly floured surface. Cut each sheet into 12 three-inch squares. Cover with a towel.


To make the filling, combine the goat cheese, Pecorino, olive oil, egg, scallions, nutmeg, and salt and pepper to taste in a large bowl and mix until well blended.


To assemble the ravioli, place 1 scant tablespoon filling in the center of each pasta square. Fold the two opposite corners together to form a triangular pillow, gently pressing out any air pockets, then press the edges together to seal; if the pasta is a little dry, moisten the edges with a little water to help them adhere. Transfer to a lightly floured work surface.


Bring 6 quarts of water to a boil in a large pot, and add 2 tablespoons salt.


Meanwhile, to make the sauce, combine the butter and olive oil paste in a 12-inch sauté pan and heat over medium heat, stirring, until the butter is just starting to bubble. Remove from the heat.


Gently drop the ravioli into the boiling water, reduce the heat to a low boil, stir to separate the ravioli, and cook until the pasta is tender, 3 to 4 minutes. Remove from the water with a slotted spoon or a skimmer, draining well, and place in the pan with the sauce. Simmer for 1 minute over low heat. 


Transfer the ravioli to a warmed serving platter, sprinkle with the Pecorino, and serve immediately.

Beef Stew, Rosemary Ciabatta

So I mentioned last time that I was feeling quite fortunate to not be working during the upcoming snow storm.

Did you know that in a state of emergency, healthcare workers are not allowed to go home? I've been a nurse for a few years, and I somehow didn't know that.

Luckily, I was not held captive on Friday morning, because the state of emergency was not called until the afternoon. Even though it wasn't snowing at that point, either.

I had initially planned to go to the store when I woke up on Friday afternoon, but luckily I realized that that was a stupid idea for several reasons.

(It was like a black and white world out there.)

Instead, I joined the masses standing outside the doors of Whole Foods at 8 a.m. on Friday morning. I have got to tell you that I have never seen anything like Whole Foods was that morning. I'm glad I had decided to go with simple, old school favorites, because searching out obscure ingredients would have been a bad idea. A Braise recipe will just have to happen another time.

So on Friday night, was had shrimp fajitas, and on Saturday night, we had our neighbor friends over and had old-school beef stew. It's been a while since I've made a beef stew-like dish that didn't include red wine, bacon, or other Frenchy accouterments, so it was kind of nice to have what Nick called good old American beef stew.

Not that there's anything wrong with Frenchy beef stews. I made Thomas Keller's Boeuf Bourguignon this past winter, and it was one of the most amazing things I've ever eaten. That recipe is hard core. It's expensive, time-consuming, and all-around intense, but it's worth it.

Sometimes simplicity is a beautiful thing, though, and this beef stew is child's play in comparison to the French Laundry recipe. I'll include the recipe, as it's one I made up myself many years ago. Not that that's an impressive feat, as it's a very simple recipe, but it's pretty darn good.

Leah's Beef Stew

-About 2 pounds of beef stew chunks
-1 large onion, diced
-3 celery stalks, diced
-About 6 medium carrots, preferably organic, diced
-Fresh rosemary
-Fresh parsley
-About 6 peppercorns
-1 can tomato paste, preferable Miur Glenn
-About 8 cups organic beef stock
-2 largish red potatoes, cubed
-One largish white potato, peeled if it's a Russet, left unpeeled if it has soft skin, cubed

Optional but yummy: Rosemary bread for serving

If the beef pieces are on the large side, trim them so that they're about 1 inch square, and thoroughly dry them, as the beef will not brown well if it is wet.

Salt and pepper the beef, and over medium-high heat, heat about a tablespoon of oil in a dutch oven until it shimmers. Working in batches, brown the beef cubes. If they are overcrowded, they will steam rather than brown. You might even need to do 3 batches, so just add more oil as needed.

Remove the beef cubes to a paper towel-lined plate or baking sheet.

Add the onion, carrots, and celery to the dutch oven, as well as more oil if necessary. The quantities above are approximate, as vegetables vary greatly in size. Basically, though, you should have 2 parts onion, one part celery, and one part carrot, which makes a miropoix. I like to go a little heavy on the carrots, actually, but that's just me.

Make a bouquet garni by tying up about 3 sprigs of rosemary with about 3 sprigs of parsley and a few peppercorns in a piece of cheesecloth. Add salt, and saute the vegetables and the bouquet garni until the vegetables are soft; they do not need to take on color, so medium heat should work.

When the vegetables are soft, add the can of tomato paste and cook for another minute or two. I suggest using Muir Glenn, because Cook's Illustrated did a taste test, and Muir Glenn was the winner.

Remove the veggies to a bowl. Add the beef back to the pot, add the beef stock and the bouquet garni, and bring to a boil. Once boiling, partially cover and reduce to a fast simmer and simmer for about an hour.

At this point, add the vegetables and simmer for at least 2 more hours, still partially covered. Add more finely chopped rosemary if necessary.

This might seem like way too long to cook a beef stew, and it probably is, but Nick and I like it when the stew has been cooked for so long its components are just demolished and the broth is very thick. We like it when the potatoes are disintegrating, and the beef cubes are falling apart into little stringy bits, and that takes at least 2 1/2 to 3 hours.

You pretty much can't overcook this stew. Adjust to taste with salt and lots of pepper. We like our stew to be very peppery, and very heavy on the rosemary.

Speaking of rosemary, I noted above that this stew is delicious when served with rosemary bread. We used to buy the rosemary sourdough bread from Whole Foods, but I didn't think that bread bought on Friday was going to be much good on Saturday, and I certainly wasn't going to be making a trip to the store on Saturday.

In case you don't live in the Baltimore/DC area, this is why I wasn't going anywhere on Saturday:


So I decided to make Jim Lahey's ciabatta bread with some added rosemary. If you haven't heard of Jim Lahey's no knead bread technique, you should definitely check out his cookbook. A few years ago, he created a sensation with this breadmaking technique, and it was profiled by the New York Times.

If you don't feel like checking out the book, the Times printed a version of his basic recipe here. Cook's Illustrated also came up with a bread that uses this technique, so you might be able to find that version.

(Finally, the sun came out, and there was color!)

Basically, you create a very wet bread dough with a very small amount of yeast. Jim Lahey explains the science behind this dough in his book:

"The long, slow rise brings the gluten molecules into side-by-side alignment, to maximize their opportunity to bind to each other and produce a strong, elastic network. The wetness of the dough is an important piece of this because the gluten molecules are more mobile when there is a sufficient quantity of water, and so can move into alignment easier and faster than if the dough was stiff."

If you ever make this dough, it will seem totally wrong at first, but don't add more flour, just go with it.



This bread is insanely easy to make; it just requires that you plan ahead in order to accommodate the 18-24 hour rise. I've made his standard recipe, as well as the wheat recipe, so I wanted to try the ciabatta.

Speaking of ciabatta, if you ever find yourself at Pazo in Batimore, you should get their ciabatta.

So I made the dough by just dumping the ingredients together, including about 2 teaspoons of rosemary, and let the dough rise for about 22 hours.

Speaking of chopping rosemary, I got bored with using the chef's knife, so I decided to try the coffee grinder. It worked beautifully, and I felt like a genius. It wasn't so easy to clean, though, so we'll see how I feel later when I'm drinking rosemary-scented coffee. Gross.
The dough then got pushed around a little bit and underwent a secondary rise for about an hour.

Jim Lahey then directs you to put half of the dough on a preheated pizza stone and cover it with a preheated clay baker. Well, I don't have a clay baker, and because they sound highly breakable, I don't intend to get one.
Instead, I inverted the dutch oven to cover the bread on the pizza stone. This was potentially a very bad idea, as dutch ovens are quite heavy. The clay bakers are heavy too, though, and I figured that the dutch oven at least has big handles.

Well, I managed to cook two separate loaves of bread without inflicting a serious injury upon myself. And the bread was awesome.

Jim Lahey sounds a little cocky when he claims that his bread is better than what you'll find in most stores, but it's true. I could have eaten all of that bread myself, especially with some cheese and Prosecco.

Did you know that sparkling wine is really good with beef stew? I wouldn't have guessed, but it was great. We've all been drinking Prosecco and Cava before meals for a while now, and it's recently gotten trendy. I swear we were doing it first, though.


What a lovely snow day.