Because if I do, I will keep making it. And then I will keep eating it. And then I will become like those people you see on TLC who need a crane to lift the roof off their bedrooms and then lift their own morbidly obese bodies out of their beds so they can go to the hospital for being too fat.
THAT is why I can never make this bread again. It is the single most beautiful thing I have ever eaten.
It's Nigel Slater's fault. He posted a recipe for "Rosemary and Honey Bread for Cheese" and like an idiot I thought "wow that looks great I'll give it a try." Despite the fact that I can't eat cheese, anything involving rosemary catches my eye. And let's face it I'm a sucker for bread recipes, and for bread itself.
I made a simpler version, wanting something I could have with a savoury dinner or even breakfast. So I took out the apricots, sultanas, etc., and instead of half white flour/half wheat flour, I used all wheat.
Thus:
VERY SIMPLE ROSEMARY AND HONEY BREAD WITH SEA SALT
(adapted from Nigel Slater's recipe, and converted to US measurements)
4 cups whole wheat flour (or 2 cups wheat/2 cups white)
1 tsp salt
350 ml warm water
1 tbsp honey (not super strong, not super light, in the middle)
2 packets dried yeast
2 tbsp chopped rosemary
a bit more rosemary, to decorate
sea salt, to decorate
- Mix flour or flours and salt in a large bowl.
- Pour the yeast into the warm water, stir until dissolved, add the honey, stir again, add the rosemary, stir again.
- Mix water/yeast/honey/rosemary into the flours. If you are using a spoon and your hands like I was, mix until a spoon is no longer effective then switch to your hands and knead in the bowl for about 5 minutes until the dough is all together and sticky. It's a pretty small ball of dough, don't freak out.
- Cover with a cloth and let rise for about an hour in a relatively warm spot. (note: when you are cooking in a freezing cold farmhouse in Massachusetts or similar, don't expect it to rise that much, it will look not that much different than it did at the beginning of the hour.)
- Divide the dough into two balls/loaves/whatever shape you feel like at the moment. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Scatter with sea salt and rosemary flakes.
- Bake at 425 degrees about 25 minutes until it's brown around the edges.
OMG this bread. I wanted to wait until dinner time but I couldn't resist, I figured I'd better determine its edible-ness before I served it and thus avoid a potential incident. So I cut off a small piece at the end. I could SMELL that musky honey sweetness as the knife broke the crust, and a few flakes of sea salt hit the parchment paper.
O
M
G
The texture was perfect. Soft and fluffy but substantianal enough that you really felt like you were eating homemade bread. And the ROSEMARY. And the SEA SALT. It's perfect bread. I stood there, in the darkend kitchen, staring out the window at the early-now-it's-summer setting sun and had a bread moment like no other. Every bite. Sweet, salty, savoury, it's all in there. And it was warm and nourishing and just made me feel like there would never be any bad in the world ever again.
When Mum got home, I met her at the door with a slice, pronouncing "I AM A F*&%ING GENIUS." She stood in the foyer in her overcoat and ate two slices making little puppy mewing noises. And we proceeded to polish off the entirety of loaf #1 with dinner (incidentally, roasted broccoli and sprouts with lima beans and more life-affirming rosemary.) She had some with butter for breakfast this morning, and as soon as my butternut squash finishes steaming, it'll be accompanying dinner tonight. And then . . . bread obesity here I come.
I wonder how much a 10 miler in arctic temps with a head wind has earned me in the bread department tonight . . . you know what, sod it. Don't care.
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