Sunday, January 20, 2013

Food Friday, Sort of

Well, I at least thought of this post on Friday, even though it's Sunday and I'm just getting around to posting it.

About 15 years ago I spent a year in the developing world.  Daily life included many inconveniences, including power and water cuts, a lack of the type of entertainment I was used to and serious difficulties in finding foods that I never knew I would crave.

And crave I did.  One of the things I learned about myself while I was there is just how resourceful I am, and what a kick I get out of problem solving.  I made chocolate chip cookies with chopped up candy bars.  After a few tries I realized that some oat meal in the batter makes up for the gooeyness of the chocolate.  While I gave up a lot one thing I gained was cable TV.  This proved to be particularly challenging for my cravings because I was continually exposed to food I could not acquire. Two things I was particularly proud of making were a barbeque chicken sandwich (inspired by a TGI Fridays commercial) and English muffin bread.

The English muffin bread doesn't have the "nooks and crannies" celebrated in the add, mainly because it's not fork-split but sliced, but other than that it makes a nice breakfast toast.  And, if you've ever seen an English muffin recipe, you'll notice the bread is a lot easier to make.

So, when one of my favorite online expat forums was lamenting the lack of English Muffins in Holland I immediately thought of my English muffin bread recipe.  Funny, my tastes have changed and in the past year-and-a-half I have not once thought of making this bread, but I made some this morning and it was really good.  So, here it is:

2 teaspoons yeast
3 cups flour (I substituted about 1/3 whole wheat flour, as I do with almost everything)
2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 cup water
cornmeal & oil (for the pan)

Combine 1 1/2 cups flour, yeast, sugar, salt and soda. Heat liquids until very warm (120-130 degrees Fahrenheit).  Add liquid to dry mix and beat well.  Stir in remaining flur to make a stiff batter.

Put in greased, cornmealed loaf pan (or mound on a making sheet).  Cover and let rise for 45 minutes.  Bake at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 25 minutes.  Remove from pan immediately and let cool.

[Pretty sneaky post, eh?  Not mentioning once my near 4 month absence from the blog.  I'm working on a post that explains that, so stay tuned.]

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