Abra

Ok, here we go with yesterday's efforts. First, I followed the recipe above, with a couple of exceptions. I added only 3 cups of AP flour, which was enough to produce a slack dough that cleaned the sides but not the bottom of the Kitchen Aid bowl. I used sugar since I didn't have malt syrup, but I did add 1 tsp of diastatic malt powder, just for good measure. Here's the risen dough - as you can see, it's very slack and elastic. Here's the dough divided into 8 parts for a little rest. The dough is shaped, quite inexpertly, into 8 small baguettes. Here's where I wish the dough were a little firmer, to allow better shaping. Another reason for a firmer dough would be the slashing. My slashing really sucks. I have a lame, but I don't use it well. With a dough like this, the slashes pulled all sorts of points and peaks into the dough. If you know of a good online tutorial on using the lame, please post it! The dough went into the oven on its parchment, on the very hot stone. I added water at the outset, and then after 2 and 5 minutes. The oven spring wasn't terrific, and I blame that on my crummy slashing. Here the bread is in the oven after 5 minutes You can see that the slashing is bubbling out, unfortunately. Here it is after 15 minutes in the oven However, the finished product didn't look terrible, and tasted pretty good, although it didn't have enough salt for my taste. While slightly warm, the crust was crisp. The crumb was very nice I could very slightly taste the rice, and couldn't taste the baking powder at all. The mouth feel was good, although ever so slightly gummy just before swallowing. As the bread cooled, though, it lost the crispness and became a bit chewy. All in all, it was a good first try. I'd like to get a better slash/oven spring, while keeping the lightness and open, elastic crumb. Oh, and I'm definitely upping the salt next time, probably by 50%. So, help, critiques, suggestions, are all in order and welcomed.

Thanks, Becca. I didn't know you were here in my area. I just looked in the back of my cupboard and found an unopened box of Joshin-ko plain rice flour. I can't remember when I bought it, but I must have known I'd need it. Great - I'm going to start my dough right now!

I don't think I've ever seen any other rice flour than mochiko - I'll have to look around. Tam, when Gabe used it, what brand was it, do you remember?

Uhm, did your disasters involve a recipe like the one posted above? I'd rather learn from your experience than create my own disasters! And now that I think of it, are we talking mochiko here, or some other sort of rice flour?

Thank you - I really appreciate it! That's an interesting recipe. I'll report back on how it turns out.

Thanks so much, Becca. Would you be so kind as to list the exact ingredient amounts? I can take it from there, unless there's some unusual technique involved. Maybe I should post this in the Asia forum too.

A group of us is doing a cook-through of the current issue of Food and Wine, and I'm making the banh mi recipe. I'd love to make the baguettes myself, and have scoured the web for a good recipe. There's one all over the place called Saigon Baguette that calls for 50% rice flour, but several other sites have criticisms of that recipe, saying the rice flour percentage shold be much lower. Does anyone have a tried and true great Vietnamese baguette recipe?

What gorgeous photographs and a sensational-looking dinner! Are you using some super high-zoot camera? The light in all of them is so splendid, the colors so pure. I'm awed. I have a bottle and a half of 51 and haven't made a single caipirinha this entire summer. This week would be the perfect time to get over that.

We can easily find both roasted and unroasted tahini, so I'll try it with the unroasted. I'm thinking maybe whole wheat pastry flour would work here.

Me too. I was going to say "on the kitchen table, under the kitchen table...." But hey, someone please tell me how to pronounce commis. I've asked elsewhere here without getting a reply. Do we say it in French, or is the s pronounced?

That looks beautiful and delicious. I'm looking forward to giving it a try. Would you used roasted or unroasted tahini?

Busboy, I am so glad you made it to Salumi. Isn't it awesome? Shelora, have you been to Union? If not, go.

Even though I live on a beautiful island myself, your pictures are making me feel like a vacation out East is in order. Gorgeous. And the next blogger's gotta be Ling. That girl can eat as much as any five of the rest of us, if her posts are to be believed. Not only that, she likes good food.

Elie, you added water and simple syrup to the vin de noix, or to the nocino? I've never seen a vin de noix recipe that suggested dilution, but I think I'm going to need to do something to it. Onthe other hand, I finished making some raspberry and blueberry liqueurs yesterday (started them last summer) and they are luscious, so I feel a little better about my adventure into spirits.

Actually, right in Langley we always go to the Edgewater. We've had some really good meals there, and they have a decent wine list.

It sounds delicious to me. Will you post the tomato pancake recipe? It doesn't sound like anything I've ever had.

For lowbrow but delicious, try the apple pancake at the Oak Table in Sequim. For a bit more upscale, Aussie owners, and lavender salad dressing, try Petals in Sequim. If you go to the Oak Table, be aware that sharing one egg dish and one apple pancake between three people is about right. The apple pancake is immense, but very more-ish.

Hey, John - great to see you blogging. What a beautiful place you live in!

I had a sip of mine when I moved it to glass jars, and it had a background of bitterness that I really didn't like. I removed the walnuts and stuck it in the basement. Pretty soon I'll have to go back to it and see what's happening. It really wasn't good as it was then, so I'm hoping it'll mellow out.

Last time we went in we had two servings of lasagne reserved, just so we could take one home. That lasagne makes the best breakfast you can imagine!

Jack, maybe nix on the smoked turducken. Even in the oven, debate rages about the safety of leaving the various stuffings at such low temps for such long periods of time. You have a huge, dense mass of raw poultry and various egg-containing stuffings, and low, slow temps/times. Food safety people would frown and wince over this one, so unless you're totally insouciant about food-borne illness, you might want to rethink this one. I know that I'm not obsessive/paranoid about bacteria, not to excess anyway, but this is one thing I wouldn't chance myself.

Apple juice is nice in turkey brine, as is maple syrup. If you want a little sweetness, I think either/both of those do more for turkey than sugar.

That tavuk gogsu is definitely not like anything I've ever eaten. I wonder whether there's actually any chicken flavor left after all that cooking, or whether it's used mainly as a fibrous structure for the pudding.

Maybe we should start a Meat for Dessert thread, and come up with some recipes. Althouh my initial reaction is "Oh, please, no!" I do love what we call in the PNW "salmon candy" or sometimes, in a non-PC manner, "squaw candy," It's little salmon bits so deliciously sweet that they really could be dessert, and I don't know anyone who can resist them.

Lovely, Mike. If I were home I'd show Riley that he's supposed to do what Arlo's doing, instead of skulking off in disgust because we won't feed him pork. I'm going to do ribs next weekend for a Walla Walla wine tasting. Have I mentioned on this thread that Col. Klink's rub is awesome when applied lightly to ribs?