Brunching, and a confession about milk

I may have just eaten the best brunch of my life.

Okay, maybe not the best brunch of my entire life, but damn near close. And it was so, so, so easy. I mean, like, I was ravenous and it was still entirely worth it for me to wait on these few pieces to come together.



This is quite possibly the most delicious tomato I've eaten in a long time. Everyone keeps giving me their garden bounty, and how can I refuse such heartfelt gifts? I cannot.

This heirloom was exquisite. Meaty, slice-able, and so juicy. Plus mushrooms and a little spice from a poblano pepper, all under pools of decadent garlic cream sauce. Add poached eggs and some of that bread and that, dear, means Saturday started out well.

Sauteed vegetables with garlic cream sauce and poached eggs

I mean, this is not even a recipe. You know how to saute vegetables. The ones I used were:

shallots
mushrooms
poblano pepper
that beautiful tomato

in olive oil. You know.

To make the cream sauce, I chopped and sauteed three cloves of garlic in olive oil until they turned brown. Probably a tablespoon of olive oil.

Then, because I am a cheater and so lazy, I made (please don't make fun of me (this is the confession part of this entry and you should treat me delicately)) instant milk--like, the powdered kind. One cup of it. I mean, I guess you could do it for real with real whole milk, but I never drink it all so I can't really keep it in the house and powdered milk works just fine for recipes. I wouldn't drink it as a beverage. I mean, I don't really drink cow milk as a beverage either way. (This is the end of the confession.)

Anyway, keep on stirring the garlic in the oil and turn the heat waaaaaay down. Slowly, slowly whisk in the milk. Keep on stirring. I let this simmer for a good five minutes, maybe longer, adding salt and pepper and tasting. It was still thin at this point. Then I added (slowly, slowly, stirring, stirring) about a tablespoon of flour. And then a few grates of some nice white cheddar I found in the fridge. Maybe an ounce? And stirred and stirred and then strained it because there were lots of garlic bits that I didn't actually want to eat.

Then you poach the eggs. I do it--again--the lazy way, where you put a little water in the bottom of the pan and then crack the eggs on top and then put the lid on until they are done.

Then you pile everything all together on the plate and douse it in garlic sauce and then just die of happiness. I wish there were pictures of how pretty the vegetables were before they got all sauced, but that meal is so gone.



Onward to dinner. Mandy is coming over and we are getting serious about the eating. I love today.

Loafing

Oh hey, it's August.

Due to extreme busy-ness and not feeling like cooking after things like two hour commutes, I bring you lots of empty space between posts!

I mean, I haven't even made bread in a month. It was high time. Like to the point where Mandy, who lives an hour away from my kitchen, even said, you know, it's been a long time since you've baked bread. Never fear. I am back with something of a vengeance.

This delicious sandwich bread comes to you from my desire to use all kindsa flours and to finally make something worthy of breakfast toast. I want nice slices, I want no large holes (which are what I am usually after, for sopping up illicit amounts of olive oil), I might even want to make a sandwich out of this baby. Try and stop me.


In the pan, after the second rise. Pretty.

Oat Bran and Flax seed sandwich bread recipe
Loosely adapted from this bread. You'll note I cut the sweetener way back and added more flours.

2 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
2 tsp agave syrup
1 1/4 cups warm water
1/2 cup oat bran
2 tbsp ground flaxseed
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour, plus more for dusting
1/4 almond flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour

Mix the yeast, 1/4 cup water and the agave in a bowl and let it sit for ten minutes. Add the remaining water and remaining flours. Stir together until it comes together as a nice sticky dough. Turn dough out on a lightly floured surface and knead for about five minutes, until smooth. Place in a lightly greased bowl, cover with a dish cloth, and let rise for an hour, or until doubled in size.

Turn risen dough on a floured surface and gently deflate. (This is always the saddest, hardest part for me. Why would I squish something so big and beautiful? WHY? Because we must. Sigh.) Then sort of fold it like a letter going into an envelope, in equal thirds, so the top is smooth. Tuck the edges under and place in a greased loaf pan. Sprinkle the top with some flour. Cover with a dish cloth and let rise again, around 45 minutes.

Heat the oven to 400 degrees. I always start heating the oven about twenty minutes before I want to bake the bread. This is a new-ish oven for me and I'm not confident that it's as hot as I want it to be. So. Heat early, and know your oven. I keep meaning to get an oven thermometer to see if it's actually as hot as it should be, but I haven't bought that yet. Birthday gift?

Anyway. Oven should be hot. Make a few slashes in the top of the loaf with a knife. Then bake for 35-40 minutes or until browned on top. The house will smell AMAZING about twenty minutes in, at which point, if you're me, you begin obsessively checking the loaf of bread, opening and closing the oven a million times, slowing the baking process. I will never learn, apparently.

Remove bread from oven. Cool on a wire rack--cool completely before cutting, or you'll smash it, and get that too-dense part at the bottom.

Top a think slice with almond butter and wonder how this lazy month could possibly get any better.




Voila. Somehow, magically, a soft crumb, grainy sandwich bread, ready for the munching.