🏷️ eating in

I started making the Tassajara bread yesterday @tinypliny #53377. Unlike the no-knead bread that I can now make with my eyes closed without recipés or measurements, this was pretty involved and required a million rising phases and also, a good amount of kneading muscle (that I don't have, btw).

I fell asleep halfway between the sponge-phase and the "1st" (technically second) rising phase. As a result, the bread rose for nearly 5 hours and resembled an intimidating massive football in the morning. The whole flat smelled like a yeast factory. I managed to punch it down for the third rise, reshaped it, allowed 20 more minutes of rising, scored and baked it at 350 F for 75 minutes and this is what I got.


Not bad at all. But it doesn't even remotely smell or taste like any chocolate - even though it has 2 glasses of spicy chocolate in the dough. Oh and it's not spicy either. I suspect that the yeast polished off all the chocolate and the peppers.


Strange little creatures.

I am making a modified version of the Tassajara Bread right now.

I got tired of the chocolate pepper shake I made and poured it all into the bread dough. The bread is in the initial sponge stage now. It could be a total disaster or a pleasant surprise... who knows.

I really wanted to do something fun to start the new year and learnt a ton of R analysis the whole day. But I guess I was a bit too ambitious when I decided to end the day with a new bread-making technique. I don't see this bread reaching it's final pop-it-in-the-oven stage anytime soon. I have already made too many changes to the recipé to be confident about what will eventually come out.

I am hoping the yeast like all the chocolate and the bread doesn't turn into a sedimentary chocolate-flavoured rock.

I was about to do the where-were-you where-was-I end-of-the-year list, but I am somewhat concerned that my fridge is out of control. So I am going to do a what's in my fridge and freezer at the end of 2010 and hope to goodness nothing spoils or gets ignored.

Let's see.


In my freezer is

• a big can of Nido, a super-delicious whole-milk in powdered form. Many uses, but mainly to spike the chocolate.
• Scharffen Berger Cocoa. Latest cocoa. I might be slightly addicted.
• 6 different types of coffee - one of which I almost like. What can I say. I think I am compulsive coffee trialist. I buy coffee because I like the smell but later find out I don't like the taste so much for many brands. I really liked Melitta. I should have just stuck to it. Some Colombian coffee in a green bag - I have no idea where to ge this anymore. Not that I want to. Its decent, not great though. Dallmayr is just okay, not so great. I don't like the starbucks, world blends european, and the Hacienda Juanita so much...
• One slab of firm tofu - could last a month but maybe I will make stir fry this weekend and it will exist no more.
• Dried chinese dates. Random discovery of 2010. Tastes like surprise-I-have-tasted-this-somewhere. That's as close as I can get to a description of what it tastes like.
• Trader Joe's unsweetened cocoa. With the grand entrance of S&B, this is getting super-ignored.
• 10 pounds of raw almonds - my ~6 month supply of Vit E and general deliciousness.
• 1/2 a stick of butter from god knows when. This needs to go maybe into a cake?
• Fresh frozen galangal
• Some boxes of homeground spices that I grind obsessively when I am stressed or when I need to think clearly or when I feel like experimenting. I guess the number of boxes shows a good amount of stress, lack of thought and failed experiments...
• MANY boxes of 1-serving homemade soup. 4 kinds. Also an indicator of level of stress and experimentation. Instant comfort breakfast, lunch and dinner.

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1. Swiss Chard and French Lentil Soup with Ginger and Garlic
2. Butternut Squash and Carrot Soup with Split Yellow Peas
3. Spicy Zucchini and Green Bell Pepper Yellow Split Pea Dal
4. Zucchini, tomatoes, kale and Moong dal soup with galangal.

• Yeast. Some lady at the store told me to freeze it and I did.
• Chickpea flour - no immediate plans. It can hibernate for a while there.

So what's in the fridge, you ask (or maybe you really don't want to know but I will tell you anyway).

Going from bottom to top.

• Green bell peppers!!
• Hot green chili peppers!!!!!!!!!!
• Drying curry leaves for the next 2 months!!!!!!

(Yeah, the exclamation points exclaim that I am really happy about these!!!!!!!!!!!!)

• Cabbage. Stir fry this weekend? Maybe not... They last forever anyway and this one is a few days old.
• Apples, Oranges, Grapefruit - my trio of perfection.
• Some more latest kind of soup - a fifth kind that will soon move to the freezer.(Carrot, ginger and lentil soup with red hot peppers.)
• Almond milk - Gone!! Just finished the last dregs.
• Celery - soup maybe? Stir fry? Maybe? Maybe not? But it still has a week.
• Soy Sauce -- Hmmm.. I am not sure it spoils.
• Cider vinegar... I don't know what else to do with this other than dress salads... Cider quandry.
• Balsamic vinegar from Guercios - not sure I have been using this too much.
• Skim milk gallon - Half down. Milk is never a concern anyway. It goes fast.
• Whole wheat flour - trader joe's. Make spectacular bread, maybe I should make some?
• Rolled oats from the coop. I sometimes use it in bread... or make granola, but I need bananas to bind the granola and I don't have ripe bananas now.
• Wheat bran - bread making supply, another reason to possibly make bread this weekend?
• Some cooked lentils
• 2/3rds of a red onion from a lentil salad I made today
• Fresh Ginger!!!!!!!!!!!
• Fresh Limes!!!!!!
• Garlic!!!!!!!!!
• Lowfat Yogurt - just opened this but this need to be finished within a week.
• Toasted almonds. My present snack-stash.
• Toasted sunflower seeds. Almost all gone except maybe a few tablespoons. Another reason for bread.
• Carrots - maybe next soup with celery... and pomegranate?
• Pomegranate... I want to make salad with tofu, but maybe soup? Or maybe just a fun salad with apples, grapefruit and with a dash of lime and spices?
• Coconut powder
• More curry leaves - current stash
• Bottled Galangal
• Egg whites - I am experimenting with this. I think I really like scrambled eggs whites with kale, zucchini, tomatoes, ginger and green hot chili peppers. The major discovery is that there is NO eggy smell with these egg whites and they give me a whopping dose of protein.
• Black currant jam - makes an excellent sweetener for fun cakes.
• Homemade banana bread with raisins - only 4 slices. Will go away soon I hope. Having this bread in the fridge is mentally preventing me from making any more.
• More oranges - need to be juiced into a smoothie pretty soon.. maybe tomorrow. Getting some shrivels I am not happy about.
• Cedar heavenly spice hummus. Need to finish this soon as well... Maybe a salad with onions, tomatoes and cabbage?
• Kerala vadu mangai pickle!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• Asafoetida powder
• Tamarind block
• Homemade Thai green chillie paste. I need to finish this soon..
• Zucchini - gone! Just mixed it with the lentils and yogurt.
• Chocolate-red-pepper shake. Just made this. Super spiky and fun!

I think that's about it. Not as grand as you thought it might be, huh? I really need to work on finishing 3/4th of everything before I buy any more things...

PS: I will justify all this fridge craziness by pointing you to a fridge of *real chef*

I made this.


A super-tasty spice and nut bread.
Without a recipé.
Without eggs.
Without butter.
Without sugar - well... added sugar, that is.

With plum jam, flax seed, almonds, milk powder, 100% whole wheat and a tonload of wheat bran. It is SUPER-delicious out of the oven, can be toasted to perfection and is divine with just about anything. And one slice meets 50% of my daily fiber AND protein requirements.

This may look like a small baking step, but its a big leap for mankind ME!

I never follow recipés and can't remember any of them anyway. I don't have measuring paraphernalia, refuse to let my life be ruled by tablespoons and cups and hate non-metric units that everyone seems to be obsessed with! And I really dislike that eggy smell that surfaces once in a while when you don't want it to.

Well...not anymore!!!!! You won't smell the fear of baking ever again in my kitchen! You will only smell cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, nutmeg and a ton of triumph... and maybe a bit of banana since some of those have been ripening on my table for ages.

Where can I get Scharffen Berger's unsweetened cocoa in Buffalo?

Any ideas?

I was tired of all the sweet-ish smelling breads and tried my hand at this recipé:

Only, I forgot the whole zucchini bit, put too much bran in an already 100% whole wheat mixture, didn't make the biga properly, was too lazy to knead so adopted the no-knead 18-hour ferment technique and the dough was so wet that it was pourable.

Imagine my surprise when in spite of all my transgressions, this is what came out of the oven:

I admit it was very very soggy in the centre. But the best rescue for soggy bread is to slice it and put it in the oven at a low heat setting for around 20 minutes. The result is a super-spicy chewy bread that is excellent with hummus, red-onions and jalapeños - my favourite toppings. I think this bread might just have 110% fibre in one serving.

This whole experiment just reaffirms one thing - anyone can bake bread no matter how much they meddle with and twist the recipé.

What I would really like to make for dinner today...


But didn't.

I was expecting the motor to give way before this happened.


I knew this day would come, with all the torture I put it through but it's depressing, nevertheless.

This is an easy low glycemic index, high protein soup, especially for @leetee.


You will need:
1. Split yellow peas (soaked overnight and steamed with salt till soft) GI: 32
2. 1 big zucchini GI: 15
3. 1 big green bell pepper GI: 15
4. Several ripe tomatoes blended GI: 15
5. 1 white onion Gl: 10
6. Curry leaves
7. Less than a teaspoon olive oil
8. Black Mustard seeds (a pinch)
9. Dried red chillies
10. Minced garlic
11. Turmeric powder
12. A bunch of Kale
13. Powdered coriander/cilantro seeds

- Heat the olive oil in the pan
- Drop in several torn shreds of dried red chillies and mustard seeds.
- Give it an occasional stir, till mustard seeds just about start to sputter.
- Add the chopped curry leaves (a good bunch of them), powdered coriander seeds, minced garlic and chopped onions.
- Saute till onions are translucent.
- Add the chopped zucchini, finely chopped kale, a pinch of turmeric and green bell peppers. Saute for a couple minutes.
- Add the blended tomatoes and the cooked yellow peas, give it all a good stir, bring to a boil.

Add salt to taste. And that's it - a soup that is guaranteed to be tasty, satisfying and that will not tax your insulin stores. :-)

---

PS: Split yellow peas don't taste like green peas at all, they are extremely rich in protein and have a very low glycemic index.
PPS: I am going to try and post more recipes for you @leetee. Being vegetarian is probably the easiest way to keep the diabetes in check.

... which I can't have right now. :/

- Pumpkin Seeds
- Toasted almonds
- Toasted steel-cut uncooked crispy oats
- Dried figs
- Slices of granny smith
- Fresh blueberries
- Fresh strawberry slices
- All dunked in super cold vanilla sunrich soymilk.

Instead I just had granny smiths and carrots tossed in lemon juice, salt and pepper with kiwis. Because I don't have any of the other "perfect breakfast" ingredients at home.