DAY 2: Sandwiches - some ideas

Roast Pork Belly Bánh Mì 

If you haven’t had bánh mì, then you have yet to discover one of life’s simple pleasures. Get a professional to make it if you can. Otherwise, do it your way with great baguettes (the first ingredient) and an online recipe. In case you’re salivating over the spread below; Catherene used Cantonese Crispy Pork Belly from Taiping and daikon instead of radish. Pâté is optional!

Banh mi. Photo and food styling by Catherene Wilson @catherenewilson

If you’re disinclined to eat meat, try tofu bánh mi (for a full recipe, refer to Priyanka Naik’s The Modern Tiffin (p111))

Roast Beef Focaccia Sandwiches 

Fill with: rare roast beef, tomatoes, radish sprouts, wasabi mayonnaise, Pickled Red Onion. Season with salt & pepper (this goes for all the other bread fillings, but one never knows whether it is a given or people need to be reminded!)

Roast Beef Focaccia Sandwiches. Photo and food styling by Catherene Wilson @catherenewilson

Roast Beef Focaccia Sandwich precut slab. Photo and food styling by Catherene Wilson @catherenewilson

Sourdough Picnic Loaf: photo and food styling by Nessie Sharpe @bakingequalslove

Or maybe try:

Spice roasted grapes and brie

Honey roasted pears, blue cheese and chopped walnuts

Pulled pork, pickles, and Swiss cheese

Roast pumpkin, chilli Halloumi, pesto and greens

And remember to change up the flavour and mouthfeel with different breads (traditional artisan breads offer a range of flavours because of how they are made (not with the same premix, dependent on ingredients, fermented etc).

Some book titles to inspire the young and experienced alike:

Rosie Reynolds Posh Sandwiches; Over 70 recipes from Reubens to banh mi
Jimmy Callaway Cult Sando; Classic and modern recipes for the popular Japanese sandwich

DAY 1: Fresh Bread

Honestly you can’t beat fresh bread and everyone knows it.

Buttered with jam,
or dipped in olive oil and dukkha,
or topped with quality cheeses and cured meats…
(We love platters)
or maybe just a hint of tahini and a sprinkling of sesame seeds…
or maybe just smother a slice in lemon honey (try Chelsea’s super fast version soon!)
or fresh bacon butties (everybody knows that fresh bread doesn’t actually hold these together so well, but it’s kind of the point. When the bread smushes up into a kind of dough ball and the chips or the bacon poke through, they’re ooooooh sooo good).

We all have a favourite way of eating it before it even starts to stale.

Photo and food styling: Catherene Wilson Photography @catherenewilson

Challah is a Friday thing

 
 

Challah is a beautiful bread and an increasingly popular one around this neck of the woods. You may have grown up with it and associate it with candlelight and wine, friends, family and blessings on Friday nights. Or you might be wondering why we don’t bake it all the time. We’re getting lots of orders for it, because, well, obviously (it’s delicious). So let’s talk challah.

Challah is an enriched white yeasted bread served on Fridays. More specifically, it’s eaten on the Jewish sabbath (which starts on Friday at sunset and ends after dark on Saturday). Challah also plays an important role on certain Jewish holidays like Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. Challah is not eaten at Passover because it’s a leavened bread (which is why we didn’t sell it at Easter this year). Challah is one of many incredible Jewish breads and pastries. (You know bagels and babka, right? There are so many more.) Challah is soft and full of flavour. It’s a bit like brioche, but made with oil, not butter, so is basically your dream white bread, especially if you don’t do dairy. It makes the most incredible french toast. And it comes with the added tactile pleasure of usually being braided, meaning it pulls apart with style and flare.

Challah also speaks of blessings and of the traditions that bring friends and families together every Shabbat. Challah functions as a physical metaphor for manna from heaven at the sabbath meal. It is baked for sharing during shabbat; candles lit, wine poured, blessings made and prayers shared. Then rip it, slice it, savour it, enjoy it, appreciate it. It’s beautiful bread.

Because challah is a ‘specialty’ bread, eaten at certain times and as part of a long spiritual tradition, we work closely with the Rabbi and The Kosher Deli on Greys Ave around when and how we bake it. Hopefully this helps get you in the mood for challah. If you want to know more, of course, there is a lot of literature out there! In the Auckland Public Libraries, for example, you might try Braided; A Journey of a Thousand Challahs by Beth Ricanati. You’ll be baking your own challah before you finish!

Basic challah ingredients: wheat flour, eggs (cracked and checked individually in kosher tradition), olive oil, water, salt, sugar, yeast; may contain traces of soy.

Sometimes, we add raisins, or coat it in sesame seeds. Depends on the time of year (or if someone’s getting married, etc.). Again, we work closely with Greys Ave Kosher Deli on this.

Note that the ‘c’ in challah is basically silent. Google “how to pronounce challah” if you are unsure!

Bread science and health - a podcast

The science of bread production and bread digestion makes for a fascinating political story.

It’s also a bit of a rabbit hole, if I’m honest, but throw in Russia’s most recent invasion of Ukraine and the “wheat war” that we may all be facing, and you’ve got a political discussion worth forming an opinion on; and that’s before we get sidetracked by fibre content and nutritional benefits… Wheat and bread are topics to be informed about in 2022.

Bacteria; nutrition; food labelling; traditional foods; modern diets; ancient civilisation; twentieth century food production; factories; grain markets; shelf lives; urban life; local foodways and international economics... It’s all in the science of bread and it’s incredibly interesting. If you want to get started on this discussion, here is a podcast. We all love a good podcast, right?! (It’s not long and it’s a good overview!)

Can bread be healthy? - podcast by ZOE Science & Nutrition (on all the usual podcast channels)

One of Minchin’s beautiful wheat fields. Canterbury, New Zealand, 2022

The ZOE podcast blurb goes as follows: “It’s no exaggeration to say that bread shaped modern humanity - it was the cultivation of wheat for flour that transformed our ancestors from hunter-gatherers to city dwellers. Today, millions of us start the day with a slice of toast, and most lunches in the US and UK are wrapped in a slice of bread or a burger bun as a cheap, flexible, and delicious energy source. But modern industrial processes designed to reduce the time and cost of baking mean today’s bread would be unrecognizable to our ancestors.  Today’s bread tastes good but has lost most of its nutritional content. With most of its fiber gone, and no time for bacteria to work its fermenting magic, bread has become a simple starch, rapidly turned into sugar in our blood and offering little to support our gut bacteria. For this reason, bread is increasingly demonized as an evil carb. In today’s episode, Jonathan speaks to two authorities on the subject to ask: Can bread can ever be healthy?”

Bread care

First few days: Not in the fridge! Unsliced is best.

Keep it on the counter wrapped in a cloth (clean teatowel works!). You can use a slightly damp one if you want to overnight, then pop it in a hot oven for five minutes or so to refresh it. You’ll find what works for you with your oven quick enough.

Avoid keeping it next to windows or in direct sunlight.

After days 1-3 ish: Sliced into the freezer works great!

As do toast and croutons (soups and salads!),
bruschetta (where do I even start and do you seriously have enough bread left over to feast out properly?!),
breadcrumbs (amazing meatballs and crumbed fish and chicken or schnitzel and all the other delicious crumbed dishes…)

You can freeze bread fresh and whole (even better). Then just refresh it in a standard oven 10-15 minutes (you know your oven and how crispy you like it!). This works so well, you might not even notice the difference! Only thing is… how much freezer space do you have???

Note: sourdough lasts longer than unfermented bread because the acidity of the starter inhibits bacteria and molds.
(The exception being those packaged ‘breads’ you buy that don’t go moldy after two years forgotten in the back of your cupboard; what the heck are those things made with???? Nothing grows on them!!!!)

As for croissants, pastries and baguettes: eat immediately if possible! There’s a reason French bakeries usually do small batches of these throughout the day.

To refresh these, though, just pop them in the oven for a few minutes (not too long!).

Want to know more? Try: https://www.theperfectloaf.com/the-best-way-to-store-bread/

TGIF everybody!

‘cos Friday means challah…

The Dusty Apron challah is certified kosher and available at Grey’s Ave Deli (essential service).

It tastes a bit like brioche if you’re not familiar. If you are familiar, then you already love it!

This is a pre-lockdown photo obviously, but it sums up the life!

This is a pre-lockdown photo obviously, but it sums up the life!

Ingredients: flour, water, yeast, salt, sugar, egg (cracked under the supervision of the Rabbi or one of his assistants) and olive oil

“Eat Oats!” (Know Your Other Ingredients Part 1)

“Eat Oats!”

“If you do not have the type of bread you like in your house, eat crackers. If you do not have bread, eat cereal; eat oats; sardines.” - Silveria Jacobs, Prime Minister of Sint Maarten in the Caribbean (addressing her people about approaching COVID-19 restrictions) and my latest favourite quote. Ref: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/emmanuelfelton/coronavirus-viral-caribbean-video-message-sint-maarten

Oats have featured more prominently again lately. They are no longer just a thing of boring childhood breakfasts or up-and-go-mueslies, because we’ve all been eating from the pantry. And we’ve all probably eaten oats, just as Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs suggested.

COVID-19 has changed eating around the globe in a very short time.

In terms of bread, oats are generally an added ingredient, rather than a primary source of flavour and nutrition.1 That said, they’re also a pretty awesome addition to the bakery’s flavour basics (and an essential ingredient in one of my favourite sourdoughs, the porridge bread).

Oats are rich in proteins and unsaturated fats and have a good amount of B vitamins. Oats have a high starch content and provide a generous amount of slow-release carbohydrates. They are rich in fibre, notably the soluble kind, and also rich in thiamin, magnesium, phosphorus, zinc, manganese, selenium, and iron. Not bad, eh.

Porridge Bread

Porridge bread is a good way of making another delicious bread by adding cheap ingredients (that you probably have in your pantry!). Cooking out the oats causes them to gelatinise, which allows you to get more moisture into your bread, resulting in a much softer crumb, and an awesome flavour.

Basically (and here, I’m assuming you have experience making sourdough…), if you want to make porridge bread:

RATIOS: 1kg flour; 650g water; 150g starter; 250g cooked, cooled porridge; 20g salt

Add cooked, cooled porridge (oats) to your final dough. NOTE: You can also ferment the oats before cooking them; put your oats to soak overnight with a little starter, then cook them out and carry on as above.

If this doesn’t make sense to you, then don’t freak; go back to basics and learn to do a basic sourdough first. It’s all the rage under lockdown and even though it isn’t super easy, it is super addictive, super healthy, and super tasty. All you really need is wheat flour, water and salt. You can make your own starter, without worrying about how old it is, whether it’s any good or where it comes from. If it’s yours, it’s perfect. Just don’t forget to name it.

  1. “Oats thrive in the cool, wet summers of northern and eastern Europe. Because of their high water absorbency and inability to form gluten, oats are generally used as a secondary bread grain, in combination with wheat and/or rye.” Ref: p30 Stanley Ginsberg (c2016) The Rye Baker; Classic Breads from Europe and America. WW Norton & Company: New York and London

#knowyourbaker

It’s all ‘back to basics’ in the world of food these days… people want to know where their food is coming from and who exactly is making it. On Instagram, there’s a #knowyourbaker following. So who is Dusty?

photos @nine10seventy

Dusty is Ngati Whatua, Ngapuhi, and Pakeha; based in Auckland, New Zealand. He was raised in in a wrecker’s yard in ‘rewa, which means he knows his car parts and can generally fix it when it breaks. If he can’t fix it, he’ll just push it. He could fill a book with funny stories about the pranks they used to play on each other in his Dad’s yard. Dusty’s dexterity, strength and ability to think outside the box come from that wrecker’s yard. Nevertheless, eight years ago, Dusty gave up cars and moved into the kitchen. He’s been baking bread every day since then and he still loves it.

Dusty’s big passion is the hand-crafted style - traditional breads; grain-to-loaf and everything in between. He loves the long fermentation and the life of the dough. He especially loves working with his hands and doing something that connects him with so many of those who have gone before him. (His Nani-Nani was also a baker and you should totally get him to make you her rewana!).

Actually, Dusty pretty much loves everything about bread except the early starts, so he’s turned that one tiny little negative into a positive and taken up listening to podcasts until Dan comes in at 5 (I’ll introduce you to Dan soon!).

If you want to meet Dusty, you are always welcome in the bakery (doors open at 2am; midnight on a busy day!)

#localfood  #localgrain #knowyourfarmer  #knowyourmiller #smallfoodnotbigfood