Delicious Vesuvius Roasted-Garlic Potato Bread

tatobread 005Why Vesuvius???  Well, look at this thing!  Clearly hauled out of the rubble of some destroyed ancient walled city.

NOT MY FAULT!  My oven is broken!  I am using an oven that is older than I am… possibly as old as this house!

But check out the inside!  It is indeed delicious, soft, moist, roasted-garlic potato bread: tatobread 006 tatobread 008 tatobread 009

 

 

 

 

 

I am becoming a huge fan of the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day concept.  The basic idea is:  once a week, create a basic dough that you keep in the fridge, and tear off pieces as you want to bake.  Let the pieces come to room temperature and bake – wah-la! – five minute “artisan” bread!

I made their Sticky Pecan Caramel Rolls last week for Rosh Hashanah, but had a whole lot of dough left over in the downstairs fridge.  And I was also feeling tantalized by their Roasted Garlic Potato Bread (We love garlic!  And we love roasted garlic even more!!) but I couldn’t just throw away the dough that I had left over and start fresh with a new dough – right???

So what’s a girl to do?

Well, toss a head of garlic into the ninety-year-old oven (I exaggerate; I think it’s only fifty or sixty), whip up a batch of (brain crash!) instant (gasp!) mashed potatoes on the not-broken stove, and whoop the whole thing together in a big huge, wet, sticky mess.

Let it rise once, then quickly and with well-floured hands, toss it into a ball-ish kind of shape, hunt for an appropriately high-sided pan, and, failing that, find a low-sided square tinfoil pan (hence what Ted referred to delicately as the bread’s tragic “muffin-head” shape), and chuck the whole thing in.

Let it rise until even more loose and floppy and toss into an {I dunno how many degrees because the thermostat broke around 1963} extremely hot oven.

Sometimes, baking is an exact science.

Sometimes, baking is a big, huge, wet, sticky and DELICIOUS mess.

Ah, the sweet (slightly charred) smell of Bread Success.

Comments

Post a Comment

Okay, guys... I'm turning moderation OFF on all my blogs. I will be patrolling for spam, so play nice!

Know what else you're gonna love?

Baking in Israel? Beware of FAKE condensed milk

Image
If you didn’t know any better – like I didn’t when we first came here – you’d probably assume, with good reason, that both of these tins contained condensed milk: But that’s where you’d be wrong.  Sure, at least at first glance, the Hebrew text is exactly the same: חלב מרוכז וממותק / chalav merukaz umemutak / concentrated sweetened milk.  But the English is different, and therein lies the key difference between the two – the one on the right is FAKE. Here are the ingredients of the real thing (on the left): Milk (55%), sugar (45%).  That’s it.  Pure and simple. Now, here are the ingredients
Read more

No corn syrup? Make your own with only 3 ingredients!

Image
One of the basic baking ingredients that’s particularly tough to come by in Israel is corn syrup.  And some Fridays, it seems like every single recipe I want to try – whether it’s pecan pie (or the pecan bars I made today!), peanut brittle , or something else – relies on a generous quantity of the stuff.  Corn syrup in a recipe isn’t just for flavour, so as most people have found, you usually can’t just substitute something else, like honey, maple syrup, or straight sugar.  Corn syrup does some kind of magic that I can’t explain and helps things thicken up and set, especially in candy making.  (If you know, feel free to explain it to me in the comments!) But there is one thing you can substitute:  INVERT SUGAR. Invert sugar is a sugar-water syrup that’s been boiled to 236°F (114°C) and then cooled off slightly.  At that temperature, the sugar turns… well, magical.  Again, explain it to me in the comments.  But essentially – it turns into cor...
Read more

Super-Easy Thick, Spreadable, Bakeable DIY Cream Cheese in Israel

Image
Cream cheese can be a hit or miss affair here in Israel.  Sure, some brands are okay for eating, but where the native product fails is usually when it comes to baked goods that call for genuine cream cheese, as I discovered at Shavuos a couple of years ago.  It's too thin, too gummy, too shiny, whatever.  It's just... WRONG. In case you’re wondering, sour cream is called “krem gevina shamenet,” and as you can see, there are lots of flavour choices… …but none of them are anything I’d want to bake into a cheesecake. But then this year, I found out I could make my own.  And not only does it taste great, it works perfectly in recipes! I won't bother calling it a RECIPE, because it's too easy to be a recipe!  It only works if you're in Israel, simply because you can’t get Israeli dairy products here.  Then again, if you're outside of Israel, you can probably just buy Philly.  The truth is, you can buy Philly here in a lot of places as well, as...
Read more

More delicious kosher morsels!

Show All