Let them eat bread

It's easy to forget what we are capable of. Life, work, situations become too comfortable and we let ourselves give up just a little bit. It's easy to become content with not reaching our full potential. I know what this feels like and it's hard to motivate yourself to combat it.

Today I will concentrate on the things I love. Those things that inspire me, those things I look forward to, that I take pride in and that I find pleasure in.

Enjoying a quiet coffee alone with the paper, the Wednesday Life section of the Globe and Mail (it's the food issue) and its Saturday Style section. Sleeping in, waking early to a day off and no scheduled plans, feeding my brothers, feeding my friends, feeding Roland. Watching seedlings grow, sketching garden plans, planning supper, getting to watch Oprah in the middle of the day. Spending Saturday morning at our Farmer's Market, cooking and baking.

Baking is so satisfying. A meeting of science and creativity. Careful and precise measurements, chemical reactions that make dough rise, pastry flake and crumb moist. Honing a feel for baking is an accomplishment. Reaching a point where you can tell how dense, tender, glutenous and flaky pie pastry will turn out just by the way it feels when it's raw in your hands is enlightening. At least it was to me.

Every time I bake a pie I feel good. Each time I take bread out of the oven, lean in close to hear it cracking, whispering to me that it's perfect, I feel total satisfaction.This bread recipe is the easiest thing in the world. You might not even believe how easy it is, until you try it. Even if you know absolutely nothing about baking, you're going to succeed with this recipe. It results in a perfectly crusty loaf of sourdough bread, with a toothsome, tender crumb. It's the best way to start my week and a helpful reminder that simple things make me happy, comforted and remind me who I am and where I can go.

This recipe has appeared many times on-line. It is Jim Lahey founder of The Sullivan Street Bakery in New York City's no-knead bread recipe. Jeffery Steingarten wrote about it in Vogue Magazine, Mark Bittman introduced the world to this recipe in the New York Times. I am going to share it with you here, at buddinggourmand.

This loaf of bread is a miracle because it requires no kneading. It does, however, require time and patience.

The Basic No-Knead Bread Recipe from Jim Lahey

3 cups bread flour (you can substitute whole wheat or rye, I usually use a combination of whole wheat and white bread flour)
1 1/4 teaspoon table salt
1/4 teaspoon instant or other active dry yeast
1 1/3 cup cool water
wheat bran, cornmeal or additional flour for dusting

You will also need:
parchment paper
dutch oven or heavy lidded pot (4 1/2 - 5 1/2 quart)
clean tea towel
large bowl and wooden spoon

Combine the flour, salt and yeast in a bowl. Add the water and mix until you have a sticky, shaggy dough. It should be very sticky - if it's not, add a little more water until it is. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let it sit at room temperature, out of direct sunlight, until the surface is dotted with bubbles and the dough has more than doubled in size. The dough will sit for 12 - 18 hours. I usually do this step in the evening, leaving it to rest over night, so that I can bake the loaf the next morning.

Once the bread has sat for its 12 - 18 hours, doubled in size and bubbled (this is the first fermentation), generously flour a work surface and scrape the bread dough onto the surface. This dough will be quite sticky, it will cling to the bowl. This is correct; do not add more flour to the dough. Lift the edges of the dough towards the centre shaping the dough into a round.

Flour a large square of parchment paper. Gently life the dough and place on the parchment paper seam side down. Dust generously with more flour and cover loosely with the clean tea towel. Leave the dough to rise another hour to two hours in a warm spot until it has doubled in size and springs back when poked.

Half an hour before you think the dough has finished it's second rise (I usually poke the dough after an hour, if it doesn't bounce back quickly I leave it for another half hour and then move onto this step) preheat your oven to 475 degrees F with the rack in the lower third position and place the covered (lidded) heavy pot in the centre of the rack. Leave the pot in the oven to heat up (about half an hour).

Using oven mitts, carefully remove the pot from the oven and uncover it. Take the tea towel off the dough, lightly dust again with some flour and quickly invert the dough into the pot - be careful! That pot is hot! Cover the pot and return it to the oven. Bake for 30 minutes.

Remove the lid and continue baking until the bread is a deep chestnut or golden brown (but not burnt), anywhere from 15 min to half an hour. Use pot holders to carefully lift the bread out of the pot and let it rest on a cooling rack. Listen to it happily crack and tear into it after it has cooled at least an hour.

Beer vs. Wine

St Veronus hosted its first beer vs wine paired dinner this week. The winner: beer.


Described as the "Ultimate Pairing Dinner", this night was a chance to pit beer and wine, notorious enemies, against each other in a battle of the palate. Which would make a better pair for lobster, steak tartar, duck and lemon mousse? Who would reign supreme amongst beverages? Each course was paired with a wine and beer and the guests chose the best food match of the two. It was a close call - beer won by 8 votes total, taking two of the four courses. Wine, also a winner of two of the four courses, just came short overall and must now wallow in its total failure.

First course:
Butter poached lobster on barley risotto cake with garlic-mushroom duxelle and arugula

While the dish as a whole was delicious, the bold flavours of the barley, duxelle and arugula overtook the delicate lobster. A challenge to pair, the winner of this round was wine: a Riesling Kabinet. Duvel, a top fermented big bodied pale ale, lost to the off-dry white, which maintained its sweetness when enjoyed with the barley and the lobster. The Duvel became a little bitter when paired with the dish.

Second course:
Steak tartar (yum)

Freshly minced tenderloin mixed with cornichon, white onion and raw egg. Dressed with crostini, fried caper, and a tamarind-anchovy gastrique. This dish was dynamite! The flavours sang... tender delicate beef uplifted by crunchy bold onion, sweet & sour cornichon and that tangy gastrique boasting an uncanny similarity to Worcestershire or HP sauce... meat's guilty pleasures.


Wine: a Portuguese tempranillo. Beer: Rodenbach Grand Cru - a sour brown beer. The beer was by far the winner. The sourness of the ale complemented the gastrique - a flavour match. The irony-metallic qualities of the raw beef brought out the minerality of the beer. And while the beer is mouth-puckeringly flavourful, a great foil for the sour-tangy brightness of the dish, it did not overpower the tender raw meat.

Main course:
Duck confit with cranberry jus, mashed parsnip and candied yam

Wonderful duck confit. Skin not as crispy as I may have liked, but the meat was tender - pulled away from the bone with ease - completely moist and flavourful, its gamey qualities still present, but delicate. This was a hard one to call. The wine: 13th Street Gamay Noir from Niagara. The beer: Aventinus Dopplebok. So close. Gamay is a perfect match for duck. The cherried flavours of the wine complemented the jus and were a great match for the candied yam. But the beer - earthy and fruity - was too great a match with duck's gaminess. By a small margin, beer wins this round, however, that fantastic duck was the true winner...

Dessert:

Lemon mousse with white chocolate creme anglaise and coconut tuile

Decadence. Light, creamy and refreshing. A real tough pair with beer. The beer: Blanche de Chambly. Just not a match. The wine: botrytis affected Chenin Blanc from the Loire Valley. The dessert wine was an obvious winner, with its citrusy sweetness.


A great night of great food, great debate and discussion, and great company. Looking forward to the next beer dinner.