Beer Bread! (No rise no knead) River cottage

This is technically the first bread I've ever made by myself. When I saw it on River Cottage's : Three Go Mad Christmas, I thought it was time to get trying or else I'll never get to make a baguette in the special thingy Sellan gave me. I did go out and buy a loaf pan from Ross though. I found the text version of the recipe "here".

Ingredients

• 350g white self raising flour, plus extra to dust
• 150g wholemeal self-raising flour
• 2tsp salt
• 1tbsp caster sugar
• 2 handfuls raisins and/or sultanas
• 1 handful walnuts, roughly chopped
• 500ml beer or lager
• butter to grease

I decided to go only white self-rising flour because that's what I had. I also didn't want to add any nuts or fruits this time because I just wanted to know what the bread taste like.

For beer I chose leinenkugel's orange shandy:

 it has a wheaty flavor with orange scent, I was hoping for more of a Panache taste when I bought it but it's nice here.

Preheat an oven to 180C (350 degF)

Sieve the flour into a mixing bowl and add the salt and sugar. Stir in the raisins/sultanas and the walnuts until well combined. Open the beer and pour into the bowl, mixing as you pour until all the beer has mixed into the flour.

Grease the sides and base of a 2lb (900g) loaf tin. Dust in flour and shake out any excess.

Pour the batter into the loaf tin (the batter will be alarmingly loose, this is correct!) and transfer to the preheated oven. Bake for 1 and a half hours or until a skewer inserted into the middle of the loaf comes out clean and the bottom of the loaf sounds hollow when tapped.

Once cooked remove from the tin and transfer to a wire rack for cooling. This can be eaten warm or cold and will last a couple of days in a sealed container. Ideal to eat with cheese.

 

my second batch was not quite as wet (I don't have a liquid measure at Thomas's so I'm kind of guesstimating haha)

ooooh I wonder if it would have been bigger if I made a larger batch?

still pretty

and tada the crumb!

I accidentally made  batch 1 a bit salty because I thought the tsp was a tbs. Batch 2 is halved and we'll see what happens!

Training 2

So far Kiara still seems to hate the harness, but loves her toy so much she doesn't pay it too much attention during play time. I wonder if i should bring out the stick part with the harness to help her associate them. 

There is now a 4th mosquito for Thomas and I to battle. Why are there so many!? I've never had this kind of mosquito problem in SF before. I had even kinda forgotten what they looked like until we killed the 1st one. Also, WHY MUST THEY BUZZ IN YOUR EAR. I know it's a book but oi vey. The current one is quite afraid of light. I stayed up and played DS trying to lure it out, got sleepy after half an hour and then it went right for my ear. I was too tired to keep waiting so I turned on my tablet and passed out, it seemed to work.

Day 6 and my throat still feels funny? Yikes. I don't even know how to go about finding a doctor.

Training

I have made it my goal to eventually walk Kiara on a harness. To such aims I have started her training by combining the harness that she hates (as of yesterday) with her new toy that she is addicted to. She fought us pretty hard when we were trying to properly clip the harness but once it was on I ran to get the toy and she alternated chewing the harness and playing with the toy. She actually did much more playing than she did attempting to escape. The harness wasn't tightened quite right yet so it slipped down a bit and she had a harder time chasing the toy (like having your pants down at your ankles) but it was pretty funny and she got treats after. Today will be day 2 and we shall see how that goes. Maybe one day she will bring me the harness asking for walks... or maybe she'll maul that harness to death while I am not looking.

I feel like I have a golf ball stuck in my throat (day 4) and it hurts to swallow. I might be sick =[

Da Bird

Bought a new cat toy for Kiara today and she loooooooooooooooooooooooves it. I played with her until she was lying on the floor for the third time because she was tired. Then I tried to put it away but she kept looking for it! Aww. It really makes me want to be able to place the harness on her because I think a walking will help use up some energy. 

She's sooooooooooo cute. 

Thomas says I might always feel hungry because I am dehydrated ... we'll see if I can maybe up the water intake. We  went to Petco together to get the toy and they had kitties in the back >< ahhh. There was a really friendly nice tortie that sounded hilarious. Thomas said she sounded like a turkey, but she was just purring sooo hard she eventually tired herself out. There was a teeny baby tortie with a little mew also. Sadly though there was a 2 yr old tuxedo boy and he had just made a mess of the cage and was sitting in the litter box because he got water everywhere else. He meowed super sadly too, poor little guy. We told the cashier lady so I hope someone helps him out. 

I will try to write a bit everyday so if you only want to see the foods use the label "recipe"

Cream Puffs

My french relatives Celine and Perrine taught me how to make chouquettes! ( which are basically creamless cream puffs covered in sugar). My Auntie Annie taught me a creme patissiere recipe so between the two I have delicious cream puffs!

Cream (Creme Patisserie)
4 yolks
35 centiliter milk
80g sugar
30g cornstarch
pinch vanilla extract

1. add sugar to the yolks and beat until lighter (color of mayonaise and it thickens)
2. add cornstarch and mix well
3. add boiled milk slowly while mixing constantly or your eggs will scramble (looks foamy now)
4. place onto stove med heat (can start on high and then bring heat down) until thicker and bubbles disappear

if it's too liquidy you can add a bit more cornstarch mixed with milk (not straight) to thicken it more 
        The most recent time I made it my pot got pretty hot and it seem to set in lumps all over the place. I beat it with my hand mixer and it got smooth and thick like it should be. I might take out a little of the cornstarch next time or start on med heat and go to low with my pot. This was not an issue while I was in France and sometimes we had to add a little cornstrach.
5. Let cool before filling.

Chouquettes
makes about 2 dozen

160g Flour
4 eggs
80g butter
240g water
pinch of salt
sugar cubes (crush them for topping because they don't sell it this way in the US)(optional)

0. Set oven to 180 deg C (that's 350 F)
1.Measure out water and butter. 
2.Boil the water and then add the butter until melted.
3. Take the pot off the heat, add all the flour and stir vigorously.
4. Place pot back onto med heat and stir until the dough no longer sticks to the pot and makes a ball, basically it comes away from the sides kinda and sticks to itself, then take off heat.

5. Beat the eggs
6. add eggs little by little until lifting the spatula makes a soft peak (at first it will be too sticky with itself and stick straight up and not follow the spatula much)

7. Place dough into piping bags
8. pipe onto a baking sheet on parchment paper in shapes as you like
smaller for plain and larger if you want to fill them
9. Add the sugar bits now or they will not stick 


10. push the tips/peaks down or they will burn (use a wet finger and press them down)
11. bake until golden brown , if you open the oven during then they will not rise
12. little ones may be about 15 minutes (10-20 minutes bake time avg) taking them out is based on color
larger is about 25 minutes give or take

13. you can fill with cream via piping bag if you stick it up the choux butt (but I like a heavy cream to puff ratio so I cut them almost in half and fill with a spoon, less pretty)