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originalpinkmountain

Report on rustic bread, sour milk and Hanukkah dinner

7 years ago

I always like to read how posts turned out in real life, so for what it's worth, here are the results of my last couple of week's threads.

1. Made the rustic bread recipe from King Arthur flour using a sponge. It turned out OK but for some reason burned even though I baked it for less time than the recipe called for. It's always something with me and bread. I was going to make rolls so I worried the dough would be too limp, which has been my experience with these no-knead breads, but I was rushed so made it in a loaf pan to save time. Would have been OK as rolls too. Needed more fruit to satisfy my taste in dried fruit breads. Will perhaps attempt again . . . when I'm not doing six other things. Literally, I was cooking all the foods ahead of time for my Hanukkah dinner.

2. Speaking of Hanukkah . . . I made the recipe for chicken with vinegar that Jasdip posted on "What's for Dinner" from Epicurious. https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/member/views/vinegar-chicken-thighs-5a367a3749f7c631c109e294 I had some honey ginger vinegar that had been gifted to me by I think a former CF friend, several years ago and really needed to be used up, so I used it up! I added chopped ginger, fennel seeds and ground coriander seed to the recipe, plus the grated peel of an orange. At the end, I did not have tomato paste so I used a half small can of V-8 juice and just reduced it further. I had to use red wine since I didn't realize I was out of white, omitted the tarragon and cream, and served it over a bed of braised cabbage, red onion and fennel, dressed with the sauce plus the juice and pulp of the orange and seasoned with fennel leaves. It was still a little too tart for my taste so I added a TBLSP or two of maple syrup. Was brownish and beige colored but delish.

3. The marinated beets made the kale salad kind of dark maroon overall, but tasted great!

4. I also made a banana bundt cake using my Dorie Greenspan recipe that called for sour cream or sour milk. I used my sour half and half that I had been saving. I tasted it first, and it did not really taste tangy and sour like sour cream or cultured buttermilk, which had already been discussed. It had a bitter almost chemical taste so I added 1 TBLSP of lemon juice. The cake came out delish, but not due to the sour milk. Modern milk just doesn't "sour" like the raw stuff so not worth saving unfortunately IMHO. The cake was pretty much a miracle because SO helped me and I didn't realize he accidentally used the bag of bread flour I had left out. I was worried the cake would have a weird texture but it was moist enough that any difference wasn't noticeable. Got lots of good compliments on that.

5. My latkes were meh, but I attribute that to a bad pan (was not flat so latkes didn't cook evenly) and my loathing for electric stoves and their pulsing. Some were slightly burned and some were undercooked. Not really terrible and the rest of the meal was great so overall the event was a success but way too much work. Got to see some good old family friends so that was very nice!

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