SC - OOP: making up bread

[Gaylin]

Tomorrow, we're having a small dinner of apprentices and squires
in a local household. It's an annual thing, usually held around this
time of year and I think for the first time we're testing out recipes.
Come January, our Barony is hosting the Kingdom 12th Night and
we thought to test the feast dishes now at the household dinner when
we have nice cross-section of omnivores, picky eaters, vegetarians,
an allergics. :)

It's nearly midnight and I'm ashamed that my eyes are drooping a
bit so *early* but I've just pulled the bread out of the oven and
it's heavenly. I'm particularly proud of it right now as I completely
made up the recipe, but I thought some people might like to try it.


Oatmeal Bread

Makes 1 large loaf.

Wet Ingredients:
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup honey
2 cups buttermilk
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 teaspoons sea salt

Dry Ingredients:
4 1/3 cups (approximate) bread flour
(flour was divided into 2 cups + 2 1/3 cups)
2 cups oats
1 cup whole wheat flour
~ 2 1/4 teaspoons dry yeast

Rising Ingredients:
grease or a spray oil

After Rising Ingredients:
1 egg
2 tablespoons milk
Additional old-fashioned oats

Note:

I have to confess this is the first time I've tried this method of bread
making, but it worked well. I've not yet tried it in my bread machine.
I'm a very not-confident bread maker, but this seem to work out okay.
The instructions are going to be for how I made it with my Kitchen Aid
mixer. A sin, I realize, but much more convenient than I'd ever
imagined.

What I did:

In a small, non-reactive saucepan, I added all the wet ingredients
and heated them gently until they felt warm to my fingers. I could
not find my thermometer, but I reasoned that if I was close to 98.6F
then 105-115F shouldn't be much warmer than that. This seems
to be a decent temperature that I've used in the past for milky
ingredients, so I used it again. At this temperature, the yeast doesn't
seem to get killed off from the heat. I removed the pan from the heat.

Instead of proofing the yeast the way I normally would, I added the
first two cups of the bread flour (reserving the remaining for later)
and the remaining dry ingredients to the bowl of the mixer. I then
installed the dough hook on the mixer and  turned it on for a little less
than a minute to power level 2 (the lowest above stir).

When the dry ingredients were mixed uniformly, I left the mixer on
power level 2 and  took advantage of the pouring shield I had mounted
on the bowl. A little bit at a time, I added the liquid to the dry mixture,
waiting each time for the liquid to disappear into the dry ingredients.
I believe the amount added at any given time did not exceed 1/2 cup.
Any more, and the liquid would splash a little onto the underside of the
pouring shield. When all the liquid was incorporated, I continued the
mixing for about 2 minutes (I had to chase a cat out of the kitchen).

I had a large mixing bowl reserved on the side at this point and took
the opportunity to spray it with some spray grease for the rising of
the bread. I found a clean, old kitchen cloth and set it aside.

After continuing the mixing, I began adding the reserved flour 1/2 cup
at a time to the now gooey mixture in the bowl. Each time, I poured the
flour down the pouring shield and waited a little bit after to see how it
was incorporated. I was looking for the dough to begin adhering to the
dough hook and the cleaning the sides of the bowl. I do not remember how
long this took, but it was not a long time, certainly less than five minutes
but probably a little more than two minutes. I used all of the flour I had
reserved.

Once the dough was a nice ball, a bit smooth to the touch, I removed it
from the dough hook and the bowl, and rounded it a little and set it in
the rising bowl. Then I flipped the ball over to grease the other side and
placed the towel over the bowl. The bowl was placed on my stove top
because that seemed the warmest spot in the room that wasn't too hot.
This dough was left to rise for roughly 55 minutes, until it was double
in size.

At this point, I pulled out a baking sheet, sprayed it with some grease,
and set it aside.

After 55 minutes, I punched down the dough, rolled it over in the bowl
again, and then removed it to my cleaned countertop. I squeezed the
dough into three equal balls and set two of them aside. I rolled the ball
on my countertop into a long tube that measure approximately 17 inches
and then repeated this step with the other two balls. I then took all 3
of these "ropes" for the braid and laid them parallel to each other and
perpendicular to me on the countertop. I pinched the top points of each
rope together, folded the end slightly under itself and began gently
braiding the pieces to avoid  stretching the dough. At the end of the braid,
I again pinched the pieces and folded the end under. I placed the braid on
the greased sheet, covered it lightly with the cloth I'd used before, and
placed the sheet on the countertop next to the stove and let it rise for
about 50 minutes, until it was nearly doubled in size.

Before the end of the second rise, I recalled the conversation on oven
temperature inaccuracy. About a year ago, I'd tested my oven and found
it to be accurate, but wanted to retest it again, as it is old. I am glad I
did. I preheated the stove to 375F, and remembered to put in the
thermometer I'd pulled out. To my surprise, my formerly accurate
oven was now reading 25 degrees hotter than normal. I adjusted the
temperature.

At this point, I lightly whisked together the egg and the milk. Lacking
a basting brush I'd thought was in my kitchen junk drawer, I lightly
smoothed this mixture onto the exposed dough with my hands, trying
to coat as many surfaces as possible. I also sprinkled the top of the
loaf with a light coating of additional oats. I then placed the loaf into
the oven.

I let the bread bake for about 45 minutes. The crust at this time looked
darker than what I'm used to, a nice brown that wasn't burnt. I took
the bread out of the oven and gently slid it onto some baking racks I
had, to improve the circulation under the loaves and keep them from
getting squishy on the bottom.

The loaves are now sitting on my countertop awaiting dinner tomorrow,
my husband has wandered upstairs and buried his face in my bread
scented shirt and declared it's time for bed. I'll see you guys sometime
later this weekend or Monday.

Cheers,

Iasmin

Iasmin de Cordoba, gwalli at ptc.com or iasmin at home.com