Braided Pesto Bread

I’ve had a recipe pinned for a pesto bread for ages. You can see the original recipe here.

In the end I didn’t use the recipe at all, rather just the method to achieve the braid.

Instead I used the bread dough recipe from the Craftsy class I purchased, as well as using the Pesto recipe from the Perfect Pizza at Home class. The Perfect Pizza at Home class is free! If you like pizza then I thoroughly recommend enrolling. It wont cost a cent, and you get to see some of the different techniques used to knead the dough. That’s the Stretch and Fold technique I’ve previously mentioned and shared a YouTube video of Peter Reinhart demonstrating it.

The pesto recipe is in the class materials and it was my first time making pesto. I only made half the recipe because I didn’t have enough basil, but then the half recipe was more than ample and I ended up dividing the left over into two small freezer bags. One of which I used for the braided pesto bread.

I wasn’t 100% sure about the bread recipe I chose. It was to make baguettes not a filled bread, but I felt that most bread doughs can be adapted easily enough and when compared to the dough recipe in the original Braided Pesto Bread, I didn’t think there was a huge difference that it would matter.

I love the simplicity of the bread doughs in the Artisan Bread Craftsy class. I used the Marbled Rye bread recipe before, a type of bread I’ve never made but it tuned out great. Other than the fact I learnt I don’t like caraway seeds and it put me off eating the bread.

But this braided pesto bread? Fabulous. Loved it. Will make it again. So simple but full of great flavours, and the bread itself was lovely and soft in the centre with a crunchy outer shell.

Basil Pesto (full recipe)

Ingredients

• 8 cloves of garlic, coarsely chopped and tossed in 2 tablespoons (30 g) of olive oil
• 2 cups (437 g) fresh basil leaves, washed and stemmed, and tightly packed into a measuring cup
• 3⁄4 cup (177 g) grated Parmesan or other dry aged cheese
• 1 cup (237 g) pine nuts or walnuts, lightly toast- ed
• 2 tablespoons (30 mL) fresh lemon juice
• 1 cup (237 g) extra virgin olive oil

Instructions

• Heat a frypan or skillet over medium heat.
• When the frypan is hot, add the chopped garlic/olive oil mixture. Stir for 15 seconds and then remove the pan from the heat. (You only want to heat and “sweat” the garlic, not brown it.)
• Place the remaining ingredients into a food processor and add the heated garlic/oil mixture.
• Pulse the mixture until all the basil is broken down and the ingredients are evenly distributed.
• Run the food processor for an additional 5 to 10 seconds to make a bright green, pebbly-textured sauce, thin enough to spread easily but not so thin as to be runny.
• Add more olive oil if it’s too thick, or more grated cheese if it’s too thin.
• Transfer the pesto to a container that can be covered with a lid to minimise oxidation.
• Keep the pesto refrigerated for up to 5 days, or freeze for up to three months.

 

White bread (full recipe)

Ingredients

• 567gm bread flour (I used High Grade flour)
• 11g (1.5tsp) salt
• 3.5gm  (1tsp) instant yeast (I used the prepackaged sachets of Edmonds yeast)
• 385gm water at room temperature

Instructions

• In mixer mix all ingredients on slow speed with the paddle for 1 minute.
• Increase
 to medium slow (no. 2 on the KitchenAid) and mix for 1 more minute. The dough will be soft and sticky.
• Let the dough rest for 5 minutes.
• Mix on medium low (no. 3 on the KitchenAid) for an additional 30 seconds. The dough will form a soft, slightly sticky ball.
• Lightly oil the surface of your bench. Use your fingers to spread the oil around the surface where you’ll tip the dough onto.
• Tip the dough onto the oiled bench and complete the first stretch and fold.
• Cover the dough with a large bowl and wait 20 minutes before proceeding with the 2nd (of 4) stretch and folds.
• Re-oil the bench as needed.
• Once 4 stretch and folds have been completed (with 20 minutes rest before the next stretch and fold) the dough is ready to rest until it doubles in size, this will take around 60-90 minutes depending on how warm or cold the room is. Remember to cover the dough with a large upturned bowl.

To make the braided bread

• Re-oil the surface of the bench ready to roll the dough into a rectangle.
• Press the dough into a rectangle and using a rolling pin, roll the dough out until is roughly 9 x 13” in size.
• Spread the pesto over the surface leaving a 1cm gap all the way around.
• Grate some Parmesan cheese over the pesto, I’m not saying how much you need, just as much or as little as you want, but generally if you’ve covered the pesto you’re good to go.
• Starting with the long end of the dough, roll the dough, tightly, toward you.
• Pinch the end to seal it then roll the dough so the sealed end is underneath.
• Get a large baking sheet around 9 x 13” in size and line it with baking paper.
• Transfer your rolled up dough to the baking sheet and using a sharp knife cut the dough from top to bottom. Now you have two separate pieces.
• Pinch the top two ends together and begin to braid by placing one side over the other. I started with the left side over the right meaning the right was on the left side. Keep repeating until you’ve braided the length of the bread.
• You want to work the braid so the cut side is facing up where you can see all the bright green pesto peeking out.
• Pinch the bottom ends together and then join the two ends (top and bottom pinched ends) together so you’ve formed a circle of dough.
• Lightly cover the circle of dough with Gladwrap and let it rest for 30 minutes while the oven is heating.
• Heat the oven to 240deg Celsius and if you’ve got one, place a pizza stone on the lowest shelf.
• Remove the Gladwrap and grate a bit more Parmesan cheese over the top of the dough.
• Bake the bread for 20-25 minutes, or until the bread sounds hollow when tapped underneath.

Sometimes when I write up a baking experience several days after I’ve made the recipe (and this was made Sunday last week) it makes me really hunger for more of the same.

I enjoyed making the bread. I had plenty of time in between the stretch and folds and resting times to get stuck into other things (I was making gumpaste from the left over ombre pink fondant from Mum’s birthday cake). The bread was easy to make, I don’t know why people have a fear of baking bread. This recipe and method is so straight forward, and since you don’t have to knead for long periods in your mixer, or by hand, there’s nothing stopping a bread-baking novice giving this recipe a go. You’ll be glad you did.

Not your usual meatloaf

Meatloaf. It sounds so American to me. The last time I had meatloaf I was living in Dunedin. That’s back in 1990. It’s been a while.

Meatloaf seems to have improved with the passage of time. Perhaps it’s that people are more inclined to make a better meal out of it. Though I still couldn’t eat it sliced up in-between bread as they do in America.

It doesn’t look half bad really, if I do say so myself.

I am really liking mixing the minced meats. This is again 50/50 beef and pork. To me that’s a fairly bold leap when it comes to a main dish. Yeah I need to live a little more and spend less time looking at fancy ways to “enhance” a sweet dish. But they are fun!

This meatloaf is called Uptown Meatloaf, but I like to think of it as an Italian Meatloaf for all the Italian type ingredients.

Oh yeah, the recipe calls for wine. See, now it’s F.A.N.C.Y.

I used a 330gm bottle of Cherry Tomato Sauce instead for V-8 Juice. I also didn’t mince the meat with fennel seeds. I didn’t use fennel at all. I actually wonder if I really missed out on making this meatloaf even more special, by meatloaf standards.

Assembling the meatloaf was a lot simpler than I was expecting. I thought I might have ended up with the sort of slippery mess I had when I made the Brioche Snails but this rolled perfectly. It was so compliant.

While the the meatloaf was “roasting” I made a sauce. I’ve never made a tomato sauce without following a recipe. But I’m into trying new things, and crossing my fingers hoping I didn’t screw up.

So here we go:

Tomato Sauce

Ingredients

• 85gm butter, browned
• 1 400gm tin of chopped tomatos
• 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
• 1/2 teaspoon of oregano, dried
• 500ml tomato sauce (it’s 97% tomato pureed with a little oil, basil and celery – well the stuff I used)
• Salt
• Pepper
• Handful of fresh basil leave, finely sliced

Instructions

• Place the frypan (skillet) over medium heat.
• Add the butter to a frypan (skillet) and melt it until it turns a deep brown and smells slightly nutty. That’s browned butter.
• Add to the browned butter the chopped garlic and gently move it around the pan to cook. But don’t allow the garlic to brown.
• Add the chopped tomato and tomato sauce and reduce the pan to low heat.
• Add the dried oregano and thinly sliced basil and gently stir.
• Add salt and pepper to taste.
• Continue to simmer the sauce until it reduces and becomes thick.
• Serve the sauce either as a bed for the meatloaf, or over the meatloaf, whatever takes your fancy.

You probably can’t go wrong with these ingredients in a sauce. I’m sure it’s not rocket science and you can certainly add other herbs, fresh or dried, the same with fresh tomatos. It was a good sauce and despite its simplicity I was slightly chuffed with myself for just knocking this together since I tend to be one to follow recipes and not generally think for myself when it comes to savoury things.

We had plenty of meatloaf left over. It was enough for 8 people and there’s just the 3 of us. I wrapped the remainder in tin foil ready to re-heat for another meal. As soon as I wrapped it I realised I should have brushed oil onto the piece that would cover the cheese as I suspected it would stick and when removed would take the cheese with it. I was right. Mr Fussy was seen trying to pry the cheese off the tin foil and then drape it over his meatloaf.

I love sundried tomatos and having those pop out through the meatloaf was kind of cool. And look at those little pockets of mozzarella cheese.

We all enjoyed the flavours of both the meatloaf and sauce.

Orzo Pasta Salad

I didn’t even know about Orzo until about 4 years ago. I didn’t know pasta come looking like fat rice. And I haven’t made a pasta salad for some years now. Though when I first found Orzo, or Risoni, I made a pasta salad quite often during summer. Actually I never found Orzo at the supermarket, only Risoni. But the Mediterranean Food Company has several brands as I recently discovered.

Anyway, in my new found quest to better my lunch-time meal I decided to make a tasty pasta salad.

This isn’t the recipe I once used, though there was nothing wrong with that one. I just couldn’t find it.

I made several changes to the following recipe, which I’ve outlined in “My Notes”.

Italian Orzo Salad

Ingredients

• 1 (1-pound) package Orzo Pasta
• Salt
• 1/4 cup Pine Nuts
• 6 ounces Greek Feta cheese, roughly crumbled
• 1/2 cup Calamata olives pitted, halved
• 4 ounces fresh baby spinach
• 1/4 cup chopped red onion
• 1 (13.75-ounce) can Quartered Artichokes hearts, roughly chopped
• 3 tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 1 tablespoon Balsamic Vinegar
• 1 tablespoon Red Wine Vinegar
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1 teaspoon fresh chopped basil
• 1 teaspoon fresh chopped tarragon
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Instructions

Bring a large pot of water to a boil, add salt, then add the orzo pasta. Cook the pasta until al dente. Drain and rinse under cold water.   

Toast the pine nuts by heating a small skillet on medium heat. Add the pine nuts and stir occasionally until the pine nuts are lightly browned.

Take half of the spinach and purée it in a food processor or blender, adding one tablespoon of the olive oil. Roughly chop the other half of the spinach.

In a large bowl, mix the spinach purée with the cooked orzo until the pasta is well coated with the purée. Then gently mix in the chopped spinach, artichokes, red onion, feta cheese, pine nuts, and the Calamata olives.

In a separate small mixing bowl, combine the balsamic vinegar, red wine vinegar, mustard, basil, and tarragon. Slowly whisk in the remaining olive oil until the dressing combines and thickens. Pour dressing over pasta salad and gently mix in until well incorporated. Place the salad in the refrigerator and allow to marinate for about 30 minutes before serving.

My Notes:

255gm Risoni or Orzo

1/2 a 130gm bag of packaged Spinach

25gm Parmesan Cheese, grated, in place of Feta cheese

100gm Sundried tomatos, drained

Add the sundried tomatos to the food processor and process about 10 seconds. Add half of the 65gm spinach and process until the spinach is pureed. The tomatos will be in small bits but not pureed. Add the drained oil from the sundried tomatos and give the food processor a few pulses.

I’ve never had Artichoke, and I’ve still never had it. I left this out of the recipe.

 

I made the dressing as above but it wasn’t to my liking, so I didn’t add it to the salad.

I managed to get 5 zip lock bags of around 170gm of salad. Plenty for lunch, in fact it fills a dinner plate.

I love sundried tomatos, but not olives so I was happy to swap a few things. So feel free to add your own touches too.

This salad would also work heated up, in case you get a cold day and prefer something warmer for lunch, or as a side dish to your evening meal.



 

Goat Cheese Tart and a real sense of anxiety

Following on from my Roast Strawberry and Goat Cheese toast I was somewhat apprehensive about using Goat Cheese.

Mum had gone to some effort to get the Goat Cheese and I wasn’t about to throw the little that was left, away.

I decided to make a Goat Cheese Tart during the week, and searched (online) for recipes.

I have modified the recipe I found somewhat, because I didn’t have enough goats cheese and the goat cheese I had was plain.

The recipe called for 250gm of goat cheese. I weighed mine and had 60gm left, which included it’s crust. I’m sure there’s a proper name for it. I wasn’t going to include that especially since it had decided to continue to culture in the fridge.

After a bit of research I found that I could swap goats cheese for feta. Not necessarily the best option but it was all I needed to be sure this would work.

Having first rinsed the feta under water to rid it of the brine I soaked it overnight in milk. This would assist, if not eliminate, the saltiness of the feta.

I’ve never made a savoury tart dish. I’ve made Bacon and Egg pie, which is nothing more than using store bought pastry and adding bacon and egg.

I’ve made pastry before, but sweet pastry for Christmas Mince Pies and my other favourite, Rhubarb and Strawberry Pie.

I have to say I’m somewhat overjoyed with the way the pastry turned out. I followed the instructions to a T and I really liked the description of what the butter should look like. After making this I’ve got to wonder if I’ve over done the butter in my sweet pastry, only that I don’t end up with the little clumps of butter visible in the pastry. And as I’ve been learning, the clumps of butter keep the pastry light.

Also this pastry required no kneading. You read that right, NO KNEADING. Simply gather it all together, which will require you to probably turn it over a couple of times to make sure you’ve collected it all but that’s it. And look at the little clumps of buttery goodness still in there.

The other new thing to me was using tin foil to blind bake the pastry, and to prick the pastry 2/3 of the way through the baking.

I don’t care if this method seems a little unconventional, that pastry was so light and flaky and crispy that I’ll be using some of those same methods in the future for other pastry.

One of the big things that was really playing on my mind was whether this would be edible for us. What if the flavour was still too strong, what if the use of feta ruined the texture.

I was all set to make cheese on toast, that was my backup plan.

When I finished taking photos I asked Mr Fussy who was going to be first to taste. He wasted no time, that surprised me. I thought he might take a tentative bite but he didn’t. So when he said (nodding his head) it was good, with enthusiasm, I had to ask if he was being serious. He was! I don’t think I even hid the relief I felt. Next up was my MIL. And the same result, it was good. So I tucked in. I loved the pastry and the flavour was ok, but I think it could have done with a little more of something. Though some bites had more flavour than others. Probably that bits where the real goat cheese was hidden away.

The original recipe can be found on this webpage. It’s by Ina Garten. The recipe below includes my changes and additions.

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups standard flour, plus more for the work surface
• Table salt (1/4 tsp in the pastry and same again in the filling)
• 170gm salted butter – plus a knob of butter for frying the shallots and garlic
• 3 to 4 tablespoons ice water (I used 4 Tbs of chilled water)
• 3/4 cup chopped shallots (3 to 4 shallots)
• 3 cloves of garlic crushed
• 200gm goat feta
• 50gm soft goat cheese
• 1 cup thickened cream
• 3 large eggs (I always use size 7)
• 1/4 cup chopped basil leaves
• 1/2 tsp chopped fresh Thyme
• 1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Instructions

• Heat the oven to 180 degrees C. Set the rack in the centre of the oven, and use the Bake setting.
• For the crust, put the flour and 1/4 teaspoon salt in the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade.
• Cut the butter into cubs, add to the bowl, and pulse until the butter is the size of peas. With the processor running, add the chilled water all at once and process until the dough becomes crumbly. Don’t over-process.
• Tip the dough out on a floured work surface, collect it into a ball, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
• Roll the dough on a well-floured board and fit it into a 9 or 10 inch tart pan (fluted side) with a removable base. Roll the pin over the top to cut off the excess dough.
• Butter 1 side of a square of tin foil and fit it, butter side down, into the tart pan. Fill the foil with rice or beans. Bake for 20 minutes.
• Remove the beans and foil from the shell, prick the bottom all over with a fork, and bake for another 10 minutes.
• During the last 10 minutes of cooking, add the knob of butter in a small pan and saute the shallots and garlic over low heat for 5 minutes, or until tender.
• Place the goat cheese and feta in the bowl of the food processor and process until crumbly.
• Add the cream, eggs, basil, thyme, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and the pepper and process until blended and creamy.
• Scatter the cooked shallots and garlic over the bottom of the tart shell.
• Pour the goat cheese mixture over the shallots and garlic to fill the shell (if the shell has shrunk, there may be leftover filling, not for me as my flan dish measured 10inches).
• Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, until the tart is firm when shaken and the top is lightly browned.
• Allow to cool for 10 minutes and serve hot or at room temperature.

Serve with a chutney and with salad if you like.