BACK IN THE SADDLE AGAIN

I wish I could say I’d been off summering somewhere fabulous and glitzy, but the reason behind my long absence is much more plebeian and pedestrian: I started working and have been acclimating to my new situation. That being done, I am now back and ready to start feeding the blog – it’s looking a bit gaunt at the moment.

To ease into things, a simple recipe of French toast – quick and comforting for those Sunday mornings when the promise of Monday starts looming ominously in the distance:

For 4 (or 2 with roomy stomachs)

1 C. milk
3 whole eggs
½ C. plus 1 TBSP. granulated sugar
¼ tsp. salt
1 tsp. vanilla extract
3 TBSP. butter
8 tsp. cinnamon
8 slices hearty bread
¼ C. toasted pecans or walnuts, toasted
2 bananas, sliced into ¼”-thick rounds

-In a pie plate or shallow bowl, whisk together milk, eggs, 1 TBSP. sugar, salt, and vanilla.

-Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat and add 1 ½ TBSP. butter. When the butter begins to foam, sprinkle the skillet with 2 TBSP. sugar and 1 tsp. cinnamon.


-One at a time (or two, if they fit) dip 4 bread slices in the egg mixture, turning to coat (don’t let the bread just sit there unless you want mush for breakfast). Arrange the dipped slices on the sugared’n’cinnamoned skillet and cook till nicely browned, 2 to 3 minutes.


-While that first side is cooking, sprinkle the soggy side facing you with 2 TBSP. sugar and 2 tsp. cinnamon. Flip bread and cook opposite side. You should have a lovely crunchy crust on your toast.
Repeat dipping, buttering, sugaring’n’cinnamoning, and cooking with remaining bread slices.

-Arrange French toast on plates and top with pecans and sliced banana. Sprinkle with powdered sugar and serve with maple syrup, if desired.


NOTES: Under no circumstances should you use flimsy sliced white bread for French toast. It’ll soak up all the liquid and be a hopeless wet mop of a thing. Stick to heartier stuff like challah or those so-called Italian loaves… I like a croissant now and then (but then I top it with whipped cream and berries), but only if it’s a sub-par one – no sense in using a perfect specimen for this.

SHAKE YOUR BUN-BUNS

Señor O was away on business and poor thing had to catch a 6:00am flight back home. I thought it would be nice to surprise him with a so-perfect-you’ll-want-to-take-the-red eye-more-often treat. I set my own alarm to 6:00am, ran to the supermarket because I’d run out of milk, and returned to start on these extra-sticky, ultra-decadent rolls. Make them for someone you love…or for someone you want to love you.


PECAN CURRANT STICKY BUNS
Adapted from The Gourmet Cookbook
Makes 12 buns*

NOTE: I made half the recipe and would suggest you do the same if you have a standard mixer, as it is all it can handle. Besides, a half batch will yield 6 enormous buns. You’ll notice I excluded the pecans and currants- I wanted a really basic roll, but I’m sure the original is delicious. Add raisins, walnuts, or whatever dried fruits and/or nuts strike your fancy. Lastly, if using nuts, I suggest toasting them on a baking sheet for 7 – 10 minutes in a 350˚F oven prior to incorporating in recipe.

FOR DOUGH:
1 ½ C. warm milk (105˚F – 115˚F)
2 packages (1/4 oz. or 2 ½ tsp. each) active dry yeast
1/3 C. granulated sugar
5 ¼ C. all-purpose flour, plus additional for dusting
2 tsp. salt
2 large eggs, at room temperature
½ stick (4 TBSP.) unsalted butter, softened

FOR FILLING:
2/3 C. packed dark brown sugar
2/3 C. dried currants
2/3 C. chopped pecans
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
½ stick (4 TBSP.) unsalted butter, softened

FOR SYRUP:
1 stick (8 TBSP.) unsalted butter, cut into pieces
½ C. packed dark brown sugar
½ C. granulated sugar
2 TBSP. light corn syrup (*I went with dark)
¼ C. heavy cream

EQUIPMENT
A heavy duty standard mixer with dough hook; 2 muffin pans with 6 large (1-cup) cups each. (*As you’ll see in the photos below, I used a standard ½-cup muffin tin and the buns surpassed the edges – they turned out successfully, in spite..).

MAKE THE DOUGH:
-Stir together ½ cup warm milk + yeast + pinch of sugar in a small bowl until yeast is dissolved. Let stand about 5 minutes, till foamy. If the mix doesn’t foam, discard and start with new yeast.

Good yeast.

-Put flour + sugar + salt in your mixer and mix with dough hook on low speed until combined. Whisk together remaining 1 cup of milk + 2 eggs, then add to flour mix. Add foamy yeast as well. Mix at medium speed for about 2 minutes, till a soft dough forms.

-Add the softened butter and continue mixing, about 4 minutes.

-Rinse a large bowl with hot water, then put dough in wet bowl and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Let dough rise in a warm, draft-free place (microwave / oven) until doubled in bulk, about 1 ¼ hours.

PREPARE THE FILLING:
-Stir together all ingredients except butter.

MAKE THE SYRUP:
-Butter muffin tins. In a small saucepan over low heat, stir together butter + dark brown sugar + granulated sugar + corn syrup + cream till butter is melted. Bring to a simmer and cook 2 minutes, still stirring. Spray Pam on a tablespoon (this helps sticky stuff like syrups and honey slide right off the spoon) and spoon 2 TBSP. of warm syrup in each buttered tin. Set tin aside.

Syrup ingredients.

Pour while hot: Two tablespoons syrup per muffin tin.

FILL & SHAPE THE BUNS:
-Turn dough out onto a well-floured, clean surface and dust with flour. Rub flour on a rolling pin and extend dough into a 16” x 12” rectangle. With a pastry brush, brush off excess flour, then spread evenly with softened butter. Sprinkle filling evenly over dough.

This dough is sticky - don't skimp when you flour your work area.

-Beginning with the long side nearest you, roll up the dough to form a 16” –long log. (*As you roll, brush off excess flour). Cut log crosswise into 12 rounds. Place buns cut-side up in tins. Cover with oiled (*or Pam-sprayed) plastic wrap and allow to rise once more, about 1 hour.

Remember to brush off excess flour as you roll.



-Put a rack in the middle of oven and preheat to 350˚F.

-Bake buns until puffed and golden, 30 – 35 minutes. Cool in pan on rack 10 minutes, then invert and serve warm. (*To avoid sticky syrup overflowing and sticking in the oven, I placed my muffin tin atop a foil-lined baking sheet).

Flip slightly cooled buns over to release cascade of super-sticky topping.



Sorry for the sensory overload -- but they were too good.

GIVE US THIS DAY

Bread is the perfect food. There’s no arguing that – it’s even in the Lord’s Prayer: “give us today our daily bread.” I know I’m interpreting that very literally, but there it is, in black and white.

I used to get my bread at Fairway on the Upper West Side and was pretty happy with it. No additives, no less-than-2%-of-the-following-impossible-to-pronounce ingredients. When I moved away from the UWS it was, for the most part, back to the bread aisle at the supermarket. There I would walk past Wonder and Sunbeam, Arnold and Nature’s Own. It got to a point where it didn’t really matter what I bought. All of these breads were wimpy and forgettable.

Tired of blah bread, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I’d been to the library recently in search of a Boston cream pie recipe (coming soon!) and along the way found a recipe for honey whole wheat bread in Greg Patent’s Baking in America. Mr. Patent failed to inform this dimwitted reader that perhaps her standard-sized Kitchen Aid (aka Kiki) would be no match for seven cups of flour. I should’ve known it wasn’t, but if there’s a recipe in a cookbook meant for home cooks, I expect it to work with standard kitchen appliances. My little Kiki started bucking like a bronco, and rather than risk breaking her neck, I turned her off and plunked the dough onto the counter. Now I would truly have to take matters into my own hands – I would have to knead.

Kneading was not easy. I’m too short to really bear down on the dough, so I strapped on some heels, but they didn’t help my situation - the heels provided height but not much in the way of support. Back in sneakers, I stood on my tip-toes and tried my best to work the dough, pretending all the time I was Lady Macbeth, outing the damned spot. Sweat started beading my brow and the bile starting bubbling. “I hate Greg Patent!” I muttered. But I kept going. I was scared because the dough was dry and crumbly and for the first few minutes, my labors did nothing to bring it together. It wasn’t smooth or elastic, just an ill-formed, uncooperative lump. To make matters worse, I kept remembering what my old boss W. told me about dough: “It’s alive.” Surely, I was killing it.

What a lump.

I continued to fret while the bread was rising. It wasn’t smooth and beautiful, but heavyset and squat. Into the oven went two loaves anyway and without waiting for it to cool I cut a slice and buttered it. It was dense and a little chewy, bland in flavor, and OK at best.

Squat, toad-like loaves.

I’d decided to make bread despite the fact that I had a date the very next day to meet a real baker at a bakery a friend described as “THE BEST BREAD EVER:” Clear Flour Bakery (www.clearflourbread.com). Clear Flour specializes in the production of French and Italian breads that are real: no additives, no preservatives. My new baker friend D. gave me a tour, which was awesome: Brobdingnagian mixers, about 50 times bigger and more powerful than my dinky little Kiki, imposing deck ovens, buckets of dough, stacks of beautiful frielings and bannetons (round and rectangular molds for shaping and proofing bread), and the main event: bread. There were baguettes, ficelles, olive rolls made with green olives, focaccia smothered with onions, hearty rolls with studded with nuts and plump raisins bearing the very poetic name of Paris night.

Bannetons.

Big mama mixers.

There is but a small area in front of the counter at it was packed solid at all times. Everyone, staff and visitors alike, were very kind, though, letting me be all interrupt-y with my camera.






I bought an assortment and Señor O and I promptly went about the business of eating it. The ficelle was perfectly crunchy and French, as was its larger friend, baguette. I didn’t get to the baguette till this morning and, swoon, it was so perfect in its simplicity and straightforwardness that I was completely swept away. I spread some good European butter on it and ate away. I also treated myself to a Paris night roll with some apricot preserves I brought back from a recent trip to Rome. I haven’t enjoyed breakfast this thoroughly since I can’t remember when. Thank you, Clear Flour for keeping it real.

A dream of Paris.

BANANA FANA FO FANA

Banana bread isn’t a particular favorite in my book, mainly because I’ve either bought or experimented with recipes that were disappointing. The commercial variety inevitably taste over-banana-ed, no doubt because they’re chock-full of additives and artificial flavors. Like fake grape products, counterfeit banana tastes like kiddie cough syrups and other over-the-counter cures. My pickle with the recipes I’ve tested is that they’re usually rubbery or dry as a bone.

Enter Nancy Silverton and her glorious book, Pastries from La Brea Bakery. Looking through her recipes I came across banana nut loaf, and thought, “Hey, if anyone can make a good banana nut loaf, if anyone can redeem it, it’s Nancy Silverton.” So I bought some bananas and patiently waited for them to get nice and black outside. Today, when the bananas, at last, were mature enough, I mashed them up and mixed them in with heaps of chopped, toasted nuts and spices.

Make sure bananas are really ripe.

DO chop the nuts with a knife – using the food processor will leave behind uneven pieces and nut powder.

Things got off to a good start, because even as I began chopping the nuts, their toasted scent reached my nose, mingling with the heady aroma of ripe bananas; they were perfectly matched. My skepticism over banana bread waning, I caught myself anticipating a sweet reward, and Nancy delivered. What came out of the oven was darkly tanned on the outside and moist inside. The cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg provided warmth as well as refinement – this banana nut loaf is for grown-ups, a far cry from those cheap attempts you may be used to eating.

BANANA-NUT LOAF
Adapted from Pastries from La Brea Bakery by Nancy Silverton

2/3 c. walnuts
2/3 c. pecans
3 to 4 bananas, very ripe, mashed to equal 1 ¼ c., plus 1 whole banana for garnish
2 extra-large eggs
1 ½ tsp. pure vanilla extract
1 stick unsalted butter, chilled and cut into 1" cubes
1 ¼ tsp. baking soda
2 ½ tsp. baking powder
¾ tsp. kosher salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
¾ tsp. freshly grated nutmeg
Scant ¼ tsp. ground cloves
1 TBSP. Poppy seeds
½ c. granulated sugar, plus 1 tsp. for sprinkling
¼ c. + 2 TBSP. Light brown sugar, lightly packed
1 ½ c. unbleached AP flour

Adjust the oven rack to the middle position and preheat oven to 325˚F. Spread the nut on a baking sheet at toast in the oven until lightly browned, about 8 to 10 minutes. Shake the pan halfway to ensure the nuts toast evenly. Cool, chop coarsely, and set aside.

Turn the oven up to 350˚F.

In a medium bowl, whisk the banana puree, eggs, and vanilla to combine. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and poppy seeds on low, 2 to 3 minutes, until softened. Add the sugars and turn the mixer up to medium, mixing another 3 to 4 minutes until fluffy, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
Add the flour and banana mixture alternately in 3 batches, beginning with the flour.

Fold in the nuts.

Pour batter into pan.

Cut two ¼" strips from the additional banana, slicing down the entire length. Arrange the two C shapes on the top the loaf, staggered, with the two ends slightly interlocking with other in the center. Sprinkle about 1 tsp. of granulated sugar over the surface.

Bake for 50 to 60 minutes, until nicely browned and firm to the touch.

The bananas on top were amazing.