milliways

Wheat Bread

I use a bread machine on the Dough setting, but using an electric mixer or by hand works too.

1. Measure the following liquid ingredients into your mixing bowl. I just put the mixing pan on a scale to measure everything. To get a good dough consistency, you can adjust the water or milk amounts as needed, mostly depending on the types of flour used.

1/4 cup oil (60 g)

1/2 cup water (4 oz)

1 1/4 cups soy milk (or milk) (307 g)

2. On top of the liquids, add the following dry ingredients. You can change the ratio of flour types, you just want to have about 3 cups total. If you use all white flour, the vital wheat gluten is not needed. It's mostly to help bind the whole wheat together better.

1 + 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (229 g)

1/4 cup vital wheat gluten (38 g)

1 tsp potato flour (optional)

1 + 1/4 cups white flour (I recommend King Arthur's or Bob's Red Mill white whole wheat)

1 tsp salt

1 + 1/2 tbsp sugar

2 + 1/4 tsp yeast

3. Start mixing on dough setting, or manually.

4. After first rising, put dough on floured surface, sprinkle flour on top of dough, and flatten into about an 8" x 10" rectangle. Roll dough up into a log, and pinch the edge into the roll. Place the dough roll into a standard size loaf pan with the pinched edge down.

5. Put a pot of boiling water into your oven, to maintain an oven temperature of about a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. My gas oven is always about that from the pilot light. Place the loaf pan with the dough in the oven to rise. This generally takes between twenty and sixty minutes. Check every five minutes after the first twenty to make sure it doesn't explode on you.

6. Once the loaf has risen to the size you want, usually about an inch above the top of the pan, turn on the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. It will be done in about half an hour to forty minutes. You can take the loaf out while the oven is heating up, but often this causes it to fall. The bread will have a lightly browned top when done. Adjust baking time as needed. I usually do 35 minutes from the time I turn the oven on, leaving the loaf in there while it's heating up.

7. Dump cooked loaf out of pan and place on a drying rack of some sort. If you don't have one, a few chop sticks will work. You just want most of the bottom to be ventilated, so it does not get soggy. You can slice off some hot bread a few minutes after taking out, but I wait until completely cool before slicing up the rest of the loaf.

Note: This has 2377 calories total (900g baked).

Whole Wheat Pizza Dough

1 cup + 2 tbsp water

1 tbsp oil

1 + 1/2 cups whole wheat flour

3/4 cup white flour (or 1/2 cup white whole wheat + 1/4 cup wheat gluten)

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

1 + 1/8 tsp yeast

Divide into 2 or 3, depending on desired thickness. Fresh or ground rosemary is a nice addition.

Mile High Chocolate Chip Cookies

I developed this recipe in Boulder, CO.

1 cup sugar (1/2 brown or 1/3 dark brown)

1/3 cup oil

1 egg

-mix-

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 cups flour

-mix well until flour is all mixed in (takes a while)

1/2 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350. Spoon on to a cookie sheet, makes about 30 little cookies. Or divide into 16 cookies and flatten them into shape on the pan. Also makes great bar cookies (may need to bake a few minutes longer).

Bake for 7 to 8 minutes.

banana bread

Origin: Pearl Jam newsletter

1 egg

3/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup butter or margarine (I use canola oil)

3 bananas, very ripe mashed fine

1 tsp vanilla

1 + 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

beat egg in bowl, add sugar and butter. cream mixture together; add mashed bananas and vanilla. mix all together. sift flour, soda, and salt; add to banana mixture and stir until well blended. turn into 6X10 inch loaf pan. bake at 325-350 degrees from 45-50 minutes. this recipe never fails.

other notes:

use almost brown bananas for best flavor

adding nuts is good....walnuts preferred

do NOT overbeat the batter...otherwise bread will become too dense

test with toothpick

Samwise stew (from LotR)

taters

bay leaves

onions

thyme

sage

carrots

salt

Hard Apple Cider

Ingredients

5 gallons organic apple cider/juice - pasteurized but with no additives

1 packet dry ale yeast (see below for selection tips)

3/4 cup (for dry cider) to 1.5 cups (for sweeter cider) of organic evaporated cane juice ( I use 1 cup)

Directions

1. Sanitize a 6 gallon food grade bucket or carboy (I use iodine sanitizer)

2. Pour cider into bucket. Splashing is good - adds oxygen which yeast need.

3. Sprinkle the yeast onto cider

4. Cover and seal with an air lock

5. If using a secondary fermenter, transfer cider after fermentation has settled (2-4 days).

6. After about a week the gravity should have dropped to 1.010 or less.

7. Boil sugar with as much water as needed for 15 minutes, then cool to 80 degrees F. Usually same amount of water as sugar works well.

8. Gently stir in sugar solution to cider and bottle; sanitize everything that will contact cider. You can use plastic soda bottles if just starting out. Be careful of using larger containers, such as gallon jugs or growlers, as they pressurize sooner and will explode.

9. Wait two days, then check cider daily. Sweeter cider will explode the bottles within 2 - 6 days.

10. As soon as cider has reached desired carbonation, refrigerate all cider until consumption. Drier cider that had no more than 3/4 cups sugar added and had fermented down closer to 1.000 can probably be left out indefinitely. Just monitor and if they start to get extra fizzy, it's time for the fridge.

Yeast Tips:

Never use Muntons, unless you like really yeasty cider. If you want exceptionally dry cider, liquid yeast is great. It's harder to balance the acidity on really dry cider though, so be warned.

Here's my favorite:

1. Safbrew S-33 (green & silver) This makes excellent cider with minimal residual yeast flavor or sediment. Probably my all around favorite.

2. Safale us-05 (pink) Also an excellent choice, I'm still not sure if I like the green one better.

3. Windsor by Danstar An excellent choice for sweeter fruity cider. Mild fresh yeasty flavor, but not overpowering at all.

4. Nottingham by Danstar This is a rather neutral ale yeast, without much yeasty, estery, or fruitiness. It eats more of sugar too, making it a good choice for a slightly drier cider.