Best of the Month July 2015

A recap of my most popular posts from last month (July 2015).

In all of my blog updates, I forgot to mention that I set up my subscribe by email campaign in MailChimp back in April.  I never thought I would set up any kind of email subscribe option.  It's just not the way I prefer to follow blogs.  I much prefer social media as a way to follow my favorite blogs, but I started reading about how other bloggers thought email subscriber was better.  I still follow my favorite blogs on social media and I don't subscribe by email (I just don't like having my mail inbox cluttered--I follow many blogs) but, I decided it was a good idea to give my followers the option.  MailChimp made the process quick and easy.

#Blogtip: MailChimp makes setting up suscriber emails #quickandeasy.  [Tweet this]

In January, I came across a post by Ashley from My Craftily Ever After about How to Set Up Your RSS Feed with MailChimp.  This post introduced me to MailChimp and was a big help when I finally decided to set up weekly email updates.  Now I have 19 followers by email.  I know that's not a lot, but I really didn't expect any so I'm happy.  I get an email each time someone subscribes and it's always a pleasant surprise.  If you would like to subscribe to my weekly email updates enter your email address below.

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Now on to my best of the month:

2013 best of July:

Light Wheat English Muffins

Soft, flat buns full of nooks and crannies.  English muffins make a great breakfast or lunch sandwich even a great snack.  Now has 476 views and 6 +1s.

#BestoftheMonth July 2015 | Light Wheat #EnglishMuffins: 2013 #bestofJuly via @joybeewhatsfor  [Tweet this]

2014 Best of July:

Wild Rice Cherry Pecan Salad

A salad of wild rice, dried cherries, and pecans tossed in a raspberry vinaigrette.  It makes a great side dish or lunch.  Now has 535 views and 60 +1s.

#Bestofthemonth July2015 | #WildRice CherryPecanSalad: 2014 #bestofJuly via @joybeewhatsfor  [Tweet this]

Back to this year's best of July:

Maple Glazed Carrots

A simple and tasty vegetable side dish of carrots roasted in maple syrup.   The perfect accompaniment to any meal. 581 views and 52 +1s.

Maple Glazed Carrots #veggiesides | #BestoftheMonth July 2015 via @joybeewhatsfor  [Tweet this]

How to Make Roasted Red Peppers

A simple tutorial on how to roast sweet red bell peppers at home.  501 views and 26 +1s.

#Howto Make #RoastedRedPeppers | #BestoftheMonth July 2015 via @joybeewhatsfor  [Tweet this]

Simple Chicken Tacos and Black Beans

A very simple dinner using leftover chicken for tacos and a quick black bean side dish.  432 views and 18 +1s.

SimpleChicken #Tacos & BlackBeans | #BestoftheMonth July2015 via @joybeewhatsfor  [Tweet this]

Focaccia Pizza

An Italian flat bread made with a wet dough, shaped into a pizza, and topped with tapenade, sun-dried tomatoes, and feta cheese (or toppings of your choosing).  396 views and 12 +1s.

#Focaccia #Pizza #bread | #BestoftheMonth July 2015 via @joybeewhatsfor  [Tweet this]

Turkey and Rougette Crescent Sandwich

Juicy turkey breast and warm creamy buttery Rougette cheese on a tender Crescent Roll.   369 views and 10 +1s.

Turkey & #Rougette Crescent #Sandwich | #BestoftheMonth July 2015 via @joybeewhatsfor  [Tweet this]

Check out my previous bests of July:

Best of the Month July 2013

Best of the Month July 2014

Linked to:  J&J, Lou Lou Girls, Whimsy, Wake Up, Tickle My Tastebuds full Plate, Freedom

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Focaccia Pizza

An Italian flat bread made with a wet dough, shaped into a pizza, and topped with tapenade, sun-dried tomatoes, and feta cheese (or toppings of your choosing).

Focaccia is a simple bread that requires no real kneading.  This wet dough is mixed vigorously and then stretched and folded with long rest periods.  Then, it is dimpled with herb oil until the desired thick/thinness and baked.  It is a long process like most yeast bread, but there is very little active time.  Focaccia is a very tender bread with crisp edges and makes a great pizza dough.  I opted for pizza-style focaccia which is basic focaccia topped with a few pizza toppings.  I chose tapenade and sun-dried tomatoes, both of which are packed in oil, so I didn't add much extra oil.

Focaccia #bread is really quite simple & delicious it just takes time.  [Tweet this]

For pizza style focaccia, there are some guidelines for when to add the toppings. There are pre-proof toppings, pre-bake toppings, and during bake toppings. The pre-proof toppings are marinated sun-dried tomatoes, olives, nuts, peppers, and roasted garlic.  These are toppings that need to be surrounded by the dough so they don't burn during baking or fall off.  Most soft cheeses and cured/cooked meats are pre-bake toppings while most shredded or grated cheeses are best to add during baking so they don't burn.  I used sun-dried tomatoes, coarsely chopped tapenade, and feta.  2 pre-proof and 1 pre-bake respectively.  Following these simple guidelines results in delicious focaccia pizza.

Just a few simple guidelines for delicious Focaccia Pizza.  [Tweet this]

Focaccia Pizza

Modified slightly from Peter Reinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice

Total time:  5 hours (active time:  about 30 minutes off and on)
     Mixing time: 5-10 minutes
     Stretch and fold:  90 minutes
     First rise:  1 hour
     Second rise: 2 hour
     Bake time:  20 minutes

Makes:  1-12 inch pizza (500 grams)

Ingredients:

3 grams active dry yeast
190 grams water
267 grams bread flour
6 grams salt
36 grams olive oil
Oil packed sun-dried tomatoes, sliced
Coarse chopped tapenade or olives
Feta

To the bowl of a stand mixer (or large bowl), add the water and a spoonful of the flour.  Stir to incorporate and sprinkle on the yeast (since this recipe doesn't use sugar the little bit of flour gives the yeast something on which to feed).  Cover with a towel and let sit for 15 minutes until mixture becomes bubbly.

To this, add the rest of the flour, salt, and oil.  Mix with the paddle attachment, on low speed, (or by hand) until  a wet sticky ball forms.  Switch to the dough hook and stir for 5-7 minutes on medium speed (or use your hand/a metal spoon, repeatedly dipped in water to prevent sticking, like a dough hook and quickly stir and mix the dough) until the dough becomes a smooth mass that clears the sides of the bowl but sticks to the bottom.  You may need to add extra flour to reach this consistency.

Spread/spray some oil on your work surface (to keep dough from sticking) and turn out dough using a spatula or bowl scraper.  Oil your hands too and pat the dough into a rough rectangle.  Let the dough rest for five minutes.  Then, using an oiled bench scraper to help lift the dough, begin to stretch it gently from both ends until about twice its length.  Fold the ends back over themselves letter-style until the dough is roughly the same size and shape it started. Sprinkle a little flour on top of the dough and cover with plastic wrap.  Let rest for 30 minutes and repeat the stretch and fold method twice more.
**alternatively to using the oiled surface for the stretch and fold method you can use a bed of flour and floured hands to prevent sticking see this method in my Focaccia (sourdough).  I found that I like using oil more because it's less messy (and olive oil is great for your hands so feel free to rub it in).  You don't need to use too much I started with about a teaspoon on my work bench and spread it out with my hands to about the size of a baking pan then rubbed oil into my hands as needed.**

After the final stretch and fold, sprinkle the dough with flour, cover it with plastic wrap, and let the dough rise on the counter for 1 hour.  The dough should noticeably swell but not necessarily double in size.  Using oiled hands form the dough into a rough ball and place on a parchment-lined sheet pan (I used a 12x14 inch pan if using a smaller pan you may need to divide the dough into 2 pieces). You can also place the dough in a zipper bag and refrigerate overnight or up to 3 days if you prefer (the refrigerated dough needs 3 hours to come to temperature once removed from the fridge).

Sprinkle the dough with a little flour and gently dimple the dough with your fingertips until it flattens out into a disk about 8 or 9 inches in diameter.  Cover with plastic wrap and let rest for 15 minutes.  Then, uncover the dough and spread with sun-dried tomatoes and tapenade along with some of their oil.  Dimple the toppings and oil into the dough spreading the dough to about 12 inches in diameter.  Cover the dough again and let rise for 2 hours or until 1 1/2 times it's original size.

Preheat the oven to 450.

Uncover the dough, sprinkle with feta and bake for about 20 minutes, rotating halfway through, until the dough turns a light golden brown.  If you are using any during bake toppings add them before the final five minutes of baking.

Transfer the focaccia to a cooling rack and let cool for 10 minutes before slicing and serving.

Enjoy.

For more focaccia and pizza recipes check out:

Focaccia

Meatball Calzones

Cheese Steak Stromboli

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Focaccia (sourdough)

A flat bread made from a very wet dough and flavored with herb olive oil.

Submitted to Yeastspotting

I had never had focaccia until I bought my first bread book about 10 years ago.  I had just gotten interested in making breads and Peter Reinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice was the perfect book for me (it is still the main book I use).  Not having the stand mixer that I have now focaccia was the perfect bread to try.  This bread requires little to no kneading it just requires room, it does make a bit of a mess though.  The first time I made it I fell in love.  It has so many possibilities.  I mainly eat it with cured meats, good cheese and roasted red peppers, but you can also make it like a pizza by adding all kinds of things on top.  It's great on its own and makes wonderful sandwiches.

Ingredients:

This is Peter Reinhart's recipe for Poolish Focaccia (I just use a sourdough poolish instead of comercial yeast)

Sourdough Poolish:

4oz sourdough starter (100% hydration)
8oz bread flour
8oz water

Final Dough:

Poolish (20 oz)
12 oz bread flour
.5 oz salt
3 oz olive oil
6 oz water
1/2 tsp yeast, optional

*1/2 cup herb oil --1/2 cup olive oil gently heated with 1-2 Tbsp of favorite dry herb mix (I use garlic, oregano and basil)

The night before you plan to make the focaccia, mix together the poolish.  Add the sourdough, flour and water to a medium sized bowl and stir until all the flour is hydrated and the ingredients are well mixed.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave out at room temperature over night.

The next day, add the poolish (which should be bubbly), and the rest of the ingredients (*except the herb oil) to the bowl of a stand mixer.  Mix on low speed until a wet sticky ball is formed.  Switch to the dough hook and knead on medium low speed for 5-7 minutes until the dough is smooth and elastic but still very wet (it should clear the sides of the bowl but still stick to the bottom).  All of this can be done with a metal spoon, dipped frequently in water so the dough doesn't stick, just change the direction you stir a few times to help with gluten development.

Make a bed of flour about 6-8 inches square on the work surface (this is where it gets messy, flour gets all over but more is better than less because you don't want the dough to stick to the work surface).  Using a nonstick spatula or bowl scraper, transfer the dough onto the bed of flour.  Sprinkle generously with flour and with floured hands pat the dough into a rectangle.  Allow dough to rest for 5 minutes.

Coat your hands with flour again and begin to stretch the dough from both ends until it is twice its size.  Then fold the ends over each other (like a letter) to return the dough to its rectangular shape.  Mist the top of the dough with spray oil and dust with flour and then cover with plastic wrap and let rest for 30 minutes.

Stretch and fold the dough and let it rest for 30 minutes two more times. and after the final stretch and fold let the dough ferment for 1 hour, if using the optional yeast or 3 hours if making pure sourdough.  The dough should swell but not necessarily double in size.

Prepare a 17 by 12 inch baking sheet (I use two small sheet pans) by lining it with parchment paper.  Spread about half of the *herb oil over the parchment then transfer the dough into the pan.  Spread some of the oil over the top of the dough and using your finger tips dimple the dough to spread it out to almost fill the pan.

Cover with plastic wrap and proof for 2 hours (if using commercial yeast or not).  15 minutes before baking drizzle on any remaining herb oil and dimple the dough again to about 1/2 inch thick.  The dough should now fill the pan.  Let rest for about 15 minutes and then bake in a oven preheated to 500F.

Immediately lower the temperature to 450F and bake for 10 minutes.  Rotate the pan 180 degrees and bake for 5-10 minutes more until it turns I nice golden brown.

Remove from oven and slide the focaccia onto a cooling rack.  Allow to cool for 30 minutes before slicing and serving.  Enjoy.

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