Home Made Turkish Pide

We simply call this Turkish Bread in our family however I believe the correct name is Turkish Pide.  I've made this once before however I've used a different recipe this time and with James assisting me we made two loaves today.  We make focaccia bread in this household which is very similar however the Turkish Pride bread has a few more steps in the beginning.  It takes two hours and thirty minutes to make and most of that time is in the "proving" so the actual total probably about 15 minutes however because it's stretched over two and a half hours it seems like a long time.  I suggest you start making this as soon as you wake up so you can have it at lunch time.

I did mine using the Thermomix Recipe however here is a recipe that you make if you don't have a Thermomix.  This dough is extremely sticky and difficult to cut into two to place over two trays.  Once it lands on the baking paper there is no moving it so aim your bowl in the middle of the baking paper which is already on your tray that you are going to put in the oven.  It is soft and sticky and we both used our fingers to shape the dough.  When I'm making focaccia bread I drizzle some olive oil on top so I can spread it out and shape it without having the dough stick to my fingers however this one needed an egg wash so I couldn't do that.  Just be prepared for sticky fingers in a big way but in the end you will have a lovely homemade Turkish Bread to eat. YUM!!

Here's the dough after it has risen for an hour and then knocked down.

It is then stretched out onto the baking paper (parchment paper USA readers).  This needs to rest with a tea towel over it for 30 minutes.

An egg wash goes on top along with poking your fingers into the bread which was a lot of fun and then topped with sesame seeds.  I think I'll get some black ones next time I'm at the bulk food store.

James very pleased with himself ready for it to go in the oven.

Straight out of the oven and looking pretty good and smelling even better. 

An overview of the top.

Feel like a slice, me too.

And two happy kids enjoying homemade Turkish Pide Bread.  Mission complete!

Home Made Baked Beans

I have been wanting to make this home made Baked Beans recipe from The Petite Kitchen for ages but it was just a matter of putting the beans and the thyme on the grocery list.  I will now have to make sure I grow some thyme as we will be making this regularly.  It is so easy and tastes amazing and as Jennifer says "once you make your own you'll never go back to buying store bought" and I would have to agree.  The kids have given it the thumbs up and can't wait to have it tonight for dinner (yes, we do baked beans as a quick meal in our household).  There will be homemade toasted Turkish Bread to go with it and the kids are pretty keen for tonight's dinner.

It's as simple as chopping the onion and garlic and popping it into a pan or saucepan with butter and then once they are soft add all the other ingredients like beans, tomato paste, chicken stock, thyme and salt and pepper and bring it to the boil and then reduce the heat for 30-35 minutes and it's as simple as that and you are done.

One thing I did while it was cooking was to add a second can of beans as there was heaps of sauce even after it was reducing so basically doing a double batch without the extra liquid.  The smell was inviting and we are big fans.

BAKED BEANS RECIPE

25gms butter
1 brown onion finely diced
4 garlic cloves chopped finely
4 cups of chicken stock [or vegetable stock]
4 cans of cannellini beans
a handful of fresh thyme roughly chopped
200gms of tomato paste
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of pepper

I did have two slices of Turkish Bread however I took a photo with my iphone and then the kids started eating the Turkish Bread before I got my DSLR ready so that's why there is a very small bit of Turkish Bread in the bottom photo.  You have to be quick around these parts.

Around here - Best Sourdough Loaf

So very proud of this Sourdough loaf of bread I made today [well I actually started the process yesterday morning].  In the last 10 years I've made many loaves of bread, bread rolls, Turkish bread, Focaccia, pizza dough etc and yet Sourdough was still something that I felt intimated by.  My friend and I did a Sourdough class back in November 2019 however it was the time frame that put me off.  If I was going out first thing in the morning then I wouldn't make a start on it the night before and I felt it was too hard when we can easily make Five Seed Bread in a couple of hours.

Last week I was given some starter by Carrie at my Homesteading Course and I really wanted to make some sourdough.  Last Saturday night I somehow I ended up finding Elaine Boddy on IG which lead me to her website and YouTube channel which lead me to her book which lead me to "I can do this".

Her Master Recipe and the timetable totally suited me and I jumped onto it and got to baking and this is what I produced.  A real sourdough loaf, something that you would find in a bakery and I had finally nailed it.  You can see what my bread attempts looked like back in 2016 [not that great, a bit like a brick] so I'm thrilled that I no longer am intimated by the process and happy with my sourdough bread.

The other thing I loved about Elaine's process is that she does a "cold bake".  In other words she puts her dough into the baking tin cold, the tin is cold and her oven is cold.  You then put the baking tin with lid on into the oven turn, it up to 220 degrees and set the timer for 55-60 minutes.  The great thing about this is there is no trying to dump your dough into an extremely hot baking tin and oven which has always been tricky not to burn yourself so a "cold bake" is perfect particularly once the dough is in the tin you then score it with your lame which is hard if you have a hot baking tin.  If you haven't given sourdough a go yet or feel intimated, trust me this is for you.

The beginning part of the process was take your starter out of the fridge at 9.00 am and bring the starter to room temperature which took a approximately 2 hours around 11.00 am.  Feed it with 30gms of strong white flour [aka bread flour] and 30gms of water [cooled down boiled water from the kettle] cover it up and leave on the bench until the afternoon.

Then around 4.00-5.00 pm:-

Weigh 50gms of starter

Add 350gms water [cooled down water from the kettle]

** Mix the water and the starter together using a spoon, then add the following:-

500gms of bakers flour [strong white bread flour]

1 teaspoon of salt

This is the Master Recipe which you then mix it together until it's all combined however it can still look very shaggy.

Then 45-60 minutes later do the lifts and folds about 25 times by turning your bowl round while you do it.  There are videos by Elaine how to do this.

Do another set of lifts and folds, it does not have to be 25 this time, perhaps half until it comes into a ball.  Do this another 4 times about 45-60 minutes apart but it's not time critical, so it could be more or less, as long as you do it another 4 times.

Cover it up with your shower cap leave it on the bench overnight.

The next morning it should have doubled in size, if not, leave it longer to prove.

Do your lift and folds and turn it into your rice floured banneton and cover with shower cap and put in the fridge for a minimum of 3 hours maximum of 24 hours [Elaine does 6 hours] - today I did 5 hours.

This is when you turn your dough into your prepared baking tin with baking paper [videos how to turn this out on Elaine's YouTube channel too] and then it's time to score the bread, put the lid on and put it into your cold oven.  Turn the oven on to 220 degrees and set your timer for 55-60 minutes.  I use this enamel roaster although mine is a tiny bit smaller however if I had to buy one again I would buy this size.

After the 55-60 minutes I took the lid off and let it cook for a further 5-10 minutes.  

You must leave your bread to cool down completely before slicing and Elaine explains why.  Below are some photos starting from when it proved overnight on the bench.  Elaine's website and YouTube channel has great videos and a 23 minute video start to finish with lots of shorter 2-5 minute videos about specific processes.   

This is the proved dough which sat overnight in the bowl.

Banneton floured up with rice flour which I ground in the thermomix.

Dough rested in the banneton covered with a new

 plastic shower cap which sat in the fridge for 5 hours.  

This is the dough that was in the fridge with the shower cap on for 5 hours

which will be turned out into the baking tin ready for scoring.

Dough in the enamel bake tin and scored with the lame ready to put the lid on and into the oven.

Straight out of the oven and took the lid off to this beauty.

Look at that brilliant crust.

Around here - Turkish Pide Bread for lunch

On the 30th June, 2013 we made our first Turkish Bread in our Thermomix and the recipe took three and a half hours from start to finish with most of that time being for proving.  It's the recipe we have been using for all these years.  Yesterday I saw a post on IG about another recipe which I thought I would give a go and I can say it's a 10 out of 10 for me.

You can make it with or without a Thermomix and the recipe took me 1.5 hours start to finish.  It's always good when at 10.00 am you decide you want to make something and 1.5 hrs rather than 3.5 hours.  This is the Turkish Pide Recipe and as mentioned has a standard recipe and the Thermomix instructions at the bottom of the recipe.

TURKISH BREAD [This is the Thermomix recipe

[if you go to this link you will find the traditional recipe]

500 gms plain flour, sifted [I didn't do this]

7 gms dry yeast

1 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt

365 ml warm water

olive oil to grease the bowl

2 teaspoons Sesame seeds

1 teaspoon Nigella seeds [I will have to buy some of these for next time]

1/2 teaspoon of sea salt flakes

1 egg yolk

1 tablespoon olive oil

METHOD

Add warm water to bowl, then yeast and sugar.  Set at 37 degrees and mix on speed 3 for 30 seconds to dissolve the yeast.  Wait 5-10 minutes to be sure the yeast is alive and kicking.

Add flour and then salt and slowly bring up to the speed of 4 to mix until just combined.

Knead for two and a half minutes.

Grease a large bowl with olive oil and place the dough into it and turn the ball over so all sides are coated with oil.  Cover with cling wrap. [note spray top of cling wrap so if dough rises it doesn't stick].

Place in warm spot for one hour [I placed mine on a chair in the backyard].

Once it has doubled in size, place the dough onto a floured surface and divide into 2 loaves.  Form two rectangles by stretching and pressing the dough and then place them onto baking paper.

Cover with a damp tea towel and leave for 15 minutes until they are puffy.

Preheat oven to 230 degrees and place a tray into the middle rack of the oven.

Use the end of a wooden spoon dipped in flour and poke holes in the bread or use your finger which is what I did.

Whisk the egg yolk and 1 tablespoon of olive oil together and brush over the loaves.

Sprinkle with seeds and sea salt and bake in the oven for 10 minutes until it's golden brown.

This is a picture of how it looked before it went into the oven.

Home Made Bread

I love making Turkish Bread and Foccacia which is pretty easy and my experience with home made white bread is in my opinion a bit heavy.  I want to be able to make a white loaf of bread that is as soft "Bakers Delight" white loaf.  I am yet to find it so if someone has the softest white bread recipe let me know.  A lot of bread is good for toast but a bit heavy to put two slices of bread together with a sandwich.  With all that being said, I found a recipe this morning that I thought would give a try.

Mix the dough and pop it in a greased glass bowl.

First rise.

Punch down the dough.

Pop it into a loaf tin for the 2nd rise - it has to rise to the level of the top of the loaf tin.

Baked for 20 minutes in the oven.

A Golden loaf of bread.

The finished loaf.

In terms of the look of the loaf I loved the look of it and the crust.  I did have a ham and salad sandwich using this bread and it was nice but I think it would be a nicer "toast" loaf but we are getting more like what I'm after but not quite there yet.  This was probably one of the better white loaves I've made but some more research is required.

Around here - Hot Cross Buns

I decided this morning I would make Hot Cross Buns using Laura's recipe.  Laura has a blog called "The Kiwi Country Girl" and lives on a farm with her husband and two kids and various animals in New Zealand hence the name of her blog.

During this time of isolation lots of people have been getting into making bread that have never baked before as they have time on their hands to try a new skill.  Laura has been doing "cook alongs" on her Instagram Stories and has saved some of these to her "Highlights" so you can view them in your own time.  She has "Hot Cross Buns", "Bagels" and "White Bread" all in her highlights if you want to go check it out.

As we all know with bread making it takes a considerable amount of time from start to finish with doing a bit of this, then waiting, doing another bit of that and waiting.  Sourdough can take up to 24 hours, some over night no knead breads can take 12 hours, my turkish bread the other day start to finish took one and a half hours and the Rosemary & Oregano took three and a half hours, so you see it's an activity you can do when you are stuck at home.  First of all you have to work out what time you want to eat your bread and work backwards and allowing for resting time.  We make these fluffy bread rolls which take two and a half hours so if we want them for lunch I have to start around 9.00 am.   Getting back to the original post about making Hot Cross Buns, Laura says these take 2 hours and 35 minutes to make [I would allow 3 hours as you may need 60 or 90 minutes for your dough to rise depending on the temperature].  So in summary, that's Prep Time 30 minutes, Cook time 25 minutes and Rising time 1 hours and 40 minutes or a bit longer for the rise.

Laura's recipe has all of these things listed so you can print it out however here's a summary.  At the start you get three things ready in separate bowls so this takes about 15 minutes:-

1.    The yeast component mix and then let that sit.

2.    The flour, spices and dried fruit.

3.    The butter, egg, vanilla mix.

After that, you bring everything together and knead with your dough hook on your mix master, kitchen aid or your Thermomix knead for 7-8 minutes or by hand for approximately 10 minutes.

Next is the rise part which again I had mine on a chair in the backyard for an hour.

I didn't take a picture after it had risen however it only took one hour and the dough was right up to the gladwrap at the top of the bowl.

Next you punch your dough down and divide into 10 equal portions, then round them with your hands [see Laura's Hot Cross Bun Highlights for this] and pop them on a tray for another rise of 40 minutes.

Back out into the backyard sun to rise for 40 minutes,   I had to be careful with this tray as the clingwrap wouldn't stick to the tray like it does to my glass bowl above and I didn't want any ants or insects to get to my dough so I was checking on it from time to time. 

After 40 minutes they had risen again and I brought them back inside.

In the meantime the oven is turned on to 180 degrees and you make the mixture for the crosses as per the recipe and also get the sugar mix ready for after they are cooked.  All the ingredients and details what to do are carefully written in Laura's printable recipe mentioned above.

Make your crosses on the buns and then bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes.......I was very annoyed with myself because I didn't check them at 20 minutes like I would normally do so they got very brown and after my mornings work I was disappointed I had over cooked them by 5 minutes.

It was due to the fact that the oven was really hot and ready when I put them in...lesson learned so set your timer for 15 minutes and 20 minutes.  Anyway enough about that, I baked them and when they came out I put the sugar mix on with a pastry brush and they are AMAZING.  

The dough is a perfect texture so soft and I'm really happy with the recipe.  This is a flashback to 2013 when James made Hot Cross Buns.

I can highly recommend you make Laura's recipe even if you think it's complicated, it's not...just give yourself 3 hours and do other things in between.  You will love how easy they are to make and totally beats the store bought ones with preservatives and additives.

NOTES:  Apart from over cooking them for 5 minutes I also made the mistake of "mixing" my ingredients in the Thermomix for 15 seconds which basically chopped the sultanas into specs so just go straight to kneading.  My daughter was happy because she doesn't like sultanas, and I was like, what are the brown specs in my dough about until I realized I had chopped the sultanas up.  So if you have a Thermomix go straight to the knead setting once all your mixture is in and the kneading will mix everything together leaving the sultanas whole.  We don't like mixed peel so it was just sultanas.

These recipes are the ultimate in slow cooking and as we all have a slow lifestyle now due to isolation now is a good time as any to try out new recipes since it's school holidays in Queensland and not home schooling online.  Let me know if you make these you will be so proud of yourself.

Around here - Rosemary, Oregano & Sea Salt Bread

We are right into bread making at the moment and when I saw this recipe on Leah Instines IG account the other day I had to give it a go.  This would be great to serve with soup or some dips.

RECIPE

3 cups plain flour
1.5 cups warm water
1/2 teaspoon dried yeast
Pinch of salt flakes
Pinch of dried rosemary [I mixed 1/2 teaspoon in the dough - could use 1 teaspoon]
Pinch of dried oregano  [I mixed 1/2 teaspoon in the dough - could use 1 teaspoon]

METHOD

Pre-heat oven to 220° Celsius

Mix warm water with yeast until dissolves. Add it into the bowl with flour and mix well.

Lightly flour a bench and knead the bread until it forms a perfect little ball. Place back into the bowl and cover with a tea towel. Leave to rise for 2-3 hours.

Remove from bowl, sprinkle herbs and then shape into a ball and place it onto gladbake/parchment paper. 

Make a cross cut on the top of the bread and sprinkle salt flakes on top and place into a oven safe pot and cover with a lid.  I placed the parchment paper and dough into the pot.

Cook in the oven for 30 mins, remove lid and cook for another 10.

NOTES:

This recipe is mixed by hand however I used my Thermomix and used the same instructions I used on the Turkish Bread I made on the weekend.

I also sprinked extra rosemary and oregano on top and the sea salt goes on top too.

I cooked mine in the Aldi pot which I bought a while back for approx $25. 

Recipes from the blog

Since it's school holiday time I thought I would go through some of our favourite recipes that I've posted on the blog previously and gather a few of them in the one place.

Our favourite Pizza Base recipe.

Home made Rustic Olive Oil Crackers these are so easy.

New York Times No Knead Bread always a winner.

Raspberry Lemon Muffins....OMG these are amazing.

Home made Granola.

Lasagne & Sticky Date Muffins with Butterscotch sauce.

Our family favourite Chocolate Coconut Slice.

Chicken & Leek Pies my kids love these as do I.

Rhonda from Down to Earth Home Made Biscuits recipe.

Brownies & Pizza Scrolls.

Home made Dumplings recipe from Celia at Fig Jam & Lime Cordial blog.

Apple & Cinnamon Cake from Kate Berry of The Lunch Lady blog.

Swedish Meatballs although they take a little time to mix and roll them this recipe will not disappoint.



Home made pasta recipe.

Irish Soda Bread and this one is a must with the herbed butter with fresh herbs....makes all the difference.

Home made baked beans which we make and freeze in small containers.  We have been making this recipe for about a year and a half now and we love them.  I don't buy any tinned baked beans from the supermaket any more.

Making home made Turkish Bread is very satisfying and with all bread you need to factor in time. Think of the end result (ie for lunch or dinner) and work backwards to start your recipe.

Home made Yoghurt is great for the kids and they also like to mix in some fresh berries.

This Apple Slice Recipe is from my Mother In Law and OMG it is AMAZING.  The recipe looks like a lot of instructions but it is so easy and tasty try this one for your next morning tea or dessert.  It uses a big tin of apples so you don't even have to peel them and cook them, too easy.

Make your own Vanilla Extract, so easy and I haven't bought any since late 2013.

Best Chocolate Cake Recipe ever, just put all the ingredients in a mix for 5 mins.

Home made Tortilla recipe.

Seeded Crispbread recipe.

Buttermilk Scones for afternoon tea....these are quick to make and soft and fluffy.

Slow Cooker Spaghetti Bolognese made with turkey mince which has a nice rich flavour.

Five Seed Bread is great for toast for breakfasts and very healthy too.

Around Here

Just a few images from our week.

An old drawing of Sienna's from a few year's back...so cute I love it and this one's going straight to the pool room..ha ha.

Vignette on one of my tables and one of my picture frames with a few pics from a few years back with a title "This is Life".

Finally hung this mask on the wall that was a gift from my sister's travels last year.

Sienna in the bush.

A portrait taken today.

Game night and concentration.

My out of focus flowers in the bush pic taken on purpose.

James making Turkish Bread for us.

Turkish bread straight from the oven...it didn't take long before this was all gone.  Recipe here.

 Anzac Day last year.