There are few virtues a man can possess more erotic than culinary skill.
Aphrodite: A Memoir of the Senses
by Isabel Allende


Starting in November of 2009 Michelle at the Big Black Dog formed a group to bake its way through Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day by Zoë François and Jeff Hertzberg. I loved Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, so I signed up with the group. Michelle first had us do a couple of warm-up assignments, which were my first attempt at blogging. The first "Official" post was on January 15, 2010, and it was followed by 41 more, on the 1st and 15th of each month. When I signed on I said I would bake the whole book, and like Horton (the elephant) I meant what I said and I said what I meant. I finished baking the book on October 1, 2011. Having completed that challenge, now I am just going to do some stuff, and post about it. As part of that stuff Michelle is posing a new, and different, challenge for us each month.

But
I am still baking bread, mostly the Five Minutes a Day kind, and if you would like to try the Five Minutes a Day bread method there are some links, with recipes, in the right hand column to get you started. Please give it a try.

But first, a word from my sponsor . . .
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This day be bread and peace my lot.
Alexander Pope

How can a nation be great if its bread tastes like Kleenex?

Julia Child

Everyone is kneaded out of the same dough but not baked in the same oven.
Yiddish proverb
(And some are only half baked.)

There is no love sincerer than the love of food.
George Bernard Shaw, via Sharon

Of all smells, bread; of all tastes, salt.
George Herbert

Monday, August 22, 2011

Dried Plum Bread Redux (39.1 of 42)

I still had some dried plums and the better part of a bottle of dried plum juice left from making the Brown Rice Prune Dried Plum Bread for the last assignment.   I hate to waste anything, so I suggested to my Trophy Wife that, at her age, she might benefit from eating the prunes and drinking the prune juice.  But that suggestion was not at all well received.   I was just trying to look out for her welfare.... 
Anyway,  my second thought was to make more of the Brown Rice Prune Dried Plum Bread.  The only problem was that I was not planning to make brown rice for anything. 
So my third thought was to make a batch of the Master WW recipe, but use 3 cups of dried plum juice and 1 cup of water for the liquid, just as in the Brown Rice Prune Dried Plum Bread.  I also decided to add the chopped dried plums. 
When I made the Brown Rice Prune Dried Plum Bread I had felt that I had not gotten the dried plums chopped finely enough.   The dried plums are sticky, and not easy to chop finely.  So I measured my flour, then put some of it in my food processor.  I added the dried plums and tossed them to coat with the flour.  Then I pulsed the dried plum/flour mixture until I got nice small pieces.  It worked great--the flour kept the dried plums from sticking and clumping.  Then I dumped it all back into the bowl and proceeded with the recipe.  
First, I made a batch in a loaf pan.  It worked out really well.  I sliced the whole thing and froze some to use for toast.
 Then I made English muffins.  I formed them then put them on parchment paper to rise.  Then I used the parchment paper to get them onto the griddle. 
 They turned out well, too.  And again, we ate some and froze some.
 






So if you have some leftover dried plum juice, you might want to give this a try. 

2 comments:

  1. That looks just great. Love the tip about tossing the dried plums with the flour to make them easier to eat.

    Say hello to your trophy wife!

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  2. Yum...I love English Muffins. And for them to be healthy too, just a bonus...as is having a trophy wife! :)

    Good tip about using flour with the dried plums.

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