Classic Butter Crust Bread

The thought of having some plain white bread with homemade jam for a simple nice breakfast, finds me looking for a simple, fuss-free white bread that is very easy and quick to make. Of course, for quick and easy bread, I always find myself reaching out to one of my favourite bread machine books, "The Artisan Bread Machine". And again, this recipe from Judith Fertig is a winner. This book never fails to amaze me with the recipes that I've tried. They have all turned out great and this is one of them.

The recipe is meant for the bread machine, from the mixing right up to the baking. But I have always prefer to finish the baking in the oven, as I hate to have the bread machine paddle stuck into the otherwise perfect looking bread! So for this, I have done what I usually do, mix the dough using the bread machine, remove the dough after the first rising, shape it and leave it to rise in a greased loaf pan, and proceed with the baking in the oven. 

This is one lovely bread. It has a soft crust and the bread texture is so, so soft and very tasty, good enough to eat it on its own. The only changes I've made was to replace the buttermilk with full cream milk, and to reduce the salt slightly to 1 teaspoon (original is 1-1/2 teaspoon). 

Can you see how soft and moist this bread is?  Perfect when you need some plain simple white bread that is a breeze to make. It stays soft on the next day, and I finished the last two pieces on the third day, and it stays just as soft. Very nice eaten with homemade jam. A definite keeper recipe. Make one today, you would be glad you did! 

I'm sharing this with :

See Ya In The Gumbo hosted by Ms. enPlace
Full Plate Thursday hosted by Miz Helen Country Cottage

This is linked to Cook-Your-Books, hosted by Joyce from Kitchen Flavours

Classic Butter Crust Bread
(adapted from "The Artisan Bread Machine", Judith Fertig)
Makes one 1-1/2 lb (750gm) loaf
3 tbsp granulated sugar
1-1/2 tsp salt (I use 1 tsp)
1 cup lukewarm buttermilk (I use milk)
3 tbsp butter, softened
2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour (I use bread flour)
1-1/2 tsp instant or bread machine yeast

Topping
2 tbsp butter, melted

To make in the bread machine

Add sugar, salt, buttermilk and butter to the bread pan. Spoon flour on top of liquid. Add yeast.

Select the Basic/White Cycle and the Light Crust setting and press Start.

Topping : After the final rise and just before baking, press Pause. Raise the lid, cut a 1/2-inch (1 cm) slash down the length or across the top of the loaf and brush with melted butter. Close the lid and press Start to continue the Cycle.

Kitchen Flavours notes :

To bake in the oven : Place sugar, salt, milk and butter to the bread pan. Spoon flour on top of liquid. Add yeast. Select Basic Dough Cycle, press Start. (which takes 1 hours 35 minutes inclusive of first rising). When machine beeps at end of cycle, remove dough and place on lightly floured work surface. Roll out dough to the length of the loaf pan, roll it up, tuck the ends under, and place in the greased 8-1/2"x4-1/2" loaf pan, cover loosely with greased cling wrap and leave to rise until doubled in size. Remove cling wrap, make a slash down the length of the dough, brush with melted butter and bake at 175C for 30 minutes. Remove and cool completely on wire rack.

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Bacon-Cheddar-Green Onions Scones : ABC June 2013

Our bake for this month at Avid Baker's Challenge (ABC) is Bacon-Cheddar-Chive Scones, a delicious savoury scones, recipe taken from King Arthur Flour's (KAF) website. We, at ABC is currently baking from KAF recipes until end December. 

When this recipe was chosen for our June bake, I thought that it sounded familiar. Checked from my file of printed recipes, and found it, I actually printed this recipe from KAF' website on 3rd Nov 2011!  It took a little push, and one and half years later, to make this savoury scone, thanks to ABC! And another recipe which I've printed at the same time, is our coming bake in August!

The original recipe uses chives, but I have replaced with green onions. I do have some chives growing in my backyard, but when I made the dough, it was already about 9.30pm, and it was a little too late to go round snipping herbs from my backyard. I do have some green onions in my fridge, so that was what I used. 

I made the dough and placed them in the baking pan, and kept it in the fridge. The next morning, at 4.45 am, (yes, it was that early!) I baked them for the kids' breakfast before school. So it was all nice, moist and tender when they had it for breakfast. 

I made only half a recipe, and got eight small scones, just perfect for breakfast. The only changes I've made was to substitute the chives with green onions, and to add some coarse black pepper powder. The salt was reduced by half, and it still turns out a little salty, next time I will not add any salt, because the cheese, bacon and butter are already salted.

Photo taken at about 5.30am, that explains the different colour lighting from the photo below...

....  taken at about 10.00 am when the sun is up! Haha! There's only one piece left for me! 

These scones are buttery, moist, tender and yummy! A breeze to make! Make the dough the night before, which is very quick to put together, place the dough in the fridge and bake the next morning for breakfast, fresh and delicious!

For the full recipe, you may get it from KAF's website, here.

     

To view the other members bake, please stop by Avid Baker's Challenge (ABC). We are currently baking from King Arthur Flour website, if you are interested to join in, please contact Hanaa.

Chicken Meatballs with Preserved Lemons and Harissa Relish : IHCC

"Pattycake, Pattycake", the theme for this week at I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC), a group of lovely homecooks who are cooking from Yotam Ottolenghi's recipes until September. IHCC's Optional Monthly Community Recipe for this month is Preserved Lemons, where we can use Preserved Lemons in any of our chosen weekly recipe. So for today, I have combined the Optional Monthly Community Recipe (Preserved Lemon) with this week's theme "Pattycake, Pattycake". 

I have never made preserved lemons before or even eaten them, even though I love eating pickles and preserves. So it is a challenge to make our own Preserved Lemons, and I have used Ottolenghi's "Quick Pickled Lemons" recipe. There's another recipe of Ottolenghi's that requires the lemons to be preserved for about four weeks before consumption, but I have opted to use the quick pickled recipe instead.

Another ingredient that I've always wanted to make is Harissa Paste. I have seen so many recipes, from my cookbook collection and from various websites that uses this paste. So far, I have not seen this paste sold in any of the supermarkets that I went. Harissa Paste is a red hot pepper paste used in North African cooking. Since I cannot find this paste, I have made my own. Will share this on another day.

For this week's theme together with the Monthly Optional Community Recipe, I have made Chicken Meatballs with Preserved Lemon and Harissa Relish.

Firstly 1 whole corn (husk removed) is brushed with olive oil and grilled on pan for about 8 minutes, turning frequently until dark charred marks are visible. Remove from heat and once cool enough to handle, shave the corn off the cob.

Ingredients used are grilled corn, white bread, chicken mince, chopped onions, chopped garlic, chopped coriander, chopped parsley (did not use this), ground cumin, chopped red chilli, 1 egg, salt, pepper. Everything is mixed till well combined.

Form into round balls and grill on pan for 1-2 minutes on each side until charred. Place meatballs on lined baking sheet and bake in a preheated oven at 180C for 6 minutes or until meatballs are fully cooked. They were cooked at exactly 6 minutes! Mine was not exactly round, as the mixture was rather wet, maybe because I have used only 400gm (original is 500gm) of minced chicken and a large egg instead of medium.

Prepare the Lemon and Harissa Relish. Mix the pickled lemons, harissa paste, lemon juice, some olive oil and a pinch of salt together. Set aside.

Serve with the Chicken Meatballs, mine are more like Chicken Patties!  With some fresh corianders.

I really like the Lemon and Harissa Relish! This would be good eaten with burgers! The lemons are not really sour and the spiciness from the harissa paste is just so good!

The Chicken Patties are really tender and moist. So good! I'm the only one eating the Chicken Patties with the Lemon and Harissa Relish,  the family prefer eating the patties as it is. I knew that I would be the only one eating the Relish, as it is too spicy for my kids and the hubby does not like sour lemons! All the more for me, yay!

You may view the video here, where Yotam Ottolenghi shows how these Chicken Meatballs are made. Enjoy the video!

Please do stop by I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC) to view what my friends have made for the theme of this week, "Pattycake, Pattycake", and if you are interested to join us, please find out more details from IHCC.

Chicken Meatballs with Preserved Lemons and Harissa Relish
(source from here)
1 whole corn cob, husk removed
60ml (1/4 cup) olive oil
35gm crust-less white bread, roughly torn, soaked in water for 2-3 minutes, drained and squeezed
500gm chicken mince
1 small onion, grated (60gm net)
1 garlic clove, crushed
15gm coriander, chopped
7gm parsley, finely chopped
1-1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 small red chilli, finely diced
1 medium egg, lightly beaten
1/2 tsp salt
black pepper

Lemon and Harissa Relish
2 preserved lemons, flesh and skin sliced into thin strips (220gm net)
1 tsp lemon juice
2-1/4 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp harissa paste

Preheat the oven to 180C.

To prepare the corn, heat a chargrill (ridged griddle) pan on high heat. Allow it to heat up well. Brush the corn with 2 tsp of the olive oil and chargrill, turning regularly, for 8-10 minutes, or until it has lots of dark charred specks and the corn turns smoky. Remove from the heat, and when cool enough to handle, use a large, sharp knife to shave the corn off the cob. Place the kernels in a large mixing bowl and set aside.

To make the relish, mix together the ingredients in a medium bowl. Set aside.

To make the meatballs, add the bread, chicken, onion, garlic, herbs, cumin, chilli, egg, salt and a generous grind of black pepper to the bowl with the corn. Stir the ingredients until well combined. Lightly moistened your hands with some of the olive oil, take 60gm portions of mixture, and form into round meatballs. Place on a tray lined with baking paper.

Return the chargrill pan to a high heat. Once hot, cook meatballs for 1-2 minutes on each side, or until visibly charred and lifting up easily from pan. Return to the baking tray and place in the oven for 6 minutes, or until cooked through.

Serve the meatballs warm with the relish.


Quick Pickled Lemons
(source from here, Yotam Ottolenghi)
Makes 1 large jar, approximately 1.5 liters)
Ingredients
1/2 red chilli, chopped (I use 1/2 tsp coarse chilli flakes)
3 tbsp lemon juice
3 small-medium unwaxed lemon, halved lengthways and sliced widthways as thinly as possible
35gm caster sugar
1/2 tbsp coarse sea salt
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 tsp sweet paprika
1/4 tsp ground cumin
1/2 ground turmeric

Method
Use a pestle and mortar to smash together the chilli with 1 teaspoon of the lemon juice; you want to get a rough-looking paste. Transfer this to a large bowl along with all the other ingredients. Use your hands to mix everything together well so that all the flavours get massaged into the lemons. Leave in a bowl, covered, overnight. Transfer to a sterilized sealed jar the next day - it will keep in the fridge for 2 weeks.

kitchen flavours notes :
I use 2 lemons and yield only half a jar.