Wednesday, December 30, 2009

A Tale of Bread

I mixed up my first batch of Artisan Bread dough on Sunday using the basic recipe in Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. On Monday, we had Ann, Eric and the boys over to have Christmas. Earlier as Ann and I spoke on the phone about what to have for dinner, I mentioned the bread dough and the possibility of using it for pizza crust. She had mozzarella, olives and some peperoni, and I had Canadian bacon and sauce. Done deal. We had fun putting the pizza together, checking the book for instructions as we went along. The moment of truth came and we slid the first pizza off the peel and onto the hot baking stone in the oven. Twenty minutes later, we took it out, slid in number two and sat down to eat. Eric took the first bite. "Wow!" he said. Cameron and Keaton bit into theirs and smiled. Finally I took a bite and it was crusty, chewy, and fabulous!! Why, oh why, did I wait so long?

Number one disappeared in short order, but here is a picture of number two right out of the oven.


Yesterday I decided we'd better get back to our bean soup from Saturday, and a loaf of artisan bread would be just the thing to go with it. It was a snap to get it ready and into the oven. I was washing up a few things when I heard a strange noise. As I was glancing around the kitchen trying to determine what I heard, I glanced into the oven (I had the light on so I could watch it bake) and saw that my baking stone had cracked. And I do mean cracked! It was in three pieces and had spread apart as much as two inches on one side. Miraculously my little loaf of bread remained straddled across the gaping divide and so I continued to let it bake.


It cooled, and we had it for dinner with the soup. It was wonderfully crusty on the top and chewy in the middle. The bottom was not quite so crusty as most of it had baked in mid air, so to speak, the last half of the time.

My baking stone?


It's in the trash.
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6 comments:

  1. Judy D in WADecember 30, 2009 at 8:11 PM

    Your pizza looks delicious and is making me want pizza. The stone--oh no! Is that the one from pampered chef? That's a shame.

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  2. Judy LaquidaraDecember 30, 2009 at 8:27 PM

    WOW! Aren't you glad you tried it. That's awful about the stone though. I can't tell how thick yours wash. When I was looking for a stone, I was advised to get one that's thick because they do break. I think mine is about 1/2" thick and HEAVY! I can hardly lift it. I'm so glad the bread worked good for you.

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  3. AnnDecember 30, 2009 at 9:39 PM

    Wow your stone really did break! Good picture of it! Your bread looks wonderful and yummy.

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  4. ChrisDecember 30, 2009 at 10:03 PM

    Yup, it sure did break! We went shopping last night and I found a new stone that will hopefully work. It looks to be at least 1/2" thick and is big and rectangular. I'd had the Pampered Chef one for years, but while the edges looked thick, it was thinner in the middle.

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  5. DianeJanuary 1, 2010 at 9:51 AM

    my baking stone broke also...because we cooked something that was a lot smaller in size. I guess you have to be sure that what you cook on it almost fills up the surface of the stone.

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  6. CJJanuary 2, 2010 at 6:01 AM

    Yippee Chris! Your pizza and your bread look fabulous! How fun is that?

    My stone is 1/2 inch thick and nearly fills my oven, it's huge. I've had it for years now, and I frequently leave it in the oven during the cleaning cycle which restores it to new condition, and it's as perfect as the day I bought it.

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