Bread

One thing my stomach always wants is bread. Not sandwich bread, or white bread, or even 100% whole wheat bread. What it really wants is bakery bread. Delicious, crusty on the outside soft on the inside bakery bread. The possibilities are endless: meatball sandwiches, eggplant sandwiches, with butter next to anything, to dip in soup, to put tapenade on, with peanut butter, with jam and goat cheese, just with jam, just with cheese, to soak anything left over on my plate, with spinach artichoke dip, BLT sandwiches, as French toast, and, eventually, to use as breadcrumbs.

This recipe has been haunting me for two years, first via the NY Times itself, then via emails, then via my intention to make it, then a few more emails, and most recently, just last week, a friend told me she did it. So, finally, 884 days after I first saw and was intrigued by this recipe, I went for it. And, for the first 20 hours, I totally rocked this recipe. But, sadly, I missed one key bit of information. A 6-8 quart pan, as it turns out, is fucking huge.

Since I'm dominating the crap out of this recipe, I might as well call my mom to wish her a Happy Easter and rub how awesome my bread is turning out in her face (it should be pointed out that my mom is the nicest lady in ever, and never needs things rubbed in her face). Wow, now she knows just how great I am. Oh! It's time to load my bread dough into a preheated pot. Let me just get this out of the oven and totally ignore the sirens coming from my stupid smoke detector since it is so f-ing sensitive and lift up the towel and HOLY CRAP. The dough has risen. Just like Jesus it has risen and I'm fucked. Because now it is about 5 times too big for any pot I have, let alone the one I preheated as per instructions. I check the recipe and it calls for a 6-8 quart pot. Who uses quarts?? Mine is only 2 quarts!! And it's the biggest pot I have!! What to do? What to do? Crap. I have to call my mom back. And apparently no, a stock pot is not an appropriate way to bake bread. And I loaned my car to Joe, that little mooch. Now I have to WALK in the rain to QFC to buy a new pot while my bread continues to rise. Why didn't I learn anything from Amelia Bedelia? Of course, the store takes forever and it's Easter and it smells like gross fake chocolate and I can't believe how many people I told that I was going to make this bread and now it's a huge failure. And of course, the store doesn't have the size pot I need so I'll just split the dough. Into three loaves, yes, three adorable little loaves. It'll be perfect. But how long should I cook it for? 1/3 of the time?? That's not enough. OK, I'll just stand by the oven the whole time. No big deal. Oh, OK, this is actually no big deal. Oh, it turned out totally fine. I guess I did totally rock this recipe after all. Suck it!

So, here is what my stomach wanted for breakfast today:


Curious? It's bread, brie, raw honey, strawberries and blackberries. Other things my stomach wanted today: asparagus and steak. (It always wants meat...)