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Ballpark Food II: Fenway Franks

Monday, May 10th, 2010

 
I mentioned in my last post that hot dogs are the top-selling concession item at Fenway Park in Boston. I suspect that they dominate the menu in ballparks all over the country.
 
I’m still enough of a kid to love hot dogs, and I have a feeling I’ll never outgrow my fondness for these warm, portable meals.
 
Fenway Park is pretty specific about what it calls the Fenway Frank. The offical Red Sox hot dog features brown mustard–not yellow!–with a little relish on a New England-style bun. Feel free to vary this recipe by using your own favorite condiments.
 
I didn’t make relish for this post since the ingredients aren’t yet in season. I did bake hot-dog buns, however, with the help of my mother and sister-in-law. A New England-style hot-dog bun has soft sides. If you’d like your sides more crispy, just place your rising buns a little farther apart.
 
As you can see from the photo above, my family’s own baseball player is now a convert to home-made hot-dog buns………
 
 
 
Fenway Franks
 
Ingredients:
 
1 New England-style hot-dog bun (see recipe below)
1 hot dog (Fenway Park serves Kayem franks, which are made in Chelsea, Massachusetts, and steams them. I like to grill them.)
brown mustard and relish (preferably homemade) to taste
 
Instructions:
 
Split the bun in the middle. Insert the hot dog into the bun, and cover it with mustard and relish. Makes 1 frank. Be sure to spill mustard and relish all over yourself as you cheer for your favorite team! 

 
New England Hot Dog Buns (from King Arthur Flour)
 
King Arthur Flour notes that this dough should be very relaxed so the buns will be soft and tender. When you’re adding the flour, don’t overdo it; just add enough after the first 3 cups to make the bread kneadable and to keep it from sticking to you or the board.
 
Ingredients:
 
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
1 packet active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water (105 to 115 degrees—slightly warmer than lukewarm but not hot)
1 cup warm milk (ditto)
1 tablespoon melted butter
1 teaspoon salt
3 to 3-3/4 cups flour
 
Instructions:
 
In a large bowl, dissolve the sugar and then the yeast in the warm water. Add the milk, the butter, the salt, and 1-1/2 cups of flour to the yeast mixture. Beat vigorously for 2 minutes.
 
Gradually add more flour, 1/4 cup at a time, until the dough begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl. Turn the dough out onto a floured work surface.
 
Knead until you have a smooth, elastic dough.
 
Place the dough in an oiled bowl. Turn once to coat the entire ball of dough with oil. Cover with a tightly-woven dampened towel and let rise until doubled. King Arthur Flour says this will take about an hour; in my house it took quite a bit longer.
 
Turn the dough out onto a lightly oiled work surface. Divide it into thirds, and divide each of those into thirds again so that you have nine pieces. Roll them into little balls.
 
Roll the balls into cylinders, 4 1/2-inches long. Flatten the cylinders slightly and place them on a well-seasoned baking sheet 1/2 inch apart so they’ll grow together as they rise.
 
Cover with a towel and let rise until almost doubled—an hour or so. Keep an eye on the buns; if they rise too fast, they’ll stick to the towel and make a mess. (Can you tell I’m writing from experience?) If you can find a way to lightly cover the buns with a box or something do that instead to avoid the danger of sticking.
 
Fifteen minutes before you want to bake your buns, preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Bake the buns for 20 minutes or until they are a nice golden brown.
 
When the buns are done, remove them from the baking sheet to cool on a wire rack.
 
Makes 9 buns. This recipe may be doubled.
 


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Posted in Breads, Muffins, and Scones, Meat and Poultry | 6 Comments »

Simple Cinnamon Scones with Fruit

Monday, May 3rd, 2010

 
As I mentioned in last week’s cookie recipe, I recently purchased cinnamon mini-chips from King Arthur Flour to make scones.
 
KAF itself has a grand cinnamon scone recipe that uses not just the chips but several other types of cinnamon as well. I like my scones quick and easy so I’ll leave that one to the experts. It does look fabulous.
 
This recipe is a bit easier, although I encourage you to adjust it. You may add a little cinnamon glaze after baking, sprinkle the tops with cinnamon sugar instead of plain sugar, and/or substitute fresh berries for the dried ones. (I used dried ones because fresh aren’t yet in season.)
 
I would avoid frozen fruit, however, as it will make your scones wet.
 
We served these for a weekend breakfast with plenty of fresh fruit on the side.
 
The Scones
 
Ingredients:
 
1/2 cup sugar
2 cups flour
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) COLD sweet butter
2/3 cup dried tiny blueberries or small pieces of apple
2/3 cup cinnamon mini-chips
2/3 cup buttermilk
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
additional sugar as needed (optional)
 
Ingredients:
 
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 cookie sheets with parchment or silicone mats.
 
Combine the sugar, flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Cut in the butter, but be careful not to overmix. Stir the berries into this mixture.
 
In a separate bowl whisk together the buttermilk, egg, and vanilla. Add the liquids to the dry mixture and blend just to moisten the dry ingredients.
 
Quickly scoop the dough (it will be moist) into rounds on the prepared cookie sheets. Small rounds will give you about 16 small scones, but you may also make 8 larger scones. Sprinkle sugar on top for added flavor and crunch.
 
Bake for 18 to 20 minutes for small scones. I imagine large scones (which I did not try) might take a bit longer. Makes 8 to 16 scones.
 


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“No Knead” Is a Terrible Name!

Monday, March 22nd, 2010

olivebreadweb

 
I’ve never been particularly trendy as a cook or as a person. Perhaps this is why it has taken me longer than most to jump on the “no-knead bread” bandwagon.
 
Many home and professional cooks ran out and made a loaf shortly after reading Mark Bittman’s ground-breaking column in The New York Times in November 2006. I have heard stories (probably apocryphal but fun nevertheless) that grocery stores ran out of rapid-rising yeast, an ingredient called for in Bittman’s formula, that day.
 
The recipe Bittman used came from Jim Lahey of Manhattan’s Sullivan Street Bakery. Lahey has since published My Bread: The Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method.
 
From 2006 until 2010 I was unmoved by all this brouhaha. “So what if it doesn’t require kneading,” I thought. I don’t mind kneading bread. It’s a simple, enjoyable task that doesn’t take very long. When I’ve been writing for several hours I love the physical break kneading provides.
 
Two people changed my mind. One was my young friend Erin Cosby, who called this bread “the best around.” The other is my sister food blogger Abigail Blake of Sugar Apple, who wrote that her no-knead loaf was “as close to Parisian bread as [she was] going to get in the Caribbean.”
 
(Abigail lives on the island of Tortola in the British Virgin Islands, lucky girl that she is. I try to remind myself that she doesn’t get gorgeous foliage color in the fall, but it’s hard not to envy her a little in mud season!)
 
So I tried the bread. It was amazing. Note to Mark Bittman and Jim Lahey: “No-Knead Bread” is a misleading name. It should be called AWESOME Bread. Or Parisian Bread. Or Artisan Bread. Or anything that emphasizes the product rather than the process.
 
The bread works because it combines just a little bit of yeast and a LOT of water with the basic flour/salt mixture. It then lets them rise together for a really long time. The process concludes by baking the bread in a preheated pot in a really hot oven, which almost replicates a brick oven.
 
The bread emerges with a gorgeous, crispy crust and a porous texture. It shouts, “I was made in a special way!”
 
I’ve tried a few variations. Bittman later proposed making bread almost as good by using more yeast and letting the bread sit for less time. (You’ll note that his original recipe takes about a day.) I encourage you to try this method.
 
For my most recent loaf I added some nice salty Greek olives to the mixture. This is the version for which I share the recipe.
 
If you don’t want to use the olives, decrease the yeast to 1/3 teaspoon (1/4 teaspoon if you’re using instant yeast) and increase the salt to 1-1/2 teaspoons. (To tell you the truth, if you ARE using the olives you may omit the salt altogether; Greek olives are salty! But I love salt.)
 
The biggest trick to making this bread may be selecting the pan. You need a heavy pan with a volume of 4-1/2 t 5 quarts that can withstand a 450-degree oven.
 
Erin tells me she uses a large covered Pyrex pan. I use my mother’s old Le Creuset Dutch oven, which doesn’t have a plastic lid-grabber. (Its grabber is made of the same enameled cast iron as the rest of the pan.)
 
If your pot has a plastic lid-grabber, I am told that you may unscrew it and put foil in its place. (Opening the pot may be harder in this case.) Amazon.com sells Lahey’s book along with a 5-quart Lodge cast-iron Dutch oven that looks useful (and a lot less costly than my beloved Le Creuset).
 
One more variation: If you want to use instant or rapid-rise yeast, the water should be lukewarm instead of hot as mine was for regular yeast.
 
Happy baking—and eating.
 
olivesweb
 
Super Duper Olive Bread
 
Ingredients:
 
3 cups bread flour
1/2 teaspoon salt (optional)
3/4 teaspoon active dry yeast
3/4 cup Greek olives, drained of all brine and chopped in half vertically
1-1/2 cups hot but not boiling water
 
Instructions:
 
The day before you want to eat your bread, combine the flour, salt, and yeast in a bowl large enough to hold more than 2 quarts of dough. Stir in the olives, followed by the water. Mix with a wooden spoon until it the dough is combined (it will be messy!), about 30 seconds.
 
Cover the bowl loosely and let it sit in a warm place until the dough doubles in size and bubbles form on the surface, 12 to 18 hours. Do not put the dough on a radiator (I speak from experience) as it will dry out.
 
Generously dust a board with flour, and using 2 wet spatulas dump the dough onto the board. Lift the edges of the dough with the spatulas into the center and nudge it into the shape of a ball.
Nudging the Bread

Nudging the Bread

 
Dust a linen dishtowel with flour, and use the spatulas to pop the dough onto it, seam side down. If the dough is sticky (it always is, in my experience), dust the top with flour or cornmeal. Fold the ends of the dishtowel around the dough so that it is loosely covered. Allow it to rise in a warm spot for 2 hours, or until it holds the hole when you poke your finger into it.
 
About 1/2 hour before the second rising is complete, preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Place a covered 4-1/2- to 5-quart pot on a rack in the lower third of the oven and allow it to preheat along with the oven.
 
When the half hour is complete, use heavy pot holders to remove the pot from the oven and uncover it. Gently but quickly slide the bread dough into the pot, shaking the pot a little to distribute it in its ball.
 
Cover the pot and replace it in the oven. Bake for 30 minutes; then uncover the pot and bake for 15 to 30 minutes more, until the bread is a gorgeous brown color. Carefully remove the pot once more and use pot holders or a heat-proof spatula to remove the bread from it. Allow it to cool on a rack.
 
Makes 1 gorgeous, aromatic loaf.
 
Here is the bread without olives (but with more salt and less yeast), also fabulous.

Here is the bread without olives (but with more salt and less yeast), also fabulous.

 

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Blarney Scones

Monday, March 15th, 2010

sodabread web

 
I can’t imagine Saint Patrick’s Day without Irish soda bread. I start baking it around March 1—about the same time the lit-up shamrock goes up on the side of the house–so my family can get into the holiday spirit at breakfast each day.
 
This year we’re eating a slightly healthier version than my usual soda bread, the recipe for which I published last year.
 
I have always made soda bread with white flour, but my neighbor Mary Stuart Cosby urged me to try a brown version, and now I’m hooked. She suggested this recipe, which is adapted from King Arthur Flour.
 
KAF suggests using its Irish-style wholemeal flour, a coarsely ground flour that sounds a bit like old-fashioned American Graham flour. I don’t have any (next year I’ll order some in advance!) so I’ve been using KAF’s white whole-wheat flour. The whole-wheat flour gives the bread a lovely nutty flavor.
 
Of course, the bread would be even healthier if we could resist slathering Kerrygold butter all over it! So far we haven’t been able to make ourselves pursue health to that degree, however.
 
By the way, I must admit that I didn’t make up the name “Blarney Scone.” That honor goes to one of my favorite grocery stores, Trader Joe’s, which is selling small rounds of soda bread under that name this month.
 
lightssh
 
Brown Soda Bread
 
Ingredients:
 
2-1/2 cups whole-wheat flour
1-1/4 cups bread flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) sweet butter, cut into small pieces
1 cup raisins (Mary Stuart suggested cutting them in half to distribute them better; I got lazy and didn’t do this, but I think it’s a good idea)
1-1/3 cups buttermilk
1 egg
 
Instructions:
 
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or a silicone mat.
 
In a bowl combine the flours, the sugar, the baking soda, and the salt. Cut in the butter; then stir in the raisins.
 
In a separate bowl or measuring cup whisk together the buttermilk and the egg. Stir this mixture into the flour just until combined.
 
Divide the dough into two clumps (they will be a little sticky) and knead each one briefly on a lightly floured board until they hold together as balls. Place them on the prepared sheet.
 
Break the bread for 15 minutes; then reduce the heat to 375 and bake for an additional 20 to 25 minutes, until it is golden brown. Makes 2 small loaves.
 
blarneybyselfweb

 

 

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Popovers and a Story for Groundhog Day

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

The Problem web

 
We have made it to winter’s midpoint! Poised between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox, February 2 is Candlemas. This ancient holiday celebrates the longer and brighter hours of daylight we now notice and enjoy.
 
Traditional foods for Candlemas usually contain grain of some sort, in celebration of the stirrings of crops deep beneath the still frozen ground. These foods are also often round and golden to mimic the sun.
 
Last night my family and I enjoyed a winter treat that nicely embodies those criteria—popovers. SOMEWHERE I have my grandmother’s recipe for cheese popovers; I recall that she gently folded 1/4 cup of shredded cheddar cheese into her popovers. We had these at Christmas, and they were lovely.
 
I couldn’t find that recipe this week so instead I used the basic popover formula shared by most cookbooks I have on my shelf, a proportion of 1 cup of of milk and 1 of flour to 2 eggs.
 
Instead of folding the cheese in, I tried sprinkling a bit of cheddar on top of the popover batter. Alas, it fell in a bit, making little holes in most of my popovers. They were still awfully tasty, however, so I wasn’t upset.
 
The recipe appears below. Before we get to it, however, here is a story that celebrates another name for February 2, Groundhog Day. As you know, on this day the groundhog is alleged to wake up from hibernation and peer out of its den to look for its shadow.
 
If the shadow is visible (that is, if the day is sunny), winter will last another six weeks. If not, spring will come early.
 
Where I live in Massachusetts we are ALWAYS guaranteed another six weeks of winter (at least!) on February 2. The holiday retains its appeal, however, and my nephew Michael certainly enjoyed writing about it.
 
He also enjoyed eating the popovers.
 
eatpopweb
 
THE PROBLEM
by Michael Weisblat
 
This is a story of how two groundhogs get mad at each other, fight each other, and fix their problem.
 
One day in a hole two groundhogs are so peaceful and happy. Their names are Michael and Collin.
 
Collin said, “It’s almost Groundhog Day. Who will go up?”
 
Michael answered, “Me. I want to go up!”
 
Collin said, “No, I want to go up!”
 
They both started to argue about who would go first. Then Michael had an idea. “Let’s make the hole of our house wider. Then we could pop out at the same time.”
 
So that’s what they did. They lived happily ever after.
 
THE END
 
P.S. They did not see their shadow.
 
Whether or not you see your shadow today, I hope you enjoy this recipe. Happy Groundhog Day (and Candlemas)………
 
popoversweb
 
Cheese Popovers
 
Ingredients:
 
1 cup milk at room temperature
2 eggs at room temperature
1 tablespoon melted butter
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
freshly ground pepper to taste
1/4 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese (use a little more if you wish, but don’t overdo!)
 
Instructions:
 
In a bowl vigorously whisk together the milk, eggs, and melted butter. Stir in the flour, salt, and pepper. If you wish to add the cheese now, do so gently. Let the mixture sit for 1/2 hour.
 
While the batter is resting preheat the oven to 450 degrees and lightly butter the insides of 9 muffin tins. When the oven has preheated place the tins on a cookie sheet and put them in the oven for a minute or two to preheat.
 
Take the sheet out and quickly fill the muffin tins with the batter. If you have not yet added the cheese, put a small amount in the center of each muffin tin. If you are using a set of 12 muffin tins, be sure to pour a little water in the empty tins to keep them from burning.
 
Put the filled muffin tins back in the oven and bake the popovers for 10 minutes. Turn the oven down to 350 degrees and bake the popovers until they are brown and firm and nicely puffed up—15 to 20 minutes.
 
Do NOT open the oven door to look at the popovers until 15 minutes have passed—unless of course you smell something burning horribly! (This should NOT happen unless your oven thermostat is way off.) If you do, your popovers won’t pop over.
 
Remove the popovers from the oven and serve immediately. Makes 9 popovers.
 
Cheesy Popovers

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