Yeast
 Matt H
 Class 8
 The yeast breads were very fun to make. We made pizza. We also made rolls (Or attempted to). Another thing we made were pretzels. The rolls turned into one solid piece of bread. The pizza was grilled before it was baked. The pizza was really delicious. We also made our own sauce. The sauce was my favorite part of the pizza. The pretzels we made were also very good. We put them in water with baking soda. Then after that we put them in the oven. My pretzels had salt on them. The only bad part of the pretzels was the cleaning up part. The rolls were by far the worst yeast meal we had. Mixing the dough, we grabbed a bowl that was too small for it. It almost overflowed. Then it went smooth until the baking. We were able to make the rolls effectively and put them onto the pan. The only problem was we didn't space them out enough. When we started to bake them, they all combined into one solid piece of bread. The rolls were a failure, but we were still able to make bread.
  

Emily Toby Ms. Hoagland Culinary 1, Class 8 November 17, 2013 Yeast Breads “From where I stood, the field stretched west to the bluish ridge of the Coast Range, a shimmering blonde avenue of lawn. If you stand in a wheat field at this time of year, a few weeks before harvest, it's not hard to imagine you’re looking at something out of mythology: all this golden sunlight brought down to earth, captured in kernels of gold, and rendered fit for morals to eat. But of course this is no myth at all, just the plain miraculous fact” (Pollan 289). Thus ends the chapter on bread in Michael Pollan’s wonderful book, Cooked. During this unit, we explored different types of yeast bread and different methods of cooking them. Two recipes we prepared were soft pretzels and rolls. They were polar opposites in success; the pretzels were beautiful and tasted delicious, and the rolls turned out unattractive but yummy. The rolls became unappealing when we took the plastic wrap off. We should have taken it off right after they came out of the refrigerator, but we waited until just before we put them in the oven. The dough stuck to the plastic, revealing the bubbly, airy surface underneath. When we baked them, they weren’t smooth and round, but blob shaped and varying thicknesses. However, they still tasted delicious, especially with butter and jam! The pretzels were more successful. We cooked these differently than the other yeast breads; first boiling them in two quarts of water and ½ cup of baking powder, then letting them bake completely in the oven. Afterwards, we drizzled them in butter and cinnamon sugar, and they came out delicious. It was my favorite bread we prepared this unit.

The yeast unit was one of my favorites. Everything we made was really good. The pizza was good especially since we made our own sauce. The dough was also fun to make since we got to knead it ourselves. Cooking the dough on the grill made it taste really good even thought I burnt myself at least five times. The pretzels were even better. They tasted just as good as Auntie Anne's. It was cool to make then dough and roll them into the shape. I always thought it was so complicated to roll them into the pretzel shape. When we let the dough sit over night it rose and they became really fluffy and airy. My group baked ours to perfection and they were so good. The final thing we made in the yeast unit was bread. It wasn't my favorite of the three thought came out really good even though the dough stuck to the plastic wrap. My group was still able to salvage a few rounded pieces of bread. The bread definitely had a yeast taste but it wasn't too strong. The bread was really good with jam and was crunchy on the outside and moist on the inside.

The yeast unit went well for the most part. The recipes all came out the right way and tasted delicious except for the rolls. Although the rolls tasted good they ended up not really being rolls. Overnight the rolls rose and touched the plastic wrap that was covering them. When we pulled the plastic wrap off the dough stuck to it and also the rolls stuck to each other. When we took them out of the oven the dough was one big piece. It was not a problem however. The recipe for the rolls was very simple, it was only four ingredients that all got mixed together to make the dough. We did not have a problem with making the dough. The grilled pizza was one of the best things that we have made this year. In the first class we made the dough and sauce and the next class we grilled the dough with olive oil and then added sauce and cheese and then baked it. My dough got stuck to the pan so it was a weird shape but it still tasted good. We made soft pretzels by making the dough and then boiling them for about 30 seconds in water with baking soda. After that we put them in the oven. When they came out we brushed them with melted butter and put cinnamon and sugar on. They were delicious and cooked perfectly. Overall the yeast unit was delicious and we all learned lessons about how to store and handle dough. Camden F.

Overall, I would say that the quick bread unit was successful and interesting. We learned a lot about how yeast will affect different products. The first quick bread we made was pizza dough. In this recipe we allowed the yeast to bloom in warm water, and “activate”. We then added other ingredients such as flour, salt, and baking powder. After we mixed the dough we put it on a floured surface and kneaded it until it was no longer sticky and had a uniform consistency. The dough was placed in the refrigerator overnight and when we took it out the next day, we found that it had risen substantially. After each rolling out the dough, we brushed a little bit of olive oil on it and put it on the grill. It firmed up and became the perfect base for sauce and cheese. The next quick bread we made was soft pretzels. This process was a little bit more difficult that the pizza, but still fun and interesting. We started off the same way as the pizza dough by letting the yeast bloom/activate in warm water, and then added the other ingredients. But this time, the dough was very sticky and we wound up having to add an extra two cups of flour than what the recipe instructed. We learned that temperature and humidity play a large roll when making quick breads. Also, when making the pretzel dough, instead of using a mixing bowl and wooden spoon, we used an electric mixer, which made it easier to create a uniform consistency. The hardest part about making the pretzels was shaping the dough. We rolled out “worms” of dough, made it into a “U” shape then twisted the top and folded it over. It was a tedious process and hard to get the pretzels to look aesthetically pleasing. We wound up having to put the pretzels into the refrigerator overnight and covered them with saran wrap. They rose so much that we had to re-roll each pretzel the next day. To cook the pretzels we boiled them in water with baking soda. It was crucial to add the baking powder to the boiling water and not pretzel dough. We boiled them for 30 seconds and then put them on a buttered baking sheet. We baked them in the oven for 8 minutes. We finished them off with melted butter, cinnamon and sugar. Even though we had minor issues, the end result was successful and the pretzels turned out very well. Our final quick bread was a “no-knead” sourdough bread. For this recipe we combined all the dry ingredients including yeast and then added water to the dry mixture. We combined the ingredients in a mixing bowl with a wooden spoon. Our mixture was too moist so we had to add a couple more cups of flour. On a floured surface, we formed balls of dough by pushing and pulling the pieces of dough using the traction of the wooden table to make them smooth. This was a very difficult process. We then covered the bread with saran wrap again and let the bread sit for another day before baking. The day we were to make the bread, it had been warming on top of the oven and had risen a lot so most of the individual balls stuck together forming a “blob” of bread. We didn’t have time to recreate the balls/rolls, and so we baked them as is in the oven. In the end the bread had a good taste and consistency but did not look aesthetically pleasing. Overall, I enjoyed the quick bread unit and feel that over time, our quick bread skills will continue to improve. Celia G

Broccoli Blue Cheese Soup For the Stock unit we first started learning about how to make stocks then we started learning about the different techniques needed. We learned that sweating vegetables when you put vegetables in a fat over low heat that eventually allows them to release moisture. Also mirepoix is chopped vegetables and herbs that you can add to stock to add different colors, flavors and nutrients. For our first soup we made broccoli blue cheese soup. Our soup had a nourishing element of broccoli and blue cheese which was the most important ingredient in our stock. First we started with a pot and putting out bouquet garni and we let that simmer then we put in our liquid and after adding other ingredients we let it sit. After that we then pureed it and lastly put our garnish on top. If I were to make this soup again I would like to correct my errors by tasting everything as we go to make sure we have enough of each ingredient so that it could add certain textures and flavors. In our broccoli blue cheese soup it said to add a certain amount of blue cheese but we only did half of it and it ended up tasting just like broccoli which wasent suppose to happen. In our second soup, we experimented. We took potatoes and chopped them into medium size rectangles then we diced carrots, jalapeno, and onions. We put our chicken stock into a pot and then through in the carrots and potatos. We applied the mirepoix technique. While that was happening we then went on and sauted the onions and jalapenos until they were crispy and tender and then we added them to the rest of the stock. Then after our stock cooked for a bit we then pureed it and added the finishing touches. - Leah C.

Making stock is new to me. I don’t do too much cooking at home. After making the stock and researching recipes that used chicken stock as the base I realized how important stock can be for cooking. I learned how nourishing elements was a key to the flavor of the liquid. So was the mirepoix and the boquet garni. I enjoyed learning and making the stock along with making the soup. I learned how the nourishing elements helped flavor it by simmering it for a while the straining everything out at the end with a chinois. My group and I had fun chopping all of the vegetables for the stock also for the soup we made with the stock. It smelled so good especially with so many people making stocks at once. Butchering the chicken was fun since I was the only one in my group that would even touch it. It was much easier than I thought. I learned the difference between stock and broth as well. They always seemed to me to be the same thought I learned that a stock is more of a watery based liquid and the solids are strained out. A broth is less watery and not all of the solids including meat and vegetables are strained out. -Tommy E