A Noble Quest – Good Bread Flour @ a Good Price, in the South

Now that I’m settled in my winter enclave, I’m ready to start baking again – Task one, go out and find some “real” flour for bread.  Non-bakers will not understand that the stuff sold at the local grocery simply won’t make superior bread, and frankly, I’m not going to apply all I know about baking to a loaf that I know won’t be as good as it should be simply because of using a mediocre flour – it’s amazing how much of a difference a good flour can make in home baking!

So I took myself down to the local Publix -where shopping is a pleasure- to  see what they might have.  Now, Publix is Florida’s upscale major food market – everyone knows the prices are a little higher, but also know that the quality will be better too – so I fully expected that I’d find a few upscale brands of flour – and I did.  Publix carries King Arthur flours, a superior flour, but at a superior price ($3.89 for 5 lbs).  I bought it, but I wasn’t happy.

A King Arthur Sourdough Loaf Baked in a Dutch Oven

Now, I’ve been spoiled – back home, I get my flour at a restaurant supply store – superior bread flour for about $23 for 50 lbs – good flour/good price!  So I tried the local restaurant supply places here – each one I checked had the same policy – no sales to the general public, only other businesses.  Even Costco struck out, since all their flour offerings were bleached, and I simply won’t use a bleached flour for my baking.  Southern commercial conspiracy!

But Florida also seems to have more “discount” stores than out west – these often serve as outlets for merchandise that’s outdated, damaged, or just old.  Food is often an offering, and although the prices are often super cheap, there’s often a good reason for that fact – so it’s clearly, “Buyer Beware”.  I just happened to pop in to one of these stores in the neighborhood,  mostly because they had a sign out front that said, “Flour – $1.49/10 lbs.”.  As I entered, I encountered a huge stack of 10 lb. bags of Eagle Mills All Purpose Flour with Ultragrain.  Frankly, I had expected a no-name brand, or at best, a name brand with an issue.  But, Eagle Mills is a respected brand -howbeit, a member of the Continental Mills family, one of the minor players in the food conglomerate industry- so I bit and got a bag to try.

Back at the house, I did a quick and dirty web research and discovered that Ultragrain is a current Con Agra project, and is a relatively new (2007) development of a new hard white wheat grain coupled with a new milling process that grinds the whole grain more finely.  Ultragrain is generally not used by itself, but is usually blended with a white flour, as in this case with the Eagle Mills All Purpose Flour.  The result is a flour which looks much like a white flour but which retains all the qualities and nutrition of a whole wheat.  Because of the finer texture, it does not suffer the gluten degradation to the extent that regular whole wheat does, and therefore proofs much like a regular all purpose flour.  Additionally, although it looks and acts much as a ordinary all purpose flour, its protein and fiber counts are higher than regular white flour, making it a worthy replacement for AP for many baking purposes.  It apparently has received a warm welcome in the baking community, and its commercial applications are increasing rapidly.

I haven’t used this flour for any baking yet, but I sure will very soon – and I’ll certainly be back here with the results when I do.  But, of course, the jury is still out on just why this respected product is showing up in a food “after-market”.  I do a lot of shopping in these places and I know that there’s always a reason why a product is there.  Sometimes it’s just junk and cheap – lots of folks have a taste for this stuff, but I give it a pass.  Sometimes quality brands show up because they are outdated, have been damaged in some way, or have been discontinued - and rather than just trash them, the manufacturer chooses to unload them in the food aftermarket, where it’s unlikely his regular customers will notice.  It is at this level that I often find the best offerings, and the shopper needs to be alert to the manufacturer’s motivations – if the manufacturer is protecting the good name of a high quality product, he may choose to pull it from the shelves early, and unload it to the discounters, while it still has a reasonable shelf life.  It’s my hope that’s what’s happening here.  The “sell by” date on my Eagle Mills Ultragrain flour is July, ‘10, which for a whole grain flour is reasonable and would indicate that the manufacturer is being ultra-cautious, or perhaps this product is about to be discontinued.

I’ll know a lot more after I bake with it – I’ll let you know.

A Yeast For the Road

Have I ever mentioned how much I love to drive?  Yup, I do – often think that if things hadn’t worked out the way they did for me (I’m a very fatalistic individual, but not of the religious ilk; more along the lines of “making your own good luck”!), I may have become an over-the-road truck driver.  So, from that perspective, I loved the 9 day trip we just took.  But, unfortunately, my body doesn’t agree – it may take me another 9 days to recuperate!

But -thank god- that’s over.  And now I can start re-learning how to get around the city (Jacksonville FL – hereafter called Jax).  It’s simply amazing to me how someone could spend almost 15 years in a place, and then forget all about the physical layout to the point of not being able to remember much at all.  For those of you who are too young to know this first hand, just let me suggest that it ain’t such a shock to old folks!  I have found a great way to bring it all back, though – using Google Maps, and simply dropping in to any location with a zoom view, and then moving down a once familar street – and it amazingly rushes back into your brain!  Great fun too.

I like Google Maps for this better than Mapquest (although in all honesty, because I had problems editing my trip schedule in Mapquest, and had to switch to Google Maps early on, I don’t remember if Mapquest’s zoom view includes area businesses as Google Maps does (No, it doesn’t) – I’m quite sure this is another way Google makes more money, but in my case, it sure did add a specificity that made the task easy to remember.

Well, of course, I brought my sourdough starter along on this adventure, and fully intended to refresh it regularly – But … it got lost in the packing glut, and only 10 days later did I open the lid – of course it looked terrible – slack, dull, and paste like – I feared the worst – for the first two days of refreshing, there was no activity at all – but day three I started to see a few bubbles.  And the next day, it absolutely exploded into full life and pungent aroma – if anything, I think it’s better for the experience!  Actually, I don’t think we bakers fully understand just how hearty those sourdough yeasts and bacteria truly are!  Welcome back Grapplestein.

I’m going to be moving into cooking/baking high gear soon, as I’m starting to run out of immediate tasks, and I’ll be looking for entertainment – and I intend to introduce Melanie -our local hostess and daughter- to a few of the low labor but highly delicious breads that can be done with sourdough.  Her job is such that she doesn’t have a lot of spare time to play in the kitchen as I do – but as we know, many of the long fermenting sourdough loaves are perfect for a “set and forget” approach – so we’ll start with those.

Before signing off today, I want to introduce you to Oliver, our Granddog.  He’s a handsome, if overweight brute, but the perfect guarantee of personal and property security that every young single gal needs when living in the big city.  Yes, he’s sometimes a bit noisy when he’s doing his job, but that’s a small price to pay for the good feeling of security that Oliver brings.  Although once he knows you, he’s a great and obedient dog friend, I’d hate to be on the wrong end of his wrath!

Good Doggie.

A Journey To America’s Culinary Wonderland

Five days on the road can do bad things to your body.  We left early on Sunday morning from home, and averaged 10 hours driving a day – that really wasn’t smart.  We had agreed early on that we’d take it slow and easy every day, no matter how long it took to get to Jacksonville, Florida, where we’ll be spending a few months with our daughter, Melanie.  I really don’t know what happened to that plan.  I think I got caught up in the effort of scheduling our nightly stops in interesting places, and frankly, you just can’t do much of that on I-10 through Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas – so the eventual scheduling stretched out our initial plan for 400 mile days, until at last we had days averaging almost 600 miles or more.

Not good.

But, we were smart about one thing – we scheduled a rest period after day 5 – specifically, 3 days in Lafayette, Louisiana, an area which I humbly consider one of America’s prime eating territories – so here we are, resting away in our Priceline secured enclave of the Lafayette Hilton, and spending most of our time either conked out, or catching up on email, or deciding which fantastic restaurant to go to this time.

There is a basic problem with going somewhere for the specific purpose of having lots of good food – it’s the “cruise ship” dilemma, where they simply keep offering you more and more eating opportunities to indulge – I’ve seen some ships with 8 separate times set up for eating – it’s simply humanly impossible to eat that many times a day, unless of course you pick one or two choice bits, and stop – but if faced with a table full of exotically temping delights, how many folks can only eat one or two?  And the richer the food, the quicker the onset of cruise ship dilemma.

I haven’t been here one full yet, and I’m already sated to the point where I couldn’t face the prospect of eating lunch today!  This is due to having had two very rich -much Cajun/Creole food is uber rich- and very satisfying meals since arriving – and only a fool would risk forcing down another rich lunch and not being ready and able to enjoy the next dinner opportunity.

But, it’s still painful to be in the land of fantastic foods, and not be able to rise to the challenge of the opportunity.  Makes you wonder if the “Feast and Purge” advocates might not be on to something we simply don’t understand!

Our dinner choice last night was a place called the Cafe Vermillionville, and I choose it for two reasons – one, because it has a wonderful reputation, especially with locals, and second, because many years ago when driving through a residential section of Lafayette, looking at all the old Victorian places, I pulled into a parking lot to read the map and get my bearings – as I looked up, I noticed a very old and beautiful building with a long porch stretching across the front – the building had what they call “character”, and the only indication of the nature of its character was a small sign at the corner of the parking lot stating, “Cafe Vermillionville”.  At that moment I promised myself that someday I’d return to have a meal at that restaurant – and now I’ve kept that promise.

Vermillionville was one of the first settlements in the Lafayette area, and the Cafe Vermillionville  has the look of a period plantation house, which I’d bet it was.  Historians date the house from 1835 using period documents, but since their documentation only starts in 1835, there is an assumption that the actual age of the house is older still, perhaps as old as 1800.  The dining room was originally the open air, but roofed kitchen, with a huge open fireplace in the center of the interior brick wall – the fireplace is open on two sides, and I’d also bet that this dual feature (heating and cooking) dates from the original construction – the original exterior brick is evident on two of the dining room walls, and is striking.

It perhaps will come as no surprise to know that I was looking forward to making a choice for this meal which might help to bring closure to my long held anticipation about the Cafe Vermillionville, and our server immediately gave me that perfect opportunity – as he presented our menus, he told us of the evening’s specials, and one was a dish which apparently was put together by the chef, and which could only be described by its parts – this is how our server described it:  “This is fried soft shelled crawfish served over blackened puppy drumfish, and all topped with lump crab in a cream sauce”.  I only needed to hear this description to know that this would be the perfect closure for my personal promise.

Now, crawfish are not really common -perhaps in Louisiana a bit more common than elsewhere- but soft shelled crawfish?  I have long believed that soft shelled crabs are perhaps the finest of all seafoods, and I knew this was a unique experience that I should not let pass me by – I ordered it, and I was not disappointed.  Later, while discussing the meal with our server, he stated that he’d never seen these served at the restaurant!  What then, fate?

The dish was beautifully presented, and an almost overwhelming splash of flavors – underneath everything I found a base of dirty rice, which easily held its own among all the other unique flavors – I also found a dozen small green beans, cooked to a crisp but tender perfection.  All considered, it was a dish of dreams, and closure as well.

Rich?  Oh yes.  However if missing a lunch in wonderland is the only price to pay to enjoy fully my next meal of perfection, it’s a price I’ll gladly pay.

A New Year – New Adventures

Those of us who live in the Pacific Northwest generally are in agreement that our winters are the worst time of the year – some of us even spend bookoodles of time scheming just how we can make a dash out of here for at least part of the gloomy season.  We used to drive down to the west coast of Mexico, where the weather is simply delightful this time of year – but each year we could see that the drug problem was getting worse and worse, and then our retirement investments went south as well, and we just put everything in limbo – until now, that is.

Our daughter, Melanie, still lives in Jacksonville, Florida, and she has kindly invited us to visit this winter, and to stay at her house for a month or so.  And so, even though our investments are still on-hold, we decided to jump in the car (a 2004 Hyundai Santa Fe) and to slowly trek across the country for a winter sojourn – we’re busy packing up, and we plan to leave this Sunday.

For the next couple of months, this blog will change complexion – I’ll still continue my interest in bread baking, and food prep -I’m taking my sourdough starter with me, of course- but I’ll be injecting some travel stories in as well – should be fun!

I’ve always been a good travel planner – and I’ve always known that I enjoyed the experience of planning probably more than I enjoyed the reality of the travel itself (fantasy will always trump reality, right?).  As we discussed this trip, we decided that we’d take it slow and easy, and work our love of eating into the trip – so, for the last month, I’ve been busy researching the route of our slow trek, our likely stopover points, and the best restaurants in those areas.  Of course, the web is a fantastic tool for this, and I took on the challenge of using Priceline to put together our lodging itinerary – I love this kind of stuff!

We’re breaking the trip up into 400-500 mile chunks – I think that’s a comfortable pace - you don’t have to get up before dawn, and you still have plenty of time each night for a nice dinner.  However, it does put you at the mercy of chance – for instance, our Day 2 chunk puts us in the Palm Springs area of California at day’s end.  This is not prime traveler’s rest county!  But if you go any further, you’re in deep desert wasteland (we don’t get the appeal of Quartzsite, and all those RVs parked out in the desert – ???) -  with overpriced, neglected motels, and only fast food stops until you hit Phoenix.

But I think we may have lucked out in Palm Springs – we got a Marriott Courtyard for $46 – lucky!  The danger of bidding Priceline in Palm Springs is the fear of being upgraded to a resort, and then being charged a “resort fee”, which can sometimes add $20-$30 to your sleep-over!  I think upgrades on Priceline are one of the traps of using Priceline, because often, a 3 star hotel is not better than a 2 star – it just may have an on-site restaurant and an unused pool out in the parking lot!  If you want to get educated in the smart and efficient use of Priceline, try using Bidding for Travel – spend a few hours here before you ever make your first Priceline bid, and you’ll avoid a costly mistake or two.

We’ll be slowing down as we slip through Texas, in the interest of sampling several of our nation’s most respected BBQ sources, namely this one – and then we get to Louisiana.  This is, in my humble opinion, the epicenter of America’s best food!  I have eaten in a lot of different places across our nation, and I simply have always felt that my most memorable meals have been in southern Louisiana.  We’ll center ourselves in Lafayette for three days and explore the Bayou country with day trip adventures.  I think we were fortunate to get the Lafayette Hilton on Priceline for $39 a night, a sign that the recession is not treating the travel industry well.  However, this fact will not diminish our pleasure while in Lafayette, and I’m sure I’ll be passing on a story or two of our eating adventures.

With all eager anticipation, we enter the final days of packing up, and readying ourselves for the trip – we’ll check in with you along the way.

‘Tis the Season for Labors of Love

One of the things I dearly miss about our winter sojourns to Mexico is the tamale vendor, who would, daily, slowly roll down the street in his pickup, selling chicken and shrimp tamales from two huge plastic containers in the open bed of his truck – his imminent arrival was always broadcast by his recorded and outrageously amplified voice repeating without-end what I can only guess was an announcement of whatever he was selling that day.  Mexico is a land of noise!  And apparently, that’s just the way Mexicans like it.

Our ventures SOB would take us to the west coast of Nayarit state, namely to a tiny fishing village of Chacala, which is rapidly, as we speak, turning into Mexico’s newest vacation paradise creation – Sad.

But Nayarit, because of its extensive coastal estuaries (what the ignorant often call, swamps!), has become Mexico’s primary shrimp producer – the estuaries are turned into huge shrimp farms, and making Mexico a world leader in the production of farmed shrimp.  So, it is not difficult to find inexpensive shrimp anywhere in Nayarit, as little as $2 a pound for medium shrimp (with heads on, which to me is a plus).  And so, shrimp tamales, which one will find almost nowhere else in Mexico, are commonplace here.  And deliciously so.

I had often seen, in the little village groceries, large baskets of dried shrimp, but I never really knew what they were used for.  But last trip down, I decided to bring back some, and upon arriving home, to do some research to discover just how they were to be used.  What I discovered was that the dried shrimp are primarily used to make shrimp stock, which is then used in soups and such, and to all flavor to things like shrimp tamalies – over time, I’ve combined several recipes into my own adaption that we think is better than even the most delicious shrimp tamales we’ve had in Chacala.

But before I give you the recipe, I think I need to have a tamale discussion with you – then, if you still want to make them, have at it.  First off, a fact that we here in the U.S. seem unaware of – in Mexico, tamales means more than one; tamal refers to a single one – OK, just so you know.  Second, these look like easy things to make – they are not!  Tamales are challenging to make well (see the Notes following the recipe below) - Yes, there are many ways to slap-dash them together, but each shortcut will take a bit more deliciousness away until they are not worth making or eating.  My suggestion is to make them correctly first, then if you want to experiment on shortcuts, go ahead and try.

Tamales have become a ceremonial food in Mexico -and all of Central America- even though they represent one of the most traditional of foods.  They far out-date the history of tortillas, and if they were easier to make, I think they’d probably replace the taco as the staple it is.  But given their nature, they appear most often at Christmas time, during All Saints celebrations, and on Sundays in many restaurants, where their popularity outweighs their challenging nature to make – they are a labor of love.  You will, almost never, find them offered in U.S. Mexican restaurants, and when you do, they likely won’t be worth eating.

Think you’re up to it?  Here’s my version.

Shrimp Tamales

Ingredients:

• 1 oz dried shrimp (if you can’t find these, use all chicken broth)
• 1 cup of very hot water
• 1/2 cup of strong chicken broth, warm
• 1/2 – 1 lb raw shrimp
• 2 cups dry masa
• 1/2 cup of lard, at room temp (Yes, shortening could sub here, but there is some loss of flavor)
• 2 tsp salt
• 1.5 tsp baking powder
• 1 small can of whole green mild chiles, cut into strips (optional)
• 1/4 lb of a firm white cheese, like Monterey Jack, cut into strips (optional)
• Enough corn husks to make 16-20 tamales – (or you could use baker’s parchment)

Procedure:

• Grind the dried shrimp in a blender jar to a powder.
• Pour very hot water over the dried shrimp powder, and let soak for about an hour.
• Strain the soaking shrimp mixture and discard the solids.
• Mix the chicken broth and the shrimp broth together and keep warm.
• Heat a large pot of water to a boil, remove from heat, and add the corn husks – allow to soak until soft and pliable, about 30 minutes to an hour.
• Using a stand mixer with the paddle, (this step is actually a bit easier with the whip beater, but you’ll have to switch to the paddle when you add the masa – so I use the paddle all the way) beat the lard until it’s light and airy, about 5 minutes – it will be necessary to stop the mixer and scrape down the sides several times while doing this.
• Now add the salt and baking powder to the dry masa – mix well.
• Add about a 1/4 cup of the masa mix, and a 1/4 cup of warm broth, alternately, with the mixer running at low speed – when all is mixed in, the dough should be pulling away from the sides of the bowl, but be very moist as well.
• Now take a piece of corn husk, or baker’s parchment, and depending on how large the piece is, place a tablespoon or two of the masa dough in the center.
• Depending on how large, or how small your shrimp are (you may use whole, half, or chopped shrimp), place some on top of the masa dough – if you using green chiles, add a strip here, and if you using cheese, add a strip of that as well.
• Take another tablespoon or two of dough, flatten in your hand, and place on top of the fillings – roll the sides of the husk over the fillings, and fold the ends of the tamal over (you may tie each one closed, or simply let their tight packing in the steamer hold them closed – your choice! – I don’t tie).
• Pack them into your steamer device – the ideal packing method is on end – but if your steamer is not high enough for that, you may lay them flat (I use the flat pack, and even go two high, but I’d advise against packing too tightly that the steam couldn’t get to all sections of the steamer.).
• Depending on your steamer device, the time will vary, anywhere from 1 hour to 2.5 hours! You’ll just need to check periodically to see if they’re done – at the end of an hour, pull a tamal from the side, and one from the middle of your steamer, and open each – when they’re done, the dough will easily pull away from the sides of the husk, and the tamal will hold its form well – if they are mushy and soft looking, give them another ½ hour, then test again – in my big Thai steamer, they take 1.5 hours.

Notes:

• Don’t shortcut the whipping of the lard or shortening – this is a pain in the ass, but it is critical to lightness and body of the tamal – the idea is to whip air into the lard, and the whip attachment does this better than the paddle, but is more difficult to clean off.
• You have many options in the choice of shrimp – if you have small or medium size, you can use them whole – if you have large shrimp, you may halve them or chop them – or you may use the tiny salad shrimp, which work well, even though they are cooked, and often are the most inexpensive of all choices.
• As you mix in the dry masa and liquid, be careful not to have your liquid too warm – if the liquid is too hot, it’ll start to melt the whipped lard, which will ruin the structure of the tamales.
• You may make your tamales as large as you wish – the size of the wrapper is your only limitation.

Traditionally, these are eaten without sauce – but if you want to use a sauce, have at it.  I like to serve them with a salad, and rice and beans – and I make beans quickly by opening a can of pintos or black beans, and adding them to a saute of onion, garlic, and chopped tomato, with a pinch or two of ground coriander, rather than the more mundane Mexican spices such as cumin or chili.

Now invent some reason to celebrate and enjoy.