I was in Orlando a bit ago for some technology training for work, but before I left, I wanted to make Kristin some black eyed peas. For those of you who haven’t been following a long, slow arc southward, black eyed peas are not really peas, but beans. And when a southerner speaks of making black eyed peas, she’s going to do a heck of a lot more than boil them.
The recipe my bud John told me was roughly, ” oil, Cajun trinity, andouille sausage, garlic, salt pepper, bay leaf, ham hocks, a bag o’ peas, some stock, cook for an hour, hour and a half.” Now, it’s not really necessary, but I thought it would be rad to make some pork stock for this, and I just so happened to have some rib bones I saved from some past gorging… So here it is:
It smelled awesome. Stay tuned for more details on the black eyed peas.
By Matt Good
on January 23, 2011 at 12:15 am
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Posted in Food Talk, Foodporn
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Tagged beans, black eyed peas, dinner, homemade, pork, real food, soup, soup beans, stock, tips_and_tricks
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So I have recently been experimenting with some higher hydrated doughs. Normally the breads I make are somewhere around 60%-70% hydration. This mean there is 60% of water to flour. For example in a 500 gram loaf I would have 310 grams of flour and 185 grams of water. The texture of a 60% hydrated dough is nice, it is slightly sticky but easily comes off your hands and the bowl. It is easy to form into a dough and knead. It is slightly softer than the play-dough you played with as a kid. The crumb on this type of dough tends to be tight and uniform. Perfect with a pad of butter and good for sandwiches. The bread you see above is closer to 90% hydration. It was a sticky wet mess and ended up being this beautiful focaccia.
I used this recipe http://veganyumyum.com/2008/05/poolish-focaccia/ I added garlic from a garlic press, sliced tomatoes and sea salt to the top. It ended up being great and you would do yourself a favor by trying your hand at it. (I didn’t use the full cup of olive oil for the top, only about 1/3 of cup)
In highly hydrated dough you get more of that artisan look, with large bubbles and un-uniform crumbs. They are pretty bread and the textures tend to be soft and chewy. The downside is they are pain to handle. They don’t really form into dough and instead you have to try some other techniques to make them into bread. One technique that is used in this recipe is folding. Folding and waiting allows the gluten to develop on its own as the flour continues to absorb the water and it hydrates. The gentle folding allows it to continue to stretch like you do when you knead. Some people don’t like this method because you end up using a lot of bench flour and flour that doesn’t get entirely incorporated is noticed. Additionally, as you add more flour you reduce the hydration and there is no exact way of knowing what hydration you end up at with this method. I just found this method which I think is called a french fold and looks fantastic.
I am going to try this next. See if it works. Since my last post I also have made beautiful sourdough loafs. The secret to a great crust on sourdough, a spray bottle at the beginning and middle of the baking process. The more I make bread the more I realize this simple fact: flour+water+time+yeast=yum.
Bean broth?
I was reading this recipe for Drunken Beans from my favorite food porn radio show, The Splendid Table, and I got myself all confuserlated. It calls for four cups of cooked beans, in their broth. I guessed correctly that the broth means “liquid you cooked the things in, dummy,” but was confused by the absence of any sort of quantity. I guess whatever fills in the cracks of 4 cups of beans. But I wasn’t sure, so I did some Googling.
And came across this fascinating article about bean broths or bean stocks on a site called Culinate. The article takes the idea of a bean stock to a more elevated level, suggesting that perhaps you add in some carrots, onions, bay leaves, and the like to the beans while they cook, as if you were making a more conventional vegetarian stock.
This is a real win, guys. A twofer. While you’re making beans for a recipe, you can add a few more ingredients (with no extra work), and end up with more flavorful beans, and a delicious, useful, and unknown byproduct! Fantastic. Again, measure out the stuff into bags and freeze for later.
I’m going to have to start reading Culinate, I think…
In the words of Pepin, Happy Cooking.
By Matt Good
on March 15, 2010 at 6:35 pm
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Posted in Food Talk, Try This Now
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Tagged beans, Food Talk, health, herbs, homemade, real food, soup, stock, tips_and_tricks, vegetables
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