Hattiesburg Fungi

I use to love a particular bread that they sold at wal-mart made by Oraweat called Oat Nut.  It was a wonderful bread with walnuts and sunflower seeds  and I just loved it.   Well, you guessed it, they stooped carrying it.   That’s when I began my quest for the perfect bread recipe.

After a lot of searching and testing different recipes I finally came up with this one and began to modify it until I got it just like the Oraweat Oat Nut bread that I loved so much.

I still fiddle with the recipe from time to time by adding different nuts or substituting whey lefter over from cheese making for the milk and stuff like that but this is it!

We make this about once a week and find it very relaxing and frugal.

You don’t have to add the nuts but we like them in there for that extra bit of crunch.

What you will need:

1.5 lbs bread flour (about 5 cups)
1 tsp active dry yeast
1 tsp salt
4 tsp wheat gluten
1 Tbsp honey
½ cup sunflower seeds
½ cup chopped walnuts
7 oz lukewarm water
7 oz lukewarm milk
1 oz butter at room temperature
flour for dusting
olive oil for greasing bowl

If you have a kitchen aid mixer with the dough hook, use it.

Place first 9 ingredients in mixing bowl with kneading hook and mix for 10 to 12 minutes on lowest speed.

After kneading remove from mixing bowl  and place on floured pastry board and fold and knead a few times.   Shape dough into a ball.

Put a little olive oil in a large glass bowl and wipe around real good with a paper towel.  Wet a kitchen towel, place dough in bowl and cover with damp towel.  Turn just your oven light on and place bowl in over with door closed.  Let dough rise until double in size. I don’t time this but do check on the dough from time to time; its anywhere from 2 – 2 ½ hours at the most. I have gone longer and it still turned out great. This is important, the more it rises the lighter your bread will turn out.

doubled in size

When the dough has doubled in size punch down and remove from bowl and knead for about 1 minute or so.  At this point I like to cut the dough into half  and form into loaves. Put each loaf in a bread pan.   Place bread bans back in oven (on second to lowest rack) and cover very loosely with a wal-mart bag.  Let the dough rise again until the dough is coming over the top of the bread pan and looks like a loaf of bread.  Some experimentation will be needed here depending on the size of your bread pans.

Remove bread from oven and pre-heat oven to 360° F. Now bake bread for about 35 – 40 minutes.  When bread is removed from the pan you should be able to thump on the bottom of the loaf and it have a hollow sound.   Enjoy!

our daily bread

Well we have all the hatches battend down and just waitin.  So, since we are just waitin and they just keep saying the same thing on the TV, its time to cook.  The pantry is full, the water barrels filed, lets cook a ham.

I thought that the Ham would be good to go ahead and cook just incase the electric should go out.   Ham is always good, cold or hot.  And, it makes great sandwiches.  I looked around for some recipes and this is what I came up with.

Cola-Baked Ham With Cherry-Orange Glaze

1 (12 to 15-pound)    fully cooked bone-in ham
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1 (2-liter) bottle Coke-a-cola
3/4 cup cherry preserves or jelly
1/4 cup fresh orange juice
2 tablespoons orange flavored liqueur – (recommended: Grand Marnier)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

Trim rind and excess fat from the ham, leaving a 1/4-inch thick layer of fat. With a sharp knife, score the fat in a diamond pattern. Place the ham in large roasting pan and sprinkle with the allspice. Pour the cola into the pan and bake uncovered 1 hour and 15 minutes, basting every 15 minutes with the pan juices.

Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, combine the cherry preserves, orange juice, and liqueur over medium heat and cook, stirring, until melted, 1 to 2 minutes.
Remove the ham from the oven and brush the top and sides with the cherry glaze. Return the ham to the oven and bake, brushing with pan juices and glaze every 15 minutes and tenting the ham with foil if browning too quickly, until an instant-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part of ham without touching the bone registers 140 degrees F, about 15 to 30 minutes.

Remove the ham from oven and let rest for 30 minutes to 1 hour before slicing. Serve warm or at room temperature, thinly sliced, with biscuits or dinner rolls and mustard to make sandwiches.

Nutritional facts (daily value): Calories 33kcal; Protein 1g (1%); Total Fat 0g (0%)(Sat. 0g (0%)); Chol. 0mg (0%); Carb. 8g (3%); Fiber 1g (2%); Sugars 5g; Calcium 20mg (2%); Iron 0mg (1%)
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Exported from Shop’NCook Pro 3.4.3 (http://www.shopncook.com)

I wasn’t able to find the cherry jelly so I used a can of pie cherries and put them through the food processor for a second.

Here it is!

Oh Yeah Babe!

Now dadts a ham

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lets talk desert!

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Moms are so great.  She knows I love German Choclate cake and I personally thinks hers is the best in the world. Of course you have to have a cold glass of milk to go with it.   I dont normally eat desert after diner, at least not right after diner; but I made an exception for this one. Tell me this doesn’t say it all!

Got Milk?