Common Sense in the Household 46

Common Sense in the Household 46

Novices in bread-making, and many who should have learned better by

long experience, fall into a sad mistake in the consistency of the

dough. It should be mixed as _soft as it can be handled_. Bread will

rise sooner and higher, be lighter and more digestible, and keep fresh

much longer, if this rule be followed. Stiff bread is close in texture,

often waxy to the teeth, and after a day or so becomes very hard.

 

Set the dough to rise in a moderately warm place, and keep it in an

even temperature. There is force in the old lament—“My bread took cold,

last night.” Cold arrests the process of fermentation. There is a

chance, should this occur, that a removal to a more genial atmosphere

and careful nursing may cure the congestion, should it be only partial.

Too much heat carries forward the work too rapidly. In this case,

you will find your dough puffy and sour. Correct the latter evil by

dissolving a little soda or saleratus in hot water, and working it well

in.

 

Knead your bread faithfully and from all sides, until it rebounds like

india-rubber after a smart blow of the fist upon the centre of the mass.

 

The oven should not be too hot. If you cannot hold your bare arm within

it while you count thirty, it is too quick. Keep the heat steady after

the bread goes in. Too much fire at first, and rapidly cooling, produce

the effect upon the bread which is technically called “slack-baked,”

_i. e._, the inside of the loaf is never properly done. Practice

and intelligent observation will, in time, make you an adept in the

management of your ovens. If the bread rises rapidly while baking, and

the crust begins to form before the lower part of the loaf is baked,

cover the top with clean paper until you are ready to brown it.

 

Grate away the burned portions of the crust, should there be such. This

is better than chipping with a knife. One of the best bread-makers I

know bakes in round pans, each loaf by itself, and grates the whole

outer surface, top, bottom, and sides, quickly and lightly, toning down

the brown to a uniform and pleasing tint. Tilt your loaves upon the

edge, the lower part resting upon the table, the upper supported by the

wall or other upright object, and throw a coarse dry cloth over them

until they cool. This position allows the air to get at all sides, and

prevents “sweating.” A tin bread-box is best, with a cloth at bottom

and enwrapping the loaves.

 

 

YEAST (_Hop._) ✠

 

4 large potatoes, or six small.

2 quarts cold water.

Double handful hops, tied in a coarse muslin bag.

4 tablespoonfuls flour.

2 tablespoonfuls white sugar.

 

Peel the potatoes, and put them with the hop-bag into a saucepan

containing two quarts cold water. Cover and boil until the potatoes

break and fall apart. Take these out with a perforated skimmer, leaving

the water still boiling, mash them fine with a potato-beetle, and work

in the flour and sugar. Moisten this gradually with the _boiling_

hop tea, stirring it to a smooth paste. When all the tea has been

mixed in, set it aside to cool. While still slightly warm, add four

tablespoonfuls of lively yeast, and turn all into a large open vessel

to “work.” Keep this in a warm place until it ceases to bubble up, or

until next day. In summer it will work well in a few hours. When quite

light, put in earthen jars with small mouths, in which fit corks, or

bottle it, and remove to ice-house or cellar. It will keep good for a

fortnight—longer in winter.

 

When you wish to use it for baking, send a small vessel to the cellar

for the desired quantity, and re-cork at once. A half-hour in a hot

kitchen may spoil it.

 

 

YEAST (_Self-working_).

 

8 potatoes.

2 ounces hops.

4 quarts cold water.

1 lb. flour.

½ lb. white sugar.

1 tablespoonful salt.

 

Tie the hops in a coarse muslin bag, and boil one hour in four quarts

of water. Let it cool to lukewarmness before removing the bag. Wet

with the tepid liquor—a little at a time—the flour, making to a smooth

paste. Put in the sugar and salt, beat up the batter three minutes

before adding the rest of the tea. Set it away for two days in an open

bowl covered with a thin cloth, in a closet which is moderately and

evenly warm.

 

On the third day peel, boil, and mash the potatoes, and when entirely

free from lumps and specks, stir in gradually the thickened hop-liquor.

Let it stand twelve hours longer in the bowl, stirring often, and

keeping it in the warm kitchen. Then bottle or put away in corked jars,

which must be perfectly sweet and freshly scalded. This will keep a

month in a cool cellar. It is more troublesome to make it than other

kinds of yeast, but it needs no other “rising” to excite fermentation,

and remains good longer than that made in the usual way.

 

 

YEAST (_Potato._) ✠

 

6 potatoes.

2 quarts cold water.

4 tablespoonfuls flour.

2 tablespoonfuls white sugar.

 

Peel and boil the potatoes until they break. Leaving the water on the

fire, take them out and mash fine with the flour and sugar, wetting

gradually with the hot water until it is all used. When lukewarm, add a

gill of good yeast, and set aside in an open vessel and warm place to

ferment. When it ceases to effervesce, bottle and set in ice-house.

 

This yeast is very nice and white, and is preferred by many who dislike

the bitter taste of hops. It is also convenient to make when hops

cannot be obtained.

 

 

YEAST CAKES. ✠

 

2 quarts water (cold.)

1 quart pared and sliced potatoes.

Double-handful hops, tied in coarse muslin bag.

Flour to make stiff batter.

1 cup Indian meal.

 

Boil the potatoes and hop-bag in two quarts of water for three-quarters

of an hour. Remove the hops, and while boiling hot, strain the potatoes

and water through a cullender into a bowl. Stir into the scalding

liquor enough flour to make a stiff batter. Beat all up well; add two

tablespoonfuls lively yeast and set in a warm place to rise. When

light, stir in a cup of Indian meal, roll into a sheet a quarter of an

inch thick, and cut into round cakes. Dry these in the hot sun, or in

a _very_ moderate oven, taking care they do not heat to baking. It is

best to put them in after the fire has gone down for the night, and

leave them in until morning. When entirely dry and cold, hang them up

in a bag in a cool, dry place.

 

Use one cake three inches in diameter for a loaf of fair size; soak in

tepid water until soft, and add a pinch of soda or saleratus, then mix.

 

These cakes will remain good a month in summer, two in winter.

 

 

BAKING POWDERS.

 

1 ounce super-carbonate soda.

7 drachms tartaric acid—(in powder.)

 

Roll smoothly and mix thoroughly. Keep in a tight glass jar or bottle.

Use one teaspoonful to a quart of flour.

 

 

_Or,_

 

12 teaspoonfuls carb. soda.

24 teaspoonfuls cream tartar.

 

Put as above, and use in like proportion.

 

 

BREAD SPONGE (_Potato._) ✠

 

6 potatoes, boiled and mashed fine while hot.

6 tablespoonfuls baker’s yeast.

2 tablespoonfuls white sugar.

2 tablespoonfuls lard.

1 even teaspoonful soda.

1 quart warm—_not_ hot—water.

3 cups flour.

 

Mash the potatoes, and work in the lard and sugar. Stir to a cream,

mixing in gradually a quart of the water in which the potatoes were

boiled, which should have been poured out to cool down to blood warmth.

_Beat_ in the flour, already wet up with a little potato-water to

prevent lumping, then the yeast, lastly the soda. Cover lightly if the

weather is warm, more closely in winter, and set to rise over night in

a warm place.

 

 

BREAD SPONGE (_Plain._) ✠

 

1 quart warm water.

6 tablespoonfuls baker’s yeast.

2 tablespoonfuls lard.

2 tablespoonfuls white sugar.

1 teaspoonful soda.

Flour to make a soft batter.

 

Melt the lard in the warm water, add the sugar, then the flour by

degrees, stirring in smoothly. A quart and a pint of flour will usually

be sufficient if the quality is good. Next comes the yeast, lastly the

soda. Beat up hard for several minutes, and set to rise as above.

 

Bread mixed with potato-sponge is more nutritious, keeps fresh longer,

and is sweeter than that made with the plainer sponge, But there

are certain seasons of the year when good _old_ potatoes cannot be

procured, and new ones will not do for this purpose.

 

The potato-sponge is safer, because surer for beginners in the

important art of bread-making. After using it for fifteen years, I

regard it as almost infallible—given the conditions of good flour, yeast, kneading, and baking.