The bread making continues

Italian Bread (New York Style)
Easy Bread Machine Recipes Copyright 1997

7/8 C water
2 ¼ C unbleached all-purpose flour
1 T whole wheat flour or rye I used rye
1 ½ tsp salt
2 tsp brown sugar or honey I used brown sugar
1 tsp vinegar
1 T olive oil I used canola oil
1 ½ tsp yeast rapid rise - use 25% more for regular active dry yeast
cornmeal for baking sheet

Topping:
egg wash (1 egg beater with 2 T water)
sesame seeds for top I omitted these

1. Put all ingredients except the topping in the machine, and set it on the dough cycle. When the beeper sounds, remove the dough from the pan and put it into a bowl in the refrigerator to chill and rest for about 15 minutes.
2. Heat the oven to 400 degrees F. Remove the dough to a lightly floured surface. Roll the dough to a 10x14 inch oblong; then fold the long sides over into a log-shaped loaf. Pinch the seams and ends closed.
3. On a baking sheet. sprinkle cornmeal. Set the loaf on it, seam-side down. Sprinkle water on top. Let it rise in a warm place until nearly doubled in bulk.
4. Brush with egg wash made of 1 egg with 2 tablespoons of water. Sprinkle the top with sesame seeds. With a sharp knife, make 4 diagonal cuts, about ¼ inch deep, across the top.
5. Bake in a 400 degree F oven for 25 to 30 minutes, until golden. During the last 5 minutes, spray water into the oven.

The recipe makes one loaf. I made two loaves since I have a dual bread machine which can make two 1 lb loaves at once. The book also has a version of this recipe for larger machines.
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I made these for my son's birthday party (for family - not kids) coming up this Saturday. I wrapped them well and stuck them in the freezer. I'm going to make garlic bread so I figured covering it in garlic butter would hide any imperfections if it wasn't that great. I only got to taste a dime size piece of it, that stuck to the pan and I think this bread is going to be pretty good. I'm more familiar with Italian bread than I am with the classic baguette so I could judge this recipe a little better than the baguette recipe. This bread does seem to have the proper texture and flavor that I would expect. I have to learn to be more thorough with my egg wash but I'm think I'm getting the hang of this bread thing.

Normally I would wait until I got a good taste of something to blog about it but I'm desperate today. I didn't get a chance to make anything else this weekend.

So I thought this would be a good time to fulfill Randi's request to see where I keep my cookbooks. This is my collection - the whole shebang, minus the Ugly Binder which really needs to be reorganized after a nasty fall.

The shelf is 5 feet tall and 39 inches wide. I wish I had the luxury of ordering them by subject, author, or anyway other my heart desires but instead I just have them organized so that they fit and so that the shelves don't bend under the weight (it's just a cheapy, laminate bookcase). Because of outlets, thermostats and light switches, the only place I could fit the bookcase was in one corner of my spare room so I had to do some funky manuevers to get the entire shelf in the picture. The angle's a bit odd.

It's not the most impressive collection but it gets bigger all of the time. So far I've blogged about recipes from 141 books, a handful of which were library books. I can't remember how many books I had last time I counted, maybe 175 or 200? And I've acquired a few more since then.

Blast From The Past: Garlic Bread from October 2005. I guess I was desperate for something to post about that day too!

Question of the Day: Do you collect anything, cookbooks or otherwise? Where do you store your collection?