BEER BREAD
Makes two 9x5 loaves
6 cups flour
6 tablespoons sugar
6 teaspoons baking powder
3 teaspoons salt
2 12 oz. bottles of beer

Start with a cold oven. Grease two 9x5 loaf pans. Mix all ingredients until you have a lumpy, sort of spongy wet dough. Divide it between the loaf pans. Put them in the cold oven and set for 375 degrees F. Leave in oven for 60 minutes. 20 minutes before they're done, brush butter on top of loaves and return to oven.

I've been using Becks for the beer. No, I'm not being extravagent--it's year-old swill left over from a family wedding. Good for cooking, but not for drinking. I wonder, however, what experimentation would yield. Would using Guinness give me the beer bread equivalent of pumpernickel?

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Originally posted by yeefan:
does anyone have any tips on how to get a good crunchy on the outside, moist and chewy on the inside type bread?

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Basic Bread:
In a food processor (if you are without, just mix by hand), combine and mix:
3 generous C. flour
4 generous tsp. quick-rising yeast
2 tsp. salt
1 and 1/2 TBS sugar
once mixed, add 1/4+ cup warm water (not hot, it will kill the yeast) and blend in mixer until it sticks together. Add as much water as necessary to make it good and sticky. After this point, Mix it by running the food processor (or just plain ol' kneading it) for two minutes, adding flour by pinches until it leaves the sides of the blenders and becomes one happy mass of bread dough. Form the dough into a donut shape, place in a bowl, cover with a damp, thin towl, and put in the microwave WITH AN 8 OZ GLASS OF WATER (Important!) on low power for three minutes. Let rest for three minutes, then nuke it on low power for six minutes, again letting it rest for three minutes afterwards.

Then, take the risen dough out and punch it down. Knead by hand for a few minutes, adding flour as necessary. Form into loaf and put into buttered glass loaf pan, and cover with saran wrap. Make sure to butter the top of the bread- makes it soft and keeps the plastic wrap from sticking. Repeat micro rising- 3 min on low, 3 rest, 6 min on low, 3 rest. Then bake in preheated 400 oven for 20 minutes, or until light brown on top and hollow sounding when tapped.

It sounds complicated, I know, but it is really quite easy when you get the hang of it- and the bread is delicious!! Let me know how it turns out.

4 cups of milk
1 cup of butter
1 tablespoon of sugar
1 teaspoon of salt
1 tablespoon of yeast
A lot of flour. (ends up being around 8 or 9 cups, I think. it's been a while.)

Heat the milk and butter over medium heat until the butter melts. Don't boil it! It won't, like, spoil it or anything, but boiling milk is m-e-s-s-y. Let it cool down until it's lukewarm. Not cold, not hot.

Meanwhile, sift flour by the cup in to a bigass bowl. Start with about six cups. add the sugar and salt and yeast and mix in.

Now, when your liquids are lukewarm (the temperature is important: too cold and the yeast won't activate, too hot and it kills too much of the yeast. either way, your bread is flat. however, I've found that even my elite cadre of fools was able to correctly identify when milk is lukewarm, so don't worry too much.), pour them in to the middle of the bowl. you probably want to stir with a wooden spoon at first because it'll be sticky, but then wash your hands and get kneading. beat that dough up. if it's sticky, add more flour, half a cup at a time. you'll probably need to add about two cups. keeping taking out your frustrations until the dough is nice and elastic-y and smooth. when in doubt, knead a little extra.

now, cover the dough with a dry cloth, and set it somewhere relatively warm and leave it alone (don't jump rigth next to it!) for about an hour while it rises - it'll double. then take it out and punch it down, once, hard. pretend it's an ex-boyfriend. cover it up, and leave it alone for another hour while it rises again.

yay! it should be big and poufy now. divide it in to 4 greased loaf pans and bake at 350 until it's golden brown. on sunny days it'll rise wonderfully in the oven. on rainy days it'll rise a bit less, but it should still be okay. yeast is so cruel.

I have sent a bed-ridden Sean out to the store to get supplies to make extra!!! And this comes just in time for dinner at my granny's (always good to impress her), and having my dad and his wife over for dinner at my place on sunday!!! Fresh bread! I will be like a domestic goddess!

I don't have measuring cups anymore either. I use a 16 oz. empty cottage cheese/yogurt container (well, actually since I'm in Canada it's a 500 g. container) Also, if you have the patience you can figure everything out to a ratio of a set "size" (i.e. a custard cup equals "one") and then just go from there. After all a cup or 8 oz. is just a label we've put onto a handful or so of whatever.

I worked for a chef who made us sit w/ a full set of measuring spoons and cups and dump measures of flour/sugar onto a pie plate. Then we'd have to free pour the same amount. After a bit you get really good at eyeballing quantities.

Which is all to say cooking is more or less of a crap shoot anyways...the best part is figuring out the chemistry and then translating the science into amazingly yummy stuff.

Sorry for the length of this...*s*...pet topic of mine!

Haven't had any beer bread, but I must compliment him in public anyway.

Plus, he remains undefeated, in that for the 4 years that I've known him, he has never fed me (food or drink) some thign that I didn't absolutely love.

Guinness and I grew up together. My parents got him when I was born, and he shepherded me around like a good boy should. He retrieved tennis balls, snapped at insects (especially honey bees) and barked at strangers. He bit the neighbor boy when that kid was being a pain in the ass.

And he also chased deer, which led to his death during the spring when I was seven. He was gored by a buck in the side, and he dragged himself home to die on our front lawn. So sad.

Anyway, the bread will be done in about a half hour, and I will report on its yumminess.

Okay, it's done.

I took the recipe from Laurie Colwin's Home Cooking (a great book, recommended by Yeefan). It's a slow rising bread, which rises at room temperature and can be left on its own for undefined amounts of time. (I love when a recipe says "... and go about your business" and "Whenever you happen to get home...")

I prepared the dough around supper time yesterday then went to a party . I punched it down at 2 AM and let it rise again until I woke up this morning at 11. Then I kneaded it, shaped it into a baguette and put it in the oven.

I'll let you know how it comes out, but so far it's looking and smelling real good.

Edited to say it turned out well... A little bit dense, probably due to a lousy kneading at 2AM. But I'll certainly do it again.

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Originally posted by yeefan:
does anyone have any tips on how to get a good crunchy on the outside, moist and chewy on the inside type bread?

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If you brush the exterior with egg white just before baking it will help give the crust a bit more crunch. Also, you can make slits (not deep) in the top and then brush the top with the egg white everywhere except the slits (go right up to the edge). As it bakes the slits will widen and they'll be lighter in color, giving it a nice decorative look. I don't know how that would work on Epi's Beer Bread recipe though since the consistency of the dough sounds different than normal bread dough. I'm going to have to try that recipe since it's so easy.

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Originally posted by yam:
We made it with whole wheat once, it was fine. I've never tried fake beer, but I bet it would work, since it's all about the yeast, not the alcohol. (although I'm thinking a slice of bread that's been cooked with a bit of real beer wouldn't exactly cause fetal alcohol syndrome..? but hell, fake beer's cheaper anyway.)

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Here's me being a Beer Smitty: The yeast in the beer is almost all dead. It dies when the alcohol level reaches a certain point. There wouldn't be enough live yeast in a bottle of beer to make a loaf rise in one week let alone the one hour this recipe takes. Additionally, most of the alcohol cooks off when you bake it, so the content would be negligible. In an entire loaf you would have the alcohol content of maybe a mouthful of beer.

On the beer bread, it's the baking powder that makes it rise and the butter that helps it get brown and crunchy on the outside. You can use any beer you like, but darker, more bitter beers need a little more sugar and some whole wheat flower to help cut them. For example, guinness plus an extra tablespoon of sugar per loaf and using 1/2 white and whole wheat flower is good--but still kind of strong tasting.

If you like the flavor of near-beer, go for it. Personally, I like mine a little stonger.

You know, you can even use beer instead of milk in Bisquick biscuits? Don't ask how I discovered that--but it works.

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Originally posted by yam:
We made it with whole wheat once, it was fine. I've never tried fake beer, but I bet it would work, since it's all about the yeast, not the alcohol. (although I'm thinking a slice of bread that's been cooked with a bit of real beer wouldn't exactly cause fetal alcohol syndrome..? but hell, fake beer's cheaper anyway.)

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Oh yeah, fetal alcohol syndrome, yikes when did our culture get SO reactionary. Like a glass of wine is going to kill the baby. Not that I'm drinking, but still. The reason for near beer would just be not having real beer in the house. I guess I could just buy the 2 beers but since near beer is around anyway it's what I would probably use.

And there are some nice chewy ones out there. We drink O'Doul's amber for a nice cold drink but like Kaliber for a stronger beer flavor. There is also St. Pauli's girl near beer, pretty good and a few from Germany whose names escape me.

the yeast is dead? Hmm. I think I totally no longer understand fermentation. Oh well, no great loss to society there. A friend of mine is really allergic to yeast and can only drink like, rye, so I'm all convinced that beer is just crawling with yeast, maybe having a yeast convention (not to be confused with a yeast infection, which has no party favours) complete with yeast feast and free drinks, and uh...

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Originally posted by Epicurus:
Here's me being a Beer Smitty:

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Originally posted by yam:
the yeast is dead? Hmm. I think I totally no longer understand fermentation.

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No, you understand fermentation just fine--you just don't know beermaking. Home-made and small batch beer goes through a multi-stage fermentation process. It ferments in a big bucket or vat until it reaches a certain specific gravity (alcohol content). At that point, the yeast has digested all of the sugars it can from the malted grain mash. You transfer it to a new bucket or vat so you can remove the sludge at the bottom which is dead yeasties, grain husks, hops, etc.

Once you've transferred the beer, you "prime" it. That's where you add a little extra sugar to the mix so the yeast get some more goodies to munch on. Then you bottle it. In the bottle, any yeast that is still alive goes to work on the priming sugar, increasing alcohol content and adding carbonation. At a certain point, depending on the strain of yeast used, the alcohol content gets too high and the yeast die, settling down on the bottom of the bottle and forming that little bit of gunk that you will find in some hand crafted beers.

Think about it--if the yeast didn't die, you'd have to drink beer within days or weeks of bottling instead of months or else the yeast would reproduce so much that the bottles or cans would be full of yeast instead of beer. Or, more realistically, explode from all the carbon dioxide the yeast release.

Some yeast do take more time to die, and that is one of the reasons why some beers aren't ready for drinking until they've sat in the bottle for two months and some beers are ready in two weeks.

Orgasmic.

Okay, make that two: Marry me? I'm sure my fiancé won't mind... [Grin]

And while I'm here I thought I'd include my recipe for Irish Soda Bread, though I'm sure it will be -nothing- compared to the wonder that is Epi's kitchen.

- Ingredients
2 cups unbleached all-purpose four
4 tbs. sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp. sea salt
1 cup currants (Optional... But I love 'em.)
1 tbs. caraway seed
1 free-range egg
1/4 cup melted butter
2/3 cup buttermilk or soy milk (Make sure to use full fat soy milk, should you choose that over the buttermilk. You won't get near as good of a texture if you don't. Though to be honest, there's no comparison to that of the all mighty buttermilk.)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a round cake pan. In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, soda, salt, currants & caraway sees. Whisk together. In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, butter & milk. Pour into the dry ingredients & mix, until moist. Batter will be a bit sticky.

Mound the batter into the pan, forming a rounded-shape load in the center of the pan. Smooth out the surface as best you can. With a sharp knife, cut an equal-sized cross into the center-top surface, about 1/2-inch deep & sprinkle lightly with flour.

Bake on the center rack for 25-30 minutes, until the loaf is golden brown & a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool before serving.

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Originally posted by SiliconeSociety:
I'm rather new to the boards, so having -just- stumbled upon Epicurus's beer bread, I simply have one thing to say.

Orgasmic.

Okay, make that two: Marry me? I'm sure my fiancé won't mind... [Grin]

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Careful, the last person who proposed to me got threatened with bodily harm by Breana--I think she's planning on rigging the Bachelor Auction, too

Thanks for the high praise, SS.

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Originally posted by DClassie:
I had some great black and tan beer bread at a restaurant--marbled and tasty. I suppose they just cut the batter and added each beer component to one half. I highly recommend it for something a little different.

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I can't believe missed this, DClassie. That is such a great freakin' idea. I'm going to try that the next time I make a batch.

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Originally posted by yam:
HEY! So if the beer is just for flavour, would this recipe work with milk instead? Not that I'm a big milk fan myself, but my aforementioned allergic-to-yeast friend has a hell of a time finding decent soda bread.

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Originally posted by yam:
Yeah, no, I for sure couldn't serve him bread with beer in it. But I was asking if maybe milk would work instead?

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I'd say "Eh, worth a shot." I'll bet the consistency will be slightly different, probably less spongy on the inside. I don't know enough about baking to predict what the proteins in milk might do. Where's that "Good Eats" guy when you need him?

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Originally posted by yam:
Yeah, no, I for sure couldn't serve him bread with beer in it. But I was asking if maybe milk would work instead?

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