Sun, Apr 20, 2008
George and the pound cake recipes
Posted to Technology category
Having named my sourdough starter George, I am now finding myself talking to it. "Come on, George, time to get that batch of bread put together."
Well, I suppose it is a sort of pet, and people talk to their pets.
On a more annoying note, I have pretty well established a pattern where eating plain bread (water, white flour, starter and salt) does not usually give me coughing fits unless it gets stuck. Eating my homemade pound cake (flour, sugar, butter, eggs, salt, baking soda, vanilla, buttermilk) generates major coughing fits later even if it doesn't get stuck on the way down.
I've still got a question mark against bread with whole wheat flour, though I had some whole wheat tortillas last week that didn't cause problems. I'm making bread this week, with George's assistance, with a mix of white flour stored at room temperature and wheat flour that has been kept refrigerated instead of stored at room temperature. I used 1 tablespoon of pickling salt, which seems a little high, but whole wheat bread that is undersalted tastes cardboardy, so I would rather aim high.
Apple strudel from the Farmers' Market was no problem at all.
I should probably look for a cake recipe that does not use buttermilk to check whether that is the problem. I wouldn't mind losing buttermilk as an ingredient. It's not part of my cultural background, no pun intended. The King Arthur Flour 200th Anniversary Cookbook has a recipe for the original pound cake (start with one pound each of flour, sugar, eggs and butter...) with no buttermilk that I may try. Maybe cut in half so it won't feel so wastefull to add it to the compost bin if I start coughing my
I don't think it can be the actual butter that's the problem, even though I do have some strange sensitivities to dairy. I'm not a huge butter fan, but I do use it in cooking and baking. I hope it is not the problem. It's hard to replace butter's chemical and mechanical properties for baking.
I should get a referral to an allergist so I can get a lot of things tested and ruled in or out, instead of just figuring out things by trial and error.
The King Arthur Flour 200th Anniversary Cookbook has a recipe for the original pound cake (start with one pound each of flour, sugar, eggs and butter...) with no buttermilk that I may try. Maybe make a half batch so it won't feel so wastefull to add it to the compost bin if I start coughing my guts out again. Time to get some butter and eggs out so they can come to room temperature.
Lately Nanette's chickens have been laying huge eggs in the extra large (more than 27 ounces per dozen) and jumbo (more than 30 ounces per dozen) range. Finding 4 eggs in the dozen that added up to less than 9 ounces including their shells was tricky, but I couldn't quite get 8 ounces out of any combination of three eggs, either. Considering how dry flour is here, I think a little extra moisture from the eggs is better than too little.
If this doesn't work, maybe I can find a dairy-free cake recipe on-line to try. Boxed poundcake mixes use oil and no milk, unless there is powdered milk in the mix.
1/2 Poundcake (proposed recipe)
preheat oven to 350 cream 8 ounces (2 sticks)room temperature unsalted butter with 8 ounces by weight sugar very thoroughly beat together 1 teaspoon vanilla 8 ounces eggs by weight add to butter/sugar slowly while beating and beat thoroughly sift together (in food processor) 8 ounces all purpose flour 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon baking powder, note: adjusted for altitude (1/2 orig recipe would be 1.5 tsp) add dry mixture alternately with 1/2 cup milk (maybe more, for altitude)
I'll try this recipe this evening -- the unsalted butter was in the freezer, so it will take a long time to come to room temperature.