Whole Wheat -- and a terrific Indian restaurant, Banana Leaf

Baked some rather plain whole wheat loaves over the weekend; no photos, and they're meant as basic sandwich loaves:

Whole Wheat

King Arthur Organic Whole Wheat
Daily Grind Corn Meal
Soy Powder
Ground flax seed
Organic unbleached white flour
Blyth honey
Kosher salt
Giza sourdough

Mixed 4/3/08
Baked 4/4/08

Far more exciting was the discovery of a southern India vegetarian restaurant on Bethel Road, Banana Leaf. More about them at http://www.bananaleafofcolumbus.com/

Because of a Calligraphy workshop, we had visitors from out of town--Ann's first teacher and calligraphy mentor, Lisa Rogers, now of Hallmark Cards in Kansas City, and Sandy Wagner of Indianapolis. So I searched for vegetarian restaurants on the web, and had a couple of options. They went for Indian, so we went to Banana Leaf. And thought we'd died and gone to culinary heaven. Buffet, with a fixed menu. And wonderful, wonderful food. Served dish by dish by the proprietor, who explained in detail what the food was, what the ingredients were, and how it was prepared. We've found a new standard place! So between the world-class Dragon Fly NeoV, the comfort food Whole World, and the downhome Benevolence, we can now add spicy and terrific southern Indian food at Banana Leaf. Yahoo!

Great food from Whole World

Still eating rye bread, so no baking this week. And we're busy with the primary approaching in any event. So we ate out, at a favorate local place--

Whole World Restaurant and Bakery is one of the vegan glories of Clintonville, now celebrating its thirtieth anniversary. Happy to say we've been regular customers since Dan and Kim Otanicar opened the joint. Stopped by yesterday for soup (Ann had the minestrone, I had the tomato-peanut--both terrific, as usual). Brought home a couple of other dishes for later. Here's the nachos, on blue corn chips with black beans, avocado, tomatoes, onions, and a bit of soy cheese


and here's the Moroccan Stew--flavorfilled and terrific


The vegegarian meetup group is planning to eat there on March 22nd--unhappily, we'll be out of town, and so will have to miss. Too bad!

Did a large batch of pumpernickel bread this past weekend; mixed the barm on Friday, mixed the dough on Saturday, combined the two on Sunday, then formed the loaves and baked on Monday. Rich taste; recipe follows the two photos of the loaves, already in plastic bags on their way to the freezer!





Pumpernickel Rye

King Arthur First Clear Flour
King Arthur Pumpernickel Flour
Daily Grind Corn Meal
King Arthur White Rye Flour
Oat Flour
Mashed Potatoes
Ground Flax Seed
Hemp Seed
Caraway Seed
Cumin Seed
Sesame Seed
Kosher Salt
Organic Barley Malt
Molasses
Soy Milk
Budweiser Beer

Rice mixture

been experimenting with various kinds of rices lately, after years (literally) of only brown rice, organic brown rice, or basmati brown rice. So here's a photo of the newest batch, a mixture of black, red, and brown (darker than before) rice. We're grateful for Japanese groceries locally, a byproduct of the Honda plant in the northwest quadrant of the Greater Columbus area, and the demand for Japanese food products from the management and worker teams brought in from Japan.



there's a bit of a bitter aftertaste; we're trying to isolate what it might be from. Tried a small amount of black rice cooked separately, and that wasn't it. So will try the red rice next-----

Double Rye

Having gotten a shipment from King Arthur, made up a variation of their version of Peasant Rye:

Double Rye Bread

King Arthur Organic Pumpernickel Flour
King Arthur First Clear Flour
Daily Grind Cornmeal
Oat flour
Organic gluten
Mashed potato
Caramel color
Ground flaxseed
Hemp seed
Caraway seed
Chopped dried onion
Chopped burgandy olives
Solar salt
Soy milk
Potato water
Barley malt
instant yeast
Organic canola oil


decided not to use any of the sourdoughs I have; will see how the loaves taste with regular yeast--it's been a long time since I baked any breads without a sourdough starter, so it feels a little odd--but today is the only day I had available, and the rest of the week will be packed, so there really won't be time to do the whole aging process. Expediency seems to be necessary this time around--

the dough after mixing



after the first rise



in the pans, ready for the second rise



and the loaves, after baking--

Butternut Squash!

A six pound butternut squash demanded attention; here was the result: a casserole with tofu, green beans, onions, garlic and almonds, adapted from a recipe found on the web



and a soup, adapted from Deborah Madison's Vegetable Soups cookbook, which is supposed to be garnished with seared radicchio and pumpkin seed oil--tried the soup a couple of months ago--the pumpkin seed oil was a nice finishing touch, the seared racicchio seemed a bit precious--

Mostly Whole Wheat

The most recent loaf--last of 2007!

(Mostly) Whole Wheat Bread
Org. Whole Wheat Bread Flour
Stuzman Farms Org. Whole Wheat Flour
Daily Grind Cornmeal
Soy Milk
Columbus Pale Ale
Ground Flax Seeds
Hemp Seeds
Org. unbleached flour
Honey
Org. Canola Oil
Kosher Salt
Giza Starter
12/29/07 Baked 12/30/07

This batch really had oven spring, as you can tell from the Brobdingnagian growth on the loaf; wasn't rising much, so I put it in the oven and baked. This was the result! Used both soy milk and ale because I ran out of soy milk and didn't want to open a new quart--the Giza starter is from Sourdoughs International, while the honey is from Kentucky, the gift of a visiting Kentucky playwright (thanks, Nancy!)