Herman ze German

I've posted before about Amish Friendship Bread, also known as Herman the German, a travelling sweet leaven that in feeding and baking produces more of himself to share with friends and loved ones.

My upstairs neighbour Rachel gave me some a couple of months ago and he's been baked and baked, with some given to Mark's mum, one batch given to one of the Guides, and another spilled in the car. Sorry Mark.

Anyway, I've noticed on facebook - speaking of which, have you seen the Penelope's Pantry page yet? Please feel free to like, I tend to do updates and general whittering on there.

Where was I? Oh yes, well, I've noticed on Facebook that Herman is doing the rounds, and I know that many Guide units are becoming beset with Hermans too so I thought I'd give some ideas for ways with Herman, as well as type out the original recipe in case you're a recipient without instructions.

OK, first to dispell some myths:

• if you miss a feed Herman won't die
• You don't need to stir out all the lumps when you feed Herman
• If you get a bit bored, Herman is quite happy to nap for a bit on your worktop
• You don't need to follow the recipe exactly, Herman is fairly forgiving

Now... here's the recipe. And much like the recent post on hot chocolate, I'll add some ways you can adapt Herman to suit your own tastes.

Day one: Put Herman in a big mixing bowl on your worktop (not in the fridge)
                Cover loosely with a tea towel
Day two: Stir Herman and peer in to see what's happening
Day three: Stir Herman and grumble a bit about about the worktop space he's taking up
Day four: Feed Herman
                 115g plain flour
                 240g caster sugar
                 250ml milk
                 Now just give him a little stir, ignore the lumps
Day five: Stir Herman, be amazed at the bubbles
Day six: Stir Herman whilst wondering if you'll ever get to eat him
Day seven: Stir Herman
Day eight: Stir again, despair of this ever becoming cake
Day nine: Feed Herman as above
Day ten... BAKING DAY!

First you split your mix into four containers and give three away to friends/ suckers/ baking nerds (delete as appropriate) then keep one and supplement that mixture as follows:

240g caster sugar
230g plain flour
1/2 tsp salt
160ml oil (it needs to be tasteless, so no extra virgin olive oil here)
2 eggs, beaten
2 cooking apples, peeled, cored and diced
160g sultanas
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 heaped tsps cinammon
2 heaped tsps baking powder
60g brown sugar

Grease and line a roasting tin, or a couple of brownie tins - yes you read that right, there's a lot of mix here.
Pour your batter in, and sprinkle with brown sugar
Bake for 45 mins at 180 degrees C
This makes a lot of cake - it both travels and freezes well.

OK, so now you have Herman coming out of your ears (not literally I hope, I'd see a doctor about that). Do you want to do keep another Herman to keep going? If so, try these additions:

• Instead of apple, sultana and cinammon, try plum, prune and ground cloves
• Or pear, ground ginger and stem ginger
• Dried fruit, apricots, prunes, dates or mixed fruit would all work well
• Berries, blueberries, or a bag of frozen (drained) berries
• Raspberries and ground almonds (instead of some of the flour)
• Changing the sugar to brown will make the cake more treacley
• Switching the sugar and blitzing down some dates and prunes, with cinammon and ginger would make a lighter version of parkin
• Warm slices through and have with ice cream as a quick and easy pudding
• Top with a mix of butter, sugar and cinammon and grill for a take on cinammon toast (an old uni favourite of mine)

The nice thing about Herman is that you always have cake, it works out cheaper than buying cake for lunches, and you know what's in it. I love the idea of sharing it with friends and family, that said I'm lucky to be able to foist it off on Guides as otherwise I'd be losing popularity with people swamped by Herman left, right and centre. That said if you want some and aren't close enough to get some from me, then try my post on Amish Friendship bread, when I made the starter myself. Sometimes, when ill I just have had too much free time it would seem!

Meal Planning Monday: baking central

It's Monday evening and I've just sat down to write my meal planning Monday post. Which isn't a good start really. That said, I knew at 7am this morning what I would be having for dinners this week so it's not too much of a crisis.

It's another truncated week in the pantry, but to make up for that I seem to have squeezed as much baking as possible into this evening - not only a brilliant stress reliever (sleepless night last night and very busy at work) but also productive too.

I do have a veg box coming tomorrow, but whilst most of the fruit will be comandeered to come with me to Poole, the veg will be left in the fridge, awaiting a more domestic week next week.

Also this weekend I received a fantastic box of freefrom goodies from Sainsburys, Mark is taste testing the coffee and walnut slices in his packed lunches, and as yet his only comment is that they're 'too small' which is clear praise. Next week I'm going to try the bagels (and will be treating myself to some smoked salmon and cream cheese to really enjoy them as they're meant to be).

So, after four hours of sleep, seven hours at work, 50mg sumatriptan, too many tastes of golden syrup, one evening, two parkins made and baked, one cottage pie, an exploding potato and Herman being fed - what does my meal plan look like?

Monday: leftover roast beef, baked potatoes, carrots, sweetcorn and broccoli

Tuesday: Cottage pie (made with the rest of the roast beef) and topped with some of our homegrown potatoes, cooked and mashed with their skins on, with brocolli and sweetcorn

We'll also be making Herman the leaven into cake tomorrow. Herman is a German friendship cake (much like the Amish friendship bread I made some time ago) leaven that was given to me as a thank you by my upstairs neighbour for her iced buns last week. We're going down the traditional apple route tomorrow, then will give away one and I'm going to experiment on the last batch and try and turn it into a sourdough leaven like Mabel.

Wednesday - Thursday I'll be working away.

Friday & Saturday we'll be visiting Mark's parents and I'll be lining up another first for the blog - Christmas pudding! I'm already excited!

So that's my week in the pantry, be sure to pop over to At Home with Mrs M to see what everyone else is up to

Our Time for Old Friends (and new)

Continuing on with my breadmaking/ baking/ general yeast obsession, I spent some of my sick leave trawling the internet for different recipes, things as a working woman I wouldn't usually have the time or the inclination to work with. I knew that I wanted to experiment a little with the idea of 'natural' yeasts and a little digging came up with 'Amish Friendship bread' which, oddly enough is neither Amish nor is it bread. No I'm not sure either.


The 90's equivalent of a chain letter (only minus any dire consequences for not passing it on), this recipe 'did the rounds' as it were with both the recipe and starter passed from friend to friend and a little online digging shows that even today it has its devotees. Basically the process is that you are given a starter (or in my case, make your own) and you spend ten days feeding and stirring this. Like any starter it smells very yeasty; of strong, slightly sour beer I found and it's important that it's kept in a warm place. This was harder than I imagined, as our house can be somewhat chilly at the best of times, and mid-January is not the best of times - it has worked however which is testament to the resilience of my starter *cough* or just blind luck! After the ten day process you then combine a portion of your starter into your loaf (or loaves), portion off 3 to pass on to friends, and are left with another final portion which enables you to start the process over again.


Today is my first day ten, so my first Friendship bread has been baked, well baked and grilled, but lets say no more of that shall we? Right, moving swiftly along... I followed the recipe I had to the letter, and ended up with a fairly dense cake, that most resembles a much lighter bread pudding (not bread and butter pudding, but the 70's favourite beloved in our house when we were children and my mum used her crock pot, a lot). However, from what I've read you can pretty much use your starter as a basis for any adaptation; bearing in mind that a lot of these recipes are American and rely on flavoured 'pudding mixes.' I think different spices, dried fruit and nuts, fruit purees and other additions like cocoa powder would all add different dimensions to the finished product.


What I really enjoyed about this recipe and process has been the time it has taken, as the famous poem says

"What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?"

So much in my life is done at speed, and one of the things I'm really learning to appreciate (well in truth, being forced to) whilst recuperating is that some things do take time, and actually there's something that takes you back to the basics of baking in working with a recipe that does take 10 days. I am really looking forward to passing my starter on to friends and family and working on variations of the recipe. It's actually something I could really see as being a fun project for children too and am thinking of ways to work it into our Guiding programme for Thinking Day - Guiding Friendship bread perhaps?


So there you have it, let's be retro and resurrect a 90's trend... Friendship bread.


Recipe


Stage One - Feeding your starter


Important things to note about this is not to use any metal implements at all, so you need ceramic, wood or plastic spoons and bowls. I stored my starter in a tupperware with a vent, and kept it in the kitchen. Measurements are American quantities - I have cups so it's not a problem but usual convert with 1 cup equalling 250g.




Day 1 - receive the starter (the recipe for the starter is below)
Day 2 - stir
Day 3 - stir
Day 4 - stir
Day 5 - Add 1 cup each flour, sugar and milk.
Day 6 - stir
Day 7 - stir
Day 8 - stir
Day 9 - stir
Day 10 - Add 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar and 1 cup milk.

Divide into 4 containers, with 1 cup each for three of your friends and 1 cup for your own loaves. As an aside here, I had enough starter for 3 cups for friends, 1 cup for my loaves and 1 cup to keep for my next batch.



Give friends the instructions for Day 1 through Day 10 and the following recipe for baking the bread.


Stage Two - making your bread

After removing the 3 cups of batter, combine the remaining cup of Amish Friendship Bread starter with the following ingredients in a large bowl:

2/3 cup oil
3 eggs
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. vanilla
1 to 1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 cup sugar
2 cups plain flour
1 1/4 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. bicarbonate of soda

Using a fork beat by hand until well blended (I used my hand mixer)
You can add 1 cup raisins and 1 cup nuts (optional - I added 1 cup of sultanas that had been soaked in tea)
Grease two loaf pans with butter, sprinkle with sugar instead of flour.
Bake at 325 for 1 hour (don't start it off under the grill).
Cool 10 minutes, remove from pans.
Makes two loaves (in 2lb loaf tins) of Amish Friendship Bread.

Starter Recipe

7 g active dry yeast
60 ml warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
375 g all-purpose flour, divided
600 g white sugar, divided
710 ml milk

In a small bowl, dissolve yeast in water. Let stand 10 minutes.
In a 2 quart container glass, plastic or ceramic container, combine 1 cup flour and 1 cup sugar. Mix thoroughly or flour will lump when milk is added.
Slowly stir in 1 cup milk and dissolved yeast mixture.
Cover loosely and let stand until bubbly.
Consider this day 1 of the 10 day cycle. Leave loosely covered at room temperature.

Cake and Starter #2

Oh and today's song title is from Merrily We Roll Along, that I saw performed a few months back by Mountview Musical Theatre students. It is a beautiful performance piece, and Our Time is a stunning piece of music. I know I'm not normally at all obscure in my references, but as MT goes, Sondheim is pretty much god and this is no exception.