NYT No-Knead Bread - reviewed

I tried the New York Times' recipe for No-Knead Bread.

Here are the pictures.

Here are my impressions of the bread:

• I used a little more salt than the recipe called for, and it was just right.


• The crust is crusty, like a baguette, while also pretty. Puts the 'art' in artisan bread.


• I put a lot of flour on the towels as it was rising. I also sprinkled corn meal on the top (which became the bottom). I use Bob's Red Mill corn meal and white flour.


• Let the bread cool for 10 minutes or so after it comes out of the oven. That makes it easier to cut.

I baked the bread in a Dutch Oven (cast iron pot) with a lid. I wonder if that can be used for other bread recipes with the same success? I'm thinking of trying it with some recipes from Beard on Bread.

Here's my tweaked version of the recipe:

Adapted from Jim Lahey, Sullivan Street Bakery
3 cups all-purpose or bread flour, more for dusting
1 teaspoon instant yeast
1 tablespoon salt
Cornmeal as needed.

1. In a large bowl combine flour, yeast and salt. Add 1 5/8 cups water, and stir until blended; dough will be shaggy and sticky. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest at least 12 hours, preferably about 18, at warm room temperature, about 70 degrees.

2. Dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles. Lightly flour a work surface and place dough on it; sprinkle it with a little more flour and fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest about 15 minutes.

3. Using just enough flour to keep dough from sticking to work surface or to your fingers, gently and quickly shape dough into a ball. Generously coat a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with flour; put dough seam side down on towel and dust with more flour and cornmeal. Cover with another cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours. When it is ready, dough will be more than double in size and will not readily spring back when poked with a finger.

4. At least a half-hour before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees. Put a 6- quart cast iron pot in oven as it heats. When dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide your hand under towel and plop into pot, seam side up; it may look like a mess, but that is O.K. Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes. Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes, until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on a rack.

Yield: One 1½-pound loaf.

Time Lapse of My Ride to Work

Here's a clip of my bike ride to work. I go down SE Salmon street, which is a bike street, to the base of the Hawthorne bridge. Then I follow the East Bank Esplanade past OMSI to the Springwater Corridor.

The background music is a song I wrote about 15 years ago called "Mike Bike" about a bike messenger, and performed by The Filthy Swine. I figured it was appropriate to the video.

Time Lapse Trip to SF - from Google Street View?

Here's a video that I believe is made from images of google street view that shows a trip to san francisco.

Abraham Lincoln in Pennies - Time Lapse

Here's a time-lapse video of a guy making a portrait of Abe Lincoln using ... ta dah! Lincoln Head cents.

Jack Kirby, Comic Book Genius, turns 90

The New York Times has a good article on Jack Kirby on what would have been his 90th birthday.

Kirby drew and (co) created some of the classics of superhero comics: Captain America, the Fantastic Four, Thor, the Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, the original X-Men, the Silver Surfer, Doctor Doom, Galactus, The Watcher, Magneto, Ego the Living Planet, the Inhumans, and the list goes on.

Keep in mind that he drew for Timely during WWII, and then for Marvel as the publishing house evolved. He drew romance and horror comics in the 50s when superheroes died out, and then had a major hand in resurrecting them for the 60s.

Also note: he drew the first couple issues of Challengers of the Unknown, which some say was the prototype idea he based the Fantastic Four on. The Challs are personally one of my favorites.

In the 70's he left Marvel, spurned by he feeling that Stan Lee was hogging all the credit for creating the bulk of Marvel superheroes. He traveled back to DC, and started with a wild story line, again one of my favorites, in (guess what --- you'll never believe it) Superman's Pal: Jimmy Olsen. In these storylines Jimmy turns into a super reporter, and Superman is barely seen. You'll have to read 'em to believe 'em

Ok, 'nuff said.

Who is Tish Rabe?

Ok, here's a weird question: who is Tish Rabe, and why did she end up getting the permission to write in the style of Dr. Seuss? When I search for her on the internet I can't find anything specific about her except that "She lives in Greenwich, Connecticut."

Even more disturbing is that her name is an anagram Bear Shit. Is this some sort freakish joke played by a publisher from the house of Seuss?

Crystal Creek 2007

Here are some pictures from my vacation to my mom's cabin.
It's near Port Orford, Oregon. The pictures on the bluff are from Cape Blanco, which is the west-most point on the contiguous United States.

The weather that week was perfect.

I've posted the pictures using Google's Picasa. The upside of this service so far:
- 1024 MB free space for posting pictures
- If you have a gmail account, you can use the same account for Picasa.
- The client software seems fast and easy to use. At least, easier than my Canon camera software

The downside:
- I had to download the Picasa client software. Not a big deal.