Rosemary and Olive Bread

I make a pot of soup once a week. It’s my cheap and healthy lunch for at least three shifts a week at work, and helps avoid inadvertently spending a fiver in M and S food every lunch time. I was trying to change this to salads for the summer, but they don’t keep as well (I’ll often take a few days worth of soup in to work at once) and so just aren’t so easy.  So I go for lighter soups instead.

I try not to have bread all the time, (carbs etc. etc.) but sometimes it just can’t be helped.  I was having a lazy afternoon yesterday so decided to make some bread. It’s a pretty stress free, relaxing process.

The basic recipe I use is the one below, so see that for specific amounts:

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/2060/easy-white-bread

It’s nice to make plain bread, but, predictably enough, I like to add stuff. 

Blitz up a few sprigs of rosemary (leaves only) and half a dozen olives. You don’t want a paste, some chunks of olives are nice.  Put this in the bowl with the strong flour, yeast and salt and give it a good mix together.  Then make a well in the centre and add the oil, and the water in a couple of batches. I use my hands to mix it together, as bread dough is like glue so you want to be cleaning it off as few things as possible.

Then on a well floured board knead it for at least ten minutes. Kneading means pushing, squashing, rolling, generally beating all hell out of it with your hands. It’s a messy process, your hands will be covered, but rub them together to get the dough off and try and get it included.  The thing is, a slightly sticky dough will actually rise much better than a dry one. It really is important to knead it for as long as you can be bothered, do ten minutes then add another minute.

It's a pretty messy process

Lightly oil your bowl and put the dough in (by now it should be all in one piece and a bit elastic), and cover with a damp tea towel and put it in a sunny spot for an hour.

 It will start this size:

And end up about double the size:

Now “knock it back” or lightly knead again. I find putting it on the board and punching it a few times to knock a load of the air out of it is a good start. You don’t need to mess around with it for anywhere near as long as before. Then either shape it into loaves or rolls. I decided to go for rolls this time. 

Put on some oiled trays and leave for another hour. (I'm not bothered that they're a bit rustic. They're for dipping in soup)

They should double in size again.

Preheat the oven at 210/220 degrees and then pop them in.  Loaves will take longer than rolls, these were ready in about 25 – 30 minutes.

Test them by knocking on the bottom, they should sound hollow.

Put on a wire rack to cool. I don’t have a wire rack, I do have an oven shelf on a chopping board.

And they’re good to go! I will be making some soup later; just mushroom, so ridiculously easy.  If anyone’s bothered just ask, and I’ll put up that recipe too.

So this week, I will be having mushroom soup with rosemary and olive bread, yum!

In other news, I love this cookery programme and I love Grace Dent’s TV reviews, so I strongly recommend you watch The Good Cook on iPlayer, and read this review:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2011/jul/23/the-good-cook-grace-dent-tv-od?CMP=twt_gu