One day while I was minding my own business, cruising along on Facebook, I ran across this recipe and had an immediate desire to make these delectable looking objects.
Please go there and take a good look at the picture.... I'll wait.
http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/soft-wrap-bread-recipe
How could you NOT want to wrap your teeth around those wraps eh?
So I printed out the recipe, read it over... had a few moments of baker's skepticism.....okay, alarm bells went off, but I plunged ahead anyway.
Turns out my baker's intuition is pretty sharp.
But I decided to give good old King Arthur the benefit of the doubt and I followed the directions as written.
I struggled through the process and eventually produced a softish flatbread that was not anywhere as fluffy looking as the ones in the photo and had a distinct need for more salt.
S. happened to come over not long after I had cooked them and as she was devouring one pretty much told me I was nuts and they were just dandy the way they were.
I disagreed strongly, but didn't press the point, as she was obviously relishing the things.
Still hopeful, I tried again a few days later.
This time I wrote out my own notes to do some tweaking. This go round, they had enough salt, but were still way more dense than I wanted AND the dough was very difficult to work and gave you many signals that you were headed for baking disaster at each step. This takes all the fun out of things for me. I don't LIKE baking disasters.
A week went by.
Now don't get me wrong. I ATE the resulting flatbreads. Every one of them. Grumbling the whole time and picking at them and examining their texture, knowing they were falling short of their true destiny. My stubborn unwillingness to be defeated by a simple flatbread spurred me on to a third attempt. Because my friends the boiling water step is actually a little bit of genius because it 'cooks' some of the flour and makes them easier to get a 'done' taste when you fry them.
I set to again. This time with more extensive notes. And to keep myself in a good frame of mind, my sense of humor kicked in and I actually wrote how I was feeling about the process as I went along. Sort of like whistling in the dark to calm your nerves.
I think you can read all that, so I won't re-type it.
You fry them one at a time in the skillet and I got a little obsessive about the timing as you can see. But that's because I have Alexa and she will set a timer with two minutes and ten seconds 16 times and not get annoyed. [One timer for each side of eight rolled out blobs of dough.]
Here are the blobs...
Please note the lumpy quality of the dough. There's your sign right there that things are not quite as they should be.
Anyway, here are the results of the third batch...
Nice. But I don't get to take home the big teddy bear at the fair, if you take my meaning.
I trotted some down to Sharon so I would run out sooner, because I am NOT giving up just yet.
That's when I decided to read the comments below the recipe on the web site. Something I wish I had done earlier.... but then again, I may not have tried making them at all.
I was TOTALLY and righteously justified in my frustration with the recipe, because almost everyone else had my same issues. Now I feel duty bound to make these things work as a community service to my fellow bakers. And I intend to post my success, should I ever achieve it, right there in the comments. And I'll pass it on to you in case you feel the need to get adventurous with some flour and yeast one snowy day in the middle of winter [or sunny if you are in New Zealand, eh Futercat?] :-)
As of this writing, there are two breads left in the bag in the fridge. When they are gone, I'm strapping on my apron and oiling up my rolling pin because at this point my baker's honor is at stake.
(Do you SEE what I'm talking about with her? I mean really. It's just a glorified tortilla and look at all this sound and fury and wasted words. How can you NOT mock it?)
^They look like they would be good with some butter and honey on them. I hope she succeeds. Let's wait and see. You'll be embarrassed if you mock her just now. I'd keep my opinions to myself if I were you..... which I am not.... because my dear acerbic friend, her stubbornness is the stuff of legend.^
(All right.... for now. But if she gives up, I'm going to gloat. Big time.)
^Fair enough.^
I think you can read all that, so I won't re-type it.
You fry them one at a time in the skillet and I got a little obsessive about the timing as you can see. But that's because I have Alexa and she will set a timer with two minutes and ten seconds 16 times and not get annoyed. [One timer for each side of eight rolled out blobs of dough.]
Here are the blobs...
Please note the lumpy quality of the dough. There's your sign right there that things are not quite as they should be.
Anyway, here are the results of the third batch...
Nice. But I don't get to take home the big teddy bear at the fair, if you take my meaning.
I trotted some down to Sharon so I would run out sooner, because I am NOT giving up just yet.
That's when I decided to read the comments below the recipe on the web site. Something I wish I had done earlier.... but then again, I may not have tried making them at all.
I was TOTALLY and righteously justified in my frustration with the recipe, because almost everyone else had my same issues. Now I feel duty bound to make these things work as a community service to my fellow bakers. And I intend to post my success, should I ever achieve it, right there in the comments. And I'll pass it on to you in case you feel the need to get adventurous with some flour and yeast one snowy day in the middle of winter [or sunny if you are in New Zealand, eh Futercat?] :-)
As of this writing, there are two breads left in the bag in the fridge. When they are gone, I'm strapping on my apron and oiling up my rolling pin because at this point my baker's honor is at stake.
(Do you SEE what I'm talking about with her? I mean really. It's just a glorified tortilla and look at all this sound and fury and wasted words. How can you NOT mock it?)
^They look like they would be good with some butter and honey on them. I hope she succeeds. Let's wait and see. You'll be embarrassed if you mock her just now. I'd keep my opinions to myself if I were you..... which I am not.... because my dear acerbic friend, her stubbornness is the stuff of legend.^
(All right.... for now. But if she gives up, I'm going to gloat. Big time.)
^Fair enough.^