Jack is Cooking Pasta with Sausage-Tomato Sauce

Hello Internet!  


For this pasta sauce you will need: 
one large can of diced tomatoes
2 onions chopped 
garlic (i didn't have any but it would be good) 
peas 
sausages  




Pasta  




Thanks to O T O for the additional camera work at the end!

Jack is Cooking a New Header

Well hello internet!

Today my friend Oto and I went about to photograph a new banner for the website.  you can see the finished result above!

Oto made a great arrangement out of the food.

here are some shots of him setting it up

Jack is Cooking (Baking) Sourdough Bread 9/21/09

Well Hello internet!
So as it is Monday I am baking a loaf of bread.  My last loaf of bread was probably one of the most successful, in terms of its texture and what it looked like.  However since I ran out of white flour while I was making the dough, I ended up substituting with too much whole wheat flour.  This time I am repeating the recipe, but with an opposite ratio.  Instead of 3 cups of whole wheat flour and 1 cup of white flour being added to the sponge, I am going to use 3 cups of white flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour.

So here it is:

This is my starter and the sponge I made out of the starter.  This morning at about 9 am i put one cup of starter in a bowl with 3 cups of water and 4 cups of white flour.  Mixed them together and then let them sit (covered) for about 12 hours

Here is my sponge:
As you can see it has bubbled up and risen quite nicely.

Next, I remove 2 cups from the sponge and put it back in the starter.  This feeds the starter, so it will be nice and ready to go next week when i make another loaf.
Then I put in half a cup of olive oil, 1 tablespoon of salt and a tiny little bit of sugar, maybe like a teaspoon.

Then to this mixture I slowly added while stirring 3 cups of white flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour (i like to mix this together before i add it into the sponge).  eventually i can no longer stir with my spoon and i have to mix it with my hands.

This mixing eventually turns into kneading.  i have been experimenting with the amount of kneading.  this time i barely kneaded the bread at all, and also decided to have a slightly moister dough, so it is a little stickier, and not the right consistency for kneading.
Here is the Dough:

Then comes the shaping of the bread.  i folded the bread and rolled it into the shape i wanted and then placed it in the bread rising pan that i have

Here is the bread before rising:

I let it rise for 2 hours, and here is what it looked like:

I then baked it in the oven at 450° for 20 minutes, then turned down the heat to 350° for the final 30 minutes of baking.

Here is the result:

So it looks pretty good i think.  but when it turned out onto the baking pan the upward risingness of the bread turned into outward rising, so the bread is quite wide and flat, but nice and soft on the inside and crunchy on the outside.  the bread also tastes pretty darn good.

I think perhaps the rising problem can be cured by allowing gluten to develop more and then the dough will be more cohesive.  either more flour, and or kneading will probably solve my problem.

We'll find out in a week or two i suppose!

Jack is Cooking a Sandwich and an Omelette (part 2)

And heres the Omelette!

Jack is Cooking a Sandwich and an Omelette (part 1)

Well hello internet!

Tonight (and most nights actually...) i am making my lunch for tomorrow and dinner tonight. i've perfected a method of doing both at the same time by making a sandwich, and then an omelette out of the same materials.

you can use any different ingredients, but heres the essentials

some kind of bread
some kind of meat
some kind of cheese
lettuce
mayo
butter
other assorted condiments
and eggs for the omelette

Jack is Cooking (Baking) Sourdough Bread

Well Hello Internet!

Since i make a sandwich every day to take to work for lunch, i stared wondering on how i could cut down on the cost of a simple sandwich.  i decided that one way, and also a potentially fun way, would be to bake my own bread.  

However since i like to make things difficult for myself i decided that i would start making Sourdough Bread.  So i made a starter and started figuring out how to make a good loaf of bread.  I am always using different mixtures of flours Along the way i have had success and failures, and its still a work in progress.  

Above are my latest loaves of bread.  While they may look the same, i did differ in the way the loves were shaped.  It will be interesting to see the differences between the two on the inside.  

Eventually once i get a perfect loaf, and i can repeat the process i will do a full Jack is Cooking episode.  

Jack is Cooking Mussels (moules mariniere)

Hey everybody!

This is the First video of the New season of Jack is Cooking.
i decided to make something really easy and quick, yet extremely delicious and seems gourmet!

so here is my recipe for Mussels. it is very easy, and very inexpensive!

here is what you will need

(this recipe is for one person. for two double the recipe, for three triple, etc.)

mussels (1 lb per person)
butter (4 tblspoons)
2 shallots
3 cloves garlic
thyme
lemon juice
1/2 to 1 cup of dry white wine