Plaidophile: Just got a new food processor

May 7, 2006

Just got a new food processor (food)

by fluffy at 5:03 PM

It seems like every cooking show on Create involves a food processor, and I was getting envious of their ability to quickly throw together salsa, sofrito, and especially bread dough. (Toss in the dry ingredients, pour in the wet ingredients, add flour until it makes a nice ball, put in a bowl and let it rest for an hour.)

I went with Black and Decker's $50 food processor. I got it specifically because it was the smallest one with a dough blade. It's a bit finicky to work with (the blade flew off a few times when I just turned it on so I guess I need to run it in pulse mode) and it's got a hell of a lot of torque (Ithrowing around a big ball of dough with 500 watts of power meant I had to hold on tight) but dough certainly comes together quickly, much better than my bread machine slash toaster oven, which I think I'll get rid of and replace with a regular, more compact toaster now that I have something better for making dough.

I'm not sure how much I'll use it for slicing and shredding, but it'll definitely be nicer for chopping than my stick blender. I might still want to get a blender and a stand mixer at some point, though.

Anyway, the first thing I made was a basic italian dough (3 cups flour, 1.25 cups water, 2 tablespoons olive oil, 1/4 tsp sugar, 1 tsp salt, 1 packet active dry yeast). I'm not sure if I'll use it to make focaccia or just a normal loaf or bread sticks though. I guess I have an hour to decide.

(Dinner will just be fettuccine in marinara sauce with chicken-rosemary sausage. Nothing special.)

Comments

#7395 05/08/2006 02:19 pm

You may want to look into getting a kitchen scale if you want to go real fancy and use baker's percentages for your bread. Also a baking stone: the one at bakingstone.com, as it happens, I've heard good things about. Also, if you use honey instead of sugar it'll be more moist. Instant read thermometers are supposed to help, too, with optimal temperature for mixing the dough, but I don't know much about that. There's this site you might like poking around in: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/

oh, also, when making breadsticks, a combination of butter and olive oil gives a good taste, and you can use more fat than you might use for other things. I love fresh breadsticks with some butter and garlic salt and oregano. mmmmm.