Daring Bakers! - Easter Bread

So if you're like, "Dude, Rebecca...not sure if you know this, but Easter was last week," my answer is, yeah, I know, I know! But Daring Bakers has strict posting guidelines and I didn't want to break them. So sorry that you now have to wait until next Easter to make this bread. Or you could just be a rebel and make it whenever you feel like it. I've been known to do that.

Apology: Pictures all taken in ridiculously different lights. 

So Easter. How was yours? I honestly didn't do a whole lot. For one of the first times my school didn't have Good Friday and Easter Monday off, so a lot of people (including me) stayed on campus and kind of just treated it like a normal weekend. It was a little weird, because Easter is such a family time for me. But I just spent it with my second family instead ^__^

So, Easter Bread. Just your basic enriched dough, twisted into a pretty ring and sprinkled with pearl sugar. What's interesting is that the egg you place in the center is raw and actually bakes with the bread. It was a little weird to dye raw eggs, but everything turned out great! These breads were eaten after Good Friday service while watching Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind and having a ten person cuddle pile. Best way to do it. 

The April Daring Baker’s Challenge was hosted by Wolf of Wolf’s Den . She challenged us to Spring into our kitchens and make Easter breads reflecting cultures around the world. Mine is Italian! My mom said my great-grandma would have been proud of me for these <3
 
Easter Bread
from Sprinkle Bakes

1 1/4 cups/301 ml. milk or half and half
1/3 cup/76g unsalted butter
2 1/4 teaspoons instant yeast
Pinch of salt (about 1/16 teaspoon)
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup/100g sugar
3 to 4 cups/ 408 to 544g bread flour (approximate)
1 egg
1 teaspoon water
pearl sugar, or rainbow sprinkles
6 raw eggs, room temperature, dyed in rainbow colors
Combine the milk and butter in a small saucepan and place over medium-low heat. Warm just until the butter is completely melted and remove from the heat. Let cool until just warm.
Combine the yeast, salt, eggs and sugar in the bowl of a standing mixer. Add the warm milk and half of the flour. Knead with the dough hook until combined. Add more flour gradually until the dough starts to pull away from the sides of the mixer. You may not have to use all of the flour. Knead the dough about 3-5 minutes longer, or until completely smooth and elastic.
Place the dough in a greased bowl and turn it over once to coat the top. Cover with plastic wrap and allow the dough to rise in a warm place, about 1 hour (
Gently deflate the dough with a fist. Turn it out onto a floured work surface and pat it down slightly so that the dough has an even thickness. Cut the dough into 12 even pieces. Roll each piece to form a 1-inch thick rope about 14 inches in length. Take two lengths and twist them together; loop the twist into a circle and pinch the ends together. Place the circle onto parchment lined baking sheets. Cover the loaves with plastic wrap and let rise again for 1 hour, or until doubled.
Preheat the oven to 350F.
Combine the egg and 1 teaspoon water in a small condiment cup. Using a pastry brush, lightly coat the loaves with the mixture. Sprinkle on the nonpareils and gently place a dyed egg in the middle of each loaf. Bake for 20 minutes, or until the bread is golden and fragrant. Let cool until warm, if patience allows.

Spaghetti Carbonara

I'm not really sure why I rarely blog the "real" things I eat. I swear, I do eat things beside cake. Sometimes. I think part of it is that when I'm cooking, I'm feeling more "I'm hungry and I don't want to take pictures, I want to eat my dinner" rather than "Oh, what a fun break this is from doing homework". You dig?

 And it's not even that I make really boring things for dinner. Some of the more notable meals have been pasta e fagioli, chicken tikka masala, pad thai, and pandan chicken. Oftentimes I even take pictures of my ingredients or process but I just forget to take a picture of the final dish. Or I just don't feel like it. Basically, I just suck, haha. 

I've also made spaghetti carbonara before and not posted it, but this time I've made a concerted effort to bring it to you! It's an incredibly easy and tasty meal, and a good way to use up random bits of food from the fridge. Perfect for a college student. 

Oh, by the way, today is the start of my spring break, woo! Or, as the Irish kids call it, reading week. I guess this is a period of study for them. For me, it's a period of almost interrupted travel! So I won't be able to post much/at all for the next week or two. But I promise you that when I come back, I'll have all sorts of stories to share. Wish me safe journeys!

 

Spaghetti Carbonara 
adapted slightly from BBC Good Food
serves 2ish

50 grams chopped back bacon (what I used), ham, pancetta, Canadian bacon...not American bacon
50g grated Parmesan
1 large egg
175 grams spaghetti
1 crushed garlic clove
a bit of butter or olive oil for the pan

Cook your spaghetti according to directions on the package. Add a little salt to the water. 
While the spaghetti is cooking, fry the meat with the garlic. Drop the butter into a large wide frying pan or wok and, as soon as the butter has melted, tip in the meat and garlic. Leave these to cook on a medium heat for about 5 minutes, stirring often, until the meat is golden and crisp.
Keep the heat under the meat on low.When the pasta is ready, drain it, but leave a bit of pasta water to thin the sauce. I only needed a few tablespoons. In your now empty spaghetti pot, throw the spaghetti back in, plus the bacon/garlic mixture, and the cheese.
Take the pan of spaghetti and meat off the heat. Now quickly crack the egg in, and using the tongs or a long fork, lift up the spaghetti so it mixes easily with the egg mixture, which thickens but doesn't scramble, and everything is coated. Add extra pasta cooking water to keep it saucy (several tablespoons should do it). You don't want it wet, just moist. Season with a little salt, if needed.
Use a long-pronged fork to twist the pasta on to the serving plate or bowl. Serve immediately with a little sprinkling of the remaining cheese and a grating of black pepper. If the dish does get a little dry before serving, splash in some more hot pasta water and the glossy sauciness will be revived.