This Week’s Bakery Bulletin
Thursday, April 09, 2009
Hello!!
Every week I’ll let you know about the bread flavors we’ll be baking, and remind you to order. Below, you’ll find a list of breads available for order this week.
I wrote all about my unconventional (but by now traditional) Easter dinner last week—but I forgot to talk about the fruited almond holiday bread! We baked it last week, and are baking it again this week, especially for Easter-time! It’s very much like hot cross buns, packed with dried apricots and cranberries and golden raisins, toasted almonds, and scented with almond extract… it’s great for brunch anytime, but especially now, when the sun back and spring is in the air!
You’ll also find a recipe at the end of the newsletter—for a pasta dish that I love to serve with the kalamata olive bread!
THE BAKERY WEBSITE
Ordering through the website will be easy and fun! The first time you order bread, you’ll click on the “register now” link, pick a username and password, and enter your information (name, email, and phone numbers).
In case you can’t make the website work, you can always email me at: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), or call me at 677-3712.
the bread ordering deadline
You’ll need to order your bread by MIDNIGHT on Sunday, so we have time to plan our bake, feed our sourdough, and pre-ferment the dough! When you order the bread, you can choose to “pay when you pick up your bread,” or you can pay via PayPal. By all means, use PayPal if you prefer—but I’m even happier to get your checks or cash when you come pick up your bread.
bread pickup locations
Pick-up locations for Wednesday, April 8
1. Side Street Espresso, 412 G Street, downtown: 8-11am
2. Tap Root Café, 1330 Huffman Road, across from Carrs: 3-6pm
NEW SOUTH-SIDE LOCATION, Starting in May
Tap Root Café will be changing locations soon—possibly moving downtown! We are very grateful to Tap Root for allowing us to deliver our bread there for these last two years—but we needed to find a new pickup location! Over the Rainbow Toys (12201 Industry Way, D5), right next to the Huffman Post Office, has graciously agreed to be our new pickup spot for bread (and Glacier Valley CSA produce boxes—more information below). May 13th will be the first date for the new pickup location at Over the Rainbow Toys, so I’ll keep you posted as we get closer to the transition.
If you need to call me during a pick-up time, you can reach me on my cell phone at 748.3712. At other times, please call me at home/the bakery: 677-3712.
Alison’s blog
If you’d like more savory and healthful recipes, you can find lots more of them on my blog about cooking and eating local food: Alison’s Lunch. You can even sign up for my blog posts (about local food, cooking, and recipes) to be delivered to your email! .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) if you have trouble signing up, and I can help you.
GLACIER VALLEY FARM COMMUNITY SUPPORTED AGRICULTURE (CSA)
It’s the only year-round program featuring local Alaskan produce! Would you like to pick up a box of beautiful and economical local vegetables when you need produce? Subscribers to our CSA program aren’t limited to our short farmers’ market season to get Alaskan produce; we’re loading boxes year-round! During the winter, local produce includes cabbages, carrots, potatoes, onions, beets, and turnips. To add variety to these nourishing and savory staples, we add all sorts of vegetables and fruits from certified organic farms Outside. Each box also contains a newsletter loaded with my delicious, healthy recipes tailored to the week’s vegetables. [$35/box]
You can sign up for a box once a week, twice a month, or more sporadically—you choose the dates! You pre-pay for your box, then pick it up at one of several locations in Anchorage, Eagle River, or the Valley. Please visit our website for more information!
featured bread this week
signature levain pan loaf (100% whole wheat sourdough)
golden maize pan loaf (100% whole grain sourdough)
toasted seed hearth loaf (100% whole wheat sourdough)
kalamata olive hearth loaf (60% whole wheat sourdough)
fruited almond holiday loaf (60% whole wheat sourdough)
recipe of the week
Spaghetti with Grape Tomatoes, Olives, Capers, & Pine Nuts
When the kalamata olive bread is on our baking schedule for the week, we like to make this pasta dish. The olives in the bread are great with the olives and capers in the pasta! If you want to heat a whole loaf of bread to eat with dinner, you can heat it, unwrapped, for 15 minutes in a 350 degree oven just before serving dinner.
Dan likes to call this recipe his signature dish, because he’s the only one who has the patience to cut all the grape tomatoes in half before roasting them. I think if you just left them whole (and let them burst in the oven) they’d be just fine—maybe the dish wouldn’t be as pretty, but it would still taste great!!
In the summer, we love to make this recipe with local cherry tomatoes, but we make this recipe all year ‘round with big boxes of grape tomatoes from Costco. The original recipe (from Cooks Illustrated) called for this amount of sauce for a whole pound of pasta, but we like twice as many tomatoes for our pasta—so please note that the recipe below only calls for a half-pound of pasta. We always make a double batch to have plenty of leftovers, so we buy two of those giant boxes of grape tomatoes at a time. While you’re at Costco, you can pick up a giant jar of capers, a bag of pine nuts, a mesh bag of garlic, a huge jug of olive oil, a big wedge of Parmesan cheese, and a jar of kalamata olives… Then you’re set up to make this dish whenever you get a hankering!
2 pounds grape tomatoes, halved pole to pole
2 tablespoons olive oil
sea salt or kosher salt
½ teaspoon red pepper flakes
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
6 large cloves garlic, sliced thin
¼ cup rinsed and drained capers
½ pound spaghetti (I like whole-wheat, especially DeCecco or Ronzoni)
½ cup pitted and sliced kalamata olives
¼ cup chopped flat-leaved parsley
¼ cup pine nuts, toasted (optional)
2 ounces grated Parmesan cheese (optional)
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl, gently toss tomatoes with oil, ½ teaspoon salt, pepper flakes, pepper, garlic, and capers. Coat a rimmed baking sheet with non-stick spray or oil. Spread tomatoes in an even layer on baking sheet and roast until tomato skins are slightly shriveled (tomatoes should retain their shape), 35 to 40 minutes. Do not stir tomatoes during roasting. Remove from the oven and cool 5 to 10 minutes.
2. While tomatoes cook, bring a large pot of water to boil. Just before removing tomatoes from the oven, stir 1 tablespoon salt and pasta into boiling water and cook until al dente. Drain pasta and return to pot. Scrape tomatoes into pot on top of pasta, add olives and parsley; toss to combine. Serve immediately, sprinkling pine nuts and optional cheese over individual bowls.
