Don’t forget! The first installment of Kids Cook Book Soup — theme: Apples! — is now open for entries through this coming Sunday, October 18.Monday, October 26 — extended an extra week! Check for round-up Tuesday, October 27th.

To simplify the challenge, here’s all you need to do: cook (with your kids!) any apple recipe … and share where you found the recipe. It can be from a story, a cookbook, or a family recipe. The only requirements are a) that it contain apples, and b) that you involve your kids! And have fun!

You’ll send me a link to your post &/or picture (no blog needed to participate), and we’ll post the round-up right here, on the 3rd Tuesday of the month.  Just email your link &/or photo, along with your name (or name you want printed), kid’s age(s), blog name and location to me at foodietots @ gmail.com.

And, everyone who participates will be entered to win a great food-themed children’s book.

Please help spread the word! Click the “SHARE THIS” button below to share on Twitter, Facebook &/or Stumble It!

Calling all farmers market fans! Whether you’re an experienced locavore or just curious about whether you could survive cooking with only locally-grown ingredients, you’re invited to join in for a three-month local eating challenge. One Local Summer 2009, hosted by Farm to Philly, begins this Monday, June 1. Participants commit to cooking one entirely local (except for oil, vinegar and spices) meal each week. Here’s a reminder of some of the Chesapeake Bay foodshed meals we enjoyed last year. And I’m pleased to be helping this year as the Southern region coordinator, so if you’re in the Southeast (DC and south of the Potomac) please sign up to join in or just check back to see what your neighbors are cooking up each week. To join, email your name, location and blog url (if you have one) to farmtophilly@gmail.com by Sunday, May 31. 

The second bread in the Bread Baker’s Apprentice (BBA) challenge was Artos, a Greek celebration bread typically enjoyed for Christmas or Easter. While I added the fruits found in the Christmas version, I stuck with the basic Artos shape rather than adding the decorative cross design.

The recipe begins with a starter, either a barm or a poolish. I chose the poolish as it was the simplest of the two, and I’d never made either before! The poolish is simply yeast, flour and water allowed to ferment for several hours. You then refrigerate it overnight and then are supposed to pull it out of the fridge an hour before mixing the rest of the bread’s ingredients. I took it out Memorial Day morning thinking I would mix it up before brunch, but of course that didn’t happen. When I returned five hours later (brunch was followed by playground and errands), it had exploded through its plastic wrap, over the top of its jar and oozed all over the place. After scraping off the crusty top, there was just about a cup left in the bottom of the jar which was precisely the amount needed for the bread.

Artos had a pretty long ingredient list, including a number of spices and extracts. I used cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg (no ground cloves). After mixing the dry ingredients, I plopped my gooey poolish-monster into the bowl….

… and added the beaten eggs, warm milk and almond extract. I had neither fresh citrus nor extract, so had to do without that. I mixed it in my Kitchen Aid again, but it was so sticky that I sprinkled an extra tablespoon of flour around the sides of the bowl so it would fully pull away from the bowl to knead. I added the organic dried cranberries and sultana raisins for the last two minutes of mixing.

After kneading, the dough went into an oiled bowl and was left to rise for 90 minutes …

Yep, more than doubled. I shaped it into a round boule and left it on the baking sheet for another 60 minutes. I was a little concerned that it rose outward at that point, rather than up, but went ahead and put it in the oven after 70 minutes as other BBAers had commented about humongous loaves.

Sure enough, 43 minutes later this fragrant beauty emerged from the oven … loved the cinnamon fragrance while it baked! And it was a moist, delicious bread.

• Note: I haven’t used spray oils in years, but after slathering oil on the Anadama dough by hand I decided I should pay attention to Mr. Reinhart’s instructions. I was happy to find spray grapeseed oil at my organic grocer. They also had organic olive oil spray but the grapeseed was recommended for baking.
• N.2. My bread shrunk a little while cooling, leaving a few wrinkles in the crust. (Any baking gurus out there know why?)
• N.3.: I hate to take a bye week so early in the challenge, but we’ll be traveling next week so bagels will be posted the following week, along with bread #4. Come back and see what’s baking!

You can see a (lovely) authentically-shaped Christopsomos loaf at Appoggiatura; or check out the enormous braided version by the Engineer Baker. And be sure to visit the BBA homepage at Pinch My Salt to check out other’s successes, failures and advice as we bake our way through The Bread Baker’s Apprentice.

One of my personal goals for the year was to conquer my long-standing fear of baking with yeast to make my own bread. We almost never eat grocery store bread, but we do rely quite heavily on our local bakeries and market vendors. And unlike the farm-fresh produce at the market, the baked goods aren’t always up to my organic/GMO-free standards. So when a favorite foodblogger of mine, Nicole of Pinch My Salt, posted a note on Twitter that she was thinking of cooking her way through Peter Reinhart’s Bread Baker’s Apprentice, it seemed like the perfect time to jump on the “bake your own” bandwagon. Apparently, more than a few other home cooks and bloggers had the same thought, as the list of participants is now 200 people strong! I’ll be making one bread a week (give or take), and you can follow along on the group site if you want to see others’ experiences with the same recipes. (Or follow #BBA on Twitter and see photos at Flickr.)

The first bread, Anadama, is a rustic New England recipe with cornmeal and molasses. The boy ate two slices for dessert tonight, so I think that’s a good sign.

My notes:

• I used dark (unsulphured organic) molasses, which gave the bread a rich, dark brown color; and my local cornmeal (Wye Mill, MD).
• Kneaded in the KitchenAid for 8 minutes.
• Didn’t shape the loaves evenly (need to re-read the shaping instructions before doing it) so they came out slightly lopsided.
• Grilled cheese: I’m envisioning white cheddar and pear on Anadama in the fall … so far we’ve just eaten it warm with farm-fresh butter.

Overall, this was a pretty simple recipe and tasted delicious. Here’s hoping future experiments go as smoothly!

Shared with Real Food Wednesday at Kelly the Kitchen Kop – check it out for more real food inspiration!