Anadama bread

I'm finally getting back to my goal of making every bread in The Bread Bakers Apprentice Book!  The latest bread was Anadama Bread. 

It started out with soaking a cup of corn meal in a cup of water overnight, and this was a new concept to me for baking bread, but I went with it.  The next day, per the directions, I added the flour, etc and let it ferment for an hour until bubbles appeared, then added the remaining ingredients (which included molasses, which was also a new addition to bread baking for me).

Unfortunately, I miscalculated my time so instead of letting the dough rise for an hour or two, I had to put it in the fridge after a couple of hours since I didn't have time to shape it.  Luckily this didn't impact the rising stage at all.

I actually didn't get around to baking the bread until the next day, so my 2 day bread turned into a 3 day bread, but it ended up making 3 loaves, which was nice.  The bread itself?  Well I'll admit, I wasn't as crazy about it as I have been other breads I've made, perhaps it was the cornmeal.  But I toasted it and put some orange marmalade on it and it tasted fine :)

Casatiello

I pulled out the Bread Bakers Apprentice book out again today so I could have a contribution for Nana's annual Thanksgiving feast, so, being the Italian that I am, decided to go with an Italian bread, the Casatiello.

After I tasted it when it was finished, I sent my friend a text that said "holy f***, this bread is amazing".

It was actually a relatively easy bread to make, just lots of time to rise, and well, it's certainly not friendly for the waistline, it's a brioche style bread with bits of diced salami and shredded provolone cheese mixed in, and it is such a rich, soft and somewhat delicate bread, and it is easily one of the most delicious breads I've ever tasted!

And it was a big hit at Thanksgiving too and a few people asked me for the recipe. Well, you can find this recipe and many more in the book!

Now for some pics:

Here is the dough after mixing

And after rising for about 90 minutes

In the springform pan I baked it in (very nice way to bake bread, btw!)
After rising for another hour:

After baking (although I baked for the recommended time, when I cut into it the top fell a little bit and it was a tad undercooked, but still delicious!)