I am an occasional bread baker. I make a killer Dutch Oven loaf but after that–eh. Yesterday I made a large pernil (Puerto Rican roast pork) and thought that a loaf of Cuban bread would go well with the leftovers. So, I also made a starter using a teaspoon of yeast and opened a packet to get it.
Today I see that the recipe calls for a whole packet to be put in the dough before adding the starter. Also, I scooped out a half a cup of bread flour (to save on my AP) for the dusting and the kneading. I now have an open packet of yeast minus a tablespoon and a bit more than a quarter cup of bread flour staring at me, wanting be be food.
I have a moderately well stocked pantry. What should I do?
Four tablespoons of bread flour? I guess you could use it as thickener in a stew. But honestly, that’s less than 15 cents worth of flour. If I didn’t have an immediate use for it, I’d just toss it.
Yeah. But-- if I add more flour to it I can make garlic knots with the yeast. I think. I’ve never made them. Can anyone finesse a dough recipe with less-than-a-packet of yeast and a bit of bread flour? I really have to get better at this bread thing.
Mix the flour with water until you get a sticky consistency. Mix in the yeast. Cover and put it in your fridge for a day or two. Add the goop to your next loaf after you’ve kneaded but before you rest it.
After you’ve kneaded your bread? How would you incorporate it? I’ve always done a preferment like that (and have one in the fridge right now) together with the rest of the ingredients when I’m mixing all my bread ingredients together the next day (or two). No need for additional yeast.
You could also make drop noodles for soup or stew. Mix 4TB flour with about 2 eggs. It should have a consistency of crepe batter, but a little bit thicker. You can then pour it in a gentle stream into simmering water, soup, or stew, and it will make one of the easier noodles it is to make at home (I made these yesterday for chicken soup). Or you could just mix it with one egg and form a simple dough, which you can then pinch off a little at a time and add to your soup or stew, for another easy type of noodle. The exact amount of egg or flour may vary a bit depending on conditions, flour type, size of eggs, etc., so you kind of have to use your judgement a bit. Oh, and add a little salt.
I was going to say spaetzle, which is basically the same things as your drop noodles, but in both cases we aren’t using the yeast up. But other than building a well-aged starter for a sponge, I don’t have an option to use all the ingredients at once.
I mean, you could probably make a small, single serving 6" (maybe? there’s just NOT much flour no matter what) flatbread in a skillet. But I love flatbreads when I’m not being careful with empty carb calories, so I’d just add enough extra flour to use up the yeast in proportion.
Make new starter! DUH! Why didn’t I think of that. For real. Why didn’t I? I just don’t think like a bread maker.
Maybe better to say incorporate it at the very end of the kneading process, but for my suggestion I think it probably doesn’t matter. I was thinking more of using the previous day’s dough rather than a levain, but this would be more like the latter.