French Bread Add-Ons!

Alright, French bread, as I said in my last post, is very versatile! One of the things we can do is fill them up with something:

Wash your hands, and get ready!

Ham and Cheese Bread:

Ingredients:

• 2 cups of Cheddar Cheese
• 1/2 lb of Ham
• 1 TBS of Cream Cheese
• French Bread dough as shown in my last post (http://alejandroskitchen.blogspot.com/2011/03/french-bread.html)
• 1 Egg Yolk
• 1 TBS of milk

Steps:

1. Make the dough for the French Bread as shown in the last post.
2. Put some flour on the table, or countertop, get a rolling pin and try to spread the dough into a rectangle having the largest sides to be the length of the bread (about 17 inches). The dough is going to try to go back to its former shape so its not going to be super easy to spread it out. The dough should be about 1/4 of an inch thick.
3. Get the 1 TBS of Cream Cheese and spread it through the dough. This is supposed to be a very thin layer. Its going to maintain the Ham and the Cheese very moist after cooked. Remember to leave about a 1/2 inch margin without ingredients in order to close the dough properly.
4. Spread the all the Ham through the dough as well as the Cheddar Cheese.

Shape the Bread:

1. Roll the dough into a cylinder making sure that the sides are well closed. Before you completely close the bread (when there is about 1 inch of dough left), get the dough and cross it over the cylinder. This way we make sure its well closed.
2. Make cuts in the bread with a sharp knife. They should be diagonal and about one inch in depth. Three or four is enough. These will let the bread to expand while cooking
3. Let the bread rise for about one hour and a half.

Cooking the Bread:

1. Before putting the bread to cook. Mix the egg yolk with the TBS of milk (any milk is fine) and brush them slightly on top of the bread. Don't be too harsh because the bread candeflate, but be sure to spread the mixture everywhere but the bottom. This will give a nice golden colored crust.
2. Put in the oven at 350 degrees for 25-35 minutes. Until the crust in golden and it makes an "empty" sound when hit. On the picture there is one French bread (right) and one Ham and Cheese Bread (left)

Another thing you can do is cut the regular french bread in pieces of about 1 inch thick and put some ham and cheese on them and put them back in the oven. You can even sprinkle some oregano on them, and have something like on the picture below.

Final Add-Ons:

1. You can make it your own type of Bread:

• Various Cheeses - Provolone, Cheddar and Swiss match well!
• Ham and Cheese with Mustard - instead of the Cream Cheese you mix a little bit of milk with mustard and you spread it just like the Cream Cheese.
• Salami and Provolone - Diced Olives, Salami, and Provolone Cheese.
• Chicken Special - Mix in a pan with a little bit of vegetable oil: 1 of 2 cloves of Garlic chopped, half an Onion finely chopped, 1 TSP of Salt and Pepper, 1 Tomato chopped, and 1/2 pounds of shredded boneless Chicken. Cook until the chicken is cooked and the onions look a little golden (I usually like to put the onions and the garlic first, they take a little longer to cook). Drain it a little bit, let cool and then spread it through the bread. If you want to you can put a little bit of swiss cheese on top of it before closing the bread.
• Topping the bread: With the same mixture of one Egg yolk and 1 TBS of milk (this is called an egg wash) you can add anything to the top of the bread. While still wet of the egg wash add some sesame seeds, or maybe sprinkle some Parmesan cheese on top of it with oregano.

Have fun and remember, be clean and have caution in the kitchen!!

- Alejandro