Week 1 - This could be fun

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Day 2 - Thursday, March 12th: 'Artisan' Bread

The date was Thursday, March 12th. My company's office was still technically open, but I had decided to stay home for a second day due to some head congestion. If we're being honest, I also really did not want to take public transportation given what we were hearing about the coronavirus.

In the three weeks prior, I had gone on a trip to Belize, two of my best friends came to visit, and then my parents came to visit, back to back to back. Why is this relevant? Because it explains why I had absolutely nothing to eat in my apartment. As I was looking through my cabinets, all I saw was some yeast and flour (and a half eaten bag of dried apricots I brought to Belize for fear of starving; given the bag came back full, I clearly shouldn't have worried about that). I decided, since I was going to be home all day, might as well try a complicated bread recipe - something with lots of steps, many hours of rising, and, most importantly, a super crispy crust.

As it turns out, I made the simplest "artisan" bread I could find a recipe for online titled the 4 Ingredient No-Knead Artisan Bread recipe. Though the Great British Baking Show convinced me that all bread requires kneading, this sounded easy enough, so I went for it.

I made the dough, did not knead it, put it in a bowl, covered it in plastic wrap, and returned to my desk (read: bed) to continue working. My coworker previously worked in a bakery, so I proudly mentioned to him that I used my lunch break to make bread. As a person who really knows the art (read: science) of baking, he asked me loads of questions:

"Which brand of flour?" King Arthur.

"Bread flour or white flour?" Bread.

"What kind of yeast?" Idk. The type that comes in a packet.

"How many cups of flour did you use?" 3 1/4

"How many cups of water?" 1 1/2

"hmmm ok..." *Uh oh. Not a great sign*.

"It will be fairly dry bread I suspect." Damn.

"How long did you knead it for?" Idk. A while. *Clearly lying. Damn. Why didn't I listen to Mary Berry?*

Given I was home for a while, I decided to try it again; this time with more water and kneading it like Mary Berry said to. I kept everything else the same.

To the right, you will see pictures of dough rising. It is clearly a screenshot of my instagram since I did not expect to need a picture of it ever again.

Many hours later, it was time to bake the bread. I had done extensive research on the proper methodology to achieve that crispy exterior. I also asked my coworker who recommended using a pot to trap in the steam. That seemed like no fun. On the Great British Baking Show, I saw people pour boiling water on a sheet pan below the bread so the steam would create that crispy outside I was desiring.

Fun fact: whether because the method doesn't work or my oven is too shitty, when I checked on my bread halfway through the baking process, it was as pale as my thighs are always. I decided to audible and throw some ice into the bottom of the oven.

After 8 more minutes in the oven than the recipe originally called for, I took out the first loaf; settling for a loaf as dark as my shoulders in winter.

When I checked in with my coworker about achieving the crispy outside, he recommended using two cast iron skillets. Alternatively, he (again) recommended using a pot. At this point, I lied. I said I would use the cast iron method even though I didn't have any cast iron pans. I was also too scared to cook the bread in a pot and have it stick to the bottom but didn't want to seem like too much of a newbie so I went ahead and doubled down on my ice method. Why this is the moment I felt the need to protect my pride, the world may never know.

I put the second loaf in the oven and threw some ice cubes on the bottom. Closed the oven door and listened to it sizzle. 7 minutes later, I did it again. 7 minutes later, I did it again. After 20 minutes, my bread had a nice tan - a color I can never get since I very much just turn red in the sun.

This is what the two loaves looked like:

Guess which is which.

Anyway, long story short: Friday night happened, we opened the loaves. I was all excited for the second one since the crust looked so crispy and I had clearly learned from the mistakes of my first loaf. Turns out, the crust may have been beautiful on the second one, but the middle was raw. Also, the extra water had diluted the flavor. Turns out, the recipe was good all along.

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Day 2b - Thursday, March 12th: Peanut Butter Pie with Chocolate Ganache

While I was letting the bread rise (and wasn't working), I realized that it was my girlfriend's birthday that weekend and I had wanted to make her a special pie for her Friday night birthday dinner. No, I didn't just realize it was her birthday, I just realized that I was about to spend all weekend (read: the following many months) with her, so had to make it immediately. As a lover of peanut butter cups, I decided to make a peanut butter pie with chocolate ganache.

After making the oreo crust, the rest of the recipe seemed pretty straight forward, which obviously felt more like a challenge than a blessing. I decided to make it dairy free. (At the time, I didn't process the irony that I had already used a whole stick of butter for the crust, so dairy-free people were gonna have to steer clear regardless, or risk some major gas issues).

The recipe called for cream to whip. As my quick scan of the internet taught me, Coconut milk worked as a substitute. I took out a can of coconut milk from the pantry that was clearly my roommate's (Sorry Julie. I owe you.) opened it, and started to whip. After many minutes, however, nothing was happening.

Spoiler alert: you want the can to be in the fridge first. Read this for instructions. Good thing I (read: Julie) had a back up can. I took the second can, actually followed the instructions, whipped it up (kind of), mixed in all the other ingredients, and assembled the pie!

See the pic to the right (unless you're reading this on your phone, then it might be below. I'm not sure.)

At this point, I still so naively believed that this had merely been just a fun day of cooking in preparation for the weekend. I opened some wine, had a couple friends over, and that was that.

Takeaway: this is a recipe I would recommend. Coconut cream instead of the cream doesn't make the dish taste like coconut. It is definitely rich though.

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Day 3 - Friday, March 13th: Peanut Butter Cups

As I previously mentioned, I love peanut butter and chocolate. I have legitimately pondered what I would do if any of my future children had an allergy to peanuts, and in a few cases, I would choose the peanut butter. (I'm sorry to anyone reading this that is allergic to peanuts, but since I don't presume many people will read this, I'm ok.) Anyway, every morning for breakfast I have a banana and Santa Cruz brand dark roasted crunchy peanut butter, and then, for dessert, I take a piece (or 2) of dark chocolate and use it to wipe up the remaining peanut butter from my plate. Yes, I have dessert for breakfast, and yes I prefer dark chocolate over milk chocolate. You can @ me on that one. Dark chocolate is superior (although fun fact, super dark chocolate makes me sneeze. My coworkers can attest.)

This morning, I had relocated to Berkeley to the GF's house, and was WFH from there (for those that somehow still don't know, this stands for Working From Home). Since I was still in a home, I decided I would continue my cooking trend and make my own Peanut Butter Cups from scratch. I went to the land of dark chocolate peanut butter cups (read: Trader Joes) in search of raw peanuts and chocolate.

While I found an easy bar of dark chocolate to melt, they only had roasted peanuts. I really wanted to feel accomplished and crafty, so I decided I would take the roasted peanuts, and roast them just a bit more. I like dark roasted peanuts anyway. I got home, took a cast iron pan, and began to roast the already roasted peanuts.

Fun fact: you really don't need to roast already roasted peanuts. This was clearly more of a pride thing than an actually creating the best kind of food thing. Yes yes, I am noticing the pride theme.

Once the peanuts seemed sufficiently roasted (read: burnt), I put them in a blender and created some beautiful looking peanut butter.

Now, it was time for the avengers to assemble! By avengers I mean the peanut butter and chocolate and by assemble I mean I put them together. While I did have access to a mini-cupcake pan, I did not have access to any mini-cupcake liners to prevent the chocolate from sticking to that pan. Rather than do the smart thing and look up the best method, I decided on a much riskier (and scientific) approach.

There were 16 spaces for 16 peanut butter cups. Rather than use 1 method for all 16 cups and hope that they all worked out, I decided to be strategic: implement 3 different strategies maximizing the likelihood that one came out picture perfect. Then, I could post that photo to instagram and make it seem like I was awesome and successful.

The three strategies were:

1. Spray a very thin layer of olive oil at the bottom and on the sides.

2. Mush a thin layer of Earth Balance on the bottom and side.

3. Put the chocolate in plain without oil or EB and hope for the best.

Bonus strategy:

I tried to butter the bottom of an upside down shot glass and poured some chocolate on it. Spoiler alert: that one didn't work.

I put the cups in the freezer and waited. After what felt like years (but realistically was 20 minutes) I took them out of the freezer, excited to see which strategy worked. Sadly, none of the them. Feeling defeated, I put them back in the freezer and drowned my sorrows in another episode of a trashy Spanish high school drama, Elite. As it turns out, all I really needed to do was be patient. A couple episodes later, I came downstairs, and took the cups out of the freezer. With just a little pop, I had 16 perfect peanut butter cups. Ok, only 7 of them worked out, but that was enough. I got my picture. Posted it to social media. Got like 6 comments. Pretended none of the cups failed. Felt super awesome.

At this point, I decided that however long I was going to be WFH, I would cook something every day that I had never before made on my own. The more time spent and the more elaborate, the better. I then told my friends and family - which was as close to an unbreakable oath as I could possibly make.

As the daytime turned to night time, I set the table for the 10 people coming to dinner to celebrate the birthday. Little did I know that this would become the last gathering for the foreseeable future, and these peanut butter cups would be the first of many many days of trying new recipes. Though the coming weeks would teach me that I needed to be creative and conservative with my resources, and that a day of cutting an apple in a fancy way was ok, at this point I felt happy and excited to start this journey.