Wild Rice & Bay Fendu

OK. When I say 'fendu', I use this word gratuitously. As you all know, I suck at shaping anything other than a boule. Batards, baguettes, forget about it. I am fairly unambitious with bread shaping, so I never get better at it. Which is fine by me. But every now and again I fancy that I'm an actual baker, and then I am humbled when I try to do something outside of a neat little ball.

Wild Rice & Bay Fendu

So, this week's bake brings two new things to the blog. I had this fantastic idea for a wild rice loaf flavored with fresh bay because I have a beautiful laurel bay plant in my kitchen, and wild rice just sounds lovely. At first I thought I might just cook some of this black grass up and add it to the dough, but then I got the wild idea to mill some of it up into flour to further enhance the loaf.

When thinking about the bay, I knew I didn't want to stash any inside the actual loaf (i.e., if I decided to go with a boule), because slicing into it would result in woody bits in the mouth. No Good. This brought me to the grand idea of fendu. In my crazy imaginings, I would shape it perfectly, encasing a few of the aromatic leaves within the split. It would proof up smashingly, hugging the leaves through the bake, whereafter I would pluck them out and wind up with an exotically-flavored bread.

(admittedly a little phallic...)

Well, most of this was true, only my fendu opened up during the bake. After the steam I was a little dismayed, but when all was said and done, despite my lack of shaping prowess, I was tickled pink with the resulting loaf.

The cool part of the experiment is that I got to work with another method of steam. Our combo cooker has been our crutch for so long, and I have tried every method of getting steam into my oven with very poor results. All of my non-boule breads end up spreading with the lack of steam, and the resulting loaves are always flat. This time I used lava rocks that I doused with ice water when the dough was loaded into the oven, and the bread achieved marvelous oven spring (happy face). This may be the start of a new love affair with alternative shapes, now that I know what glorious steam the lava rocks create in the oven.

So, let me describe the bread: in a word, heavenly. But beyond that, the crust was super shattery, and such a wonderful ratio of crust to crumb. I was worried that the rice bits would be super tough on the outside of the loaf, but nothing could be further from the truth. While working with whole grains in my breads, I do try to encase as much of the grains within the dough when I turn and shape because they can bake out a little tough. Here, the bits that remained on the outside of this loaf added a pleasant crunch to the already crisp cortex.

The crumb was superbly tender and open, and the flavor, wow. A sweet earthy quality from the wild rice, and the bay permeates the loaf delicately, lending a lovely resinous and spicy perfume.

For this bread I milled up some white whole wheat (Bob's Red Mill hard white wheat berries) along with the wild rice. I also used Giusto's Ultimate Performer and Golden Haven. I added just a pinch more salt that I normally do to compensate for the addition of the wild rice. I never knew I could bake up such a glorious thing!

Without further babble, here is the method for our wild rice & bay fendu in all its glory.

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LEVAIN NIGHT

Three days before you plan to make your levain, throw your starter into overdrive by feeding it three times each day. On the fourth day, build your levain:

12g 100% hydration dark rye starter

75g freshly milled white whole wheat flour, I used Bob's Red Mill hard white wheat berries. 

75g h2o

DOUGH DAY

You will need:

All of the levain

350g h2o (you will underhydrate here and the dough will feel a little on the dry side, but the wild rice adds water to the dough, so resist the temptation to add more water at this point)

317g Giusto's Ultimate Performer

83g Giusto's Golden Haven flour

75g freshly milled white winter wheat flour, I used Bob's Red Mill hard white wheat berries

25g freshly milled wild rice

175g cooked wild rice

13g kosher salt, I used Diamond

Wild Rice Flour

When the levain is at its peak, mix it with the flours and h2o until you reach a shaggy mass. Autolyse for one hour. During this hour, make your wild rice. 4 parts water to 1 part wild rice. To arrive at what you need here, you will need 2 cups of water and 1/2 cup wild rice. Cook till tender, about 45 minutes, drain and rinse with cold water using a fine-mesh strainer. Set aside.

After the autolyse, squish the salt into the dough so that it is thoroughly incorporated then fold in the wild rice.

Now begin your 4-hour bulk fermentation. Here you will perform a series of turns for the first two hours of bulk. Leave it be for the final hour. My bulk was done at room temp for the most part, even though it was in the 80s here in L.A, but I did refrigerate it for the last 45 minutes because it began to expand rapidly at this point.

After the bulk fermentation, scrape the dough onto a worktable that you have dusted with brown rice flour, gather it into a loose torpedo shape and let it rest for 10 minutes.

After it has rested, shape it into a neat batard. Now, flip the dough seam-side down, and using a dowel or a thin rod of some sort. All I had was a French rolling pin. Likely part of the problem. Make a wide moat in the dough by rolling the dowel back and forth, trying to maintain equality on both sides of the moat. As you can see, I was not as fastidious as I should have been and ended up with one more shallow side. When you have accomplished this, roll either side of the dough back toward the center firmly, then slip in a few bay leaves. This is where I started to have trouble. My seam would not stay closed, and the sides of my dough kept rolling open relentlessly. So I ended up pinching the ends of the torpedo before placing into the banneton. This is going to take more practice.

If you want to learn how to properly shape a fendu, see Susan's post here. If you want to learn how to shape any loaf, defer to Susan. She is the mistress of shaping bread.

Place the dough seam side down, being careful not to dislodge the leaves, so that when you flip it on bake day, it will land seam/leaf side up. Moving along... pop it into a banneton, which, incidentally, I don't have. I used my Staub 4.5 quart oval roaster lined with a thick piece of canvas, and inserted rolled up pieces of this canvas into the sides of the pot so that the dough would not expand too widely.

Cover and get it into the fridge and ferment. Mine fermented for 18 hours 45 minutes.

BAKE DAY

One hour before you plan to bake the bread, preheat the oven to 500 degrees, installed with a baking stone and cast iron pot loaded with lava rocks which you have placed on the oven floor.

After the hour preheat, remove the dough bowl from the fridge, place a piece of parchment over the mouth of it, then a pizza peel on top of this, now flip the whole thing over so that the dough ends up on top of the parchment and peel. Remove the linen (if you have over dusted, now is the time to brush away any loose flour. I know, I have been the victim of some snowy loaves too).

Fill up a 4 cup measure with 3 cups of water and a full tray of ice cubes. Set aside.

Slide the dough onto the stone, then pull out the pot of lava rocks a bit and pour the ice water over the rocks. Quickly slide the pot back into the oven and steam for 15 minutes at 500 degrees. After 15 minutes, turn the oven down to 475 degrees and steam for 15 minutes more. After the steam, remove the lava pot from the oven and bake out till the loaf is chestnut brown, spinning it now and again for even heating. You may need to lower the oven to 450 for the last 10 minutes of cooking so that it does not burn. You want that crack down the center to bake out thoroughly. Mine took about 55 minutes to bake, I believe.

Cool the loaf for a full hour, and remove the leaves before slicing.

To the staff of life!

(This post was sent to Susan's Wild Yeast Blog)

Pane Siciliano (and A New Michette)

This all began with a new Michette. Wait. So, what exactly is the definition of my Michette? It's a boule made with home-milled whole grain and hand-bolted flour, or 100% bolted flour. It generally makes for a flattish loaf with a tighter, more even crumb. Like a mini Miche, hence the name. OK, so, I was busy bolting away some Iraqi Durum, right, coming up with a new bread for us all. And you know how durum is, right, super hard with spiky little molecules that rip at the gluten structure. Yes, there is plenty of protein in this hard grain, but the quality of it is not conducive to achieving much oven spring. Hence my idea of bolting part of the flour to soften those angry little particles. Let me tell you, the resulting Michette was lovely.

Michette, in Iraqi Durum

Of course, I couldn't stop there. I wondered if I could make a durum loaf using 100% hand-milled whole grain. A challenge, right, because of the nature of durum. So how do the Italians do it then? How do they make lovely loaves with 100% durum? Just to revive our understanding of durum, we all know that durum is a very hard wheat, yeah? I think the hardest. We know that, as aforementioned, the milled grain produces barbed molecules that slice away at our gluten structure, what little it has anyway, since the protein, while pretty high in percentage, is weak. We also know that semolina flour is made from durum, but semolina refers to the flour's coarse grind, not the grain itself. What I never knew, but that which I learned through this experiment, is that in Italy when bakers make durum loaves, they use a specific grind of durum called rimacinato, which translates as 'regrind'. So, when you buy a bag of semola di grano duro rimacinato, you are conceivably buying durum wheat that has been ground twice to break down those harsh little molecules a little further, smooth out their spiny little edges. This is the flour that bread makers in Italy use. Hm, sounds dubious, sounds like there is something else going on here. More on this in a second. Anyway, I decided to take up the idea of remilling my semolina, transforming it into this lovely sounding flour.

Pane Siciliano

There was not much information on the net about 100% durum loaves, and all of the breads I ran across either involved the addition of strong flour or employed this commercially made rimacinato which creates a loaf of bread with fantastic oven spring. Because of such, I would venture to guess that some other technique is involved in the processing of this flour because you are not going to get crazy oven spring if you are making rimacinato at home. While the breads I saw using this commercial rimacinato were beautiful, I wanted rustic loaves, truly hand-made loaves that would reflect the sort of country breads you might find on a Sicilian table. Judging by the breads produced by the commercial flour, I suspect that while it is 100% durum wheat, it is likely not whole durum wheat, but rather white flour, just like any ordinary bread flour, but made from durum berries. It's okay if it is. Just not what I was after here. 

I made several loaves of bread for this experiment, double testing the formulae that you see here, playing with hydration. I think altogether I made seven loaves to get them just right. First up is our Michette, in durum. A definitive keeper. It made a really gorgeous loaf, chewy crumb, fantastic nutty, sweet flavor. It was lovely plain, toasted, drizzled with olive oil, slathered with pesto and suffocated with slices of first of the season heirloom tomatoes and fleur di sel. Then I baked up three loaves of my newest invention, which I am calling my Pane Siciliano. I hand-ground some rimacinato, employing a double grind technique, right. First grind on sort of a standard setting on the Komo. This produced what would be regarded as semolina. I then sent it through the mill again on a finer grind, thus, our rimacinato is born. And all three loaves were an experiment with hydration as well, so I could get it right for the post.

Pane Siciliano (double grind)

Finally, and here's something, I baked up another three loaves of my Pane Siciliano, again making my hand-ground rimacinato, but this time I experimented with a triple grind to see what sort of crumb it would yield, perhaps it would contribute to a higher loft (though for this loaf, as with my Michette, I am partial to a flattish loaf with a tighter, more even crumb). I employed the double ground technique as above, then cooled it a bit before sending it through the mill a third time on a finer setting. What resulted was a very, very fine flour. Almost imperceptible to the touch.

Pane Siciliano (triple grind)

The resulting breads were fantastic. As we are all surely aware, the danger of durum breads can be a really tough cortex, especially with protracted baking times. But all of our experiments here resulted in lovely, tender crusts, and on that note, a decidedly earthy, nutty almost buttery crumb. Sweet and moist, a touch of acid. I will say, I didn't notice much difference in taste or texture between the double and triple milled breads, save for the crust of the double-milled which was only minutely more firm. They were both aesthetically pleasing as well. But to save time and effort, I would probably incline toward the double-mill when making a Pane Siciliano in the future.

The things you need to know about this bread is that it ferments very quickly, so you may not want to push fermentation times. For your benefit, I played with hydration and fermentation times within these 7 loaves, and the formulae here exhibit the ideal measurements and method. Finally, the loaves also bake really quickly, so, don't crank the oven beyond 450 degrees after the first 15 minutes of steam or you will likely pull them out prematurely. This is a very wet dough, so it needs the full hour to bake. Use your thermometer for this one guys or you may end up with an underbaked crumb.

This afternoon I had several slices with pesto and tomato, olive oil, and nipped at it plain every time I walked into the kitchen. Just a lovely rustic loaf to add to our repertoire. Please let me know how your Pane Siciliano works out for you. These are the perfect breads to compliment your next Italian feast, or frankly to bake up weekly. If this bread is one of peasant ancestry, it is the king of its kind.

Here is the method for both our kingly Pane Siciliano and our new Michette.

PANE SICILIANO

LEVAIN DAY

Three days before you plan to make your levain, throw your starter into overdrive by feeding it three times each day. On the fourth day, build your levain:

-10g 100% hydration starter
-75g rimacinato (double milled) durum wheat flour (I used Iraqi Durum for all of our experiments, but you can use a non-heritage varietal if you can't find Iraqi)

-82g h2o

Mix up the above. You will arrive at a very firm paste. It's okay, it will loosen as it ferments. Mine fermented for 6 hours.

Levain, Just Mixed

Fermented

DOUGH DAY

You will need:

-All of the levain

-530g h2o (no, this is not a typo. This is a very thirsty flour, which you will discover)

-500g freshly milled durum that has been milled once on a semi-fine setting, cooled a bit, then sent through the mill a second time on a fine setting (you will have to stir the flour in the hopper to push it through the stones). If you want to experiment with triple milled durum, cool the rimacinato, then send it through the mill a third time (again, you will have to stir the flour in the hopper to push it through the stones)

-12g kosher salt, I used Diamond

When the levain is at its peak, mix it with the flour and h2o until you reach a shaggy mass. Autolyse for 45 minutes.

After the autolyse, squish the salt into the dough so that it is thoroughly incorporated. Now begin your 3-hour bulk fermentation. Here you will perform a series of turns for the first two hours of bulk. Leave it be for the final hour.

* This dough will not gain obvious gluten formation. It will feel grainy as you do your turns, with only slight gluten formation. It does not have elasticity which we are familiar with when working with hard winter wheat flours either, so, it will indeed 'break' when you pull it up and stretch it during the folds. All is fine. It will ferment nicely despite this. Indeed, as you can see, this flour ferments very, very quickly. If you will notice both the reduced autolyse and bulk fermentation times. The final fermentation is also reduced considerably. My advice is not to push it. I have conducted this experiment with longer fermentations, higher hydration, and lower hydration and what you see here is the optimal method, measurements and fermentation times. The only change you might make is to refrigerate the dough after the first hour of bulk if it is very warm (above 80 degrees) where you are, and complete the bulk fermentation cold. Still, avoid pushing the fermentation time as this dough quickly overferments.

After the bulk fermentation, scrape the dough onto a worktable that you have dusted with brown rice flour, gather it into a loose round and let it rest for 5 minutes.

After it has rested, shape it using the 'Forkish fold' method, which is best for this dough. As you will quickly find, the dough will seem to disintegrate in your hands. You will not be able to shape it uber-tightly. Do the best you can. Just fold the sides up over the dough toward the center of the mass, spinning the dough until all of the edges are folded over to the center to create as tight a boule as possible. It will seem like this is never going to work. It will feel grainy to the touch. It's fine. Just forge on. The Forkish fold also affords another advantage. You cannot and should not attempt to score this dough. It won't work. It is very much like a high-percentage rye bread where the method is to let it fissure and open up at its natural cracks. You will place the dough seam side down, so that when you flip it on bake day, it will land seam side up, thus allowing the steam to escape and the loaf to organically 'self-score'. Moving along... pop it into a banneton or a bowl lined with a linen that has been dusted with brown rice flour, again, seam side DOWN.

Cover and get it into the fridge and ferment 8 hours. 

BAKE DAY

One hour before you plan to bake the bread, preheat the oven to 500 degrees, installed with a baking stone and both halves of your combo cooker.

After the hour preheat, remove the dough bowl from the fridge, place a piece of parchment over the mouth of it, then a pizza peel on top of this, now flip the whole thing over so that the dough ends up on top of the parchment and peel. Remove the linen (if you have over dusted, now is the time to brush away any loose flour. I know, I have been the victim of some snowy loaves too).

Slide it into the shallow end of the combo cooker. Cover with the fat end and steam the loaf at 500 degrees for 15 minutes. Now turn the oven down to 450 and bake for another 15. After the steam, remove the lid, pop it beneath the pan for a little buffer to protect the bottom of your loaf and bake out at 450 degrees.

This loaf browns up quickly, so, keep the temperature modest for the rest of the bake. You decidedly do not want to go to chestnut brown with durum loaves, or the cortex will become hard as a rock, and you do not want to crank the oven or the interior will not bake properly. This is a really wet dough, and needs the full hour to bake. Be sure to take the temp to at least 210-212 before pulling it out of the oven. The recommended temp here should should keep the loaf more on the golden brown end of the color scheme.

Perfectly Steamed

After the steam, remove the lid and bake till you reach the recommended temp, rotating the pan as you go to avoid dark patches.

Allow to cool for at least two hours before slicing. The interior will be moist beyond belief, the crust will be crisp but tender.

The formula for the Michette is below this group of pictures:

k

MICHETTE, IN DURUM

LEVAIN DAY

Three days before you plan to make your levain, throw your starter into overdrive by feeding it three times each day. On the fourth day, build your levain:

-10g 100% hydration starter

-75g single milled durum wheat flour (I used Iraqi Durum for all of our experiments, but you can use a non-heritage varietal if you can't find Iraqi)

-75g h2o

Mix up the above. You will arrive at a very firm paste. It's okay, it will loosen as it ferments. Mine fermented for 8.5 hours.

DOUGH DAY

You will need:

-All of the levain

-480g h2o

-250g freshly milled durum that has been milled once on a semi-fine setting

-250g freshly milled durum that has been milled once on a semi-fine setting, then bolted through a sieve using a #50 screen

-12g kosher salt, I used Diamond

-A good glug of olive oil, I don't know, 15g perhaps? I used California Olive Ranch extra virgin

When the levain is at its peak, mix it with the flour and h2o until you reach a shaggy mass. Autolyse for 45 minutes.

 Just Before Autolyse

 Growing

Autolyse Accomplished

After the autolyse, squish the salt and olive oil into the dough so that it is thoroughly incorporated. Now begin your 3-hour bulk fermentation. Here you will perform a series of turns for the first two hours of bulk. Leave it be for the final hour.

* This dough will not gain obvious gluten formation. It will feel grainy as you do your turns, with only slight gluten formation. It does not have elasticity which we are familiar with when working with hard winter wheat flours either, so, it will indeed 'break' when you pull it up and stretch it during the folds. All is fine. It will ferment nicely despite this. Indeed, as you can see, this flour ferments very, very quickly. If you will notice both the reduced autolyse and bulk fermentation times. The final fermentation is also reduced considerably. My advice is not to push it. I have conducted this experiment with longer fermentations, higher hydration, and lower hydration and what you see here is the optimal method, measurements and fermentation times. The only change you might make is to refrigerate the dough after the first hour of bulk if it is very warm (above 80 degrees) where you are, and complete the bulk fermentation cold. Still, avoid pushing the fermentation time as this dough quickly overferments.

After the bulk fermentation, scrape the dough onto a worktable that you have dusted with brown rice flour, gather it into a loose round and let it rest for 5 minutes.

After it has rested, shape it using the 'Forkish fold' method, which is best for this dough. As you will quickly find, the dough will seem to disintegrate in your hands. You will not be able to shape it uber-tightly. Do the best you can. Just fold the sides up over the dough toward the center of the mass, spinning the dough until all of the edges are folded over to the center to create as tight a boule as possible. It will seem like this is never going to work. It will feel grainy to the touch. It's fine. Just forge on. The Forkish fold also affords another advantage. You cannot and should not attempt to score this dough. It won't work. It is very much like a high-percentage rye bread where the method is to let it fissure and open up at its natural cracks. You will place the dough seam side down, so that when you flip it on bake day, it will land seam side up, thus allowing the steam to escape and the loaf to organically 'self-score'. Moving along... pop it into a banneton or a bowl lined with a linen that has been dusted with brown rice flour, again, seam side DOWN.

Cover and get it into the fridge and ferment 8 hours. 

BAKE DAY

One hour before you plan to bake the bread, preheat the oven to 500 degrees, installed with a baking stone and both halves of your combo cooker.

After the hour preheat, remove the dough bowl from the fridge, place a piece of parchment over the mouth of it, then a pizza peel on top of this, now flip the whole thing over so that the dough ends up on top of the parchment and peel. Remove the linen (if you have over dusted, now is the time to brush away any loose flour. I know, I have been the victim of some snowy loaves too).

Slide it into the shallow end of the combo cooker. Cover with the fat end and steam the loaf at 500 degrees for 15 minutes. Now turn the oven down to 450 and bake for another 15. After the steam, remove the lid, pop it beneath the pan for a little buffer to protect the bottom of your loaf and bake at out 450 degrees.

Steamed

This loaf browns up quickly, so, keep the temperature modest for the rest of the bake. You decidedly do not want to go to chestnut brown with durum loaves, or the cortex will become hard as a rock, and you do not want to crank the oven or the interior will not bake properly. This is a really wet dough, and needs the full hour to bake. Be sure to take the temp to at least 210-212 before pulling it out of the oven. The recommended temp here should should keep the loaf more on the golden end of the color scheme.

To the staff of life!

(This post was sent to Susan's Wild Yeast Blog)

Sidebar Sunday: Friends

What is a friend? I mean, it's hard to quantify, really. And it's different for everyone, the parameters of friendship. My idea of a friend is someone who confides in me and with whom I can do the same; someone to spend time with for no particular reason at all, indeed, but above all, there is no friend like the one who will take you to the airport.

A Lemon Cake for Molly

Molly is a beautiful soul. She is the sweetest girl I have ever met in my life. No. Seriously. She's one of those people whom you say about: not a mean bone in her body. I wish you all could meet her, your lives would be better for it. And frankly, it would take a million cakes to show Molly how wonderful and lovely and special she is (and not just because she takes me to the airport). I love you Molly! (and not just because you take me to the airport).

Indeed I was on my way to the airport to attend my best friend's wedding in Seattle, I was the bridesmaid/chef/wedding cake baker. The wedding cake was naked and gluten free and served with stone fruits that I macerated in St. Germaine liquor and chantilly cream. The ceremony was very sweet, set in the couple's luxuriously wild back yard and Seattle couldn't have given us more glorious weather. Oscar and I have been friends for 12 years. It has been that many years of nothing but laughter (and food) and love (and food, oh, and wine). I left Oscar and Donn to plan their honeymoon in China. Another friend gained, and hopefully many more years of laughter and celebration.

As it turns out, this has been a celebratory month. Aside from the wedding and the airport cake for Miss Molly, I have been baking up a storm for two of my closest friends' birthdays. It's what I do, you know, to let the people in my life know that I love them. Sandra's birthday was just last week, and I made her this cake that I make when I have something important to celebrate, like a birthday, or a friend stopping over with a bottle of wine. I also baked her chocolate scones, a couple of loaves of bread and a fabulous spelt focaccia and for days after I received texts about how much she and her family were enjoying it as they powered through it all. Sandra is a supermodel-turned-chef with fiery Spanish blood. She and I instantly connected because of a like-minded candor and because we both have professional cooking careers in common. A warm spirit whom I cannot imagine having in my life, it is with great fortune that I get to call her one of my dearest friends. Indeed, I think I'm the only friend she has who cooks for her. She's definitely the only friend I have who has strutted down the runway.

Finally there was a blueberry tart for Mika, another lovely woman who I am lucky to have in my life and who has become like a sister to me. Our friendship is one of deep confidence. Mika is the first friend I gained in L.A., and since we met five years ago, I find myself searching for excuses to invite her over for dinner (er, Bastille day? No better thing to celebrate than that!). Oh, the dinners we have had. They start with loads of food and wine and end with tears of laughter. But more than that, Mika and I have spend many more days sitting quietly on her porch admiring her lovely garden and eating of its spoils as the sun goes down. And it never fails when we are together that I look at her and wonder how it is that I came to find such a perfect and wonderful friend. Lucky. Me. Since I've been in L.A., no one has 'been there' for me like Mika has. I don't know how I would have done this infernal city without her.

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So this month has been less about occasions to celebrate than friendship. These three lovelies have enriched my life in measures that I probably don't deserve. Always here for me. Always loving. Always effortlessly. I am fortunate, and I never take it for granted.

Oh, before I forget, dear reader, I am finishing up a rather lengthy bread experiment and will be back at the page in a short bit to share it. I just have a few more things to tinker with to make sure the formula is up to snuff. Until then, you can make this cake.

Have a look.

Gather together:

(For the cake)
1 1/2 cups Giusto's Baker's Choice flour
1 cup cane sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup heavy cream
1 stick unsalted butter
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1 TB pure vanilla extract
Zest of 1 large lemon
A few rasps of nutmeg

(For the glaze)
3 TB lemon juice
3 TB powdered sugar
Zest of one small lemon
A couple of rasps of nutmeg

Preheat the ov to 350. Cut a strip of parchment paper and line a standard 9x5" loaf pan with it. The idea is to cut it so that it's only wide enough to cover the bottom and long enough to come up over the top of the pan at the sides about two inches on either side. These will be nifty little handles to lift the cake out of the pan later on. Butter the parchment/sides of the pan. Set aside.

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, salt and baking powder. Whisk in the zest and the nutmeg. Set aside.

Using a stand mixer, cream together the butter and sugar. When fluffy, add the eggs, one at a time. Beat thoroughly. Beat in the vanilla. Turn the mixer down to low, add the cream, and beat just until thoroughly incorporated.

Using a rubber spatula, and broad, sweeping strokes, fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients in two passes, making sure that you don't overmix or the cake will be tough.

Get the batter into the awaiting pan and smooth out the top. Bake till a skewer shoved into the center of the thing comes out clean. Be sure to flip it round toward the end of the baking so that it browns evenly. Mine took an hour (?).

When the cake is done, cool in a wire rack for about 15 minutes, then carefully pull the cake out of the pan, using the parchment as handles. Cool for another 30 minutes.

When the cake is cool, mix together the glaze ingredients: the powdered sugar, lemon juice, zest and nutmeg, whisking out the lumps. Using a pastry brush, brush the mixture all over the cake (including the sides!), making sure to drizzle a bunch in that crack at the top.

Give to a friend, preferably one who takes you to the airport.

To the staff of life!