Subliminal's Adventures: Today's *random loaf*

I like to make baked goods. Things like banana bread and soda bread are my favourites to make, and I even regularly make a baked thing I've named Franklbuns for my parrot, who won't eat veggies unless they are blended and mixed into a fruity bun. Little does he know the fruity buns he loves so much are... good for him! Anywho, I sometimes make random loaves of soda bread, and today was one of those days. There's not much science to it, I just kinda add random things to a basic mix, usually the last bits of stuff I have in the fridge or pantry. With that, we get today's creation... jalapeno garlic cheese bread!

The first step to any baking project is....

A clean kitchen! I hate starting to cook anything when there are dirty dishes and counters around, so I always clean the kitchen before I start. Plus I keep a sink full of hot soapy water going so I can "wash as I go" between steps, thereby making less clean up at the end! Next, gather your ingredients:

Then, pre-heat the oven! I went with 400 this time, but I would really recommend only 350. This oven is wierd.

I use plain all purpose flour, vegetable oil and baking soda for the main base, as well as a packet or spoonful of vinegar, depending which I have handy. I also put in a packet of malt vinegar to see if it would affect the taste. Regardless what kind you use you need some sort of acid as there is no yeast in this mix and the baking soda needs something to work with! To start, I put about 1 1/4c of water into the stand up mixer, along with 1/2c of oil, you can use regular oil but we had some chili oil and some garlic oil kicking around, so I added a splash of those as well. I also put in two big squeezes of deli mustard, the last spoonful of minced garlic in the jar, and although not pictured, the last spoonful of garlic cream cheese from the container (see what I mean about clearing out my fridge!). Finally I added a couple of chopped up jalapenos that were starting to get a bit old and wrinkly in their package (another bit gone!). If we had any eggs I probably would've added one or two but we were out of eggs, oh well. I gave this all a good mix (as well as you can mix oil and water), and then combined 3c of flour with 2tsp baking soda in a bowl. Depending how much liquid you used you may have to add a bit more flour to get a smooth dough. I will get to that part in a minute. Here's where we are at:

I forgot to take a progress shot, but basically you want to mix the flour mixture in a bit at a time at a slow speed. Your mix will go from liquidy to firm quite quickly. I usually start with 3 cups of flour/baking soda/other dry items (like spices) in the mixer and then knead in the rest. To do that, cover your counter with a good amount of flour and dump your sticky dough ball on there. Get lots of flour on your hands and then dump a good sized handful of flour on your dough, and knead it on the counter, pulling the ball apart to expose sticky dough and just kinda working all the flour in. I keep adding handfuls until it no longer pulls apart to reveal any sticky dough and it's in a fairly even round easy to shape ball. Once it's in it's final shape I oil it with a bit of veg oil to help the crust stay soft:

Slap that dough ball onto a buttered baking sheet, and cut an X on top with a sharp floured knife:

At this point I put it in the oven for about 10 min, just to get the crust to start to form. I then usually pull it out and add a bit of melted butter to the crust to help keep it soft. This time I also put a bit of cheese on top, and a sprinkle of salt and pepper: