Dutch oven Restoration and Reseasoning.

Last week, my neighbor let me take his Dutch oven and “rehab” it. As you can see from the pictures, it was pretty badly rusted. I did one of my own that had gotten all oxidized as well. Here, you can see a pic of them both. Mine is the long, oval one.

I started out by cleaning them off, using a wire brush attachment to my power drill. It wasn’t easy. My hands and wrists got really tired, and I had to do it in stages. Here’s a few pics of that process.

Then, I heated up my gas grill. I much prefer the grill because the process smokes a lot, and I’d rather not do that inside.

I adjusted the burners so that, with the lid down, it measured at about 500 degrees. I coated the Dutch ovens in vegetable oil. I normally like to use shortening, like Crisco, but I didn’t have any there. I put the oil in a spritz bottle to get better coverage. Then, I set one of them into the grill, upside down, with the lid separate (also coated). My grill wasn’t big enough to do them both at the same time. I let it bake for about a half hour or so, then (using heavy leather gloves) took it out and spritzed it again. It went back in for another half hour.

The first one, I pulled out to cool. The second one, I just left in the grill and turned off the gas.

Here’s what they look like when the came out:

Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Shelf-stable 100% Whole Wheat Bread

One of the problems with doing breads with long-term storage is that not all of the ingredients of bread are shelf-stable. The flour is a particular culprit. The wheat grain is easy to store, but as soon as it's ground, the inner parts are exposed to the air and begin to degrade. This is especially true of bread flour. I don't like to make bread with flour that's more than a month or two opened. I just don't get as much gluten, nor as much rise.

Add to that the problem that whole wheat flour doesn't develop much gluten anyway. That leaves you stuck with a lot of compromise. To get the lift and the fluff that the gluten gives, a lot of people will add fresh bread flour to the whole wheat, usually at a ratio 70% whole wheat to 30% white bread flour. That works, but the problem, again, is storage.

On the other hand, baking a loaf out of fresh-ground whole wheat flour works very nicely, but it won't have the gluten, so it won't get all stretchy and fluffy. It'll be more dense and crumbly. Still edible, of course, but not what most folks are used to.

This recipe takes a bit longer, because the ground flour pre-soaks. This helps boost the gluten development, so that it can trap the gas the yeast makes and rise more fluffy.

12" Shallow Dutch Oven
12-14 coals below
26-28 coals above

3 cups whole wheat flour
3 cups warm water

1/2 Tbsp yeast
1/2 cup warm water
1/4 c. liquid honey
6 tbsp. butter, melted fresh, or mixed from powder
1 egg, fresh, or mixed from powder
2 tsp. salt
2-3 cups whole wheat flour, more for kneading

I started this whole experiment out by grinding up some wheat (I use an electric grinder, but you can do an hand-cranker if you really want to). I took about 3 cups of the flour and an equal amount of water (almost hot works very well to be absorbed). I let that sit for a long time, about an hour or two. The intent is not to have this raise, since we haven't added any yeast yet. We just want to coax the gluten strands into forming.

When I came back, it was gooey, stringy, stretchy, and sticky.  Yuk.  But no matter. I mixed the yeast with the additional hot water (just hot to the touch, no hotter), and let it sit to get foamy and active.

I added the yeast mix and all of the other ingredients into the mixing bowl (add only 1 or 2 of the final cups of whole wheat flour.) It was kinda hard to stir, because the gluten had had a lot of time to develop with the liquid. Once all of the ingredients were well-incorporated, I turned it out of the bowl, and onto my kitchen counter (well-floured, with whole wheat flour). I began to knead it, sprinkling on more whole-wheat flour as I went. Just enough to keep it not so sticky on my hands. I was really pleased to feel the gluten tugging on it. It was coming together much more so than any other whole wheat loaf I'd done before. Finally, it passed the stretchy windowpane translucence test!

I shaped it into a boule and set it aside in an oiled bowl to rise. I sprayed on a light coating of oil, to help it to not dry out, then covered it and let it rise for a couple of hours.

Since the gluten had developed so well, it rose quit fully and quickly. After the first rise, I quickly reshaped into a boule, pinched a seam at the "bottom", and set it, seam side up, into my proofing baskets for the final rise. As I was doing this, it was good to see a nice, tight surface. That showed that there was, in fact, good, stretchy gluten!

I lit up the coals and let them get white edges. Once there were many that were ready, I oiled the inside of the Dutch oven and set the coals below it and on the lid, so that the Dutch oven could preheat.

Once the coals had been on the empty, closed Dutch oven, preheating, it was time to bake. I lifted the lid, then quickly upturned the proofing basket into the middle of the Dutch oven. Now, the seam side, the "bottom", was back on the bottom, and the stretchy clean surface was on top. This I sliced a couple of times with a sharp knife, to help it vent and "bloom" in the initial spring. I quickly covered it back up with the heated lid and marked the time.

After about 15 minutes, I turned the lid about 1/4 of the way, and then lifted the Dutch oven and turned it a quarter turn as well. After about 30 minutes, I checked it, and it was looking nice and brown, but not done yet.  I poked it with the thermometer and dropped the lid. After another 10 minutes or so, I looked again, and saw that the bread had reached it's done-ness temperature, about 180-190 (being a darker bread).

Then, I lifted it out and set it onto a cooling rack. It really tasted great, and I was surprised by the lightness of the texture with a traditionally heavy bread like %100 whole wheat.  It was very fluffy. Not like a french bread, to be sure, but still, very palatable. So, I will always do a pre-soak with the non-glutenous flours. It worked wonders!



Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Food Storage Dutch Oven Chili

Exciting news!

I’ve been offered a contract for a fifth book, tentatively titled something like “Dutch Oven Preparedness”!  It will be all about using food storage ingredients in your Dutch oven.  The idea is that if you find yourself in an emergency situation without any electricity, you’ll still be able to cook and eat well!

Here’s one of the first ideas, that I tried out last week. It was unique for me, because I was faced with the challenge of cooking something delicious without using any fresh ingredients. That was hard for me, because I’ve always emphasized the value of freshness. But in the end, it came off great!

Food Storage Dutch Oven Chili with Beef Jerky

12” shallow Dutch Oven

20+ coals below


12-16 oz  lbs beef jerky, any flavor you like.
4 cups water

3/4 - 1 cup dehydrated onions
3/4 - 1 cup dehydrated green peppers
3/4 - 1 cup dehydrated celery

1 15 oz can pinto beans
1 15 oz can red kidney beans
1 15 oz can black beans
(or 1 1/2-2 lbs dried, bagged beans, soaked overnight in water)
2 14 oz cans minced or crushed tomatoes
1-2 cups additional water, as needed

Chili Powder and/or cayenne
garlic powder
salt
pepper
Cumin
dried lemon zest
cilantro
Molasses

1-2 Tbsp corn flour


I started this out a little different than a traditional fresh-ingredient chili.  Usually, I’ll begin by sauteing the aromatics.  In this case, I want to start by rehydrating some of the ingredients and extracting some of the rich flavors, creating the broth first.  I lit up some coals and when they were whitening, I put about 20 or more under my 12” Dutch oven.

Then, I put in 2 cups of the water and let that get heated up.  I did this with the lid on, because it simmers faster.  While that was heating up, I chopped up the jerky into chunks with my chef’s knife.  I didn’t want the chunks to be too small.  Bite-sized, really.  I put those into the simmering water, and stirred occasionally.  After about a half hour, the water was quite dark with the liquids and seasonings of the meat. I added two more cups of water, and tossed in the dehydrated  veggies.  I let it simmer some more.

After another 15-20 minutes of continuous simmering, all the dried stuff was puffing up and the smells were getting rich. Much of the water had been absorbed, but there was still a lot of liquid. I added the beans and other canned ingredients.  Usually, when I make chili, I like to add different beans because it makes for more visual variety.  I’ve heard that combining bean varieties is more healthy, too, but I don’t know that for sure.  I’ll usually drain all but one can, and use the liquid from that last can as part of the liquid of the broth.  If I use dry bagged beans, I’ll usually drain off any of the leftover soaking liquid before adding them. The tomato cans I add in completely, with the liquid.  If you need more liquid, you can add more at this point, or not drain the cans.

All along this time, I was adding more coals from the side fire, replenishing as necessary to keep a steady simmer (not a rolling boil) going.

When that has been simmering for a while, I began adding in the flavorings.  When I start adding heat, I’ll sprinkle some in, let it simmer, then taste it.  You can always add more hot pepper flakes or cayenne, but you can’t remove it if you put in too much.  I didn’t put any amounts on these flavorings, because you’ll really just do it to taste.  I find, for example, that the dried lemon zest flavor gets lost easily, so I like at add a lot.

Finally, the corn flour can be added a bit at a time to thicken it up if necessary.  As thickeners go, I like it for chili because it adds a certain southwest tone to the whole pot.

Finally, serve it up!  A great bowl of chili from food entirely stored on your shelf.

Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.