Free Web NovelChapter 352: Making Bread
"So, you’re saying if we add this special fruit juice to our dough, it will create fluffy bread?" Jessie asked curiously.
"Supposedly," Christina replied with a shrug, also uncertain about what the end result would be.
"Y-Your Highness... there’s really no need for you to handle this personally..." Tess once again tried to convince the princess to stop.
Unfortunately for the anxious maid, Christina had no intention of leaving this monumental revolution in gastronomy to others, shaking her head and declaring firmly, "Say no more, Tess. I enjoy cooking. I’m not doing this because I ’have’ to, I’m doing it because I want to."
"U-Understood, Your Highness!" Tess nodded hurriedly, worried she may have offended her master.
"Good. Now, let’s get started," Christina, having hopefully settled this matter once and for all, grabbed a bowl and began measuring out some ingredients.
To her bowl, Christina added 150 grams of flour, 110 grams of yeast liquid made from apples, 10 grams of melted lard, and a dash of salt.
Beside her, Jessie added the same set of ingredients, but instead of 110 grams of yeast liquid, she used 80 grams of the murky fruit juice and 30 grams of warm water.
Tess similarly reduced the amount of liquid yeast to 50 grams in her bowl, topping it up with 60 grams of water.
Following Jessie’s directions, as she was the one who had the most experience making bread, the girls brought the ingredients together with their hands before turning them out onto the well floured countertop and kneading it vigorously.
After about 3 minutes of massaging their individual doughs, they formed them into balls and placed them back into the bowls, setting them aside for now.
While the first round was ’resting’, something Jessie said helped make bread softer when baked, the girls grabbed another set of bowls and repeated the process, but this time with yeast made from grape juice.
20 minutes and 12 bowls of dough later, Jessie and Tess wiped a bit of sweat from their brows. The two of them were both in the Body Tempering Realm and had almost no martial training, so while they weren’t weak by commoner standards, they also weren’t particularly strong.
Christina, on the other hand, was a Third Step Sea Establishment Practitioner and had been focusing intensely on building up her stamina and strength recently, so she wasn’t even breathing harder yet.
As such, the princess eagerly went over to examine the first round of dough they had prepared, and when she did, she immediately noticed something.
"Has it gotten bigger?" Muttering to herself, Christina took a closer look at the dough, spinning the bowl a bit and poking its content lightly with her finger.
Uncertain if she was just imagining things, Christina called Jessie and Tess over.
"Yes, Your Highness?" Tess responded promptly, wondering what the princess needed her to do next.
Jessie, on the other hand, didn’t say anything as all her attention was focused on the ball of dough before her.
As someone who had prepared and baked hundreds of loaves of flatbread over the past couple of years, Jessie was much more familiar with what should have happened, which was why she was so surprised when something completely unexpected occurred.
Catching the look on her friend’s face, Christina asked, "You noticed it as well?"
"En," Jessie nodded, "When we rest our bread after kneading it, it does tend to smooth out a bit and can sometimes get a little bit puffier, but nothing like this."
Grabbing the other 2 bowls from the first round of kneading, Jessie examined them closely and soon noticed that the dough she made had also expanded. It was hard to tell if it was bigger or smaller than Christina’s, but it was definitely bigger than when she left it to rest.
Tess’ dough was less puffy, but even it had ’risen’ somewhat.
"Is this... is this what you were trying to achieve, Your Highness?" The young maid wondered aloud before quickly covering her mouth and lowering her head. She couldn’t believe she had spoken out of turn again, questioning the princess about her intentions when she should have just kept her mouth shut and followed instructions.
Christina would have felt exasperated with her new servant’s perpetual timidity if she wasn’t so absorbed in examining the bread dough.
In all honesty, she wasn’t sure this was what she was looking for, but thinking that her goal was to make lighter, fluffier bread, and the dough she just made was getting puffier, she figured she was at least on the right track.
"What should we do now, Tina?" Jessie asked.
"What would you normally do now?" Christina asked back.
"Well..." Thinking about it for a moment, Jessie remarked, "Normally, we’d just put the breads up on a paddle and stick them in the oven, but I’ve never seen dough act like this before, so I don’t really know what we should do..."
"Hmm..." Christina sank into her thoughts, pondering how she should approach this problem now that, apparently, they were all in uncharted territory.
Mulling it over for a while, however, she realized that there were really only two options available, let the dough sit and see if it puffed up more, or cook it immediately and see what happened.
Although the main oven they had ordered hadn’t been delivered yet, since this shop used to be a restaurant, it did have a working stove and oven already. All they needed to do was add wood and light it up.
Not one to linger in indecision, Christina quickly got to work, "Let’s fire up the oven, then cook a quarter of the doughs right away. We’ll let another quarter rest for half-an-hour longer before cooking them, and so on and so forth until we run out of doughs."
With no better ideas of her own, Jessie agreed without any fuss and began prepping.
Whether Tess had an opinion or not was unclear, but what was certain was that the shy maid didn’t have the courage to express herself either way, so she simply ran to fetch some firewood from a pile in the backyard.
It took another 20 minutes or so for the oven to heat up, during which time the balls of dough continued to expand, along with Christina’s anticipation.
Using a lightly floured wooden paddle, Jessie placed the first 3 balls of dough they had made into the centre of the oven before closing it and stepping back to take a seat.
All that was left to do now was wait.
.....
At first, nothing of note happened, but about 10 minutes into the bake, the girls noticed the breads begin to rapidly expand, puffing up at a speed that was visible to the eye when they peaked into the oven.
Seeing this, Christina felt like she needed to do something, like poke the loaves or move them around somehow, so she reached for the nearby paddle to do just that.
Jessie, however, smacked her hand away and told her to be patient, a scene that caused Tess to hyperventilate and nearly faint from terror.
A commoner slapping a princess! What could be more scandalous!?
Of course, Christina just stuck out her tongue apologetically, looking a bit sheepish as she forced herself to calm down, realizing she was being too hasty.
Another 10 minutes passed before Jessie took the paddle and shifted the breads slightly, rotating them to ensure they were evenly exposed to the heat and properly browned.
She may not have ever baked bread that rose like this before, but Jessie had plenty of experience helping her parents and older siblings in the kitchen, so she at least knew what to look for and what to do in order to not end up with an undercooked or burnt product
5 minutes later, Jessie felt it was time and swiftly removed the breads from the oven, sliding them off the paddle and onto the counter as a thin wisp of steam rose from each of them.
The 3 loaves of bread were now over twice their previous, uncooked size, with Christina’s having expanded the most while Tess’ looked a bit smaller but still quite large.
The smell was also quite tantalizing, filling the kitchen with a pleasant aroma that tempted all the girls greatly.
Still, understanding that they would only be scalding themselves if they tried to cut into the loaves right now, Christina, Jessie, and Tess set about prepping the second set of doughs.
These uncooked loaves had a slightly darker colour to them, but that could be explained by the fact that they were made with grape juice yeast, which had turned out somewhat purple compared to the light brown apple yeast.
Jessie then carefully added the doughs to the oven.
A couple more minutes went by before Christina finally couldn’t take it anymore, grabbed a nearby knife, and cut into her loaf of bread.
What happened next, however, was somewhat unexpected.
While it was true that the small loaf of bread had puffed up greatly, the moment Christina tried to slice it, it actually collapsed.
The crust broke and caved in while the crumb seemed to be filled with large holes.
It was certainly ’airy’ in that sense, but this wasn’t exactly what Christina had been aiming for.
