Turn Up the Heat

One of my neighbors recently opened a very unique gift shop in Monroe, CT, The Angry Pepper, so for their grand opening he asked me to come up with something unexpected that he could serve with barbeque. The majority of the items in his store are shake-on spices and sauces, so I came up with a chip that uses a mixture of dried chili flakes, poppy seeds, sweet paprika, salt and black pepper, and can be dipped (if you dare) in salsa. The chips are essentially pita chips that I rolled out with a pasta maker, and I only baked them once, so technically they are not twice baked pita bread, but they taste great and maintain an extreme crunch for a week or so.

The main heat source is a mixture of red savina and jabanero peppers by Dave's Gourmet (appropriately named Insanity Spice). One pepper flakes has about as much intensity as an entire shake of conventional hot pepper flakes, so watch out. The chips have enough flavor from the poppy seeds, paprika and salt, so the dough I used was not fermented very long. If you are making plain chips, though, you could ferment the dough overnight in the refrigerator (see Peter Rheinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice for the recipe).

For rolling the dough, use a pasta roller and a roller-docker. First divide the dough into 3-4 ounce pieces. Once completely rolled, each piece should cover half of a half-sized sheet pan. Flaten the dough to around 1/2 inch thick and coat lightly with flour, just so it doesn't stick. Pass it through the pasta roller set to 1, and repeat 3 times. Then set the roller to two and repeat the process. Move on through the settings until you reach 4. Lay the strips of dough side by side on the pans and dock with the roller. Wet each strips and sprinkle on the toppings. Bake according to the recipe, but watch carfully that the chips don't get too dark. You can break up the baked sheets into shards or slice into square with a pizza cutter prior to baking. To keep the pizza cutter from sticking, have a bowl of water handy and dip the cutter liberally between every few cuts.

<=check out the shine!

I also bake some baguettes and kaiser rolls today, but I only wanted to mention the kaiser rolls because I washed them with egg and water this time, and they got the classic shine. As I mentioned in a previous posting, Rheinhart's recipe forgets this step. I also added 1/2 tbsp. additional olive oil, which made the rolls slightly softer.

So, I hope you try both of these recipes (sorry I am making you buy the book...you could also visit your local library) and until my next entry, I'll be baking.