29 Comments
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Martini Glambassador's avatar

How clever! I want to try this for myself. Forgive the dumb question, but as an American, I don’t have a great reference for oat porridge. I assume it’s what we call “oatmeal,” but do you mean the stuff made with quick-cooking oats or rolled oats or made with steel cut oats? Or(or or or) do you make your porridge with the traditional Scottish oats?

It’s possible I’m making this more complicated than it needs to be 😆

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Wil Reidie's avatar

Good call. I must be more specific. I appreciate this, youre definitely not overcomplicating.... I use rolled oats.

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Kathy Clay's avatar

Like porridge, don’t be confused. An Insta Pot is NOT a slow cooker (although it has that function too). Its main feature is serving as a pressure cooker. One of my favorite recipes is a potato salad; you chunk up the raw potatoes, put them in the pot with a bit of water, place 5 or 6 raw eggs in their shells on top and cook for 4 minutes. When finished, cool the potatoes while you peel the hard “boiled” eggs, make up your salad dressing and just like that you have a delicious potato salad!!

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Wil Reidie's avatar

I'm getting mixed up with the one my mother had. It was a Crockpot slow cooker. I stand corrected, Kathy.

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Jenn's avatar

OMG this is genius. Thank you!

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Mary's avatar

Would love to try. Is whole meal whole wheat flour? And do I need bread flour? Too many questions from the rube of a bread baker.

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Wil Reidie's avatar

This is really helpful. And Ive tried to clarify by updating the recipe. Definitely bread flour and, yes, whole meal is what I call whole wheat. This is definitely a lesson im learning about specificity as a British writer using Finnish ingredients and writing for a great many American readers. Thanks for the help, Mary.

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Nicol Clayton's avatar

Which rice cooker did you get?☺️

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Wil Reidie's avatar

It's called Bamboo by a company called yum asia. Seems to be a good specimen.

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Mao Zhou's avatar

Ah! You got the Bamboo! I was pondering that and I think the induction feature would make temperature control very fast and thus aid in producing perfect rice.

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Wil Reidie's avatar

Well I'm really enjoying it so far. Thanks for your help with the matter!!!

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Mao Zhou's avatar

I’m FULL of opinions… 🙄

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James L Jim Stevens's avatar

I am assuming that porridge is the oatmeal variety. I haven’t tried it, but tang zhong works for me. Our area had a lot of German influences and used boiled mashed potatoes. I now use my mother-in-law’s trick of adding pureed left-over baked sweet potatoes. Anything that retains a lot of moisture will soften the bread. I have not tried humectants like propylene glycol food additives but would expect good results. Might even try left-over grits if thoroughly cooked to sticky state.

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Wil Reidie's avatar

Good call about oatmeal/porridge. I've made that cleaner in the web version now. Thanks. Pureed sweet potato sounds fun. I'd like to try that sometime.

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Bob Beck's avatar

I’ll try the daddy bread.

I have made bread recently with tangzhong with wheat flour, rice flour, potato flour, and cassava flour. More recently I have been making bread with a big dose of boiled potato into the mix which is an Amish tradition among others. I agree that gelatanized starch is well worth the trouble.

I have two grandsons 11 and 7 and they eat the bread I make with real enthusiasm.

They say man does not live by bread alone, but I wonder if they have tried it. I suspect it is possible.

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Wil Reidie's avatar

As long as I had some good salted butter with my bread I'd probably be all set.

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Will Cooper's avatar

I just made two loaves of your recipe. Excellent. Lots of good airy structure. Quick and easy, hydration is high but I like manipulating wet dough. Brilliant loaves.

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Wil Reidie's avatar

Thanks so much. Means a lot you'd try it.

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Erin Corrigan's avatar

I love that book! Thank you for recommending and perhaps reviving an audience for it. I keep it as a bedside read that is soothing as well as inspiring.

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Hanne Blank Boyd's avatar

I own a stand mixer, a blender, a stick blender, an Instant Pot, and a food processor/robot culinaire.

Since I bought a properly large heavy stone mortar and pestle I don't use the food processor. I never used it much to begin with. The pesto, hummus, and taramosalata are better by far from the mortar and pestle.

But for one or two things I could do without the stand mixer entirely. Which is to say I could do without it entirely.

It is possible that I could keep the stick blender and ditch the blender that has a jar. I like having one with a jar for when I want to puree frozen fruit though.

The one thing I do use regularly is the Instant Pot, which doubles as a rice cooker.

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Wil Reidie's avatar

I love my stick blender. I'm always using that one

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Martha Loftis's avatar

Can’t wait to try it. Went back and read the poolish post about the shaping and will be trying that as well.

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Kathy Clay's avatar

An Insta Pot makes perfect rice every time! And oh so many other great dishes. You’ll not consider one now that you have the bulk of the rice cooker. Too bad, it is an amazing cooking machine making life oh so much easier in the kitchen! Thanks for your writing!

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Wil Reidie's avatar

I've never had a slow cooker. This rice cooker has a slow cook function and I'm looking forward to trying it out.

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Ofifoto's avatar

I'll definitely be trying out this bread. Thank you for the recipe. I love the fact that your children ask for "daddy bread" as their preferred snack.

I absolutely agree with you about "by hand" over machine, but my most-used appliances are my coffee machine, sandwich press, and rice cooker.

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Wil Reidie's avatar

Sandwich press. another dream kitchen gadget I genuinely love.

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Ofifoto's avatar

I forgot to mention my slow cooker. It has a searing function, which is really handy.

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Ambermoggie's avatar

I will try the left over porridge bread as winter time is always porridge breakfasts. Thanks Wil. My can’t do without gadget is my Magimix. I found that dicing slicing etc is very hard now due to the onset of older age and mainly due to the ravages of rheumatoid arthritis since I was 2 and subsequently the joys of osteoarthritis.this machine has made a huge difference.

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Jenn's avatar

I’m a gadget minimalist but the Instant Pot is worth the cupboard space. I hate canned beans, and I hate planning ahead so it’s the solution to wanting chickpeas or other beans and not having all day to cook them. The texture of pressure-cooked beans is so much creamier and better as well.

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