borscht and black bread

Don't you hate when you cook something and it's the biggest fail in the known universe? And isn't it even worse when it happens to be for company? First there's the case of the brown tough pork but that is still too embarrassing to talk about so instead I'll talk about C and T's last night here.

I made Ukrainian Red Borscht (similar to the version on allrecipes.com under the same name) and some Russian Black Bread. The Borscht turned out all right (T loved it, which for a 2 year old is quite a compliment) although Aaron says I messed up on some quantities. (I will admit that he makes it better than I.) But the bread failed. I found the recipe here and thought it would be so yummy just because of the random ingredients included in it (chocolate, coffee, vinegar...).

Not. Entirely my fault though. See I heated up the chocolate mixture to melt said chocolate at the same time that my yeast was bubbling away in the PERFECT temperature water. (The recipe said 105-115 degrees and our water heater is set to 110 degrees so, yah, perfect.) So I mix the wheaty stuff, pour in my hot chocolate mixture, pour in my perfectly temperatured yeast.... and the yeast dies. DUH. So I attempt to save the loaf and continue and nope. Loaf is rock hard and unedible. Nice. Poor C and T. We bought C ice cream later that night to attempt to make up for it. I think it worked.

I made the black bread again two nights later and it turned out a'ight!!! Here's picture proof: