I had enough orders this week so I have some crumb shots and some not as most was going toward orders. I made my usual 100 % sourdough bagels from Wild Yeast blog but I used whey from my kefir for all of the liquid including feeding the staters..I use 1/2 rye starter and 1/2 white staters for the formula. They were all spoken for but the fragrance and shape are lovely so I have high hopes for the reviews on texture and flavor . I also had more orders for the Oatmeal Bread. I made 2 5 oz rolls from the extra dough...Grand son and his Momma and Papa ate those with peach jam we made this afternoon !   Made 8 Challah seeded buns and 2 Challah braids, a huge batch of peanut butter granola and 3 semolina sourdough boules. I ran out of semolina so added a touch of spelt. They turned out beautifully...baked in my DO's. That's it...oh and I made a small pan of lasagna from the last of my husbands sourdough pasta. We have always made our own pasta dough but have just lately started using starter for the lasagna. It gives a wonderful texture and lightness to the whole dish.  

oatmeal loaves and 5 oz oatmeal buns, Challah and Challah seeded rolls: semolina crumb: big ears ! : retarding in the "all fridge" boules and bagels: boiling bagels: baked and ready to go : granola : lasgana:

Yesterday, I baked the “Field Blend #2” bread from Ken Forkish's Flour Water Salt Yeast. It is a mixed grain and mixed leavening formula with 30% whole grains (wheat and rye). It is similar in method but quite different in flavor from the “Overnight Country Blonde,” which was the first bread I made from this book.

My experience with two bakes of the Country Blonde prepared me for shorter fermentation times than Forkish specifies. This week is significantly cooler than it was when I baked the Country Blondes, however. My times for ripening the levain and for bulk fermentation were actually pretty close to Forkish's.

The result was a dark, crusty bread with a tender crumb that is somewhat less open than the Country Blonde because of the whole grain flours and the lower gluten in the rye. It has a complex flavor and moderately pronounced sourdough tang. On the day after baking, the rye flavor was quite present, although it is just 17.5% of the flour.

I like Forkish's approach to time management a lot. I am currently fermenting the levain for an “Overnight Pizza Dough with Levain,” but with a different timeline than he suggests for that dough. I'm going to cold retard the levain tonight and mix the final dough tomorrow morning and make pizzas for dinner.

We took 4 short vacations last month, so I baked less than usual during July. I did get back in the swing starting last weekend with some San Joaquin Sourdough Baguettes and San Francisco-style Sourdoughs with increased Whole Wheat.

Looking forward to Fall and cooler weather.

 Happy baking!

David

I got the book "How to Bake" by Paul Hollywood for my birthday recently, have been baking some bread from it; I like the sort of breads that are in it, though I don't like the "vagueness" in the recipes. Especially in the sourdough ones. For instance, the amount of hydration of the starter is not even mentioned. With my 100% hydration starter, the recipe below has a total hydration of 71,4%. Which I do not find that very high, considering the original recipe uses part whole wheat flour. And that is with the maximum amount of suggested water

So I kind of freestyled it, using wholemeal flour (cause I thought I still had wholewheat, but didn't), not sure what the distinction between the two is in English. It basically a wholewheat flour that is not as wholewheaty as usual , but not quite a wheat flour :P.

Anyway; this is what I used:

225 grams of flour
175 grams of wholemeal flour
250 gram sourdough starter, very active, refreshed day before
8 grams of salt
250 grams of water
50 grams of sunflower seeds
50 grams of flax seeds
50 grams of sesame seeds
50 grams of poppy seeds, half in the loaf, half on top

Mixed it all, kneaded with dough hooks, let rise for 5 hours until double, shaped, rolled in poppy seeds, put in proofing basket, proofed for 2 hours (original recipe said 14 hours!), baked 45 minutes at 190 degrees C with steam.

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