Make your own Greek yogurt and then use the drippings to make great bread by substituting the yogurt whey water for the water in your bread.

Get stuck with too many Red Pears and and Blueberries?  Make a chocolate crust, lemon and blueberry cheesecake and a blueberry, ginger and red pear Italian fruit tart with home made Puff Pastry that's what !!!!!

After finding out the Pierre Nury's Rustic Light Rye didn't have much if any rye taste or earthy taste either, I decided to try and see if I could get more rye taste and earth flavor without totally compromising Pierre's fine SD bread completely.

The changes include home grinding whole rye berrys and adding 25 grams more to make 75 total, adding 50 gramsof home ground whole spelt berries and deducting 75 grams of bread flour to keep everything in balance.  I also  lightly slit the loaves before they went into the bag for final rise to try to get them to rustically split on top. 

I really like this bread with these small changes. It kept all the great character of Pierre's original but produces more and deeper rye flavor and sour.  The spelt also gives the bread a very nice speckled brown crumb - something a Brownman appreciates :-)

Here are some Pic's

My next attempt at learning something new about bread, I decided to bake off David Snyder's SFSD that he is trying to perfect like the rest of his fine breads, with Pierre Nury's light SD Rye that I ran across in zolablu's fine blog.  Thought I would make them both as directed and bake them off in the same oven at the same time now that is is clean after my San Joaquin adventure even if it was a fiasco.  I used a compromised temp, steam and time since they didn't quite line up perfectly.  I did shape the Nury loaf and lightlu slashed it before in went into the final rise to try to get it to swell and split naturally somewhere on the top.  I used my new parchment containment system to control a very wet dough from spreading and ....It worked just fine.

David's small SFSD boule went into a heavily flowered basket that should have been floured more sanely.  I used 50% rice flour for this heavy handed dusting.  I have never done this before so, was flying a little blind and had read that they will stick when the basket is new.  Plus this basket was never meant for bread in the first place.  When I went to slash David's boule, it was pretty hard and my razor just sort of bounced off.  I finally butchered it with a big serated knife.  My slashing skills are quite primitive and weak to begin with even though I have seen many folks live, and on video doing it like it was easy as pie.  I think they are showing off knowing my slash challenged bread making skill :-)  David's didn't spring because of its tougher exterior and Nury's nearly exploded.  Both browned up nicely and I did bake the boule 5 minutes longer to get that deep dark skin.

The crumb was slightly more open on the boule but both were fine with holes of all sizes.  The weird thing was that I couldn't taste any rye in Nury's and I wanted to since I love rye.  Couldn't taste it in David's either.  In fact both the breads tasted the same to me. and both had the same sour undertone probably because they both used the same rye, spelt, WW and AP starter and levain.

David's won the taste test the next day as the crumb got , the sour revealed itself and it became more complex.  I can't wait for David to get it perfected as he is sure to do.  I have my own changes to make to Nury's 'Non Existent' Light Rye so that will be more rye like and complex in taste.  Here are some Pic's.

Pizza is one the special favorites we make when my daughter brings her sorority sisters home from college for pizza night.  What they don't expect is a very thin crust that is sourdough, has whole wheat and garbanzo flour, sun dried tomatoes, fresh rosemary and garlic in it.  They also can't believe that they can make their own from a wide range of toppings, most of which are home made including spicy sauce -  and they can load it up with worrying that the crust will not be able to handle it.

This baby is loaded!!!  Lots of sauce, caramelized onions and mushrooms, roasted red green and spicy peppers, home made Italian sausage, pepperoni, Pecorino, Parm and Mozz cheeses, olives and a few other things hardly worth mentioning - except the fresh opal basil on top after the pie came out of the 500 degree oven.  The key is to pre bake the pie crust on a stone for 3 minutes before taking it out, quickly brushing on a thin coat of garlic oil before letting folks load up what ever they want  on top - before chucking the fatso back into the oven for 4 minutes or so to finish browning it off.

Before TFL came into my world, I had a multi grain, seeded, SD challah that I baked every week for my daily sandwich loaf. I called it my made up name Brachflachen Mehrere Vollkombrot. It was the standard; mix about 20 ingredients, kneed for 10 minutes let rise, punch down, let rise in the loaf pan, egg wash, slash and bake a 350 until 205 F. It took about 8 hours from start to finish - and I thought that was slow bread!! After finding out the slow bread was really 3 days - not 8 hours, I converted my old recipe to make it take nearly forever to make - instead of just a really long time :-) Now it is a 12 hour levain build, long S&F ferment, long retard and long after fridge rise bread. I really like the way it came out. Nice dark crispy, crunchy crust with Nijella and sesame seeds, soft, moist, small holed crumb with subtle SD taste that made great tasting toast too. It is still my favorite sandwich challah loaf .

The second shot of the crub says a lot about me and my foodie nature.  Home made; challah, dijon mustard, pickles, cheese, meat and home grown; lettuce and tomatoes.

The 3rd shot means it is home made Aranchello, Minneochello and Limochello time too !!!!!

My first attempt at making SD using S&F, long retard and David's parchment paper technique.  The only change I made was using 50 g of home ground WW berries instead of the rye that David used.  No rye to be found anywhere.  I also used a WW, and AP flour build for the levain.  I'm not sure what David's was but I am guessing he had some rye in it.  I was very happy with the  results.  Nice exterior crust, great open crumb and fine taste.  It was better the next day too.  I liked it with oiive oil, fresh basil, pecorino, parm and pepper.  On Davids's blog you see my ordeal trying to bake the San Joaquin.  He said my saga proves his recipe is bullet proof :-)  It is bullet proof too!   There is also a photo of my second recipe of my home made Puff Paste Blueberry Cream Cheese Braid inspired by the one on TFL with bread instead of puff paste.  What a great site for bakers like me!!!

Mischbrot variations

In earlier experiments with breads having a higher percentage of rye flour I found that adding spelt, emmer or semolina complemented the rye very well.

With this bake I wanted to compare the effect of substituting the wheat part with emmer and spelt in breads with 70% rye. The flours are all from Shipton Mill.

The outcome:

I used my tried and tested Mischbrot formula as a base, this time using a rye starter with 100% hydration. The starter is made with dark rye, while the remaining rye in the formula is light rye.

Here the formula:

At the current cooler temperatures (about 23C / 73F in my kitchen) the starter took 16 hours to mature.
With 70% rye the doughs / pastes are very sticky and require only a short mix/knead so that all materials are mixed well.

After 100 minutes of fermentation at 23C / 73F I shaped rounds with very wet hands (in mid-air), and put t hem into baskets (floured with light rye) for the final rest..After 60 minutes the rounds showed cracks, a sign that they are ready for the bake.

The bake (on a stone, with steam) started at maximum temperature (ca.  240C / 464F), after 15 minutes I turned the loaves and lowered the temperature to 210C / 410F, After another 20 minutes the bread was ready.

I am very happy with oven spring and bloom. All three breads performed equally well and were indistinguishable from the outside.

After a day I cut into the loaves. The crumb is quite similar in all three loaves, the bread containing wholegrain emmer  is a bit darker and more dense.(The wheat bread got a bit of a shadow - bad photography!)

Although the crumb looks fairly dense, the breads actually feel light.

The crust could be thicker, but that's my oven – not much I can do about this at the moment.

The taste of the three breads is also very similar – quite complex with rye dominating, and a distinctive tangy after-taste. The emmer bread has the most complex taste.

There are a few things I would like to try with this formula:
1. using all wholegrain flours
2. going back to the original German way: using all medium rye and refined flours (which would be called ”Berliner Landbrot”)
3. Reducing the amount of rye sour and using some of the wheat/emmer/spelt in a stiff starter as a second preferment
4. using a wheat/emmer/spelt poolish as a second preferment
5. adding spices

Lots to do!
Juergen

Been trying out a lot of recipes since my last entry, nothing worth to mention what had not been done before, I played around with my sourdough starter

I exclusivly use white flour/bread flour now. The rise may it be bulk fermentation/proofing is nothing much sensational on the contrary, but every

bread i make lifts off in the oven. A guy at the mikrobiology department told me over time strains take over others, one may become dominant, and it is not

said that visibility of activity always indicates the lack of it, this starter is easy to test with the water test, when you taste it it tingles on the tongue and i have a 2-3 day window of using it since right after refreshing it goes right in the fridge, a day later to 4 days its potent, this allows for more flexibility, with

rye starters i could see more development during the rest phases but the window of opportuinity was smaller using the starter. With this i get constant great results and it is also apt to venture into spiking bakers yeast recipes with sourdough. (sourdough/bakers yeast pizzy is a delight) I was pretty amazed at this result country bread form tartine bakery....

I used bread flour instead of white flour, it has more aleurons, and much higher protein content, you could say it is partly wholegrain :)

Fellow baker Hanaâ (http://hanaaskitchen.blogspot.com) instigated me to buy yet another baking book - as if my bookshelves were not already buckling down under the weight of my cooking library. She invited me to join her ABC baking challenge, every month trying out a new recipe, currently from Abby Dodge's: "The Weekend Baker". The author, contributing editor of one of my favorite magazines, "Fine Cooking", also posted the recipe here:

http://www.cookstr.com/recipes/glazed-cinnamon-rolls-2

My husband loves sticky buns and their sugar laden relatives, but, though I like cinnamon, I was never very fond of the overly sweet stuff he would sometimes buy. Therefore, without Hanaâ's challenge, I would probably never have thought of baking cinnamon rolls.

What I especially like about "The Weekend Baker" and this recipe, are the several "do ahead" options. I prefer working with slow fermentation for my breads, and most doughs show their appreciation for the cold treatment with a significant better taste, so, after a 30-minute rise, I put my my dough to sleep in the fridge overnight.

I always try to incorporate some whole grains in my recipes, a substitution of 10% white flour with whole grains doesn't require additional liquid, so I replaced 47 g of all-purpose flour with whole wheat pastry flour.

The recipe was easy to follow, and the next morning the dough had nicely risen in the fridge. I rolled it out cold - it will come to room temperature quickly - and the filling was no problem, either. Next time I probably would add some toasted, chopped nuts, though.

Cutting a roll of dough in even slices with a bench scraper or knife is not that easy, the layers slipping away over the crumbly filling. Using dental floss, as Hanaâ suggested, works much better.

I skipped glazing the rolls, nice as it looks, it adds even more sugar, without contributing to the taste. And even without this decoration - the cinnamon rolls looked beautiful when they came out of the oven and their wonderful aroma filled the whole house, so that I could hardly wait to try one until they had cooled down a bit.

"... now I know their taste - now I'm a believer..." you don't have to be a Monkee to love these treats!
I am converted, and my husband could wallow in them, so good are they!

They, also, freeze well, wrapped in plastic foil and then placed in a ziplock bag. To enjoy them you only have to nuke them for a few seconds, and then re-crisp them at 350ºF/175ºC for a few minutes in the oven.