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Yes, baking instructors have homework, too.  And both of this week's bakes are geared to upcoming classes that I will teach at the Culinary Center of Kansas City.

The bread pictured in the lead photo is the first pass at a variation on Clayton's Chopped Apple Bread.  A bit of background: one of the classes that I teach is a Breakfast Breads class.  The current version, coming up again this next weekend, features sourdough English Muffins and Kolaches.  It's a popular class (there's a waiting list for next Saturday) but we wanted to add some variety.  Consequently, there will be a Breakfast Breads II class next Spring which will feature a scone and a further evolution of this apple bread.  I left the ingredients alone for this version because I wanted to try a different fermentation regime.  Since that worked out as hoped for, I can tweak ingredients next time around to add a bit of this to the dough and a bit of that to the filling and eventually wind up with something that (thanks to my darling wife) will be called Apple Fritter Bread.  I think it will be a hit because of its convenience, flavor and novelty.  And yes, it is supposed to look knobby and rough.

The other bake this weekend was a batch of stollen.  The stollen, and a Bavarian Braid, are the featured breads in a holiday breads class coming up in three weeks.  Baking students are a surprisingly hungry bunch, so it pays to have something for them to munch on in class.  While it would have been better to bake these a week previously, that just wasn't in the cards what with my wife having had knee surgery two days previously and me having a roaring cold.  Happily, both of us are feeling much better this weekend.  

Here are the stollen, just out of the oven and brushed with melted butter:

And here they are, cooled, sugared, wrapped in foil, bagged, and settling in for three weeks of "maturing":

Actually, one of them is staying home and will get more than three weeks of quality time.

My previous class resulted in an interesting bread.  The class itself was on Pain a L'Ancienne and and a Pain de Compagne.  Postal Grunt was there to steal some ideas for a class that he will offer through the County Extension office.  The class itself was well attended and, as is typical, the students went home with dough to be baked in their own ovens.  This time, so did the instructor.  Since I had a number of other things clamoring for my attention, I slung the dough into the garage refrigerator and promptly forgot about it until three days later.  Figuring that other people do the same thing intentionally, I pulled out the two doughs, kneaded them together with some additional flour to make a manageable but still very soft dough, shaped them, fermented them, and baked them off.  That was some of the best tasting bread I have made recently!  That long, cold fermentation gave plenty of time for the enzymes to work their magic on the starches and the new flour gave the yeast an additional food source.  The oven spring was only moderate, even though the dough wasn't over-proofed, but crust color and crumb structure were both good.  For a yeasted bread, it was delicious.  Still not as complex as a sourdough but very, very good.

Other than that, the freezer has been my "oven" recently, since I need to work down the backlog there.  It's not a bad thing, since I got to enjoy the second loaf of Hamelman's Potato Bread with Roasted Onions this last week.  It just means that I have to resort to homework to have some fun in the kitchen.  Which sounds really sad, somehow.

Paul

I let nature take its course and instead of scoring the dough, I let the dough tear itself during oven spring- something like the Incredible Hulk's shirt. It saves me the shuffling around looking for my razor blade during that critical oven loading time, not scoring the dough saves me so many motions which- in my modis operandi- is performed like a magicians trick, sleight of hand style.

Ah November... for me, as a mom, this is the one time of year I start to dread all the sugared temper tantrums that are bound to become a regular thing now that the season of non-stop candy and sweets is upon us.

I still want something sweet, but I would rather see all the *sugar, sugar, sugar!* that the kids are bringing home get thrown out, so today I made Guilt-Free Hippie Cookies.

No sugar, no butter, just honey and applesauce, vanilla, walnuts and carob for flavoring. I don't even usually like carob, maybe because usually when I have it it's in something replacing chocolate where chocolate would frankly have tasted better, but in this recipe, it's like carob is acknowledged as it's own thing, slightly sweet and salty, and it just goes really well with the cookie. 

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And, despite their Halloween baskets still overflowing with candy, the kids are really into these, and I don't mind them when they indulge as much.

After my first cheese bread success at work (which in fact needed more cooking, but was a success anyway) I decided to get a chorizo bread now.

In this, my third bread, I made some adjustments:

• Increase the oven temp to 220ºC from 150ºC.
• Make sure I put salt! LOL.
• Experiment with steam to get a crust.
• Add more yeast to get more bubbles inside the bread and increase size.

Receipe:

Mix everything, knead it for 10 mins, let it rest for an hour, gently knead 10 times to remove excess of CO2, another hour in the mold or cooking recipient, into the oven, 220ºC for about 20 mins or until the core is about 90ºC.

The butter and fat of the chorizo makes everything pretty moisty. In the original receipe I put 200g of water which forced me to add some flour to compensate. With 175g you will be fine.

The steam really helped me to get a nice crust. Put an aspirin aside so you can figure out the scale of the bread.

Enjoy!

taking into DA's advise finally been able to bake a loaf with a moist and soft crumb. Adding the soak water of long an and goji berries give this bread a sweetness tang. 

So, after my last try to make bread with an overnight retarded fermentation (which I REALLY want to succeed in because it will intensify the flavors of the bread enormously) I made a new attempt. With the help of dabrownman I discussed my last experiment of making a wheat bread with overnight fermentation. The wheat bread was a great success, taste wise, but I had problem with a very compact crumb. Following his advice I switched my method to grow my sourdough yeast bacteria base from the single stage sourdough (which I used to do before this day) to the three stages sourdough methods (which I will use from now on). The difference is just worlds apart and I got the crumb that I could only dream of before. Now I got it all. I am using the overnight fermentation in the fridge for improved flavor and I am using the three stages sourdough in order to improve the crust and I will always try to make the dough as wet as possible for an improved crumb. The result of my specially created wheat bread with oregano made this way was so successful, after putting it in the bread form it more than doubled in size so that the bread grew “over board’ and I got a funny wave form after baking it. I can live with it and now I know it for next time, so I will be portioning it more wisely.

Last time I made my own Feta cheese and had a lot of left over whey from this time. This whey found its way in my bread and I simply love the special taste not that it gave my bread.

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 Last week, I got a nice private message from a TFL member who had just made and enjoyed the Sourdough Italian Bread about which I blogged back in 2008. That bread was Peter Reinhart's Italian bread from BBA with the biga converted to a biga naturale, AKA firm sourdough starter.

That message reminded me that in 2011 I developed another “Italian Bread” formula that I actually preferred to the 2008 version. Coincidentally, my Italian class classmates have been harassing encouraging me to bring some of my breads to class for them to sample.

So, I decided to make the 2011 Italian Bread and San Francisco-style Sourdough Bread with Figs and Walnuts (San Francisco-style Sourdough Bread with Walnuts and Figs) to share with my class.

Sourdough Italian Bread

Those who have made my San Joaquin Sourdough may note the resemblance between the method outlined below and that for the SJSD. This is not coincidental. On the other hand, any resemblance between this bread and any bread actually baked in Italy …. Well, whatever, it is quite delicious.

 Note: When I blogged about this bread in 2011, Andy (ananda) pointed out that the diastatic malt was probably unnecessary, since most American flour has some malted barley already, and it's redundant with the sugar. However, I did not review those comments until after the dough was mixed. Maybe next time I'll leave out the malt.

Method

1. In a large bowl, disperse the levain in the water.

2. Add the flours, sugar and malt to the liquid and mix to a shaggy mass.

3. Cover the bowl and let it rest for 20-60 minutes.

4. Add the salt and olive oil and mix thoroughly. (Note: I squish the dough with my hands until it comes back together, then do stretch and folds in the bowl until it forms a smooth ball and the oil appears completely incorporated.)

5. Transfer the dough to a 2 quart lightly oiled bowl, and cover the bowl tightly.

6. After 30 minutes, do 20 stretch and folds in the bowl. Repeat 3 more times at 30 minute intervals.

7. Refrigerate for 12-36 hours.

8. Divide the dough into two equal pieces and pre-shape as rounds or logs. Cover with a clean towel or plasti-crap and let rest for one hour.

9. Shape as boules or bâtards and proof en couche or in bannetons for about 45 minutes. (Note: Optionally, if proofing en couche, roll the loaves on damp paper towels then in a tray of sesame seeds. Alternatively, you can brush the loaves with water and sprinkle with sesame seeds. If proofing in bannetons, you would use the second method but after transferring the loaves to a peel, just before baking.)

10. One hour before baking, pre-heat the oven to 480ºF with a baking stone and steaming apparatus in place.

11. Transfer the loves to the baking stone. Steam the oven, and turn the temperature down to 460ºF.

12. After 15 minutes, remove the steaming apparatus. (Note: What I actually do at this point is switch to convection bake and turn the oven down to 435ºF for the remainder of the bake.) Continue baking for another 12-15 minutes or until the loaves are nicely browned and the internal temperature is at least 205ºF.

13. Transfer the loaves to a cooling rack. Cool completely before slicing.

The crust was crisp at first but became soft and chewy after a few hours. The crumb was moist and chewy with a complex sweet, nutty, tangy flavor accented by the sesame seeds on the crust.

This bread is delicious toasted with almond butter or un-toasted dipped in olive oil, but it might be best just plain right after cooling.  

Happy baking!

David

This was my first addition experience.  I thought I would take a bit of risk and go for something savory.  I think this was so tasty!  I added 120g of toasted pecans and 105g of the Tillamok Sharp Cheddar.  I used 125G WW and 675g KA AP flour, 360g of my Levain.  The retard was 8 hours.

My first YW bake had amazing spring and crumb but was a little bland flavour wise, so I borrowed Josh's idea of using half YW levain and half of my sweet levain. I really like the flavour of my sweet levain and have sunk into a comfortable groove with it. I keep 75g sweet levain and every day or 2 use 50g to bake and refresh @ 1:1:1. I am going on 2 weeks now with a healthy fizzing yeast water culture and after another week after another refresh tomorrow and I can begin refrigerating it, I will try another 100% YW bake.

I proofed this in a SS wire mesh collander lined with 2 layers of well used linen, dusted with rice flour. I didn't score this time as it looked like the seams would open.

I try very hard in my shaping to ensure I get a tight seam and pinch my seams tight. I also try and get a tight skin on the loaf, gently shaping with my hands ans pulling the loaf across the counter while rotating with my little fingers. Richard Bertinet has an excellent youtube video demonstrating this. Despite my best efforts the seams were already coming apart after proofing.

And despite my best shaping and dough handling efforts I still have the 'hole where the baker sleeps.'

Total flour 300 grams

Total water 231 grams 77% hydration

YW levain 25 grams

Sweet levain 25 grams

Coarse sea salt 8 grams, 1 tsp

Thirty minutes autolyse with 90 degree water, filtered and absolutely de-chloriated. Mix in Levains @ a dough temperature of 78 - 80 degrees F. Rest 20 minutes, with salt on top. Mix well, rest 5, then mix again and rest 20 minutes. Four sets of S&F's with 10-15 minutes rest and a final fold after another 30 minutes. I retarded in the fridge immediately and let it finish bulk proofing for about 6 hours the next day after removing from the fridge, pre-shaped, rested for 10 then shaped, proofed as described above for 40 minutes and baked @ 500F in hot Lodge cast iron combo cooker.

I had a real 'skibum' moment yesterday. Two days ago, I had mixed a sweet levain dough enriched with all milk, egg and lots of butter. My plan was to bake off pull apart dinner rolls. Anyhow, yesterday when it came time to pre shape and shape I had my 'skibum' moment. I had forgoten thta I was making dinner rolls and shaped up another Forkish style boule.. The enriched dough baked too hot and too fast and despite being nearly blackened on the outside, not cooked on the inside and of course I didn't bother to check the internal temperature. Definitely a skibum moment. Some would say senior moment . . . So now, rather than just writing out a list of ingredients I am adding SHAPING AND BAKING INSTRUCTIONS DUMB SKIBUM! This is the prettiest loaf I have ever had to throw straight into the trash! :-(

This is the Arkatena bread from Bread Matters by Andrew Whitley, except with rosemary instead of fennel, more salt, more heat, steam, an autolyse, some stretching and folding, and a shortcut using my own starter to create a chickpea starter.  The chickpea, aka garbanzo, aka gram flour is the unique feature of this bread.

I feel like I stuck to the spirit of this bread even if I didn’t stick to the letter of the formula.  The only really substantive change was the switch from fennel to rosemary.  I meant to use fennel up until the last minute.  I have nothing against fennel, it’s just not something I get really excited about.  When I remembered the bit in the book that says fennel probably isn’t used in the original bread on which this one is based, well, out went the fennel.  I really do like rosemary and it seemed like a good fit for this loaf so, in went the rosemary.

The dough was strong and not particularly wet so I couldn’t resist shaping it with a twist.  I might add more water in future tinkering. 

The rest of the changes were made for the sake of habit and convenience.  Reworking the formula took some wrangling because the book has you make a chickpea starter from scratch and then make loads of extra leaven during the builds.  I’ve included the numbers I came up with. I left out the nitty-gritty details of the process – best to check the book for that and then modify as you will.

If you don’t have this book it is worth taking a look at.  Mr. Whitley is refreshingly blunt, even if you don’t agree with every last thing he has to say.  “Constructive neglect” – brilliant!  Steaming “a fruitless exercise” – you underestimate me, sir!  One nice takeaway from this book is to worry less and go with what works.  It is good to be reminded of that once in a while.  It is, after all, your bread. 

This is one tangy bread.  Maybe it was the long, cool leaven builds.  Quick, warm fermentation might yield a different result.  Right out of the oven it reminded me of hummus with lots of lemon juice.  Good stuff.  The chickpea flavor faded over time but still lends its unique tang to the bread.  The rosemary flavor comes through nicely.  I think I'll be baking this one again!

Marcus