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I haven't baked baguettes in ages. I'm not sure why. I baked a few today, including an epi de blé. It was very yummy with a bowl of bean and farro soup for lunch today.

The obligatory crumb photo. This is one piece of the epi.

Bean-Farro soup. I made this up for my vegetarian granddaughters. It was so good, I wrote down the recipe and have made it many times since.

I'm baking more sourdough multi-grain loaves tomorrow. 

Happy baking!

David

I missed baking last week due to life getting in the way, so was happy to get some time this weekend to make friends again with "Woody" (yes, my starter has a name) and make a fresh batch of my usual weekly sourdough.  This week, I dropped the rye to let the semolina shine through a little more......next time, I think I will drop the WW (except for what's in the starter) and up the semolina appropriately.

1000g AP (KA)

100g WW (KA)

100g Semolina (Bob's)

250g Starter (100% hydration, fed w/WW)

803g Water

26g Salt

I did everything up to the final fridge proof in one day, starting the first starter wake-up refresh at 9a (10:10:10).  Followed this with 30:30:30 and 90:95:95.  I wanted to try using the starter a little earlier this time, so only let it rise about 70%, then proceeded with my mix.  All of the flour, water and starter got mixed up, and then rested for 30 minutes.  Pinched in the salt, and did about 25 stretch/folds, then rested 30 minutes.  Another two series of s/f on the half hour, trying to be much more gentle with the last one than I usually am.  After this, I let it bulk proof at 75F which took about 2 hours.  Shaped (had a devil of a time for some reason....STICKY!!!), then into lined bannetons to proof for an hour at 75F, then off to the fridge for the night.  In the morning, baked covered at 475F for 20 minutes, then uncovered for 25 minutes.

I am very pleased with the results of this loaf across the board.  Good oven spring and bloom, crazy blisters, crispy crust, and a bit more open crumb than I usually get.  Oh, and it tastes damn fine, too!! :)  Some pics......

My brother asked me if I had any extra bread for his mother-in-law but all of my Kamut 3 Ways with Honey were spoken for. I had some left over levain after I mixed up my other dough so I threw this recipe together. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to mill fresh flour, however, I did use flour from our local Brule Creek mill so it wasn’t all commercial flour. 

By the way, I am not sure if this qualifies for a 1-2-3 dough but I used that as my starting point.

Recipe

Makes two large loaves

Soaker

200 g of large flake oats

200 g boiling water

Main dough

250 g of 100% 4 stage levain

500 g of water

250 g partially sifted wholewheat flour (Brule Creek)

500 g unbleached flour

50 g honey

17 g Pink Himalayan salt

40 g plain yogurt

Soaker

1. Pour boiling water into oats and let sit until cool.

Dough

1. Pour the water into the levain, and add the oat soaker. Stir to loosen the soaker. Add the honey.
2. Add the flours and mix well to hydrate all of the flour. Let sit for an hour.
3. Add the salt and the yogurt. Mix well.
4. Pour the dough onto a bare counter and do 3 sets of slaps and folds (70/40/30) each 30 minutes apart.
5. Do 2 sets of stretches and folds in the bowl also 30 minutes apart. Let rest in a warm place for a couple of hours. The dough rose a fair bit but because it was in a bowl, I couldn’t judge the degree of rise. I might have overdone the bulk fermentation but the dough came out of the container quite cleanly. I would have gotten to it sooner but I was dealing with the other recipe.
6. Divide into two equal portions of about 975 g and do a preshape. Let rest 45 minutes. 
7. Do a final shape by flouring the rounds and flipping the rounds over on a lightly floured counter. Gently stretch the dough out into a circle. Pull and fold the third of the dough closest to you over the middle. Pull the right side and fold over the middle and do the same to the left. Fold the top end to the center patting out any cavities. Finally stretch the two top corners and fold over each other in the middle. Roll the bottom of the dough away from you until the seam is underneath the dough. Cup your hands around the dough and pull towards you, doing this on all sides of the dough to round it off. Finally spin the dough to make a nice right boule.
8. Sprinkle rice flour and Oat flakes in the bannetons. Place the dough seam side down in the bannetons, cover, let rest for a few minutes on the counter and then put to bed in a cold (38F) fridge for ~10 hours.

Baking

1. The next morning, heat the oven to 475 with the Dutch ovens inside for 45 minutes to an hour. Turn out the dough seam side up onto a cornmeal sprinkled counter. Place rounds of parchment paper in the bottom of the pots, and carefully place the dough seam side up inside. 
2. Cover the pots and bake the loaves at 475 F for 30 minutes, remove the lids, and bake for another 16 minutes. Internal temperature should be 205F or more.

I was checking out my stash of grains and realized that I have a lot of Kamut. So I decided to do a repeat of a loaf that I did about a year ago. I did make a few changes to include things that I have learned over the past year and also decided to add some honey. 

And.... I forgot to add my usual yogurt. I didn’t feel up to par for some reason so I’ll consider myself lucky that the rest of the dough seemed to come nicely together. 

Recipe

Makes 3 loaves

Sprouts

100 g Kamut berries

Soaker

50 g flax seeds

100 g Kamut flakes

300 g boiling water

Dough

700 g unbleached flour

250 g high extraction Kamut flour (mill and sift 285 g of Kamut berries)

50 g high extraction rye flour (mill and sift 60 g of rye berries)

570 g water + 30 g 

60 g honey

22 g pink Himalayan salt

200 g 100% hydration 4 stage levain (procedure in recipe)

Extra whole grain wheat or/and partially sifted whole grain flour for levain

Three days before:

1. Soak 100 g Kamut berries in plenty of filtered water for 6 to 8 hours. Hubby forgot to drain mine while I was away at pottery so it was more like 12 hours!
2. Drain and rinse the berries. Drain again and let sit at room temp (72 F).
3. Every 6 to 8 hours, rinse and drain the berries, and keep at room temp  until the roots are about the same length as the berries themselves. This took about 2.5 days for me. Your mileage may vary. =D
4. Rinse, drain very well and refrigerate until needed.

Two nights before:

1. Take 5 g of refrigerated starter and feed it 5 g water and 5 g whole wheat flour.
2. Let sit overnight.

The morning before:

1. Feel the levain 15 g of water and 15 g of whole wheat flour.
2. Let sit 12 hours.

The night before:

1. Prepare the soaker by toasting the flax seeds in a dry frying pan. Place the flax seeds in a bowl, add the Kamut flakes and pour the boiling water over the seeds and flakes. Cover and let soak overnight.
2. If you are using Kamut and Rye berries, mill into flour. You could use commercial whole grain Kamut flour and dark rye flour if milling your own is not a possibility. Sift to remove the bran. 
3. Place 250 g of the Kamut flour and 50 g of the rye flour in a tub. To the tub, add the unbleached flour. Cover and reserve till the next morning.
4. Save the extra flour and the bran to feed the levain. I ended up with a total of 20 g of Kamut/Rye bran and 21 g of extra Kamut flour.
5. Add 30 g of water and 30 g of bran/extra Kamut flour to the levain. Let sit overnight at room temp (72 F). Note that the bran and the whole grain flour make for a very thick mixture.

Dough day:

1. In the morning, prepare the final stage of the levain. Add 60 g of water and enough leftover Kamut flour and partially sifted whole grain wheat flour to make 60 g. Mix well and let sit until it peaks; this took 3 and a half hours. 
2. An hour or so before the levain is ready, add 570 g water to the bowl with the soaker, stir to loosen the mix, and pour it all into the tub with the flour. Add the honey and mix until all the flour is hydrated. Autolyse (let sit) for an hour. 
3. At the same time, take the sprouts out of the fridge to warm up on the counter.
4. Once the autolyse is done, add the Kamut sprouts, the salt, the yogurt, 30 g water, and 200 g of levain. Mix well and let rest for 30 minutes.
5. Do three sets of French slaps and folds (75/40/10) at 30 minutes intervals. The dough felt quite sticky for some reason. Again on 30 minute intervals and in a warm spot (oven with light on), do 3 sets of stretches and folds in the tub. The folds really helped pull the dough together. 
6. Let rest until you can see bubbles through the walls of the tub, the dough feels jiggly and there are some bubbles along the walls of the tub. The dough rose about 30%. Total bulk fermentation was 4.5 hours. 
7. Tip the dough out on a bare counter, sprinkle the top with flour and divide into portions of ~820g. Round out the portions into rounds with a dough scraper and let rest 45 minutes to one hour on the counter. 
8. Do a final shape by flouring the rounds and flipping the rounds over on a lightly floured counter. Gently stretch the dough out into a circle. Pull and fold the third of the dough closest to you over the middle. Pull the right side and fold over the middle and do the same to the left. Fold the top end to the center patting out any cavities. Finally stretch the two top corners and fold over each other in the middle. Roll the bottom of the dough away from you until the seam is underneath the dough. Cup your hands around the dough and pull towards you, doing this on all sides of the dough to round it off. Finally spin the dough to make a nice right boule.
9. Sprinkle rice flour and Kamut flakes in the bannetons. Place the dough seam side down in the bannetons, cover, let rest for a few minutes on the counter and then put to bed in a cold (38F) fridge for 9-10 hours. 

Baking Day:

1. The next morning, heat the oven to 475F with the Dutch ovens inside for 45 minutes to an hour. Turn out the dough seam side up onto a cornmeal sprinkled counter. Place rounds of parchment paper in the bottom of the pots, and carefully place the dough seam side up inside. 
2. Cover the pots and bake the loaves at 450 F for 30 minutes, remove the lids, drop the temperature to 425F, and bake for another 17 minutes. Internal temperature should be 205F or more.

I was very happy when I lifted the lids and saw that these loaves had sprung nicely! They sure smell good!

I make my baking as easy as possible - I want bread, not the experience of making bread.

I keep a sourdough starter, and I feed it about 30 grams of whole wheat flour and 20 grams of water, about every other day, so it is always ready, always very active, and always about the hydration of my dough - one less thing to worry about.

On a baking day,  I start about 5:30 am by  grinding ~480 grams of hard red wheat and 20 grams of rye malt through the stone burr grain mill 4 times, once coarse, once medium, once fine, and once fine as possible. (Some grain mills are not designed to re-grind meal/flour). This takes less then 10 minutes. I put the fresh flour in a big mixing bowl, (with a lid, I sometimes just use a stock pot), add ~5 grams of instant yeast, about 50 grams  of sough dough starter (often half my starter),  about 666 grams of room temp water,  mix with a wooden spoon,  put the lid on it, and let it ferment at  room temp for ~6 hours. We have wet seasons and dry seasons, so the moisture content of my wheat varies by 5% through the year.  At this stage, I do not worry about hydration.  This mix ferments fairly  rapidly. I check on it and give it a stir a couple of times during the morning. 

After lunch, (1:00 pm) I stir in by handfuls 500 grams of good bread flour and 20 grams of salt,  and I let it sit covered for most of an hour.  In the next hour, I give the dough several stretch and folds, and I adjust hydration either by adding water or flour.   About 2:30 pm the dough gets pre-shaped, bench rested, the loaf/loaves formed, and placed in a proofing basket(s), covered with shower cap(s), and allowed to rise in a warm place for a couple of hours. 

About 4:30, it gets put on the hearthstone in a 450 F oven.  Oven temperature is reduced during baking because we do not like very dark crusts.

Thus, we have fresh bread for dinner at 6 pm.

When I am baking for friends that grew up  with "black bread", I  use more, or even all, whole wheat. The bread should fit the rest of the menu. 

 Flavorful, complex Boule

 324 g  kefir whey

325 g all purpose flour

150 g whole wheat flour

25 g whole-grain rye

 1/2 tsp Instant yeast

10 g sea salt

 6:00 pm. mix all the ingredients by hand or in a mixer several hours to prove

10 PM, shaping into tight boule, place seam side up in well floured cloth lined basket. Refrigerate within larger plastic bag

 Next morning

Preheat cast iron skillet and cast iron loaf pan (For steaming) in 475 oven

 Turn over refrigerated boule, dust with more flour and score design

 Carefully place scored Boule in hot skillet and add boiling water into cast iron loaf pan. Lower heat to 450°

after five minutes cover with pot cover.

bake 20 minutes

remove cover. Lower temperature to 425  and continue breaking 10 more minutes. 

Good evening,

my name is Filippo and I write from a beautiful city called Bergamo,

located in northern Italy.

I worked for a few years as a pizza chef in Italy and six months in

Greece. From one year I found out the bread with sourdough, and seems

that in Italy it is still a recent practice. There are few realities

willing to teach.

My girlfriend and I would like to open a micro bakery near our house

and we are looking for someone to teach a small business.

Produce 1 kg of bread is different to produce 50 kg

We would like to make bread with long fementations (using the fridge)

with sourdough and organic flours. At the moment I have a little

experience with tests done at home (after reading Tartine bread) by kneading by hand and cooking in

a "Lodge" cast-iron (waiting to buy a mixer and the Rofco b40 oven) if

anyone is interested and want to help us we will be honored.

We are willing to leave for all of Europe (Spain, England, Ireland, France, Germany Etc ..)

Thank you

Filippo and Linda

Farina Bona is a unique flour produced in Cavigliano, a village in the Swiss canton of Ticino.  Cavigliano sits in the Valle Onsernone that runs east out of Locarno, the lakeside town from which the better known (to bread bakers) Valle Maggia runs north.

This deeply yellow flour is milled from toasted but unpopped maize kernels and smells very much like what you would expect:  It has an unmistakable and intense popcorn fragrance. Farina bona production dates back centuries, was eventually abandoned but has recently been revived by some romantic slow foodies.  History and production notes can be gleaned from the official Farina Bona website or Wikipedia.  

How to toast corn without popping all the kernels, you ask?  With legendary Swiss precision, of course. Remove the pan from the fire after exactly one third of the kernels have popped (those Swiss can count really fast.  Who knew?).  Then [optional: fire up Netflix,] eat the popped kernels and mill only the Old Maids.  Mind you, this is the ‘revived’ procedure. From the official website, it is clear that the current revivalists are making their best guesses as to the actual but unrecorded protocol followed by the late, venerated Annunziata Terribilini (no, I’m not making up that name).

As interesting as it would have been to visit Cavigliano when we were motoring in that direction this past summer, we were happy to find 250 gr bags of Farina Bona (along with a dazzling range of cheeses and chocolates, as well as fresh Pane Maggia) in the food hall of Manor, nearby Lugano’s big department store.

Hot damn.
The fragrance of the stuff is incredible.
Did I say that already?  

Now, most of the recipes provided in the online Farina Bona cookbook are for sweets.  Sounds tempting and we'll get around to some eventually.  After all, Piedmontese maize biscuits ~ pasta di meliga ~ are seriously delicious and rival biscotti/cantucci/cantuccini for the cappuccino dunkability crown (pasta di meliga are available from Eataly and some Carluccio’s (UK)).

So far we've just salted our precious Farina Bona into the weekly house miche our usual way:  At 3% of total flour, it coats and thereby de-clumps home-flaked porridge added at the second fold.  

We'd taken to using Alt Altus and/or powdered dehydrated sweet corn for that purpose this summer (in combination, an uncanny approximation of Farina bona), but popcorn is one of those smells and tastes that evokes such universally happy associations.  So why not.

Farina bona would need to be closer to 10% of total flour to take center-stage and give the miche an assertively corny character. But we’re after some light maize counterpoint here, not a Popcorn Requiem Mass.  At 3%, it's a largely subliminal hint barely peeking above the radar, but a happy hint is better than no hint at all.

There’s an outside chance that Eataly sells Farina Bona in their stores (they don’t online*).  It's just the kind of unique regional product they'd promote. I keep forgetting to forage for it there.  But then again, Italy has far too many worthy regional culinary delights competing for precious Eataly shelf space.  More importantly, Cavigliano’s being culturally but not politically Italian is almost certainly a deal-breaker. Still, if you're lucky enough to have an Eataly nearby, take a look.  And a sniff.

Happy Baking,

Tom

___________________

* If you Google(Shopping) <Farina bona>, you get a page of Farina bona fan T-shirts.  I don’t know where that’s coming from. Maybe those romantic slow foodies have hired a PR firm.

I chanced upon a long TFL post Chasing thin, crispy, not thick/tough dough A comment by Mariana regarding a 100% sponge method loaf caught my eye. I think Mariana made it in a bread machine, but the loft was incredible. I've been thinking of making a tin loaf for a while, so this was the perfect opportunity.

It's a yeasted dough, but I did a couple of tweaks to add some extra flavour: addition of 10% Mockmilled whole wheat flour and addition of 13% leftover stiff levain I had in the fridge. Overall hydration was 64%, plus the butter.

Initial mix

• 270g Duchy bread flour
• 270g Waitrose Canadian bread flour
• 60g Mockmilled whole wheat flour
• 1.5g diastatic malt
• 24g warm butter
• 3g IDY
• 0.03g ascorbic acid
• 80g levain @ 56%
• 324g warm water

 Later Additions

• 12g salt (1.8%)
• 12g honey
• 24g dried skim milk powder
• 64g water

Process   

• IDY creamed with 24g water at 40C
• 64g boiling water poured onto honey and skim milk powder - mix and allow to cool
• 300g water in mixer, add AA, then flours, levain, creamed IDY, malt, butter
• Mix lightly - no gluten development
• Rest for 3hrs 40 mins
• Add honey/milk mix and mix in on slow, then add salt and mix in
• Develop gluten - 5 mins on high speed
• Bulk ferment at 28C for 30 mins
• Shape to 1 x 900g tin loaf plus a very small "leftovers" loaf
• Final proof 1 hour at 28C - dough nearly at top of tin.
• Bake in oven at 230C with steam for around 50 mins until internal temp 95C

Thoughts

• A crazy big loaf - I don't think i've ever made a taller one! Height was 185mm/7.25"
• Nice crumb - not too open, which wouldn't have been appropriate, but not tight.
• Mild but pleasant flavour.
• Probably not a type of loaf I will make on a regular basis, but a nice occasional style.

Lance

It is easy to make one for yourself though using Lucy's variation of Peter Reinhart's whole grain rye method that takes 4 days and makes bread on day 5 with left over starter for storage - without any discard!

Day 1- 30 g of whole grain rye and 25 g of water.  mix cover with plastic wrap and leave for 24 hour

Day 2 add 30 g of WG rye and 25 g of water Mix and let sit for 24 hours covered in plastic

Day 3 - divide in half.  Add 30 g of WG rye and 25 g of water to each half, stir and cover each with plastic

Day 4 Add 30 g of WG Rye and 25 g of waterstir and let sit for 24

Day 5 Make levain for a loaf of bread with one half and divide the other one in half.  Feed one 60 g of flour and 40 g of water for storage in the fridge after it rises 25% and feed the other one 30 g of flour and 25 g of water to make a levain for bread 2 on the next day.

Works every time without fail at 75 - 78 F.

Happy SD baking