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This week I have cooked up a couple of breads to test my skills using my powerful sourdough and 00 flour.

Sourdough / Natural Leaven:

I spent a few days refreshing this firm starter for the panettone. Feeding 4 times a day, every 4hrs.

San Francisco SD:

 I converted my firm natural leaven into a 70% hydration starter and fed a few times, keeping at 28-29C. At the end of fermentation it was quite soupy. From this I made a 60% hydration dough.

This was the nicest all white sourdough I have ever tasted! Crisp and yet chewy crust. Delicate and smooth flavour. But unexpectedly just a hint of sour.

Fruitless Panettone:

Beautifully yellow, soft, light and shreddable crumb.

It is a stunning Autumn morning – crisp and clear. Outside a container of dough gently rises and for the first time all week I have a chance to sit and write a post for the blog.

I spent last weekend with friends near the small township of Pittsworth helping in their micro-bakery as they prepared for a food festival in a nearby community. Laurie and Rhonda started Chalala Micro-Bakery a few years ago with the vision of producing quality breads in a masonry oven. This has been expanded to include a range of stunning wood-fired mueslis, nuts and gluten free cookies.

I contacted Laurie a year ago with hope of gaining some experience in the operation of a small bakery and the use of a wood-fired oven. From that moment on they opened their home and hearts to me and have given this raggedy home-baker (I love that term Pat) some incredible hands-on experience.

Their bakery is based around an Alan Scott built oven and a recently purchased diving arm mixer affectionately dubbed baby Huey. Previously Laurie was mixing all the dough by hand in plastic tubs and I can tell you this is hard work – needless to say everybody was very grateful for baby Huey’s arrival.

Finishing work early on a Friday afternoon I drove west from Brisbane for two hours. After leaving the close confines of the city you start to notice the horizon and feel distance in all directions. The roads widen and lengthen before you.

I was heading out to assist Laurie with the bake and market stall for the Felton Food Festival. Felton is a farming district on the inner Darling Downs about 30 km south west of Toowoomba and in recent years has seen plenty of conflict between the mining industry and the local community over the development of an open cut coal mine. A month ago it was announced that the newly elected state government would rule out the proposed coal mine. The community had won and now the food festival was a chance to showcase the beauty and productivity of the Felton region.

Preparation for a bake is always a busy time. Flours are scaled and placed in boxes, ingredients are prepped and finally the leavens expanded. Along with this busy activity I milled flour in preparation for a batch of Country breads and Miche. My little mill had its work cut out for it and so did I as I sifted through a few kilograms of flour. This was to be a specialty one off bread for the food festival and Laurie was kind enough to allow me to develop a formula and mill the required flour. By the time I had prepared the flours I looked white as a ghost :) – covered in flour.

The plan was to bake an oven-load of country breads (Campagne) that included 3 x 2kg miche scored with the Felton Food Festival logo. The formula used Laurie’s organic white 100% hydration starter, a mixture of organic plain white flour, milled and sifted wheat flour, whole-grain spelt and whole-grain rye flour. Some final wood was placed in the oven and a draft door set in place until bake time. It was time to try and sleep.

Chalala’s Felton Miche 3 x 2kg Miche (Original formula was for 20kg)

Formula

Method

1. Mix starter and leave to ferment for 10–12 hours at 23°C
2. Combine Leaven, water, flours and salt and mix on slow for 15-20 minutes
3. Bulk ferment 2.5–3 hours with two stretch-and-folds 30 mins apart in the first hour.
4. Divide. Preshape. Bench rest 20 mins. Shape.
5. Proofing took two and half hours
6. Bake in woodfired oven for 30 minutes at 250°C

On bake day we were a little surprised by cool bakery temperatures but by midway through the bake we had caught up and were back on schedule with the oven performing better than expected. By the end of the bake we had produced 300 loaves made up of 13 varieties of breads – 11 of them sourdoughs.

Ciabatta, miche/country bread, struan multi-grain, sprouted wheat bread, Irish brown/beer bread, olive bread, onion and rosemary bread, flaxseed rye tin loaf, spelt and teff tin loaf, fig and roasted walnut boule, banana sourdough tin loaf, fruit sourdough tin loaf and cinnamon scrolls.

Market day had arrived. We watched the weather with some nervousness and crossed our fingers hoping for a good attendance being it was the inaugural food festival for Felton. The organisers had been hoping for an attendance of 500 people, in fact there were many thousands – possibly 5000 or more.

We were fortunate to have a stall right by the front entrance and thus we didn’t have a moments rest until the last loaf of bread was sold only two hours after the gates had officially opened. Laurie and Rhonda then continued to sell muesli throughout the day.

Celebrity chef and owner of Tank and Bretts Wharf Restaurants in Brisbane, Alastair McLeod provided cooking demonstrations and utilised one of the miche in his dishes. He is a strong supporter of locally produced foods and some of his chefs have even travelled from Brisbane to spend time in the bakery with Laurie.

The festival was held on a property on top of a gentle hill overlooking farming land in all directions. Hay bales were scattered around under trees for people to sit and enjoy the local food while taking in the scenery. Some rain did drop for minute or so during the day but was welcomed happily by the farming community.

At the end of a long but rewarding day we headed back to the bakery to re-fire the oven and prep for Laurie’s Monday wholesale bake. It was time to try and sleep again.

… to be continued.

I read about and saw pictures of gorgeous flaxseed ryes coming out of members' ovens last week and I thought I'd give it a try, but I don't like to bring new flours or specialty ingredients into the house until I use up much of what I already have. Such is life in a small New York City kitchen. Finding no rye and no flaxseeds, flaxseed rye was pretty much out of the question. There was some flaxseed meal, though, and a nice bag of Central Milling whole wheat, so I went that way.

I fed my 100% hydration white storage culture with the whole wheat a few times and mixed up a stiff levain from it to ferment overnight. I made a hot soaker with the flaxseed meal and hydrated all the white bread flour overnight. Bulk fermentation was two hours, with s&f's at 30, 60, and 105 minutes. Shaped loaves proofed another two hours on the bench. I put a total of about 2 ounces each of flaxssed meal (via the soaker) and buckwheat flour in the mix.

The large loaf was baked covered in cast iron, from which I'm getting good results recently. The smaller loaves were baked with my usual steam setup, but not covered. They did not exhibit the same cell structure as the larger loaf. The crumb on these is very light. There is no bitterness or excessive tang from the whole wheat. I tried to be conservative with the fermentation and proofing times. Delicious with good butter, cheese or maybe smoked fish. Will make these again.

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Hi All,

A few weeks ago, I bought some goat milk to try out.  I love goat cheese, but found out that I absolutely hate goat milk…  It tasted terrible with cereal, and still not so good mixed with cow's milk...  So rather than toss the milk, I decided to make bread with it…  I think it turned out quite well.  The crust was very crispy, the crumb was very moist and soft.  The goat milk taste was most present in the long lingering finish or aftertaste…  Not overpowering, but there…  Funny, after eating the bread, and waiting a while, the final taste I had in my mouth was something uni-like (sea urchin)…

While I think this bread turned out well, I don't think I will be baking it too often as it would require me to buy more goat milk…

Please note that I have a hand crank grain mill, and tend to freshly mill grains for my starters and/or preferments...

Here is the recipe/process below:

Poolish:
150g - Freshly ground organic rye berries - medium fine grind
75g - Freshly ground organic spelt berries - medium fine grind
75g - Organic AP flour (Whole Foods Mkt 365)
450g - Tap water
1g - IDY (1/8 tsp)
751g - Total

8:30pm - Mix poolish, cover and let rest.  Measure out 700g of goat milk, scald in saucepan and let cool (in ice bath if necessary).

Final Dough:
1200g - AP
30g - Salt
600-650g - Goat Milk (some will have evaporated)
751g - Poolish
2581g - Total (approx)

11:00pm - Mix all ingredients until all flour is combined with liquid and there are no dry bits in large mixing bowl.  Cover and let rest.

11:30pm - Turn dough, transfer to lightly oiled plastic tub at least 3x size of dough (6L), cover and let rest.

12:23am - Turn dough, cover and let rest, go to bed.

7:00am - Turn dough out onto floured surface, divide into 4 equal pieces, shape, proof on lightly floured linen couche, cover with plastic, proof.

8:00am - Prepare oven with 2 baking stones and steam pan filled with lava rocks and water.  Preheat to 500F with convection.

8:45am - Turn off convection.  Transfer loaves to lightly floured peel, slash, place in oven directly on stone.  Bake for 10 minutes at 475F with steam.  Remove steam pan, bake for 15 minutes at 425F.  Switch loaves between stones, bake for another 10 minute.  Then turn off oven and leave loaves in for another 10 minutes.  Cool before slicing and eating…

Enjoy!

Tim

Without crumbs

With crumbs

Eccomi qui per condividere alcuni scatti della panificazione di questo venerdi/sabato, ospite nel laboratorio di un amico. Solo foto nei momenti liberi, quindi niente foto dell'impasto ... avevo le mani sporche.

Here I am to share with you some pics of this friday/saturday bake, guest in the lab of a friend. Only photos taken in the free time, so no shots of the dough ... I had my hands "dirty".

Venerdì sera ho impastato quattro micche a lievitazione naturale con lievitazione finale in frigo a 4°C. Sabato mattina ho infornato come meglio ho potuto in questo "vecchio" forno dismesso nel magazzino, il forno era fermo da qualche hanno e lo ho riattivato per l'occasione la settimana prima dopo un pò di manutenzione.

On friday I mixed four sourdough miches I left to proof in the refrigerator overnight at 4°C. Saturday morning I baked the loaves in this "old" oven in the deposit, it was inactive for a few years and I re-activated it for this bake the week before.

La pasta è stata impastata in questa tuffante (impasto breve con autolisi), ho usato una farina semi-integrale forte (tipo 2) idratata al 80-82% e lievitata con lievito naturale liquido. In totale 4kg di farina, 3.2kg di acqua e 88g di sale integrale.

The dough was mixed in this double arm mixer (short mix with autolyse), I used a strong high extraction flour hydrated at a rate of 80-82% and raised with a liquid levain. 4kg flour, 3.2kg water and 88g of unrefined sea salt.

Non fate caso alla temperatura visualizzata sul forno, la temperatura reale è 20-30°C meno di quella mostrata.

Don't look at the diplayed oven temperature, the real temperature is 20-30°C less that the one showed.

PS: riesci a vedere il volto di una persona sulla pagnotta nell'ultima foto!

PS: are you able to see the face of a man on loaf last photo?

Today my mom requested I make bread for her. As I was thinking about what to make for her, I saw eggs and milk we had just bought. I thought milk and egg bread would be perfect for mom as she loves soft crust and soft crumb.

I am not good at measuring but here is what I used to make this delicious loaf of bread.

1 large egg

3 tbsp powdered milk

¾ tsp instant yeast

1/3 cup sugar (yes this bread is super sweet)

2 ½ cups of flour

¼ cup unsalted Butter

Pinch or two of salt

Water (I didn’t measure it) maybe about 2-3 tbsp or more. just enough to make soft dough.

Dissolve yeast in 2 tbsp of water. Beat egg and sugar well until it turns glossy. Sift flour, milk, salt together and add 1/3rd of it to the egg and sugar mixture, add the dissolved yeast and mix well. Repeat twice using 1/3 rd of the flour. Add more water 1 tbsp at a time if needed. Mix well. Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 10 minutes. Slightly flatten the dough and add butter. Fold the sides to seal butter in and knead again until all butter has melted and incorporated well with dough. Rest for 45 mins in a bowl covered with a damp cloth and stretch and fold once. Rest again for 45 mins.
Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured surface and flatten into a rectangle. Roll into a log and cut into 3 parts. Take each part and flatten lightly into a rectangle, roll and place it in a loaf pan seam side down. Repeat with other two parts. Place the rolls snugly together in the pan. Cover with greased plastic wrap or greased parchment paper and let it rise for 30-45 mins.
Preheat oven at 200C and bake for 10 mins. Lower the temperature to 180C and bake further for 15 mins. Cool completely before slicing. Makes great toasts. Just spread butter on top and serve ;)
This makes only one loaf of 8.5x4.5 (baked in 1 lb loaf pan). You can double the recipe if you want two loaves.

PS: I am buying a new scale so my measurements will be more accurate next time. :) just this one time let me apologize for not measuring everything. I wanted to share this delicious recipe with everyone ASAP. I will update this recipe with exact measurements after I get my scale. 

After the last bake's attempt for flavor instead of holes, this bake was for baguette holes.  I also had some hemp seeds burning a hole in my pocket so thought they would be appropriate.  Burning, burning holes, holes and hemp are baggie proof and go way back to SF in the early 70's as far as I can personally attest.

I wanted to use txfarmer's 36 hour baguette method for a new variation that was different from all of her many variations.  The holes she produces with this recipe, in all of its forms, are amazing - and holes were the main goal today.  I wanted a new variation and Hanseata's Hemp seeds (scalded and then soaked for 4 hours) were the ticket.  I want to thank them both for their inspiration.  I did use a slightly different method by retarding the levain for 12 hours too, to go along with the 24 hour autolyse.  Was trying to get more SD flavor and hoped for holes with this extra levain retard.  The previous bake of 20% rye and WW had much better, deeper and lingering SD flavor - the taste of the bread was just better overall and more akin to my personal preference.

Got a nice crust with some blisters, some ears, some glossy holes, nice nutty taste from the hemp seeds, nice SD twang along  some very poor slashing on one baguette as is usual for me.  I give this bake an 87  or B+. Recipe follows pix.  Use txfarmer's method and just retard the levain too.

The bread was more sour today and I am adding another crub shot of the lunch shot that follows.  Bologna with  cheddar cheese and greens, salad, a brie wedge, a radish, carrot and jicama sticks, olives, tomato, some refried black and red beans.  Sorry for the smudge on the lens - never photograph while you eat!  Took Dopey out of the title too since this bread isn't.

Seeds not included in weights or percents calculated off of them. 

These are my first few attempts at baking with wild yeast only.

The first was a San Francisco style sourdough, recipe from Weekend Bakery. Not much rise/oven spring. The crust was crunchy but the crumb was way too chewy. The starter was 100% rye at 100% hydration

Then I tried Syd's San Francisco Style Sourdough from here. This turned out to be a Mr. Jekyll and Dr. Hyde loaf, one side rather nice looking and the other burst open. The crust was crisp but pale in color. The texture of crumb was somewhat closer to my liking though, not as rubbery as the first time around but with mine tunnels instead of well distributed holes. The starter was 100% rye at 100% hydration. Suggestions from those who have tried Syd's recipe, or from Syd self, would be most welcome.

Then there was the third time around, almost a charmer, called Vermont Bread from Home Cooking Adventure. The crust was thin and crisp, the color was more golden then in the previous breads, the texture of the crumb was pleasant yet still slightly chewy and the holes more evenly distributed. I think these bread has a more acceptable oven spring than the previous attempts. The dough after final proof has a much tighter feel. One of the two breads looks pregnant, one side protruding from a burst underneath. This bread turned against me as I was shaping it, I couldn't get the seam straight and it twirled in my hands when I placed it upside down in the proofing basket. Still, I am very happy with this recipe and think this could be the beginning of a long relationship. For this recipe I converted some of my 100% rye starter to 25% rye and 75% white flour over the course of 5 days at 100% hydration. I also changed the overnight starter of the recipe. Since my starter is used rye at mealtimes I used 40gr rye from the final formula for the overnight starter and added 40gr white flour to the final formula instead. Beginner's luck perhaps, but more of a gut feeling that this might agree better with my starter than to be feed white flour alone.

Today we had a wonderful breakfast and lunch thanks to sweetbird's fine bread that had pistachios and soba noodles added to it by a 'butcher' or as Varda says a 'postmodernist'.  When toasted, this bread, like most, takes on a new life that is hearty and modern too.

As a classic smoked salmon, grilled chicken, tomato and basil feta cheese, lettuce and mushroom masterpiece - rarely attempted by the most professional sandwich artisan, this bread comes into its own saying 'You Know I Ain't No Slimy White Slice Sweetbird'

The original blog is here aand where you find the link to sweetbird's fine recipe on her blog :

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/28081/dabrownman-butchers-sweetbird%E2%80%99s-lovely-buckwheat-apple-and-apple-cider-buckwheat-groat-br

With some fresh pineapple, strawberry, bread and butter, kosher dill and Serrano pickles, a slice of brie and some corn chips with jicama and corn salsa - this lunch is terrific on any spring day that nears 100 F in the shade.

A legjobb kalács.

2 dl langyos tej

3 evőkanál cukor

1 tk só

50 g puha vaj

2 tojás sárga

100 g joghurt

600 gliszt

20g élesztő

+ 1 tojás a kenéshez