Howdy from the Blue Mountains in Oregon!
Just wanted to introduce myself. After several years of only baking once in a while, I am back to making bread daily! I have always loved baking breads, and have spent many hours with sourdough starters etc in the past. The reason I am back to baking breads again, is that I just can't get myself to pay $5 a loaf for a small baguette! They are usually beautiful little guys, but come on! I can make one for a fraction of the cost, and it taste so good and smells absolutely wonderful. I thought, "I can handle it, just make a couple baguettes each week and that will work just fine. No sourdough!" Sigh, ok that lasted all of 4 days and now I have a homemade starter and a san fran started in my kitchen (they are both bubbling away as we speak). Right now I am working them daily, trying to get them going well and stable before putting them into my fridge. The san fran one is going strong already, even has a wonderful sour smell to it. It's already even given me hooch, which surprised me today. Can't believe it's being so active when my house has been so cold!
The biggest reason I have started making breads again is that my husband has diabetes, and every loaf of bread in our grocery store has corn syrup or sugar in the ingredients except the small baguettes. They put sugar/corn syrup into all the regular french bread and sourdough breads that are mass produced. From baking bread in the past I know that most regular french breads do not contain oil or sugar and are easy to make. The carbs from the flour are bad enough for someone with diabetes, but adding high fructose corn syrup to sourdough and french bread is just going way to far IMHO. Don't get me wrong, I love the taste of sweet breads in moderation. There's a time and a place for everything! I will still occasionally make some of my favorite recipes from the past, and drool over all the wonderful pictures I have seen so far here!
BTW, I am married, have two children, one in college one in graduate school, live on a small farm, have been baking bread since I was a teenager, and I love artisan breads!
And welcome to TFL!
There are some conflicting data floating around about the impacts on blood sugar caused by sourdough bread versus the impacts caused by non-sourdough bread. And anecdotally, some respondents say that they see big spikes after eating sourdough bread while others claim the opposite. I hope that your husband is one of those who can tolerate it better than he can other carb sources, since that would give him a little margin for enjoying an occasional slice of bread.
Paul
Welcome, Jo_Jo_!
We have a lot of Oregonians here, including myself, though most of us are on the west side of the Cascades.
Most of the everyday European breads do not contain sweetener - and even if they do, it's very little and can be easily left off.
I'm just preparing a specialty sourdough rye bread from my hometown Hamburg, "Hamburger Kräftiges" (Hamburger Strong One), no sweetener, no oil, the hint of sweetness only comes from the rye.
Welcome to TFL,
Karin
I have enjoyed looking at all the beautiful bread pictures here on The Fresh Loaf, it is inspiring! I hope to learn a lot, and try many new breads. I have never used bakers math before, just look at the dough and decide what it needs as I go. This has created some interesting loaves in the past, but I have learned a lot through the years by doing this. Not much time right now, but will try to get online tomorrow!
Blessings...
Joanne