After much experimentation with many flours, I settled on KA AP organic flour, Bob's Red Mill Organic flour, and 365 (whole foods brand) AP flour for white bread. All were pretty good, with Bob's Red Mill being a bit chewy.  (I still need to try Giusto's Baker's Choice. I tried the ultimate performer, and that was way too chewy for me). For Rye, I found that Arrowhead Mills has both pumpernickel and whole rye, and I liked the whole rye (didn't try pumpernickel yet). So far so good. (And I tried Bob's Red Mill Teff Flour too, which is great. (I got a recipe for Teff Baguettes from SFBI - 5% Teff in the bread, the 5% goes into the poolish, the flavor is dramatically different!)

w.r.t Whole Wheat Flour, I did not like King Arthur, it's too bland for me, not enough WW taste plus the grind seemed too coarse. Giusto's, I could find only the fine grind, and that was WAY too fine for bread (I think). Plus again, it was a bit too bland for me (but not as bland as KA WW). Any recommendations? How's Stone-Buhr or Arrowhead Mills WW flour for WW bread? Thanks!

Please help.  I have just started to learn how to bake my own bread, I have followed a recipe in jamie olivers cook book as follows

3cups of flour

pinch of salt

teaspoon of sugar

7g of dried active yeast

water

the finished product is heavy and very sour, can anyone tell me how to reduced the sourness and make the loaf lighter.

Well no, it actually doesn't contain Altoids.  Just the tin.  And probably your survival would have to be in jeopardy before you'd actually resort to this.  But!  Kudos to the baker (?) for his resourcefulness.  :)

Here's the link:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Altoids-Tin-Bread-Bake-Survival-Bread/

Actually, maybe I'm being unfair.  I suppose this might be a great technique for backpackers.

Karen

I am looking for a special loaf pan, if any one has seen one or has one they would sell me, that would be wonderful.

I have seen one in UK catalogue but it would cost me about $40 plus tax and P/P and I think that would be just a bit too pricy for a loaf pan, as much as I would like to get it. And that I have in the past paid a rediculous price for some of my toys. [probably unless some kind soul can help me on this side of the Atlantic.  Canada;-))))) will go this route in the end}
It's to make a milk loaf that looks like this.
I know doesn't look like much but the bread would look nice baked in it, don't you think.... qahtan

Hi all,

I've been baking bread in a loaf pan the last few times. I keep the steam on ("the bowl method"), bake for about 15 mins at 400, then remove the pan from the bowl and reduce temparature to 375 for another 25 mins or so (till it's just about 200 inside the bread). The bread gets a good ovenspring etc, but the crust is leathery rather than soft and thin. How do I get a soft+thin crust in a loaf pan?

Thanks!

Okay, I am using non-diastatic malt powder for the first time in a new recipe for sourdough kaiser rolls. I mixed the dry ingredients (along with the malt powder) and as I was mixing by hand I noticed the flour felt 'crusty'- no other way to put it. Hmmm. I continued and added the wet ingredients and I could feel little hard lumps in the dough. I assume this was caused by the malt powder (since this has never happened before) and I am wondering what I did wrong. Should I have dissolved the malt powder in the liquid? Is this dough a lost cause? I am using the stretch and fold method so I have another 30 minutes or so to go before I feel the dough again. Arghhhh this is frustrating- just when you THINK you know something about bread you find that you a lifetime of learning yet to do. Suggestions?

Thanks!

Amaz

I have a Kitchenaide Superba oven it has 3 heating elements, the lowest one is under the floor of the oven,, any way,,,,,,,,

I made cinnamon buns, looked good going into the oven nicely puffed  so all was well, untill the brown sugar etc that was/did melt, boiled over out of the pan, all over the floor of the oven, it burnt on contact, thick smoke beltched out of the oven the fire alarm went off, OMG what a shamozze.  the buns wre only partially baked....... :-))))))

 Plus a thick black crust to get off the oven floor.

                                   qahtan 

Hi All,

I recently made my usual pane pugliese using 100% pasta dura (durum wheat) flour rather than the usual standard unbleached bread flour.  To try improve the crust I not only added hot water in the bottom of the oven but I also sprayed the bread every few minutes for 10 mins. After 10 mins I removed the water and stopped spraying.   Even though I have baking stones I noticed the temperature reduced significantly (30 oC) in the oven over this time.  The resulting bread had a very 'springy' crust rather than a hard crust as I usually get.  What are the reasons for this? The flour? Teh temperature variation?  Too much steam? 

Every 3rd sunday after service at our church we have a luncheon.Everybody brings food and we eat in the fellowship hall.Today my contribution was cinnamon buns and 3 different breads.Well,the ladies doing the preparating before we even had church ate most of the cinnamon buns and about half the bread so there wasn't much left after church when we had our luncheon.I'd made a triple batch of the buns (36 big ones) and 4 loaves of bread.Long story short,they liked the stuff I'd brought.Now they want me to supply a bunch of bread and buns for their church bazaar.My question.Can I make a bunch of the various doughs I would need ahead of time and freeze the dough till I'm ready to make the stuff?If I can do that,should it be frozen after it's completed or at an earlier stage?Thanks in advance.

I would like to hear some opinions.  Are there happy DLX mixer owners!  I have a KA Artisan and I think it is great for many things except it just seems to wimp out when it comes to kneading some doughs.  I like the option of being able to do larger batches with a machine that can handle the load and yet can make a nice merigue, cookies etc. and that is going to last!

Sylvia