hi i just wanted to ask as there are so many different techniques out there, how do you shape your baguettes. i made seven baguettes the other day from a batch of pain ordinaire that i had made up from the village baker. initially i wanted to practice my scoring. the technique i used to shape was one i had seen in a video on youtube,  'artisan breads week 2 - baguettes'. i thought it was really informative. so i tried this as well as the technique described by richard bertinet in his book dough.

i noticed the first method had more folding involved while bertinet's just had the one fold after the initial 'envelope fold' then rolling to elongate and seal seam.

bertinet's method i used for only the last one and it did come out the nicest looking in appearance (shape, scoring, inside texture) but whether this was due to the technique or practice on the previous six baguettes, i don't know lol !

any thoughts?

.  

I finally did it. I installed a conventional oven in a small shed here at my resort. I have fed the birds 50-60 lbs of bread trying to get a decent loaf with my small convection/microwave oven in my Motor Home.

After about 10 minutes of Baking I had a nice smile on my face. Its about time. All the nice coments and help I have got from the forum and now I can bake again. Thanks Floyd for all the nice replys and the members also.   

 Now I be happy.

 Mr Bob

www.siemann.us

When I knew nothing about bread baking and just did the no-knead bread it worked beautifully every time.  Now I am developing more serious interest in making bread and nothing is working whatsoever.   

I am trying to make Jason’s Ciabatta http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/2984/jasons-quick-coccodrillo-ciabatta-bread.  I don’t have a bread mixer but I wanted to make Jason’s recipe anyway, by hand, as some people say it can be done.

I quote campcook  http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/12994/best-ciabatta-recipe:

I have been making Jason's recipe with variations for some time.  It is very forgiving and produces excellent results every time.  I have flattened it into pizza, folded in extra ingredients, used fresh ground whole wheat flour and cooked it over a campfire -- all to the raves of my tasters.

 Recently, I started doing it almost no knead with no mechanical mixer.  I stir the dry ingredients thoroughly, then stir in ice cold water and let it rise over night.  (We are camping in the mountains so it is very cold at night but I still put it in a cooler to slow the rise.)  In the morning, I (wet) stretch and fold it a couple of times before dividing it for the final 40 minute rise.  Each loaf is wet stretched again before baking one at a time in my camper oven.  I have a pizza stone in the oven to help hold temperature constant.  Each loaf gets 25 to 30 minutes at roughly 500 degrees ( we are at 7000 feet here.)  The results are just fantastic -- big open holes, chewy crust and wonderful flavor.

I have flattened this dough into pizza or near pizza shapes and just shortened the bake time.  I have added slivers of garlic at times, nuts, whole grains and raisins at other times - it all worked.

He says (in the boldface above) that he is getting the same result from stretching the very wet dough about a couple of times when  the recipe directs to beat the hell out of dough….upto 30 mins at high speed(??) 

Here is what is happening to me:

I mix the ingredients together lightly and after a few mins rest I turn the wet dough with a spatula a few times, sort of like stretch and fold in a bowl.  It seems to firm up and become smooth and shiny but still floppy.  But I am (was) assuming at this stage I am far, far away from what the dough is supposed to be as per recipe because people are beating it in a mixer for a long while before they say it ‘comes together’.  I now throw the dough on a board and do the French fold which is touted to be great for very wet doughs.  But, within a few turns, instead of progressing towards coming together,the dough gets GOOPIER  and WETTER and breaks down completely.  As I try to lift it the dough drips for my fingers.  What wasn’t pancake batter a few moments ago suddenly turned into stretchy batter.  It is still shiny but instead of smooth it looks rough, like cellulite. I scrape it off the board into a bowl and let it go.   The yeast works because I see a lot of bubble eventually but NO rising in the dough.

I have tried this six times now and sometimes with different flours.  It is happening every time.

Is it possible that the very wet dough develops gluten very quickly and then breaks down?   Then I really need only a few folds?  How can dough be this sensitive?!  Then how is it that all those happy people beat it for so long?  Is it that the gluten does break down while mixing but they don’t notice it because things are moving in the mixer but strangely the gluten comes back together after prolonged mixing?  The yeast not raising the dough is kind of telling isn’t it?

Or, if not the above, then what? 

Some people have stretched and folded several times but I am not getting there.  The dough seems to disintegrate right at the beginning. 

I want to almost buy a mixer to do this kind of dough.  God, I am restraining myself not to do that.  I want to be able to do this by hand producing the same bread at the end.  It has got to be possible.  No?    

Can anyone help me with what I am doing wrong and what I should try? Any insight from fellow, but, experienced bread bakers will be so appreciated.

 Meanwhile I am still working on it to test the variables.  And I will post what happens. Maybe I will just go ahead and bake whatever happens and see.

Many thanks for taking the time to read this long post!

K.

I've been making bread and selling it to friends and family for a while now, building up my menu to include nine different breads.  Recently I promoted a cranberry walnut brioche braid which turned out to be by far the most popular, selling very well.  I hadn't expected it to be so popular, which makes me wonder what other type of bread might be a best seller. 

I'd like to hear from my baking colleagues what bread they think I should add to my menu.  What do you find is your most requested bread for family events?  What is your favorite to eat?  i've found that my favorites (ciabatta and sourdough) don't sell nearly as well as the sweeter breads. 

Also, I'm opening a contest on my blog for a new bread nomination and the winner gets a free loaf of bread from the menu shipped to their home.  The link is below and feel free to enter.  Thanks and let's hear those nominations!

-PeterPiper

http://psoutowood.vox.com/library/post/bread-contest.html

Hi folks -

Well, I just failed at my first attempt to make bread.  I tried making french bread using Carol Field's cookbook "The Italian Baker" and never made it past the biga.  I was unable to get my dough to rise and I don't know why since I followed the instructions.  Can anyone suggest what I may have done wrong?  Could my room temperature have been too low?  (It's about 70 degrees.)  It was supposed to rise within 1.5 - 2 hours.  I even used the author's tip to help speed up the rise by heating up my electric oven at a low setting for 3 minutes, and then turning it off before putting the dough in.  After several minutes, nothing seemed to happen.   Should I have left it in longer?

Any help provided will be greatly appreciated as I am determined to make my own bread!

Thank you!

P.S. I accidently posted this question on the blog, so if you see it there please ignore it.

In my zeal to become an accomplished baker (hopefully of good sourdough bread) I brought home half a dozen books from the library that got me started.  My first decent sourdough (utilizing some of Maggie Glezer's methods) was Susan's Simple Sourdough http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/13771/simple-sourdough-909#comment-87254  and the last book I waded through (because it had the least to do with sourdough) was Charles Van Over's The Best Bread Ever which details his scientific method of mixing bread dough in the food processor.  Well I have to tell you I have become a convert!  I'll still keep working to master sourdough baking of various breads, but I don't have to look any further to find a baguette that's any better than the ones I made on my very first and second attempts.  The first was the best I'd made...until I baked the second baguette from the same batch of dough after retarding overnight.  The second also benefitted from the use of an oven thermometer and the knowledge that my oven temp was about 50 degrees cooler than I thought it was after steaming, and compensating by keeping it higher throughout the entire bake.  Here are a couple pictures:

Here's a look at the crumb:

My wife and I agree this is the best bread I've ever made.  The taste and texture is wonderful.  I'm very pleased.

Chris

Still referring to the recipe from "Artisan Breads Everyday". After last night's over-proofing hocky bucks, I immediately mixed up another batch of dough (1/3 of the recipe), baked up 9 rolls (2oz each as the book suggests) tonight, they come out much better:

The topping is "dutch crunch" thanks to Nathan's help here: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/14406/dutch-crunchtiger-bread-question . I applied the topping 15 minutes into proofing, and got the right size of cracks for me

Also left two without topping, but scored one instead, just to see how it will come out, as a test to oven spring:

Great flavor since I used wild rice and organic dried onion (incredibly fragrant), tight crumb but that's not unexpected for this dough. Soft chewy crumb.

BUT, here's the thing: tonight, I only proofed the rolls for 35 minutes! Rather than the 90 to 120 minutes indicated in the recipe. I proofed for 70 minutes last night and it was way too long. Tonight, at 35 minutes, when I poke the dough, it comes back only partially. Judging from the scored the roll, it was not under-proofed either. That's a huge difference IMO, is it really just because the rolls are much smaller than tin loaves, and come to room temperature faster? I love the taste, but next time, I will cut the yeast WAY down, or maybe even use a totally different process, just keeping the flavor combo. For those of you who made the dough into freestanding or tin loaves, what's the crumb like? Holy and open? Or tight like mine? I keep thinking the crumb can be improved with a different process, right now it's sort of in between - not open and chewy enough, yet not soft and spongy like a dinner roll or sandwich loaf.

I just finished a recipe of PR's Wild rice and Onion bread. I didn't get the same rise that Floyd did but it was reasonably well inflated. After it cooled for a while, I cut a piece and enjoyed the aroma of this delicious savory bread. Then I bit into a piece of rice that had been on the surface and dried out. I thought I had broken a tooth.

If any of you bake this bread, I suggest you pick out any grains of rice that end up on the outside during the bake. They are hard little pieces of shrapnel that could damage our teeth.

Eric

I've been using organic freshly-ground whole wheat for a while, and recently switched to KA 100%WW.  What a difference!  The KA is ground superfine so the flour is tan, while the freshly-ground is more white with brown specks.  I switched again to Stone-Buhr and that's also white with brown specks.  Has anyone found that the KA is less liekly to cut gluten strands because it doesn't have bigger (and sharper) pieces of bran in it?  Both types have made good bread, though the coarse-milled seems to not have as strong a structure and web.

-Peter

http://psoutowood.vox.com

Hi:  I am fairly new here.  I love baking bread. Actually I love baking anything!!!  I have tried many sunflower seed bread recipes, none of which I like.  Does anyone have a good recipe for sunflower seed bread?

I appreciate any recipes to try.

Thanks

Lucy