I have had numerous requests for my Sourdough Cinnamon Swirl Bread recipe. Here it is, but it is in volume measurements. If someone wants to convert it to grams, be my guest. I'm not good at conversions and this is an old recipe, before everyone was interested in using weights.

Sourdough Cinnamon Swirl Bread

2 cups active, bubbly starter

1/2 cup milk

1 tsp. vanilla (optional)

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup butter, softened

1 1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 cup instant mashed potato flakes

3 1/2 cups flour (half AP, half bread flour)

Mix and knead the dough. Place in an oiled bowl and cover with plastic. Bulk ferment until about 1 1/2 times the original size. This makes a very soft dough. Roll out dough on floured or Pam sprayed surface into a rectangle about 9 x 18 inches. Spread with soft butter, sprinkle with sugar, and very generously with cinnamon, leaving 1/2" on one of the 9" ends clean for sealing. Roll up as for cinnamon rolls. Try to keep the roll snug as you roll. Place in greased loaf pan. Spray oil top of loaf and cover with plastic. Proof until almost double in size. Bake at 350°F for 30 to 40 minutes, or until done.

I don't frost my loaf because I like to toast my bread and it just melts in the toaster. As an alternative to frosting, I have brushed on an egg white wash and then sprinkled with coarse raw sugar just before baking.

Hello, everybody!

So, here in Hungary, it seems like everybody's got a farm, and coextensively a vineyard.  My husband David and I don't, but we do have an incredibly kind old neighbor who's teaching us to make our own red wine. It's so much fun - picking our own grapes, grinding them, removing stems...  Like so:

Naturally, in gratitude I've baked him lots of bread.  We're not quite done, but in approximately two weeks we will have (for $50) 150 litres of red wine!  Which leads me to my question:

I've seen and read a number of beer bread recipes.  But obviously, we've got plentiful wine...  Are there any breads which call for a splash of wine in the dough?  It seems like it would be possible, but I've never seen any; I'm still a student baker, so I don't know if there are any chemical or taste-related reason for this.  Does anybody know, and if wine bread exists, any ideas?  

Thanks!  

Erzsebet

Also, if anybody is interested in other pictures and a diary of our winemaking process, it's on my blog - http://erzsebetgilbert.blogspot.com

I've been trying and trying to get my sourdough bread up but have had little success.  The 1-2-3 recipe worked out ok except it was always too gloppy to make anything but ciabatta.  So I started experimenting with different forumlas, twice a day for two weeks. I think I've hit on something and I'd like some of you guys to maybe try it out and see if it works as well for someon else as it does for me.

I maintain two starters...a 100% hydration white and 100% hydration whole wheat.  I used Gold Medal AP Flour for everything, both refreshing the starter and making the dough.  If I want a wheat bread I use the wheat starter in the recipe, the same a white bread.  All ingredients are measured in grams for simplicity's sake.  So here's the formula:

1. part ripe starter

1. part water

2. parts flour

2% salt

Here's my technique.  I take a nice ripe starter and measure out the first part.  Normally I use 150g as a base.  Then I stir in 1 part water (150g) to make a slurry.  To this I add the 2 parts flour (300g) and mix in to incorporate.  I use a fork and my fingers to get everything mixed completely.  After everything is mixed I let it sit for about 20 minutes to autolyse.

After the autolyse I sprinkle in the 2% salt (12g) and give the dough a quick 5 minute knead in the bowl.  Part of this experiment was to cut down on the amount of crap I had to wash and clean up.  After the knead I let rise until doubled.  This could take anywhere from 1-3 hours.

After the dough has doubled, I flour a work surface and scrape out the dough.  It's should be a little on the sticky side but easily workable on the bench.  I've only made batards and baguettes so far, but the dough could probably hold other shapes.  I shape it into a rough oblong, give it a flatten, then do a quick letter fold and let it rest about 10 minutes.  Now a stretch, flatten and make either the baguette or batard.  I have a makeshift couche (read: old napkin) that sometimes doesn't work so well, so I tend to place the formed loaf right onto parchment with a little cornmeal on it.

After the loaf is formed you can do two things,  cover it and let it rise to about doubled.  I use spray oil to lubricate a piece of saran wrap so it won't stick to the loaf.  Again, this takes about 1-3 hours for me, your mileage may vary.  About halfway through the second rise preheat oven to 450.  Steam the oven, slash the loaf and put bread on a stone or cookie sheet.  After five minutes I give the oven another spray for more steam.  After another five minutes I give the bread a turn for even browning and reduce heat to 425 for another 15 minutes or so.  Here's how the white bread turns out...

and here's the wheat...

I've also formed the loaves and retarded overnight in the fridge.  This really brings out the sourdough twang.  I'm also experiemting with the salt percentage, 2% feels too high in some loaves. 

I would appreciate it if someone else could validate this recipe and let me know if it worked out as well for them.  Thanks!

These are inspired by the "Chocolate Things" at the Cheesboard Bakery in Berkeley. However, since I've become somewhat obsessed with my sourdough starter (Sebastian) since growing it (him?) a month or so ago, I of course, decided to modify the recipe to use up some of my discards.

Recipe (all measurements are in volumes, and are also approximate--I am chronically incapable of sticking with any precision to any recipe whatsoever. I know it would probably help my baking if I did, but going by dough-poking feel is more fun.)

Combine in a bowl: 3/4 cup sourdough starter discards (straight from fridge, they'd been accumulating for about a week), 3/4 c water, 1 c flour. Let sit for 2 (or more) hours. Mine bubbled, but didn't rise very much.

Add in 3/4c water mixed with about 1/4 tsp. dry yeast (I was worried that my discard starter needed a bit of help, but you could probably skip this), 1 egg, 2 Tbsp sugar, 2 Tbsp very soft butter, and about 3-4 c flour until a soft, fairly moist dough forms. Knead for a few minutes, then cover and let rise for about 3 hours. My dough almost tripled in this time.

Fold/knead into the dough about 1cup coarsely chopped chocolate chips. Shape into balls (or a loaf) and let proof on a baking sheet for about 45 minutes while the oven preheats to 400. Bake for about 20 minutes. I sprayed the oven for steam right as I put them in.

The sourdough taste is less pronounced than I'd like, but they are great for a breakfast or snack treat. As the dough isn't too sweet, the chocolate doesn't seem too overly decadent. (Which of course is my justification for eating them right out of the oven.)

I made these last night.

Here's my blog post, plus the recipe.

In all honesty, the entire brownie baking night came about because I was bored and wanted something chocolate. The ranting about grocery store brownies was actually me being pissed at myself because I broke down and, instead of baking my much better tasting ones, bought some frosted ones at the store a few nights ago in a pregnancy-craving-induced spending spree.

Hi all,

I'm really keen on knowing which ingredient is responsible for the very dark almost black color of some breads. When I make bread, regardless of the recipe at most it's grey. Sometimes a little darker, but never deeply brown/black.

I read that dark sugar might be used or roasted malt. Yet, I can't exactly pinpoint the cause of the deep dark color. So anyone any ideas on which ingredients might darken the bread?

Cheers

I'm pretty new to both sourdough baking and TFL, but I was asked for my recipe, so here we go...

This is actually a variation of the Times No-Knead, which I got from Eric at Breadtopia.  However, and here's the "Devil's in the Details" moment, I didn't have what I would call success with that recipe.  So, I knocked the water from 12 to 11 ounces, and changed the way I'm handling the dough and baking, and Voila', good bread!

Glass-Weaver Sourdough

80 grams ripe 100% starter

11 ounces iced water

5 ounces whole wheat bread flour (I'm using Trader Joe's White Whole Wheat)

11 ounces bread flour (I'm using Power Flour by Pendleton Mills -- highly recommended)

1 1/2 tsp. plain salt

Mix until moistened, then knead about 30 strokes by hand in the bowl, spray-oil container, put dough in container, spray-oil top, cover, leave at cool room temp overnight.  In the morning, or perhaps closer to noon, when dough has doubled pat out on a wet cutting board, deflating large bubbles only, and stretch-n-fold, put back in container until doubled again, repeat deflating/stretch-n-fold two more time, for a total of three sets.  Then pat dough out on wet cutting board, stretch-n-fold, ending with the dough in a ball.  Allow to rest a couple minutes while preparing a sheet of parchment with a sprinkling of semolina.  Form the loaf by holding in both hands and tucking the skin under until the top is taut, paying attention to kind of "sealing" the gathering point at the bottom.  Then flip the ball over into the left palm and pull the gathering point up into a kind of "stem" about 2" high.  Give the stem a quarter-turn and then flip the dough ball back to right-side-up and sit it down on the parchment, trying to keep the "stem" in the center-bottom.  This helps the loaf climb higher and spread less.  Put an inverted mixing bowl over the loaf to keep it moist and allow to rise until it springs back slowly from a poke with a wet finger.

In the mean time, when it's about half an hour until baking time, preheat oven to 500 degrees and put water in the steamer.  Yeah, steamer, but more about that later.  When the oven is up to temp, slash loaf, use a peel to put the loaf, parchment and all, onto Fibrament baking stone, cover with terracotta pot and inject 5 seconds of steam, cover hole in pot.  Reduce temperature to 450 degrees, bake 15 minutes, remove pot, bake 15 more minutes.  Pull out with peel, invert loaf into pot-holder-protected palm and pull parchment off bottom, cool on rack.

I got the idea for using the steamer and pot from several different threads here on TFL, and put together my own version.  It so happened I already have a steamer, intended for either steam-cleaning or for pressing clothes ($129 from Costco, a whole bucket of attachments, used it twice, grrr.)  As you can imagine I was thrilled to have a use for the steamer, so I worked hard at making a home-made "cloche".  The pot was easy, but I wanted a way to handle it without getting burned, and I wanted to be able to inject steam, trap the steam and divert the steam off the raw dough.  The handle I came up with is made from 1/16" TIG welding rod (which is stainless steel) and two food can tops removed with a side-cutting can opener, and some nuts and bolts.  Hopefully you can see from the photos how I did it.  Oh, the most expensive part of the project was buying a drill bit for tile (about $9.00).  The cover for the hole just sits loose on top and is shifted to open and closed positions with a potholder.  Seems to work fine.

I know some people are nervous about using pots that aren't intended for food, but the pot never touches the bread, and lead, which is what I think people are worried about, is used in glazes, not the clay itself, as far as I know.

The handle was made by wrapping the piece of welding rod around a 1/4" steel tube (I needed help for this, hard to hold onto), a loop was formed in each end to go around the bolt.  Then, a curved piece of rod was passed through the spiral and cut off, more loops in the ends were formed (crudely, with pliers.)  It was a struggle to get everything lined up between the washers and get the bolts tightened down, but I did it myself.

The "diverter", which is a can top, is about 3/4" below the hole in the pot.  This allows the steam to enter, but not hit the dough directly.  The space between the pot and the diverter is maintained with nuts and lock washers on the long bolts.

The steam makes a lovely shining crust, chewy and crisp.  I knocked down the water to 11 ounces because I wanted smaller holes in the crumb.  (I know, that's not what lots of people here are after, but I like the sandwich fillings to stay in the middle!) 

You'll notice that everything I've mentioned was learned and gathered from posts here on TFL.  Thanks to all the great bakers who are so happy to teach and share.  So far, this bread is my one-note tune, but I hope to be expanding my repertoire soon.

Terri (Glass-Weaver)

Hello,

Having had a very successful experience with boiled pretzels, I was convinced bagels were a walk in the park.  The recipe in BBA seemed approachable enough -- doesn't take too long, doesn't require lye (I know...point of contention) and is ready to bake for breakfast.  I had a mediocre experience, however, and am looking for pointers from those of you who have had great success making "true" bagels.

The good part:    The dough was easy to mix up, the shaping instructions using classic wrap method were a piece of cake and everything looked just right.  I even found malt syrup in my local Whole Foods.  My only difficulty was the baking time.  In the foreward to the recipe, Reinhardt says total baking time is 15-20 minutes, but in the recipe itself it only describes 5 minutes plus 5 more.  I think this is a typo and the second, cooler baking time should be 15 minutes.

BUT...the real reason I am writing is to ask about the crumb and general texture/mouth feel.   I found the outside to be pleasantly and acceptably chewy, but the inside was a bit to "bread-like" for me.  The bagels were almost fluffy with a fair number of air holes inside.  I am used to a denser, chewier crumb and a bit more flavor.

Is success with the chewy crumb better achieved using a starter instead of yeast?  I suspect this would go a long way toward generating the right crumb.  Is there anything else that I'm missing?

All pointers are appreciated and I'm looking forward to Bagels:  Round 2

Thanks!

MommaT

Have you ever developed an original recipe? Most people think it is some long drawn out process, but remember you are not Pillsbury test kitchen with thousands of dollars and test kitchen cooks to address ever question or issue.

When you find a recipe that is good, reliable and consistent...that's a keeper. If it is not, you have a couple of choices. Rework the recipe, refine it so it works, put it in the "to-do" pile for a later date or toss it. What you do depends on how much time you want to devote to recipe and only you can answer that question.

As you test, and retest, you will find a pattern to the process and it will fall into an everyday groove. I would suggest that you schedule time each month to test or at least review the recipes you are working on. Remember it's not just about recipes, this is a listing of products you can enter into contest, feature in a magazine or newspaper, include in a future cookbook or sell in your home-based bakery. When your bakery is up and running and a local journalist ask...may we have a recipe to attach to your story? What will you say, no they are all secret...

Always have a dozen or so recipes that are uniquely yours that you don't mind sharing...just in case.

You may also want to place a recipe in your marketing materials...not that people will prepare them necessarily, but to show you are open to sharing your knowledge and skill. You are a great baker and this is not the time to be shy!

Now with that said, you don't have to give out your best recipes, just things you don't mind sharing. Give it some thought.

There is an old saying, there is nothing new under the sun, and it is so true. It is easy to add a new twist to something, but food companies spend millions to create new products, it's a real challenge; but every once and a while an independent culinary innovator comes up with a unique and inspiring food, spice or taste. Take a look at what is missing out there on the grocery shelves... get creative. I would love to see an alternative to buttercream frosting, but I have not yet figured out what it should be, something sweet, creamy and not made with all that fat.

I was inspired by David (dmsnyder) and his 5 hour baguettes. I needed a sandwich bread that was as lean as I could get it but was still very much soft crusted and soft of crumb. I've found it, I think, by slightly modifying the 5 hour baguette idea and adding one enrichment: olive oil.

Stephanie’s Simple Bread
Makes 1 small loaf

225g AP or bread flour
10g rye flour
15g white whole wheat flour
3/4 teaspoon instant yeast
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
170g water

Mix ingredients in the bowl for your stand mixer until you form a shaggy mass. Mix, on low, for 5 minutes, then increase speed to medium for 3 or 4 more. I left this in a clean bowl for 75 minutes for a first rise, folding at 25 and 50 minutes, and 60 minutes for a second rise. Shaped carefully and proofed for 40 minutes, scored, and spritzed with water. Baked for 30 minutes at 425 degrees.

I posted the recipe on my blog, too.

So thank you David. Thanks also have to go out to Susan of Wild Yeast for inspiration due to the fact that I was browsing the Wild Yeast Blog when I thought about how good a simple bread would be with the locally homemade ham salad I bought today.