I saw a post here on The Fresh Loaf  by someone looking for a formula for a Lemon Rosemary bread.  This combination sounded really good to me so I decided to give it a try.  First I had to decided how much Lemon Zest and Rosemary to put into the bread and I decided to try for about 2% for each of them.  Then I decided that I would use up the last of my bread flour and use some fresh milled whole wheat and rye.  I figured on a hydration of 70% and that the percentage of the sourdough preferment would be 20%.  It is summer time here and the temperatures have been hot so I figured less preferment would slow things down a little bit.  I now had a plan on how I was going to make this bread now I'll tell you how it went.

 The first night I made my first build of the preferment.

 The next morning I add more flour and water to the preferment for the 2nd build.

When I got home from work the afternoon I mixed the dough up as follows.
 

 
First I dissolved the preferment into the water and then  mixed in the bread flour.  I let this sit while I went and milled my wheat and rye flours.  Next the wheat and rye flours were mixed in and the dough was let sit for 30 minutes.  We have Rosemary growing in the yard so I went and picked enough for 11 grams and then chopped it up into small bits.  I used a small grater to make Lemon Zest from one lemon and ended up with 12 grams.  I added the Lemon Zest, Rosemary, Salt and the Lemon Pepper infused Olive Oil all at the same time.  The rosemary went in first and my first reaction was it was going to just over power the bread.  The Lemon Zest went in last and after that all I could smell was lemon.  This seemed like it was going to be one powerful bread.  I mixed the dough until the gluten developed.  Then the dough was turned out into an oiled bowl and placed in the wine cellar for a cool ferment.  Four hours later I placed the bowl in the refrigerator so I could cook it when I got home from work the next day.  I checked the dough in the morning before I went to work and it had raised up to touch the plate that I place on top of the bowl.  When I got home that day the dough was lifting the plate off of the bowl.  I set the bowl out and let the dough warm up for two hours.  Then I turned out the dough on to a floured work surface and folded the dough over on itself to get some flour on all the surfaces of the dough.  When I looked at the dough after I did this the dough looked so nice I just want to bake it like that without shaping it any more.  I figured that if I rolled it over onto some parchment paper that it just might work.  Then I put the dough into a counche and turned the oven on to 460°F to preheat it.  I used a cast iron roasting pan to bake this bread in so it is oiled and preheated in the oven too.  When the oven gets up to temperature I place the dough in the pan and cook it with the lid on for 25 minutes and then the last 15 minutes without the lid.  The bread had great oven spring and just looked wonderful to me when I pulled it out.  The aroma of the bread just filled the house but now I had to get some sleep.  Cutting the bread would have to wait for the next day at work were my coworkers are my bread testers.
 
My testers really liked the bread.  They were eating great big slabs of the bread all day long.  I told my boss what kind of bread that I had made and she said she didn't like Lemon Rosemary.  Later a coworker tells my boss how great it tastes and talks her into trying a slice of it.  My boss then emails me telling me how great the bread is.  There were many great compliments on this bread, it was just incredible.

Daniel T. Dimuzio's new book Bread Baking: An Artisan's Perspective is a textbook on the craft of artisan bread baking.  As such, there is more emphasis on understanding your ingredients and technique rather than on recipes.  That said, the book does contain an appendix of reliable formulas, one of which caught my eye this afternoon. 

As can be seen in the photo, some of my techniques, such as my scoring, still leave a lot to be desired, but this bread was quite simple to make, made the house smell great, and tasted delicious.

Rosemary Olive Oil Bread (makes 2 loaves)

Pre-ferment
250g bread or AP flour
170g water
5g salt
2g instant yeast

Final Dough
750g bread or AP flour
510g water
40g extra-virgin olive oil
5g rosemary leaves, chopped
15g salt
5g instant yeast
427g pre-ferment

Combine the ingredients to make the preferment the night before baking.  Leave them out at room temperature for roughly an hour and then refrigerate overnight.

The next day, combine the remaining ingredients with the pre-ferment.  Use your preferred mixing and baking technique, which for me was about 8 minutes of mixing in the standmixer followed by a 3 hour bulk fermentation with two folds.  Shape, score, and bake your loaves as appropriate for the shape you choose, which for me was roughly an hour final rise followed by 20 minutes in my steamed oven at 475.

Bread Baking: An Artisan's Perspective is available from Wiley & Sons.

Read a Q & A with Dan DiMuzio here.

This is from a recipe in Peter Reinhart’s Bread Bakers Apprentice and I didn’t make any changes to the recipe, being the first try at it. 

Well, ok, one or two very minor changes: he asks for fresh rosemary, I only had dried which I soaked for an hour while the dough was warming up. He says to mix in roasted garlic - didn’t have any. I guess next time I’ll have to make that ahead of time along with the extra mash. 

Anyway… here’s the final product, first try (slashed a bit too deep) and the loaves are still cooling so I haven’t cut or tasted yet but boy-oh-boy, does the house ever smell wonnnnnnderful!!

Full post on the blog:
Potato Rosemary Boules

Last night we had some mashed potatoes.  I had just read the BBA pugliese formula recently, and thought that I would make it with some of the leftovers.  Well, as it happens, I found the Potato Rosemary bread on my way to the pugliese, and it also contains mashed potatoes!  Then I saw that the general formula for the biga makes enough for both the pugliese and the potato rosemary breads.  And then I discovered that my leftover potatoes weighed EXACTLY as much as the amounts called for in the two recipes.  A sign from the universe, perhaps?  So I made the biga last night and s

This is Rosemary Olive Oil Sourdough from Nancy Silverton's book. I used the starter that I have been growing since Feb - my first one (not Nancy's formula) and I have to say I am proud of this little starter! Oven spring!