Here is a link to an interesting article I found on the web.  This baker uses whole grains, sourdough, and sells his product at the local farmers market and by subscription.  I haven't tried his bread but I will at the next opportunity.  Prairie19

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/11/magazine/11food-t.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

My latest bake........and no, I don't usually bake 24/7...it's just that I had the time and the urge the last few days to bake a slew of breads.. and decided that now, was as good of a time as any, to start a blog, since I would have a smattering of photos to post...Also Mondays tend to be my big bake day for the week..but enough excuses for all the bread:)...I took the advice to bake a bit longer on this one....glad i did.....yum!

add about 25g semolina and 40 grams soaked 7 grain cereal to this one. Remainder of flour was Wheat Montana Natural White Hi-Protein

and here's the crumb shot:

Any helpful questions or comments are appreciated!

 P.S. Yes....this was another big reason why i felt like holing up and baking bread today....can you believe the sight that met our eyes as we peeked out the windows of our cozy lil house this morning? Behold the weather on Oct. 12 ...if you live in N. Wisconsin!!!

I posted this under Eric's SIMPLE SOURDOUGH CHALLANGE and here in my blog.

Two tries

Ok, here's what I did. Yesterday I made a loaf and baked it the same day. Today I baked a loaf I had mixed yesterday. I'm happy with both but want some improvement and I want to try some things a little differently.

Yesterday I used my starter that was made with AP flour. I consider my starter firm but it's not kneadable. I started at 7am, followed directions using the high gluten flour but 1/4 cup of oatmeal instead of the whole wheat. I wanted to see if I could make a loaf the same day with no refridgeration. I did the S & F's as instructed. It's cold in the kitchen, the dough was taking forever to rise so I moved it to a warmer spot on the oven. I finally baked it at 5:30pm. I was very surprised to see blisters on the crust because I thought that only came with time in the fridge. (Was my kitchen that cold??) Anyway, the crust was both crisp and chewy. Crisp on the outside with a chewy underside. The crumb was very open with nice shiny air holes and chewy. Holes are almost too big, I think. Taste was excellent fresh and this morning made very good toast with butter dripping on my front. I'm happy with the rise but I want the nice round boule with high shoulders. Try again.

The important things for me are:

Use high gluten flour if you like chewy

I did the S & F's in the bowl. Let the dough rise to double, turned it out on a lightly floured board and GENTLY did a S & F, pulling the dough out and folding it over itself, preshaped GENTLY, let rest, shaped GENTLY and it only took an hour to rise enough to bake.

I baked it under cover (in my hot le creuset) as written. Lately I've been turning the oven down from the 450ºF to 400ºF but not this time and I think it helped make the shiny holes and the crisp top crust.

SECOND LOAF

Yesterday when I mixed the first loaf I refreshed my starter with high gluten flour and it was ready for me to mix this second loaf at 4pm. I followed the recipe and was ready to put in fridge at 9pm last night. This morning at 7am I took it out. It was well risen so I turned the oven on at 7 and baked at 8am. I was trying for a nice round boule but used an oblong basket with linen that I folded up around the dough hoping to keep it round. Instead I ended up with a square loaf! The blistered crust is nice, the taste is great with a tiny bit of sour. Very chewy and if you don't like chewy I'd try using regular AP flour.

Getting the dough from my basket to the le cresuet and trying to slash was not easy so next time I'm going to turn the dough unto a cookie sheet and use the stainless steel cover. I know it will bake the same as the le creuset because I've done it before. The slashing was impossible once the dough was in the HOT pot so I just used scissors to cut some kind of pattern that didn't come out very pretty. Next time I'm going to do like hans and just turn the dough upside down and let the bread do its own thing.

Thanks Susan for all your hints and patience. Do you think your very firm starter makes a difference in the outcome? How do you get your dough to the baking surface from your colander? How do you get your boule to pop up so nice and round??

weavershouse

Ok, I’m a newbie here, so a little back ground is in order. I’ve tried to get a sourdough starter going three or four times in the past. With less then good results, I used dehydrated starters and they appeared to be going good but when I tried to make bread things fell apart. Ok that’s in the past and truly I couldn’t tell you what steps I took back then. 

So I’m trying again, I started last friday using the flour (whole wheat organic) and pineapple juice method to start my own starter. On day five nothing had been happening so instead of dumping all but 1/4 cup of the starter I just added another 1/4 of water and flour thinking it might help to keep all the yeast I might have already captured. It seems to have worked because the next morning it had really started to bubble and grew at least an inch or two (I marked the level on the out side of the jar). So that morning I dumped all but 1/4 cup of starter and added flour and water again, good results, no foam on top, but lots of bubbles and film on the inside, looks like maybe it rose and fell some. 

The smell is good, no off smell, no accumulation of hooch, but the foam on top I’ve read about is missing, will that foam appear over night then be gone before I check it in the morning? What is the next step, does it sound like my starter is active or should I keep feeding it every day for a little longer before I try making bread. I noticed the bubbles are coming on faster now, this morning, the seventh day, it started bubbling within a couple hours of feeding, and rose a 1/2 inch in the same time frame. 

Greetings,

Long-time lurker, first-time poster. Although I haven't been active on the Fresh Loaf, I have spent a lot of time reading, learning from and enjoying the content posted by fellow bread enthusiasts. Now, I hope to become a more active member of this site, hence this blog entry which serves as a brief introduction of myself as well as some pictures of one of my recent bakes.

I've been baking on a regular basis for about three years now. I enjoy baking all sorts of bread, though I have to say I'm a sourdough junkie at heart. Originally from Cleveland, Ohio, I've been living in Madrid, Spain for the past ten years.

The following photos are of a recent bake of the sourdough seed bread found in Hamelman's Bread (p. 176). This is a lovely bread and I find myself baking it time and time again.

Lastly, I'd like to thank all members of the Fresh Loaf for their time and dedication. Your knowledge and help have made me a better baker.

Nathan

Hamelman's Sourdough Seed Bread

Hamelman's Sourdough Seed Bread - Crumb

I recently made Hamelman's Vermont sourdough, and especially liked the flavor layer contributed by the ten-percent whole rye flour. However, my favorite bread in this genre remains Dan DiMuzio's Pain au levain formula. I think the stiff levain and the ten-percent whole wheat flour create a more complex flavor profile. So I took what I like from both, and baked a couple of loaves yesterday.

The formula:

480g ripe starter (67% Hydration)

Final dough weight: 1700g

Hydration: 67%

KA Bread Flour: 90% (we like a chewy crumb and crust)

Hodgson Mill Whole Rye Flour 10%

H2O: 67%

Salt: 2%

I ripened the starter, using my usual 3-build method, over the 24 hours before making the dough: 4 minutes, speed 1; 30 minute autolyse; added salt; 3 minutes speed 2 (Kitchenaid stand mixer)

Bulk proof: 2 hours and 15 minutes with S&F at 45 and 90 minutes.

Pre-shaped two boules, 750g and 925g--I have two different size brotforms--rested 15 minutes, final shaped.

Final proof: large boule, 1 hour 45 minutes, small boule 2 hours 15 minutes--I baked them serially; I need a bigger baking stone:-(

Initial temperatute. 500°F; 10 minutes with steam, lowered temperature at 5 minutes to 450*F; at 10 minutes vented oven, baked 18 minutes and 15 minutes more respectively.

I also used dmsynder's before and after steaming procedure see Sourdough bread: Good results with a new tweak of my steaming method

The results: We like it! The difference between this and a pain au levain true to DiMuzio's formula is subtle, a slightly more accented note from the rye flour than whole wheat flour, and the stiffer levain lends its more complex flavor profile.

and the crumb...

David G

Sunday again, at my house this time. And once again I need a pan loaf for sandwiches! I started flipping through Bread Baker's Apprentice looking for my next target. The Multigrain Bread Extraordinaire caught my eyes, without so much as a picture! People who know me probably wouldn't be surprised by this, because as much as I love various artisan breads, whole wheat or multigrain anything will make me sit up and take notice. And no, I don't eat cardboard in my spare time.

The first step was to figure out what grains I was going to use in the bread. The recipe called for 3tbsp of either corn meal, amaranth, millet, or quinoa; 3tbsp of either rolled oats or wheat, triticale or buckwheat flakes; and 2tbsp of wheat bran. I decided to go with 2tbsp amaranth, 1tbsp millet, 2tbsp rolled oats, 1tbsp buckwheat cereal (not as small as flakes, but who's counting?), the 2tbsp of wheat bran, and 1tbsp of flax meal.

I'd also decided to deviate a bit from the recipe and make it sourdough. I already had my starter out to refresh (Friday night), and I had some leftover that I wouldn't be able to use for anything else, so why not right? I used the starter to make a small stiff levain (which I meant to build Saturday, and forgot). I wasn't particularly following a recipe for that part, so I wrote down the amount of flour and water I used so I could account for it in the recipe for the loaf.

I gathered together the rest of the ingredients:

And not shown here: honey, cooked brown rice, and water. They went in after the levain descended on the milk.

Mixing time! The dough was much gummier and stickier than I was expecting. I think a lot of that gummy/stickyness came from the starches in the soaker. As I emptied the grains into the dough I noticed the somewhat stringy goop of starch conglomeration on the bottom of the container.

After a bit more mixing, adding a little bit of flour, doing some stretches and folds, the dough finally reached a point where I could actually handle it. It still was quite sticky and gummy though, definitely unlike other doughs I've dealt with so far.

As I mentioned, I forgot to do a build of the stiff levain I made for this loaf. So it took a very long time to rise, in fact, at one point I wasn't even sure it was going to rise. What made it especially hard is that my sourdough starter really doesn't do most of the rising until the oven. So, I gave the dough plenty of time and a few more folds, it had finally grown some and didn't spring back on a poke test, so I shaped it into a loaf and plopped it into a pan.

In the loaf pan it didn't take quite as long for the second rise, but it was getting late and I really needed to get to bed, so that was all the rising it was going to do!

Into the oven it went, it did get a nice little bit of oven spring (but not as much as I was hoping for, and nowhere near as little as I was dreading). I think next time I'll make it with regular yeast, or make sure I remember to have a build of levain before I start the loaf! It smelled really wonderful when it was baking, in fact it smelled amazing when it was rising too! Never had a loaf that smells that good during bulk ferment and proofing. It was a great combination of yeasty, sour, sweet, and grassy/grainy. I assume the aroma must have come from all the grains in the loaf, but I don't really know for sure. This is definitely one bread I want to make again, and soon! I'll probably experiment with switching it over to whole wheat too, if that turns out well I think I may have found my dream sandwich bread...

Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge

YeastSpotting

Usually when I get it in my head to cobble together a formula based on two or three things I've seen mentioned on this forum, two more in my head, and a bit of whimsy, the results are not pretty.  Especially when it comes to baguettes.  The last two or three times I've tried to make baguettes, they've come out flat, with closed crumb and, with the sourdough versions, crust that provides a thorough jaw workout.

But not this time, oh no!  This time I tasted victory.  Victory, and some very yummy bread.

Here's what I was trying for:

• 100% Sourdough baguettes
• All white flour
• Two preferments (saw this mentioned a couple places and it sounded good).
• Roughly 65% final hydration (also based on some other posts at thefreshloaf)

To this I arbitrarily decided that 50% flour weight would be prefermented, of which about half and half from a 50% hydration pate fermente and a 100% hydration wet starter.  Because, y'know, why not?  I decided on 700g total flour and worked out the math to get:

• 340g wet starter (170g flour, 170g water)
• 273g pate (180g flour, 90g water, 3g salt)
• 350g final flour
• 200g final water

Got to set up a bakers math calculator for myself.  Anyway, the formula ended up being thus:

Liquid Levain

• 32g active starter (I'd converted part of my firm starter to 100% hydration the day before, but I doubt it matters much)
• 150g Stone-Buhr bread flour
• 150g water, room temperature

Sourdough Pate Fermente

• 45g active starter (50% firm starter, in this case)
• 150g Stone-buhr bread flour
• 75g water 
• 3g salt

Mixed starters at about 9:30pm the day before baking and let them sit overnight.  My firm starter had been in the fridge since that morning, so I used warm water for the pate. Began the next stage at 7:30 the next morning.

Final Dough

• 350g Stone-buhr bread flour
• 200g water, room temperature 
• 11g salt
• Liquid Levain (all)
• Sourdough Pate (all)

Mixed Flour, water, and liquid levain until a shaggy mess, then covered and left to autolyze for 45 minutes.  Held off on adding the pate partly because it seemed like The Proper Thing To Do(TM), leaving out the salt and all that...but mostly because the pate looked pretty sluggish and needed at least another 45 minutes to ripen.

Added pate and salt and kneeded for a couple minutes.  The stiff pate really didn't want to incorporate, so I gave it a 5 minute rest then kneaded a little more until the lumps were more or less dispersed.  Then it was into a bowl to rise.

I gave the dough 30 folds in the bowl with a rubber spatula after 30 minutes of fermentation, then again after 2 hours.  Total time for the first rise was 5 hours (I meant for it to be 4, but got confused, and anyway it wasn't rising hugely).

Preshaped the dough into 4 ~10oz pieces (yeah, yeah, switched measuring systems midway), and let rest for 10 minutes.  Then final shaping, and rising on my well-floured couche-tablecloth for 2 hours.

Baked at about 475 (my oven's temperature sensor is wacky) with steam for 22 minutes, opening the oven a crack after 10.  Then left the oven cracked and turned off for another 5 minutes before removing the baguettes from the oven.

The results:

Sourdough Baguettes, Exterior:

Another Angle

Crumb Shot

 I was incredibly pleased with the results here.  The scoring is easily the best I've ever done, though there's clearly room for improvement.  The mere fact that the things didn't turn out flat was a huge improvement of my last attempt at a sourdough baguette.  The crumb turned out well.  The flavor was wonderfully complex, moderately sour, with a thin, crisp crust that was just slightly chewy (hey it's sourdough, after all).

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!

Last week I baked one of my favorite recipes, Hamelman's Whole Wheat Levain from Bread. The bake turned out successful I would say, especially since I finally was able to use my two week old liquid levain starter and achieve a delightful tang when the bread was sliced and eaten. One thing though is my batard (and boule) seemed to explode in the oven! Was this because of an unsuccessful scoring? Or did I let it rise to long? Any help would be appreciated in this manner, though I do kind of like the looks of it.

And then the crumb...

And finally the boule, sorry no crumb shot, though I will say it turned out a bit tighter then I would have liked.

So what might I have done wrong in this bake? Any help would be appreciated since I am always open to advice and will always be baking weekly hoping to only improve my methods and results!

My next bake is going to be Hamelman's Vermont Sourdough with increased Whole Wheat. I will be attempting this tomorrow (hopefully) and pictures will follow soon!