The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

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aimeruni's picture
aimeruni

looking for crunchy cookies! help!

I am looking for recipes for gingersnaps, oatmeal, and chocolate chip cookies that are CRUNCHY (very crunchy throughout the whole cookie, not crunchy and chewy).

 

From what I've read you should use all shortening, not use brown sugar (because brown sugar causes baked goods to become more moist) and that supposedly you should bake at a lower temperature for longer (by 'low' I mean 300 or 325 degrees F)

 

Unfortunately all the cookie recipes I am finding for chocolate chip, peanut butter, and oatmeal cookies (these are three different kinds of cookies, three separate recipes, just clarifying) that say they're crunchy are calling for butter and brown sugar.


I still want to use a little butter, for the taste not the texture.  But  what is the ratio of shortening to butter I should use that will yield a very crunchy cookie?

 

 

not.a.crumb.left's picture
not.a.crumb.left

How does scoring affect crumb

I baked a :

100g Spelt

100g Caputo Durum Rimacinata

300g Stong Canadian White

420g water

72g starter - 80% hydration - from the night before

10g salt

I had a shorter AL this time 2 hours as I wanted to use the stiffer starter from the night before. I found that because I used the spelt and durum that I almost got a windowpane just within that shorter AL time.

Otherwise my usual process of adding leaven, wait 30 min and then add salt and a bit more water.

Slap and fold and then bulk for approx. 6 hours including a lamination and 2 folds.

30 min benchrest and 30 min at room temp in banneton before in wine cooler at 4C. for 15 hours.

I then scored 1 loaf with a simple in the middle cut and the other with a double..

I noticed a slightly lesser rise on the double cut loaf and thought it was amazing to see where the bubbles were trying to escape...I always knew that scoring can affect the crumb and the shape of a loaf and was great to being able to compare...I might try that again..

Kat

Crumb of double score loaf

alfanso's picture
alfanso

Go Big or Go Home?

That's the saying.  But I was already home and wanted to go big anyway.

My wife was off to an early morning flight to Tobago for a Pan-Am Dragon Boating competition.  She asked if I'd bake a WW fig-raisin-pecan levain bread as some boarding gate breakfast for the troops traveling together.  Made two, sliced 'em, and packed them off with some butter and cream cheese.  These are designed to bake dark and craggy, the left with traditional baguette scoring, the right with a criss-cross design.

630g x 2

Getting itchy to bake up something.  This gargantuan specimen is a Rye with Caraway.  Instead of using a Rye Sour I opted for my 125% rye levain.

1000g x 1

 

Rye w/Caraway, 125% hydration rye levain       
alfanso         
     Total Flour    
     Prefermented15.00%   
 Total Dough Weight (g) 1000 Rye15%   
 Total Formula   Liquid Levain  Final Dough 
 Ingredients%Grams %Grams IngredientsGrams
 Total Flour100.00%569.8 100.00%85.5 Final Flour484.3
 AP Flour75.00%427.4 0%0.0 AP Flour427.4
 WW5.00%28.5 0%0.0 WW28.5
 Rye20.00%114.0 100%85.5 Rye28.5
 Water73.50%418.8 125%106.8 Water312.0
 Salt2.00%11.4    Salt11.4
 60% Starter3.00%17.1 20%17.1   
        Levain192.3
 Totals175.50%1000.0 245%209.4  1000.0
 Caraway Seeds2.30%13.1    Caraway Seeds13.1
          
"Autolyse" levain, water & flours, 30 min.  2 stage liquid levain build @125% hydration
Add salt. pinch and fold.   Stage 1    
150 French Folds, 5 min rest, 150 FFs   Rye42.7   
Dough remains sticky untl first Letter Fold  Water53.4   
Bulk for 80 min, 4 LFs at 20,40,60 80 min.  Starter17.1   
Add Caraway Seeds on first LF   Stage 2    
Retard overnight, divide and shape in morning  Rye42.7   
Can roll loaf in wet towel and add more Caraway Seeds to top      
Onto couche, will require very little flour  Water53.4   
Preheat 500dF.   Total209.4   
Bake 470dF, steam for 13 min, rotate and continue baking til done     

A short time ago I decided to Ziggy-up a 5-Grain Levain.

I can't recall, but he's probably about 750g.

 

 

Isand66's picture
Isand66

Whole Wheat Sour Cream Beer Bread

I baked this one several weeks ago but have not had a chance to post.  This is a 70% Whole Wheat bread made with freshly ground whole wheat with no sifting.  I watched a video on how to adjust the stones in my MockMill II and ended up with a super-fine flour, no sifting necessary.  I think for the next bake I will sift courser and still sift once and then re-grind at the fine level.

This one turned out a little denser than I would have liked, but it had a nice tang to it and made great toast.

Here are the Zip files for the above BreadStorm files.

Levain Directions

Mix all the levain ingredients together  for about 1 minute and cover with plastic wrap.  Let it sit at room temperature for around 7-8 hours or until the starter has doubled.  I used my proofer set at 83 degrees and it took about 4 hours.   You can use it immediately in the final dough or let it sit in your refrigerator overnight.

 Main Dough Procedure

Mix the flours  and the beer for about 1 minute.  Let the rough dough sit for about 20 minutes to an hour.  Next add the levain, sour cream, olive oil and salt and mix on low for 4 minutes.  You should end up with a cohesive dough that is slightly tacky but very manageable.  Remove the dough from your bowl and place it in a lightly oiled bowl or work surface and do several stretch and folds.  Let it rest covered for 10-15 minutes and then do another stretch and fold.  Let it rest another 10-15 minutes and do one additional stretch and fold.  After a total of 2 hours place your covered bowl in the refrigerator and let it rest for 12 to 24 hours.  (Since I used my proofer I only let the dough sit out for 1.5 hours before refrigerating).

When you are ready to bake remove the bowl from the refrigerator and let it set out at room temperature still covered for 1.5 to 2 hours.  Remove the dough and shape as desired.

The dough will take 1.5 to 2 hours depending on your room temperature and will only rise about 1/3 it's size at most.  Let the dough dictate when it is read to bake not the clock.

Around 45 minutes before ready to bake, pre-heat your oven to 540 degrees F. and prepare it for steam.  I have a heavy-duty baking pan on the bottom rack of my oven with 1 baking stone on above the pan and one on the top shelf.  I pour 1 cup of boiling water in the pan right after I place the dough in the oven.

Right before you are ready to put the bread in the oven, score as desired and then add 1 cup of boiling water to your steam pan or follow your own steam procedure.

Lower the temperature to 450 degrees.  Bake for 35-50 minutes until the crust is nice and brown and the internal temperature of the bread is 205 degrees.

Take the bread out of the oven when done and let it cool on a bakers rack for at least 2 hours before eating.

 

Delldgm's picture
Delldgm

Grains in Australia - help!!!

hi everyone

windering if anyone can help me out. I’m milling my own wheat flour and everything I read inline talks about hard and soft wheat.  I have managed to source hard wheat berries but can not seem to track down soft wheat berries anywhere.  I really want the soft wheat berries for pastries and pasta making. I’ve tried using the hard wheat and sifting it through a really fine mesh so as to remove the bran ( from what I’ve read the bran is what’s causing the main problems and the high gluten/protein content in the hard flours)

 

can anyone point me in me in the direction of a seller of soft wheat berries or to some good pastrie cookie and pasta recipes for specifically for  hard wheat.

 

thanks in advance 

 

Dell

doughooker's picture
doughooker

Starterless Sour Bread — Completely Revised

My starterless sour bread formula has been completely revised. It now uses a formula developed by the USDA Eastern Regional Research Center in Wyndmoor, PA. It was developed several years after the landmark Kline & Sugihara study at the Western Regional Research Center in California which studied the bacteria found in San Francisco sourdough.

I have baked the new recipe and it turned out significantly more sour than the first formula. If it's sour you want, this recipe is worth a try. It does not use a starter or sourdough culture. All of the ingredients can be found on supermarket shelves — nothing to order from amazon.com.

Send me a private message if you are interested in it.

Sims's picture
Sims

Please help me how can I make these croissants

I saw this picture on Pinterest and I was wondering how I can these type of croissants please if you have any idea please help me 

Samcowgreen's picture
Samcowgreen

Advice on scoring not catching

Hi everyone, I've been having trouble with my scoring for a little while. The loaf rises fine, but the scoring doesn't catch and create and ear on my batards, and on my boules it stays a bit flat too. Its the same for every recipe.  Does anyone have any ideas why it might be happening? 

The recipe I used this time was: 

780g white

147g spelt

50g rye

18g salt

75% hydration

1 hour autolyse, mix, 3 sets of NESW stretch and folds, bulk fermentation to about 3 1/2 hours (internal dough temp of 80f), preshape, shape, and then 20 hours in the fridge at 37f. 

 

Thanks for your help! :)

 

 

berryblondeboys's picture
berryblondeboys

Back after a LONG hiatus - baking is therapeutic for me!

I'm just here to quickly re-introduce myself. I consider myself an intermediate baker and I have my fair share of baking toys. I've been baking in a variety of ways for the last 15 years, bread baking is one area I still want to master MORE.

My return coincides with recovering from a stroke (actually two, but only one left a deficit) that I had almost a year ago. The strokes were small, but significant and for a while, I lost my ability to read and write. Reading long passages is still difficult (I tend to skip words), but I'm recovered and I shouldn't have further strokes as they discovered what caused them. I happen to have a flukish system that needs slightly higher blood pressure due to the way the blood flows through my brain and so when I started taking blood pressure medicine for the first time a year ago, it lowered it too much and too quickly for my body and caused a stroke within 3 days of starting the medicine and again 3 months later - which is when they figured out the problem.

Mentally, I'm "over" the strokes, but how I was treated at work when I had the strokes will take longer for me to recover. Basically, I lost my career, so not only did I have to recover from the strokes, but I had to recover from losing a job and career I loved too. THAT has been the part that still makes me so sad, so I'm using bread baking (and baking in general) as therapy. Exercising my brain to try new things helps keep my brain sharp, so reading here, trying new things, and keep my brain flexible is all good.

I don't eat much of my creations as I'm carb sensitive, but my family enjoys, so there is that too.

LizaLeigh's picture
LizaLeigh

Sourdough not rising, advice?

Hey there!

So I'm new to pure sourdough breads. I've been baking breads with commercial yeast for years but recently was given Flour Water Salt Yeast and wanted to try one of the pure levain breads. 

I spent two weeks making and feeding a sourdough mother, and then took a stab at the Country Blonde dough from the book. I was prepared for the dough to be very sticky so that wasn't a problem. But it really didn't rise much during the bulk fermentation that he calls for and then it didn't rise at all during baking! 

First attempt

I'm disappointed but not beaten! I tried again making sure that all of my temps and weights were perfect and my mama was nice and bubbly when I used it and still, a very weak dough and basically no rising. I'm still eating the loaves but they are gummy and dense textured. (Although flavour wise are quite nice haha) 

Second attempt

My thoughts so far are:

-my mama isn't actually strong enough yet

- I'm on well water and we use a water softener, which I've heard can affect things. 

- maybe I should shorten my times for bulk fermentation? 

- not enough prayer and ritual sacrafice to bread gods? 

Any advice would be very welcome, I'm quite new to a lot of the fancy terminology so please give me simple terms, I would be thankful!

Liza.

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