The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Rosemary Meyer Lemon bread

breadforfun's picture
breadforfun

Rosemary Meyer Lemon bread

Like a number of other Bay Area bakers on TFL, Della Fattoria is one of my favorite bakeries.  I have always loved their Rosemary Meyer Lemon bread, although it can be hard to get from this small local operation. Inspired by onceuponamac on this post http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/23378/rosemary-meyer-lemon-80-hydration, I tried my hand at making something that approaches their bread.  Of course, without a WFO it can never be the same, but this bake came out pretty good.

I used a fairly high percentage (almost 30%) starter, and mixed it with predominently T85 flour from Central Milling and a small amount of light rye.  It is 76% hydration (including the starter), and it got a fairly dark bake.  Here is a photo of the finished loaf and the formula.  Next time I will probably double the rosemary.

-Brad

 

Crumb:

Recipe:

Comments

ananda's picture
ananda

Nice formula and loaf Brad

Best wishes

Andy

breadforfun's picture
breadforfun

Thanks Andy. Your blog is one of my inspirations!  I've been experimenting with rye breads with barley malt soakers after one of your posts, and I love the flavors they add.  Great idea to get them from brewing supply shops.

-Brad

SourdoughRules's picture
SourdoughRules

Where did you get that recipe spreadsheet?  I've done some ad-hoc ones and looked at the ones under the "Tools" section here but that one takes the cake! 

breadforfun's picture
breadforfun

I made it myself after looking at many others.  If you are interested I'll look into sharing it on Google docs.

-Brad

SourdoughRules's picture
SourdoughRules

I would love that, thanks!

breadforfun's picture
breadforfun

You should be able to download the file at this site: http://www.box.com/s/hztb0ngqvoqmufzl1nz0

I have also put it on my own website: http://bandb.holage.com/Eats/Entries/2011/12/10_Brads_Bread_Calculator.html

I would appreciate if you let me know if you find any errors or if you have ideas how it can be improved.

-Brad

decatur's picture
decatur

What are the characteristics of this flour?  What about the % protein?  What suggestions for other flour to use for this bread?  Lovely loaf and I want to try it but have no Central Mills flour.  Thanks.  Jane

breadforfun's picture
breadforfun

Hi Jane,

T85 means that it is an 85% extraction flour. It is often recommended as something close to what is used for a traditional French miche such as Pain Poilâne, and many recipes call for a mixture of all purpose and whole wheat as a substitute. My understanding is that when the wheat berry is milled, some of the structures, like the bran, are not milled as finely so they can be filtered out.  When they are filtered, it reduces the yield of flour from the grain.  In other words, you might filter out most of these structures and end up with 60 grams of flour where you started with 100 grams of berries.  This would be 60% extraction and white flours might be in this range.  A whole wheat flour where nothing is thrown away would be close to 100% extraction.  A T85 has some bran, which give it a little color, and the one I used is listed at 12.5-13% protien.  Hope this helps. 

There are several posts on TFL that can explain it better than I can: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/10487/highextraction-flour, http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/25636/high-extraction-flour-miche, http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/2033/high-extraction-flour

-Brad

GSnyde's picture
GSnyde

I am one of those Bay Areans who's a fan of Della Fattoria's Lemon-Rosemary Bread.  Your formula looks excellent.  But was it close in texture and flavor to the inspiration?

Thanks.

 

Glenn

breadforfun's picture
breadforfun

It's been a while since I had the original, so take the comparison with a grain of salt.  The next time I try this, I will definitely use more rosemary, maybe double what I used this time.  I may increase the lemon zest as well, but maybe only by half (fortunately I have a prolific Meyer lemon tree).  The crumb was pretty close - it was airy but with a good chew from the rye.  It was probably underproofed a little, so next time I plan to keep it a bit warmer (my house was probably sitting at 65˚ during the proof), or possibly do an overnight retard.  I don't think it's possible to reproduce the crust of a WFO in a home oven no matter what, but this was certainly passable.  I'm not sure if spraying the loaf with water to get the salt to stick to the surface is detrimental to the crust.  Any suggestions are welcome.  It may not be exactly what Della Fatoria makes, but it was an enjoyable loaf. 

-Brad

imaloafer's picture
imaloafer

Hey Brad,

I'm trying a Meyer Lemon-Rosemary bread today, based off a diiferent dough, but similar weights. I just zested about 10 Meyer lemons yesterday to get juice to preserve and the total zest from all of those was only a bit more than 13 g. Just wondering if the 12 g in your formula here is a typo or did you get 12 g from just 2 Meyer lemons?

breadforfun's picture
breadforfun

I'm looking at my notes and there is a typo, but I did get 8 gm from 2 lemons. Of course, many scales are notoriously inaccurate at the low end, and since I don't have a calibration weight, I can't vouch for the measurement.  On reflection, I think you are right, even 8 grams seems like too high a number.  I got maybe one to two loosely packed tablespoons total.  It's possible that the scale didn't tare properly.  I'll try a different method next time to verify.

imaloafer's picture
imaloafer

I baked up two loaves today, Pain Rustic from Hamelman's Bread book, but altered the technique, rounding and using bannetons, cast iron dutch oven for bake. Beautiful looking loaves, but I am so hooked on Tartine's bread, it just didn't stand up flavour wise. I used 5 g Meyer lemon zest for these loaves today and felt the lemon still needs a bump up. These were 750 g loaves prior to bake, so with Tartine being larger, I will try 10 g next bake. I used 15 g Rosemary and felt that was pretty much on the mark for me.

Cheers,