The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

A Q-Tip as a lame!

staff of life's picture
staff of life

A Q-Tip as a lame!

After searching high and low and not being able to find my precious curved lame ANYWHERE, and with many batards needing scoring, I threaded a double-edged razor through a Q-Tip and it worked great!  The curve seemed identical to the one my lame provided, and the cuts bloomed beautifully.  The only drawback is that a Q-Tip has a much shorter handle than my lame, but in a pinch (or for the penny-pincher), this solution works great.

TRK's picture
TRK

I usually use a double edged razor blade with a wooden coffee stirrer as a handle (a cheaper, easier to find version of that Brotkunst mentioned above).  It makes a decent handle and is cheap and easy to replace.  The stick bends the blade into a nice curve.  Recently I have been just using a serrated tomato knife that came with a knife set I have.  It is nice and sharp, because I use it for almost nothing else, and it is serrated which helps with very wet doughs.  If I am worried about sticking, I spray it with oil before I use it.  Works great unless you need a curved blade...

 

 

Loafer's picture
Loafer

This makes me wonder if a chopstick could be rigged to be a lovely substitute...

 

But hey... I'm super cheap. I use a bix box of single edge razor blades and don't use a handle of any kind.  Not usually a worry for home baking.

 

-Loafer 

KipperCat's picture
KipperCat

DH recently made me a couple of lames with chopstick handles.  I haven't tried them yet.

CountryBoy's picture
CountryBoy

People probably already know this but I just discovered that my local paint supply store sells a clipp on gadget in the configuration of a flat pocket fountain pen for under $2.00. It has on it a supply of small straight edge razor blades that can be used and then broken off and disposed of as desired.