I AM THE BOMB!!!!
Eureka! After four months of baking four to five different kinds of bread each week, it's finally come together for me! Sorry if I sound euphoric, but it's been a long, sometimes hopeless journey, and several times I almost gave up. If I hadn't been enjoying the journey so much, I would have given up, but, fortunately, the journey in breadmaking is as much fun as the destination. But last night I made Italian bread and everything came together--even the scoring. So here go the thanks--thank you to Cyril Hitz and his book and DVD which was my first inspiration. Thanks to Mark Sinclair at The Back Home Bakery whose DVD (#2) I have watched and watched, and taken notes, and watched some more (and came to realize by watching him that the reason I mutilated so many loaves while scoring them was that I had not formed them correctly and thus didn't have the needed surface tension). And thanks to all of you on TFL website who are so helpful, patient, gracious, generous, and just as enthusiastic after all these years of successful baking as we newbies are!
Sheri B.
P.S. Tonight--Eric Rusch's Cranberry-Pecan Extraordinaire from his video (Breadtopia).