I’m a big fan of Barton Springs Mill grains and one of their specialty grains is called Quanah. This is an Heritage grain which a grower in Texas just started up again. It’s become one of my favorite grains to mill and use in breads and it’s a Hard Red Winter Wheat, 11.5% protein and has a buttery, creamy and malty flavor. Here is a link for some more information.
I made a new version of my pretzel rolls to bring to my Cousin’s for Rosh Hashanah dinner along with some of my standard ones. Everyone seemed to really like the new ones so I guess I must have done something right :).
This version had some fresh ground rye along with some dark cocoa powder along with the Guinness which really gave the final dough a nice malty flavor.
I used pretzel salt, black sesame seeds and everything bagel topping for the toppings. As usual these were made with a lye bath
I made the same bread about a year ago to bring to my Cousin’s house for the Jewish New Year. It was a big hit and I really liked the malty flavor the Guinness imparts on the overall bread. It doesn’t taste like beer but you can definitely taste the underlying flavor. I don’t really like beer that much and I definitely would not be caught dead drinking a motor oil type beer like Guinness but it’s my favorite one to add to bread.
A double build was used for the levain but you could easily just do one build if you desire.
Cherry season is going strong and they are readily available for a good price at the supermarket so I figured it was a good time to bake another version.
I had some leftover grits from a recent brunch so that was added for some extra texture and flavor. These had some cheese and butter added and added quite a bit of extra hydration along with the fresh cherries to the dough. The cherries were pitted and cut into pieces and drained in some paper towels before adding.
I’ve made bread with rice several times before and always love the added flavor and texture it brings to the party. I used a purple (more black) rice I made with some onion stock which was very tasty.
The flours I used were freshly grounded whole wheat (Rouge de Bordeaux ) and Rye from Barton Spring Mill) sifted twice and milled twice as well as some KAF bread flour.
The overall hydration is higher than indicated in the formula since the rice added some extra moisture. The dough was pretty wet but was manageable.
Grilling season is upon us so I needed to make some soft tasty rolls for burgers. These are pretty straight forward and ended up just as I expected.
I used a combination of freshly milled and double sifted Butlers Gold whole wheat flour from Barton Springs Mill and KAF bread flour plus some KAF AP in the starter. Softened butter along with the ricotta cheese really added to the softness of the crumb and the honey added just enough sweetness to pull it all together.
I have not made a bread with dates for quite some time and for whatever reason it popped into my head the other day that I needed to make one.
This bake also used some purple sweet potatoes that I baked and then mashed up. I decided to add a little bit into the levain to see what would happen. It did a nice job of making a slightly sweet levain and when added with the sweet dates and the rest of the purple sweet potatoes the flavor on this bake was amazing.
I’ve made bread with carrots before and I loved the extra sweetness it provides. Previously I have roasted them and cut them into little pieces to add to the dough. I decided to puree them in the mini-food processor this time. I had seen a video on FB of a professional baker who juiced the carrots and added the carrot juice in place of the water so I wanted to try and get the carrots as liquid as I could. They were not really like carrot juice but the pureed version did add nice purple striations to the dough.
