trailrunner's blog

well I am astounded at the results of this bake. Even more simple than any others of late. Small amount of  hands on involved and amazing oven spring for so little effort. Will post crumb later...having a dinner party in an hour so need to get scooting ! 

Refreshed Starter, 100% hydration*:  150 grams
Total Flour**:  485 grams 
Water:  330g 
Sea Salt:  11 grams

Borrowed this formula from Girl meets dirt a blog that is interesting if you want to take a look. 

Basically the same process as the last bake. So little hands on that it is amazing to see what the dough becomes with just time and two s and f's. The one thing I will change is I won't be doing a bulk ferment any longer. I remember why I hate having to wait around for the dough to get warmed up and risen before baking. I will shape and retard in the banneton.  I like baking the cold dough as it is so easy to get out of the banneton. Other than that I won't change any of the technique . It all went flawlessly. 

Well the pics tell the story but here goes for some more details. 

350g very very young spelt levain 100%( fermented only about 4-5 hrs) 

660g KA bread flour

90g Kamut

50g fresh milled rye

22g Kosher salt

20g maple syrup/20g yogurt

500g water ( 300g apple yeast water 200g water) 

whew....I think that says it all !  Date yeast water has been stored in fridge. Still going strong and I had added water to the used dates to see how it would hold up. So far so good. Levain loves Kamut . It filled the jar in a matter of a couple hours so I stored in fridge. Using up many flours from Breadtopia in an effort to move forward with grinding my own grains. These three loaves are the proportions that I used for the buns except I used more grains in the mix to = 532g. I used my Middle Eastern date syrup instead of maple syrup.

Another double levain dough. I joined a facebook group that uses only yeast waters for baking. Wow....there is SO much info and amazing pictures of breads etc. Anyway I got my feet wet , so to speak with date water. I took a small amount of my AYW and inoculated it with 6 dried dates. Whoa...stand back !  It was full of bubbles in just a couple hours using the lights in my oven to warm it. I added a piece of orange peel, as I do with my apple yeast water, as I think it keeps it from getting too much  alcohol formation. 

733g unbleached KA

266g Spring WW

the banana rye date and pecan bread made it to the iron skillet this morning! My maple syrup comes from a friends trees in Wisconsin. He taps each Spring. Delicious. 

how often can a person make and eat pizza before they get tired of it ?  Apparently a LOT !!  I wanted to see how this dough would do after X days in a plastic bag in the fridge. The answer is wonderfully. Very  much improved flavor profile and great holes !!  I used some of my chef son's sweet Italian sausage and it really added to the flavor. Same mode of operation as far as the rest of it. Layered sliced provolone on the bottom crust after it had risen for a while on the stove top. I made sure a put plenty of EVOO in the skillet before I laid the dough in.

Oh my....that's about all I can say. The blue granite roaster is definitely the way to go , at least I will not be using my cast iron anymore. Look at that ear :) and caramelization.  I had extra ripe bananas and I remembered posts from Shiao - ping and txfarmer using bananas and SD. I read and read and came up with a formula.

Took a formula that Ian had posted some time back and made a few changes . He made enriched buns as did I but I had 750 grams leftover so shaped a batard and pinched the bottom with flour in the crack hoping for a burst of creativity !  I got it. 

700g starter- 600g rye and 100g AYW 

600 g unbleached KA bread flour

225g durum

200g spring wheat 

100g soft cheese ( I used Délice de Bourgogne with the blooming crust pulled off) 

100g soft butter

85 g maple syrup

32 g salt

approx 650g water