Blog posts

Loaf 1: Forno Antico Santa Chiara Durum Wheat

Well, it’s a been a bit of time since posting.  Last night I had itchy fingers to go back to a favorite but with a pair of twists.  My most-favored sesame semolina based on Mr. Hamelman’s 125% hydration AP flour version.  However this time I subbed out the levain for my old favorite 75% mixed flour levain.  

Mixed Dec. 14, 2019.  Baked Dec. 15, 2019.

Mostly the same as #11, 75% home-milled whole grain (mostly Prairie Gold), 25% King Arthur All Purpose. But this time reduced levain to 7% prefermented flour.  3 hour bulk ferment, overnight in fridge.   Dusted in a combo of whole brown rice flour and ground chia seed.  Baked at same oven temps, but an extra 10 minutes, to an internal temp of 210.4 F.

Did not get much oven spring, but crumb was still excellent.  

After my first attempt to bake bread in my hooded BBQ I had several issues to address.  Most critical was the fact that the gas hose had touched the body of the grill and partially melted! So I ordered a new one and a second grate.  These arrived this week so yesterday I repeated the previous bake, substituting rye for spelt.

12 December - refresh starter and build levain before going to bed

13 December

08:25 am autolyse 105 g freshly milled whole wheat, 50 g freshly milled rye 440 g flour + 10 g gluten flour and 400 g water.

A staple of traditional Italian delis, it's surprisingly hard to find a quality recipe for Italian Prosciutto Bread online, also known as Lard Bread. This is a bread loaded to the brim with thick, cubed prosciutto, adding in parmesan and lots of black pepper for extra flavor, and brushed with prosciutto fat for tenderness and a beautiful gloss. While this is not a pretty looking bread by any means, it is uncontrollably delicious: you won't be able to stop eating it. This recipe is adapted from numerous others.

White with WW, Semolina and Rye

One of my TFL friends expressed concern that I had not posted for awhile. I can reassure him and you all that I am well and baking as much as ever. The thing is I have settled on a few favorite breads (if "a few" is less than ten), and I have already posted about all of them at least once. 

This weekend I baked something old and something new, so I have an excuse to report that to which I have been up.

This was a beet sourdough with 36% roasted beet, 25% Hard Red Winter Redeemer, 5% rye, and 70% KABF. The hydration was 70% + the liquid from the beets. I did a 2 hour autolyse and let the bulk go for 6 hours (kitchen was 64 degrees). The oven spring was fine, but maybe the bulk could have gone shorter. Interestingly I made a leek loaf simultaneously and those loaves had huge oven spring. Maybe the beets sped up the fermentation? 

The crumb isn't super open, but I think it's fair for a vegetable loaf. 

With cold weather settling in I'm spending more time baking.  I decided to make some whole wheat bread inspired by Tartine's version. It has about 60% whole wheat, 10% whole spelt and 30% all purpose unbleached flours. It has about 83% hydration and I added 5% wheat germ. 10% levain was used and I overnight-ed the loaves in the fridge for about 15 hours. Baked at 450 for 20 lid on and 20 with lid off - great oven spring.

I realized that I’ve been less experimental in baking recently. Today, cheesy herby bread is making a strong comeback!

Blue Stilton Tarragon SD with Sprouted Quinoa & Buckwheat