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I bake bread at least twice a week plus the cookies and quick breads that are the treats around here, but I just haven't had the time to post.  That combined with the fact that most of my bread baking is about getting sandwiches made that my kids will eat!  Panned loaves didn't seem interesting enough for me to keep track of, but hey, I'm baking like crazy and sometimes I like to look back and see the results of all the work.  Too bad I didn't get a shot of the eight loaves of challah last week.

I haven't been taking pics lately but have been baking as usual. Wanted to thank David and also document how wonderful this formula is. I have a starter , thanks to Gaarp, that doubles in one hour. I take it out of the fridge 1x a week and feed it q 12h for a total of 2 times and it is fantastic. I also have a rye starter and a bowl of "discard". The San Joaquin is great. Here are pics. Perfect sour for us as we are not wild about lots of sour. I have found that my starter is very happy in the fridge. At least it works for me.

Baker Beware!

I'm making a blog entry to document my experience with Leader's Corn-Rye Rounds from Local Breads. The recipe was simple enough and the little rounds seemed to turn out as described by the recipe, but they tasted just awful. I was so disappointed that I didn't even take a picture of these little round rock-like things with a very odd and inharmonious taste of corn and rye. I threw them all in the trash.

--Pamela

I have finally developed a great formula for a naturally leavened sourdough. They are slow rising, but they come up very nicely. The problem is that when I slash them, they deflate. I tried to make a more shallow slash, but then I don't get a nice looking slash after final baking. Maybe I am proofing too long I guess, but I don;t get the nice open holed texture I like if I don't proof it to that point. I am using a very sharp lame each time so I know that isnt the problem either. Any ideas?

chefryan

"Cheese Bread" is a rather drab description of this strongly flavored bread, so I decided to give it the name of the cheese I used.  

The overall formula (which includes a stiff levain) is:

Bread flour - 100%

Water - 60%

Olive oil -  5%

Salt -  1.5%

Yeast -  1% (or half that amount if you plan to retard the bread overnight)

Parmesan cheese -  20%

A few weeks ago I asked around at TFL if I could freeze my starter. Thanks for the all the tips: I turned half of the starter into ice cubes, left the other half in the fridge. The result: the icecubed starter needed some awakening (feeding for 2-3 days). It has a stronger taste then the starter I put in the fridge. Both as still very useable.

Being a new member in this cool informative site, i would like to share my newest attempt to bake a Mild Rye loaf (50% AP). Pictures attached will do the talking. However, the crumb was gilatinous and rubbery, beacuse the dough was very hydrated. The end result, had a bland taste rubbery crumb, though airy and somewhat spongy. I'll reduce hydration next time.

I don't have any vital gluten, so i kneaded the dough in runnung water to get rid of some starch.

Iam learning as i go..

I made another batch of the baguettes described previously in http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/11925/baguette-surprise-and-challenge.

The only significant changes in the procedure were:1) I did not add the salt until after a 50 minute autolyse, 2) I was more meticulous in gently pre-shaping and shaping and 3) I let the loaves proof more fully. 4) I also poured about twice as much water over the pre-heated lava rocks to steam the oven.

Firstly, thanks to those who welcomed me to TFL!

Recently, I inherited some rather large loaf tins - 12" x 5". At the time, the person that passed them on said "I wouldn't even bother using them, I just can't get a loaf baked in the middle!" to which I scoffed a little. Hah! I am quite the baker now! I won't have those problems!

Now, these tins look big. You could drop the Grand Canyon in one of them. Well, compared to the cute little 9x5, that is. And I now have four. What to bake first?

My "San Joaquin Soudough" formula grew out of explorations of the technique used by Anis Bouabsa for his prize-winning baguettes. I have discussed this in detail in earlier blog entries on TFL. This remains one of my favorite breads, but I'm always looking for ways to improve on it.