Blog posts

 When we traveled for the first time to the Yucatan, I wanted (of course) to try some typical Mexican breads. The bakeries in Cancun and Tulum had beautiful displays, and we were very eager to purchase a selection of those pretty little breads and pastries.

But what a disappointment! The attractive exterior was misleading - everything we bought tasted more or less bland and sweet.

   Bakery in Tulum - a pretty disappointment!

I've been busy baking this week, but haven't quite caught up on posting about it. So you get them all at once.

First, I played with spelt for the first time with a Sourdough Spelt Country Loaf. It truned out very tasty and had more structure than I thought it would.

Hello everyone,
I caught an episode of "Mexico: One Plate at a Time", on TV - hosted by Chef Rick Bayless.
Fresh flour tortillas were the subject - very quickly made, using a food processor.
The recipe is available online at rickbayless.com  -
(I used the ingredients posted online, and the method demonstrated on TV, to make these tortillas). 

Dear TFL'ers

I'm on an obligatory pause from baking, as i've underwent a spinal fusion Surgery in my lower back. Can't bake nothing now, nor bend forward... It is a dead pause for 3 months at least!  I'm bound to this dreadful back brace, so the only bread related activity i'll do is watch TFL, and learn more, take it easy, and enjoy some time in some personal reflection (remembering how vulnerable we are as humans, and that without God's mercy and grace, we are helpless).

After the difficult and tedious Not So Stollen bake earlier in the week, we decide to continue our Thanksgiving bake list with something much simpler, less stressful even if not as enjoyable.

I have been for the last couple of weeks using a nearly pure rye sourdough starter and have baked nothing but the New York Deli recipe from P. Reinhart's BBA.  I love the addition of the fried onions.  So far I have added the onions to the final dough and at some pont I will try adding them to the starter to see if it makes a difference.  For my last bake, I reduced the fried onion and added garlic to cook lightly, but not brown.  With the heat off, I added the caraway seed and fresh rosemary.

This So Not Stollen is based on a modification to a real Dresden Christmas Stollen recipe that was posted by nellapower here:  Refer to it for most of the method with a few exceptions below.

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/25407/dresden-christmas-stollen