Blog posts

I had to squeeze in another bake before visiting family in Germany  and as they normally just see photos I wanted to take a loaf with me. I also came across some white spelt from Doves Farm rather than the usual WW spelt and the dough felt much softer.....

Inspired by Ru's scoring I gave a pattern a go for the first time!

The square scoring turned the other loaf into a spaceship....

We had not made pizza in some time and it had been way longer since we had made YW/SD combo levain for the dough and even longer since we made it on the gas grill but it is summer and there is no way we are heating up the kitchen  to ramming speed for a couple of hours.

Although I’ve been to South Korea before, I haven’t learnt of Gyeran-ppang, a popular kind of Korean Street food, until I came across its picture a week ago. Being a soft sponge cake with a molten egg in the centre, what’s not to love?

Fancified YW Gyeran-ppang계란빵 (Korean Egg Bread)

Confession: 

I did not diligently fold the dough as Rus did during shaping...hence the crack???

The recipe is from George Greenstein's Secrets of a Jewish Baker, but I'm using the starter from Silverton's Breads from the La Brea Bakery and omitting any commercial yeast. 

My brother usually won't eat my English Muffins, but I thought I would give it the old college try one more time; he is used to Old Bay brand, and is very picky about his muffins tasting just like them (he won't even eat Thomas').

Between a fair amount of time away from home and baking the same old reliable stuff, I haven't been much of a blogging presence around these parts lately.

Hi Everyone..

A mouthful of a title...a la Dab !  This bread has evolved considerably from my initial bakes based on Shaio Ping's posts. The only liquid in the bake is the banana puree. I use two levains just because. I add figs and pecans..well just because. 

I wasn’t happy with the rise I got the last time I did this. Thinking back on it, I think the loaves were already over proofed when I put them into the fridge. I remember poking them and the imprint sort of staying there. It was late at night and I wasn’t thinking things through. I probably should have baked them right then and there but being late, and they really hadn’t risen a lot, I thought they could wait. This time round, I changing up a few things:

As I am without a Dutch oven, oven stone or bread pan of the right size, I thought I would try this basic bread in a cast iron non-stick saucepan. This is the second time I have tried baking this way. I got a limited bloom as the dough was very wet, very ripe and had no bench work or second prove. 

500g Tesco Very strong white bread flour

100g Matthews Cotswold Crunch flour

100g plain white flour starter 100% hydration

10g salt

80% hydration

Starter fed 6 hours before mixing. This had just gone past peak.