Blog posts

My wife, Cat, is away in Australia on business.  Yes, my wife’s name is Cat, which may cause some confusion because we also have a cat.  But the cat’s name is not “Wife”, which would make it even more confusing…and be pretty weird.  Especially since one of my wife’s many nicknames is “Wife”.

Anyway, I’m stuck in boring San Francisco while she’s off traveling the World.  So, I have to find a way to entertain myself.  And what entertains me these days is baking.  So, here’s the plan:

Hello,  I wanted to try making Apple Bread again, after seeing Larry's recent Odds and Ends post (thank you Larry) (and because I was able to find Honeycrisp apples at the market!).



I made this bread combining elements of Mr. Hamelman's Normandy Apple Bread, and Mr. Kastel's Apple Bread. With many thanks to Mr. Hamelman and Mr. Kastel!
I wanted to try mixing the final dough without water, to try and get as much apple flavor as possible in the bread

Another yummy loaf from Dan Lepard's "A Handmade Loaf". According to Wiki:

"Lardy cake, also known as Lardy bread, Lardy Johns, Dough cake and Fourses cake is a traditional rich spiced form of bread originating in Wiltshire in the South West of England, which has also been popular throughout the West Country and in Oxford and Suffolk.

The main ingredients are freshly rendered lard, flour, sugar, spices, currants and raisins."

 It was 1967 when the classic Star Trek episode "The Trouble with Tribbles" was first broadcast.  As I mentioned before, it was a different time and I was not yet the worldly sophisticate that I am today.  "Quadrotriticale" seemed like a wonderful, fictional, impossible grain of the future.

When I discovered that triticale (trit ih KAY lee) was indeed a real grain, it immediately became my "favorite" for no other reason than it reminded me that the "impossible" could become real.

With all of the attention on the Miche breads of various members, I was motivated to try the one dmsnyder posted on. I was taken by the flavor comments and the use of toasted wheat germ. I took a stab at replicating the high extraction flour David used by combining 25% whole wheat flour with 75% Better For Bread (my stock AP). I use the fresh ground WW from Organic Wheat Products (flourgirl51) which is stone ground. She offers it ground fine but I have been using the more course ground product which you can see in the bread.

It's Australian Day and it's the day when Aussies celebrate with things we love, barbeque, beer and lamington (?). We didn't plan to do any BBQ gatherings but ended up with one.

I only knew about the BBQ 5-6 hours in advance and decided to bring some fresh butter rolls to the barbie. Given the tight timeframe, straight-dough is the only option. I chose the soft butter rolls recipe from Jeffrey Hamelman's Bread cookbook. The rolls can be done in about 3 hours which worked out nicely with the limited time.

A friend experienced what appeared to be a protease attack earlier this week while making a Blue Cheese, Walnut, and Fig sourdough using the Tartine approach. The loaves began normally - up to forming and then sat with little change. Rather interestingly this was done in parallel with a batch a Tartine aux Cereales using the same sourdough starter and dough recipe. The loaves without blue cheese performed admirably. My friend told described the problem to me and wondered what about the blue cheese might have led to the problem.

Hey Guys! I've been baking my way through The Bread Baker's Apprentice for a high school project. Here's my entry for Challah from a blog about bread which my brother and I share!  http://bakingacrosscountry.wordpress.com/

There are numerous threads on TFL about the benefits of retarding fermentation and/or final proofing by reducing yeast amounts or, more commonly, refrigerating the dough.  However, other than using higher temperatures to manage production scheduling, and a few posts discussing warm fermentation increasing lactic acid production in sourdoughs there doesn't seem to be an equivalent interest in other benefits (if any exist) warmer temperature fermenting and proofing might bring to our baking.