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I've made croissants before now, twice: once during a King Arthur baking class, and, shortly after, at home, a bit more than two years ago.  I was nominally satisfied with both attempts, but in that same time frame my focus was elsewhere: sourdough and baguettes. With due humility I've been satisfied with my consistent successes with both baguettes, and a handful of sourdough formulae that I've felt the urge to try a new challenge: croissants--high on my "enjoy eating" list.

A well-intention friend gifted me with 10 pounds of supermarket flour as a thank you for making them bread, and I'm wondering what to do with it. It's Baker's Corner brand APF from Aldi's, bleached, 10% protein. I'm interested in the challenge of making excellent bread or baked goods from processed flour. Any suggestions?

 Since school there was one nugget of sourdough wisdom that had always been drilled into me, “firm starters produce acetic acid and liquid starters produce lactic acid”, the lesson continues that breads made from the appropriate starter will also produce breads of following acidity, with lactic acid being the weaker of the two. Yet, recent discussions of the topic point to the opposite, which does make some sense, with less water to move around in, bacteria would be less able to access appropriate nutrients, therefore, energy, with which to grow and reproduce.

Hi Guys

Just wanted to pop and in show you a loaf I baked the other day. Its an enriched bread with raisin's and fresh rosmary added.

I should have let it proof a bit more but it came out quite well I think. The flavour is brilliant. What I would change is the amout of proofing it had and what tempreture that I will bake the laof at as the cumb is a bit soft, but this might be the result of using butter in the recipe or cutting the bread too soon.. 

Please let me know what you think and if anyone would like to have the recipe.

Churs

Loaf:

It's week 8 in the Inside the Jewish Bakery Challenge - Semester 1. This week is Onion Rolls. Sadly, I'll be sitting out the next few dessert-heavy weeks.

Once my confusion over how to deal with the onion mix was clarified (thanks all) this proved to be an easy, fast bake (in terms of actual prep). My notes follow:

Starting on where I left this in my previous blog, long story short some viewers got offended by my choice of words in my previous blog of No Knead Variations Part I (http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/26972/no-knead-variations-part-i), hence, I am going to mind my language here. However, if you would like to read the unedited version of this transcript please visit theuneditedfoodie.blogspot.com

The blatant plug and thank you’s first: I got the Brød & Taylor proofer. I love it. My breads are more consistent and predictable now. Yes, I could’a rigged up a homemade proofer but that ‘s not my thing. With zero counter space in the kichen this B&T gets its own little table tucked in a corner of the dinning room.

Earlier this week I had a dream about ham & cheese on baguette. Since this was a dream that I could turn into reality, I took up the task of making some baguettes. So many dreams just stay dreams, when you have one within reach: grab it.