Blog posts

Sourdough challah is a familiar subject on this site, and there have been lots of recipes discussed and shared, with Maggie Glezer's probably in the lead. My only reason for revisiting the theme is that my version of challah, a sourdough adaptation of Jeffrey Hamelman's straight-dough recipe in Bread, is a bit away from the mainstream. To be blunt, nearly everyone who tastes my challah—thankfully, not my family—doesn't know what to make of it at best.

Like most of my bread friends, I purchased Chad Robertson's new bread book, Tartine Book No. 3, back when it came out over the holidays, however, I only got around to baking from it fairly recently. In Book no. 3, Robertson builds upon his basic country bread formula he established in his first book,Tartine Bread, with a focus on whole grain baking.

When I got more serious about baking several years ago, I created my own spreadsheets (or "breadsheets" as I like to call 'em) where I kept accurate track of formula tweaks, timings, etc. Over 200 sourdoughs, ciabattas, mixed grain pan loaves, pizzas, flatbreads, etc. 

Nowadays, even though I still weigh my ingredients, I "eyeball" things much more, and I rarely write my outcomes down....probably because for the most part, the outcomes come out consistently well. I haven't been baking a ton of breads lately, but my recent go-to's are:

About two months after baking my first-ever loaf of bread, I'm posting my first blog entry here. From raising my own sourdough starter to learning to handle ever wetter and slacker doughs, it's been a fun and action-packed couple of months. I've been edified and consoled many a time by this site, and I'm finally feeling confident enough to say hello.

If you know how to handle wet dough (80%) and with the right flour, big holes are a breeze!!!

Happy baking

Thomas

www.campingchicago.com

I know what you're thinking. "A bagel on the west coast? and in Oakland? never!"

My wife asked me to bake a loaf of bread for some neighbors who recently had a new baby. She made meatballs.

It was sort of last-minute and I had just picked up some el-cheapo store brand AP flour (we haven't yet made our St. Patty's day soda bread and I was planning on using AP like I always do) so I took out some ripe starter (that I had refreshed after my last bake 2 weeks earlier) and decided to try a different recipe ... Reinhart's Pain de Campagne.

• 527g BF 37%
• 385g AP 27%
• 200g Rye 14%
• 142g T85 10%
• 350g Levain (12% flour 12% water)
• 1022g Water 72%
• 28g Salt 2%

1 hr autolyse

2 min slap and fold

15 min rest

1 min slap and fold

3 hr bulk ferment with a set of stretch and folds every half hour for the first hour and a half

scale/preshape/shape 2+ hr proof

Lucy finally got back to her bread and butter with a high percent whole grain multi-grain bread.   It has been a while but this one may prove she hasn’t lost her touch - if she ever had one.

I'm always amazed how much the acid in the levain leaches out the color becoming almost white compared to the autolyse which has exactly the same grain in the same proportions at nearly the same hydration..