Blog posts

In this hot summer I find myself less eager to crank up the heat in our oven - thereby turning our kitchen into a sauna - my mind is more on something cool, tangy and refreshing. North German and Danish traditional cuisine has a treat just for this season: Rote Gruetze or Roede Groede (it's Danish name). Literally translated the name means "red gruel". That may not sound very enticing, but it's an old fashioned dish with an old fashioned name and soooo good!!!

After seeing Shiao-Ping's post last week about the Sonoma Bakery near her, I was awakened from a long slumber. My other half has been working on a high protein diet that forbids grains, potatoes and rice. I have been supportive of the diet plan and have tried to not create things in the kitchen that would test her strength. What happened was I also was keeping to the plan and found surprisingly that I did not crave starches. So my self imposed hiatus has come to an end.

Since we are having a heat wave, I try to do everything in the mornings or late in the evenings. So, while I was making the English muffins, I had a starter going in the mixer beside me.

One of my favorite breads of all times is the Pain de Campagne which I can get at the farmer's market at Burke or at Whole Foods. It's such a big loaf, that you buy a section of it, not the whole thing and it's always expensive, which means, I rarely buy it. It's something like $6 for a section at Whole Foods.

So, I've delved into baking a few times. We got the Laurel's Bread book upon recommendation of our Jane Brody cookbook 16 years ago. I baked a few things, enjoyed it, but didn't have the time to devote to it between school, then kids and career and so on.

TOO MUCH OF A GOOD THING?

Hello, This is from Eric Kastel's "Artisan Breads at Home". I baked this bread and froze it, and we tasted it tonight with dinner. YUM. With many thanks to the author!!! I tried slashing the bread in a starburst, as I saw someone else do quite beautifully on this site. I wish I could remember who that was, so I could go back and take a look at their handiwork and pay them a compliment here - I will keep trying until I can make mine look as nice!

I'm getting ready for a sizable family gathering in about 10 days. We are descending on my baby brother, who has a vacation home on the Northern California coast. We expect 15-20 hungry Snyders. I'll be baking while I'm up there, but we'll need something to snack on while the levain is ripening. So, I baked a few things to fend off starvation ... 

A couple Gérard Rubaud sourdough bâtards

JT's 85X3 formula can be found here, I made several changes:

1. I don't have type 85 flour, so I followed Farine's advice and mixed 80% bread flour with 20% ww flour

2. I didn't use yeast in the final dough

3. I added a 30min autolyse before mixing, and let it rise for 3 hours at room temp, with 3 folds (one per hour), after that I shaped the dough and put it in fridge overnight for about 10 hours

The weatherman has forecast a brutally hot day in the city... heeding his warning my girlfriend and I went for an early morning bike ride whilst my doughs were rising, and returned to bake them before the heat set in. On the agenda for today was a sourdough rye with walnuts (from "bread") and Larry's English muffins (the original recipe can be found here).

I made these today along with Larry's 'Wally' wonderful English Muffin recipe.  Since I had a cup of levain left and wasn't about to waste this lovely bubbly..I decided to try it in my 'Buns for Sandwiches'  for even more added flavor.  They turned out delicious.  I added the measured one cup or 8oz measure of levain I had left and 4oz less water and 3oz less 'KA bread flour was used' to the original recipe.  I didn't write down my calculations, just figured in while preparing dinner and making the EM