Blog posts

I am such an excited little bread maker right now!  Look.... Sourdough!!!  Thanks for all advice from TFL members.  I will add to this blog later this evening, but for now I have to go finish a painting.

Okay, now that I'm feeding my poor little starter the right amount, I'm sure it's happier, but I don't know if that's the reason for this sudden improvement.  I've tried several new things with these loaves.  

I froze 1/2 a recipe of dough before final shaping with the idea of shaping and baking within a week.  I thawed for 24 hours in the refrigerator and noticed some rise as it thawed.  Let it come to room temp and then carefully shaped so as not to degas.  That was it - no further rise after 3 hours.  I hate to throw out the dough.  Can I use it as a starter or something?

This is a late bake from Hamelman's WW levain, only with yeast being left out. I have done bulk dough retardation for the first time, and it was successful, though it took 8 hours to be reeady to bake following its exit from the 18 hour refrigeration.

Over the past couple of months I have been learning how to bake sourdough bread. I have produced a fair share of pale crusts, scorched bottoms, dense crumbs and one terrific doorstopper. I've spent hours on TFL looking for explanations and solutions (and finding them! Big thanks to all of you!). I think I'm slowly getting the hang of it. Last Sunday I tried my first sourdough with fruit and nuts and it all seemed to come together: it was delicious! As good a reason as any to start using the TFL blog :).

A good sandwich deserves a good roll.  Enter the Cemita, a slightly sweet bun that gives its name to a whole style of street food in Puebla, Mexico. Crackly thin crust on the outside, with a lightly firm but airy center, and fresh! - made every morning in just one bakery, following a closely guarded recipe.

Back to basics in my quest for a whole wheat sourdough that doesn't take over my weekend or keep me up half the night.

The method this time is about as conventional as it gets, except for the long, refrigerated pauses.  Some of my previous attempts were so far from my usual routine that simply getting my head around them was a chore, and the bread suffered as a result. My brain will only put up with so much! 

Hello, I wanted to try making something different for a birthday dessert.

I made a recipe of Ciril Hitz's Basic Sweet Dough & divided in two, one half for each 'number'.
Each half was rolled out and covered with roasted hazelnut paste, then rolled up and shaped.
I extended the first roll a bit to make it longer, so it would be long enough the shape the '8'.
I used two metal rings for the '8' and an oval cake pan for the '0' to maintain shape while proofing and baking.

Chad Robertson's Basic Country Bread from “Tartine Bread” has been a hit among TFL members, and with good reason. It's a wonderful bread, and Robertson's description of how to make it is clear and detailed. He not only describes what to do but also why. He provides variations on his procedures in recognition of the realities of the home baker's scheduling issues and describes their effects on the end product.

Anyone who's followed my blogs knows that I'm constantly whinging about my gas oven and it's tendency to vent steam as quickly as I can create it.

But it's true: my relationship with my oven is probably like that of Ike and Monty in WWII - hated one another but needed each other.