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First Bake of 2014

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Totally from scratch loaves! There was no recipe, I used what I had on hand, and went by taste, smell, feel and 30 years of home baking experience to come up with something totally unique.

There's a little yeast, a lot of sourdough starter. I used oat, whole wheat and all purpose flours. Added a little honey and a little turbinado sugar. Mixed in some unsalted nuts and seeds (walnuts, almonds, cashews, pumpkin and sunflower seeds, all unsalted). A touch of walnut and sesame oils.

Tartine, Basic Country loaf -- round or rectangle?

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Photo: My first sale!

The above breads were made with the same recipe. As I have written before, I was looking for a good sandwich loaf.  The trouble with the round bread is that it is a pain to cut into sandwich size pieces.  The trouble with baking a "white bread" that I have had is that it is so soft that it is a pain to cut into slices without the bread crumbling.

BBA Basic Sourdough ... with Higher Hydration

Toast

So the first loaf was pretty stiff. Upon reviewing the recipe I noticed that the water called for can range between 12 and 14 ozs, therefore the hydration of the main dough can vary between 59% and 70% ... of course the starter can affect the overall hydration and my starter is hydrated at 50% while Reinhart calls for 100% hydration in this recipe.

Oops.

Nonetheless the first batch was good. As I mentioned I gave a loaf to a friend who enjoyed it, and my kids housed the other loaf. A neighbor came over on Saturday afternoon and I gave him a piece and he also enjoyed it.

Multi-Flour Miche

Toast

After reading Khalid post on Miche, it really itches me to bake on myself. I didnt use SFBI formula, instead I followed Jeffrey Hamelman -  multi-flour miche to create this beautiful monster.

 

80% Whole Rye Pullman loaf

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This is the second time I've baked a high percentage rye bread. The first was Hamelman's Volkornbrot; I wasn't elated with the result. ( http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/14991/christmas-baking-blisters ).  That was four years ago.

Lately--happy with my progress with sourdoughs, baguettes, challah and deli rye, and motivated by a number of other TFL'er's seemingly annual flurry of activity with Borodinsky rye Ioaves I thought I give it a go.

Rye Bread Slices

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Made some Rye bread, and thought I would show you how these came out.  Used a different recipe for this bread than I normally use.  Will Post another photo of the loaf and two slices.

Burger Buns

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I made these and they came out fine.  I made them 4.2 oz. size.  I did make some that were  5 oz. size but a bit big for burgers.  Will post the photo of them next.  The bigger size were just as tasty toasted with butter, or whatever we desired.