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Although the daytime temperature is still above 25°C in HK, hawkers selling roasted chestnuts and sweet potatoes are starting to show up on the roadside. Of course I cannot miss out the opportunity to them in bread.

Miso Caramelized Chestnuts Sourdough

Dough flour (all freshly milled):

120g      40%       Sprouted white wheat flour

After my first positive experience with baguettes last week, I wanted to give them another try (and we were out of bread…..gasp!!)  I decided I wanted to go with a 65% hydration dough this time to take any dough handling issues out of the process.  I also decided to just use a yeasted dough since I had a window to make bread, and didn’t have a leaven built up from my stored starter.  Here’s the formula I used (shooting for 3x 330g loaves): 

480g AP (80%)

120g Semolina (20%)

390g Water (65%)

3g ADY

12g salt 

In preparing for the 123 community bake on Saturday morning I hauled out my wooden dough board and gave it a brief scraping down.  My usual maintenance regime is a simple scrape after use, then an airing outdoors in the sun, weather permitting, followed by a light scrape prior to next using.  This time I decided apply science to the "light scrape" residue by dropping the bits (<2g) into a plastic container to which I added another <2g water, closed the lid and waited for the evening.  I then added 20 g each of water and flour, and&nbsp

Several years ago, a baking buddy asked me to help him with a German recipe.

The formula, published by a German bakers' association, combined rye meal and cracked wheat with mustard and cheese. The amounts, of course, were calculated for a commercial bakery, as were the sparse instructions. I had to downsize the formula to home baking proportions.

We have visitor's from London and they wanted to take some bread home so quickly made this

bread...

I pre-mixed the flour with salt the night before and put it into 10C wine cooler until 6AM when I just took it out and added 12 hour leaven via Rubaud. I have found that the pre-mix works on many formulas apart from the Champlain as long as I keep the dough coldish.....

...Ang inyo pong abang lingkod ay isa nang ganap na guro..!

Yours truly is now a fully-fledged teacher.

This weekend is Canadian Thanksgiving, and as usual, I have been asked to bring bread to the family dinner. Because it is going to be served with a number of different courses, I needed a rather plain sort of bread. At the same time, the 1-2-3 challenge presented itself. So how to combine the two… well, it is the harvest, might as well use the plethora of grains that are in my pantry as well as some flour from the local miller. He produces 100% wholegrain flour and a partially sifted flour.

well this week I learned a big lesson about leaving the house when dough is proving in the conservatory. What was originally a dull, yet pleasantly warm day quickly turned into an absolute scorcher and in just an hour my dough was ruined! My stretch and folds were  almost impossible due to the fact that (I think) the gluten was completely broken down (is that what happens?)

i baked it anyway and the results were flavoursome (first time adding spelt into the equation) but there was very little rise and they should’ve been at least 60 - 70% larger!

Hi everyone!

Ok, so this weekend, I posted for the first time in over two years, and I mentioned that I'm not very adventurous......and, yet, here I am, posting about making my first ever baguettes.  I have long drooled over the many wonderful baguettes posted here, with Alan's leading the pack.  So, I got a bit of a wild hare, and decided that I'd give the baguette shape a go.  I started with one of my standard formulas - 75% AP, 10% WW, 10% Semolina, 5% Rye @ 70% hydration.  After doing a bunch of reading, and watching the King Arthur baguette shaping video, I dove in.....