Blog posts

Hi Everyone,

Today I finally got Bread by Jeffery Hamelman from the library!  I have only read a few pages, but I can already tell that it is going to be a fantastic book.  I already own two bread books, one of them being The Bread Bible by RLB, but I can't wait to bake from this one (isn't it cruel that the library deadline for returning is two weeks?).  But I suppose I could always renew it.  The big chalenge is going to be deciding what to bake from it first!  I want to make something unlike anything I have ever made before (such as focaccia, which I make a

Yesterday was the big premiere: first wholemeal loaf made with home-milled flour, and also the first try at baking a loaf from Reinhart's Whole Grain Breads: the Rye Sandwich Meteil. Of course, I can't help but tinker, thus replaced about a quarter of the rye meal with a multigrain mix. 

So I started this a day ahead, did the whole mother starter thing (why he can't just call it sourdough, I don't know), I soaked, and mixed, I rested overnight, and after work yesterday I mixed, I rested etc etc. 

I love baguettes. I love them for the challenge but even more for the complexity of flavor that can be developed. My two favorites are Hamelman's poolish baguette and Sam Fromartz's Parisian baguette that gains so much from the addition of just a small amount of whole wheat flour and sourdough.

Hi all!

I am excitied to say that although I have lurked around here and posted on occasion, this is my first blog entry, and my first picture post!

Last night I decided to give the poolish baguettes from BREAD another try, and I am fairly happy with the way they turned out. They arent quite as nice as some of the ones I see on here, but I am fairly new to the bread baking at home thing, and I feel I am progressing pretty fast. Anyways, here goes:

I was so inspired by Beth Hensperger's recipe for making a 'Shallot and Poppy Seed Braid' it's in her book 'Baking Bread Old and New Traditions'.

I am after a good european bread book with good european recipes. I have been baking bread for a few years now and have a number of good american bread books. Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should get and why?

thanks

Hi everybody

That it's! now that I know how to pin my photos I can try and write my own blog !  after one year on TFL it was about time. My thanks to Ananda who helped me to sort the problem photo uploading.

I apologise already..I don't really seem to be able to create such nice and well thought out entries as some of the fellow bakers here. They always end up having to be wedged into my life and suffer from such rough treatment.

So, here are pictures from my second try at the baguettes. I feel they were slightly more succesful than the first ones but still just so far from GOOD....they tasted nice, but they also just haven't tasted the way I remember baguettes tasting in Paris.