Blog posts

It has been quite a while since I last baked with spelt. Spelt and emmer are similar in terms of their characteristic in dough. Working with them is always a pleasant experience for they produce a silky (read: not gluing to your hands like rye…) and extensible dough.

Temperature has been hitting 33°C these days, so it wasn’t at all surprising that the levain (1:5.5:5.5) got aerated within 3.5 hours. I didn’t plan very well so it had to go into the fridge for 3 hours before use.

My husband had a hankering for a rye bread....who can say no?

I grabbed my Hamelman, and went in search of a rye that had no commercial yeast and also was wholegrain.  I failed, so I modified his 65 percent sourdough rye to use only freshly milled grain.  I have to say - this is one of the tastiest rye breads I have had since I moved out of New York. 

Prepare sourdough -and then let it sit about 16 hours on the counter at about 20 degrees C

This bake was from a few weeks ago.  The spouted whole wheat and sprouted purple corn flour really added a special flavor and made this an extremely tasty bread.  I added some fresh ricotta cheese which really softens the crumb.

I made one large miche style bread and I was extremely happy with how the crust and crumb came out on this one.

Modern baking with commercial cultivars of wheat, blended flours, thermostat controlled ovens, and particularly commercial yeast is predictable. Yes, it takes skill, and there is always something to learn that will make the product better, but it is predicable. 

I have been grinding my own flour for a few years now, and every time I try new kinds of grain or new blends of grain, I have increased respect for the bakers of 500 or a thousand years ago.

Here, in Romania, we're making some bundles of enriched and fragrant dough filled with goodies - walnut+sugar+cocoa+rum; Turkish delight; raisins - sometimes all of them, and called them "cozonac". Our cozonac is more like a babka that a panettone, more like a brioche stuffed with precious sweet things. 

After years of stopping making cozonac with commercial yeast, I've decided to give it another try with sourdough instead. It took two days (night not counting) from start to finish and it's a joy, a pride, and a treat. A winner. 

A Portuguese classic... 

This turned out great! The pastry really was not hard to make. I ran the oven at 500F with convection, and I baked on 2nd rack from the top, which gave me some nice blistering of the custard. My one 1 improvement for next time: ensure the sugar syrup tastes to cinnamon.

Recipe from Food Wishes: https://foodwishes.blogspot.com/2018/11/portuguese-custard-tarts-hieronymites.html

I wanted to see how far I could push bulk fermentation and with this bake I probably went a bit far.  I’ve baked this bread before which is in total 50% whole grains but I’ve never pushed the hydration to 83% which I did for this bake.  I also used my aliquot jar and shaped once it showed that the dough had risen 50%.  Given the lack of oven spring, I think for my skill set, 83% hydration and 50% rise made the resultant dough a bit too loose to shape tightly and attain better oven spring.  I’ll post photos of the crumb when I slice it tomorrow.

Hey bakers,

Today I made a video of how I usually shape a sourdough boule. This is a really easy method for me, as it's very similar to the "Stretch and Fold" process. The video is included below for anyone who wants to see it!

Happy baking,

Grant

since before Christmas.  You know how it is, down in the bottom of the fridge hidding between the spuds and onions.  Na ya, keep or toss?  Opened the bag and removed the top inch of kraut.  Hmmm, about a cup of nice juice and great smelling sauerkraut in there.  Put it into glass added a little water and sprinkled several heaping soupspoonfuls of white wheat on top.  Stirred in making a milky lumpy thin batter.  Covered and came bake later to notice nothing going on.  Next day nothing.  Ah, waking up the sleepy beasties.