Blog posts

Pork shoulder was on sale last week, so my wife decided she wanted pulled pork sandwiches for dinner and it was up to me to make the buns this past Sunday. I mostly followed Maurizio's brioche hamburger bun recipe, but instead of a blend of whole wheat and white flour I used 100% freshly milled 85% extraction hard red wheat (which I'm obsessed with the past couple of weeks since I bought a new sieve).

100% whole wheat with rye starter using Bob's Red Mill whole wheat flour 

This is a simple sandwich bread that can be done in one day. The texture is moist, but not gummy

Night before, feed your rye starter (mine is around 100% but it doesn't have to be precise) 

500g flour

500g warm tap water

Mix together with your fingers until lumpy. Let stand 10-15 minutes

Add 100g of starter and work it in with your fingers. Let stand another 15 minutes

Add 15g of salt, pinch in with your fingers

I’m a big fan of Barton Springs Mill grains and one of their specialty grains is called Quanah. This is an Heritage grain which a grower in Texas just started up again. It’s become one of my favorite grains to mill and use in breads and it’s a Hard Red Winter Wheat, 11.5% protein and has a buttery, creamy and malty flavor. Here is a link for some more information.

I know I’ve made these many times trying to improve them, but I think for the flour that I use which is an organic AP equivalent to T55 I have settled on what I think is the ideal hydration and degree of fermentation.  I have baked another set today along with the pie for a dinner party we are throwing tonight.  Hopefully our guests will enjoy the meal.  The main course is a miso vinegar chicken dish with peperoncinis and peppers.  Both the miso and the red wine vinegar I make myself, the miso is fermented for 1 year.

Recently we’ve acquired a preference for streusel topped pies over double crusted pies.  One of the nice things about a streusel topping is that you can add spices or nuts to it that might compliment the flavours of the filling.  In this case the filling has both cinnamon and allspice so they were also added to the streusel.  Another thing about streusel toppings is that you can have your pastry rolled out and crimped and then frozen, fill your pie and then throw on the streusel and immediately bake.  It is so fast and simple.

I was thinking the other day about eliminating the butter from my milk breads and remembered the bottle of toasted walnut oil in my cupboard that needed to be used, so I came up with this loaf.  I was in a rush out the door at the time I needed to shape this so I did the lazy thing and shaped it as a batard and not into my usual four lobes.  I actually quite like how this turned out visually especially when topped with black sesame seeds.

Today's bake: Weinheim Carrot Rye   Weinheimer Mohrenbrot (Germany)

Source: The Rye Baker by Stanley Ginsberg

Notes: None

Substitutions:  None

During my experimentation on grinding durum into semola rimacinata, I found out that the 50 mesh sieve I bought got me about 85% extraction on hard red wheat (not sure if it's spring or winter) after a single pass through my stone mill, so I decided to try a bake with it.

Inspired by Will's Altamura and Matera bakes made with 100% semola rimacinata, I wanted to try a durum loaf again. A couple of years ago I acquired a 50lb bag of durum berries from Central Milling while I was up in Logan visiting family, so I wanted to see if I could replicate his results with freshly ground flour.

Phase one

Newfoundland savory spice ordered & incoming. For this first attempt I will be substituting basil for the main flavor component.

Test bake #1 using sweet basil.

Phase #1

The mix

All the players are assembled.

The dry ingredients flour, salt, yeast, and sugar