Blog posts

which coincides with Not Enough of a Good Thing, Part 1.

This time it was the Hamelman Pain au Levain with WW.  This is the same bread that I made a week ago but then used my own levain and added figs and pecans.  This time I built the dough heeding to the original formula, which carries less whole grain and no additions than what I made last week.

Hello Everybody,

It's nearly 2 years since I last posted; where has the time gone?

The answer is that I have spent most of my time making and selling lots of bread.

I was at Hexham Farmers' Market yesterday in the sunshine.   There are some photos attached taken just before the start of trade.   There are 235 loaves in the photos and by close at 2pm there were just a couple of 100% Rye loaves left.

Hello Freshloafers

<Sorry the orientation of the main picture is a bit off, just tilt your head to the left and it's the right way up again! >

One of the (many) things I enjoy about TFL is you don’t have to look very far to find a recipe to try! This week’s bake was a variation of dabrownman’s jewish deli rye from a couple of weeks back

This loaf is based closely on the recipe from Sam Fromartz's book. It is 70% rye with the balance whole wheat at 80% hydration. I didn't have his mixture of rye flours so substituted high extraction fresh ground rye with the bran resifted and reground twice. The whole wheat is fresh ground Red Fife. I used 120g yeast water replacing some of the water in the final dough. The dough was also retarded after the mix to be formed, warmed and proofed after about ten hours. The dough had swelled a lot during the retard.

2016 Dabrownman’s Blog Index

1/1/2016 - New Year’s Eve Pizza – 2015

1/5/2016 - Westphalian Pumpernickel – 1537

1/8/2016 -  3 Starter Italian Olive Bread with Rosemary and Sun Dried Tomato

For Bread baking Day #83, found here at the KOCKTOPF Blog -  http://www.kochtopf.me/bbd-83-brot-spezialmehl-bread-special-flour Lucy came up with weird bake - even for her.  The theme is a bread that wasn’t just rye, spelt or wheat.  Well, this was not an issue with us since our usual bread has all kinds of sprouted and whole multi-grains from the ancient to the odd.

Thanks A BakER!  I tried your suggestion of lowering the pre ferment to 10% and this was the result.  It did not really do much in the fridge overnight so I let it stand at room temperature this morning for 4 1/2 hours ......... that did the trick!  Then after knock back and shape for an hour into the preheated Dutch Oven.

You were right the hydration was a little wetter than usual however it rose a treat :)  I adjusted the quantities and used 300g strong bread flour.

We went out for a picnic today so I had to take the cooling loaf with me!

Have made an important decision about baking...

It rained...

Wow, this is the biggest rise and oven spring I have EVER had! Now the working part of my peel measures 8"x14" and this loaf filled most of it using 460 grams of flour! Best pulla ever, with a soft almost shreddalble crumb.

Normally, I will do a sponge of liquid levain, sugar, egg, flour and scalded milk infused with cardamom. After this got happy, I would put it in the fridge at bedtime, remove it in the morning and mix  after about an hour of warm up.

I began getting ruthless with my deep freeze a while ago and these are the only things I have baked in three weeks. I found an abundance of breads I baked then froze and have been eating my way through.

I bookmarked this recipe some time ago and finally got around to baking a half batch. this batch I rolled out, shaped a rectangle and cut the biscuits into squares using a butter knife, then baked on a parchment covered pan. Quick, easy and tasty!

My batch:

1 C flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 TBS sugar

1 C grated sharp cheddar