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This was one of the first sourdough recipes I tried when starting out last spring - and I failed royally with it, ending up with blown-out wonky loaves with flying crusts and a kitchen smeared in sticky dough. Admittedly I was a relative newcomer to baking bread and made every possible newbie mistake with it.

Wanting a change from the last few loaves of pain sur poolish, my baking supervisors - Poppy and Lexi - suggested I take the plunge and give this a whirl again. But this time, I've taken a lot of advice, lessons and feline displeasure on board.

I haven't had much time lately for baking so it was nice to spend a day in the kitchen. 

This is by far the best German Hefezopf I have baked and I have tried heaps of different recipes. This one is so light and fluffy and stayed fresh for days.  

Recipe can be found here 

http://www.chefkoch.de/rezepte/378801124204434/Friedas-genialer-Hefezopf.html

After getting Alan in trouble with his latest higher whole grain (25%) SJSD baguettes, Lucy felt terrible about it and when he shot back a challenge bread for her with a 7 Stater,  4 Sprouted Grain bread after last week’s 4 Starter, 7 Grain Bread. 

The first of this year's volunteer daisies popped up on my birthday last week

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

This bread was inspired by STUinLouisa's spring cleaning post. The nuts and dried fruit in the cupboard were, unfortunately, limited to 70g of hazelnuts and 160g prunes left over from Christmas.

I over indulged last night so thought some wholesome wholemeal and plain flour soda bread would help. The smoked salmon, cream cheese and gravadlax mustard sauce helped :) http://www.thebreadkitchen.com/recipes/irish-soda-bread-recipe/#

Make no mistake.  dabrownman is a puppeteer, a master manipulator, one who is capable of, and who garners great pleasure in takes unfair advantage of those weak of will and of mind.  Like me! 

Dear Loafers, below are photos of my first sourdough loaf, and I'd love some critical feedback.  Do any more experienced bakers see defects in the crumb, for instance?

This is a BBA Poilane style loaf recipe from Breadtopia, http://breadtopia.com/whole-grain-sourdough/.  I used a Le Creuset instead of a La Cloche, and the bottom was a bit darker than ideal.  I should have checked it once I removed the lid for phase two of the baking.

This one was made with a flour I got at the Farmers Market last week and used it yesterday to get that bread started.

The Flour is from Wessex Mill and called Onion Bread Flour.

The recipe is as simple as can be.

200g  80% hydration starter

700g onion bread flour

400g water

  15g salt

1tbsp caraway seeds

2tbsp olive oil.

Mix your starter with your water, olive oil, caraway seeds.

I was in the mood for a pretty simple but tasty bread so I threw this one together a day after my return from my business trip to Germany.

I used a mix of AP, freshly milled whole wheat and rye along with some rye chops and cracked wheat for added texture.

The addition of the olive oil helped soften the crumb a bit and the toasted onions added a nice subtle onion flavor.