Now there’s a string of words that usually don’t go together.
For old timers who thought I might have gone the way of Bill Wraith – no, I didn’t just disappear. At the end of December 2013, I officially hung up (sort of) the consultant/road warrior gloves and went into my long planned retirement.
Before I joined this site, I didn't realize how behind the curve I was as I had never made a Vermont Sourdough. I decided to get with it and make one today. I have been schooled by the many wonderful bakers on this site and encouraged to try, so I did. I used David's Hamelman's recipe, but altered it a bit by adding a bit more rye. I was finishing a bag of bread flour and didn't have quite enough, and I thought the additional rye would add some nice flavor.
Well, in case anybody remembers, about a year ago I posted this. Well, the time of year has come again when the winter is over, and we have tons of left over semolina (we buy it to make porridge). A lot of water (and flour) has passed under the bridge since that naive attempt, and I had 2 other attempts (unpublished) before this, the final result.
Hi everyone!
A few months ago I gave my colleague some rye starter, using which she's been successfully baking 100% rye breads at home. Now some more people have expressed interest in baking a "rustic" white bread. My job was to develop a simple formula that a someone new to bread baking could easily follow, while at the same time yielding a good-looking, crusty loaf with good flavor. I pondered whether to develop a simple formula using sourdough or commercial yeast and finally decided on the later.
There is a lot of discussion of Chad Robertson's Basic Country Loaf, as written about in Tartine Bread. This was the first truly successful loaf I ever baked, having purchased the book because I wanted something extraordinary to bake with the sourdough starter that I had been in the process of developing while trying to figure out how to bake with yeast.
Yes, same old multi-grain loaves this weekend, but I don't mind. Healthy, easy, tasty...
Less words this time and more photos.
I baked two loaves of the Tartine basic country bread today. Both loaves were from the same batch of dough and were proof retarded in the refrigerator. The loaf on the left was baked on a baking stone with a stainless steel bowl as its "cover". The loaf on the right was baked in an enameled cast iron combo cooker.
2014 Dabrownman’s TFL Blog Index
1/1/2014 - New Year’s Panettone - 2014
1/3/2014 - YW SD Spelt and White Whole Wheat Miche
1/5/2014 - Saturday Night Pizza - 1/4/2014
Lucy loves naan more than she loves Indian food but she really loves Indian food the best of all. So when she found out we were going to make Fusion Chicken Curry for dinner at 10 AM she was a little put off since she likes her naan to snea a long cold nap in the fridge just like pizza dough.
Well my hiatus is over. The full market has begun and I'm ready to return to the weekly trading routine. Been hooked on the stiff levain lately so i decided I'd switch in up and build a liquid levain and then do a second build and use a young levain to keep it mellow and sweet. I had honey in the formula and opted to omit and allow the young levain to bring the sweetness. I kept the pre-fermented flour low to give enough time to gently build the gluten.
