Blog posts

Norm Berg's onion rolls. (RIP) Shared publicly on the Fresh loaf. 

Since I already had onion topping from the Bialy bake, I rehydrated two TBs of dried onions. This gave me the onion water needed for the formula. I decided to use the re- hydrated onions as an inclusion. I was thinking that might have been a mistake.

 That being said, I adjusted the bake time on the fly for what looks like a very nice outcome.

The biga fun continues. This time, I decided to pre-ferment everything. 50% whole rye in a SD crumble biga (45% hydration), and 50% bread flour in a IDY poolish.

The next day, I simply combined the poolish and the biga and added salt. Given that this was a 100% preferment, the bulk was really short - 2 hours - and I concentrated on building a lot of strength upfront. Shaped, added the usual suspects, and baked in the dutch oven at 220 degrees with the lid off halfway.

1. Pizzaria style sausage and chicken rolls 

2. Fall off the bone smoked ribs 

    

About a decade ago, when I first read online about trying to make Neapolitan-style pizza at home, the consensus seemed to be that it took about 7 minutes to bake a pizza at 550°F. Obviously, that's a lot longer than the 90 seconds typical for true Neapolitan pizza, so you compensate as much as possible with dough hydration to keep it from getting too crispy.

I recently bought some fresh barley grain and figured what better use for it than as a scald. This one was almost exclusively a fresh-milled loaf. The only non-FMF was a little bread flour in the starter. I like to include that to make sure the starter is nice and strong to help with the FMF and low-gluten barley flour.

The finished product.

Not the most beautiful pie I ever made. That being said, the oozing goodness is  telling me it will up with my most delicious! The pastry was off this time. It was all I could to make it work.

I have been feeling homesick these past few days. Since moving to the UK 2 decades ago, I have always reached back and reclaimed my Filipino roots through food. Not just any kind of food but food that nourishes the soul. Food that brings me back to my island roots. All the memories captured and stored in my psyche by all the delicious and wonderful snacks and dishes I grew up savouring. The only way I can feed that nostalgia is by trying to recreate the food that shaped and nourished my childhood.

These biscuits (UK: more-or-less "scones") use 50% whole wheat pastry flour, 50% AP flour with melted butter, sour cream, milk, baking powder, a tad of baking soda, salt, and sugar. I used the baking soda to get a little more lift because it would react with the acidity in the sour cream. I made a small batch, using only 125g (1 cup) of flour. I winged the recipe as I went.

400 g of levain half was Sourdough and half was my YW levain that I’m keeping as a firm starter  and just feeding it flour and water. 

It was 1400 g but didn’t quite fill the Pullman. I used my Trinity at 25g for each component. Dough fragrance was a rich chocolate. I used 3 laminations on a very wet counter to create a lovely elastic dough. 

Will definitely make again. Having it with Smoked Salmon and Horseradish sauce and veggies. Yum! 

It had been a while since I'd gotten myself into trouble with baking, my long-awaited mixer was washed and waiting for its inaugural batch, and I had 15.4 pounds of pears on hand. So, naturally, I made pear pizza with a spiced butternut caramel sauce.