Blog posts

Yes, I've been baking regularly still, usually twice a week at least. Just been a bit lazy in posting the result lately.  :p  

 My first trial with Four Grain Blend flour  Richard (Ruralidle) kindly got for me from Little Salkeld Watermill, Cumbria, in Lake District.

This is baked from Hamelman's "BREAD", in levain section. It is naturally leavened, with 10% wholewheat or so. I increased the hydration from 68% to 78%, as i like a softer dough. everything went as scheduled, but i ended up in bed at 1:00 am! a chronic symptom of my late sourdough baking...!

Therefore, i thought of an idea, which is reducing the prefermented flour to 10% to allow 21 hours retarded bulk fermentation, and consequently allows me to continue baking next day without having to sleep late.

Two bits of personal info to share with the community.

* * *

The first is that this summer my family and I are moving to Vancouver, BC.

I took 60 g of rye berries and soaked them for 5 hours in water.  Then, taking a metal sheet tray, I moistened a paper towel and placed it on the tray and spread the berries over the paper towel.  I then took two paper towels, moistened them, placed them over the berries, covered the sheet pan with plastic wrap and covered the whole shebang with a kitchen towel..

The other night I cranked up the charcoal grill and smoked some nice juicy pork chops with some red beans for dinner.  I didn't want to waste what was left of the nice smokey fire so I roasted a bunch of yellow potatoes and what better use for them but in a bread.  I had some left over roasted corn so I figured I might as well make use of that as well.

Since I first got excited about bread, I have been dreaming of ways to use that love for bread for creating something worth sharing with the rest of the world. I have dreamed of opening my own bakery (not going to happen any time soon, but never say never). I have bought a bunch of domain names for starting a bread blog (such as BakerDad.com or 365breads.com to name two). But all the time, I wasn't quite sure what my thing should be. Well, I guess you can never be sure...

I love this cake, the crisp meringues, chewy chocolate ganache, fresh vanilla cream and strawberries work so well together.

I used the meringue recipe from the ‘Burke Street Bakery” book , I love this book. The cake I made was  28cm so it is quite large.

http://www.bourkestreetbakery.com.au/

Meringue

8 egg whites

500 grams caster sugar

2/3 teaspoon natural vanilla extract

2/3 teaspoon white vinegar

Hi

I haven't been able to bake any bread for a while as I have recently shifted house, and still in the process of unpacking. But I did have a quick go at the same simple recipe that can be found here.

The only difference with this loaf is that i managed to get some multi seed mix from the pick and mix at the local grocery store and added them in.

And here is how the loaf game out. Please let me know what you think.

Last night my husband and I made a faux-Thanksgiving meal (turkeys were on sale). We made stuffing from homemade-bread crutons. (Yes!) Anyway, I saved the potato water from when I prepared mashed potatoes, because I remembered it being called for in some bread recipes. Here's my question -- given that I have potato water and lots of fresh thyme, what can I bake with them? I also have a functioning sourdough starter (I've baked with it once!), and a modest assortment of kitchen staples.