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Hi, everyone! It's almost time to start the Inside the Jewish Bakery challenge! 

We'll be baking nearly every recipe found in the wonderful "Inside the Jewish Bakery" by TFLs very own Stanley Ginsberg and Norman Berg. Not only will we get a chance to bake all the recipes -- we'll get to eat all the recipes! I can't wait!

Though my favorite bread to eat alone or with a dab of butter or cheese is French-style sourdough, there is nothing better than a good Jewish deli-style brunch, featuring bagels and rye bread.

Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François, the authors of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, swung through Portland a couple of weeks ago to promote their newest book, Artisan Pizza and Flatbread in Five Minutes a Day.  I was able to catch a few minutes of their time to chat about the new book.

You’ve heard that expression, right? It isn’t that it does it well – it’s that it does it at all.

In that vein, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about why we love the wheat from America’s Heartland. The gluten is strong and tolerant – mix it gently or intensively, it stands up.  Throw it in the retarder – it just gets stronger.  Put it in a poolish and let it go slightly over ripe – well, it won’t be perfection, but it will still make decent bread.  Shape it aggressively and it still holds together.

Thank you Chef Reinhart to a wonderful addition to the Cornbread world!

I think this version would be wonderful for stuffing!

The night before preparation

2 cups of buttermilk

1 cup of corn polenta grits Put both of these ingredients in a bowl and cover with plastic wrap and set aside at room temp.

The next day add dry ingredients into large bowl as follows:

1 3/4 cup of unbleached all purpose flour

1/4 tsp of baking soda

1 1/2 tab of baking powder

1 tsp salt

1/4 cup of granulated sugar

I had a *bunch* of extra rye starter after feeding this time, so I made a mostly-starter batch of sunflower and pumpkin seed rye inspired by PR's in BBA. I only added about 1.5 cups of hard red and white whole wheat total, the rest was 100% rye starter.

I have been tinkering with an oat and whole wheat english muffin loaf for quite a while. I used to make this recipe with AP flour but now we try to eat only whole grain baked goods. This is my latest tinker and I am quite happy with the results. I increased the water for a higher hydration loaf hoping to get bigger nooks and crannies to better simulate an english muffin. The recipe follows the pictures. Happy baking!

Hi fellow bakers and thanks for reading.