Well, actually, I do love my new job. It's not as boring as the previous one and so much better than studying @ uni (at least my uni). But it has like two major drawbacks: firstly, we are not allowed to wear jeans in the office, and the second, which is really depressing - I have practically no time to bake bread!!!
This is baked from Hamelman's "BREAD", levain breads.
I knew that the radiant heat from a preheated stone will result in an unmatched ovenspring, so i played with my steaming technique a bit to accomodate the stones.
Here is a picture:
This was my bread project last weekend. I really enjoyed making it and it was delicious! I slightly modified the recipe found here. I didn’t do the sponge; I added the sponge measurements to the dough ingredients and halved it. Next time I will omit the red pepper from the herb & cheese mixture (the following includes the adjustment). Here is what I did:
Dough:
2 ½ tsp. Fleischmann's RapidRise yeast
3 - 4 ¼ cups all purpose flour
1 tsp fine sea salt
1 tsp black pepper
http://www.brightbakes.wordpress.com
The latest bake...I used an overnight starter with a pinch of SD, then finished off the dough the next day. Nothing complicated, but this sure was tasty!
Love,
cathy b. @ brightbakes
I have been attempting to begin a sourdough starter. I have tried a few methods from the internet as well as the guru Reinhart's, and the old man Clavel's method. I have been successful up until day three, then nothing. I have gotten my starter to the point of bubbling and regular feedings, but as soon as I take half to replace the new barm the whole thing separates into goo and hooch and goes slack. I have tried to "wake" the starter with small amounts of flour and water. I have even tried cider vinegar, but to no avail. I can't seem to keep the starter alive.
To give my old KitchenAid a break I normally prepare two smaller batches of dough in a row, instead of one large batch. Unfortunately I forgot to account for the flour of the sourdough starter and adjust the flour of the first batch accordingly. No problem lets adjust the water with the second batch. What a stupid idea!! But with the slap and fold method of Bertinet (http://www.gourmet.com/magazine/video/2008/03/bertinet_sweetdough) I was able to get myself out of trouble and the result was pretty good.
After reading this article by Dmsnyder, I decided to give Pat(proth5)'s formula a go. This formula bases the opening of the crumb solely on technique, instead of higher hydration. By the way, I would love to read the initial post by Proth5, if anyone can find it and share the link. I was not able to find it via search.
Here is the suggested formula...
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