Blog posts

If ever there was a time to make a hearty rye...

When mom returns from a trip to Germany with an assortment of Brotgewuerz and mustard recipes (gotta love a mom who knows), I think that's a sign that I need to get back to some rye bread.  She whipped up a few test batches of mustard, all mouthwatering, some sinus clearing, so I baked up some crusty rye.

We took a final trip to South Haven, MI to the DeGrandchamps Farms for another 20 lbs of fresh blueberries yesterday.  I've been baking muffins, pies and generally eating a pound at a time of their delicious blueberries. 

This Whole Wheat and Whole Rye, was baked from Jeffrey Hamelman's BREAD under Soudough Rye section. It involves yeast in the final dough, with Rye sour as the flavour.

With all the work related to the NY Jewish Bakers book that seems to occupy my time I just wanted to drop a post on here and let y'all know that the oven is still running almost every day.

David had posted a new improved version of his famous SJ. sourdough. I had told him I would give it a try and post the results...it is amazing. That is the only word for it. I used my rye starter as a substitute for the levain build. It was so lively and I wanted to see how it would work. WOW is all I can say. I doubled the formula for 2 loaves. It filled the 5qt bucket overnight in the fridge. I then removed it and shaped in lined baskets for one hour. I preheated my cast iron for 30 min at 500.

This time, i used 50% bread flour with (12.9%) protein, and 50% Wholewheat Pastry Flour(11%) Protein. I also included in my soaker (Flax seeds, Whole Rye Berries, Whole BuckWheat, and Whole Sunf. Seeds).

I had to get rid of starters and Larry's post the other day was the inspiration I KNOW he meant it to be :) I had enough bubbly weekold starter and I added that to his measurements. I added a couple more splashes of water as my KA mixed since it seemed dry and I wanted it to really slap the bowl. All went perfectly. I used my Grandmother's old blue granite roaster to bake. I have another really large one also. I have not tried this but saw the post by another TFL member and decided to give it a shot. Perfect. HUGE oven spring.