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Hey All,

Just wanted to share with you some baguettes that I made last night...  Nothing fancy, but I think they turned out pretty nice except for the slightly burnt bottom on a few of them...  These are 65% hydration using a firm 60% hydration sourdough starter and active dry yeast...  I think it's a variation on Eric Kaiser's Baguette Monge, but using American flours, and a firm sourdough starter instead of a liquid one...  It's probably closer to Dominique Saibron's baguettes that do use the firm sourdough starter... 

Yesterday was a milestone in my Bread Baking quest. The seemingly defiant Wholewheat has been brought to its Knees, Well at least to me.

This was a 100% Whole Wheat Sourdough Boule i Baked yesterday. Constituted of 100% White Whole Wheat flour i milled, and baked under stainless steel bowl on a stone. It is very mildly sour, and very tender and creamy/ nutty somewhat moist crumb.

Credit and props go to:  thefreshloaf.com, and its members: David (dmsnyder), and ShiaoPing (ShiaoPing), for enlightening me on the stretch and fold method.

Inspired by Shiao-Ping's Miche, Pointe-à-Callière from mid-January, and by the excellent efforts of other bakers here, I decided to try my own hand at this loaf.  My wife requested some loaves for her sister's birthday coming up soon, and it seemed a good opportunity to try this.  I have never had Hamelman's book in hand, and have not baked this loaf before, so I followed Shiao-Ping's excellent instructions for this bake.

When I first baked bread back in the late '70's, one of my favorites was the “Pane all'Olio” or “Mantovana Bread” from Marcella Hazan's “More Classic Italian Cooking.” Even then, Hazan referred to this bread as one that “used to be common” in Northern Italy. I have no idea how common it is today. Perhaps Giovanni (JoeV on TFL) can tell us.

After reading this site (and many others) for some time, I have read and learned many tricks and tips from fantastic bakers on how to make a better loaf.  My goal is to just keep improving and making my loaves a little better each time.  I don't really make them for anyone in particular.  My wife will have a piece once in a while but I usually make bread for myself.  I think I've achieved a pretty consistent recipe that yields a fairly consistent loaf, and I would like to use this blog spot to discuss the different cooking vessels for baking the bread.  Although the

I was so happy when my 1 starter white bread came out nice. Tomorrow I will share with everyone at work. My husband had some and said it was very good. I can't get my pictures to work or I would show you. I love the pictures everyone send in by the way.

Here's a Rustic Italian Round I baked today using straight dough method with 15% levain added.

Bakers share recipes on knead-to-know basis.

I'm fighting a nasty cold. I don't have the snowstorm excuse to stay shut in and bake bread, so ... whatever. 

I baked the San Francisco Sourdough from Michel Suas' "Advanced Bread & Pastry" again. Delicious, and not at all aggressively sour.