Blog posts

Hi all,

This is a brief follow-up to my last post about Hamelman's whole-wheat pain au levain. I was very pleased with the creamy, light crumb of the loaf and wondered how an increase in whole-wheat flour would affect it. To gauge things, I decided to bake the whole-wheat levain from the same book, thereby doubling the whole-grain flour content.

After being fustrasted with my last few loaves I was reading over this site trying to find answers. I've been baking bread for a couple of years now with some really good results and some not so good!

Have you ever had the experience of searching for some one or something high and low?  We are in the dead of winter, but I am already thinking of spring.  A few years ago we were on our way to the jacaranda capital of Australia, Grafton, in the state of New South Wales, 300 km south of Brisbane.  Every October Grafton is as beautiful as April in Japan with its cherry blossoms.                

I have learned so much watching the entries from members of this community.  Now I feel emboldened  to join in.

Yesterday I baked my first challah, using the formula in TBBA.  I got a lovely to look at loaf, with a nice crumb, but I don't think much of the flavor.  Have other people using this recipe been pleased with the flavor?  Perhaps I did something wrong. 

I would love to post a picture of the challah.  How do I do that?

Does anyone have a yummy challah reccipe t share?

Leah

My son had put in his order for Indian food this weekend.  We have Indian food at home every now and then.  My kids' favourite combo is Tandoori chicken (marinated in yogurt, lemon and the usual tandoori spices the night before), Indian-style fried rice with cashew nuts and sultanas, poppadom, and mango chutney.  As it's only my son and myself for supper I didn't feel like cooking a big pot of rice - why not putting all the ingredients for the Indian rice into a bread?  A curry bread?  This is not a new idea.  I used

Today I was baking a couple of loaves and thought since I was going to be in the kitchen all day I may as well go ahead and do the first James J. MacGuire's Pain de Tradition loaf that was posted by Shiao-Ping.  The last one tasted so delicious.  This time I thought I would bake it the same as the last JJMG Tradition sourdough I made puting it in the Bell La Cloche..only this time I pre-heated my stones for 45 min.

Jacques Brel is alive and well and living in Paris.

Imagine you invested in a piece of art work but shortly after that the artist decided to go into retailing, sales, or anything totally unrelated to art - the value of your investment is down the drain! because there is no continuity in the creative force.  Or, consider a completely different scenario:  for 30 years you've enjoyed an artist, he has accompanied you from when you became a young adult, marriage, career, through till you retired, and has begun your second 50 years of life...  

I used my 2 day old biga on the loaf that is sliced.  The other boule is still a Scali experiment in the works!  Scali has become one of our favorite everyday breads.  The flavor is so delicious.   What the olive oil does to the crumb is so pretty and seems like you are eating buttery pastry and the sesame seeds just add more nutty toasty flavor...I don't know how else to discribe it.  Now I know why this is such a popular bread in New England Italian baking!  It's traditionally a 3 rope braid.  I like the shape boule's give for sliced bread so I