Blog posts

Coconut Yeast Water Challah

Profile picture for user Isand66

I have wanted to try my hand at a Challah made with a Yeast Water starter for a while so I decided to give it a try this weekend.  Naturally I needed to change it up a bit more and added some shredded coconut and used coconut water in place of the liquid.

Proof of starter

Profile picture for user Floydm

Not the prettiest loaf I've ever made but proof that my new starter is indeed alive. 

* * *

In other news, I just can't wrap my head around it being Thanksgiving here in Canada Monday.  It feels too early in the season for pumpkin pie and turkey.  I think we're going to have a mini-Thanksgiving with some friends here Monday and then celebrate again with family members from the states six weeks from now.  Will I bake?  We shall see.

-Floyd

Quarter sponge (first take) - or the Wonder(s of )Bread

Profile picture for user Juergen Krauss

I wanted to make some bread according to the Quarter Sponge Method as outlined by Elizabeth David / Walter Banfield ever since I came across it more than a year ago.

The details are intriguing: A standard metod used to make "Batch Bread" in Scotland well into the thirties, it uses a long fermentation process and a minimal amount of yeast. A sachet of yeast will make about 30Kg of bread!

The result of my first bake: As close to shop bought sandwich bread as one can get - just with flour, water, salt, yeast and a 16 hour fermentation!

Here some pictures; details follow.

Is my starter doing okay? Am I ready to bake?

Toast

After a recent failed attempt to make Tartine's basic country loaf, I decided to change up my starter.

I now feed 50 grams of starter 50 g water + 50 g flour. I feed it every 12 hours. (On a related note, this seems a little too fussy. Do I really need to do this all the time?)

I store it in a glass pint jar on the top of my fridge. I keep it screwed shut.

The starter shows strong bubbling activity, though I can't get it to double in size. It maybe -just maybe - gets to be a third larger in a 12-hour span.