The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

What's on deck for your weekend bake?

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

What's on deck for your weekend bake?

On deck for this weekend's bake:

Sourdough Noir (it sounds slinky...surely I'll fit in my pants next week, right?) - Bread made with Dutch process cocoa, and loaded with toasted pecans, dark chocolate chunks, and dried cherries. That one is by request of the Hubbin.

For me - a Treehugger Special. A "porridge sourdough", this one is made with sprouted spelt, whole wheat, and buckwheat flours & has Bob's Red Mill 10 grain cereal (cooked) worked into the dough plus a heavy helping of whole dry grains and seeds (wheat berries, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, millet, teff, amaranth...). Bubbling away on the counter.

BXMurphy's picture
BXMurphy

Hi, Runnerfemme!

Sourdough Noir. I need a cigarette after THAT! ;)

Dabrownman shared a recipe in the "Why is it always 500° F?" thread that I'm going to try this weekend.

I've been wanting to try a dark bread. This is a great weekend to mess around and I bet this will be a delicious thread to follow! :)

Murph

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

who says bread dough can't be sexy, right?!  Have fun with the rye.  I made a super fragrant rye about 3 weeks ago -- with fennel and caraway seeds, golden raisins, blackstrap molasses, and orange zest.  It was pretty dang good, if i do say so myself.

jimbtv's picture
jimbtv

Sourdough baguettes!

 

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

Those are a thing of beauty! I'm so intimidated by baguette...

Arjon's picture
Arjon

unless you're baking for sale and/or show. Outside of those situations, people seldom know enough about bread to judge yours against the same standard you do. For example, remember that the only baguettes a lot of people have ever had are the tasteless, small-crumbed ones the got from grocery chain stores. 

I don't bake baguettes very often and when I do, they're certainly not what I'd want to show here. However, I don't think I've ever taken them any place where I haven't subsequently been asked to bring them again. 

alfanso's picture
alfanso

No need to be intimidated by them.  You would have never made those beautiful chocolate batards which open so wonderfully had you been intimidated by them.  

If you don't start trying, you'll never know what you can do.  Trust me on the baguette thing.  From miserable first attempts to now, I know...

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

Thanks, alfanso and Arjon. I needed that shot in the arm!  

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

I just cooked Bob's Red Mill 10 grain cereal to mix in with a combo of dark rye, spelt, Kamut, multigrain, high extraction and unbleached flours. I am building up the starter now and will make the dough tomorrow with the intention of baking Sunday. I am making 4 loaves, 3 of which will go to the soup kitchen and one will probably end up with my daughter's  friends. I still have lots of bread in the freezer so I am not baking for us. 

ETA: Well, looks like we are going to camp with some friends so the mixing of the dough will happen Sunday with the bake on Monday. My starter will have to pull a DAB and sit in the fridge for a day.

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

Something about the horrible smell of bread baking that makes one want to puke:-)

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

Are you sure she isn't from Eugene, Oregon? (You have to have read FSWY to understand this!)

Lazy Loafer's picture
Lazy Loafer

Hahahaha!!!!!

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

Glad someone got it!

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

i get this joke and realize what a bread nerd i've become! :)

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

WHAT???

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Tom Cat's semolina filone.  Dough is bulk fermenting now.  Will bake around 8:00 a.m. tomorrow morning. Daughter is home from college and hasn't sampled this recipe yet. 

Lazy Loafer's picture
Lazy Loafer

Let's see. For tomorrow:

  • Pain au Levain - 8
  • Ale & Yeast - 6
  • Dark Ale & Yeast - 6
  • Cheese & Onion - 6
  • Many Seed sandwich loaf - 4
  • Bag End Levain - 4
  • Oatmeal Raisin - 2
  • 123 Veg bread (assorted) - 6
  • Miller's Bagels - 2 dozen

And for Sunday:

  • Country Blonde Levain - 9 (so far)

:)

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

I love reading what everyone is doing!  Lazy Loafer - suddenly my sourdough noir on the counter is..eh.  Cinnamon raisin is my all-time favorite cookie.  I need to make that loaf!  They all sound marvelous!

Lazy Loafer's picture
Lazy Loafer

Your Sourdough Noir sounds marvellous, not ... eh! You'd like the Oatmeal Raisin bread - it has rolled oats, wheat bran, oat bran, milk and honey, raisins and cinnamon. The ultimate comfort bread!

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Bread is in the oven now.  Should be ready for lunch!  :) 

Ru007's picture
Ru007

steel cut oat loaf in the fridge :) Going to be baked tomorrow. 

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Here it is.  It's lunch time! Creamy crumb, and it appears the dough was not fully degassed before forming.  1 hour bake at 400F on a stone no steam.   No changes to the formula.   Next time will try 10% less water.  It really is a slack dough. 

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

I'm to knock out all the big bubbles so as not to have big gaping holes in the final loaf but one wouldn't fully de-gas.

Nice loaf but I'm wondering why yours is more white while mine is more yellow when both are made from durum flour. 

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Lechem, the crumb is yellow, the same color as the durum flour.  The lighting and resultant photo weren't the best, giving an overly white appearance. 

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

Thought there was an issue with mine. I too can't get great colour photos like you see on this site. However I do rely on a tablet so not the best of cameras. 

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

I love knowing that all this delicious bread is being baked this weekend in all of your kitchens!  Here are pics of my Sourdough Noir and my Treehugger Special. Looking forward to a lazy day tomorrow starting off with buttery toast and strong coffee. :)

joc1954's picture
joc1954

Great loaves, I have to try them some time in the future.

Happy baking, Joze

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Beautiful looking loaves!

Started a poolish this morning for a bake tomorrow morning. It will be a mix of WW, whole rye, rye chops and whole spelt.  

 

The semolina loaf from yesterday will be gone by this afternoon.  :)

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

and really got yelled at for that but the red rye malt was worth it!

BXMurphy's picture
BXMurphy

:)

I, on the other hand, caved in to Mrs. Murphy's requests to take her to ALL THREE DAYS of the local Feast of the Three Saints in Lawrence, Mass., and DIDN'T get yelled at except for not moving quickly enough.

Yes, I'm spineless. No, I don't have bread. Yes, there's an amber-colored liquid to drown my manhood in.

Happy Labor Day!

Murph

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do! 

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

Murph, you crack me up!

nmygarden's picture
nmygarden

you gotta take one for the team.

joc1954's picture
joc1954

This weekend I was experimenting with raisin yeast water. The flour mixture is 10% WW, 5% whole rye and 85% bread flour. Bulk fermentation for 6 hours with 100g of preferment with YW and then retarded for 18 hours and baked directly from the fridge.  The results were quite good. The hydration was only 63%.

Happy baking, Joze

 

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

joc1954! That is some gorgeous bread! That crust is crackling and blistered and looks divine.  I'm new to bread baking and have not yet ventured into yeast water.  Beautiful results.

joc1954's picture
joc1954

I am baking now with SD for about 10 months. However, I was baking bread for a long time  with instant/fresh yeast. I tried to bake with sourdough starter about 9 years ago but at that time the bread was too sour for me so I just stopped using SD starter.

I am experimenting with the yeast water because I would like to use wild yeast and get only a slightly sour bread. This year I got 5 gold awards on different evaluations of bread and two bronze awards. The latter were not gold awards simply because the judges found my 100% kamut bread too sour - actually it was a normal SD but they were not used to taste kamut bread made with SD starter. I also found that lot of people don't like SD bread just because it is "sour" although my bread is really almost not sour. So all these facts drive me to run experiments how to make a perfect loaf with wild yeast and somehow preserve all benefits of SD. 

I am lucky because I have 4 grandchildren who like to eat my bread and like the true SD bread. But it is fine if one can really control the sourness of the bread and produce a bread according to the expectations of those, who will eat it.

Just yesterday while biking in the afternoon I got a very good idea which I have to test first before disclosing any details.

Happy baking, Joze

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

used in combination with SD it mutes the sour tang quite a bit since, throughout history, most people do not like sour bread and you can still get the keeping qualities of the SD with less sour taste.  Plus the remarkable spring of YW can really help open the crumb of heavy whole grain and rye  SD breads too.

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

Those are stunning loaves. I might have to give YW another shot. My previous efforts produced near bricks. I absolutely love the crumb on your loaves. It looks nice and tender. 

joc1954's picture
joc1954

Danni, thanks for your opinion. I am sure you have to give YW another try.

In last month I have prepared several YW: raisin, pears & plums, grapes (from my own garden), even tested YW one with sage and another with basil. Now my raisin yeast water is about 3-4 week old and stays in the fridge. I feed it with some honey and raisins approx every 2 weeks or when adding tap water after using it for baking. It is very active - when mixed with flour 1:1 triples in few hours. So for the above loaves I made a two stage levain from YW. First stage: 30g RYW and 30g bread flour. After tripling and having a lot off bubbles I added another 70g of bread flour and 70g of tap water and about 2 hours later I mixed the dough. 30 minutes autolyze, 6 hours of bulk fermentation with S&F every 40 minutes during first 4 hours (dough temp about 27dC), then just waiting until the dough almost doubled (actually I was sleeping), preshape, bench rest for 20 minutes, final shape, immediate retardation for 18 hours, baking straight from fridge like any other SD.  

The hydration was quite low because the dough with YW is quite wet/slack, much different than SD at same hydration. I still have to find the right hydration for my type of flour (European one). Next time I will try 5% higher hydration.

Happy baking, Joze

joc1954's picture
joc1954

Danni, thanks for your opinion. I am sure you have to give another try to YW.

In last month I have prepared several YW: raisin, pears & plums, grapes (from my own garden), even one with sage and basil. Now my raisin yeast water is about 3-4 week old and stays in the fridge. I feed it with some honey and raisins approx every 2 weeks. It is very active - when mixed with flour 1:1 triples in few hours. So for the above loaves I made a two stage levain from YW. First stage: 30g RYW and 30g bread flour. After tripling and having a lot off bubbles I added another 70g of bread flour and 70g of tap water and about 2 hours later I mixed the dough. 30 minutes autolyze, 6 hours of bulk fermentation with S&F every 40 minutes during first 4 hours (dough temp about 27dC), then just waiting until the dough almost doubled (actually I was sleeping), preshape, bench rest for 20 minutes, final shape, immediate retardation for 18 hours, baking straight from fridge like any other SD.  

The hydration was quite low because the dough with YW is quite wet/slack, much different than SD at same hydration. I still have to find the right hydration for my type of flour (European one). Next time I will try 5% higher hydration.

Happy baking, Joze

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Dough is in the fridge and getting stretched+folded every now and again.  Whole wheat, whole spelt, whole rye, rye chops and a little AP.  Will add some flax, sunflower and sesame seeds.  It's a good breakfast bread, and very good toasted.  Thick slice of course with Irish butter.

 

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

My loaves are in the fridge too but they are proofing. Baking them in the morning. 

nmygarden's picture
nmygarden

It has been a pantry-clearing weekend - targeting odds and ends of flours, grains, whatevers. Will try to blog about it. First up was a YW bread put together over a span of several work days, counting on slow fermentation, much of it in the refrigerator, a combo of flours, about 50% WW and spelt, 50% AP, with some toasted pistachios. It was, alas, somewhat overproofed, so a bit slack, but a decent crumb and will be fine toasted.

Next up was a 1-2.25-3, again with more than 50% whole grains, WW, Spelt and BF (hence the extra liquid) polenta and tricolor quinoa (both dry), and with molasses added during the autolyse. I added even more water as I mixed in the salt and starter - very thirsty grains. Bulk fermented on the counter for several hours and then the refrigerator overnight. Baked as oversize rolls and brushed with milk, to keep the crusts soft. We had some at dinner - soft, moist, caramel-colored crumb speckled with quinoa and polenta. Quite satisfying, I'd like to make these again.

And in the refrigerator now, a 'white' bread, only a third WW (but Sonora, a white wheat), the remainder AP, plus a heaping handful of multigrain hot cereal (wheat, rye, oats, barley, triticale and flax), added to the autolyse. Ground hazelnuts and dried apricots (hydrated and chopped) were added during stretch and folds. The levain liquid was milk, as was part of the dough liquid, so I'm hoping for a soft crumb. Smells good and well-developed. We'll see how the bake goes tomorrow.

So, my hands have been busy, I tried some interesting combinations, and the freezer is getting stocked. And I can easily justify restocking supplies. Yea! Enjoy the rest of your weekend and your baking!

Cathy

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

Well, things turned out not too bad. Loaves look pretty good considering the grief they gave me during shaping.

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Nice looking loaves!

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

These are so beautiful. Well done!

nmygarden's picture
nmygarden

Love the basket marks!

Cathy

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

Whole spelt, whole rye and rye chops with a poolish made of AP and WW, using Tom Cat's semolina Filone formula.  Sunflower, flax and sesame seeds added.  1hr 15 minute bake at 405F, rested 8 hrs before slicing. 

 

This formula is robust and works with many different grains.  Dough handling was very good and stretching+folding generated a nice firmness in the dough. Poolish developed for 12 hours at room temp, bulk fermentation was 12 hours refrigerated and final proof was 1 hour warm and moist. 

 

The last hurrah for my holiday weekend baking and cooking!  :)

 

p.s. Apologies for the rotated photos.  Others seem to have the same problem.  This is the only site where I experience such a thing. 

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

Love how your scoring opened up! Must taste great!

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

Your bread looks so tasty--I love the texture and the scoring.  Beauties!

Lazy Loafer's picture
Lazy Loafer

How about a bevy of Blondes, for Sunday? Gave me a chance to test a full load in the new bread rising forms, and I must report, they performed well! Nothing seems to stick to the bamboo placemats, even though in this instance I forgot to flour them. They hold my full-sized 750 gram loaves just fine too. I have to use the dining room table though, as all the kitchen counter space is already full. :)

More 123 bread on the go tonight / tomorrow...

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

They look wonderful!  Those forms are fantastic too.  Made or bought?  I noticed the bamboo placemats in another photo.  That's ingenious.

semolina_man's picture
semolina_man

G looking loaves lazy.  I'll be they would be good with smoked turkey and Emmentaler!

Runnerfemme's picture
Runnerfemme

smoked turkey and emmentaler. Dang, yum! :)