Sourdough Pioneer Bread
Last month, I posted about my work on developing a formula for the Pioneer Bread recipe from the Kansas Wheat Commission.
http://chaosamongstthefloursandflowers.blogspot.com/2011/06/variation-on-pioneer-bread.html
Being quite pleased with my effort, I said that I'd get to work on a sourdough version of the same bread. After some work with my ADY yeast formula this past weekend, I baked that loaf and feel pretty good about it as well. I do concede that the slashing needs some work but I like the flavor, so does Mrs PG.
It turned out to be relatively stress free in that the most work was the flagrant calculator abuse to figure out my starter quantities. I have yet to master using a spread sheet.
I've indulged myself by posting some chatter about the loaf at my blog
http://chaosamongstthefloursandflowers.blogspot.com/2011/07/sourdough-pioneer-bread.html
I think the formula is fairly solid at this time and it may be one of my entries in the Leavenworth County Fair. Before I lock into that, I want to try using butter in place of the sunflower oil in the recipe. I have the most current version of the recipe in a seperate document that I can forward in either an .odf for Open Office users or a .pdf attachment for everyone that is interested in a copy. Just leave a message for me here at TFL and I'll send it along. Comments, humor, and questions are welcome.
Comments
Lovely looking batard, PG! Corn meal, rye, and wholewheat with a preferment.. must be a winner recipe.
Looks great and I agree with Khalid. That combination of flours must produce a great flavour. Nice crumb!
Syd
Thank you Mebake and Syd. The flavor is quite good, it stays with you after you finish eating. The crumb isn't bad for an enriched loaf. Two Tbs, or about 30g, of sunflower oil will do that I guess. I've been working on an Anadama bread formula and there are more similarities than differences between the two.
We can never have too many good recipes in our repertoire. Tomorrow will bring more work at the bench and in the flours to find better alchemy in the blend of flours.
I love where you're coming from with this loaf. And don't be too hard on yourself about the slashing, from the photo it looks like it filled in just right.
Marcus
Thank you Marcus. I've started thinking about going back to the three slash pattern that I used on the ADY yeast version of this bread. I'm trying not to overthink the issue but with so many good examples of loaves being posted here on TFL, I can't help but want to keep improving.