The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

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timtune's picture
timtune

Just a few days ago, i decided to try Pete Reinhart's Pane Siciliano. It's been a long time since i've wanted to try this..

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Wished i'd shape it better though.
But the semolina adds something nice to it :)!

Anybody tried Pane di Altamura before? Is it 100% durum flour bread?

Joe Fisher's picture
Joe Fisher

It's still easy to cut yourself while slicing bread. Yesterday, when halving one of my Pane a l'Ancienne from TBBA, I put my hand on top of the loaf, and sliced along the side, like I always do. It removes the possibility of getting the knife in the palm of my hand. Instead, the knife skipped on the (beautiful) crust and right into the pad of my middle finger.
I managed to keep the blood off the bread! :) And boy, was there a lot of blood.
I served it at a friend's party, and it was the talk of the room. Nothing trumps fresh bread!

-Joe

KazaKhan's picture
KazaKhan

I started out on Saturday morning creating a fresh starter using 75% water to flour.

I moved on to a lunch loaf and a couple of baguettes.
Lunch Loaf & BaguettesCrumb

On Sunday it was a four strand platt, a lunch loaf and a couple more baguettes, however when proofing the platt dropped on to the baguettes. One baguette survived and the other was put aside to use for pizza later on in the day. The little bread roll was by my two year old daughter. I forgot to take a photo of the finished platt, I took it to my parents place to eat while watching some football it only lasted 15 minutes. I also forgot to take a photo of the finished pizzas, they were thoroughly enjoyed as well :-)
Four Strand PlattLunch Loaf & BaguetteDead BaguettePizza Base

I also added some malt to my starter in the morning which resulted in quite a lot of activity by the afternoon. (Images deleted...)
I suppose it doesn't look like much but I spent all weekend making and eating bread...

Teresa_in_nc's picture
Teresa_in_nc

Today is Saturday, a bread baking day: I've made a batch of Low Fat Bran Muffins with apples, raisins, oat bran and All Bran cereal and later today I will be making a whole wheat recipe as a tester for author, Peter Reinhart. Perhaps I will start Floyd's Pain Sur Poolish later today and finish it up tomorrow. So many breads....so little time.

Recently I received a copy of Elizabeth David's English Bread and Yeast Cookery. This is a book that I have wanted for a long time, but it may now be out of print. I was thrilled when an internet forum friend found a paperback copy on Ebay.

I'm now making my way through this fascinating book of history, investigation, and comment about all aspects of bread cookery. I've read about grains, milling, yeast, salt, other ingredients, bread ovens and am now up to bread factories. The recipes are in the second section of the book. First published in 1977, this book is universally acclaimed to be a major source of information on the subject of English bread and yeast baking. Mrs. David died in 1992.

This book is recommended to all the bakers here that want to learn more about the history of bread making.

timtune's picture
timtune

Just to update my blog,

I recently made 2 kinds of breads. First was a barley stout bread (malt syrup, rye, wheat, barley grains and ...Stout! :) ). Nice aroma with a slightly taste.

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The other is a maneesh zatar (in the front) and pitas.

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The zatar spice blend adds a wonderful aroma. Mmmm

Floydm's picture
Floydm

Sorry to anyone who tried coming by this evening. While applying a security patch to the site I made a configuration error. The site was quite unhappy for about 15 minutes. It should all be back now.

Floydm's picture
Floydm

I've been gobbling up The Handmade Loaf. Great book. A pity it is so hard to find in the states.

I'm too tired to post any recipes or articles tonight, though I will again soon. I'm long overdue. For now, a roll call of things I baked this weekend:

cinnamon buns Cinnamon Buns - an amalgam of recipes.

flax seed bread Flax Seed Bread - from Dan Lepard's book. He calls it Linseed Wheat Bread, I believe. So good I made a second batch. It looks like a yam, no?

barm bread Barm Bread - another Dan Lepard recipe. Bottle conditioned beer mixed with a bit of levain. I used a combination of white, whole wheat, barley, and rye flours. Not one I'm overjoyed by, but a worthwhile baking experiment.

barm bread My pain sur poolish and the flax bread being oogled by the littlest one.

KNEADLESS's picture
KNEADLESS

In the summer I live in the Chicago area but I spend seven months of the year in Fort Myers, FL. Down here I greatly miss the great Asiago bread made by Panera (formerly St Louis bread company.) Nobody makes it in this area, so I thought I would give it a try. I was sort of on my own, because I couldn't find a recipe.

I chopped up 2 1/2 oz. of the cheese in a mini blender. I used three cups of flour and followed exactly Floyd's lesson number five for making french bread. I used 1/2 tsp. of dry yeast (bulk from Costco which I keep in the freezer) in the starter and 1/2 tsp. more in the mix. I made the wettest batch I have tried so far. It almost poured like a cake batter.

I didn't put the cheese in the mixer, I incorporated it by spreading some over the surfaces during folding. I put the loaf in a long french bread pan like the one sold by King Arthur for $20.00, but which I bought at a kitchen store in a Tanger outlet mall for $3.00.

When I shaped the roll it was about 2" in diameter. After a 60 min. rise and with the jump, it was over 5" in diameter. With a 500 start, then 450 oven it was done in 15 minutes. It was very light with large holes and a thin crisp crust. Perfect.

The flavor was very good. Next time I will use perhaps another ounce of the cheese to get a little sharper flavor.

Joe Fisher's picture
Joe Fisher

So last night I was thinking to myself, "I'd like to make some sourdough this weekend. Tomorrow morning I'll take out some of my ripe chef and make a starter with it. It can activate while I'm at work."
This morning, I went into the fridge, grabbed my tub of chef. Grabbed the scale and a spatula, took out the stone ground rye.
Then I walked over to the garbage can and dumped half of the chef.
Then I stared at the chef I had just discarded.
*sigh* Stupid auto-pilot.

-Joe

timtune's picture
timtune

My 2nd attempt at a 100% sourdough rye bread. :)Finally turned out better!!
Made with wholemeal rye and chopped rye grains. Aromatic and sour..

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Would increase the hydration next time to obtain a more open crumb...if possible.

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