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Sourdough photos:

Yum.

I had an unmitigated success with my sourdough starter today. Two round loaves of something resembling my rustic bread but with my starter instead of yeast.

I pulled the starter out and started feeding it every 12 hours beginning Thursday evening. During that time I kept it in my oven with the light on so that it was in a 80 to 90 degree environment. It seems to require that: without it, I don't even get a doubling in 24 hours. With it I get nearly a tripling in size in about 8 hours. We must keep our house too cold.

I made my final dough Saturday night and placed it in "the cold room," a poorly insulated room in our house that stays between 45 and 50 degrees this time of year. In the morning I gave it a fold and put it in the oven with the light on again to take the chill off. Gave it two hours, folded, two hours more, then shaped them. After a three and a half hour final rise I baked them. Amazing how much pop sourdough loaves get in the oven. They came out great.

Thanks for all of the advice and encouragement everyone, particularly Sourdolady. The continued effort paid off.

This recipe comes from "Home Baking-The Artful Mix of Flour and Tradition Around the World" by Alford and Duguid. I don't know if this book is known on this board as I recently got involved with this site. It is available from chapters.ca and is well worth it. They have 3 excellent books that have 3 of my passions-food, travel, and photography.This is not the speediest bread to make,but it is great.

Portugese Mountain Rye

Poolish 1/2 cup warm water tiny pinch of yeast 1/2 cup unbleached flour

Give the poolish 24 hours at least.

Starter All of the poolish 1 cup water 2 cups dark rye flour Stir the water into the poolish and then add the flour. Mix well. I use a wisk to aerate it. Let it sit loosely covered overnight on the counter.

Bread

Next day, add 3 cups warm water to the starter and mix well in a large bowl. Sometimes, I just use my hands at this point, as it can be pretty tough using a spoon. I take a couple of cups of this mixture as a starter for my next batch. Keep it covered in the fridge and it lasts for a long time.

Add another 1 cup of water to the bowl and 4 tsp salt.Mix. Add 2-3 cups flour to this and add a touch more if you need it. It should still be sticky, but not goopy.

Here is the hard part for me. Knead it for 10 minutes-set the timer, no cheating here. It really does make a difference! You'll need to add more flour as you go, at least one cup, but add slowly.It should still have a definite stickiness if you want to get any rise.

Put the dough into a slightly oiled bowl and make sure it is evenly coated. Wrap it in plastc and set it into the fridge overnight.

Next morning, form 2 boules and let them come to room temperature, then let them rise, covered. They should not double, but maybe 40%. I'm always surprised how long this takes, so be patient as it'll take 4-6 hours at least. You may be able to speed this up by putting it in the oven with the light on, but I've never tried.

Make a few slashes before baking at 500 for 15 min, then 45-50 at 425. I rotate them at least once. The internal temp will be around 205 and the loaves will have a definite thump. Cool on racks-the first piece is a moment of heaven.

Continuing my bread exploration, i decided to try the Sweedish Rye aka Limpa recipe in the BBA.
The loaf was too big to fit in my rather..too small oven, so the loaf look like a snake tht've swallowed too many chickens. In fact, one end was falling a bit from my baking sheet (covered all of it in the photo though) :P.

I reduced the sugar content and used blackstrapp molasses instead. I regretted it. I should have added more sugar.
However, a touch of caraway seeds was added besides the other spices. That went well.

With the site turning one year old, I decided it was time to finally put together an article on French Bread. Regular readers probably have noticed that while I bake some kind of French Bread (rustic bread, pan sur poolish, etc.) almost every week, I've yet to do an article on it. It isn't because I haven't wanted to, I just haven't thought I was good enough at it to offer any advice.

Well, I'm still not great, but after a year of baking and chatting with folks here I have gotten better, good enough that I feel like it isn't presumptuous to offer some advice to newbies, particularly if they are offered in the grain of "Don't make the same mistakes I did. Because, believe me, I've made some doozies."

Initially I thought it'd be a short piece, but as I started writing I realized it is going to be longer. I was going to write them all and then drop them here with a big "tah dah!," but then I thought it'd make more sense to open them up for scrutiny to other community members. After all, probably a majority of the tricks I've learned I've learned from folks here.

So here is what I've got so far. The other tips will follow as I write them up the next few days. Please, add comments to offer advice, suggestions, corrections, criticisms, whatever tickles your fancy.

Once all of the tips have been written up and your suggestions and corrections have been incorporated into the text, I'll publish this article to the front page of the site. I think it'll be a good one, and I'm looking forward to hearing people's comments. I'd love to see this one be more of a collaborative effort.

Done some bread baking this past Sunday. Was fun getting the ole fingers into the dough.

The first bread was two loaves of 100% Whole-wheat Bread. I used the recipe from Laurel's bread book. It is called "A Loaf To Learn". I have made it several times. And it usually turns out rather good. Especially after I found Wheat Montana brand whole-wheat bread flour at the local Wal-Mart.

A wonderful whole wheat flour that is high-gluten as well as chemical-free. It will definetly be used in my bakery. All the loaves I have baked with it so far have had a good taste as well as a good rise.

I also baked two loaves of Jeffrey Hamelman's "Semolina (Durum) Bread". Tastes good. Especially warm with butter spread on it. Makes good toast. May have to try it out in my French Toast recipe. Has a nice golden color. Made me wonder how semolina flour would do in my Challah bread.

The last two loaves I made were "Sourdough Wheat with Assorted Grains". Used a little bit of my brain power and came up with the recipe myself. Both loaves went out of the house this evening (Tue.) so I didn't get a chance to taste it. Guess I will find out how they came out after the individuals let me know.

I used flax seed, rolled oats, cracked wheat and rye, and toasted wheat germ for my grains. The sourdough starter I used was my rye based, San Francisco sourdough starter. Thanks BM from SF. I did use bread flour in this recipe as well as whole grain wheat flour. Montana of course.

What made this recipe especially gratifying for me was that I came up with the recipe myself. And the fact that it turned out with a great crumb structure. It also raised well despite the fact that I used the "no-knead" technique. Seems that by the time I got all the ingredients together, it was too much for my KA 4.5 qt. stand mixer. I might work a little more on this technique of bread building and use it in my bakery. To me, it seems to go hand in hand with the artisan way of bread building. Like sourdough. And the length of fermentation time lends itself to sourdough breads. Definetly don't want to use instant yeast with the no-knead method.

I was going to let it sit in the refrigerator overnight. But I wasn't sure of what the next day held in store. So I stayed up late and baked it.

Guess I need to get a digital camera so I can take pictures. Then I can look back and check my progress. Would help me refine my bread building.

Til next time, L'Lechem -- To Bread.

What better title for my first blog than a turn of the phrase from that classic book by Betty MacDonald, The Egg and I? Usually if I want something catchy I have to borrow from someone brighter than myself.

A little introduction, I am Teresa and I live in North Carolina, which is a Southern state in the US. Among the things that I am, I am a bread maker. I'm also a mom, sister, daughter, friend and quilter. I started making bread in earnest about 30 years ago when I used the very basic of tools, a bowl, wooden spoon, measuring cups and spoons, and my hands. I've taught bread classes in my home, to 4H groups, as my job in a retail gourmet store, and I'm not yet tired of making bread.

Through the years I've tried many different kinds of breads from simple daily loaves to challah, hoska, brioche, stollen, focaccia, rolls, English muffins, pizza, sweet breads, and whole grain breads. These days I mostly bake grain breads using the 5, 7, 8, 9, and 10 grain cereals. I guess I want the biggest nutritional bang from my bread. Two years ago I sent off for the Oregon Trail Sourdough Starter maintained by the Carl's Friends group of bakers. Finally, success with Sourdough! Now that my starter has some age on it, it is getting a nice sour twang that I can be proud of.

With the help of the fine people at Pizzamaking.com I am working on perfecting my pizza dough. This past year I practiced on the New York-style and making a sauce that consistently suited my taste. Quarry tiles line my lowest oven rack for baking pizza and I use my wood peel (with the help of parchment paper) to transfer the pizza from the counter to the baking tiles.

I bake bread just about every weekend and other times when I have time off from my job. As an Event Coordinator at a textile company, I have the pleasure to plan business lunches and special events for many people. They know I'll always try to feed them well! Like most bakers, I share the breads I make with many co-workers, my family and my friends. I could not possibly eat all the bread I make - could you?

Bread making is such a satisfying pursuit. While I'm mixing and kneading I think about all those bread makers who came before me, the farm wife on the prairie during the Depression, the housewives in small hometowns during the 50's, hippies in communes during the 60's, and men, women, and children everywhere who have experienced the magic of making a loaf of bread, then shared it, still warm from the oven, with another person.

I will plan to make entries here as I proceed with my bread making. And now, I can post photos of my results as well.

T.

For a pot luck at church last weekend, I followed the 'Casatiello' recipe in the BBA.

It was rich and very cheesy, and the crust was flaky.

Also made the Tuscan Bread recipe. But i think too much flour paste and water made the inside a lil sticky and it became a rustic dough..and somehow, the gluten didn't develop right. Anyone experience that too?
But the flour paste made the bread naturally sweet!
Nevertheless, good with a stew.. :)

I've been meaning to mention that this site is one year old now. Check out the first post.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed and participated in the discussions.

May your bread always rise!

This weekend:

• Banana bread: good, as always. I haven't baked it since the holidays began. Nice to have again.


• Sourdough batch #1: refrigerated overnight. Great flavor, but too dense. About like a bagel. I still ate two-thirds of the loaf.


• French bread: Awesome. Perfect with the pot of soup I made on a cold, damp day. Pictures and more info to come.


• Sourdough batch #2: I thought I did everything right, but instead of springing in the oven it just sat there. Came out with the consistency of mochi, so I just tossed it. I'm not sure if I used too much starter or too little. Shrug. I'm still getting the hang of it.