jackal10

I'm excited for you too...bread virginity... The dough will need a total proof time from mixing to bake of about 4 hours. Overnight in the fridge is roughly equivalent to 2 hours warm, pretty well regardless of how long you leave in in the fridge (above say 4 hours in the fridge, and up to a few days) since it goes on proving a bit while it cools down. Thus you can mix, prove for 4 hours, then bake directly; or mix, prove the dough for 2 hours, refrigerate until ready, then bake from cold. I suggested this latter since it might suit your breakfast schedule better, and the cold dough is easier to handle.

I'd give it a few hours more, if you can (I don't know what time it is there). Up to 24 hours is OK. Bear in mind that you will need 2 hours after mixing the dough, so you might want to leave it until the morning. Alternatively leve it a few hours then put it in the fridge (covered) until you are ready for the next step. Then take it out an let it warm up for a few hours in the morning. The great advantage of refrigeration is that you can do it when it suits you, rather than the other way round.

Mother looks fine. I'd start the preferment. After all itd only 100g of flour if it doesn't work, but I expect it will...may need to leave the preferment for 24 hours, but see how it looks.

I just made a coarse ground 100% wholemeal loaf, (including a wholemeal preferment) that I was pretty happy with. It used 50% of the total flour as preferment, that is the dough step has 200% preferment. Overall hydration was about 80%. Proof time was, of course much shorter - about half. Good wheaty flavour and crumb texture.

I have, slightly by accident a spere copy of both Volume 1 and 2 of Machlin "The Classic Cuisine of the Italian Jews" (Giro Press about 1993). I think I paid about $30 each. Happy to pass them on to a good home In it she descibes sfogliettiPassover Pasta, amde from passover flour (same flour used to make Matzo), and baked as soon as mixed, a bit like matzo

I like to add a demi-tasse of strong coffee

Hmm...maybe the starter is not yet fully active. No worries, just give the preferment a few more hours, if you can. and refresh the starter (throw out half, add another 100gm flour and 100gm water0, leave out (ideally 30C but room temperature will do) for 24 hours. Actually this part of England has less rain than the Negev, and people are seriously worrying about a drought this summer.

You might mean oy vey zmir (the reflexive form - sort of "woe is me"), or even oy gvalt! (roughly "what have I done?") Yes I am worried. I don't think there is a skin on the starter, I assume it was covered. I just hope its bubbly and active...

oh dear, oh dear. Your bread recipe is not too bad. Quite a lot of starter and that will make it fairly sour. Lets do the sums: Assuming your starter is roughly equal weights of flour and water (you refresh it with 300gm flour and 300gm water) All bread formulas use Baker's pecentages, that is relative to the total weight of flour. Total flour is 1Kg + 250g =1250g (from starter) Total water is 650g+250g= 900g or 72% hydration. That is a wettish dough, as you found. Cutting the water back to 560g will give you a 65% hydrated dough which will be much easier to handle. Salt is 2% which is OK The dough will need support while rising, for example in a banneton (cloth lined basket). If your starter is active it will take around 3 hours to rise with that much starter. More worrying is that your starter doesn't seem to be very active. I guess either start again -100g plain flour and 100g water, maybe a little malt or rye, and leave for 4 days, stirring every day until its really bubbly. You can hasten the process by taking 10ml of your current starter, which will have some activity. You will then need to refresh it a couple of times - take 10g of that and mix with 100g each of flour and water and leave 24 hours at 30C etc.. Alternatively pm me your snail mail and I'll post some starter.

Thats great, but is it white or brown/wholemeal flour?

Not that it matters, but you will get better texture for baguettes if you use ordinary white not strong flour. T55 (french) T550(german) or 9% protein (UK) AP (US). Organic ideally and check the small print for additives. There should not be any, but bread flour often has Vitamic C and malt or amylose enzymes added to it. They won't hurt, but may need to adjust timings if they are present, and not add extra Vitamin in the dough step if its already there..

I find sourdough a lot more forgiving than commercial yeast, partly because everything happens more slowly

Long time low temperature (140F/55C bottom oven of the AGA) for 6 hours, then flash the skin (250C/500F) for 10 mins

Not only will you have Sunchokes (same family as sunflowers btw), you will have them forever - you can't dig them all out. Google maps also shows my house http://www.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=c...005524,0.020428 Annoyingly they have spelt the village name as Cladecote instead of Caldecote... Its the house at the top of the picture. If you zoom in you can see the vegetable plot, the green house and the fruit cage along the East boundary...

So long as you use unbleached or not bromated white wheat flour it will work fine - the bleaching process kills the natural yeasts and lactobacilla. Might take 4 days or so to get going, and, like all new starters, a month or so of regular feedings to get it stable and up to strength. Temperature is important - keep it around 30C/90F to select the right bugs.

So far: Eating the last of the leeks and overwintered rainbow chard In the UK spring is late, cold and wet. Still getting frosts Sown outside: Broad (fava) beans; Peas (purple podded) Probably plant seed potatos (arran pilot, and purple) this weekend Overwintered garlic is showing Moved the cardoons to make way for a new Asparagus bed (Purple Pacific) Inside: Tomatoes (Sungold, Gardeners Delight, Brandywine) Chillis: Thai Dragon, Prarie Fire (ornamental as well) Lettuce: Winter Density, Buttercrunch, Lollo Rosso Basils Cleaned up the strawberry bed and the raspberries.

Fitzbillies Chelsea Buns, the best cinnamon sticky buns in the world. I don't know how they get the dough so fine. http://www.fitzbillies.co.uk/v2/index.php

Great post. However the yeasts and bacteria that live on apple peels are different from those that eat flour (or rather degrade the starch in flour to sugars for the yeast). The natural fructose in the apple peel will give an initial fizz and false start, but then the starter will appear to get less active while the flour bugs take over, if they can. You then have to keep refreshing your starter until all the apple junk drops out. You might like to to try instead (or as well) to make a starter with equal weights of flour and water, and a little rye flour if you like, and leave it at about 30C/90F. When it begins to bubble in a day or two take throw out two thirds and replace it with and equal weight of fresh flour and water and leave for another day or so at the same temperature. This process reduces the acidity and waste by products that would otherwise inhibit the yeast. It should then be lively. Refresh a couple more times, if you like, and its ready to bake. Happy to send some of mine if you like.

Traditionally dried and used as tinder

That is a fine looking loaf McDuff. Note the thinness of he cell walls

As Dan says, its a complex story, and dough is a complicated system. On the one hand reactions are going on to develop the gluten into thin cross-linked structures, while at the same time other reactions and enzymes, such as protease's are weakening the structure. Crumb texture comes from a whole series of factors, of which the amount of gluten is just one. Others include hydration, and most importantly the mechanical work and gas nuclei present after mixing. I only have anecdotal rather than scientific evidence. In my subjective view more gluten allows you to work with a higher hydrated dough, which usually, but not necessarily means bigger holes. However that gluten has to go somewhere, so you get either a finer grained crumb or thicker cell walls. Effectively it means the loaf might rises higher than a lower gluten loaf, but with finer cell texture. I've found that with all other variables the same, as far as I can make them, lower gluten gives bigger holes. Crudely you might think that the weaker gluten allows cells to coalesce easier, but according to Sluimer, there is very little coalescing of the individual gas cells in normal dough, or rather if the conditions are suitable for cells to coalesce, then they all do and the bread degases and deflates, such as when dough is overproved and collapses. I suspect that weaker gluten lets fewer gas nuclei are form when in mixing for some reason. Its rather like trying to whip up a froth with too little detergent in the water. Adding more detergent doesn't give you bigger bubbles. Thus for coarse texture, again crudely, you want weak gluten that will not support the micro bubble gas nuclei formation, either with the gluten underdeveloped during mixing (short mix, then stretch and fold), or mixed so far that the gluten is beginning to break down again (I think it recovers and cross links during the bench time). Stretching and folding, like laminating pastry, also introduces structure and some big bubbles.

Dry them. Semi-dried banana look like dog excrement but are delicious. They also keep.

Good to see you blogging. Innkeeping to me implies a bar...and probably substantial evening meals. Any plans?

Nice to see its still made. Lemon (Lehman) Hart (1768-1848) was my many gts granduncle on my paternal grandmother's side...

Why heat it? I though most bacon was cold smoked (at least it is here), and then used however the recipe dictates. Normally I slice it thinly and fry it, or use it in a dish such as a stew or beans, but I have been known to slice it thin and eat it cold...