The Bread Topic (2009 – 2014)

[Anna N]

CatPoet,

Your bread looks great.

I have a sponge started to make another loaf of semolina bread. I have been invited to dinner tonight so I shall take it along. This time I will shape it as a batard rather than a boule.

[CatPoet]

I dont use the french words for bread.  In Sweden loafs are most often long, so that is what I am doing and it is easier to cut slices of it.

[Smithy]

I love the expression 'flying sponge'. It's about time for me to start baking again: I'm home for a while, and weather here is drizzly and cold. Thanks for the inspirations!

[Anna N]

So here is the second iteration of the semolina bread. I will gift this to my hosts this evening. I used a new linen towel, dusted with rice flour, as a couche supported on either side of the loaf by my rolling pins. It is not a particularly slack dough so this worked well.

[smokinjack]

My second post .I hope it ends up in the right place.LOL

I made ciabatta with stiff biga and foccacia from Jeffery Hamelman 'Bread".Foccacia was scaled at 1lb from the ciabata recipe,baked in a 10" cake pan . Also Harvest Bread with poolish from Ken Forkish's book "Flour,Water,Salt & Yeast." Baked in a Dutch oven

Ciabatta baked on the Big Green Egg ceramic charcoal cooker.

[DianaM]

I would make this again in a heartbeat!

This is Jeffrey Hamelman's semolina bread using a "flying sponge". That's a sponge made with yeast and given a short (relative) ferment. Gotta go for another slice!

Oh, that looks so delicious, Anna, gorgeous crumb! You had me at "semolina," lol. I have to dig out my Hamelman, and look up the recipe. Did you bake it on a stone, or in a DO?

I have Reinhart's pizza course, though I cannot remember whether I liked it or not. I wasn't aware he had a bread course too, thanks for sharing your experience.

The red fife: I am very interested! You think Bulk Barn might have it, or only a specialty store?

[Anna N]

Oh, that looks so delicious, Anna, gorgeous crumb! You had me at "semolina," lol. I have to dig out my Hamelman, and look up the recipe. Did you bake it on a stone, or in a DO?

I have Reinhart's pizza course, though I cannot remember whether I liked it or not. I wasn't aware he had a bread course too, thanks for sharing your experience.

The red fife: I am very interested! You think Bulk Barn might have it, or only a specialty store?

DianaM,

I found the recipe on line (hope to get his book but there's more month than money right now!). It is incredibly easy. I converted it to metric and halved it so it's very manageable. I baked it directly on a stone giving it a couple of squirts of water for steam. To my amazement the family loved this bread. They tend to be squidgy white bread fans. I found the red fife in Whole Foods here in Oakville. We used to be able to buy it in Manitoulin but they have stopped growing the wheat.

[Anna N]

Just a simple loaf of white sandwich bread as I make most weeks for my granddaughter. This week it domed beautifully. Had been running into issues with mishapen loaves. Watched the Crafsy video with Peter Rinehart and obviously learned something!

[emmalish]

I rarely eat bread, but when I see a beautiful loaf like this I get a craving...

[smokinjack]

I rarely eat bread, but when I see a beautiful loaf like this I get a craving...

Thanks for the compliment!

[smokinjack]

image.jpg

Just a simple loaf of white sandwich bread as I make most weeks for my granddaughter. This week it domed beautifully. Had been running into issues with mishapen loaves. Watched the Crafsy video with Peter Rinehart and obviously learned something!

Very nice! Just beautiful color.I rarely get bread to rise like that.

Thanks for sharing.

Jon

[Ann_T]

I think I need to pick up some semolina flour today.

 

Anna, your sandwich loaf is a beauty. I'm so boring.  I tend to bake the same bread over and over because that is what we like.  I haven't baked a pan loaf in a long time.   Maybe next week.

 

I fed my starters yesterday and used two ounces of the excess to make a biga. 

 

The biga doubled within five hours.  So late afternoon I mixed up a batch of dough using 1000 g flour, 500 g biga and 750 g water.

 

Baked 8 mini sourdough baguettes.  The last four came out of the oven at 10:30 PM.

 

 

Crumb.

[Kim Shook]

Gorgeous stuff, Jack!  

[DianaM]

Ann_T, those mini baguettes look delicious. And these last two photos in your post are gorgeous - I have "prop envy," if such a thing exists.

A question: you wrote you use 2 ounces of leftover starter to make 500 g of biga. Is it a 100% hydration? If yes, you would be adding about 225 g each of flour and water, correct? And you mix the final dough when it has doubled.

[CatPoet]

 

A sourdough semolina bread and some rolls.

[Ann_T]

Diana, it was actually  230 g flour and 230 g water along with the starter.   I add the doubled biga to 1000 g of flour and 750 g water for that batch. Sometimes I do an even more hydrated dough  - up to 92% for ciabatta.

 

~Ann

[CatPoet]

 

Here is the sponge of my bread, a little bit too big holes for my liking but I only have my self to blame, I didnt knead it enough.

[Anna N]

Even I am tempted to ooh and aah at this bread but I suspect it will prove to be very disappointing. It is my second attempt at Tom Cat's semolina filone. First, as you see it's the wrong shape. Despite adding more and more flour it remained simply impossible to shape. According to Gezer it should pull away from the mixing bowl. Not a chance. In sheer frustration I dumped it into my proofing basket and baked it in a Dutch oven. If anyone has had success with this rather famous bread I would love to hear about it. I know Kerry Beal had some success but I believe even she found it would not clear the bowl. The dough seems almost as if it defies the laws of physics! It is from Artisan Breads by Maggie Glezerand the recipe can be found on the blog The Fresh Loaf.

[rotuts]

Fair Enough AN.

 

Ill do the ooh and aah

 

looking forward to ' the slice'  and maybe 'the toasted slice'

[Anna N]

Fair Enough AN.

 

Ill do the ooh and aah

 

looking forward to ' the slice'  and maybe 'the toasted slice'

Thanks, rotuts. I will take it to my hosts tonight. I hope I remember a photograph. And if it really bombs then there are these as my fallback:

[Anna N]

As I suspected this was dense, doughy but even worse the atta flour I used was decidely past its best before date. It went into the compost bin. (I tried hard to convince myself that the flour was fine and that the rancidity was purely my imagination. Why do we play these games?)

This was great both fresh and grilled with garlic butter. All very fresh flour!

[Ann_T]

Fed both sourdough starters today, one with rye and one with white.  Baked four sourdough rye loaves and have another batch of sourdough white in the fridge that will get baked tomorrow or Wednesday.

 

[Ann_T]

Sourdough Rye Crumb.

 

[DianaM]

We had the same brain wave, Ann_T! My 30% rye sourdough is just now cooling on the counter. I shaped mine into a batard, however.

[DianaM]

And here it is. I botched the shaping, so it looks like a giant ladyfinger, but the taste is very good. The loaf has a soft, moist-cool crumb, it sliced beautifully, and is just begging for the fixings of a sandwich with personality (so no chicken breast or low-fat mayo).