dabrownman's blog

From the last whole grain multigrain SD bake with seeds and scald here:

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/35130/whole-multigrain-sd-bread-scald-seeds-and-more-aromatic-seeds

 we held back 60 g of the final dough before the scald was added to make some pizzas.

We added 30 g each of AP flour and water to the old dough for the first build and then 3 hours later we added 290 g of AP and 210 g of water,.  After another 3 hours we added 50 g of AP and 35 g of flour to the dough and immediately refrigerated it for 48 hours.

We divided it in half for one Pizza on Saturday night and the remainder was used of Sunday night with the addition of sun dried tomato, fresh rosemary and garlic to the dough.

Look at that first piece of the first pizza bend!           And the bootom of teh 2nd Pizza

It was shocking how much the aromatic seeds of caraway, anise, coriander and fennel came though in the first pizza. There was such a small amount of these seeds, less than half a gram, in the first 350 g of pizza dough that one would think the flavor would disappear.

But, even with all the toppings of, grilled chicken, pepperoni, hot sausage, Poblano and red peppers, red onions, caramelized onions and mushrooms with mozzarella and pecorino cheese the first thing my wife said after the first bite was that the dough tasted like rye bread.  I though the same thing. I loved it but she thought it was little strange to have a rye pizza. 

For the first pizza we didn’t par bake the crust as we usually do and it was a little thicker than our super thon usual so it didn’t bake up as crisp at 500 F – even with a stone top and bottom 10” apart.   My wife liked the texture better than the normal for some reason.  I thought it was like thicker fold over not crisp NY style pizza that I don’t like very much.

See through pepperoni.

The pizza tasted great even though it didn’t have half the stuff we usually put in or on it.  The 2nd pizza was retarded for 72 hours.  When it came out of the fridge we added the sun dried tomato, fresh garlic and rosemary to it – like we do our favorite SD pizza crust that uses a modified Focaccia  Romana recipe. 

This curst had no rye flavor at all even though it had the same amount of aromatic seeds as the first one but you could taste the new additions. I liked this crust better for 3 reasons.  I baked it at 550 F, never knew the oven went that high, it was par baked for 2 minutes before being loaded up and it came out thinner and much more crisp – just the way I like it.  My wife said it tasted better without the rye!

Our favorite tortilla and pizza flour at over 13% protein - from little Italy in Mexico :-)  $1.88 for 5 #s!

Still, no crust has been able to dethrone the Focaccia Romana made outside on a 650 F gas grill with a stone.

Continuing our merry end of the work weekly bread bakes, we kept to or recent 100% whole grain multigrain bread formula inspired by Karin’s recent challenge.  The twist this time was to limit the whole grains to Kamut, wheat, spelt and rye since we ran out of farro (einkorn).

For dough liquid we used the left over whole berry soaking water from last week’s bake and we added additional seeds of the aromatic kind: Caraway, anise, coriander and fennel.  Karin also got us using them in higher percent rye breads and we thought this bread was over 20% rye so why not toss some in?

We added some honey this time because Lucy wanted to and you don’t mess with that without risking a vicious ankle attack when you least expect it.  We dropped the red malt because we ran out last week and forgot to get around to sprouting  and roasting any more this week  Age has it’s privileges especially if you are lazy like my apprentice – who is off to the beauty parlor today and AWOL from today’s bread bake.

The starter smelled especially sour this time when coming out of the fridge.  It’s been in there for 3 weeks and getting more and mote sour in the cold.  We followed or usual levain build by grinding the grain for this bake in our trusty little Krup’s coffee mill and using the sifted out 25% portion of the hard bits to feed to the starter.

In this case, we ended up with 72 g of hard bits and we used 15 g of starter instead of our usual 10 g.   The levain ended up being 19% of the total weigh instead of our usual 12%.  Since the temperature in this AZ kitchen is now down to the mid 70‘s from the mid 80’s (after last weeks break in the weather to the mid 90’s )everything takes 25 % longer.

Our normal 3 stage 2.5 hour each  levain summer schedule is now 3.25 hours each in the fall.  Once the levain had risen 25% after the 3rd progressively larger feeding, it went into the fridge for a 48 h\our retard to increase the labs in comparison to the yeast by a factor of 3 which results in much a more sour producing levain.

Once the levain came out of the fridge it took 3 hours for it to finish doubling.  That time was used to make the scald by simmering the berries for 25 minutes and letting them soak and by autolysing the 75% extraction flours and the rest of the ingredients less the scald.

Once the levain and the autolyse came together we did 3 sets of slap and folds, per Josh’s recent example we have been following, of 8, 4 and 2 minutes that were spaced 10 minutes apart in order to develop the gluten.  At 86% hydration this was a wet dough in the beginning but not too difficult to work with after the first set of slap and folds.

We then did 3 sets of S&F’s, 4 stretches each time from the cardinal compass points, on 15 minute intervals to develop the gluten further and to incorporate the scalded and soaked berries on the 2nd set.  The scaled was fully incorporated by the end of the 3rd set.

Home made bacon wrapped Ahi Tuna - Yum!

We pulled out 65 g of dough before the scald went in to use for old dough for Saturday’s pizza.  We added 35 g each of AP flour and water to this whole grain old dough and let it double before making a 72% hydration AP dough for the pizza crust = which we will retard for 48 hours too.

After a 10 minute rest the bread dough was pre-shaped and then shaped into a squat oval to fit this week’s basket and into the fridge it went for an 18 hour retard. We have been using a 20-24 hour retard and the dough has been proofing to 100% in the cold so we thought a little less time would be better.

SD pancakes go well with any sides and set up a healthy, tasty lunch.

The bread warmed up on the counter for an half an hour before the mini oven was fired up to 500 F and Sylvia’s steaming cups were heated in the microwave which takes 15 minutes.  The dough was un-molded onto the top of the mini’s vented broiler pan that was covered with parchment paper.

Mis en place for Thai green chicken curry.

It was slashed, with a single edge razor, in a basket weave pattern we saw Josh use in his last post.  Sadly, our slashing technique, even on this cold dough, was hampered because of the scalded seeds getting in the way and a lousy slasher holding the blade.  Where is Lucy when you need her?

Into the mini the poorly slashed dough went with 2 of Sylvia’s steaming cups.  We tossed in 1/4 C of water into the bottom of the oven to supply some instant steam before closing the door and let the bread bake with steam at 500 F for 5 minutes before turning the oven down to 475  F.

At the 15 minute mark the steam came out the temperature was turned down to 425 F, convection this time.  After 20 more minutes rotating the bread 180 degrees every 5 minutes, the bread registered 203 F and the oven was turned off and the bread removed from the oven to a cooling rack when it reached 205 F.

It had browned up boldly with the typical mini blisters the whole grain breads seem to get in the mini oven.  Not much bloom or spring though.  It sure smelled great when baking due to the aromatic seeds.  The crust was crunchy and di not go completely soft when cooled.  It was very tasty and thick - just the way we like it.  Will have to wait on the crumb but expect it to be like the other whole grain breads.  Well the crumb hots are in and while not as open as some this crumb is very moist, soft and open.  The chew of the scalded berries is especially nice. 

What makes this bread better than other recent interactions that have beer, whey, YW additional grains and nuts is that this bread tastes the best. More earthy and deeply sour,  less confusion with the nuts gone from the mix but, the aromatic seeds are what put it over the top and made it better.  This is a fine natural, nutritional,  healthy whole grain bread that tastes too good - to be that good for you .  This is possibly the best whole grain bread we have managed and that is saying something  since we have baked so many of late - all were good though.  Maybe the bread turned out better than the rest because Lucy was missing and getting her hair done.

Formula

This bread made for a fine lunch sandwich with the usual suspects for sides. 

I started out to see what the keeping qualities and crumb structure of a YW /SD combo levain and a straight YW levain would be compared to a SD levain bread.  I figured that if YW alone couldn’t supply a decent keeping quality and was better in combination with SD for this while still mellowing the sour and providing YW’s unique crumb structure - there was no sense making a straight YW bread if you could get the benefits of it and still get the SD keeping quality with a combo levain.

Sounds great except my apprentice wanted to do an even more important retarded proofing test too, a test she sort of snuck in there while I was asleep.  At first I was a little miffed but heck, life is too short and after contemplating it, I thought the YW overYW / SD melon recovery test was a great idea. Why not kill 3 breads with two melons!

We took one of favorite 100% whole grain, home milled multigrain SD breads with whole berry 24 hour soak and 4 seeds, and made it 3 ways: SD, SD /YW Combo and YW levains.  To mix things up a little bit, 1 hour after the 3rd feeding, we retarded all 3 for 72 hours to bring out the sour in the SD portions.

As per our usual when home milling we took the 25% sifted out portion of bran germ and what nots and feed that to the levains.  They don’t seem to care and nit is a great way to get the hard bits of the wholegrain wet for as long as possible.  The grains used were 20% each whole berry: barley, Kamut, spelt, rye and wheat.  The AP in the formula was brought up to whole grains with the inclusion of the appropriate amount of Toadies.

We let the levains finish doubling after removing them from the fridge which took 3 hours.  We started the autolyse for everything else less the soaked whole berry, pumpkin and sunflower seeds 1 hour before the levains came out of the fridge to warm up.  We used exactly 2 bottles (11 oz each at 5.4% alcohol – no tasting) of Full Sail’s Session Black Lager for the autolyse liquid resulting in a 4 hour autolyse  for the 75% extraction flours, malts, VWG, sesame and flax seeds.

We divided the autolyse in half.  One half we mated with the SD levain to make a straight SD bread.  The other half we divided in half again and made one into a straight YW bread and the other half go the SD/YW combo levain.  All of these whole grain breads came in at over 90% hydration but less than 92%

Each got our new 3 sessions of slap and folds that Lucy shamelessly stole from Josh – this time 10 minutes, 5minutes and 3 minutes and 3 sets of S&Fs where the left out soaker and seeds were incorporated on the 1st one and fully distributed by the end of the 2nd set.

We were starting to like this method but doing 3 breads at a time was 46 minutes of slap and folds – whey.  But, at least I know that with the holidays looming, I’m ready for Michael Wilson’s required 30 minute minimum of panettone slap and folds. 

After a very short 30 minute rest the 3 separate dough balls were shaped.  The two smaller ones were going into cocktail loaf pans, due the high hydration and sized to have a 1 pound finished weight.  The larger lump was shaped into an oval and placed into a rice floured basket.  Once shaping was complete all 3 went into a used trash can liner and into the fridge for a 20 hour retard.

When I checked them at the 12 hour mark; midnight and all was well.  All three had already doubled and the cocktail loaves had risen above the rim in the middle.  I was worried that they would over proof in another 8 hours but figured they were good and cold after 12 hours and that the yeast would shut down while the dough got a little more sour.

About here is when I think things started going strange.  Lucy got out of bed and went out the doggie door next to the kitchen to do her business.  Right after she came back in I heard a thump coming from the family room or kitchen.

Lucy says everyone should start their day enjoying a good breakfast featuring Hanseata's Challenge Bread and have a fine lunch in the middle of the day of seafood pho, feta salad and Tzitzel pastrami sandwich.

When I investigated I couldn’t find anything wrong other than Lucy had a satisfied look on her mug.  Normally she would bark if a thump happened in the darkened house but not a peep came out of her this time.  So I figured it wasn’t an evil intruder and it was probably just the ghost of my previous baking apprentice; Gretchen, who sometimes comes out to play with Lucy late at night.

 This weeks smoked meat is maple and brown sugar cured, apple wood smoked bacon.  If you don't make your own bacon, you are missing out on what real bacon should taste like when made properly without nitrates and used to make a BLT.

At the 20 hour mark I went to get the trash can liner and bread out of the fridge and I noticed that the cantaloupe and Honey Dew melons I had purchased at the Sprouts were sitting right one top each of the two tinned loaves.  Both had been smashed down from their midnight high marks!

A mixed apple and stone fruit crisp is a fine desert for any dinner and no dinner is complete without a salad.

I though it was an accident since I had piled them up above and behind the bread in the fridge and perhaps they were unsteady and just rolled onto the bread, but nnnoooo!  Lucy had decided to do a Mashed by Melon Test on the YW and YW / SD tinned loaves to see if one could recover better than the other in the heat of the mini oven when baked.

YW left SD right and the combo in the middle.

We decided to bake the two tinned melon mashed loaves first so they couldn’t recover at room temperature.  They were placed in the tins seam side up hoping they would crack naturally on the seam anyway - if they cracked at all.  We chucked them onto the 500 F mini oven with 1 of Sylvia’s steaming cups and 1/3 C of water thrown into the bottom of the oven’s the door was shut to supply an instant burst of steam. 

Sourdough

After 2minutes the temperature was turned down to475 F and then down to 450 F 2 minutes after that.  After a total of 15 minutes, the steaming cup was removed and the oven turned down to 425 F, convection this time.

YW / SD combo 

5 minutes later, we removed the bread from the tins and turned them upside down in the mini oven to make sure the bottom got as well done as the top. After 5 minutes upside down the bread was rotated 180 degrees and flipped back over.

Yeast Water

In 5 more minutes the bread was 203 F and the mini oven was turned off.  When the bread hit 205 F on the inside it was removed to the cooling rack.  32 minutes total time in oven was all it took.

They both recovered somewhat from the Melon Mashing but the straight YW one recovered fully and not a hint of the MM was observable.  Plus one - for the YW over the YW / SD for the full Melon Mash recovery.

Combo YW / SD

We redid the entire process again with the oval in the basket.  This time the bread stuck in the basket and was deformed in one place so we immediately had a Basket Deformation test going for this loaf.   Lucy wanted to drop a melon on it too but we caught her just in time.

Soudough

The SD oval was out of the fridge for 45 minutes to warm up but was still cool when it was un-molded and slashed. Before going into the mini with 2 of Sylvia’s steaming cups this time.  We used the same schedule as before including the flipping over and rotating; 15 minutes of steam and 17 minutes with out steam - with a falling temperature and convection with the no steam portion.

YW / SD

The oval spread mostly, but did spring and bloom a little.  All the bread browned well on top but the big blisters were hiding somewhere else this time for some reason - Tiny ones were there agin though.   The crust was crisp as usual though.  Can’t wait to see the crumb of these 3 different but similar breads and how much different the taste is and how the keeping qualities compare.  As you can see the crumb is fairly open for these 100% whole grain breads.  All are soft, moist and tender. with the YW more so.  The YW has no sour and the SD / YW has a light tang and the SD is tangy as one could want.

Lucy voted this the best bread for a sandwich ever - especially when it is paired as a brie, homemade pate & bacon lettuce and tomato sandwich.

We love SD so it is no surprise we like SG bread the best - by far -  with the SD /YW second but those who don't like sour would likely prefer the YW.  They are excellent breads and would likely be nearly as good without the Session Black Lager and,  without the beer, the bread would have a lower GI and perfect for those with diabetes.   The crust stayed a little crisp but cooled much softer but it was very tasty on all 3 versions.  Now to see if the YW versions can withstand a week of counter and still be edible.

The last monsoon dust storm was yesterday for the year it seems and today feels like the first day of fall with a high of 90 F 

Formula

 The Melon Mashing Mama

We love challenges of all kinds and bread baking ones are no exception.  Anything, within reason, that one can do to learn something new, stretch limited understanding, gain new skills while having some fun at the same time, sounds good to my apprentice.

Top left are rolled oats, top right aresteel cut oats, bottom are whole oat groats.

Hanseata’s Challenge; of a tinned multigrain bead with sunflower seeds, was a great way to see what grains were hidden away in Lucy’s secret pantry.  I knew she didn’t have rolled spelt and barley or chestnut flour which proves even deep pantried, German baking apprentices have ingredient shortages like everyone else.

Look how chunky the autolyse ended up - even before the oat groat scald and sunflower seeds were added!

We went looking all over town for chestnut flour because we knew that we would never spend $10 a pound delivered for it over the Internet.  But the Chinese and Indian market came up wanting.   There are no Italian markets to be found around Gilbert, AZ either.

The fix was easy enough for Lucy, she just ground up a mix of Brazil, pecan, almond, walnuts and pistachio nuts as a replacement.  She subbed medium grind whole spelt for the rolled variety and subbed medium ground bulgar for the rolled barley.

Lucy couldn’t be outdone by a German baker she had never met, so she added some ground sesame seeds to the ground flax, some scalded whole oat groats, Toadies of course, and some left over prune water from the last bake.  She also decided to sub yeast water for the commercial yeast specified and use a bit of lard, 5 g for the fat instead of shortening.

Fill the pan half full adn let it sise in the middle to the rim of the pan and it starts to crack on top.  We didnlt dock.

What we wanted to make sure of is that we followed the list in order of weight and to use or limited knowledge of these kinds of breads to work out a formula that would make some sense to the woefully uniformed and totally lost like my apprentice and I.

We used all the whole spelt in the recipe for the levain and all of the liquid for it after the first stage build was YW.  The 3 stages were 4 hours each where the levain tripled at the end of the 3rd stage.  At that point we added the 10 g of whole rye to it, technically making a 4th stage and immediately retarded it in the fridge for 24 hours.  The levain ended up being almost 12% of the total weight but it was very active.

It is amazing how bread can become..................................Eggplant lasagna in the blink of an eye!

The levain rose 50% in the fridge and finished doubling in 2 hours on the counter the next morning while everything else but the salt, which was sprinkled on top, the huge amount of sunflower seeds and the oat groat scald was autolysing.  Normally we would do a minimum 4 hour autolyse for whole grains like this but we used 2 hours this time hoping for the best.

The whole grains came in at 85 % because the white whole wheat isn’t whole wheat at all.  The Toadies were note included in the whole grain calculation even though they are  the toasted; sifted out middling, bran and wheat germ that, when added back into the mix, makes up for 4 times as much weight as the toadies as whole grain.  By taking toadies into account, the whole grains would be 95%.

Once the autolyse and levain met up we did 6minutes of slap and folds to get the gluten going.  After a 10 minute rest we did another 4 minutes of slap and folds.  After another 10 minute rest, we did 2 minutes of slap and folds and then let the dough rest 15 minutes.  We then did 3 sets of S&F’s on 15 mine intervals where incorporated the sunflower seeds on the first on and the oat groat scald on the 2nd set.

A 30 minute bulk ferment followed the 3rd set of S&F’s before the dough was divided into (2) 500g pieces and shaped into batards to ft the cocktail loaf pans.  The tinned dough was allowed to proof on the counter before being retarded in the fridge for 24 hours.

The dough had doubled in the fridge and showed some cracks on top, a sure sign the dough was ready to be baked off.  We allowed the dough to come to room temperature over 1 1/2 hours on the counter.  The mini oven was fired up to 450 F and (2) of Sylvia’s steaming cups were placed inside after being heated to boiling in the micro wave.

The tinned bread was steamed at 450 F for 5 minutes and then the mini was turned down to 425 F for another 5 minutes.  The steam was then removed and the mini turned down to 375 F, convection this time.  The loaves continued to bake for another 10 minutes as we rotated the tins every 5 minutes.  At that point, we de-tinned the bread and continued to bake it for another 10 minutes.

When the bread hit 201 F we turned off the mini oven but let the bread stay in the mini oven until it hit 204 F when we removed it to a cooling rack.  Because of the low temperatures, we didn’t get the bold bake, spring or blisters of our other mini oven bakes but the bread did brown up to a medium brown and was very crunchy coming out of the oven,  All of these characteristics are nearly identical to our other bakes  of similar breads.

Lat night's dinner salad of kale, red leaf and romaine lettuce with nappa cabbage and feta cheese.  All the usual fixings too!

We also didn’t get the huge lengthwise split down the side of the loaf of the sample in Karin’s post and don’t know what we could have done to achieve that artistic baking flair of the original.  This bread smells great, even though there aren’t any aromatic seeds in it.

I think aromatic seeds would have been a fine addition and can’t believe my apprentice didn’t throw them in - even after I had Mini Oven’s seed mélange toasted and ready to go in this bread.  The Queen of Seeds, quite rightly, will be very disappointed in Lucy I’m sure - just like I am for this glaring omission.

A beautiful stuffed chicken breast with a tasty wine and butter suace.

This bake finished at noon yesterday and the loaves were wrapped when cooled to let the moisture redistribute. This morning the crust has gone soft, a good sign and we will cut it at the 24 hour mark to give it a taste.  Cutting is over and the bread is about the nuttiest and seediest bread Lucy has ever concocted and more than the example.  The dough more than doubled and the crumb is soft, moist and open.  There is purple tinge to the crumb from the walnuts no doubt.  It is delicious but not as dark as the original.

Very delicious indeed - unreal toasted.  I got some pate out of the freezer I was saving for a bread like this one and plan to add a variety of cheeses, fruits, and veggies to go with the pate and this fine bread for lunch.  Yummy!

Thanks Karin for the idea of this challenge bake!   So much fun and tasty to boot ...... even though it ended up not very close to the original example.

Sunbursts right before sunset on retard day.

Formula

Lunch on retard day. 

We went with another multigrain white bread this week but instead of putting ground sesame and flax seeds in it we went with the 3 P’s: pistachios, prunes and pumpkin seeds.   This bread is the equivalent of 38% whole grains due to the Toadies and malts.

We decided to go with our multigrain sourdough starter instead of the SD, YW and poolish combo starter from last week and we went for the dour too by refreshing the stiff starter and then refrigerating it for 3 days before building levain and then refrigerating it for 24 hours.

The levain was a 3 stage build of: 3 hours, 3 hours till it doubled, and then 1 hour where it rose 25% before refrigerating.  The levain was allowed to come to room temperature and finish doubling, about 3 hours before it was used.  The levain came in at 20% of the total weight.

While the levain was finishing its final doubling on the counter, we began the autolyse the flour with the fig water, extra water, Toadies and malts – with the salt placed on top.  The fig water was left over from re-hydrating the figs for a bake a couple of weeks ago.  This week we have prune water for a future bake left over from re-hydrating the prunes from this bake.

Looks a little over proofed to me.

Once everything came together with a spoon at a little over 74% hydration, we did 5 minutes of slap and folds to get the gluten development started before resting the dough for 15 minutes and doing 1 more minute of slap and folds.  Normally we would do at lea1t 20 minutes of slap and folds over two sessions of 6 and 4 minutes

We decided to go with less slap and folds and 3 S&F’s to see if it opened the crumb.  We don’t think it will with all the add-ins for this bread but you never know when your apprentice gets her paws into stuff when you aren’t looking,.  The pistachios, pumpkin seeds and prunes were added at the beginning of the first and 2nd set of S&F’s. 

By the end f the 3rd set the add-ins were thoroughly incorporated.  We allowed the bread to bulk ferment for 1 hour before dividing the dough into the pieces required for the Chacon design: a central knotted roll, 4 balls and 4 snails surrounding the roll.

This bread makes fin toast with half of; a mango, nectarine and peach, some bacon, black grapes and raspberries - yummy!

After these pieces were placed in the bottom of a lightly rice floured basket I forgot to put the pumpkin seeds in first which would cause a mistake trying to glue them on later.  The remaining bulk of the dough was air shaped into a huge bialy to cover the design.  The basket was immediately placed into a used trash can liner and placed in the fridge for an 18 hour cold retard.

The dough rose well in the cold and after a peek, Lucy decided to let the dough warm up for an hour before baking it off in the mini oven at 500F with (2) of Sylvia’s steaming cups and 1/4 C of water tossed into the bottom of the oven for instant steam.

We glued the forgotten seeds on with egg wash, per my apprentice’s recommendation but we should have used water as the egg wash browned much darker than the rest of the crust.  Oh well, I really could care less and I know Lucy doesn’t care a lick either!

The lunch sandwich today was an aged white cheddar, pastrami, spicy brown mustard with caramelized; onions, mushrooms and hot peppers all melted together in the micro wave to make a fine pastrami melt.  Yummy!

After 4 minutes we turned the heat down to 475 F and at the 8 minute mark we turned it down to 450 F.  At the 15 minute mark we removed the steam and turned the oven down to 425 F, convection this time.  12 minutes later the bread hit 205 F and was deemed done and removed to the cooling rack.

The bread sprang weakly but well enough for the Chacon design to show itself and it browned up with the little blisters the mini oven is famous for putting on crusts.  But that egg wash was a mistake.  The crust didn't lose all of it's crispiness as is cooled. The crumb was open, soft, glossy and moist. It was slightly sweet and sour due to the SD, fig water and prunes.  The pistachios and pumpkin seeds were a nice chew foil to the soft crumb.  We like this bread and will have no problem devouring it. 

The rest of lunch.

Formula

We have been trying out various versions of buns for hot dogs and hamburgers.   This time we went back to basics and looked for a whole wheat bun on the King Arthur website.  We found their 100% WW one for hot dogs and their white bread one for hamburgers.

Since we were going to do a 35% whole wheat one, we decided to combine the two, replace the sugar with honey, drop the commercial yeast and replace it with yeast water, up the hydration  to 75% and add some cream cheese to mix like Ian does on so many of his bun bakes.

We were needing to refresh the cherry YW anyway so did so, with only apples this time, and used the remainder to make a 1 stage, 100% hydration, levain over 300g that sat out at room temperature for 8 hours before we refrigerated it overnight after it had risen 75% in volume.

The next morning we let the YW levain finish its last 25% of rise on the counter.  When it had doubled we through everything together and did 5 minutes of slap and folds and then let the dough rest for 10 minutes before doing another 5 minutes of slap and folds.

After a 15 minute rest we did 2 sets of S&F’s on 15 minute intervals before allowing the dough to ferment on the counter for an hour.  We then pieced out the dough into (8) 110 g pieces and pre-shaped 4 of them into  hot dog buns and 4 into balls for hamburger thins.

10 minutes later we final shaped the buns putting the hot dog buns into a small Pyrex pan to proof and the hamburger thins on parchment on the top lid of the mini oven’s broiler pan.  The buns were allowed to proof for 5 hours on the counter.

The hot dog buns were brushed with an egg wash and were the first to go into the mini oven at 425 F after 8 minutes of baking the oven was turned down to 375 F convection this time.  After 8 minutes with the fan the hot dog buns were deemed done and the hamburger thins then received the identical treatment.

The buns blistered up like the mini usually seems to manage every time.  They were brown and shiny.  Wow!  These buns sprang 3 times their pre mini oven height!  Yes 3 times higher - only yeast water can do that according to my bread baking experience. These bins were very open, light, airy and moist – the buns we have ever manages to date.

Yes, there is some hotnpeppers, cheese adn bacon in those beef patties.

Today's lunch with that fine Taztzel and I bet there is some pastrami in there too!

 They were tasty too but not sour at all.  Lucy was especially happy that her sister, our daughter was accepted into PA school.  Yeah.  We are all so happy for her.  She requested tacos (Pibil, carnitas, grouper, chicken and carne asada) with guacamole, red and green hot sauces, pico de gillo, smoked pork necks in beans and Mexican green rice last night for dinner.

 Tonight she got hamburgers, caramelized onion, mushrooms and various hot peppers with sweet and regular grilled potato wedges.    She even liked the buns!  Congrats to Molly!

Formula

 A fine breakfast for the PA girl too!

Holiday weeks usually mean festive cooking in the kitchen or outside on the grill and in the smoker.  This week all three were up front and well used.   It started off last Sunday with grilled salmon and corn on the grill.

Labor Day on Monday, we had our usual smoked ribs. We only smoke them for an hour and half before wrapping them in foil and finishing them in oven at a low and slow 225 F where we collect the juice to make the glaze….. ala Alton Brown.  The girls don’t like heavily smoked ribs and 5 hours of smoke can be too much for them.

Then on Tuesday, we grilled up some tasty smoked brats with homemade buns, chicken breasts and grilled eggplant.  Wednesday was Rosh Hashanah so Aunt Beve’s Hot & Sweet Brisket Flat came out of the oven and challah for the bread.  With a whole brisket, the flat comes with a the point too.. 

I had been out in the garage looking for stored old Architectural photos for Ian wan I came across my lost Pastrami cure recipe that I though was lost forever.  So the brisket point was destined to become pastrami for Meat Week.

Aunt Beve's Hot & Sweet Brisket.

We started the cure on Labor Day and deemed it finished yesterday morning- a full 4 day dry cure.  I get better results using a dry rub cure than brine when curing a brisket point.  Flats and whole briskets do better with a brine to cure that thicker meat well.

First pastrami dry cure on Monday .......and the 2nd non salt dry rub below right before going in the smoker on Friday.

The point has more fat than the flat and it is better suited for curing and smoking too.   You can dry cure flats but it will take 5 days instead of 4 to cure properly.

After washing off the cure and soaking the cured brisket it cold water for an hour and half changing the water every half an hour to reduce the salt used in the cure,  we heavily applied the non salt, dry rub  and let the cured beef air dry uncovered in the fridge for 6 hours.

Then it was ready for the smoker, a full 8 hours at 225 - 250 F where the smoke was applied for the first 4 hours only.  It took all day, but, by midnight, the pastrami registered 160 F on the inside and was finally done.   After refrigerating overnight the pastrami sliced as thinly as anyone would want, both tender and delicious.

Home made pastrami is a rare treat since we usually smoke brisket without curing it for pastrami.  This capped off a perfect Meat Week and now you know why my apprentice made that fine Tzitzel on Friday …Pastrami without a decent deli rye just isn’t allowed around here.   Guess I will have to have a pastrami sandwich for lunch just to make sure both Tzitzel and Pastrami are as good as they taste separately.  But, then there is breakfast that is even better......

Some folks will say Brownman has gone nuts wasting good pastrami this way but my favorite way to eat pastrami by far, even better than in the middle of rye bread, is to make a Breakfast Pastrami Hash.  This one had, besides pastrami, sauteed yellow,green onions and mushrooms,  grilled corn, Mexican grey squash, red pepper and eggplant, steamed fresh; green beans and broccoli, roasted; carrot, red, white and sweet potato with a fried egg.  If you haven't made home made breakfast pastrami hash you need too - as soon as possible:-)

Ingredients

5 pound brisket flat

6 cloves of garlic, minced

2 C beef stock (unsalted or low salt)

2 C red wine

3 large onions, sliced 1/2” thick

1 celery rib and 1 carrot sliced 1/2” thick

4 T canola oil

1 tsp each sea salt and fresh ground black pepper

1 tsp each onion powder and garlic powder

3 T of tomato paste

1 cup ketchup

1/2 cup Vietnamese garlic chili sauce –more it you like it hot.

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 tsp each dried thyme and rosemary

Directions

Preheat oven to 235 F and trim all but 1/4 of fat off the top of the brisket.

Put 2 T of canola oil, 3 cloves of minced garlic, the dried thyme and rosemary in a mortar and pestle can crush all into a thick paste. 

Dry rub the brisket with onion powder, garlic powder, salt and pepper and place it in a large cast iron, enameled, Dutch oven with 2 T of canola oil and brown well on all sides on the stove top.   Remove the brisket from the pot and coat with the herb garlic rub on all sides.

Put the veggies in the pot to soften and brown them.  Add the rest of the minced garlic and tomato paste and brown the paste.  Add the wine and sauté until 1/3rd reduced.  Add the brown sugar, garlic chili sauce, ketchup and the  beef stock to the DO to come up 2 inches up the sides.  Nestle the brisket in pot.  It should be submerged all the way but the fat top of it.

Bring the pot to the boil, cover and place in the oven for 1 hour basting the top every half hour.  Flip the meat over and bake for another hour continuing to baste every half hour.  After another hour flip the brisket again and check with fork for doneness.  It should be tender but no falling apart.  If not done continue to bake, 3 hours total in the oven and it should be tender.

Remove the brisket and tent with foil.  Mash the veggies in the sauce with a potato masher or use a hand processor.  Reduce the sauce by 20%.  De-fat the sauce with a gravy separator and strain through a sieve forcing though all the liquid with a spoon. .  If the sauce isn’t thick enough for you, return to a pot, add some butter mashed together with flour to the mix to thicken it up.

When meat is cool wrap in plastic and refrigerate overnight.  Cool the sauce and refrigerate it too.  Slice the brisket against the grain in 1/4 “slices when very cold, place in a baking dish and sauce it.  Cover with lid or foil and re-heat in the oven at 250 F.  Serve heated sauce on the side.

Weoast oil coated chopped 1”square veggies with salt pepper, garlic and onion powder with some smoked paprika in a 400 F oven until browned about 45 minutes.  Veggies include, red and white potatoes, sweet potatoes, cut in half mushrooms, summer squash, eggplant and onions.  I make the veggies the day before too and re-heat them with the brisket and sauce in the oven at the same time.

Serve with a nice salad, pan sautéed green beans and challah with butter.

We used the same amount of the 3 part levain that we used for the Challah bake earlier this week.  It was a 3 stage poolish with a pinch of DY, YW and SD levain that was retarded for 48 hours 1 hour after the levain had risen 25% after the 3rd feeding.

Our last Tzitzel used a SD levain and we know the Pratzel’s Tzitzel was commercial yeast.  We would expect that this will more closely approximate the flavor of the St Louis original corn rye.

There are no home milled flour in this version.  We used rye, whole wheat bread flour and unbleached bread flour out of the bins at Winco.  We assume the rye is a white rye flour.   Instead of 40% rye we used 35% this time and the corn meal was put inside instead of rolling the exterior of the dough in it like last time.

We will have to see how this combination of flour mimics the taste of the Pratzel’s version after version 2 turned out very tasty indeed but not very lose to the original.   We reduce the hydration down to 81% thinking that there was only 33% whole grain and non of it home milled.

We autolysed the dough flours for the hours that the levain was coming up to counter temperatures from its 2 day retard.  Once everything came together, we did 8 minutes of slap and folds, with a 15 minute rest, and then did another 6 minutes of slap and folds like Josh has been doing of late fir his market barter bakes.

We also did 3 sets of S&F’s on 20 minute intervals where we incorporated the 2% of lightly chopped caraway seeds on the first one.  We used an aromatic seed mix last time that included half caraway with anise, coriander and fennel making up the other half.

We then let the dough ferment on the counter for 1 hour before shaping an placing in a basket seam side up.  We then did 1 1.2 hours of counter ferment before placing in the fridge for an 18 hour retard.

Yesterday's lunch with white bread above and today's lunch with Tzitzel and Aunt Beve's brisket below.

Once freed from the cold the next morning, we let the dough warm up and proof some more for 2 hours on the counter before refrigerating again for half an hour, slashing and placing it in the 500 F mini oven with (2) of Sylvia’s steaming cups.

This morning's breakfast with challah and jam, peach, nectarine, blackberries, whit bread with grilled salmon schmear - two white breads in one meal- Can't be?

After 2 minutes we turned the oven down to 475 F and 13 minutes later we removed the stem, turned the oven down to 450 F and continued to bake another 20 minutes when the dough tested 203 F.  The oven was turned off and when the bread read 205 F it was removed to a cooling rack.

The crust browned boldly, sprang and bloomed well as the mini oven is famous for applying to any dough that hits its heat.   The crust was light blistered with small bubbles, another mini oven trait.  We will have to wait on the crumb but have our fingers crossed.  Well, the wait is over.  The crumb was open moist and soft with the flavor of the caraway coming though well.... but not overly pungent.

A fantastic lunch with Tzitzel and Meat Week'e home cured and smoked pastrami!

This crumb is similar to version 2.  The crust was originally crunchy but. by the time we sliced it, the crust has gone more soft and chewy.  A good bread that went very well with Aunt Beve's Sweet & Hot Brisket.  We have had a Meat Week like we haven't had in....forever but will post about that separately.

Formula

We were going to make a multi-grain challah but, at the last minute, decided to do a more typical one.  It is white bread with saffron, honey, sugar, egg and oil.  Pretty standard except the honey sugar egg and oil are a little less than the standard traditional challah - if there is such a thing.

The unusual thing about this challah is it is a mixed up levain of YW, SD and poolish  Why do one when you do all three at once for the Holidays?  This levain was (2) 5 hour builds and then a 1 hour one before being retarded overnight in the fridge for 12 hours.

When it all came together the next morning we did 12 minutes of slap and folds and 2 sets of S&F’s before a 1 1.2 hour counter top bulk ferment.  We shaped a Franz Joesph roll, a small 4 strand braid roll where the ends were rotated around to kind of make an octopus looking thing. Then we did a big 6 strand challah that was supposed to be round but ended up kind of square of some reason that escapes my apprentice completely.

A good 2 ¾ hour final proof and the bread was egg washed and tossed in to the mini oven without much steam other than a ¼ C of water thrown in tot bottom.  We did 5 minutes at 400, and 5 at 375 F then rotated the lot and turned the oven to 5 minutes of convection at 375F.   Then we baked n additional 20 minutes at 350 F convection when the large challah was done at 195 F - 35 minutes total.  The small rolls were done in 20 minutes.

The small rolls didn’t brown as much but were nicely golden, shiny and blistered and the large challah was dark brown shiny and blistered.  All puffed themselves up well in the mini’s heat.   My daughter came home in the middle of the bake and said they smelled grand and wanted to eat one of the rolls but my apprentice defending them.

The bread should go well with tonight’s brisket dinner based on Aunt Beve’s recipe the is sweet and hot just kike she was in life,   Beverly passed away last year and we miss her way more than we can convey.

There is no question that this n=brad needed to proof another hour at least.   But, dinner nneeded a challah so it was baked off.  It wasn't horrible at all.  The crust was just terrific and the taste was wonderful but..... my daughter said 'this bread is dense' and she was right.  Instead of proofing to 85% it needed to go to 150%.  Ah...next time....when we have more time.  The dinner was great, The brisket was some of the very best - fork tender, jjuicy and flavorful - my daughter could not get enough of it.

And New Year's breakfast of French toast, a sausage, berries and a sliced peach.

The gravy from the braise  was so tasty with the Sambal garlic,  chili sauce in the heat background.  The brown sugar and tomato paste made for the sweet.  Sweet and hot just like Aunt Beve and just as tender  as she was.  No one except her brother could ever be as gracious.  This character trait runs intthe family through her children. .  She always made the best brisket.... that wasn't smoked.  Then the sunset made for a the perfect start for the New Year.

With a nice salad and the background of roasted veggie made up of eggplant, summer squash, mushrooms, yams, red and russet potato, onion and carrot with a splash of sweet and pan sauteed green beens and spicy gravy, the meal was simple and simply satisfying,

The best in life to each of you for the New Year!

Formula