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This year with CLAS! Will bring the treats to work tomorrow.

Here is the dough formula: https://fgbc.dk/2blk

For the filling I found milled and steamed poppy seeds here - Dampfmohn (pricey, but saves a trip to Germany to buy ready made filling, or saves lots of hard manual work with a pestle and mortar). So just boiled those with milk, honey, lemon zest and raisins the day before.

I used quite hot milk/sugar/salt/oil mixture when making the dough, so it was super warm from the beginning and in an hour it was more than doubled. I punched it down and gave about another 25 min before making the hamantaschen.

Then I had a work thing, so punched down the remaining dough and put on the balcony to slow it down, and then after about 2.5 hrs rolled out and made cinnamon buns.

I made brioche buns and smaller loaves of sourdough recently. Smaller bakes are fun!

Instead of my usual braided loaves, the brioche with sourdough discard and Tangzhong were made into little buns (or pastries). These were not 2:1 or 3:2 (flour:butter) brioche; 50-70% butter versions. I used just 30% eggs, 30% butter which came out soft and buttery, thanks to the use of Tangzhong and Kamut. The second batch used 25% of each.

These buns were made using 50-60g of dough each, small enough for me to enjoy two at once. A little extra work was making the easy pastry cream to fill the buns.

Brioche dough with tangzhong and sourdough discard 1

Tangzhong
100g milk
20g all purpose flour

SD Discard
130g SD discard
1/4 tsp baking soda

Dough
All of the Tangzhong
All of the SD discard
40g milk
150g eggs
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
60g sugar
290g all purpose flour
120g Kamut flour
5g vital wheat gluten
3g instant yeast
8g salt
150g unsalted butter, cubed/flattened pieces

Egg wash
1 large egg
1 tbsp heavy cream
a pinch of salt

The first batch were baked as two separate days (left the second half of it in the freezer for 3 days):

First half of the dough (photo above)
- Biscoff spread braided buns
- masala sugar braided buns
- sugar pie/bun (brioche tarte au sucre) - flatten the dough ball to about 3 to 4" in diameter, toward the end of the second rise, brush with egg wash and sprinkle with sugar. Then, gently dock the dough with fingertips or blunt end of a chopstick dipped in cream. Dab each cavity with a little cream and place a piece of cold butter in each of them. Shor-cut version: after sprinkling with sugar, poke the dough with pieces of cold butter to create the cavities. Like my failed attempts at flattening Barbari bread, these were got very puffy when baked :p


Second half of the dough:

- pastry cream with rum raisins,chocolate chips and blueberry jam (bit into the jam one before taking the photo, ha!)


Brioche dough with tangzhong and sourdough discard 2
- with lemon zest rubbed into the sugar before mixing
- not as rich as the previous batch, but it's a version I would use if I feel like using more than 50g of butter in my dough.

Tangzhong
100g milk
20g all purpose flour

SD discard
120g discard (100% hydration)
1/4 tsp baking soda

Dough
All of the Tangzhong
All of the SD discard
30g heavy cream
100g eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tsp lemon zest (1 lemon)
48g sugar
3g instant yeast
120g Kamut flour
195g all purpose flour
5g VWG
6g salt
100g unsalted butter, cubed/flattened pieces


Second batch was made into a dozen of these:

- cinnamon sugar twists - filled, rolled and sliced, then flatted, pulled and twisted to expose the swirls
- brioche tarte au sucre (can't help it, these are just so easy to make and tasty, I'd make them with any enriched dough)
- hazelnut chocolate twists

Masala or cinnamon sugar filling
- brush a thin layer of egg wash before sprinkling the sugar filling

15g all purpose flour
20g unsalted butter, melted
60g sugar
8g (1 tbsp) ground cinnamon or masala mix
A pinch of salt

Easy pastry cream
150g milk
80g heavy cream
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp lemon extract
40g sugar
1 tsp lemon zest
1 large egg
15g cornstarch
A pinch of salt
20g unsalted butter, cubed


Preparing the dough:
Dry ingredients
Rub lemon zest (if using) into the sugar. Then, whisk together with flours, salt and instant yeast in a large mixing bowl. Set aside.

Wet ingredients
Prepare the sourdough mixture. Stir baking soda into the sourdough discard (this neutralizes the sourness especially in old discard). Cover and let the it rest for about 15 minutes before use.

Prepare the Tangzhong, making sure the mixture reaches approx 65°C before removing from heat. Stir in fridge-cold milk, eggs, starter discard and vanilla extract.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients. Mix on stirring speed until a dough forms, making sure no dry bits of flour remains, about 4 to 5 minutes. Cover and let the dough rest for 30 minutes.

Add 2-3 pieces of butter to the dough. Mix until these are absorbed before adding the next pieces of butter. Repeat until all the butter has been added to the dough. Gradually, increase the kneading speed to 2 to develop the dough, stopping every 2 minutes to scrape the bowl and to turn the dough. This process may take 15 to 20 minutes in order to achieve windowpane stage, where the dough is smooth, shiny and elastic. Do not add any more flour.

Shape the dough into a boule, then, transfer it to a greased bowl, cover and let it proof for 45 minutes to 1 hour at room temperature (20-22°C) or until nearly doubled in size.

Then, deflate the dough on a lightly floured counter, fold it in half, then in quarters and reshape it into a flattened disc. Wrap in clingfilm and place it in an airtight container, resealable bag or on a baking sheet. Proceed with the desired next step based on when the dough will be shaped and baked:

To bake the same day: place the sealed dough in the freezer for 2 hours followed by 3 hours in the refrigerator before dividing and shaping.

To bake the next day: place the sealed dough in the freezer for 2 hours followed by an overnight in the refrigerator before dividing and shaping the next morning.

To store and bake another day: place the sealed dough in the freezer for up to a month. Thaw the dough in the refrigerator overnight before dividing and shaping.

Divide and pre-shape the dough pieces into boules, chill for 30 minutes, roll out dough. Add fillings and final shape. Cover with plastic.

2nd proof: 1 to 1.5 hours (at 21-22°C), until puffy and not quite doubled in size.

Preheat the oven 20 - 30 minutes before baking.

For small rolls (50-60g), 180°C 15 to 20 minutes.
For 9x5” loaf (about 600 to 800g), 180°C 45 to 50 minutes.


Preparing the pastry cream:
Milk mixture: In a saucepan, bring half the sugar and 2/3 of the milk to a gentle simmer (about 77 to 80°C), whisking or stirring to prevent burn spots on the base of the pan.

If using zest, rub zest with sugar before adding the milk. Whisk/stir until all the sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla/lemon extract.

Egg mixture: In a mixing bowl, stir together remaining sugar, cornstarch and salt. Whisk in eggs and the remaining 1/3 milk. Mix until well combined.

Tempering of the egg mixture: Slowly add half the warm milk mixture in a thin stream to the egg mixture while whisking continuously to avoid any lumps. Pour this egg-milk mixture back into the rest of the milk in the saucepan, stirring continuously.

Place the saucepan back on the stove and cook over medium-low to medium heat, whisking constantly until the cream begins to thicken, about 2 to 5 minutes. Once it thickens, continue to whisk, pausing every few seconds to check for bubbles and the temperature as it approaches 93°C. When it begins to bubble, set a timer and continue whisking for 1 minute. This step helps neutralize a starch-dissolving protein in the egg yolk.

Remove from heat and whisk in butter until melted, one piece at a time until thoroughly combined. Strain (if there are lumps) the cream into a bowl or tray. Cover with cling film over the entire surface of the cream to avoid it forming a skin. Let the cream cool completely at room temperature or in the fridge.

Once cooled, whip it with a whisk or spatula gently, not too vigorously to avoid thinning the cream. Pipe or spread the pastry cream in pastries. It may also be mixed with whipped cream or milk to use as a filling.


The extra pastry cream leftover from the bakes above went into these two tarts (3.14 pi day yesterday): coconut cookie crust layered with chocolate ganache, pastry cream, more ganache topping and garnished with a little whipped cream and glazed berries.



Next, my current favorite sourdough loaves! These sourdough same-day bakes are easy to fit in my schedule and I like how small and easy to handle they are.



Sourdough loaf with Semola and AP
50g starter (100% hydration)
180g semola flour (semola rimacinata di grano duro)
20g all purpose flour
5g sugar
140g water
4g salt

Add-ins up to 80g


With jeera and cheese

Laminated 3g jeera and 50g Swiss cheese before coil folds
(similar to my other post)


And this one with spelt, AP and 50g pork floss mix (shredded meat cooked until a cotton candy-like texture) with seaweed and sesame seeds


Total BF at 22-23°C approx 6.5 to 7 hours
Final proof 24-25°C 2 hours, freezer 1 hour
Bake at 230°C 20 minutes with lid/steam, 25 without.

Until next time, happy baking! :)

- Christi

Bennie started it with his lemon love! This is a mixed up  crust with YW SD whole wheat and a bit of T65 and the rest AP. Toppings are mozzarella and Parmesan and black olive tapenade with pepperoni and homemade sauce. 

Tomorrow is Pie Day 3.14, what do you have prepared to celebrate? Instead of a double crusted pie I decided to bake a tart today (Pie day minus 1 = 3.13 ). The lemons looked really good yesterday at the market so decided upon a lemon tart which uses a pate sucrée pasty.

I like an extra lemony and tart curd so my curd has a bit more lemon zest and a bit less sugar than I usually see in the lemon fillings in recipes.

For the pastry - pate sucrée

75g icing sugar
250g plain flour
125g butter
1 large egg, beaten (plus 1 large egg white, depending on consistency)

Put the icing sugar, flour and butter into a food processor and blitz to breadcrumbs. Continue to blitz, and gradually add the whole egg until the dough comes together. You may need to add a little more egg white. Form the dough into a little round, cover with clingfilm and rest in the freezer for 10 minutes.

Roll the dough out to 12” diameter between two sheets of parchment paper (keep one for later). Transfer to the tart pan. Dock the dough.

Chill it again for 30 minutes. Pre-heat your oven to 350F (180C) while the tart dough is chilling in the pan. When the oven is ready line the top of the crust with parchment paper and place pie weights or dried beans to keep the pie crust from puffing when baking.

Bake the pâte sucrée for 20 minutes. Carefully remove the parchment paper filled with weights and bake for 15 more minutes, until the edges of the crust are golden.

Set the tart shell aside to cool (still in the dish). Leave your oven on at 350F/180C.

In the meantime, make the lemon filling.

Grab a fine-mesh strainer before you start and have it ready within arm’s reach.

For the lemon filling :
1 cup (250ml) lemon juice (about 4 lg lemons)
Zest of 2.5 lemons (organic lemons)
3/4 cup (150g) sugar
1/4 tsp table salt
¾ cup (170g) unsalted butter, cubed.
4 large eggs + 4 large egg yolks

In a medium saucepan (no heat yet), whisk together the lemon juice, lemon zest, sugar, salt, egg yolks and eggs. Add the cubed butter and turn the heat to medium. Whisk slowly until the butter is all melted. Continue whisking steadily until the mixture thickens to a thin custard consistency. This took about 20 mins.

Immediately pass the lemon filling through the fine mesh strainer, directly into the tart shell. You may require a third hand to help get all the curd out of the pot into the strainer. Tap the tart on the counter a couple of times to eliminate air bubbles. Using an offset spatula (or back of a large spoon), smooth out the top of the filling. Bake the tart for 5-6 minutes, until the filling has slightly set and turned slightly deeper in color.

Set aside to cool for at least 30 minutes. Enjoy slightly warm or chilled.

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Two experiments this weekend.  One I've been wanting to try and one a friend asked me to make.  I"ll try to get a more detailed method loaded in the next day or two.

 Garlic Onion Oregano and Turmeric
This is one I've been wanting to try.  Didn't know for sure how much of each inclusion to add, so this is the starting point.  Smelled wonderful coming out of the oven.  Seems to have lost those aromatics as of this afternoon.  Haven't tried it yet.  The Red Fife and Kamut were milled on my Mockmill.  

EDIT:  From my perspective, the texture was spot on but the flavor was lacking.  Shared half a loaf with a friend.  She thought it was delicious and made great paninis, but couldn't discern any flavor other than onion.  Next time, I will increase the inclusion amounts.

 Method
1)    Combine levain ingredients and ferment at 70 deg F for 12-14 hours
2)    Coarsely mince garlic and chop green onion.  Combine and sautee in 1 tsp olive oil over low heat to avoid burning the garlic.  Sautee until aromatic.  Add oregano and turmeric to the sautee, stir well to combine, and cook for 1 minute to bring out the aromatics in the herbs.  Remove from heat and cool.
3)    Combine all final dough flours and final water.  Stir gently until flour is just wetted.  Cover and autolyse for 30 minutes.
4)    Add levain, inclusions, and salt to autolyse and combine with pinch and folds.  Continue until levain is well mixed into autolyse.
5)    Develop medium gluten.  I used 3 sets of bowl kneading with 10 minute rests.
6)    Bulk ferment at 76 deg F.  Folds every 30-45 minutes (30 min if dough strength is low, 45 minutes if dough is reasonably holding its shape) until dough is starting to get "puffy".  Allow dough to expand to roughly 75-90%.
7)    Degas dough and pre-shape in a boule.  Bench rest for 20 minutes.
8)    Final shape round or oval.  Final proof at 76 deg F until dough has roughly doubled and is "jiggly".
9)    Pre-heat oven at 465 deg F; steam oven: bake at 450 deg F (5 mins), 425 deg F (15 mins); vent oven and remove steam; 425 deg F (10 min), 400 deg F (10-15 min)

Unfortunately, the yellow in the crumb didn't come through to this file upload.

Garlic inclusions

Bacon Egg and Cheddar
A friend asked me to try this one.  My choice on yeasted or sourdough.  I went with the RYW/SD combo in my levain.  Wasn't sure how much inclusion to add for this one either.  Like the Garlic Onion Oregano, the bacon was noticeable when it was pulled from the oven, but that aroma has subsided. 

I am presenting this bake of my 3.0 version of this bread to show how it does without any added VWG.  As I suspected the VWG really helps with getting the super tall loaf that I love seeing.  Without the VWG, the loaf is a normal profile, neither tall nor short.  I’m not mad at it.  It’s good to know that VWG isn’t absolutely required.

I

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For 9 x 4 x 4 “ pan

Overnight Stiff Sweet Levain fermented at 76-78°F 

14 g starter + 14 g brown sugar + 18 g water + 41 g whole wheat

Tangzhong prepared the night before and refrigerated 

28 g whole wheat + 142 g milk

Final Dough

184 g milk (reduce to 174 g if not using VWG) + 1 large egg (53 g) + 24 g sugar + 5.56 g salt + all Tangzhong 

+ all Stiff Sweet Levain + 331 g whole wheat flour + 7.08 g vital wheat gluten (optional) + 1.91 g diastatic malt (optional)

+ 52 g butter

Pre-bake Wash 

• 1 egg beaten

• 1 Tbsp milk

Post-bake Wash 

• 1 Tbsp butter (optional)

Instructions

Levain

Mix the levain ingredients in a jar or pyrex container with space for at least 300% growth. 

Press down with your knuckles or silicone spatula to create a uniform surface and to push out air.

At a temperature of 76ºF, it typically takes up to 10-12 hours for this sweet stiff levain to be at peak.  For my starter I typically see 3-3.5 times increase in size at peak.  The levain will smell sweet with only a mild tang.

Tangzhong 

In a sauce pan set on medium heat, stir the milk and flour until blended. Then cook for several minutes until well thickened, stirring regularly with a spoon or heat-resistant spatula. Let cool in the pan or, for faster results, in a new bowl.  Theoretically it should reach 65ºC (149ºF) but I don’t find I need to measure the temperature as the tangzhong gelatinizes at this temperature.  You can prepare this the night before and refrigerate it, ensure that it is covered to prevent it from drying out.

Dough

In the bowl of a stand mixer, add the milk (consider holding back 10 g of milk and adding later if this is the first time you’re making this), egg, tangzhong, salt, sugar, diastatic malt and levain.  Mix and then break up the levain into many smaller pieces.  Next add the flour and vital wheat gluten.  I like to use my spatula to mix until there aren’t many dry areas.  Allow the flour to hydrate (fermentolyse) for 20-30 minutes.  Mix on low speed and then medium speed until moderate gluten development this may take 5-10 mins.  You may want to scrape the sides of the bowl during the first 5 minutes of mixing.  Next drizzle in the melted butter a little at a time, or alternatively add room temperature butter one pat at a time.  Slow the mixer down to avoid splashing the butter at you. The dough may come apart, be patient, continue to mix until it comes together before drizzling or adding in more butter.  Once all the butter has been added and incorporated increase the speed gradually to medium.  Mix at medium speed until the gluten is well developed, approximately 10 mins.  You will want to check gluten development by windowpane during this time and stop mixing when you get a good windowpane.  You should be able to pull a good windowpane, not quite as good as a white flour because the bran will interrupt the windowpane somewhat.  This is a good time to add inclusions such as my favorite black sesame seeds, that way they do not interfere with the gluten development.  If you add inclusions mix until they are well incorporated in the dough.

On the counter, shape the dough into a tight ball, cover in the bowl and ferment for 2.5-3.5 hours at 82ºF.  There may be some rise visible at this stage.

You can next place the dough into the fridge to chill the dough for about 1.5 hours, this makes rolling the dough easier to shape.  Remember, if you do so the final proof will take longer.  Alternatively, you can do a cold retard in the fridge overnight, however, you may find that this increases the tang in your bread.

Prepare your pans by greasing them or line with parchment paper.  

Lightly flour the top of the dough. Scrape the dough out onto a clean counter top and divide it into four. I like to weigh them to have equal sized lobes. Shape each tightly into a boule, allow to rest 5 mins. Using a rolling pin roll each ball out and then letterfold. Turn 90* and using a rolling pin roll each out to at least 8”. Letterfold again from the sides so you have a long narrow dough. Then using a rolling pin, roll flatter but keeping the dough relatively narrow.  The reason to do this extra letterfold is that the shorter fatter rolls when placed in the pan will not touch the sides of the pan.  This allows the swirled ends to rise during final proof, this is only done for appearance sake and is not necessary.  Next roll each into a tight roll with some tension. Arrange the rolls of dough inside your lined pan alternating the direction of the swirls. This should allow a greater rise during proof and in the oven.

Cover and let proof for 6-8 hours at a warm temperature.  I proof at 82°F.  You will need longer than 6-8 hours if you chilled your dough for shaping. I proof until the top of the dough comes to within 1 cm of the top edge of the pan.

Preheat the oven to 350F and brush the dough with the egg-milk wash.  Just prior to baking brush with the egg-milk wash again.

Bake the loaves for 50 minutes or until the internal temperature is at least 190ºF, rotating as needed to get even browning. Shield your loaf if it gets brown early in the baking process. After 50 mins remove the bread from the pan and bake a further 10 mins by placing the loaf directly in the oven on the rack with the oven turned down to 325ºF. You can brush the top of the loaf with butter if you wish at this point while the bread is still hot to keep the top crust soft.

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This next one is for comparison, this one used the VWG.  There is quite a difference between the two and the only difference is the 7.07g of VWG.  So if you want a really tall loaf, use the VWG with this small amount you cannot taste it.  However, you can easily see the difference it makes.

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Hi Community,

First off, what a fantastic resource and community y'all are. Newbie here, and I almost instantly fell down the Panettone rabbit hole. I started in January and finally, FINALLY, this week I have a panettone that is beginning to resemble the image I had in my mind. I read so many past blog posts (especially Susan and MWilson) and consulted many, many recipes online, and even stumbled thru Italian sites with my 2nd grade-level Italian literacy.

My big takeaway: flour strength is paramount. After several failed bakes and poor gluten development, I saw success using flour with vital wheat gluten added. I used Giusto Baker's Choice (11.5% protein) and added some Vital Wheat Gluten (45% protein) to arrive at a blended flour of 14.2% protein. The second dough windowpaned, and the Panettone rose in their molds. I followed all the steps from Breadtopia here, and used the gluten calculator they link to:

https://breadtopia.com/naturally-leavened-christmas-panettone/

I used a stiff starter at 50% hydration, refreshed for a week or so, 2-3x a day, as my schedule allowed. A few times I had to store in the fridge during busy days. On the day of the first dough, I actually had it in the fridge, took it out at noon and then made the dough at 8pm (basically, not sticking to all the strict 4-hour tripling guidance here...still worked out ok somehow). I always stuck to the 60grams starter + 60 grams flour + 30 grams water for refreshments. Regular tap water and Giusto's Bakers Choice flour.

For my next attempts, I'm going to up the protein to 15% and be a little fussier with the starter and try three 4-hour refreshes before mixing the first dough. The crumb was beautiful but I'd like to aim for slightly bigger holes. Nevertheless, this panettone toasted up is heavenly...impossibly light and delicate, considering the amount of yolks and butter. On future attempts, I'll also experiment with flavorings, as I stuck to citrus zests and dark chocolate chips (a minor deviation from the Breatopia recipe linked above).

Thanks again to all the committed, passionate bakers on this site. You inspired me to keep iterating and pushing forward. Baking has been, especially in these times, a soothing way to occupy the mind. The Panettone pathway unspools before me, and I look forward to what it might hold.

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I had mentioned previously about converting my Challah recipe that I have been making since the mid ‘70’s to YW. I posted pics of the Apple/Raisin YW that I used on the YW topic . . Freshly fed and fermented it did an outstanding job. The fragrance is intoxicating. Crumb shot in a bit. 

I simply use 2c YW that’s very active and then follow my usual recipe. It’s in cups and measures and I haven’t ever bothered to change it. It’s been perfect all these decades so I haven’t felt the need. 

The beauty of YW is the enriched dough rises so nicely and the bread crumb stays soft and shreadable for days unlike yeasted crumb. 

In a small jar I put a handful of raisins, a handful of dried sd rye cubes and some lukewarm water. I let it ferment in a lukewarm spot for 3 days. Third day evening, I added water to volume of 650ml. I fed it with a couple tablespoons of rye flour. In the morning I added more flour, to the consistency of pancake batter.  It fermented about 5 hours, then started collapsing.  At this moment I made the proper dough using all purpose flour and salt.  Didn't add anymore water. Bulk ferment was 2 hours, final proof probably around 1 hour. Baked free standing, with steam,  on a pizza stone 

Similar technique to  Russian Monastyrski from rus brot channel 

Dan's recent questions, and all of the recent discussions about yeast water have made me think of ways of making it more reliable.

With a double build preferment, as was done in the Swiss Farmhouse community bake, yeast water breads can be reliable. We end up waiting to see if the first build of preferments starts to increase in size and show all the signs of active yeast fermentation and then use that to start another preferment which is used for the final bread. It works reliably once we know the first preferment works and because of the high amount of preferment in the final dough the bread bulks and proofs rapidly. The trouble is that it involves advanced planning!

A single build preferment, while not as reliable does work too (however, occasionally it fails to grow, and it is hard to gauge visually if the fizzy yeast water in the fridge has enough active yeast).

But what if we could drop the preferments altogether and just work with the liquid yeast water directly in the final dough? Other bakers, like Caroline seem to be able to get this to work. Maybe they just use a large amount of yeast water; or there is confidence that it is fresh and was fed recently. When I've tried it, it has been haphazard with the occasional 20 hour plus fermentation time, so not reliable for me yet.

The recent experiments with the sediment at the bottom of the yeast water jars for me indicated that it might be possible to use that as a form of 'concentrated' yeast water. It worked well at a high bakers percentage in that basic test - 20g of sediment/slurry had strong raising power.

How would it work as the sole leavening source for a bread? What I like about malt yeast water is that it propagates rapidly and there is no requirement to strain fruit pieces.

For this bread then, I cultured 56g of existing malt yeast water with 71g of malt extract syrup and 710g of water (so a ratio of 1:10 malt extract to water). After 24 hours, even with the jar kept exclusively at fridge temperatures, which I prefer to do, there already seemed to be a large build up of sediment. Wasn't ready to bake then so used it a day later when it was 45 hours from the initial feeding. After siphoning off the top I could get 41g of the concentrated sediment that was settled at the bottom of the jar. It was surprising that it was only 41g - thought it looked like more and maybe I should have left it in the fridge for more that 45 hours to get more sediment.

This 41g was used to make a bread with 400g of flour (so the concentrate was at a baker's percentage of 10.25%). It performed a bit like a slow sourdough, and took 6 hours at 26°C(79°F) before the dough was at about 55% volume increase when it could be shaped and cold retarded overnight. A lot slower than the initial basic test, but the amount used was much lower.

Here's the bread after baking the next day:

(What makes the bottom lift like this on the baking steel? Baked at 230C for the initial part of the bake when it lifted like this; it almost looks like it is hovering on the breadboard!)

The lazy part of me is questioning if this method is worth doing when it is very easy to go and buy a sachet of instant yeast which would have a similar effect. I guess the bread itself, because this is yeast water might be more acidic than with commercial yeast, but don't yet have a pH meter to confirm that! It was certainly nice enough to eat, see the pic for yourself.

I think this approach might be more successful with faster fermentation, and for that would probably need a larger amount of the concentrate and to try it at a baker's percentage of say 20% or higher (but would also have to make sure that the non-diastatic malt added in wouldn't get too high!).

-Jon