Two days ago, misinterpreting what Dan was after, I posted a Pullman loaf that baked up short and dense. With the feedback from several folks, a few YouTube videos and a consultation with Mr. Hamelman via his book, I made a series of changes, seemingly all for the better.
Felila posted a link to an article in the Washington Post newspaper on baking with a newly developed flour, Kernza. During the summer I visited with a friend in Vermont who was gifted a small bag of Kernza flour, apparently promotional as the one pound bag has no markings on it other than the Land Institute logo and "Kernza Perennial Grain Flour". Not even the weight of the contents. And handed it over to me.
and still kinda get away with it? Answer - a lot.
Background is rooted, but barely, in my recent enjoyment of an 80% PFF biga version. I was refreshing the regularly neglected 75% mixed flour levain along with the workhorse 100% AP levain when I suddenly had this "brilliant" idea. Why not change a few things at once so that I won't know what may have worked and what didn't?
Things that changed, some not necessarily on purpose:
Our building's A.M. is retiring at the end of this month and we wanted to give her something to take home in the most alfanso way. Sesame Semolina and Ciabatta.
My wife's contribution were her fabulous orange chocolate chunk meringue cookies.
happycat posted about his Yudane bake mere days ago. I'd never heard of Yudane before but he mentioned that it is another Tangzhong type of scald - typically for enriched breads, I would guess. On the back burner for quite some time I still hadn't gotten around to baking with Tangzhong yet. And then happycat posted his Yudane bake. Time to give it a whirl.
Posted before as big batards, so first time out of the chute as baguettes.
We were eating grilled pork chops with polenta a few evenings ago, and that reminded me of this bread that I'd made twice in succession back in Feb. for the first time.
This time, aside from the baguette shape I rejected using the mechanical mixer instead opting for a hand mix.
Yes, posted before and guilty as charged! However, I'm here to sing the praises of this extraordinary bread. And can't think of a better way than to put it in front of your eyes again. After these came out of the oven and cooled, and we'd had a few slices, I said to my wife - if I had only one bread that I would be able to bake forever, I think this would be the one.
While in NY last month, I noticed this irresistible Sourdough Bread Making Kit in the window of a "health foods" store. I resisted.
We visited with my brother and sister-in-law last week in New Mexico. Sandra wanted to bake a few different breads than those she had made before and wanted to try her hand, and taste buds, on these two. I brought out much of the goods and formulas for her, and off she went...
Hamelman SD Seed Bread.
I'm infrequently in the habit of reposting breads from the past without a change of something or other. However I can't seem to find any prior reference of mine on TFL of having posted this one here before.
The background: My initial levain, true and trusted friend all these years, was this 75% mixed flour affair, and from that grandpa sprouted all subsequents. These past two years I seem to always bake with the 100% hydration AP levain, and occasionally work some other levain requirement off that.
Two words I had never thought of stringing together before yesterday.
But just for the fun of it I hand mixed the Bouabsa dough at its normal 75% hydration with it's quite low iDY at 0.16%. Modifying the remainder of the method, the dough was BF'ed for ~100 minutes with "ciabatta-like" folds in the vessel at 30 60 & 90 minutes. Then off to retard for ~20 hours.
