David Esq.'s blog

Decided to bake a loaf of bread for a colleague, and decided I ought to make two different versions, just in case one didn't turn out properly.

I took the plunge a month or so ago and bought a pizza oven for our patio. I am still "dialing it in", as it were, but I was able to make some outstanding pizza with it this weekend.

The photos are on my phone and I've never had much success posting from my phone to my fresh loaf blog, so you'll have to just take my word for it.  Or, if you are so inclined, you can read a review and see some photos on my word press blog.

I decided to make the "Sesame" bread from Tartine Bread, which is basically the basic country loaf formula with a cup of toasted sesame seeds added after the first turn.

For this formulation, I used 300 grams of home ground white whole wheat instead of the 200 grams of whole wheat flour.

Deja vu.  This weekend I decided to make the Tartine Country rye bread again, this time I made four loaves.  The formula in the book:

Leaven  200g

Water    800 g

Whole Rye 170 g

Bread Flour 810 g

Salt 20g.

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My "modifications" to the formula:

Leaven                      200 g.

All Purpose Flour     500 g

Whole White Wheat 330 g

This weekend I decided to make the Tartine Country rye bread again.  The formula in the book:

Leaven  200g

Water    800 g

Whole Rye 170 g

Bread Flour 810 g

Salt 20g.

++

My "modifications" to the formula:

Leaven                      200 g.

All Purpose Flour     500 g

Whole White Wheat 330 g

My father and my next door neighbor have both confirmed that Field Blend No.2 from Ken Forkish's Flour Water Salt Yeast is the best bread they've ever eaten.  I happen to enjoy it a lot.  To date, it has consistently produced the best tasting loaf for me.

The plan for this loaf started out to be the Overnight Country Brown, from Flour Water Salt Yeast.  However, I ran out of all purpose flour and made up the difference with whole wheat from my red winter wheat berries freshly milled for the occasion.

For the flours, I autolyzed 200 grams KA AP flour with 680 grams of the whole wheat flour.  I decided to use 699 grams of water and that seemed just about right for moistening all of the flour. After an hour or so, I added 22 grams of salt and the levain.

Obviously, a lot of us are baking or will be baking bread for the upcoming U.S. Thanksgiving.  I decided to do a "double" on Ken Forkish's Overnight Country Brown, using a mixture of Red and White wheat berries for the whole grain portion fo the formula.

I was planning to make a "field blend #2" bread, using starter and the directions for the overnight country brown.  However, I started earlier in the morning and by the time the dough was tripled, it was very much over fermented.  I knew this because the dough was much more fragile than usual.  I could see the gluten web being fully developed as it poured/pulled out of the bucket.