We are having homemade soup tonight for dinner. Since we've been eating a lot of sourdough lately I decided to make Hamelman's Pain Rustique. A unique bread, attributed to the legendary French baker. educator and author, Raymond Calvel, its poolish preferment comprises more than half of the entire dough weight.
Two pounds of poolish, for three-and-a-half pounds of dough!
At the moment we have three Welsh Corgi's, two "found us" cats, and a Haflinger pony. I think we give more thought to the healthiness of what we feed them, than what we consume ourselves.
Here's a very pet-healthy pet snack recipe my wife makes about every three weeks. It originated with our wonderful neighbor, and accomplished horsewomen, Cathy, pretty much as she gave it to us. Both our dogs and Mimi, the pony, love them.
Buck-a-Roo Bites
As far as the cookies go, I usually have some basic ingredients and add whatever I might have.
Yesterday I was baking baguettes. I've usually had to bake them in groups of two, not because my oven can't hold up to four, but because I couldn't find a fool-prove way of getting more than two on the hot baking stone using a peel. (I've dropped them on each other, off the back of the stone onto the rack, and, worst of all, onto the oven door.)
I recently made Hamelman's Vermont sourdough, and especially liked the flavor layer contributed by the ten-percent whole rye flour. However, my favorite bread in this genre remains Dan DiMuzio's Pain au levain formula. I think the stiff levain and the ten-percent whole wheat flour create a more complex flavor profile. So I took what I like from both, and baked a couple of loaves yesterday.
The formula:
480g ripe starter (67% Hydration)
Final dough weight: 1700g
Hydration: 67%
KA Bread Flour: 90% (we like a chewy crumb and crust)
We enjoy sandwich breads--soft crust, close crumb--a buttermilk white straight dough, the dough for three loaves made in our bread machine and oven baked, or a whole wheat variation has been our mainstay for six or seven years. My favorite is the whole wheat version. Recently, I've made a sourdough variation a couple of times, with enjoyable results. It was natural I'd turn to this favorite for my first go at making pain de mie--Pullman bread. This is a poolish started version. The final dough contains 25% whole wheat, and is firm (60% hydration).
Four afternoons of hands-on baking--that's Hands-on with a capital H. We started with first steps for making croissants, and sourdough levain, went on to bake lavash, classic baguettes (poolish), sunflower sourdough bread, rye fougasse (w/preferment), miche, and pizza. The latter two were baked in a wood fired oven; all our other dough were baked in the KA Bakery oven.
Folliwing Dan DiMuzio's guidance (and others) re creating a more sour levain I prepared a 500g, 50% hydration levain, and then fed it every 12 hours for two and a half days. I maintained it at 55°F, in our wine closet, thoroughout. Subsequently, I used DiMuzio's Pain au Levain (firm starter: 480g, 60%) formula with two changes. 1. The aforementioned 50% hydrated levain vs. the formula's 60% levain; and, 2. I encreased the whole-wheat flour percentage to 20% vs. the formula's 10%.
I think one of the biggest differences between commercial artisan bakeries, that bake every day, and the amateur that bakes once or even twice a week is how each handles levain day-to-day. From my reading I've gleaned the commercial baker keeps his or her levain (starter) at room temperature, and feeds it on a periodic schedule every 8 or 12 hours. (I'm an amateur, so, experts, please correct me if I'm terribly wrong). on the other hand, most amateurs keep thier starters at refrigerator temperature (~40°F), and feed them once weekly, or less often.
