I've recently picked up baking again, in particular sourdough. My baking mostly occurs at sea level in CA, but I am spending part of summer at our house near West Yellowstone at 6,800 ft.
I brought my starter with me and did my first bake here. I anticipated altitude-related problems, but it turned out fine (I made a few adjustments).
The formula was:
SIP (shelter in place) causes me to very regularly make SIP (Sourdough In Place). All this possible thanks to my local baker "The Midwife and the Baker" which sells high quality bread flour and hard white and hard red wheat flour (nothing to be had for even typical low quality store flours in any store for weeks).
Practice makes perfect, and they're turning out better each time.
Baking Challah is a weekly thing in my kitchen. I have blogged about it extensively. For the holidays I did something a little "special" inspired by a long ago post by Mariana (I think).
Rosh Hashanah Challah (yud bet)
Same party with neighbors (see Eliopsomo), different bread. From the book "Savory Baking from the Mediterranean" (Anissa Helou), page 133. This was definitely an interesting a delicious treat. Two loaves did not last very long.
Tortano Ripieno - Savory Baking from the Mediterranean
A party with neighbors brought some new inspiration to bake something different. From the book "Savory Baking from the Mediterranean" (Anissa Helou) I picked the recipe for Eliopsomo, or Greek olive bread. The book does not specify baker's percentages or weights, but I used my Dough Calculator to compute those. The conversion for spinach, herbs and olives are guesses and probably not exactly what the author intended. Nevertheless, I doubled the recipe and made two loaves.
Today I made Norm's recipe for Irish Soda Bread. Discussion here and elsewhere has me convinced that his Americanized version is more appropriately called Spotted Dog.
Norm's Spotted Dog (Soda Bread)
In seeking a tasty and healthy bread for my 6 year old son's lunch box I've been looking to create a sandwich loaf that is in large part whole wheat flour and other grains, yet has a somewhat soft crust (you know children: they don't appreciate the best part of good bread), and fine and soft texture. It should hold up well for PB&J as well as cheese, turkey etc.
Multigrain Oatmeal Sandwich Bread
