gavinc's blog

Keeping up the baguette practice.

I have to practise making baguettes occasionally or I lose the mojo. Today was baguettes with poolish (Hamelman). They are the longest I can fit into my oven; I may have to drop off a few grams of dough to get them a bit thinner. I've put them into the freezer for the unexpected "drop-in".

Cheers,

Gavin.

 

Vermont Sourdough with whole-wheat

This is a 10% whole-wheat sourdough that is our everyday bread. It is great in the morning with bacon and eggs and an extra slice with vegemite or a jam. I bake it once a week or sooner if we run out. I gift a loaf to the guy next door occasionally as he mows our front nature strip when he is doing his own.

Five-Grain Levain - Hamelman

This is Hamelman’s Five-Grain Levain. I used the same grains as per the formula; cracked rye, flaxseeds (sold here as linseed), Sunflower seeds and oats. I made the cracked rye by milling the rye very coarsely, then sifting with a 40# mesh sieve.

I recalculated for a 750-gram dough (to suit my banneton) and have included the formula below.

I mixed the final build of the levain about 5 pm the day before and made the soaker at the same time. The levain and at its peak by 7 am the next morning.

Golden Raisin Bread - Hamelman

This is Hamelman's Golden Raisin Bread. The baked loaf tasted very nice. I used organic raisins and some seemed to erupt through the surface in the oven. I increase the raisins next time. The crumb was nice and light for this bread. I'll post the formula below.

Test Run 3 stage rye sourdough

This last weekend I did a test run of a 3-stage fermentation rye sourdough. I know a little about how rye behaves, so I thought “What could go wrong?”. I chose Hamelman’s Three Stage 70 Percent Sourdough Rye. I recalculated for a 750-gram boule.

The first issue was that the recipe called for medium rye flour. I only have home-milled whole rye. Lance advised getting a 40# mesh to get something close to medium rye. I was keen to proceed anyway and went ahead using whole rye.