HeiHei29er's blog

The final request for the long weekend was a basic "white" sourdough that would be sized well for a toaster.  I decided to make a blonde with cross loaf scoring to make it lengthen instead of spread and bloom.  I do like the look of the long score with a big bloom, but I must say there's something to be said for the "clean" look of this scoring too.  

I was due for a starter refresh, so in this case, I used starter discard (6-hour feed discard) as seed instead of building a levain.

The other request for the weekend was a porridge bread.  I've made this one quite a few times now, and it's becoming a go-to bread when I get a request for a loaf.  To-date, I've always made the porridge as a soaker about 1-2 hours before final mix.  This time I made it as a mash following Benny's recent post.  My usual mash method followed Peter Rhinehart's (heat water to 165 deg F, add grains, hold temp at 150 deg F for 1-3 hours).  For this bake, I cooked the porridge in the microwave until it just started to boil (about 40 seconds) and then set in on the co

My parents are visiting this week, and my mom likes rye bread.  I made this once before with good success using a LAS.  I've been able to keep my "sour" raisin yeast water going and refreshed so I decided to make this loaf using that instead of the LAS.  The concept being the sour yeast water provides the leavening and acidity that a rye needs without using a traditional sourdough starter.  Similar concept to a LAS without having to take 2-3 days to make one.  The method uses a 2 stage levain build with the rye followed by a final proof after the spelt and soaker is

After last weekend's success doing a cold retard during bulk, I decided to try it again, but this time with a whole grain loaf.  It's been quite a while since I made a 100% whole wheat loaf and I have some flour I want to get through.  This one's not quite 100%...  I used my white flour starter refresh again for the inoculation.  I kept the method the same and am happy to say it worked again for me.  My summer schedule gets pretty crazy, so I'm glad I tried out th

I came across this video while surfing YouTube.  I love the way she degasses and pre-shapes.  Seems effortless.  Besides that, the black cumin and feta cheese combination intrigued me.  Had to give it a whirl and decided to try it with my Country Blonde sourdough recipe.

The concept for this loaf of bread came from the following video from FoodGeek.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InTqgRYVmh4

This loaf turned out really nice!  Moist but not gummy.  The jasmine rice really comes through in the aroma but the oats and corn help give it a whole grain flavor.  It has a creamy texture and will be great for grilled sandwiches and toast!

It was an experimental kind of weekend.  Two loaves that I've been wanting to try and had a window of opportunity.  Really happy with one and mixed results with the other.

It's been a long time coming, but I finally got around to doing a side-by-side comparison of a bake with and without raisin yeast water.  One caveat...  any of you that have followed my posts may remember when my yeast water that I made with honey and raisins went sour and noticeably acetic.  I thought it was the new batch of raisins I had purchased, but it happened again with a brand new YW with new organic raisins.

Tried my first loaf with Flourless Sourdough Starter this weekend.  White flour loaf with 10% whole wheat (KAF), 10% sifted durum (Janie's Mill), and 5% barley flour.  12% cracked wheat was added as a soaker.

FLAS was prepared by putting 40g of Breiss red wheat malt and 10g of kamut berries in 25g of raisin yeast water and 475g of water.  This was kept at 87 deg F for 36 hours and was fed 1/4 tsp of sugar after 24 hours.  pH after 36 hours was 3.45.  It had a sour apple type aroma, but not like a rye starter sour apple.

We recently spent a week in Hawaii, and while I couldn't bring back any fresh fruit, I was able to bring back some good macadamia nuts (Sea Salt Roasted).  Wanted to use some of them in a bake and came up with the following idea.  I used the Sourdough Cinnamon Roll recipe from Breadtopia's Sourdough Cookbook for Beginners (Pg. 102) as the basis for the recipe and then developed my own filling using the macadamia nuts.  Gave a few to friends, and the early reviews are great!