Isand66's blog

22Mar

One of my favorite ways of making healthy potatoes is to partially boil them in salted water and then toss them in olive oil with some spices. Then, I place them on my pellet smoker until they are nice and crisp with a slightly smokey flavor. They are good enough to eat by themselves. I decided to prepare some purple sweet potatoes in this fashion and had enough left over to use in this bread.

This is my entry into the Freshloaf.com Community Bake Flatbread challenge. About a year ago another baker on TFL, Tom Passin (Tpassin) posted a yeasted version of this unique style of flatbread here. He goes over some of the history of the bread and has some cool links with videos. There are many ways to make this one with different styles.

Whole Wheat Rye with Corn Flour SD

1Mar

It’s time for a hot pastrami sandwich, so I made rye bread with fresh milled whole wheat, rye, and corn flour. I added some molasses for sweetness and some sour cream for extra tang.

23Feb

I love adding cheese to my bakes. Usually, I cut the cheese in small pieces or chunks and fold them in, but I decided I wanted to use shredded cheese and added some to the starter. I used Parmesan and smoked cherry cheddar cheese. The combination really imparted a noticeable cheese flavor and when the bread is toasted or grilled it smells amazing.

I made a version of this several months ago. This time, I added dried raspberries and used Butler’s Gold whole wheat from Barton Springs Mill.

The durum and the whole wheat were milled in my MockMill 200 and sifted with a #30 drum sieve, re-milled, and then sifted with a #40 drum sieve.

The Butler’s Gold WW is an organic modern Red Winter Wheat with a neutral classic wheat flavor and is considered a relatively high-strength flour. The protein content is 15.5%.

For the first bake of 2025, I figured I would try something new. I’ve never combined a Tangzhong with a Scald. I used fresh milled green corn flour for the scald, which had boiling water poured over it and stirred until combined.

The final mix was done in my Ankarsum and open-baked with steam.

This was a very high-hydration dough, and with all the fresh milled flour, it ended up over proofing. I should have baked it the next morning, but I had to go to work, so 18 hours ended up being too long. The dough didn’t hold its shape and had very little rise.

I really like the effect that using a Tangzhong has on the bread. It helps the bread stay fresher longer and I find the crumb to be a little more moist.

I usually use water to make the Tangzhong which is typically 5 parts water to one part flour. I decided to try something new and used a nice Merlot wine in place of the water. It worked out great and gave the final dough a subtle wine flavor but not overpowering.

This was a very high hydration dough I probably could have cut the water down 20% and still had an excellent overall bake.

Dec

I made a couple different versions of this bread several years ago and decided to change it up a bit using a Tangzhong. Making a Tangzhong is simple and it really helps make a super soft crumb.

I made a version of this before but never posted it. It is a pretty wet dough, but not so wet that you couldn’t do a traditional braid. I made one of these plain to use for stuffing, and the other one was a request for one of my friends’ families.

Most of the flour used was KAF bread flour and I mixed in some fresh milled Butler’s Gold whole wheat and spelt both from Barton Spring Mills.

I used dark chocolate chips and Chukar brand air-dried Rainier cherries which were rehydrated in water before adding to the dough.

Dec 14

I love adding beer to sourdough bread. I’m not a big beer drinker but the malty flavor it imparts is amazing and Guinness is one of my favorites to use.

The sour cream added extra moisture to the crumb, and the caramelized onions imparted a wonderful sweet onion flavor.

I used King Arthur high-gluten flour since I didn’t have any first clear flour, along with some fresh-milled Danko Rye (milled from Barton Springs Mill berries).