Isand66's blog

  We just went from Spring/Fall to Winter in one day on Long Island New York.  It was in the low 20's last night and this morning, perfect for a nice hearty porridge bread!

I recently bought some nice plump organic dried cherries from Trader Joe's and we had bought some Parmesan Cheese rinds at Whole Foods to use in sauces, etc. so of course both went into the porridge mixture along with oats, malted wheat flakes and cracked spelt (left-over from sifting the spelt flour).  I used milk to add some extra creaminess in the porridge.

I finally had a chance to sprout some grains and mill them with my new Mockmill II.  I bought some Einkorn a while ago and was saving it to sprout.  I love the nutty flavor that the einkorn flour imparts and the sprouted and sifted flour is amazing.

I decided I needed to stock up on some rolls and wanted to add some creamy grits to the mix along with some fresh high extraction rye and whole wheat.  Just to take it over the top some Greek yogurt was added to give it an even softer crumb.

This is the first bake after using fresh milled flour from my new toy, the Mockmill 200.  My wife was nice enough to buy this for me as a present and I couldn't be happier.  I have the Kitchenaid mixer attachment Mockmill but this new stand-alone version is so much quicker it's well worth the investment.

   This is the softest crumb of any bread I've made to date.  The combination of the porridge, cream cheese and potatoes made this one soft like a "pillow".  The taste was fantastic with the combination of 5 different flours.

If you decide to try this one, make sure to leave the skins on the potatoes when you mash them up.  This really gives some added texture and flavor to the bread.  I left the potatoes chunky on this one and you can see some of the potato chunks of flavorful goodness in the crumb and the crust.

   I don't like drinking coffee, but I do like the flavor in food including bread.  I thought the nice nutty flavor of freshly ground and sifted spelt flour would go well with the earthy coffee flavors and I wasn't mistaken.

I added some Greek Yogurt to soften the crumb a bit and also some real Vermont Maple Syrup to add a touch of sweetness.

This ended up with a nice subtle coffee flavor and tasted as good as I expected.  The crumb was moderately open and soft as desired.

  This is one of my favorite breads I've made to date.  I love porridge breads and the combination of pecans, cherries and cranberries really just made this one hard to resist.  I brought one loaf into work and wished I had saved it for myself :).

      This is a new version of a recipe I made a while ago.  I replaced around 30% of the high gluten flour with fresh milled and sifted whole wheat flour and used First Clear flour instead of High Gluten flour.  I added some cheese on top of some of them just to make it interesting.  I also added some extra water which the thirsty whole wheat gobbled up.

For the water in the main dough I used ice water.

    I used fresh milled and sifted durum flour for this bake.  My wife had made a big pot of rice with mushrooms that I've been eating all week as a side dish and I've been meaning to make a rice bread and also a mushroom bread, so here goes.

I did not use enough water in this bake and only had around 56% total hydration which ended up being way too low and caused the crumb to be very tight.  I have adjusted the formula to reflect what I should have used.

    I wanted to make a nice soft sandwich roll and had not used the Tangzhong method in a while.  This method never fails to deliver a soft tasty bun.  The addition of the potatoes and Greek yogurt along with caramelized onions put this one over the top.

For some of the rolls I added some shredded cheese on top and for the others some smoked sesame seeds were added.

The end result was a soft, flavorful roll perfect for a burger or sandwich.

I haven't made a rye bread in a while and I wanted to a nice moist one that would be good for sandwiches.  The addition of the ricotta cheese and mashed potatoes made for a super moist crumb and the corn flour added a very interesting flavor profile.

I was very happy with the flavor on this one and love the moist crumb.  The onions always go well with rye of course.