Isand66's blog

   Wine, Walnuts, Cranberries and Porridge....what's not to like?  I have to say, nothing!  This one is chock full of flavor and good enough to eat by itself, but even better with some cheese.  I gave 2 of these away to some work colleagues.  I think they will enjoy them, I hope.

There is just enough wine in this one to add a nice flavor without overpowering the bread or inhibiting it's fermentation.  The crumb is nice and moist and you get a mouthful of walnuts and cranberries with each bite.

These were made as gifts for some of my office colleagues.  I ended up keeping one for tasting purposes :0.

I used hand milled durum and whole wheat both sifted and a little KAF bread flour.  The ricotta was added for some extra softness and that combined with the olive oil made for a nice smooth dough.  I added some smoked and black sesame seeds as a topping and on 2 of the breads topped it with some melted cheese.

The bread turned out great with a nice nutty flavor from the durum and a soft crumb.

   Coming in at 65% fresh milled high extraction Durum flour, this one is bursting with flavor.  The addition of the porridge and ricotta cheese takes it over the top.

This is the perfect bread for some home made tomato "gravy" and or grilled with some good olive oil and melted cheese.

    Well this was supposed to be one of DA's famous Chacon breads but as you can see it failed miserably in the shaping department.  I used the wrong size basket which I think killed it and produced a nice misshapen blob or something that looks like it escaped from Stranger Things.

These rolls were baked for Thanksgiving dinner at my Brother in law's in North Carolina.  We made our usual pilgrimage down south and as usual I volunteered to make some rolls for dinner.

  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.