martin's blog

After some time, several months, I am finally able to download pictures from my camera to my Linux system. Today I have sent you my first picture from Malaysia. The picture shows our Baguettes, Nutty Mardia Bread, White Unyeasted Bread and some coconut filled buns. The latter are filled with fresh coconut which we buy just up the road from our house. The coconut is split in half and the meat is grated out on a quite vicious machine that you do not want your hands to get near.

I first started playing with sourdough breads a couple of years ago. Unfortunately they did not turn out well although I kept trying for almost a year. This I came across Dan Lepards site (and later this one) and bought his book. I followed his recipe for the levain and after four or five days realised that my previous efforts did not resemble the bubbling mass I now had. My first attempt at the White Loaf was not a success, but I think that was because the climate temperature was around 34 C and I tried to keep to his recipes suggested timings.

Apart from the fact that most of us eat Peanut Butter on Bread. This has not much to do with Bread. A few months ago I made some Peanut Butter just to see how it would turn out. It was good so I made some more and gave sample to our Organic shop. They loved it and now I am having a job keeping up with the demand. It is sold in all 5 outlets of the Organic store. The bottle-neck is in peeling the peanuts. We did try using ready-peeled nuts but it was not the same.

Its 10:26 AM and I have just finished Baking. I started at 04:30. Shortly my wife and I will be off to deliver our bread to an Organic Shop we bake for. Three years ago we started baking in a small shop. We had the idea of baking healthy wholegrain bread. Boy were we wrong. Mostly we just got complaints about how hard the bread was. I have to say that in Malaysia bread is very very very soft and fluffy.