pmccool's blog

One of the breads for tomorrow's Festive Braids class.  

Paul

Ian asked that I post something from my bakes (it has been ages).  So, here's today’s bread, a simple pain de compagne.  It's yeasted, rather than sourdough and will form the base for some DIY grilled cheese sandwiches for tomorrow's class.  The other bread the students will make is pain a la ancienne.

 My running debate with myself over whether to buy a mill or do without came to an abrupt end the week before last when I saw a post about a KoMo Fidibus Classic for sale at an attractive price.  The new-to-me mill arrived early last week but I wasn’t able to play with it until I purchased some wheat this weekend.  

Beth Hensperger's Sweet Vanilla Challah, to be precise.  These will be appreciation gifts. 

Paul

Okay, the grain bill was different than Hamelman's but the rest of the bread was per the formula.  Good stuff!

Paul

My work schedule is set up so that I get every other Friday off.  Or, as my employer puts it, I'm on a 9/80 work schedule.  That means Mondays through Thursdays are 9 hours a day, one Friday is 8 hours, and the following Friday is off.  I love it.  Having a 3-day weekend every other week is a wonderful thing.

One of the all-time favorite recipes here on TFL is the Blueberry Cream Cheese Braid that Floyd posted clear back in 2005.  If you haven't yet, or haven't recently, read that post and the long string of comments that follow, I suggest that you have a look.  There are a lot of good ideas in that thread.

Lots of decorating throughout the house, plus some stollen for when family visit for the holiday.  Maybe some for gifting, too.  Fortunately, the white stuff hasn't shown up outdoors, yet.  

Paul

Since receiving my copy of The Rye Baker, I've been baking and savoring its breads on a virtual basis.  It is a beautiful book with many intriguing breads to try; far more than I sampled during the test bakes.  Good as all that has been, the time has come to do some real baking.  Actually, the time came last weekend but I hadn't made the necessary preparations, so I ran out of weekend before getting to bake anything from the book.  Consequently, I made sure to have everything on hand and my schedule laid out so as to get serious about baking this weekend.

Back in March, Stan (elagins) posted about a Lithuanian black rye bread that he had made.  It looked absolutely lovely and worthy of a bake.  However, my baking over the past three months has gone in other directions.  Worse, I've taken about as much bread out of my freezer as I have out of my oven.  It's a wonderful tool, the freezer, but baking is much more satisfying than thawing.