Blog posts

Wait...what?

Toast

After my first attempt in artisan baking my family promptly volunteered me for garlic bread duty for the family spaghetti lunch Xmas eve...I figured I'd just do another batch like I did for my introduction and then garlic it but then I decided I wanted to make rolls for dinner at my father-in-law's Xmas eve and lunch at my mother-in-law's Xmas day as well.

Yikes - my cuts opened up

Profile picture for user varda

Over the past few weeks I have been trying to "take it up a level."   I had hit the wall on getting properly shaped and slashed naturally leavened loaves.    LindyD's recent post http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/21045/fire-and-ice-great-oven-steam on generating steam set off a lightbulb in my head.  The symptoms I have been trying to cure are cuts that open a little and then seal over, and a split side.   I had been convinced that this was caused by un

The Bread That Grew A Horn or Apple Yeast Gone Wild

Profile picture for user hanseata

During our last trip to Portland I lured my (for good reasons) wary husband to go with me to "Rabelais", with the sanctimonious promise "just wanting to look what's new". Rabelais is cooks' equivalent to an opium den, a famous cookbooks-only store; they carry probably every English language (and several foreign language) cookbook on the market, plus many antique ones.

pandoros in the snow

Profile picture for user freerk

My second batch of pandoros came out very nice as well! I used Glezer's recipe. It was amazing how difficult it was to find cocoa-butter in this town. Especially when you know that Amsterdam is the #1 harbour for shipping the stuff around the world... In certain weather conditions we can smell the coacoa from our balcony, but for buying the cocoa-butter I ended up going out of town to a very old fashioned drugstore in a nearby city. The oddities of globalization, I guess... Anyway. here it is: my second batch of pandoros!

thom leonard's french country bread

Profile picture for user freerk

On X-mas we'll be having a cheese-thingie going on with friends, so I made my first 4 pounder today. It looks quite spectacular I think:

country french bread

This dough is quite soft, and I forgot to fold it 3x early on in the ferment, so i did one fold and at the end of the 3 hour ferment and hoped for the best. It came out flatter than I wanted, but it did get a substantial oven spring, so I'm  happy.

Ciabatta Bread Attempt Part III (The Final Chapter)

Profile picture for user Shutzie27

Well, time passed in that way it does and soon I had two loaves ready for the oven: 

Ciabatta ready for the oven

 

I trimmed the parchment paper (which burned to a crisp, by the way, any tips on avoiding that in the future?), wished them well, and gently slid them on the stone. 

Twenty minutes later, I pulled out these: 

Panettone with Cherries, Chocolate and Pecans!

Profile picture for user SylviaH

Not in the mood to spend hours in the kitchen, or feeling confident yet enough to tackle an authentic italian panettone, but want a lovely festive tasty panettone!  Mix it up tonight, bake it tomorrow!  These are festive little Panettone's and perfect for the Christmas Caroler's along with cup of hot coco!