Blog posts

I came back from vacation!

I made this Barley batard (1/3 barley , 2/3 Whole Wheat), hearth bread.

Al though i used volume measurements, it turned our more or less sufficient. here it goes:

1 cup naked barley flour (1/3)

2 Cups Whole Wheat flour (2/3)

1 table spoon salt

1/4 teaspoon yeast

1.85 Cup of water, so roughly the final dough is 62% hydration (i could not elevate the hydration further because of the barley flour which kind of hinders the shaping process).

We're invited for dinner tomorrow at the home of one of my favorite high school teachers. He and his wife have become our good friends over the years. I offered to bring bread and decided to bake two different breads that I think they will enjoy: The Miche, Pointe-à-Callière from Hamelman's "Bread" and my own San Joaquin Sourdough. (This version)

My wife thought the miche would be just too much, so I divided the dough and baked two boules of 820 gms each.

The inspiration for this bake: 

http://www.wildyeastblog.com/2008/04/24/name-that-loaf/  

Susan at Wild Yeast has incredible breads on her site and I've printed out quite a few to try. This was one of them. 

I've been wanting to try "Pain Normande" ever since seeing it on SteveB's blog recently. Not only did I want to attempt to replicate his lovely bread, but I also conveniently have a ton of apples that I needed to use up. There are a lot of orchards around where I live so it's easy to come by (free!) great apples and fresh pressed apple cider. So, I threw a bunch of these apples in the dehydrator and got out the cider for this loaf. 

Two girl friends came for tea this morning.  In the past I would have toiled for weeks (no kidding) to prepare the most exquisite desserts and pastries that I could think of for our tea.  Since I started making sourdough breads, my taste bud has changed.  Just as well, Chinese tea is not meant to be enjoyed with sweets.  We just drank and drank until we were hungry.  We then had the finger sandwiches that I made earlier for lunch with the two Pains au Levain that I baked yesterday - Snow Peas Pain au Levain and Carrot Pain au Levain.

Having used this site for ages, and having greatly appreciated and learned from the collective wisdom of my fellow bakers, I finally decided to join the Fl. So now, I figured, is as good a time to introduce myself as ever.

This is my first attempt to post a blog. I have been baking bread and looking at the site for many years....here it goes.

You ask, what could be more decadent, and I say absolutely nothing. Cartellate are traditionally made during Christmas. They are traditional Pulgiese fried pastries, filled with roasted almonds, honey, spices and chocolate.

They are a holiday cookie and although mostly made at Christmas time, they are our star dessert on our Thanksgiving table. They just seemed so suited to a beautiful Thanksgiving dessert table. 

Well here I am;