Blog posts

On Saturday the 7th at 9pm I started mixing my first dough and began my overnight bake to have fresh bread out for my display at the 2009 culinary salon. As the night progressed I created my take on the epi loaf, guinness and barley bread, ciabatta, palmiers, croissant, danish pastries, 5 grain buns, 5 strand challahs and my centre piece. I set up the display around 6 am on sunday after a relaxing night bake. Judging began at 8am and i was allowed back at 1pm. I arrived with much anticipation and found my peice awarded a 1st place standing in my category!. Gold!

Irish American Heritage Month

In absence of my camera (the display is broken), I uploaded a few old pictures. When our kids were younger, we once took them to the Bakkery Museum. They were really exited about the figures the bakers demonstrated. If it is not the content of a bread, it will be the form that decides whether they like it are not!

We made some of these breads during several birthday partys, even the 'never eat bread' kids would eat that own bread this time.

Hi,

New here, thought I'd try a little blog to see what happens, learning wonderfully, hearty thanks to generous people, and I hope I can be as helpful.   

Digital Photography, Tips and Methods for the Baker

One of the wonderful things about the digital cameras we all have today is that we can share the look of the wonderful things we bake. It’s one thing to write a recipe and describe how things should be but as someone once said, “A picture is worth a thousand words”.

Today i put together a decorative plaque, baguettes, ciabatta, and the beer and barley bread. I'm entering a baking competition this weekend and have been practicing for the last little while. On Sunday I'll be doing the decorative plaque, baguettes, ciabatta, beer bread, multi buns, challah, palmiers, croissants, and danish dough for my display. Thoughts and comments are always welcome. If people are at all interested in a tutorial for the plaque just let me know!

Where are all of the artisan bakeries in LA?

Well here it goes, trying to post pictures on my blog - today I baked a traditional Jewish holiday treat called Hamantashen.  They are popular for the holiday of Purim which is next Tuesday.  I made about 110, a mix of prune, cherry and blueberry.  I'm not the most careful cookie shaper, but these are disappearing too fast for that to really matter.

Inspired by Hansjoakmin's [url=http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/10753/loaf-and-something-coffee][u]five-grain rye sourdough[/u][/url], I decided to try a sourdough rye. I chose Hamelman's Flaxseed bread, which is a 60 percent rye, because I've never tasted such a rye (let alone baked one). Plus, flaxseed is good for you.

Hamelmans 5 Grain Levain