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My partner requested another Roman Pizza so how could I say no?  I wanted to use up a bit more of the whole Kamut that I have left so changed the spelt to Kamut.  Also having made this once I wanted to improve it, the last time the crust didn’t brown as well as I would have expected for the baking time.  So I added a tiny amount of sugar and some diastatic malt.  This worked well to improve the browning of the crust so I am happy with that.

I came across this purple sticky rice while stocking up on some pantry dry goods recently.  I've never heard of it before, but it has a nice rich flavor, and I've enjoyed working it into my recent breads.  

My first go-round was a 50-50 white/whole wheat loaf 

I think amounts were about

200g Maine Grains hard red spring whole wheat

200g KA special patent 

~3tsp salt

50g starter

@ 80% hydration I think

I needed more bread, so what’s new?  Wanting some whole grain bread though I decided to use some spelt with the whole wheat for some variety.  I also wanted some seeds in this bread because I love seeds so decided to add pepitas and sunflower seeds at 10% each.

Today's bake: Goat Cheese & Herb Babka

Source: Clotilde Dusoulier - Chocolate & Zucchini  #cnzrecipes

Note:  Orig TDW 0.650kg & Pan 30x10x10cm; New TDW  0.900kg & Pan 40x10x10cm

This first time I tried making one of these I used Full Proof Baking’s Kristen’s formula. It was great, but I had some technical issues related with shaping and transferring the dough from the countertop into the pan.  This time I thought I’d try a different one, Maurizio’s The Perfect Loaf formula.  Some of the minor changes I made are in brackets.

This recipe is for 11”x17” that I have decreased to 80% of the original weights. 

Today's bake: Lyubitelsky Rye (Russian)

Source: Breadlines Spring 2016 - BBGA by Stanley Ginsberg

Note:  Changed TDW from 1.25  kg to 2.188 kg., Molasses - Blackstrap, Unsulphured  for Dark Molasses

My daughter in law has given me some starter. I have already made one nice sandwich loaf with it. Now I'm trying to figure out a feeding schedule. I tried putting it in the fridge, but that was a disaster. It got a thick "skin" on the outside and didn't rise at all. 

I took it out, got rid of what looked weird, discarded all but 100 gr, then added 100 gr spring water, 100 gr A/P flour. (1:2:2, right?) It doubled in 11 hours (although it did not do anything at all for the first 4 hours).

Sourlotti by Abby has a great way for making an 'oat porridge' bread that has worked out well for me before. I think it might be the amount of butter in the soaker preparation that makes it work so much better for me? In any case, for this loaf I decided to eschew the butter and replace it with coconut oil which has been working very nicely for me as a substitute for butter in other recipes too like hamburger rolls.

My mother-in-law loves laminated pastries, so I decided to spoil her a little bit by making a few different ones while she was here. Of course, I am also spoiling my husband and myself because we now have an abundance of riches in the freezer. Not sure whether the lamination bug will continue or whether I am all laminated out.

First up: poolish croissants, https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/22677/poolish-croissant-pursuit-perfection