Blog posts

Hi friends, this old ski bum had a busy winter baking mostly cookies and muffins and logging 100 ski days for the season in a difficult snow year. YAHOO!

I was going to bake baguettes, got lazy and decided to do a Forkish style proof and bake. Funny, I ate little bread over the winter and suddenly had a hankering for a fresh loaf. Mission accomplished! I also started a pineapple juice solution to get a levain going and in day 5, it looks like I have a successful starter!!!!! I Am also day two on a YW starter that is progressing well according to dabrownman's instructions.

Started baking with levain a few weeks back, and it only took a few loaves to get me started on experiments and new flavors - couple that with chocolate cravings hitting with a passion - well, the rest is pretty self explanatory.

This week is finals (and my graduation!) week at Penn State, so naturally I've hidden from all responsibility in the kitchen. This week I made Po'Boy rolls for buffalo chicken cheesesteaks, oatmeal bread, oatmeal cookies, and pizza. 

Po'Boy Rolls - http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/24960/new-orleans-poboy-bread-it039s-all-eric039s-fault

I made these a little smaller for shareability, maybe a little less crackly, but so delicious.

Hello,

Sourdough Italian Demi-Baguettes: Variations on a Theme 

David M. Snyder

May 3, 2015

1/1/2015 - New Years Eve Pizza

1/2/2015 - 50 % Whole Grain Sprouted 8 Grain SD/YW with Japanese Black Rice & Seeds

1/9/2015 - 50 Percent Whole Sprouted 16 Grain SD with Lake Havasu Desert Magic IPA

I haven't posted a lot as it seems I have been traveling all the time, but I have been baking, so I will share some of those photos.  When I found out that we were so close to the King Arthur Flour HQ during our New England trip, I just had to go visit there.  It was so much fun, and I wanted to buy everything.  Generally, carrying flour in one's suitcase does make it a lot heavier, and I am already at the limit!  I got a gift certificate for my birthday, so I will be ordering a lot of KAF goods when we aren't traveling so much.

Decided to give the pantry and the new mill a workout. List of ingredients:

5 variety rice mix

Quinoa

Flax seed

Steel cut oats

Wheat bran

Milk

Water

Amaranth

Chia seed

Sunflower seed

White wheat flour, high extraction

Semolina flour

Einkorn flour

Spelt flour

Barley flour

Buckwheat flour

Wild yeast starter

Sorghum syrup

Coconut oil

Salt

Pumpkin seed

Bread smells wonderful. Won't cut it till tomorrow. 

Stu

Today in addition to the Hamelman Challah, our rye starter was floating so we needed to put together bread.

Inspired by Hamelman's Vermont Sourdough with increased whole grains today's dough is really a 1.2.3 with an emphasis on pumpernickel...simply because I didn't feel like working at it.

384 grams of floating starter, 768 grams of water and @1100 grams of flour split:  200 Whole Wheat, 300 Pumpernickel and 600 KA Bread.  I actually dropped the bread flour a little because of the increased whole grain pumpernickel.

  Bread number two I baked this week incorporated some of my ever-growing collection of dried cherries along with a small amount of shredded cheddar cheese and a multitude of tasty flours.  I wanted to make a good healthy bread I could eat for breakfast and I think the end result fits the bill.

I used some of my freshly milled Durum flour in the stater and incorporated some KAF Oat flour, whole wheat, potato and European flour into the final dough.  Some cracked wheat and rye chops were added to round out the whole grain aspect of this one.