Blog posts

A few months ago, I stumbled upon these puffy soft bagels called açma/acma while learning how to braid strands of dough. But I never got around to studying about their ingredients. They are so easy and fun to make. Unlike simit with its crispy crust, açma is soft and bun-like. I turned the doughs into different kinds of twists and rolls. The ones above were topped with chopped walnuts, brown sugar and maple butterscotch glaze.


Topped with cheddar and sesame seeds

Trying to get into baking 2 times a week to get some practice in, hence this loaf!

Almost the same process as the first one, but with the following inclusions/ steps:

- 4% Miso
- Alot more furikake. Almost emptied the packet out
- Added these 2 ingredients at the final mix before bulk fermentation (as per benny's suggestion)

The crumb seems a little tighter compared to the first loaf, and not as open as benny's.

 I have not made Bialys in a long time.  The last time I made these I used Spelt so this time I decided to use some freshly ground high extraction whole wheat.

For the filling most of them used the traditional mixture of poppy seeds, onions and oil but I didn’t make enough so I used some shredded aged Vermont white cheddar.  You can’t go wrong with adding cheese to about anything in my humble opinion :).

so I've baked this Chocolate Rye from Lutz Geißler's ploetzblog -- https://www-ploetzblog-de.translate.goog/2015/09/05/im-schoko-rausch-schokoladenbrot-sechzig-prozent-roggenbrot/?_x_tr_sl=de&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_… -- twice now. It's got extraordinary flavor and, though I got two completely different looking results, I wanted to share it here.

I didn't have a plan for this week and had a request for some kind of onion bread. After searching around I found an onion and sage bread. Reading more about that someone mentioned that the bread tasted kind of like a Thanksgiving Stuffing. AH HA! Inspiration strikes. If I can make an onion bread with some herbs, why not make a Thanksgiving Stuffing bread. One of the easy to make instant bread stuffings in America is StoveTop stuffing. Bread crumbs, a seasoning package, and some chicken stock to hydrate...cooked on the stove or in the oven.

Finally got around to making bialys based on the King Arthur recipe. I've always loved the bialys they used to make at the Mendocino Bakery which has since changed hands several times and had sadly disappeared from the menu on our last visit early in the Covid epoch. I will be looking for them when we visit again in a few months. In the meantime, these came out just great so we won't go without.

This bread arose from a “What if…?” musing.  Specifically, what if I used oat flour in place of barley flour for the Barley/Wheat Bread I made previously?  As it turns out, it's a pretty good idea.  

The formula was:

350g whole oat flour

50g whole rye flour

OK first blog entry here. About time I start documenting my bakes so I have some record of progress...

Mostly my bakes are for my weekly sandwich and other common uses (toast, etc). I've played around with a few flours and one reason to start blogging these is so i can keep the experiments straight. Most past bakes have been all or almost all bread flour with some whole wheat here and there. 

Today's bake is another using my sour raisin yeast water as the predominant leavening.  I also added in a bit of starter at the final mix because the RYW poolish seemed a little sluggish.  This was also an overnight cold retard during bulk.  I've made this once before at 30% whole grain, so I bumped it up to 40% for today.  I think I could go up to 50% and get similar results, but not using the cold retard (or I would have to go into cold retard sooner).  The dough looked good after the cold retard and during shaping, but it was starting to lose steam and dough stre

Third in my series of polenta breads each different from the previous.  This third loaf instead of either cooked polenta or saccharified polenta, I used cooled cooked polenta and then held it at 135-140°F after being mixed with koji rice for 14 hours.  I’ve made regular amazake before but this was my first time trying it with something other than cooked rice.  So to understand what amazake is you need to know what koji rice is.  Koji rice is rice that has been inoculated with aspergillus oryzae.  This incredible mold has so many food related uses.