Hello from Yorkshire, England

What a great forum! My name is Cath and i live in Sheffield in the UK :)

I am a newbie to the whole 'making a loaf from scratch' thing, the closest i used to get was my bread maker.

I do really want to become an expert in baking my own though, its a real art!

Had some total disasters recently but we all have to start somewhere don't we!

Am looking forward to learning lots on here!

So Hello to everyone!

Welcome to the Fresh Loaf. Floyd Mann is our host. Use the "Search" box, ask questions, and show off your baking results.

Ford

I was like you not too many months ago, the good folks here share a wealth of useful information and have helped me become an actual baker of edible loaves. I'm sure you'll find them as welcoming as I did.

seen a few from the UK join here since I joined (Down in Devon, but do visit Sheffield from time to time)

Flour, water, yeast, salt - and off you go :-)

Cheers,

-Gordon

Hi Cath Also in yorkshire. Just started baking sourdough in september. I had baked bread before but not much. Am totally addicted now! I made my own starter following the richard bertinet method (from his book 'crust'). Now keep one of his recipe stiff starters and a liquid, tartine-type starter on the go at the same time! If you want to start easily I recommend the bertinet approach, will give you a really good feel for the dough, timing etc., before you start with the stretch-and-fold methods that most on here use with the liquid starters. If you just want to make more bread, including yeast bread, I recommend the bertinet book 'dough' and the dan lepard book 'the handmade loaf' happy baking!

... as is Andrew Whitleys "Bread Matters" - the first half is dedicated to explaining what the commercial world does to mutilate what should be a simple flour/water/salt/yeast process into something so horrible you'll never want to buy mass-produced bread again...

-Gordon

Hi Cath

I am another forum member from the UK. Have a look at "lessons" in the menu options at the top of the page. Lesson 1 should help you get your first hand made loaf sorted.

Happy Baking