Bread ****

[Airgead]

Made ciabatta on the weekend.

Left the dough to prove for an extra 2 hours and it was climbing out of the bowl.

Much harder to handle than regular bread dough, very sticky. Covered the kitchen (and myself) in flour.

Made 3 loaves and they turned out very well, so much so that i cut up one of them into 3 portions to use for rolls at work.

Here is one just before being toasted. Nice crust, plenty of the typical holes in the bread and light in texture.

I need to squish them down a little bit more before baking but other than that i am pretty happy with it. Hoping to make individual rolls instead of loaves this weekend.

Very nice. My last batch came out pretty well too. Its the extra long first rising that does it. It really needs to be climbing out of the bowl to get that open texture.

Cheers
Dave

 

[drsmurto]

I did the first rise overnight, then added the rest of the flour/water etc the next morning and let that prove for 4 hours. Shaped and let i sit another 30 mins before bunging in the oven.

Proving room is the lounge room next to the fire :lol:

 

[Airgead]

Been a while since I posted anything here.

Foccacia with rosemary and smoked sea salt -





And some fancy looking (but really simple) fougase -

 

[drsmurto]

Just ordered Dough and Crust.

Couldn't decide which one to buy so bought both. :lol:

 

[bonj]

Brilliant, DrSmurto! They complement each other really well. If I had to recommend only one, I'd recommend Dough to a beginner, but by the look of your bread above, you're probably right in getting both.

 

[drsmurto]

Was wondering if there was too much overlap but on closing perusal it would appear one is for beginners and then one more advanced?

I fired up the sourdough culture this morning after a few months hiatus focussing on the ciabatta.

Was considering doing a 2 day ferment prior to mixing with the remaining dough to make the loaf. 1st 24 hours at room temp, 2nd 24 hours in the fridge. I recall others doing that just not sure of the reasoning behind it.

 

[bonj]

Was wondering if there was too much overlap but on closing perusal it would appear one is for beginners and then one more advanced?

I fired up the sourdough culture this morning after a few months hiatus focussing on the ciabatta.

Was considering doing a 2 day ferment prior to mixing with the remaining dough to make the loaf. 1st 24 hours at room temp, 2nd 24 hours in the fridge. I recall others doing that just not sure of the reasoning behind it.

I wouldn't really call either of them a beginners book, but for the beginner, Dough offers more instant results as Crust has a lot of breads that require building cultures. Both are fine for the beginner, and I actually got Crust first. Dough just has more recipes that you can make same day. I haven't done any sourdough yet.

 

[drsmurto]

Dug out my mothers old bread making tin and made a sourdough loaf.

Went 50/50 wholemeal/white. Did the prooving in the car as the sun was out and it rose like a champ. Had a chat to my mother the day before and asked her about that. It was her tried and tested method, drive the car around the front of the house and park it in the sun. Heated up beautifully even in the middle of winter.

The crust was perfect and the crumb pretty damn good. I ended up slicing off the crust and ate it, no need for butter or anything. Yum! The sourdough culture is really tasting/smelling good after nearly a year.

 

[bonj]

Dug out my mothers old bread making tin and made a sourdough loaf.

Went 50/50 wholemeal/white. Did the prooving in the car as the sun was out and it rose like a champ. Had a chat to my mother the day before and asked her about that. It was her tried and tested method, drive the car around the front of the house and park it in the sun. Heated up beautifully even in the middle of winter.

The crust was perfect and the crumb pretty damn good. I ended up slicing off the crust and ate it, no need for butter or anything. Yum! The sourdough culture is really tasting/smelling good after nearly a year.

Awesome. My sister down in Melbourne does the same thing with her breads rising in the car. No need for that here. I just put mine in the microwave (turned off) and it rises nicely.

 

[drsmurto]

Dough arrived last week and i flicked through it. Some nice recipes but there wasnt really anything in there to change my thinking on how i was doing things or why i was ended up with bread a tad too dense.

Then i watched the DVD that came with it and if i was in a cartoon a light globe would have appeared above my head. Watching him hand knead the dough and seeing it go from a sticky mess to a silken dough really hit home.

Richard was born and bre(a)d in Brittany in the NW of France where i spent 6 months studying - a loose connection if ever there was one but i am claiming it!

Really happy with the flavour and crust of my sourdough so I am doing a number of things right but i need to throw away the mixer and go back to kneading by hand. The folding after the proving step is also something i am not doing well.

The last 3 loaves have used ~15% rye and the extra dimension it adds to the bread is the same reason i use it in beer so often. :icon_drool2:

 

[brettprevans]

Dough arrived last week.....

Ive got that and by coincidence I made the french doughnuts on the weekend


not a great picture but they were delicious. light, fluffy and very hard to stop eating, esp once you stick some jam inside. they coloured a bit much but thats also cause i had to use sunflower oil instead of peanut oil because the missus is alergic to peanuts.

other than that they were great.

Ive tried a few other recipes out of dough and they all work well.

 

[Airgead]

Then i watched the DVD that came with it and if i was in a cartoon a light globe would have appeared above my head. Watching him hand knead the dough and seeing it go from a sticky mess to a silken dough really hit home.

Yep.. the DVD was the real lightbulb moment for me as well.

 

[Airgead]

Just realised I had a bunch of bread pics I haven't posted yet...

Some brown tin loaves I did for sandwiches -







A very nice onion and garlic flatbread I made from some leftover ferment



Some rye tin loaves



Seeded brown loaves with oats



I did some really nice spelt rolls as well but can't find the photos.

Cheers
Dave

 

[Airgead]

Since I chucked my job in I have had plenty of baking time. I've been getting back into sourdough -

Four really nice brown sourdough loaves -





Some sourdough spelt fruit loaves (yum)





An attempt at some sourdough seeded rolls. They dried out too much during the long rising so they have come out looking not the best. I call them my turdpedo rolls. I'm not sure that rolls and sourdough are a good mix. I'll have to work on that.



And some creative ways to use up some leftover sourdough starter - number one is a flatbread brushed with olive oil then sprinkled with salt and za'tar. The second is a flatbread brushed with honey and sprinkled with almonds.





And the missus has been baking bickies (Anzacs and lemon & coconut) -

 

[Airgead]

I think I have this bread thing pretty well sussed now -

Ciabbata rolls



Sourdough

 

[drsmurto]

What changes do you mak between a full ciabatta loaf (and i notice you are finally spelling it correctly ) and individual rolls?

Is it just the baking time?

They are looking as good as always mate. My dream is to bake all my bread myself and not buy any. Time and laziness so far have put pay to that.

 

[Airgead]

What changes do you mak between a full ciabatta loaf (and i notice you are finally spelling it correctly ) and individual rolls?

Is it just the baking time?

They are looking as good as always mate. My dream is to bake all my bread myself and not buy any. Time and laziness so far have put pay to that.

Pretty much just the cooking time. Same dough, same handling process, same shaping (just into smaller blobs).

And yeah... mu spelling sucks... but my bread looks cool so all is forgiven... right?

 

[drsmurto]

And yeah... mu spelling sucks... but my bread looks cool so all is forgiven... right?

You are way out in front with all this ****o bread (and food) pics! :lol:

 

[Airgead]

You are way out in front with all this ****o bread (and food) pics! :lol:

Made a big double batch of ciabatta today, 4 loaves and 16 rolls -















Cheers
Dave

 

[Tim F]

I just made a couple of loaves in the wood oven to use some of the heat after a pizza session.

These are low-knead sourdough with about 50% whole sprouted rye grain, fresh apricots off my tree, and a bit of honey. Not the neatest slashes I've ever done but it tastes great. I cut it still warm enough to melt some butter... Don't like the chances both loaves will make it through the night