linder's blog

Today we baked some more San Joaquin Sourdough in the Dutch oven over charcoal.  This time I upped the whole wheat to 300 grams, added 10 grams of water to the initial mix and used pumpernickel flour in place of the dark rye.  One glitch in transfer to the pot was my handkerchief flour lined bread bowl wasn't floured enough so the bread stuck to the kerchief, but a quick whack with the bread knife/lame took care of it. 

Heating the charcoal

Waiting for the bread to bake -

The finished loaf -

The "proof" is in the pudding(er --- bread).

I've been wanting to do this for a few months now, since we are living in a yurt and the only oven I have is a Coleman 12 inch square oven that sits on a burner of our 2 burner Primus camp stove.  I finally got up the nerve to try the San Joaquin Sourdough formula from Dave Snyder in our 'primitive' digs here on Orcas Island.    

I did do somethings a bit differently than Dave.  First, I took the dough out of the fridge after 12 hour rest and let it hang out at 'room temperature', here that's 62F- 65F, for an hour to take the chill off.  I shaped the dough into a single boule.  Lacking a real banetton I floured a cotton neckerchief really well and lined a plastic bowl with it.  I covered the shaped boule with a light dusting of flour and placed it top side down inside the lined bowl.  Then into the Brod and Taylor bread proofer it went.  (The proofer has been my salvation here in the yurt, we have electricity in the yurt and the proofer does a fine job of maintaining a warm moist environment).  I kept it in the proofer at 72F for 1 1/2 hours.  

Meanwhile, my husband started the charcoal briquettes, and we preheated a 10 inch dutch oven to 450F.  Once that heat was attained we placed the bread into the dutch oven and baked for 30 minutes, rotating the oven 180 degrees at 20 minutes into the baking to equalize the heat in the oven.  The bread came out well.  

Here's a picture of the interior crumb,  Great flavor due to the dark rye flour and the rest in the dorm sized fridge overnight.

We've moved to Orcas Island, Washington and while our house is being built we are living in a 16 ft diameter yurt.  it is cozy to say the least.  Here is my bread kneading station set up in the yurt on top of our clothes dresser.

I'm baking the bread in a Coleman oven that sits on top of the propane camp stove burner.  In the oven I have unglazed tiles on the bottom to equalize and retain heat.  The thermometer on the front of the oven is unreliable so an over thermometer inside the oven is a must to know what the temperature is in the oven.

The bread came out really well.  The recipe I've been using is Peter Reinhart's whole wheat bread from Whole Grain Baking.  Next step - San Francisco Sourdough baked in a dutch oven over charcoal in a firepit.  

After baking 80 dozen Christmas cookies, I switched to buttermilk rolls for my husband's potluck and some San Francisco sourdough bread for us and one loaf to my son-in-law, Paul.  Paul lives in Rio Rancho, NM so I'll be sending his loaf tomorrow via UPS. 

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Today, I took out a portion of the spent grain in the freezer that was leftover from making beer last week. (The beer is resting comfortably for another week after being decanted from the carboy into a second carboy).  The bread made from the spent grain along with a wild yeast starter and whole wheat soaker is rising right now - soon to be baked. 

Linda

I finally got around to making Eric's Rye Bread.  I've been wanting to try out this formula ever since I saw it posted here on TFL.  It is a wonderfully fragrant loaf of rye with sourdough, onions and caraway.  I sauteed two medium sized onions in about 2 TBSP of olive oil and added them to the final dough along with all the other ingredients.  The dough smelled sooo good even before it was baked.  The bread is light and fluffy.  I baked the second loaf about 10 minutes more for a total of 50 minutes since it was a 2 lb. boule.  The batard loaf could have stood a little more time in the oven but it still is baked enough in the middle. 

I made this bread to take to a potluck on Thursday.  There will be a hearty soup as part of the potluck so I thought this rye bread would work well.  I'm definitely making this again for us to have with some pastrami and homemade sauerkraut.

Crumb close up

We ran out of whole wheat sandwich bread and there is only a crust of sourdough left.  Yikes!  Time to start baking.  Actually I started the San Francisco sourdough three days ago per David Snyder's formula, a very reliable go-to loaf of tangy goodness.  Those were baked first. 

Yesterday I also put together a wild yeast starter and soaker for the Peter Reinhart 100% whole wheat sandwich loaf from Whole Grain Breads (I'm really enjoying this book, got it for my Kindle now too).  That loaf was baked next and almost had a disaster, but hopefully caught it in time.  I was merrily going along doing other things when I happened to look at the oven temp reading and realized I hadn't reset the oven to 35oF from 425F per the recipe.  Uh-oh the bread spent 25 minutes in the oven at 425F.  I quickly turned the oven down and tented the loaf with aluminum foil, baked it another 10-11 minutes and took it out of the pan to give it a look/see thump.  It was done.  It looks none the worse for wear. 

Today's bakes (one SF SD went to work with my husband) -

I had to use up the rest of the ricotta I made so it was time to make an sweet Italian Easter pie to match the savory one, which we have almost completely devoured.  The recipe I used is from the website http://www.ciaoitalia.com  The only 'change' I made was to use wheatberries in place of the rice as indicated in the recipe.  Otherwise the pie was made per instructions.  I tasted some of the filling as I was making the pie and it is very flavorful with vanilla, orange zest, orange juice and cinnamon.  I have seen some pies that add chocolate bits as well, maybe next year.  Will be having some of this pie with a cup of tea later this evening.

Okay, I got rid of the baking soda in the bread.  It doesn't taste like baking soda anymore.  I added 1/4 cup honey to the bread instead of diastatic malt, added zest of one orange and one more cup of oatmeal substituted for about that much flour. 

Results- better but still not a loaf to write home about, rather bland in flavor.  My husband says it's not near as flavorful as the 100% whole wheat bread from Peter Reinhart's Whole Grain Breads.  Hmmm, what to do next? 

A little more salt? I'm using about 2 tsp. for 2 loaves.  I'm thinking of uping the whole wheat flour and doing a preferment of wild yeast starter like the WGB bread and putting together an oats soaker as well a la Reinhart.  Is it the oats that make the bread so ho-hum?

Or maybe just forget this recipe, because it seems like by the time I've tweaked it there won't be much left of the original.  Any ideas for improving the flavor profile of this loaf gratefully accepted.

Linda

Here's my first go at the sourdough oat bread recipe I received from a friend of mine.  I made half a recipe and made note of the weight of each item as I went along.  The formula can be found in grams by following the original posting of the recipe at http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/32444/sourdough-oat-bread

The crumb -

Oh no, I just tasted a slice of this bread - it takes like Bisquick!  I'm so disappointed, but maybe I can try a second batch WITHOUT the baking soda and replace the diastatic malt with honey too.