Tag Archives: sourdough

Summertime and the Desired Dough Temperature

Here is a ‘quick’ hybrid sourdough/yeast bread that I made today, suffering from low bread baking pressure as I was. It was suddenly hot today, (hotter than Athens)  27°C  degrees outside, 24°C in my kitchen which as people who read too many bread books know is a  ‘desired dough temperature’ for many breads.

Mixed sourdough starters light rye bread by Joanna @ Zeb Bakes

50 g mature rye starter at about 100 per cent hydration
100 g mature white starter ditto
320 g water at 22 C
50 g dark rye flour
200g strong white flour
250g very strong white flour (high gluten)
a squeeze of agave syrup
1/2 teaspoon instant active yeast

Autolyse for 30 minutes

add

10 g salt

This bread marked a small turning point for me.  No book, no recipe, just what I have finally managed to get stuck in my brain as to numbers, it has taken a while….

To print this recipe with suggested timings and oven temperatures click here

I had been feeding my starters for a couple of days and they were never quite ready at the point when I was ready, so this morning I took what I had as above. Mixed them with water, mixed up some flour to match, a squeeze of agave syrup for luck, which we all need, a pinch of yeast because I wanted to bake them before midnight, nearly forgot the salt. I think the autolyse process was designed by someone who forgot the salt, don’t you?

Method once mixed: Leave, neglect, forget, remember, fold, leave, neglect, forget, do the garden, entertain the dogs by throwing squeaky balls into the paddling pool, I do enjoy listening to Zeb blowing bubbles under water and I  finally dug out the tulip pots. Brownie point there.  Remember the bread again,  get it into a square ended 1 kg  banneton, leave, neglect, forget. Hastily put oven on, tip dough onto peel, slash, steam oven, put flattened out dough into oven. Sit down in front of oven and stare. And then the miracle of oven spring! Yay! Even this bread came through for me.  I love bread so much,  a cake wouldn’t have tolerated being treated the way I treated this poor dough today.  A nice substantial white loaf  with a hint of rye,  sourdough tangy, a good crust, not as airy as a full blown nursed, timed and cosseted  mulitpli -folded sourdough, but quite frankly I don’t give a damn!

Flush with success, I dashed out into the garden and savaged the rainbow chard which had miraculously survived the winter snow and ice; chopped it up, steamed it lightly and mixed it up with two eggs, a packet of feta cheese, some freshly brewed yoghurt, some chopped garden mint, a twist of black pepper and then wrapped it up in the remainder of the  filo pastry which I found in the fridge today, brushed with melted butter, into the oven at 170 ° C till done!

Yum delish with some salad and a  chilled glass of organic white – biobon sauvignon blanc from Riverford of which they say

Biobon Sauvigon Blanc, Pays d’Oc, Gérard Bertrand

Next to Sauvignons from more northerly climbs, this is soft, almost creamy but it still has that lively, slightly aromatic quality. Most importantly is that it’s pure and easy to drink, with you instinctively reaching for another glass.

My broadband provider, Virgin Media, and my TV are out of order as I write, so I think it is time for another glass of wine, don’t you?  And here four hours later I am connected again. Cheers!

Downstairs meanwhile, the TV and the set top box and the DVD player have decided to stop talking to each other following a visit from a Virgin Media ‘engineer’ the other day. Fortunately they never get their hands on my Mac!  Hope you are all having a lovely weekend!

Miche Pointe-à-Callière – Lost in Translation?

I am so happy to be baking with the Mellow Bakers!  Here we are starting on our May breads.  There is always some brave person making the bread first, and you can hang back and say, hmm,  that’s interesting, I see what happened there,….or if you feel like trail blazing, that’s OK too. It’s a grand way to bake. Thank you my friends out there!

A miche is a big bread – an oven hogging, flowing monster of a bread. I know the sort.   I have made one of Mick of Bethesdabakers miches and they are most definitely for sharing! I made a 900 gram mini version of this formula this time as B is not keen on strong sour flavoured whole wheat breads and I would be on my own eating this one.
If you want to read more click here

Using baked bread as a soaker in a mixed rye and grain bread

I got this nice email this morning from Andrew Auld who I know from Dan Lepard‘s bread forum.

Thought of you recently as we had a trip to Copenhagen (Andy’s blog post) and had some great rye bread. Still thinking of trying out a danish rye recipe as our rye breads do sell well. Will have to try the soaker recipe you referred to .. .

do you have a link?

I hope this is the one you are thinking of…

This bread requires both a cold soaker and a sourdough leaven

Cold Soaker

  • 50g baked rye bread (or ryvita if you have no old bread- by old bread I mean bread that is maybe 3 days old, hard but not mouldy of course, rye breads tend to age very gracefully and you can always put the end of a good loaf in the freezer with this bread in mind)
  • 25 g linseed
  • 25g millet
  • 20 g malted rye grains  or any cracked smallish grain you have that you like
 – these are small pieces of rye that have been malted by the mill (in this case Shipton Mill in England)
  • 165g water

Extra thoughts eighteen months on….To make the cold soaker, slice the bread thinly and cut into small fragments and put together with the seeds in a bowl, cover with the water and leave for 12-16 hours. If it feels very lumpy then I recommend whizzing the mixture with one of those handheld whizzy things or in a food processor to break up the lumps of bread.  If you are someone with many bowls, you could make two cold soakers, one with the bread and one with the seeds, and distribute the water between them. If you bake the slices of bread till they are golden brown before soaking, you will increase the umami flavour of your final bread.

Starter

  • 30g mature rye leaven
  • 200g lukewarm or room temperature water
  • 225 g dark rye flour (whole rye flour)

Make both the above at the same time,  12 hours plus before you want to mix the dough

For the dough

Mix both the above together. I use an electric hand mixer to do this.

Then add:

  • 370 g strong white flour
  • 105 g water
  • 15 – 20 g salt
  • 150g worth of toasted pumpkin and sunflower seeds
  • 1/4 teaspoon of easy bake yeast (optional)

Makes a quite sticky dough. Leave for 10 to 20 minutes. Do a quick knead and then leave it alone. It becomes less sticky after a while.

If you use the yeast, bulk ferment for about an hour and then scale and shape and leave to prove again for another 1 – 2 hours depending on dough temperature, room temperature etc. If you don’t use the yeast, then it will take longer of course.

I put seeds in the bottom of the banneton but you can mist the top of the dough and sprinkle seeds on top just before baking.

Slash the loaf well!

Oven temp 230 º C  for 10 minutes with steam in the oven (little tray in bottom with boiling water in)  turned down to 220 º C once the loaf has sprung and started to go brown for 20 minutes and then 210 º C  for the last 15 – 20 minutes.

Looks like Andrew liked it :) See pingback below! And this is his emailed comment:

…Definitely a deliciousness to the rye bread which I think is down to the umami effect of the old bread you mention on your blog.

Used some of the 100% rye loaf we do inspired by your recipe on dan’s blog. It has pumpkin seed and orange in it. Will be making it again for sure.

And here is Andrew’s bread ready for sale!   here