Bread Bakers?

[xBa380]

Anyone else dabble in bread making here?

I'm always making bread... From sandwich loaves to soft pretzels (using lye!), biscuits, sourdough, English muffins, wood fired pizzas, etc...

Just baked this sourdough off this morning. Digging in once it cools in a few hours. Cant wait, it looks and smells amazing. I dont think anything is better than fresh, warm tangy sourdough with butter...

 

[KS-Ryan]

My wife bakes bread. The house smells amazing when it's baking. There are few things better (food wise) than fresh bread out of the oven.

 

[Malo83]

Love sourdough bread and that thick crust, I order on line from Boudin bakers in SF. need to learn how to make my own. Care to share your recipe.

 

[#18FAN]

A great piece of bread never hurt anyone.

 

[Variant_S]

Love sourdough bread and that thick crust, I order on line from Boudin bakers in SF. need to learn how to make my own. Care to share your recipe.

Are you looking for a sourdough starter recipe, a sourdough bread recipe, or both?

For starter, I looked at a few old cookbooks, did some googling, then just dove in and made some.

 

[Variant_S]

Good timing for this thread! Bacon and scallions bread, fresh from the oven.

 

[ripcord]

I was skimming through the thread titles and I read this one as "Bead Breakers", LOL.

I used to have fun making sourdough bread a few times a week. I had to stop when the wife and I put on 10lbs in a year.

 

[ripcord]

You don't really need to order a special sourdough starter. Just mix plain flour and water 50/50 (like pancake batter) and leave it in an open container in a warm place. In several days, you'll notice bubbles and in a week or so you should see lots of bubbles and expanding in volume a bit. Dump half of it out and add some more flour and water. Keep feeding every few days (or when it has lots of bubbles and has expanded) until it will double in volume in about 2 hours.

 

[oggb]

Not my favorite thing to do, but I can bake some bread and bread-like products.

 

[MParr]

I make my own sandwich bread and pizza dough. I have an old Welbilt bread machine that my mother gave me. I put it on manual and let it do the mixing. I then put the dough in a greased bread pan and let it rise. I bake at 350F for 35 minutes. I really like white wheat sandwich bread using maple syrup as the sweetener. I also like rye bread. We haven’t bought a loaf of store bought bread in quiet a while. A favorite for holiday meals is buttermilk rolls.

 

[oggb]

I also like rye bread

Same! And store-bought rye just isn't the same as that super dense rye and pumpernickel like you can make at home.

 

[MParr]

Same! And store-bought rye just isn't the same as that super dense rye and pumpernickel like you can make at home.

Exactly! You know exactly what’s going in home baked bread. The taste of home bake rye is amazing.

 

[53' Stude]

A great piece of bread never hurt anyone.

Facts

 

[RDMgr]

Anyone else dabble in bread making here?

I'm always making bread... From sandwich loaves to soft pretzels (using lye!), biscuits, sourdough, English muffins, wood fired pizzas, etc...

Just baked this sourdough off this morning. Digging in once it cools in a few hours. Cant wait, it looks and smells amazing. I dont think anything is better than fresh, warm tangy sourdough with butter...

My problem is that I would eat this entire loaf with ice cold butter in one afternoon. My excuse would be it won't be this fresh and good in the morning. I can rationalize anything! Then, I would be on my way to the hospital having my 4th heart attack.

 

[#18FAN]

Facts

the key word I said is a single piece of bread.

 

[oggb]

the key word I said is a single piece of bread.

The whole thing is a single piece if you have the determination!

 

[#18FAN]

The whole thing is a single piece if you have the determination!

Right! Lol

 

[MParr]

I have a fresh loaf of pumpernickel on the cooling rack.

 

[andyd]

Current fav is 1/2 and 1/2 wholewheat and Sir Lancelot baking flour. I make it in a Zojirushi bread machine

 

[xBa380]

Love sourdough bread and that thick crust, I order on line from Boudin bakers in SF. need to learn how to make my own. Care to share your recipe.

It's easy to make, just a touch time consuming relatively speaking. My process on this loaf:

1. Make the leven from the sourdough starter (40g sourdough starter, 80g water, 80g bread flour). Usually do this in the morning the day before I want to bake the loaf.
2. Let sit half a day or so until bubbly/foamy. (Let’s say around noon time).
3. Mix leven with 270g of flour and 200g of water. Mix until it comes together and let sit 2 hours.
4. Add in remaining flour (185g) and salt/water mixture (50g water with 8g salt). Knead a few minutes in machine.
5. Place on counter and let rest an hour or so.
6. Fold the dough every 30minutes for a few hours (by folding, I mean stretch out one side and place to middle of dough ball… do this in 4-positions (every 90 degrees). Want to do this at least 5-6 times, until the dough strengthens up.
7. At this time, it should be late evening, so it’s time to shape the dough and place into a bowl (seam side up) with a heavily floured towel. Cover and place in fridge overnight.
8. The next morning, preheat oven and dutch oven (or heavy glass or other lidded oven-safe pot) to 475F for an hour.
9. Flop your dough out onto some parchment paper, score the top surface with a razor and place into preheated dutch oven. Drop oven temp to 465F and bake for 20-25 minutes with the lid on. Take lid off, reduce heat to 450F and bake another 10-15 minutes depending on desired darkness and pull out, place on cooling rack and give it a few hours. Or not. Cut in and enjoy!

Or you can do a 'lazy man' sourdough, which I have done a ton of. Basically throw in 200-300g of active sourdough starter into a sandwhich bread recipe with twang from the sourdough starter. It won't have the same texture or flavor depth though as a more traditional process, but they are all delicious IMO. So many ways to go about it.

Currently starting another loaf this morning to make a fresh seeded rye sourdough for corned beef sandwiches this Wednesday (at step #1, made the leven this morning with rye flour).

Also, this weekend (as we do every weekend) made some fresh Pizza! Also had a thin-crust sourdough one I didn't grab a picture of (topped with artichoke, goat cheese, onion and red pepper), but here is the deep dish shown below. It was a supreme, so fresh made italian sausage (ground pork with toasted fennel, garlic/onion, salt, cayenne and white/black pepper) which is hidden under the sauce. Sauce was just pureed San Marzano tomatoes with fresh garlic, basil and oregano from the garden and salt and dried italian seasoning. Topped with green pepper, onion and black olive. Dough is fresh made of course, very easy dough (AP flour, water, salt, yeast, sugar and olive oil) with ingredients all added at once, mixed for a minute or just until it comes together and proofed for an hour before stretching in the deep dish pan and building the pie. Easy as can be!