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- Home baking is great. But sometimes it goes wrong... Baking sourdough bread takes hours. My current baking method takes about 24 hours, from the first step feeding the sourdough starter up to the point where it comes hot and crusty out of the oven. So when you mess up your brand new creation in that very last step it’s not the best sensation one could feel. But failing is an unavoidable part of home baking — and sometimes even a failed loaf can taste quite good. I was trying to improve my rye, honey and hazelnut bread — this time using a higher hydration and adding no semolina to the dough. I’ve already tested these changes some weeks ago and it was really better than the first version, so it looked like a “100% guaranteed” recipe. BUT… I remembered that last time it wasn’t easy to transfer the dough into the baking pot after proofing. It was too slack (high hydration has its counterparts). So this time I decided not to use the pot and bake it on a simple steel sheet, covered by a steel bowl. That was the mistake: the hydrated dough rose more than I expected and clung to the bowl’s surface. I thought it was a complete disaster but, apart from it’s weird aspect, the loaf was pretty decent — specially the not crumbled half. Eduardo, a friend of mine whose visit was the initial motivation for this whole adventure, had the courage to prove it and seemed to like it. Apart from the bowl’s incident, I really believe this formula is better than the one I tried before, so I’m describing the details below. I just hope next time I can post better photos. --- Rye sourdough bread with hazelnuts and honey --- Flour mix: 50% rye (290g), 50% white wheat flour (290g) 80% hydration (464ml) 25% levain starter (also 80% hydrated) 115g hazelnuts 1 teaspoon of honey 2% salt (14g) Kneading: 20min in my bread machine Bulk fermentation: 8 hours at room temperature Proofing: 2 hours at room temperature Baking: 30min covered, 25min uncovered
July 27, 201401 - Seeds and grains Last week I went to São Paulo’s “zona cerealista”, a neighbourhood full of traditional grocery stores where you can find a little bit of everything. They offer a huge diversity of seeds and grains, and — the best part — with great prices. I came back home with kilos of seeds, willing to try them on my next bread loaves. Here is some of what I bought there: 1. Golden flax seeds 2. Whole sesame seeds 3. Rye seeds 4. Peeles sunflower seeds 5. Amaranth grains 6. Oat flakes 7. Chia seeds 8. Macadamia nuts 9. Wheat grains Any suggestion for how to combine them in bread?
July 13, 201411 - Pizza night! I was looking forward to try a recipe of pizza dough with levain I saw in Ken Forkish’s book. Yesterday I could finally put Levindo (that's how I call my levain starter) to work, thanks to a delightful visit I received from some very special friends. I was a bit insecure because I’ve never made sourdough pizza before, but I followed Ken’s detailed instructions by the book and they worked just perfectly. The dough is made from italian “00″ flour, water, salt and a 80% hydrated levain. The process is the same as with bread up to the proofing step: levain feeding, autolisis, kneading, folding, bulk fermentation, dough division and shaping (in balls), proofing. Then it’s time to shape the pizza and add the toppings. I was lucky to find beautiful, fresh San Marzano tomatoes in the supermarket, which allowed us to prepare a delicious red sauce just blending them with garlic, oregano, salt and olive oil. We followed Ken’s advice not to cook the tomato, as it cooks on the pie while it’s baking. The pizza was just superb, and we had a great night baking and chatting. My special thanks to Filipe, who helped me prepare everything and brought some bottles of delicious wine, and to Roxane and Jalver. Seeing a hot pizza coming from the oven and waiting patiently while one obsessively takes pictures of each detail is a true proof of friendship.
June 9, 201411
