Cinnamon Bread and Rye Sourdough

Two new projects, well; one new and one revisited this time.
The Cinnamon bread is for Millie, part of her breakfast menu, a vehicle for crispy bacon, maple syrup etc and here it is

Ready to bake.

Looks alright!

I took it down to Millie and Me and Sophie loved it, so I'm crossing my fingers for an order.

The revisited is Rye Sourdough, I used to do this for Oats, but stopped due to lack of demand. So I was pleased to get a request from them for a loaf as a special order.

As usual with sourdough, you need a bit of preparation, so I activated and fed my starter overnight,

Before

After, spot the bubbles.

and made the dough next morning, it needs six hours bulk proving,

Now it has to be shaped and left for a second rise.

After its doubled in size I can bake it.

And that was five hours later.

I also made a white bloomer for Alan, which went in at the same time.

and out again,

Also some Sourdough Croutons for soup/salad topping, flavoured with a touch of Balsamic.

Plus some dairy free teacakes (No Butter, Sunflower Oil instead)

 

 

Now its just the Soda Bread to do, it's half past six in the morning and I've nearly finished. Time to put the kettle on.





Expansion Plans

The good news is that I'm resuming the Onion Seed rolls for Millie, and she also wants a Cinnamon flavoured bread for her breakfast menu. So always one for a challenge, I set out to make her a sample using Wessex Mills Apple and Cinnamon flour blend.

The rolls start on Monday morning, for a Tuesday delivery, so you can get a good flavour developing in the dough with a long slow rise.

The loaf will be made fresh on Tuesday morning at about 0500. I checked with the neighbours and they can't hear the mixer!

While I am delivering, I will pop into the West Country Deli, which has just re-opened after it's winter break. I want to pitch the cracker packaging to them and see if they are interested. I can then go ahead and buy the containers and labels. (I need to buy a lot to get a price worth having)

Also I have left the Rendezvous for long enough sitting on samples, so it's time for a visit to catch up and give them some prices.

Then on Wednesday, I have Oats usual order of Soda bread, plus some more teacakes, this time I'm doing dairy free ones for them. And They want a Rye Sourdough loaf as well, special order, So maybe that's the start of something. No spelt this week, but that's a cyclic thing.

So it's all happening and next week I'm off to a trade fair, to see what bargains I can pick up and spread the word.

Sourdough by Post?

I made a couple of Sourdough Loaves today, to use up my starter, and it occurred to me that there might be a market for it mail order. Sent by courier overnight on the day of baking, it would keep for a week at least after you received it.

So if anyone would like one of these, let me know and we can see what can be arranged.

So that you know its a 750g Organic Mixed Grain loaf.

 

 

Or alternatively, if you live within a reasonable distance of Torbay, I can deliver at a small cost.

New Inspiration. (What can I do with this)

Meet my new acquisitions, the challenge will be to see what they can do.

 

 

But first, a few samples have been disbursed, and it will soon be time to see what interest there is. We have crispbreads and sourdough croutons on offer, amongst others!

 

Meanwhile orders are still coming in, Oats today is the usual loaves and some rolls, then we start again at Millie after the winter break next week. I have some experimental work to do for them, more about that later.

A Busy Day

Today is the usual Oats order, plus 20 Teacakes, and 2 Marmite loaves for Gravesend.
 The marmite loaf takes around 18 hours, so I started that one on monday.
And here they are after the first rise and shaping,

and here's the teacake dough after proving and shaping.

Then a swift bake later.

We get back to the usual Spelt and Soad Breads. No pictures as you've seen them before.

Update on the Crackers, they are going well on day 14.

Back in Business

It's my first order of 2014, and I'm getting back in the 5.15am swing of things.
In fact I missed it, a bit!

The Organic White Rolls came out as good as usual,

as did the Soda Bread,

and the Spelt Loaves.

So all in all, a successful morning.

Stop press: the Crackers are still crisp, 8 days in, but my scales have fallen by the wayside, I had to use the old ones to finish off. Hopefully I can pick up a new set in the sales. It explains why my Whole Wheat loaf failed last Sunday though. (Hang on, that's on my other blog)

Samples update

They are now 4 days old and still crisp !

Also the packs have arrived, and I have the choice between 75g or 100g in a pack.

 

It's a bit hard to tell the difference from these pictures. I will take them down on monday, assuming they are still in good condition and see what we come up with.

Sample Time

New Year, new start.

I'm still waiting for the samples of containers which I was told would be posted on Dec 16th.
These are for the cracker order, so while I'm waiting, I can see how long the biscuits will keep crisp.

 I'm devising a test scenario for freshness, one batch in an airtight box, one in a sealed plastic bag and one in a plastic bag with most of the air sucked out. That way, I can work out a sell-by date for them, then I will know how many I can make at a time.

First of course I had to make the crackers, this time I used Sun dried Tomato and Garlic flour blend to make a dough,

which I rolled and cut, then put them into a preheated oven at 170 degrees until they were dry.

These were a bit thicker than the Rye and Seed, due to the pieces of Sun Dried Tomato so they needed 45 minutes. After cooking I left them to cool, I had to try a couple of course, and I'm glad to say that there are no worries on the taste front.

I let them cool and bagged them up.

From the left, plastic bag (tied), Tupperware (large), Tupperware airtight and zip lock bag

It'll just be a case of trying them daily to see how long they keep fresh for. I'll keep you posted.