Friday Bake, all sorts of Bread.

I had to wait in on Friday for a delivery so I thought I would do a load of baking, top up the freezer and try a new recipe.
Of course, the delivery arrived right as the first load was ready to come out, and the second to go in, that's to be expected, anyhow I managed and got a good set of breads to keep us going over the next few days.

I actually started the bake on Thursday, mixing my no-knead dough for a white loaf.
Its 500g Flour, 470g water, 4g instant yeast and 9g salt.
Just mix and leave it covered in the kitchen for 18 hours.

Before

After 18 hours

As you can see its fermented nicely.
Now you just fold it into a ball, flour it well and put it in an oiled Dutch Oven for 2 hours.

After an hour, preheat your oven to its maximum (mine is a bread oven and goes to 300°C)
Bake for 30 minutes at this temperature with the lid on,

Then leave the lid off, reduce the temperature to 220°C and give it another 20 minutes, or until the internal temperature is 95°C.

While all that was going on, I made a Focaccia dough, 500g Flour, 20g Coarse Semolina, 320g Water, 50g Olive Oil, and 10g each of Instant Yeast and Salt. To this I added 120g grated Carrot and 1 heaped tsp of ground Coriander (Cilantro)

This I proved for an hour,

then stretched into two Focaccia in oiled trays.

after 45 minutes, in fact, as the loaf came out of the oven and the delivery turned up they were ready to go.

They had 20 minutes at 200°C.

You can see the carrot inside the dough. They tasted delicious.

I also made Cheese and Onion Swirls, I've done these so many times I won't repeat the recipe, if you want it click here. I baked these at the same time as the Focaccia.

They looked and tasted pretty good.

Sundried Tomato and Beetroot Bread.

I thought that this would make a nice flavour combination, good with cheese or maybe toasted and covered in garlic butter.

Ingredients:-

For 2 loaves.

1000 g Strong White Flour
40 g Coarse Semolina (Gives it a crunch)
640 g Water
100 g Olive Oil
20 g Instant Yeast
20 g Salt
500 g Cooked Beetroot, cut into chunks
100 g Sundried Tomatoes, chopped.

Just put everything into the mixer and knead for 10 minutes on low speed,

then prove for 90 minutes. Knock back and shape.

Prove again while the oven heats up to 240°C, then bake for 40 minutes, with steam.

Enjoy.

White and Rye Sourdough

Even though I have stopped baking commercially, I keep my starters going, feeding them weekly and storing them in the fridge.
I use them in rotation to make bread and all the discard goes in yeasted loaves to add flavour (just add 10% by weight of discard to your normal recipe)

This week it was the turn of the Rye starter but I wanted a white loaf so I mixed the two ideas together.

I took 360 g of active Rye starter, (I used 40 g from fridge fed to 120 g, 12 hours later I fed it to 360 g) I mixed it with 1020 g white flour and 600 g warm water until just hydrated. 

This I autolysed for 30 minutes then mixed in23 g salt. I gave this 5 minutes in my mixer on low/medium speed and covered it.

I folded it after 45 and 90 minutes,

then after another 45 I turned it out, split it into two and shaped into boules.

These I placed in Dutch ovens and left for 2 hours.

I then put them into the fridge for 8 hours.

One hour before baking I warmed the oven to 250°C, when it was warmed up I put teh ovens in for 30 minutes. After that time the loaf looked like this.

I left the lids off and gave them another 30 minutes.

Looks like a good sandwich loaf.

Balsamic Bread

I spotted a recipe for a bread with Balsamic vinegar in it, and modified it to suit my ingredients. I used up some discard sourdough starter in it as well to give it even more flavour and made rolls and a couple of baguette shaped loaves as well.

The ingredients.

750g flour, I used my favorite blend from Wessex Mill, it has dried onions, peppers and Oregano in it. You could make your own mix of your favourite herbs and add it, no more than 15% by weight though.

450 g warm water,
75 g EVOO,
30 g Balsamic Vinegar,
15 g each of salt and yeast,
100 g White Sourdough Starter.(optional)

Then it's just the usual bread making method, whatever works for you.

After 1 hour in my proofer, (sounds posh but it's actually my oven, with a tin of warm water in the bottom and a 1 minute blast of full heat.) it had risen well.

I turned it out and shaped it into 2 x 400 g baguette shapes and 6 x 105 g rolls.

These I left to rise as the oven heated up.

And the whole lot was baked with steam for 20 minutes at 240°C

When the internal temperature is 95°C they're done, and the crusts were crisp as well.

White Spelt Sourdough

Here's a new version of the Spelt Sourdough, using a new formula and method.
I started with 300 g of 100% Wholemeal Spelt  starter and added 1000 g of White Spelt flour and 550 g water. This I mixed together and left to autolyse for 1 hour.
I then added 50 g water with 24 g salt dissolved in it and another 200 g of flour. (Wholemeal Spelt this time)

Over the next three hours I folded the dough three times with no kneading. It doubled in size.

and I shaped it into two boules. These I placed in Dutch Ovens and covered.

after another three hours they had doubled and passed the 'poke' test. I had the oven on at 250°C,

I gave them 30 minutes covered,

and they rose nicely, leaving the lids off I gave them another 25 minutes. (They were 1100 g dough weight each so needed a while to get the middles cooked.)

 Very pleased with the result.