What are you baking the week of Feb 25, 2018

[Mike Nolan]

Which hot dog bun recipe did you use?

[chocomouse]

I didn't use a recipe - just a standard basic bread formula of a cup of water, plus added a couple of tablespoons to get the right consistency, a couple tablespoons of olive oil, 2 cups of AP and 1 cup of WW flour, a little salt, a tablespoon of sugar. They were fine. I rarely make hot dog buns, and would usually use Moomie's bun recipe, but I was in a hurry.

[Mike Nolan]

Moomies makes a good burger bun, but I think it isn't soft enough for a hot dog bun. I wish I could get Chicago-style hot dog buns (with poppy seeds) locally, though the KAF recipe is pretty close. (I can't get Vienna all beef hot dogs here, either.)

[BakerAunt]

On Friday, I have been busy in the kitchen. I fed my sourdough starter and used the discard to make a double recipe of the dough for my Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers (recipe on this site). I'll bake them in a couple of days, since I think that they are better when the dough rests in the refrigerator for a couple of days.

I also baked Butterscotch Apple Sweet Rolls, a recipe from Sift (Fall 2015), p. 40, which is also on the KAF website. I first baked it at the end of November. I still had enough Jonathan apples in the refrigerator from fall to make the recipe again. This time, I used half white whole wheat flour and 1/4 cup of flax meal. As before, I used the special gold yeast. I'll glaze them tomorrow morning, and we will have several mornings of nice breakfasts. [Note: This recipe kneads beautifully on the dough cycle in the bread machine, which gives you a chance to start making the filling, so that it will be cool by the time the first rise is finished.]

My final project was to make the levain for the recipe for Honey Spelt Sourdough Bread, another recipe that I first tried last fall. It's on the KAF website and was also in one of their fall catalogs. I'll bake it tomorrow.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 8 months ago by BakerAunt.
• This reply was modified 6 years, 8 months ago by BakerAunt.

[BakerAunt]

On Saturday, I baked the Honey Spelt Sourdough Bread, from the KAF website, in my Emile Henry long baker. I had some issues with rising, probably because the house was cool today but not cool enough to start a fire in the woodstove before evening. I don't think that I got as much rise as when I first baked it last fall. (I am now threatening to buy a bread proofer.) It should still make nice sandwiches.

[luvpyrpom]

This week I did a bit more baking - dug up an old recipe for Finnish rye bread (it was given to me by a coworker over 20 yrs ago) made only half recipe and baked it in my Dutch oven to give it a nicer artisan look. Also made KAF sourdough buns w/almond schmear with no icing, KAF 12-grain raisin sourdough loaves (I guess they no longer have the recipe online as they don't have the main ingredient - 12 grain flour) and I had substituted the grain flour with harvest grains. Also made ATK popovers to try to use up some milk and had them for lunch. Today I wanted to try to convert the KAF Sourdough cinnamon raisin bread into a vegan style - substituted the butter with vegan butter, added 2 tbsp potato flour instead of the one egg and just didn't brush the dough before putting the cinnamon filling down. I thought I would melt the vegan butter to brush it on but I couldn't tolerate the smell after melting it. Totally off-putting. Will be cutting a slice later tonight to see how it turned out.

[Mike Nolan]

I've been reading about baking this week more than baking, specifically "The Art of French Pastry", by Jacquy Pfeiffer, co-founder of The French Pastry School in Chicago. Next week I'm probably going to spend a day (or maybe two) practicing with choux paste.

[BakerAunt]

I look forward to your experiments, Mike.

My Honey Spelt Sourdough Bread came out somewhat dry, so a lack of humidity may have been a factor. The taste is good.

[Mike Nolan]

We spent about 2 hours practicing piping choux paste in pastry school, and I was TERRIBLE at it. Part of the problem is that I have trouble holding the bags the way they taught it because of arthritis. And I wound up with too many tails. The book uses a slightly different technique. (I may also try switching hands, using my dominant right hand at the bottom of the bag rather than at the top. I was trying that the last time I piped anything and it seemed to work better for me.)

I'm also going to try it using some Wilton bag clips. Also, the book says to use a slightly smaller tip than the one we used in pastry school (3/8" versus what I think was either 7/16" or 1/2".)

[cwcdesign]

I tried a recipe for Rory’s scones, originally created by the Allen family of Ballymaloe. I tried halving the recipe, but I didn’t realize how small the scones were. They are small, savory ones to go with soups or salad - an Irish biscuit so to speak.

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