What are You Baking the Week of May 14, 2017?

[BakerAunt]

My first effort to start this thread disappeared, along with my post, when my computer suddenly lost its connection. This time I wrote it in my Baking and Cooking Log, so I will paste it here.

In honor of the Formula-1 Spanish Grand Prix which aired this morning (my husband is a huge F-1 racing fan), I tried another new recipe from the BH&G s 100 Best Pumpkin Recipes specialty magazine that I bought last fall. The recipe is "Pumpkin Waffles with Maple Walnut Cream" (p. 15). I made a half recipe, and I altered it. I substituted half whole wheat pastry flour for that much regular flour, added 1 Tbs. flax meal, and used one cup of pumpkin. I substituted buttermilk for regular milk, so I reduced the baking powder to 2 tsp. and added 1/4 tsp. baking soda. I deleted the cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg. I did not make the maple cream, because real maple syrup is as good as it gets: Why gild the lily? The recipe made five two-pane Belgium waffles, so I cut the three leftover ones in half and wrapped and froze them for future quick breakfasts. The recipe only uses 2 Tbs. melted butter, so the fat content is lower than in many waffles. We liked them a lot, so they will become part of the regular waffle repertoire.

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• This topic was modified 7 years, 6 months ago by BakerAunt. Reason: corrected title

[aaronatthedoublef]

I made scones for Mother's Day.

I just made the sponge for my first attempt at rye bread. This is also my first attempt at a sponge. So far so good. I aspire to Len-quality rye breads. Looking at the flour I have, I think for looks I made need a darker flour although this smells pretty good.

[Mike Nolan]

The darker the rye flour, the more of the bran it contains. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it does affect the texture of the dough and makes for a denser loaf. Using first clear flour would also darken it a bit, since it's more cream colored than white.

Many people use a little cocoa powder to darken a rye bread loaf, but I prefer using powdered caramel coloring, I think the cocoa powder can be detected on the tongue. Kitchen Bouquet browning sauce is another commonly used coloring agent.

[BakerAunt]

Today I'm baking two loaves of my Buttermilk Grape Nuts bread.

[aaronatthedoublef]

What's a good internal temp for a well-baked loaf of rye bread?

Thanks

[Mike Nolan]

For most breads, I aim for 200 degrees, but a few degrees over 200 degrees is what I aim for with rye bread, which seems to need a slightly higher final temperature than white breads, I'm not sure why.

Rye bread also needs to sit until the loaf is COMPLETELY COOL before slicing it.

[RiversideLen]

Thanks for that compliment, Aaron!

I have used cocoa powder to make the rye darker and I agree, that does alter the flavor. Not a bad thing but it tastes less like rye. You can use brewed coffee in place of the water to darken the loaf too. I use decaf because caffeine doesn't agree with me. If you're making the bread for other people I suggest decaf as well as you might not be aware of other people's tolerance for caffeine.

I used to use a blend of 1/2 KAF medium rye and 1/2 KAF Pumpernickel, which is the whole grain dark rye. The past couple of years I have been using just the Pumpernickel. In my opinion, the keys to making the rye light in texture is (1) making a sponge, and (2) make sure the dough is properly hydrated. Although recipes I have seen usually use only part of the rye and water to make the sponge, I use 100% of the water and rye for the sponge.

I agree with Mike about the internal temp of 200 degrees, 205 won't hurt it but I'd be careful not to go over that.

Today I baked KAF Chewy Semolina Rye bread but made it into a raisin bread. I did that by omitting the onion and adding cinnamon (a heaping tsp) and a cup of raisins. It's delicious.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Mike, Len,

Thanks for the tips. I would never have thought rye bread need to bake to 200. I would have guessed much less so I really appreciate it.

Also, the light-ish colored rye flour is making a darker dough than I would have thought. I also used first clear flour because I have it and this, as Mike points out, makes it a bit darker than bread flour would have. I'll try to post a picture when I am done.

Also, should I slash the top?

[Mike Nolan]

Slashing can be done for both decorative and functional purposes, ie, more control over the rise and preventing blowouts. I've always suspected that some bakeries use the slashing pattern to help identify the type of bread, too.

I read a note on another baking site recently that said when making diagonal slashes across a loaf, an odd number of slashes (ie, 3 or 5) is more pleasing than an even number of slashes. Do people agree?

Rye breads also take well to decorative stencils.

[aaronatthedoublef]

It appears cannot upload my picture as it is way to big. I'll have to work on shrinking the file size.

It was a little lighter than I want but I have lots of advice on how to remedy that.

Also, it was wider and flatter than I would have liked. My dough felt a little soft when I shaped it so perhaps it needed a bit more flour. Or maybe I needed to make the loaf tighter. Or both?

I also wanted it a little more sour and rye tasting. So I need to up the percentage of rye flour.

Thanks for the help. To quote Stephen Sondheim, "I took myself one step, I won't stop with two!"

• This reply was modified 7 years, 6 months ago by aaronatthedoublef.

[Mike Nolan]

I think I have the site set to support 'large' images up to 1250 x 1250 pixels and 'medium' images of 400 x 300 pixels.

My big camera is usually set to produce 4000 x 6000 pixel images that are between 5MB and 6MB each, I usually reduce them down to 400 x 600 for posting here, although technically I upload them to another site of mine and then just post a link. The two I posted earlier today reduced down to under 170K when I did that.

A stretch and fold or two and/or getting a tighter skin when shaping might have helped produce a taller loaf, but I find it difficult to get a free form rectangular loaf that is taller than about 3.5 inches. The right type of slashing can also help produce rise in the direction you want the loaf to go. Large round loaves are easier to get tall, but I prefer loaves where most of the slices are around the same size, and I suspect someone running a deli would need that as well. If you want a true 'deli loaf' shape you might need to bake it in a deli loaf pan. I think I've seen 4, 6 or 8 gang deli loaf pans on some professional baking sites.

Adding pickle juice is a good way to add some sour without going the sourdough starter route, but you have to be careful about how much salt you add then, because pickle juice is often high in salt.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Thanks. I'll look into deli loaf pans but I will also try a bit more stretching and folding to tighten it up. I'm guessing this is what we used to make banana bread in the bakery. I had a dozen large bread pans all attached. They were heavy when filled!

The taste this morning was more noticeable and a bit stronger than last night so maybe it needs to sit longer after I take it out of the oven. I finished it at about 4:00 yesterday and cut into it around 8:00.

Also, this had a sponge that sat for about eight hours but maybe that needs to sit longer too.

[BakerAunt]

I seem to recall hearing that rye bread really is better if you wait a long time before cutting into it. I usually bake loaves in the evening, and do not cut into them until lunch.

I have two "hearth bread" pans from KAF that I like for my rye loaves, but I just looked, and they do not have them right now. I bought these for my Limpa bread and was pleased that I could get a bit of height. I also use it when I make the KAF sandwich rye bread.

KAF is selling connected loaf pans and roll pans (3-strap)--some are even on sale. I'm not tempted, because I rarely bake more than two loaves at once, and I have enough pans to do three on those rare occasions.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Thanks BA. I'll look at the hearth pans. I don't usually make more than a couple loaves either. I am trying to buy things from a local cooking store now. It's a two or three store chain that started in Sydney, Australia and they are a very nice family. They are right in the high-rent center of town so they are a bit more spendy than I like but I want the store to survive so I buy from them when I can. I start there and then go other places if the prices are too dear.

And, Mike, I just use the camera on my phone. I'll need to see if I can dial back the resolution. We do have some other cameras in the house but I am not certain I am allowed to use them. 😉

[Mike Nolan]

I don't have a smart phone so I have no experience with whether the photo resolution can be adjusted.

There are quite a few tools out there that can be used to scale down the resolution of a digital photo, crop it or convert it from one image type to another. (I use ImageMagick, a Linux-platform tool, but I've been a Linux geek for longer than I care to think about, dating back to before version 1.0.)

[Author]

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