[BakerAunt]

I know this one!

[BakerAunt]

Len--Did you let them rise with the printed side down, then flip them over to bake? KAF's recipe says to do so, but I looked at some videos online, and the prevailing wisdom was that if using a stamp, there is no need to do the flipping.

[BakerAunt]

On Saturday afternoon, I made another try at the “3 Grain Bread,” recipe from Breads, Breads, & More Breads (#37), a Pillsbury cook booklet from the 1980s. (The bread is misnamed, as it counts AP flour as a different grain from whole wheat.) The adaptation I did the week of October 13 did not rise well and was dense. This time, I again used the additional whole wheat and rye. I decided to do half medium and half dark rye, in part because the medium rye is more expensive, and I want to save it for another recipe. I replaced the 3 Tbs. butter with 2 ½ Tbs. olive oil, since I like how the olive oil works in Len’s famous Whole Wheat/Rye/Semolina bread. I replaced ¼ cup bran with ¼ cup flax meal, and I again used 2 cups buttermilk. The additional ¼ cup of water, and another ½ cup bread flour, as well as a bit more honey and 4 ½ tsp. yeast resulted in two beautiful loaves of bread now cooling on a rack on my counter. Both rises were long: the first one as 80 minutes and the second an hour. I don’t know if that is the dough or due to a cooler house. I did the rises on the dining room table, as the heat from the wood stove wafts up, so it is around 71F there. I tried a different shaping technique, based on the discussions at Nebraska Kitchen. After pre-shaping, I did not fold the dough but pressed it down just a bit, then tucked it around all the edges, being sure to seal the seam on the bottom. It worked on these loaves, which baked in 9x5 bread pans. I look forward to slicing a loaf for lunch tomorrow.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 7 months ago by BakerAunt. Reason: changed "flour" to "grain"

[BakerAunt]

Thanks for sharing the video, Len. Those pumpkin-shaped rolls are cute. Now I'm wondering if I could use my Nordic Ware pumpkin muffin pan or the fall items muffin pan and make rolls in it--maybe use Ellen's (Moomie's ) recipe? I may give that a try and see if I can make it work in time to use it for Thanksgiving dinner when we will host some friends.

I actually have a pumpkin mold--made like the famous lamb mold that comes out at Easter--that I bought from King Arthur years ago. The one time I tried baking bread in it, using their recommended recipe, it did not fill the mold, and so only had the shape on one side. I need to look at it and figure out its volume....

See what you started? 🙂

[BakerAunt]

To go with leftover stroganoff, I stir-fried a half bag of some fresh vegetables that the store had on sale (broccoli, diagonally sliced carrots, and a couple of snow peas) in a bit of olive oil.

[BakerAunt]

Hey, Len--if it isn't broken....

The design on the two pumpkin breads seemed a bit clearer today, although not as sharp as I'd like. I took the second loaf to a friend who injured her leg over a month ago, and had the injury made worse by an inattentive physical therapist who relies on subordinates. She, her husband, and their son were delighted to get the loaf.

[BakerAunt]

My educated guess was correct.

[BakerAunt]

I'm enjoying the bread discussion and making notes.

I baked my version of Whole Grain Pumpkin Bread (on Nebraska Kitchen site) on Friday afternoon. I used two 9x5 inch Nordic Ware loaf pans with pumpkin design. However, one pan has a darker finish than the other, and it overbaked—not badly, but since I hope to give one of the loaves as a gift, it will be the one we keep. The design did not come out particularly sharp on either, possibly because I had to use old-fashioned oats, as I am out of quick oats. I should have ground them a bit. The breads did release nicely from the pan, thanks to The Grease.

[BakerAunt]

I own two of them, but my attempt to bake a recipe from The Cake Bible did not go well, no doubt due to my ignorance about cakes at that time.

According to the latest issue of Sift, which listed five new cookbooks, it seems that Bernard Clayton's Small Breads (1998) may be being reissued, as it was listed with four other cookbooks from 2018 and 2019.

[BakerAunt]

I also got it right.

[BakerAunt]

In case anyone wants even more background on candy corn:

https://www.marketplace.org/2019/10/30/history-candy-corn/?utm_campaign=Marketplace+Midday_Newsletter_20191031_134823&utm_medium=email&utm_source=sfmc_Newsletter&utm_content=Financial%20Frights%20%f0%9f%8e%83

[BakerAunt]

Susan Reid was editing Sift. P.J. has now handed over the weekly blog to a new person. I don't know if she still does occasional articles.

I wonder if tall Frank is still among the bakers. He would pop into the Baking Circle with excellent advice.

[BakerAunt]

Aaron--I measure my flour in the KAF approved way of spooning it into a cup and leveling it off. When the recipe bombed the second time I made it--the time I used KAF's metric weights, I thought it was due to using Bob's Red Mill spelt flour rather than KAF's more expensive spelt. Nope. I went back to volume and got the great result with BRM that I had gotten with KAF's spelt.

[BakerAunt]

Thursday night's dinner was salmon and couscous with Penzey's Mural seasoning. I had the last few green beans from our garden, and my husband had the little bit of broccoli that he managed to save after the two caterpillar attacks.

Halloween has also brought us our first snow, a wet one, so it isn't sticking. The wood stove (and new insulation in the house) is keeping us cozy.

[BakerAunt]

I thought that Sift was becoming increasingly glitzy in trying to appeal to the demographic that Zen (now Pyewacket) dubbed "boutique bakers." I find that ironic in that this group is the most unlikely to pick up the magazine. The former publication, The Baking Sheet, in its last two iterations before ceasing publication, were more focused on the practical baker. With those publications I felt that I belonged to a group of bakers that wanted to learn and grow. I never felt that with Sift, which had a bit for beginning bakers but seemed to focus more on less everyday items.

I don't think King Arthur will have another regular publication.

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

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