[Mike Nolan]

Looks like the closest one to you is in Indianapolis, which is probably also where the closest Gordon Food Services is.

[Mike Nolan]

I am starting the Munich Penny Rolls from TRB today, but they won't be baked until tomorrow. I've got the two sponges mixed, I still need to grind up the chopped rye malt and toast it. I've cleaned off the flour mill to minimize wheat contamination, but I don't think I'll be using the red rye malt in any 100% rye breads or breads designed to be gluten-free so a little wheat probably won't hurt. I"m going to run some rye chops through first to kind of clean the insides out, since that's not accessible for cleaning. It'll also give me a good idea how well it works on chopped grains.

[Mike Nolan]

The nearest Penzey's is in Omaha, and I think I've been there only once. I've probably been to the one in the Strip District in Pittsburgh more than that. I"m not into pre-made spice blends and that seems to be a large part of Penzey's inventory these days.

I don't know if Lincoln is quite big enough to support a Penzey's. There's a new spice shop on this side of town that I haven't visited yet, they also do knife sharpening, which interests me. (I have been sharpening my own knives, I've got whetstones in 400/1000 and 3000/8000 grit levels, but I have some scissors that need sharpening.)

[Mike Nolan]

I've tried a variety of steam methods over the years. What I've been doing lately is putting an 8" cast iron skillet in the oven when I turn it on, then I put the tea kettle on the stove. When the dough goes in the oven, I pour a cup or so of boiling water in the skillet. There's a big burst of steam, but much of it comes out the open door, I think. So I also take a sprayer and spray the side walls of the oven.

I believe steam is even more important for free-form loaves, because there's a lot more dough surface area exposed to the open air, so there's more crust for the steam to impact.

Several years ago I read something about a kit someone was selling that consisted of a heat-safe plastic tube that would attach to the oven door and lead down to a heavy metal pan inside, you could pour water in it and it would go into the pan while the oven was (mostly) closed. I assume it had some kind of funnel. I haven't found that reference lately. What I wasn't sure about is whether you took the tube out a few minutes later or if the oven door wound up being propped slightly open as a result.

Several companies make a steam oven for home use, they're expensive and the reviews I've seen of them have been mixed. (Maybe it is just getting used to a new oven.) But I have no plans to replace my 48" DCS dual fuel range any time, and it'd be a major job anyway, we'd probably have to take out the center island temporarily.

As I understand it, steam injectors in commercial ovens require periodic maintenance, cleaning out calcium buildup, etc. I assume there would be some ongoing maintenance on a home steam oven as well.

My KA is making some noises every now and then that tell me the main gear may be going. I don't know if I can get a replacement for it, since we've had it since 1972. (It was a wedding present.)

I've thought quite a bit about what to replace it with.

KA makes several lines of mixers in each of their sizes, with different quality/durability levels, I'm sure. You probably have to check the motor rating to figure out which one it is. (Price is probably a good clue, too, if it is under $200 it probably isn't going to be the strongest motor.) From reviews on various sites, it seems KA has gone back to metal gears from the plastic ones, at least in some lines.

KA also now offers a glass bowl option for their smaller mixers, but I hear it is very heavy and the base tends to chip where it hooks in, so I'm not sure it is worth the cost.

Viking used to make an 8 quart mixer that got good reviews (they're what KAF had in their test kitchen when I visited it several years ago.) But they've gone out of the business. I've looked at a 12 quart commercial-grade countertop mixer a few times, but it's in the $1000 range.

I've also looked at the Anksarsrum and similar mixers, I think I'd like to work with one before actually buying one.

Not sure where I'd find the counter space, but if I had to replace it NOW and funds weren't a major object, I might go with a cheaper 4 1/2 or 5 quart KA just so I've got one for small batches and the 12 quart one for bigger stuff. That way I'd still be able to use my KA pasta attachments and the bowls I have.

Has anybody tried the KA attachments on other brands of mixers that have an attachment port?

I've made recipes that were in the 9 cup range in my 4 1/2 quart mixer, but what you have to do is add the flour and water in several stages so it doesn't slop over the side. Larger mixers tend to have a bowl shield that probably helps prevent spillovers. If you're doing a dough with a preferment (and I do a lot of those, especially the rye breads), you might have to add the preferment in several stages as well.

[Mike Nolan]

We have fish periodically, my wife usually has orange roughy in a lemon-butter sauce and I have salmon in butter. (She doesn't care for salmon.) I've been adding some dill and occasionally some rosemary to it.

[Mike Nolan]

I've got a 4 1/2 quart KA (from the early 70's), so when I get to that one I'll be able to report on how well it works. I've heard from several people with larger capacity mixers (like the Anksarsrum) who said they had problems with smaller batches.

I haven't decided on an order yet for the 78 recipes in TRB, so I will probably be skipping around a bit, as it doesn't make a lot of sense to me to make two similar recipes back-to-back. A fellow BBGA member contacted me to say he was having some problems with a couple of Ginsberg's recipes, I may try one of those soon.

I think I'm doing the Munich Penny Rolls next, just because they're rolls not loaves, and Ginsberg says they have a thin crisp exterior. (My Holy Grail of breads remains the rolls I had in NYC around 25 years ago, with a crust like an eggshell and a creamy interior. I think they had some rye content, too.)

[Mike Nolan]

Tonight we had spaghetti with mushroom sauce and semolina bread cheese toast.

[Mike Nolan]

It took me about 2 minutes last night to measure out 70 grams from the previous day's rye starter, add 70 grams of rye flour and 70 grams of water and stir it up. So a long weekend and a few minutes of coaching might be all it takes to get a rye starter launched.

One of the reasons I went away from using my Zo was that it didn't allow me to make adjustments on the fly to the process. A small change in the number of minutes of kneading or rising time might have affected the volume and crumb a lot. As Peter Reinhart once wrote, your dough will tell you what it needs.

[Mike Nolan]

They were very good. I salted and peppered them, sprinkled on a little marjoram, nutmeg and flour, let them sit for a half hour, then seared them in a little butter on medium heat for 2-3 minutes, then flipped them over, covered the pan, reduced the heat and let them finish cooking until they were above 145 degrees. That kept them nice and moist and gave me a nice base for the pan sauce.

This is a pan sauce I'll make again. (And I might do that tomorrow, I bought two packages of these pork chops. They're thin ones, about 4 ounces, and were 88 cents each, but you can't often buy your protein for less than a dollar a serving.)

[Mike Nolan]

Dinner tonight was pork chops, pan cooked. I made a pan sauce using lemon juice, chicken stock, some mustard and parsley. We also had steamed broccoli. The pan sauce was excellent, the mustard gave it a taste reminiscent of a milder Sauce Robert.

[Mike Nolan]

I saw something on an episode of Chopped this week that I haven't seen very often on competitive cooking shows.

In the dessert round one of the competitors cut his hand badly with less than two minutes in the round. He hadn't finished plating all four of his dishes and leaving ingredients off the plate will often get you chopped. While the medic was attending to him, the clock kept counting down. With under 30 seconds to go, he was still being attended to, so his opponent finished plating his foods for him. (All he had to do was move two bowls of ice cream onto the plate.)

As it turned out, the guy who cut his hand won the competition, he almost certainly would have lost had his opponent not finished plating for him. I hope they invite the guy who lost back for another competition, sportsmanship deserves recognition.

[Mike Nolan]

Once you've got a starter well-established, it can be pretty tolerant. I know people who've forgotten they had a starter and found it at the back of a refrigerator shelf weeks or months later and it bounced back just fine.

I'm in the last few days of building my rye starter, so it hasn't gone in the fridge yet. It's pretty active at this point, I refreshed it around 10 PM last night and by 10 AM this morning it had doubled. It has an interesting but fairly pleasant sour aroma.

I think if you've got a week or so when you'll be at home, you can probably build a rye starter using Ginsberg's protocol, then stick it in the fridge. A day or two before you're ready to bake, take a small amount of the starter, mix it with some rye flour and warm water, and let it sit on the counter for a day, it should be ready to go.

I've saved up all the discards, they're in the fridge. I'm planning to use them for some of the Ginsberg recipes. (Right now I'm thinking of trying the Munich Penny rolls next, I've ordered some rye malt and will toast it to produce red rye malt--lightly toasted).

There's no beer in the Old Milwaukee bread, though I think there are a few of Ginsberg's recipes that do use beer in them. I'm not a beer drinker, but I think that Old Milwaukee beer is still on the market.

Making 78 rye recipes is likely to produce rye bread fatigue here, so I'm thinking I may do 2 or 3 then take a break of a week or two. I may have to try a few new non-rye recipes just for a change of pace, too. Maybe I'll try Hamelman's wild yeast raisin bread recipe again, last time I got the wrong kind of mold on the top of the raisin water and had to throw it out. Debbie Wink says that sometimes happens, raisins can have several types of mold spores on them, including Botrytis cinerea, the grey mold responsible for 'noble rot' in Sauternes dessert wines.

[Mike Nolan]

King Arthur used to sell a 'deli rye' pan, with sides that sloped out sort of like a trapezoid, but it looks like they no longer have it. I thought it was a Chicago Metallic pan, but they don't seem to have it on their site, either. Specialty pans come and go, I guess, I've got several that nobody seems to carry any more. (And I've got two large glass pans that I broke the lid to one of, but the French maker no longer makes that size.)

The main reason I bake most of my breads freeform is that I prefer a crust that has some body to it.

[Mike Nolan]

Report on Old Milwaukee Rye (The Rye Baker pps 98-101):

The recipe made two loaves. Although Ginsberg recommends a football shaped loaf, I made more of a cylindrical one, because that way the slices are more uniform in size. The loaves are about 11 inches long with a cross section of about 5 inches by 3 inches. The finished loaf weighs 696 grams or about 24 1/2 ounces.

This dough came together quickly and looked and felt quite a bit like gingerbread, not at all sticky. It rose well, though a little slow, that might have just been the kitchen temperature. It baked a little faster than the recipe called for, but that may have been due to how I shaped it.

The caraway seeds on the outside didn't stick very well, I may not have had enough egg in the egg wash. And I remembered why I generally don't put caraway seeds on the outside, they get very hard and stick in between my teeth.

The bread is fairly dark on the inside, due in large part to the molasses. There's a noticeable aftertaste from the molasses, but it is not an unpleasant one. I think that may fade a little over time, when the loaves came out of the oven the molasses odor was much stronger.

We think the bread is very tasty as a sandwich bread, it would probably make excellent Reubens, too. It reminds me a bit of the rye bread I get in the Amish store in Iowa.

It toasts very well and I think it would pair quite well with stronger toppings, like an apple butter. I think there's a good chance I'll make this bread again.

Followup: It tastes even better on day 2.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Mike Nolan.
• This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Mike Nolan.

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[Mike Nolan]

We had sandwiches on the Old Milwaukee rye bread, hers was pastrami mine was corned beef. I also had some peas.

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