Bread

there is a huge difference between home made and store bought. Even the supermarket bakery baked bread is just frozen dough shoved into an oven on site.

Yep, as stated above, we've never purchased supermarket bread.

Thanks!

No yeast. But a good use of overripe bananas.

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https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4LM1Hv2zkPLnq9yNB8tygqS/soused-breal-and-scrumpy

Anyone made the treacle bread from Great British Menu last year? I’m going to give it a go but will probably use strong flour and yeast it, else it’ll basically be a brown cake, won’t it?

Fail!

I experimented with autolyse here, plus shorter bulk proof followed by an overnight fridge proof in the bassinet. Result somewhat lacking, instead of oven spring I got something resembling a cow patty :(

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Mixed results, some spring where I hadn’t scored the surface.

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Running low on decent whole meal flour and dried yeast. Any tips where to pick some up?SE London, or ideally, online? Ta

I am, yes!

I'm nervous about starter as I struggle to keep it maximally active. How do you maintain yours? what flour?

I was at Daily Bread the other day but forgot to check, doh. They were defo out of flour ...

I've been super lazy with my starter, I do one refresh a day before I want to make my levain, and then another refresh after taking out the starter for the levain, then straight back into the fridge.

I'm a total bread noob so idk. I just sometimes...feed it 50/50 tepid water and flour. I have that wessex mill strong white flour. I'm trying not to be too fussy about bread because I'm already totally insufferable about coffee so I don't know if it was maximally active.

I'm just down the road from daily bread, so my offer stands!

A couple of trial loaves:
Rye bread was a case of follow the Swedish recipe, bung in some fruit and nuts and chip seeds and hope.
Khaorsan/spelt was a pecan maple wholemeal recipe 200g of each. Else pretty standard.

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I've but had any bread flour for a couple of weeks, so no bread.

I have, however, made pancakes with plain floor that i have fermented for a couple of days.

No pics, because they are eaten far too quickly.

Going to experiment with baking in my cast iron bottomed tagine today

Went ok, was slightly flatter than usual but got some bubbles.

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After 6 months of no baking, and subsequently allowing my starter to die about a year ago, now seemed like an opportune time to get back into it. Everything was going well until the flour shortage started to hit hard...

Anyways, had enough to get a new starter going and crank out a loaf. Super happy with it!! First time I've baked with a dutch oven (i.e. stainless steel pot with a lid) and it the difference is amazing. Now need to have a proper search for some supplies....

This was 72% hydration, 15% inoculation, 2% salt with a 80:20 strong white:wholewheat.

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Looks good. It's rare for bananas to get to that stage in our house but do you have a recipe?

Yeah. I just use this one - omitting the cream cheese spread.

It's really forgiving but a couple of tips from experience.

1. Their take on "Small Banana" must be really small so go 50%-75% of what they ask for if you have larger or average bananas. Too much banana makes for a tougher texture.
   
2. More vanilla is great
   
3. You can add in non-caster sugar instead but you don't quite get the same light texture. Tastes fine though.
   
4. Go full fat on yogurt element - creme fraiche is better if you have any.
   
   

https://www.waitrose.com/content/waitrose/en/home/recipes/recipe_directory/b/banana_bread_with_frosting.html

Thanks!

Lucky our local bakery is still open, but we're going through bread at a rate of knots.
So like so many I'm trying to make a leaven starter and use that to make some bread at home. Giving it a go with old flour as haven't seen flour since we entered isolation. I'll pop to sainsbury's at some point this week and see if I can grab some fresh if they've restocked.

If anyone wants starter posted I’m more than happy to. Will be at cost (but forum donation instead) and will take a few days as it’s from Sweden. I’m sure it’ll survive though considering the neglect it has seen during my care...

My partner has been baking Sourdough every 3rd day, most a bit dense but we're gradually troubleshooting that.

We ran out of bread flour but then found 4 bags bbe Oct 19 in our Brexit #prepper ftw store.

I used some to make Pitta for kebab dinner this evening, following the "machine to oven" recipe in the Bread Bible book, happy with the outcome as fussy eating 7yo scoffed a couple straight down which is rare at the moment.

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That boule looks good. Nice and dark ^

I could use some advice. I was given some starter dough. I've been feeding it twice a day for a week, and want to start on a bake, but I haven't any bread flour (not sure I want to go hunting around shops for it tbh). However, I do have some GF Plain Flour. Should I give that a go for a first bake, or will I be throwing myself into a suicidal battle?

Personally, I'd hang onto the GF flour in case you need to make something specifically GF. Trying to use GF flour in place of bread flour is likely going to be a messy and frustrating affair, and will likely end up being a waste of flour. Gluten free bread baking is a bit of a dark art tbh.

Ah yeah, that's what I feared. Right, will hold out for some bread flour. Thanks for the advice.

Update: Obtained some bread flour at lunch, let's bake this thing!

Today's loaf. Partner forgot to cut the top pre bake.

I'm part way through making lentil & rice dosas, which should be ready to eat Thursday breakfast.

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