Bread

How long did you leave between oven and cutting?

Something happens with the steam inside the bread that improves it if you give it at least an hour or 2. I have found when my timings have been off and I don’t give it that time it can be dense and moist.

Oops. Basic slavering greed meant that I was dipping in my soup while it was still hot, about 25 minutes.

Dense and damp seems an apt description of much of our beloved forum.

Baking bread is basic voodoo no one quite knows why or how. Lots of trial and error

This is the best one I’ve don’t so far.

Just need to see how the inside looks

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I’ve done it so many times including this week.

The problem is that warm bread sounds so fantastic at any time.

Make a small roll and a loaf. You can then eat the roll but allow the bread to cool properly.

After a lot of mediocre loafs I managed to get a nice one again, just couldn't manage to get enough skin tension for them to hold shape during the bake, crumb was good and they were nice enough but they looked a bit shit.

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Finally tried some of this. Tastes great. Lots more bubbles. Mostly in the upper part.

I’m sure whether to proof for longer

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Trying a no knead loaf for the first time this morning. At this point: still skeptical.

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Looks nice. What’s the inside like?

It looks like a normal higher-hydration loaf inside. It’s quite a heavy loaf because of the higher hydration. Texture is (for want of a better description) like a loaf which hasn’t been kneaded enough. Has the taste of a loaf which has been left on an overly-long prove.

I’m going to give it another go but I’m not convinced it’s a replacement for kneaded dough I think it would benefit a bit from slightly more mixing at the beginning and a longer bake.

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Please change the thread title to:

lockdown 2: sourdough boogaloo

Loaf #2 of the shortest baking career on the planet. I tapped, it sounded hollow, it might even be edible, I shall find out in about an hour...

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I'm this close to perfecting the Beigel Bake beigel. Today's revelation was Horlicks.

Great work, tried this after a bit of a hit and miss series of results and faffing around with sourdough and fancy techniques: loved the casual, relaxed approach and I now have two excellent, well risen loaves

Did another no knead loaf with a few tweaks. Much better this time - quite an acceptable loaf.

This time I mixed it a little more thoroughly and opened a new yeast as I’m pretty sure the old stuff had lost a bit of activity. Longer bake as well, which I think is beneficial with a higher-hydration loaf.

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This thread helped push me to make Day of the Dead bread. First batch turned out ok but a bit chewy. Will post more if I get the insides to look like your breads.

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Morning bake. Mix of rye, seeded and bread flour. All Wessex mill.

Think it was approx 25% starter.

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I'm this close to perfecting the Beigel Bake beigel. Today's revelation was Horlicks.

Recipe?

I'm out of non diastatic malt so I'd like to give that a shot!

It was a variation on this

https://www.eastlondonlines.co.uk/2020/05/brick-lanes-beigel-bake-reveals-recipe-for-iconic-bagels-for-stay-at-home-bakers/

I halved the volumes but even then needed less flour (3 cups instead of 3.5). I also baked them for waaaay less time. The article suggests 20-25 min at your oven's max temp, but I was taking them out after 7-8 min.

My shaping was way off trying to follow it to the letter. I ended up making hoops instead of their more batch like beigels. Next time I will shape them differently and try baking them batch style to see if that helps. Because mine were so big/open, they browned all over (like a circular pretzel). If they had have been batch like, they would have been pretty much spot on. Making them smaller/plumper might also mean I can boil two at a time instead of one.

So for 8 bagels, I'm going to try;

3 cups of strong white bread flour (high in gluten)
2.5 teaspoon of dried yeast
1.5 table spoon of sugar
1 table spoon of horlicks
1 cup of lukewarm water
0.5 teaspoon of salt

Mix the water, sugar, yeast and horlicks in a bowl.

Add 2 cups of flour and mix. Add salt and the rest of the flour and mix/semi-knead until smooth.

Rest for 10 min covered in a cloth

Separate into 8 pieces and shape into balls.

Pinch through the centre of each ball to form a fat ring with a small hole.

Leave on a floured board covered with a cloth for 1 hour.

Boil in water for 40 secs each side.

Arrange on a wire rack nearly touching.

Bake at 250C for 7 - 8 min, turning after 4-5 min.

edit: being slightly thicker than before, I might let them go for 9-10 min, will have to see how it goes.

My experience of the no-knead recipe is that the second proof is a bit long. I also do quite a lot of shaping after the initial rise. So my process is:

Mix well (at around 75-80% hyrdration depending on flour); Proof for ~12hours. Then turn out and shape with lots of folds (so that you get a good tight loaf). I then do a second proof in a banneton for around 1-1.30hr and then in the oven with a slash.

Here's a picture of the result: https://www.lfgss.com/comments/15376601/

Sort of a question: I’ve been doing the no-knead for a while and using rice flour for dough handling. Last loaf, I tried a mix of rice and wheat for handling and the resulting crust was so much better when toasted.
Getting the dough out of the banneton was harder, mind.
Eh. But anyway. Crust is a big part of enjoying these loaves, so I want to play around with that some more, would welcome suggestions for what to try. Thanks.

(crust might also be related to the amazing amounts of steam generated by baking potatoes and beetroot in the same oven at the same time)

No expert but I've found the crust gets thicker & tougher when I don't put a tray of water in to generate a bit of steam, with steam it's definitely lighter & crisper on my loaves - rice/wheat are rougher in texture than normal white flour so maybe that accounts for the handling issues, I always just use white flour for this but been meaning to mix it up a bit