Bread

Gluten>>>>>
Cook food>>>>>

I made the Basic Real Bread from the first post on this thread / realbreadcampaign.org a few times now.
It's pretty good.
It works best with the cheapest white flour and the cheap fresh yeast, unfortunately (organic yeast and flour don't rise as much, especially when using whole grain).

I use a gas oven at max heat for almost the entire baking time.
I put a shallow cast iron pan with water in it on a grating under the baking tray with the dough.
That way temperature in the oven is more even (the bottom of the bread does not burn), and moisture level is kept high as it should.

Oh, and by the way - if you're in Berlin -
the organic bakeries are opening their doors next week / do various events; check http://berliner-bio-baecker.de/

The desem loaves of organic spelt (3 ingredients only) that we buy cost almost $9 each.

..for a kilo of bread ?!

^^ Crazy this is why I make my own!

Is true.
From here.

Chapati dough made Tues, left over was fridged, is cooking up nice this eve:

Nice, looks thick enough to be naan.

Are chapatti's as easy to make as chapati flour and water?

10 kilo sacks of chapatti flour seem to be £3 at the mo, so was thinking of using the flour in as many flour related uses.

From what I've just read *, chapati are just that, flour and water.

• assign proper value
  

Chapati Flour & Gram Flour mix
Splash of Walnut Oil
Water

Plain Flour for rolling out.

Making sourdough for the first time this weekend. Any tips?

A few...

A vigorous, bubbly starter is necessary to have a good sourdough. The longer you leave the dough to rest, the more sour your bread will be - so less (starter) is more! If you want a really sour loaf, refrigerate the dough for a couple of days. I've left it in the fridge up to 5 days with no problems - resulted in a lovely tangy bread.

If you want bread with big holes - use white flour, a wetter dough helps.
To get a crackly, chewy crust, bake in a pre-heated Dutch oven for the first 20 minutes or so.
Slash it before baking to help it rise better.
Experiment with different flours - I like spelt, rye and barleycorn when making sourdough.

Looks delish! I've been bringing up the starter over the last few days, and it is looking pretty vigorous at the moment. Reckon I'll stick with white flour to start, though I do have a bit of rye knocking around that might make it interesting. I hadn't thought about the effect of resting time on flavour, but that makes total sense, given how the starter behaves.

I've read semolina flour helps for dusting, stopping it sticking etc., so will give that a go too.

To my shame I'm eating 4 asda sunflower and honey rolls each day. they're addictive and £1. self checkout code is 6362 :/

@kati Rye sourdough is amazing;

Going to try rye sourdough this weekend. Had a go last weekend, with similar proving times to a regular white one, but it was massively underproved. Have seen some stuff saying 14-16 hours for bulk fermentation, followed by a couple of hours for the final rise. Anyone else got some experience to chip in on that.

The regular sourdough was pretty nice. Meant to post a pic but haven't got round to it yet.

@Dumps I usually retard mine in the fridge and take it out a few hours before baking. A little bit of black treacle can help oven spring, especially with denser breads like rye.

Great chat, thanks @kati

Mrs. Pharoah was making a pork belly roast, so I got to thinking that a rosemary and sea salt foccacia might be nice with that. Yum!

nice!

We didn't get through even half of it, so will be great for sandwiches and other eating this week. Will have to do these more often I think, so simple.

First sourdough since about 2010. Not very sour but good texture.

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How's your life in Australia by the way?