A Nice Pair, Of Loaves

These came out of the oven Wednesday. The boule is our house loaf currently. It's a white whole wheat and wheat bran loaf. The oval loaf is a sourdough rye with caraway, something that will go well with sandwiches and soups. I mailed the rye loaf to my cousin who lives on Southport Island in Maine. Hopefully, Paul will email me a jpg. file of the crumb for me to add sometime in the future.


White Whole Wheat with Bran

Soaker
28 g wheat bran
52 g water at room temperature


Starter
150 g at 68% hydration

Main Dough
267 g bread flour
133 g white whole wheat flour
280 g water at 90F
10 g kosher salt
All of soaker
All of starter 

Sourdough Rye with Caraway

150 g at 70% hydration
Main Dough
267 g bread flour
100 g whole rye flour
33 g whole wheat flour
280 g water at 90F
10 g kosher salt
10 g caraway seed
1 Tbs Molasses
All of starter
 
The boule is consistent with other similar loaves that I've been baking lately. A doctor told me that I shouldn't expect any great health benefits from adding bran to my loaves but it does add a little bit of nuttiness to the flavor. I had it, I used it, and I'm in a "lets clean out the odds and ends in the cupboard" mode again.

Lately, I haven't been doing too much retarded proofing. Proofing for 3-4 hours at room temperature as needed appears to give me a more consistent open crumb without the squashed bottom. It's only aesthetics but how many bakers, even raggedy home bakers as myself, don't aspire to a better looking loaf. Appearance does count when eating.

Even though the snow has melted away and the ground is exposed, we have quite a few of the usual suspect birds at the feeders. I fixed the chain for the suet feeder and have been rewarded with daily visits from woodpeckers. A pair of red bellied woodpeckers drop by and a downy woodpecker will push aside any chickadee in the path to the feeder.

I just noticed that I have two more countries to recognize for page views, Denmark and Lithuania.

Comments, humor, and questions are welcome.