A Simple Pao de Caseira and a Malted Wheat Flake Loaf, Again

The first loaf is something I'm working on and it's based on a formula from Mr Forte's Portuguese Breads blog. Traditionally, the loaf is round in shape but since I baked it to mail to a college room mate and his wife, I used my oval brotform instead.

Anyone who looks carefully at my formula might think that it's almost identical to the horiatiko psomi recipe that I posted in 2011. That's what I thought as well but since the psomi was so good, I'm hoping that Gary and Jeannie will confirm my expectations.

Starter
140 g at 75% hydration, fed with 75% AP and 25% white whole wheat, built in two stages.

Main Dough
300 g bread flour
60 g white whole wheat
250 g water at 92F
8 g kosher salt
10 ml olive oil
10 ml honey
All of starter


I still haven't run out of malted wheat flakes and since I keep them in the freezer, there are no grounds to suspect that they're reproducing themselves. So I grabbed them to soak while I was waiting for my 125% hydration starter to hit its stride. I'm beginning to like the results from using a 125% starter but I admit to guessing on quantities because I don't bother to learn how to use a spread sheet to save myself the time I spend hammering a calculator to establish either a ground point or an alibi. My guess work on the results is that I could have used less water in the soaker or adjusted the main dough water down 10 g. On the other hand, considering the use of the flakes and 25% whole wheat flour, a spectacular oven spring may have been out of the question to begin with. It still tastes good with winter foods so I did alright.   

Starter
160 g at 125% hydration

Soaker
80 g malted wheat flakes
80 g water at room temperature

Main Dough

300 g bread flour
100 g whole wheat flour
260 g water at 90F
15 ml honey
11 g kosher salt
All of starter
All of soaker


It seems as if all my fine feathered friends are loading up on food in expectation of the snow storm that is supposed to arrive late tomorrow night. I finally managed to identify another woodpecker type. It's a Northern Flicker, sometimes called a black shafted flicker, and sometimes a vulgarity or two since they will drum on houses in a fit of misguided expectations of food. It's a male as far as I can tell since it has a bright red, triangular cape on the back of its neck. Most of the time he can be seen digging away at the suet feeder but sometimes he'll go to the seed feeders in search of the peanuts and raisins found in that food blend.

New countries have been added to my pageviews recently. They've come from Sweden, Venezuela, and from the home of some of the world's finest beers, Belgium.

Comments, humor, and questions are welcome.