Breadhunter's Blog

Technology

2012-02-15T18:16:00.000-05:00

While hiking in the forest today, I came upon a friendly dog wearing a bulging collar. Soon, the dog's owner appeared on the trail. I asked him about the collar, and he told me that the collar had a radio transmitter that beamed a signal to his GPS. On the GPS, I could clearly see the trail we were on, and he could see where his dog was. He said he could also get in touch with his dog, and he pulled out another device. With this tool he could "beep" the dog so the dog would know he was being called or he could actually give the hapless dog a shock as some sort of punishment for perhaps straying too far. But he would never do that, he told me. Clearly he loved his dog.
I also noticed he was carrying his iPad on the forest trail, and I asked him why. He said the iPad was like taking his office with him. In the tablet he had a list of all his products and prices along with sales records. If he had to carry the physical documents, they would have been the size of the New York City telephone book. But here, they were neatly stored in his iPad, and if necessary, he could do his business right from the trail. He really had no need to sit in the office.
What does this have to do with bread baking? I don't know.

Artisan Bread In Five Minutes A Day (con't)

2012-02-14T16:29:00.000-05:00

On Tuesday morning I took the highly aerated dough from the cold storage room where it had been kept since Sunday at around 45-50º. I scooped out a hunk and placed it in my banneton. Probably I should have scooped out more because the dough was really undersized for the banneton, and it barely rose at all. The instructions tell you to bake after about 40 minutes, but I wasn't excited about putting such a cold dough in my conventional gas oven. I waited about two hours, and the dough was still cold. I baked it anyway and did get a little oven spring.

The crust is thin and crisp, just the way I like it, and the dough is pleasantly filled with mouse holes, but the flavor did not excite me. In fact, there really wasn't much flavor, and it tasted slightly salty.
I will, however, continue with this method for awhile to see where it takes me.

Artisan Bread In Five Minutes A Day

2012-02-13T13:06:00.000-05:00

Artisan Bread In Five Minutes A Day is the name of the book by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François.
First off, I was totally turned off by the title. Why is it that everything has to get done in five minutes?
And that would include eating, sex, meditation and of course, bread baking.
Once I got past the title, I read an article in Mother Earth News that explained the technique. Okay, I was intrigued, so I mixed up the dough yesterday, and now it's in the refrigerator. I hope to bake with it on Tuesday or Wednesday, and I'll post the results. The recipe calls for a lot of instant yeast (really a lot), and let's think it's not the same as "doping" to help you to create stellar loaves.
Eric from Gardenfork. TV does an interesting comparison between the "no knead" and the "five minute a day" technique. Watch the video here.

Bread Undercover

2012-02-07T15:16:00.000-05:00

If you're baking indoors in a conventional oven, be it gas or electric, there's only one way I know of to make great bread. To make the best breads, you have to bake undercover, and that means baking in some sort of cloche.

What to expect

The cloche might be a cast iron Dutch oven, La Cloche, an inverted flowerpot or some other variation. Baking undercover attempts to replicate the conditions of a genuine wood-fired bakeoven by trapping the steam escaping from the baking loaf. To make a fine crust you need steam. If you don't bake undercover, the steam simply dissipates too quickly from a conventional oven to do any good. Your baking loaf needs to be surrounded by a cloud of hot steam that will postpone the formation of tough crust. The most popular device on the market that allows you to trap the steam is La Cloche, but the price is around $54.00. I've had a couple of them, and they do a fine job, but the bottoms tend to break from hot ovens. If it only happened to me, then I'd be suspect of my procedures, but I know it's happened to others as well.

You could easily make your own oven insert out of a clay pot, and it will work just as well. Your cost would be under $15.00.

A Dutch oven also does a superb job, and I bought a beautiful one from Lodge.

Most "experts" who bake undercover say you must remove your cover anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes into the bake. Then you're instructed to finish the bake without a cover. Yes, this certainly works, but if your goal (as is mine) is to strive for a thin, crisp crust, then leave the cover in place for the full bake, but reduce the temperature for the last 15 minutes. I bake on a shelf half way up the oven, but on the lowest shelf I place an insulated cookie sheet to help deflect heat away from the bottom of the baking bread. This will keep the crust from burning.

Achieving A Failure

2012-02-04T17:16:00.000-05:00

Achieving A Failure
And that's a good thing because it means I'm working and experimenting. What's the sense of finding some comfortable niche that only limits my growth as a bread baker or artist. To always succeed at something bespeaks a timid attitude. Yes, I can always bake the same loaf of bread using the same procedures, and that's what professional bakers need to do if they're selling to the public. Or, I can keep painting the same scene with slight variations, never taking any real chances, because then I might be afraid no one would want to buy my work, but what kind of a life is this?

When Dylan wrote, "there's no success like failure," he wasn't joking. And when Emerson said "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds," it doesn't take a quantum leap to draw a parallel with what Dylan said.
Yes, it's much more difficult for me to make a piece of art using unfamiliar colors and materials or construct an earth oven of unusual design. Sure, I might fail, but I'd prefer that to riding on a wave of certitude that will always inhibit my growth.

Today I am changing my sourdough bread formula. Day#1 Normally I use about 1/4 cup of sourdough starter for a loaf of bread. Today I stirred in a full cup of starter. I don't really know (although I think I do) what will happen, but I'll let you know the results. Day#2. The resulting bread was heavy, although filled with mouse holes, between them it was dense and very sour, not exactly my favorite.

Yes, I used too much sourdough starter, but I had to go to that place. I went there because I was asking my perennial question. What if?

P.S. I forgot to mention in my last post that I never did get an opportunity to achieve another failure in Guatemala making corn tortillas. I was simply too busy building stoves, and I didn't have time to mess with the masa harina. Just as well.
Stu

Back from Guatemala

2012-01-31T15:35:00.000-05:00

I'm back home now from Guatemala, and as always, my stomach needs a little bit of repair. Unfortunately it's not so easy to stay well there, and there's not too much you can do about it. One does have to eat, drink and touch things.
Anyway, lots of energy efficient stoves were built by our group, and you can see some smiling faces by one of the stoves. My son Eric financed the cost of materials for the stove in the photo.
The stoves we build are intended to replace the "three stone fires" where Mayas develop all kinds of respiratory problem from constantly breathing smoke.

Energy efficient stove for making flat breads (tortillas), soups and for general cooking purposes.

Maya shrouded in a miasma of unhealthy smoke from cooking over a "three stone fire."

Back to Guatemala

2012-01-18T15:32:00.000-05:00

In another couple of days I'll be heading back to Guatemala. I think it's my seventh trip, and I'm as excited as usual. My first two trips were to construct ovens for Safe Passage by the Guatemala City dump. The dump experience is one I'll never forget. You can see the ovens being constructed on YouTube.
More recently, I've been going to Guatemala with a group called Masons On A Mission and we build energy efficient stoves for the Mayas in the villages around Lake Atitlan.

Besides building stoves, I've been trying to learn how to make corn tortillas, and I'm probably the only male who has attempted this is Guatemala. It's definitely not something that men do, but the women are quite accommodating in letting me participate. As hard as I try to make a tortilla that the Mayas approve of, I'm quite confident I'll achieve another failure.

Bread Baking and Oven Building Class

2012-01-17T08:47:00.000-05:00

This spring I'll be teaching a bread baking and oven building class. Although the class is currently filled, there is a waiting list, and I might consider adding another class.

Do you enjoy really great bread, but don't know how to make it, or if you do, it causes a lot of anxiety? If yes, then join me and all your bread baking hassles will be over. We will be baking in my wood-fired oven outdoors, but we will also be baking in my conventional gas range in the kitchen. Outdoors we'll make all types of flat breads which may include pitas, journey cakes, zatar, bagels, bialys, onion breads superieur and brick oven pizza. Indoors our focus will be sourdough and yeasted loaves, utilizing my no-knead technique. Expect to bake undercover with cloches to achieve that perfect crust.

A complimentary sourdough starter will be available for all. The primary focus of this class is hands-on bread baking, but while the bread is in the oven, we'll watch some bread baking videos, and also for those who are interested, we can assemble a small brick oven outdoors, a perfect low-cost oven that you can build at home for your pizza parties!

Lunch included. A materials fee of $20 must be made payable to Stu Silverstein and submitted to the adult ed office at the time of registration. Your place will not be held until the materials fee is received.

$29.00 Online price	Available slots: 0

Course location

Location address not available.
Please contact us for the exact location of where this course will be held.

Phone: 873-5754-Waterville/Winslow ~ 465-9134-Messalonskee

Course schedule

This course meets Sat from 9:00 am to 2:00 pm for 1 week.
Start date: June 2nd, 2012
End date: June 2nd, 2012

Course details

Instructor: SILVERSTEIN, STU

Course ID: 2009248.312

GardenFork.TV

2012-01-16T16:40:00.000-05:00

Check out this website for lots of useful information about baking, gardening, home repairs and just about anything else that you might find useful or not.There is even a video of the construction of a portable brick pizza oven based on a design from Bread Earth and Fire.
Instead of having to buy angle iron (expensive), Eric came up with the ingenious idea of cutting up an old iron bed frame that was made from angle iron. Hey, recycle and reuse when you can.

Insulated oven base just waiting for pizza oven

Fire almost reaching the plasma (love that word) stage. Note the firewood drying on top. The top is also a neat place for keeping baked pizzas hot. Watch the video to see how easy it is to construct the oven. No mortar required!

Keeping Bread

2012-01-12T14:51:00.000-05:00

amishdirectfurniture.com

Bread does not keep particularly well. In fact, it's best to eat the bread the day you bake it, but only after it's cooled. Allowing the bread to cool before slicing it, is important. It's not that we want to do a Sylvester Graham number and postpone gratification, but rather we want the bread to finish baking. Yes, it's still baking while it's cooling on the rack. I know this is an oxymoron, but it's a real phenomenon.
If you can't eat the bread on day number one, then it's okay to place it face down (the side you've cut) on your cutting board. It should still be edible on day number two. Remember, toasting does have a wonderful rehabilitative effect, but don't even think about nuking it in the microwave.
Unless you have high humidity in your kitchen, after the second day the bread may become dry and hard.
I have gone back and forth on plastic bags, but they certainly will keep the bread soft. But soft bread doesn't mean "fresh bread." Freshness may only be a illusion because bread will soon begin to compost if it's left in plastic for too long. You may choose to be a purist and not use plastic, but I have seen people break a tooth from chomping down on crusty bread. There are plastic bread bags with tiny perforations that do allow a breath of fresh air, and you could try these.
Or, you might want to try a breadbox for keeping bread. See the above photo.
But no matter what you contrive, the day of reckoning will soon be upon you. Either eat the bread, make Tuscan bread soup, bread crumbs, bread pudding or give it to the birds.

By baking frequently, you should always have fresh bread at home, and bake extra if you can for your friends and homeless shelters.

Bread Interrupted

2012-01-11T14:58:00.000-05:00

If your dough is happily rising in a couche and suddenly you discover that you don't have time to bake the loaf, then don't worry because there is something that you can do.
Simply take the dough from the couche, place in a plastic bag and refrigerate. You might even be able to leave the dough in the couche when you refrigerate the dough. Seal the dough carefully or it can easily dry in the fridge.
With yeasted dough, I have left the dough in the refrigerator for several days with no loss in quality. In fact the quality may have been improved by the longer fermentation.
When you do have the time to bake, take the dough from the refrigerator, allow it to warm up, rise and then bake. This should work as well for sourdough, but it might not keep as long refrigerated.
Refrigeration does not stop the fermentation and leavening process, but it does slow it down. To stop the fermentation process completely, freeze the dough. This may not work for sourdough (I'll let you know after I try it), but it does work well for yeasted dough.

Markouk Bread

2012-01-04T21:25:00.001-05:00

Just today I visited with someone who told me that when she was a child her grandmother always made markouk bread. "It was really the very best bread I ever had," she said.
Markouk bread can be purchased in areas that have a large middle eastern population, but of course you can make your own, but it's not so simple. Watch the video made by Sönke Henning Tappe www.caucasus-pictures.blogspot.com
Note how the dough is expertly stretched, formed over a cushion and then baked on something that looks like an upside down wok. In the video the fuel is bottled gas, but I watched another video that had a wood fire under the baking surface.
Let me know if you're inspired to make this wonderful flat bread.

Lodge Dutch Ovens

2011-12-11T09:22:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I decided to try out my new Lodge Dutch oven, indoors, in my conventional gas range.
Well, I was really impressed with my no-knead loaf. Not only did it look and taste great, but the Lodge was very easy to use. I was able to drop the dough onto the cover and then cover it with the base, rather than the other was around. To me, it's much easier to bake this way rather than plopping the dough over the high sides of the base. I hope the photos tell the story.

Another great thing about Lodge is that it's an American company that actually manufactures the cast iron that it sells. Yes, right here in the United States. Lodge is a very old company that knows how to survive, but it really needs our support.

Another Dry Stack Brick Oven

2011-12-07T18:22:00.000-05:00

You know, it's remarkable that these ovens are so easy to build, and it's also remarkable that you don't see more of them.

If you don't have money, but you do have a pile of old, red bricks, then you're well on your way. You can do the roof supports with angle iron, as illustrated, or as I have shown before, you might choose to make a simple brick arch.

These ovens will bake just as well as any other masonry oven, but I highly recommend that you insulate the oven, construct it at a decent baking height, and restrict the size of the oven opening. You don't want all that wonderful heat to escape.

I realize that long ago folks didn't insulate their ovens, and they certainly baked bread in them. However, with insulation, your oven will come up to temperature faster, bake better, and you'll far less fuel. That means less air pollution and less denuding of our precious forests.

Thanks to Stuart Wier for the PDF

http://www.westernexplorers.us/A_simple_brick_bake_oven.pdf

Gluten Intolerance

2011-12-06T14:35:00.000-05:00

A friend recently sent me this article that calls into question the causes of gluten intolerance. The writer stridently maintains that gluten intolerance is caused by the way bread is prepared. I think the article is definitely worth reading. Also called into question is what really constitutes a healthful loaf of bread.

http://nourishedmagazine.com.au/blog/articles/bread-dread-are-you-really-gluten-intolerant

Brown Bread or White Bread

Bread is good for us. It nourishes our bodies as well as our souls. But when we look at nutrition and bread more closely, we discover there is a problem of digestive assimilation associated with bread made with l00% whole wheat flour.

Bran is highly laxative and a useful component in a high-fiber diet, but do all of us actually need more fiber? Just how much is more? And how regular do we really need to be?

Harold McGee, author of On Food And Cooking, tells us that during World War II the government of Dublin, Ireland, put the population on wholegrain bread to improve health. Almost half the children developed rickets because phytic acid in the wheat bran makes calcium unavailable to the body. Wartime rations contained few dairy products, so the action of phytic acid proved catastrophic to the children.

H. E. Jacobs in Six Thousand Years of Bread quotes Antoine Auguste Parmentier (1736-1812), a French army apothecary:

"My own experience of many years and above all the things I have seen in wartime have convinced me that in the plan of this world the husks and woody parts of plants were not intended to form part of our food. And especially these materials, insofar as they occur in grains, were not meant to be included in your bread. The bran, a woody parenchyma, the husk of the grain, is not nutritious precisely because it contains no meal. The art of the miller should consist in removing this husk from the grain--but without pulverizing it so that it can no longer be sifted out. Close grinding is therefore harmful."
So where do we go from here?

Parchment Paper

2011-11-27T15:04:00.000-05:00

I've never used it, but I can see that there are certain advantages to using it in a conventional oven. If you're making no-knead bread as I do, often it's difficult transferring the somewhat amorphous loaf to your very hot Dutch oven. By using parchment paper, the process is simplified in that you simply lift the risen loaf by holding the edges of the parchment paper and drop it, paper and all into the Dutch oven. The paper will not burn. The video shows the whole process.

Note how the hot Dutch oven cover is dropped on the floor. Actually it's hard to miss, and maybe we should all take safety precautions by wearing steel-toed boots.

King Arthur

2011-11-22T10:46:00.000-05:00

I use almost exclusively King Arthur flour and have had great results with it. The company is cooperatively owned, and I give it my support.
Jeffrey Hamelman of King Arthur, a certified master baker introduces a five part video that illustrates lots of interesting baking techniques.

Although it's difficult to navigate between the videos, they are definitely worth watching, particularly the video on shaping and slashing baguettes.

Gluten Free Cornbread

2011-11-17T19:31:00.000-05:00

For a long time now I've been resisting the gluten free craze. It seems like everyday someone is discovering a new syndrome, and there is always someone to capitalize on it. Anyway, I've been asked for a gluten free cornbread recipe, and I believe I've come up with something that doesn't compromise the qualities I look for in traditional cornbread. After doing some experimenting and searching the web, here it is.

GLUTEN FREE CORNBREAD

Ingredients:
1 cup brown rice flour
3/4 cup stone-ground cornmeal
3 Tablespoons of honey
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 Tablespoon canola oil
2 beaten eggs
1 cup milk
1/4 cup canola oil

Directions:

If you're baking outdoors in your wood-fired oven, then it's okay to maintain the fire while the bread is baking. Push the fire to the back or side.

If you're baking in a conventional oven indoors, then preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Mix the dry ingredients (flour, cornmeal, baking powder, and salt) together in a bowl and set aside.
Spread 1 tablespoon of canola oil in a 10 inch cast-iron skillet.
In another bowl, combine the eggs, milk, honey and 1/4 cup of canola oil, stir into the dry ingredients and then pour into the skillet.

Bake for about 18 minutes or until a wooden toothpick comes out clean. Serve warm.

I like to use buttermilk or soy milk, but any milk will work. You can also substitute melted butter for the canola oil.

Firewood

2011-11-10T13:00:00.000-05:00

If you're planning to build a wood-fired oven, then you should really learn a lot about firewood.

A couple of years ago I cut down a white birch tree and sawed it into 16" lengths. I didn't bother to split it, thinking that the birch would simply dry in the woodshed, and I was in no rush. Just last week I started to split it, and I discovered that the wood was rotten inside. The lesson for me was that firewood really needs to be split after its cut so it can dry out properly. This is particularly true of white birch because the bark is highly water-resistant, and if the birch is not split, then the moisture stays inside and damages the firewood. Probably because birch bark forms such a protective coat, the Native Americans used it for canoe construction and vessels to hold water. For great information about firewood go to this website.

Old tire sits on chopping block to prevent firewood from flying helter skelter when split.

Bread Pudding

2011-11-06T17:49:00.000-05:00

In all fairness I have to admit, there are times when I have too much bread around the house. My wife is an expert at making bread pudding, and it was time to use up all that bread. With her guidance, we both put this together.

Ingredients:
3 medium apples, peeled and sliced
¾ cup of raisins
4 cups (237g) of 1” cubed bread
1 tablespoon butter
2 cups milk
2 beaten eggs
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
pinch nutmeg
1/4-1/2 cup honey

There are many variations of bread pudding, and there is simply not one recipe. A favorite appears to be a sauce made with brandy or bourbon that's poured over the pudding. hmmm

Procedure:
Place cubed bread on bottom of Dutch oven (if you need to buy one, then I highly recommend one from Lodge.) Place apples on top of bread. Add butter to milk and scald on stove top, campfire or in wood-fired oven. Add raisins, cinnamon, nutmeg, honey to the scalded milk. Add hot liquid slowly to beaten eggs (you don’t want them to cook).
Pour liquid on top of the apples and bread.
Cover Dutch oven and place inside a low to medium hot wood-fired oven. You can maintain a small fire in the back or to the side. It will take approximately 30 minutes to bake. Of course, nothing is exact here because of all the variables in baking outdoors, and for this reason, it’s my favorite way to bake. I like to watch the progress every five minutes or so because I don’t want to burn the dessert.
Serve it hot or cold, and I like it with ice cream.

Sharing Bread

2011-10-30T11:35:00.000-04:00

I think that most of you who read this blog really bake more bread than you and your family can possibly eat. If that's true, Then consider sharing it at a homeless shelter.

Bourke-White

If you think it's a good idea, here are some sugestions:

Share only your very best loaves.

Avoid crusty loaves because many of the recipients have poor teeth.

Slice the bread before taking it. The workers at the shelter have enough to do.

Place the sliced loaves (after they've thoroughly cooled) in a unsealed plastic bag because you want the bread to breath a little and to stay soft.

If they like your bread, and I'm sure they will, then you'll probably have trouble keeping up with the demand.

Favorite Photo

2011-10-18T14:19:00.000-04:00

Madeleine de Sinety, Four Loaves, 1993, archival pigment print, 10 x 16 inches, Courtesy of the artist.

This has to be one of my all-time favorite photos. Certainly the antithesis of factory bread. I've been trying for years to get a print of this photo from the photographer, and maybe someday I will. In the meantime I simply marvel at the beauty of these rustic French loaves, and who are the people holding them?

Campfire Bread

2011-10-12T16:18:00.000-04:00

hotelreservations.com

Bread being pulled from the embers

I was so inspired by these two videos, that I immediately ordered the Dutch oven from Amazon.
What I so like about these videos is their lack of glitzy polish. Eric, the owner of Breadtopia is on a camping trip with his family in the Grand Tetons where he attempts to make campfire bread. Well, he actually does make, but you can tell how unsure he is of himself, and often I feel the same way.

I don't want to say too much about the videos, you know, like giving away the ending and spoiling your experience.

Seeing Eric in this video and others is really like a breath of fresh air. He is so mild mannered that it's downright alarming. I suspect he has a lot of trouble promoting his excellent products on his website, and because of his attitude I have shopped there and will continue to do so. Just for the record, I have no connection to Breadtopia.

Without Fear

2011-10-06T11:29:00.000-04:00

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” Steve Jobs

There's a real message here for oven builders and bread bakers. Take big chances. Forget niches. Don't be afraid. Build an unconventional oven and bake what you think won't work.
What's the worst thing that can happen?

www.urbanhomestead.org

low tech oven base (stump)

yes to earth oven bagels

Baking in the Wood-Fired Oven

2011-10-04T15:38:00.000-04:00

Baking bread in a wood-fired oven presents multiple challenges and often a lot of discouragement. To understand some basic principles about wood-fired bread baking, you can look right to your conventional stove in the kitchen. Bake some loaves in a "cloche," and we'll call this "baking undercover."

Bread baking under a stainless steel cloche

Imagine that your cloche is really a miniature wood-fired oven that only holds one loaf at a time. Part way through the bake, remove the cover of your cloche and note how bland looking your bread appears to be. It's bland looking because the cloche has been containing all that steam escaping from the dough, and the loaf has not had any time to brown.
Leaving the cloche cover off now and finishing the bake, the steam will dissipate, and the bread will brown nicely.

Bread baking in a Dutch oven

Now translate this to your wood-fired oven. Your baking loaves need steam at the beginning of the bake, but a dry atmosphere for a finish.

Bread baking in a WFO

Baking loaves in a tightly sealed wood-fired oven may provide enough steam, but if they don't, then you'll have to use a steamer.

The steamer

The most important thing to remember is that you're not going to get good at baking in a WFO unless you bake lots of bread.