Here is the sourdough bread we had for Thanksgiving 2008.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
French Bread with poolish
After making the buttermilk bread I made a simple French bread using the poolish. To make the poolish easier to make I use a recipe calculator to calculate the amount of poolish, water, flour, yeast and salt for the specific hydration and weight of the loaf. It seems to work OK. I got a big hole in the center of the loaf. This comes from wrapping a bubble of air into the loaf when forming it. Sorry, I will be more careful next time. The recipe is standard French bread from any book. So is the method. The only difference is the use of the 50/50 poolish living in my refrigerator. Here is what it looked like.
Buttermilk Bread
In October I made a loaf of buttermilk bread to take to Atlanta when we visited our two grandchildren. I wanted to try the poolish when making a soft white bread. I used powdered buttermilk for the bread and I think it came out OK. Here is a picture of the kids enjoying the bread with peanut butter and jelly. This shows that using aged dough does not always make a hard crusted bread with seeds on top.
So, here is the recipe. Remember, the poolish is 50/50 by weight flour and water, aged in the refrigerator for up to a week (or two). For a 2 lb loaf with 62 % hydration, use:
302 grams of poolish (allow it to warm to room temperature)
401 grams of flour
191 grams of warm water
6 grams of instant yeast
6 grams of salt
20 grams of butter
20 grams of sugar and
20 grams of buttermilk powder.
Mix the yeast and the salt with the warm water and add to the poolish. Stir well, then add the butter, sugar and buttermilk powder. Add the remaining flour and knead for 5 minutes using the mixer, or 10 minutes by hand until smooth and elastic. Place the dough in an oiled bowl, cover it with clear plastic and let rise until doubled. Punch down, then knead for 3 minutes and let rest for 20 minutes. Form into a loaf and place into a greased bread pan. Let rise until doubled. Bake for 35 minutes or til done. Cool on a rack.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Suas Baguettes using my poolish
Sept 29, 2008 -- The San Francisco Chronicle posted an article about Michel Suas, a bakery consultant in that town. I used his recipe (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/24/FDST12VPFT.DTL&hw=michel+suas&sn=001&sc=1000) to make baguettes using my 100% poolish. Mrs A and I nibbled on one as we watched the market crash tonight at 4:30! 
French bread using my poolish
July 15, 2008 -- This is a loaf of French bread made from my poolish that lives in the refrigerator and the recipe from Jeffrey Hamelman's Bread. I made a couple of loaves and froze one to use later. My wife doesn't eat much bread and I am not supposed to either, so a little goes a long way. I give away a lot, too.Ciabatta with my poolish
Sept 4, 2008 -- Since making the 5 minute bread I have changed the recipe in the refrigerator to a 100% poolish so the dough can age somewhat before making bread. This increases the flavor. Here is my ciabatta made with the poolish. Any recipe can use this method by taking equal (gram) quantities of the water and flour and useing that from the stored poolish, then complete the recipe with the remaining ingredients. That's my theory anyway and this is, therefor, a test. It came out pretty good. The loaf in the back of the oven got too close to the back oven wall and burned slightly. See in the last slice where the very top of the slice is blackened.See www.theartisan.net/Ciabatta_Indirect_Poolish.htm for the original recipe.
Plain White 5 Minute Bread with Ribs
We had ribs! But we needed to have white bread with barbecue. There was this 5 minute bread dough in the refrigerator, so I made it up in a bread pan and baked it in the oven while the ribs cooked on the grill outside. Oh, boy this stuff works really well. There is nothing like white bread with barbecue!
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