Thanks for your company Owen!

Artist, writer, fellow baker Owen Curtsinger came over to share his tricks and trades. While we were waiting for dough to rise, we sketched in our books and watched a Chris Rock stand-up video. Then came the baking. I put together a molasses bread, put is into a loaf pan and slit the top. When I checked on it a couple minutes after putting it in, well, the top had slid off life a mudslide.

Owen's bread was delicious and beautiful with a light tanginess that made it easy to just break a peace off and pop it into your mouth.

You can see Owen's artwork here: http://ocurtsinger.tumblr.com/

The quest for face exploding sourdough #1

One of the things that every cookbook tells you is that sourdough doesn't have to be sour. This this is a misnomer. That the only thing that sourdoughs have in common is that they use a wild strain of yeast. If your sourdough isn't sour, then don't worry about it because its fine. But I want a sour sourdough.I want it so sour that my face explodes... and I know that I'm not the only one.

One of the things that you learn about it is that location has something to do with it. A big difference between San Francisco sourdough, New York sourdough and Seattle sourdough is that these people are in San Francisco, you're in New York and I'm in Seattle, but with bread this difference is huge. The Levain takes on the characteristics of the city it lives in.

So what can I do about it? what can I do, living in the city that I live in, to alter a strain so that I can have the culture that give a sour flavor to a sourdough? I've searched online and, again, I read a lot of things telling me that sourdough doesn't need to be sour. But maybe you can spike your dough with rye flour. I've done that plenty of times. Also present puckery doughs is citric and lactic acid. One of the listings that I read said that citric acid is the more flavorful of the strains. So for this loaf I squeezed a grapefruit into the batter on the first fermentation period. Also I spiked the batter with a heaping Tbs of rye. Also recommended is a slow fermentation, so I took the glubbling heap of batter and stuck it in the fridge for a couple of days. (Another thing that I did is forget to add salt to the batter. I don't know that it would have made a difference in this instance.)

The result? Two beautiful loaves of bread the first night and another one the morning after. (The last one I let have its final proof over night just because slow is better with wild yeasts and so a slower slow must be better better. The bread is sweet and tasty and moist and delicious. I rolled the loaves in almond before the last proofing which gives them an interesting texture, taste as well do the almonds add, I think, to the visual presentation. To be honest, I want to find as many things as possible to stick on top of bread. The more interesting the better. As far as sour though, nothing. So the grapefruit sacrificed into the tub like a virgin into the volcano didn't do nothin'.

Next time, it's a lemon and I'll make the batter with some grape juice. I read that fermenting grape juice can bring about some lactic acid. Ex nihilo lactic acid. Finding a vegan answer to lactic acid may be an interesting journey.

Here are some pictures!

Entry #1

This loaf is from The River Cottage Bread Handbook. I salted the top of the bread and sprayed it down with a spray bottle for the last 10 minutes of baking. Unless I figure something out, I won't salt bread during the bake because the salt collected moisture and made the crust slimy.