85% Baked

Following on from “Another Fine Mesh” and “Crossed Wires“, let’s go the whole hog and bake with the stuff. As I said, my blend of preference is 85% Extraction, that is sifted flour with 15% bran added. To be honest, I don’t know if this is the correct use of the phrase “85% Extraction” but […]

Crossed Wires

Monday morning – new week. Step boldly forward to test sieves in light of new information – see previous post. Ignore the diameters, that’s just a red herring. The sieve on the left is 60 mesh, the one on the right is 80 – we now know that 60 mesh has bigger holes than the […]

Another Fine mesh…

I must have been off school when they did mesh in maths class. I didn’t even know that mesh, as a measurement existed. I’m trying, in my old age, to learn about grain and home milling and sieving flour. I’ve been baking, both amateur and for sale, for 30 years but when you get into […]

4 Doughs in Day!

In the old days, when we were baking for sale, we always mixed eight different doughs – Campagne (which also did for the baguettes), Classic, Wholemeal, 5 Seed with Spelt, Multigrain, a Special, a Special Rye and a Special Flatbread (usually some variety of focaccia.) – the 3 specials changed every week. Couple of days […]

Patatas Bravas Pizza

Peter Reinhart said that if you want to create a new pizza, base it on food that you already like in another context (like his spaghetti & meatball pizza). Last week we went to London to see the great afrobeat band Antibalas. Had to stay overnight so took the opportunity to have lunch in Moro, […]

Roman Remains

Continuing from the previous post where you will find the formula: Following day used the rest of the dough (about 570g) to make a focacccia. Ignore the cheese cubes on the top – wrong sort of cheese – didn’t melt but nice crunch … About 2½ hours prove. 20 minutes in the Pico at 250C […]

Another Roman

After a couple of weeks in France, it’s back to the grindstone with the first pizza for a long time. My adaptation of Marc Vetri’s (I think) Mixed Wheat Roman Style: As you will notice, the table shows the weights for 1K of dough. I used 400g for this double pizza so you might need […]

A Crown For Charlie Boy

You might have noticed we are having a coronation here in the UK in the morning. We don’t get any choice in the matter – we are not citizens here, we are subjects of the Crown. Anyway, I didn’t think the occasion worthy of a new creation, but here are a few items from the […]

Whey Hey!

You’ll have seen a couple of weeks ago I did a wheat tortilla recipe based on whey – except I didn’t have any and used yoghurt instead to good effect. But I thought I should beg some from Carrie Rimes whose dairy is only 10 minutes walk away (Cosyn Cymru) and has the added cachet […]

Bracidèla

I’ve been a Facebook Friend of Luisa Jane Rusconi for several years and have found her a good source of ideas for theft. Not sure how she would describe herself but probably Swiss/Italian and as such has access to traditions and cultures beyond my own limited sphere. When I responded to a photo she posted […]