First bread of 2018

While in my parents’ place I baked many pompes a l’huile for Christmas, but I didn’t bake any bread. There are a few nice organic bread shops and bakeries around. But now that we are back to Isumi, it was mandatory to bake some bread. I started this year with a very simple bread: rye and whole wheat, with a handful of flaxseeds. And since the house is rather cold, I kept the bread all night in the room with us for it to rise, and only baked it much later. It has risen very slowly but the result was a very soft yet dense bread. With jam, honey, butter, or whatever, it’s delicious for breakfast. And it goes together with the book I am reading about Roland Feuillas, a guy who has been working for the last 12 years in making bread with traditional wheats grown traditionaly too. This reading has revived in me this idea that I should grow my own sourdough, but I still don’t know how to manage the trips between Isumi and Tokyo every weekends, and the longer one abroad  and to keep it alive properly… If you have some experience in raising sourdough I’ll be happy to learn from you!!!

Little breads for breakfast

There is nothing as such as a good breakfast, prepared just in time and served just when it’s done. In particular, I can’t help but love bread that is just out from the oven, with a good cup of a hot drink and a fresh fruit (from the garden any time it’s possible). It makes the perfect start. Of course baking requires a bit of organization and time but in the end it’s not so difficult and incomparable with anything else you can buy the day before!

As you may have noticed I bske pretty much anything. Even if I am not master in making croissants yet and naad to work on that, I start to be pretty confident on making rye and whole wheat breads. So here is an other variation of the basic recipe, where I mixed 250g of flour: half rye and half whole wheat flours, 120g of water, 14g of sourdough, 3g of yeast, 6g of salt, knead until soft and smooth, then added dry raisins and chocolate chips in part of the dough only. Waited until it has almost doubled, then shaped it and leave all night in a cool place. Before going to bed I scedule a delayed start of the oven so that In the morning I just have to bake them for 10-12min and breakfast is ready!!! Have a nice weekend!

First bread of the year

When we left Japan in December it was still the end of autumn, in our garden the Japanese mapple trees were all red, the gingko had just lost all its leaves, the camelias were starting to bloom. 15 days later, the mapple leaves have all fallen, at first sight only the camelias haven’t changed, but with a closer look, the daffodils are blooming, the magnolias  and the plum trees are full of buds already big, and the garden is metamorphosing slowly towards spring. From now on it’s going to be the coldest days, but the garden needs a lot of attention to get ready for spring: tree treaming, weed removing, cutting, grooming, planting… So we spend a lot of time outside in the cold, and there’s nothing better to start such days with a warm energizing rustic bread for breakfast. My recipe is simple: 50g of rye flour, 200g of white flour, 170g of water, 14g of sordough, 4g of natural dry yeast, 6g of salt. 20min cooking at 230deg, plus 5min in the oven cooling down. Perfect with jam, honey, butter or whatever pleases you!!!

Baking bread again!

I’ve the impression that I haven’t baked bread too often recently, and I was happy to kneal again this weekend. Because I wanted both a bread for breakfast and to accompany our lunch I decided to prepare a half-half rye-white flour. I ise now a pretty simple and standard procedure for my bread: 250g of flour (whatever you like or mix), 14g of dry sourdough, 3g of natural yeast, 6g of salt, 150g of water. Though my bread don’t have giant bubbles forming, probably of a too low temperature, I love them for the delicious taste, the crunchy and soft combination, and the smell in the house!

My first original recipe for bread

It’s been some time now that I’m baking bread following thoroughly recipes from books, but this time I felt like I can change that and start thinking about my own mix and recipes without opening a book.  once you’ve learned the basic proportions and you know what kind of texture you need to achieve after kneading it’s not difficult at all.

So my first original recipe is a warming whole wheat and rye bread. I used 160g of rye flour, 90g of whole wheat flour, 180g of water, 12g of sourdough, 5g of salt, 3g of yeast, knead until smooth and soft. After the dough has taken enough volume I shaped it, leave again a few hours, and finally baked it at 235deg for 10min, then at 220deg for 20min.

Rye baguette

It’s been some time I haven’t posted a simple bread recipe. Not that I haven’t made any, on the contrary! But I made a lot of my classical breads: whole grains… Now that it’s becoming chilly it’s going to be difficult to control accurately the proving time. For this rye baguette for example the recommended proving time was 1h, but the house is now about 18-19deg so I had it prove for 5h. The result was perfect.

The basic ingredients are: 175g of rye flour, 75g of flour, 13g of dry sordough, 180g of water, 5g of salt, 2g of yeast. The process is just as usual. I shaped my bread as a baguette, but any shape can do. For the baking, 30min at 225deg.

More bread

I can’t stop making bread and trying new recipes each time. And each time being delighted by the result, yet the other day I bought some bread at Viron (the top place for me to buy bread in Tokyo) and I realized that I need much more practice to attain such a stability in the result.

Anyway, it just mean more fun! 

Here is a recipe of a delicious meslin bread.  For a large bread you need: 250g of flour, 250 of rye floor, 25g of sry sourdough, 2g of yeast, 10g of salt, 350g of warm water. As usual start by mixing well the ingredients, then stirr until soft. Wait for 90min, shape the bread, wait an other 90min. Spread flour on top of the bread and cut in a cross. Bake for 25min at 230C.

First bread of the year

About a year ago I’ve started to bake my own bread on week-ends. Not for being snobbish but because in Ohara there is no good bread, and there is nothing better than a homemade breakfast!

Using a lot Eric Kayser’s book on bread making in the past 12 months I really learned a lot and manage to make some good breads, brioches, etc…

In 2015 I’m well decided to continue and learn more.

So here are my first two breads in 2015:

Rye bread and Orange bread.

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