Another sourdough experiment gone right. I know, I know, I’ve been going a little overboard with the bread-baking these past few weeks, but soon it will be summer and I won’t want to bake bread nearly as often. Anyway, this is a traditional German Bauernbrot — German-style Farmer’s Bread. It’s a combination of rye, whole wheat and high-gluten bread flour, and a wee combination of some typical bread spices: caraway and fennel seeds, a bit of ground anise and coriander. None of those spices on their own are my favorites, but put together, they do taste like traditional bread. And the loaf turned out fairly pretty so I am happy. Yay!
Monthly Archives
May 2021
I’ve had a song stuck in my head for a day now. Do you like Piña Coladas? Getting caught in the rain…. Yup, all because of these here Pineapple Coconut Crumble Bars, I have been humming those two lines of The Piña Colada Song (mainly because I only know those two lines 🙂 ). It turned unexpectedly tropical this weekend in Greater Boston, so it was more or less appropriate eh?
And here is something different: have you ever tried *sweet* Focaccia? Normally it’s savory, with rosemary or garlic or olives or just as a rustic accompaniment to Italian food, but I decided to make some with honey, oranges and hazelnuts. Wow! Simply phenomenal. I could see this along side a salad for brunch or even as a breakfast bread. It’s bursting with flavor, light, sweet and delicious. And it was another excuse to experiment with my sourdough.
Plain ol’ boring white bread: Country White Sourdough Loaf
OK, so it isn’t really that boring. It’s got a nice crust, an airy (though not much of an open structure) crumb and the taste is great, but I am still experimenting with the sourdough loaves. I prefer to make multigrains and mixes, but I suppose that I should get the standard breads down too. This bread did make a spectacular turkey, spinach and harvarti panini for dinner last night though.
This week, in my ingredient challenge game, we’re doing things with peppers and chilis and I remembered that I had a whole lot of Thai Bird Chilis dried from last summer, so I decided to make some chili oil. It’s pretty hot, so definitely designed as a finishing oil. It’s got a bit of sesame seeds and sesame oil in it as well. Spicy, but not blow your head off spicy!