Retired, living in Western Mass. Enjoy music, cooking and my family.
Current cookers Weber Spirit 3 burner with a full insert griddle added. A 22" Kettle with vortex SnS and OnlyFire pizza oven. A Smokey Joe and the most recent addition a Pit Barrel Jr with bird hanger, 4 hooks and cover. ThermoWorks Smoke 2 probe, DOT, ThermoPops and a Thermapen MK4. 3 TempSpike wireless meat thermometers.
Nancy and I spent a good portion of the day baking. I made Everything Bread and she with me as her assistant, biscotti or as Jacob, our 5 yo grandson calls it, scotti. Some drizzled with chocolate. Really delicious.
The bread will be tasted tomorrow along with cream and lox with a side of eggs with either bacon or ham.
Three batches of Poolish to be made into dough and baked off in the next three days.
I’ve developed a pretty decent method for replicating the results from batch to batch. These little Cambro containers are so useful. I use them for mixing and fermenting the Poolish and the bulk fermentation of a 750g final dough.
> Weber Genesis EP-330
> Grilla Grills Original Grilla (OG) pellet smoker with Alpha/Connect
> Grilla Grills Pellet Pizza Oven
> Pit Barrel Cooker (gone to a new home)
> WeberQ 2000 (on "loan" to a relative (I'll never see it again))
> Old Smokey Electric (for chickens mostly - when it's too nasty out
to fiddle with a more capable cooker)
> Luhr Jensen Little Chief Electric - Top Loader circa 1990 (smoked fish & jerky)
> Thermoworks Smoke
> 3 Thermoworks Chef Alarms
> Thermoworks Thermapen One
> Thermoworks Thermapen Classic
> Thermoworks Thermopop
> Thermoworks IR-GUN-S
> Anova sous vide circulator
> Searzall torch
> BBQ Guru Rib Ring
> WÜSTHOF, Dalstrong, and Buck knives
> Paprika App on Mac and iOS
> Weber Genesis EP-330
> Grilla Grills Original Grilla (OG) pellet smoker with Alpha/Connect
> Grilla Grills Pellet Pizza Oven
> Pit Barrel Cooker (gone to a new home)
> WeberQ 2000 (on "loan" to a relative (I'll never see it again))
> Old Smokey Electric (for chickens mostly - when it's too nasty out
to fiddle with a more capable cooker)
> Luhr Jensen Little Chief Electric - Top Loader circa 1990 (smoked fish & jerky)
> Thermoworks Smoke
> 3 Thermoworks Chef Alarms
> Thermoworks Thermapen One
> Thermoworks Thermapen Classic
> Thermoworks Thermopop
> Thermoworks IR-GUN-S
> Anova sous vide circulator
> Searzall torch
> BBQ Guru Rib Ring
> WÜSTHOF, Dalstrong, and Buck knives
> Paprika App on Mac and iOS
For a first pass, not a bad approximation of New York style bagels at all.
Flavor (7/10) - I didn't have any non-diastatic malt powder on hand, so still missing that. Molasses and baking powder in the poaching water were spot on.
Texture (9/10) - That's a nice chewy bagel there ... although I might back off on boiling time with the next batch just for s##ts and giggles.
Finish (4/10) - I was so focussed on flavor and texture that I didn't bother with any lipstick-on-the-pig stuff ... like an egg wash to make it pretty. Maybe next time ...
WayneT I was so busy baking and getting them out the door to neighbors I just forgot to take any photos. I will definitely do so for next week’s loaves.
Today’s single loaf bake. One of my best loaves in terms of shaping and scoring.
Disaster barely averted: When I pour water in the steam pan, I lay a dish towel on the oven glass in case some water drips on it to avoid breakage. I forgot to remove the dang towel and closed up the oven. 10 minutes later, when I opened the oven, smoke billowed out and I was greeted with a smoldering towel. I’m fortunate this oven has the hidden heating elements or else I’d be posting pix of a house fire.
I made the poolish using AP flour but the final dough using bread flour for this loaf. I was experimenting with fermentation and proofing times compared to using AP flour for both the pre-ferment and the final dough. It took slightly longer for both the bulk ferment and proof which makes sense due to the higher protein content and stronger gluten structure. I used Bob's Red Mill Artisan Bread flour for this loaf which has a 12-14% protein content and is made from American grown red wheat. This one turned out quite well with a very dramatic ear.
The loaf on the left is today's bake and the right loaf yesterday's, using all AP flour. There's a few mm difference in the width but otherwise, they compare favorably. Later, I'll see just how 'chewy' the loaf from today is compared to the one from yesterday.
Despite my best, albeit unintentional, efforts to screw up this bake, it still turned out respectable.
The Poolish was on the edge of expiring. It went beyond my usual bulk fermentation time. It was slightly overproofed. I thought I totally bungled the scoring. The baking stone wasn’t up to temp. Just goes to prove (pun intended), dough is a very forgiving intermediate foodstuff.
And, alas, I noticed a sizable crack in my 10+ year old Fibrament D baking stone. It’s seen a lot of bakes and served me well. Time to start looking for a replacement.
Sorry to hear about the crack. Lot’s of steels out there, I think I have a nerd steel, and I can look up my other. Although I only use my steel, as it has two holes on corners to help move it around, let’s set up that chat soon!
I dunno RonB and Richard Chrz , I’ve had such tremendous success with my Fibrament stone. Maybe I’ll get one of each and do my own personal experiment. I see the steel can withstand direct flames from a grill so maybe it will find permanent residence there.
Thank you, yes, lighting is definitely the issue there. And the middle ones are not that light either. They are all really as dark as the two on the right end.
This is one of my favorite breads to bake. I love how the bottom crust fries in the olive oil, turns a nice golden brown and becomes crunchy. The flavors are phenomenal. This is a Peter Reinhart rustic dough recipe found in BBA . I may experiment with Poolish focaccia next.
Took advantage of different opportunities, and applied a bit of new to it. Beautiful bake in the kitchen today. 2 of the 6 are going to two neighbors who snow blowed our driveway twice this week.
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