gavinc's blog

I saw a picture of your Debra Wink’s 800-gram loaf in a 330 mm / 13 inch Pullman pan. It looked terrific, so I ordered the pan from the USA. It arrived this week, so today I baked using the pan and was very pleased, apart from a shaping mistake (I shaped as per a batard out of habit instead of a blunt cylinder). I’m learning with each iteration of this wonderful bread. It’s such a beautiful taste that it is now has a place in our weekly breadbasket. A nice light soft crumb.

Cheers,

Gavin

I was prompted to make a time lapse of my sourdough during the oven spring. This is the start of the bake condensed into 37 seconds. Sorry about the background reflection, but you’ll get the gist. They are 750-gram oval loaves, Vermont sourdough with 10% whole wheat.

You can view the video on my YouTube https://youtu.be/c90Yqi3gLBE

Cheers,

Gavin

This is a Hamelman’s recipe that I’ve baked a few times. It is 75% Whole-Spelt flour that I stone-milled the day before baking. The Pate Fermentee is made 14 hours before mixing. I love the taste of this bread as it is full flavoured and quite different from our everyday Vermont sourdough loaf.

I have a quest to improve the rise and softness of a 100% Whole-Wheat Sandwich Bread. This is the third time baking this and I have been tweaking the formula with each attempt. There has been a gradual improvement with each bake and this time I got a good rise, soft crumb, and wonderful flavour. Debra Wink has graciously given her advice and ideas given that it is her recipe in Hamelman’s 3rd Edition of Bread.

Today I baked Debra Winks 100% Whole-Wheat Sandwich Bread from Hamelman’s Bread Edition 3. I never thought that 100% whole-wheat would produce such a soft and pleasantly tasty sandwich loaf. I milled the whole wheat yesterday, but I’m not sure of the protein level as Debra recommends about 14% protein. Debra also recommended some recent changes to the formula and process tweaks for the home baker that I adopted.

I don't think I could fit in a third loaf. Two 750-gram loaves are my maximum per bake.

Cheers,

Gavin

My original post about making the dough loader is at DIY dough loading peel | The Fresh Loaf

I was urged to make a short video about using my DIY dough loader. This was made today, loading three baguettes onto the baking stone. You can check out the video on YouTube using the below link. 

https://youtu.be/ZxXpd8GcTho

Here is a picture of the finished bake:

I made these a while ago and thought to post them to my blog during our 4th COVID lockdown (bored). I learned how to make these during Chef Jacob Burton’s online culinary boot camp.  I learned the bun sizes for large, regular and slider buns.

155 g each for large (4.5 inch) buns - about 114 mm

100 g each for regular size (4 inch) buns - about 100 mm

55 g each for slider size (3 inch) buns - about 76 mm

A well-formed bun was baked using foil ring molds held together with a couple of staples.

This is my first attempt at baking Hamelman’s bagels. Dough made and shaped the night before, then refrigerated overnight, then boiled and baked early this morning. I also tested my DIY bagel boards. Hand-mixed, kneaded and shaped. The final shaping was to join the ends to seal the ring, however, my arthritic hands wouldn’t quite manage, but generally very pleased with the results. Tasted very nice and slightly chewy. Cream cheese at the ready!

This is my submission to the Community Bake - The No Comfort Zone Bake.

The write up is here: 

Community Bake - The No Comfort Zone Bake | The Fresh Loaf

Cheers,

Gavin