MESSY BAKER

This bread was a bit of an experiment, it’s the first time I baked this recipe, but it turned out such a success that I will definitely be baking it again! It is bursting with flavour – super seeds mix for the extra goodness and a touch of sweetness from the dried fruit.   Makes 2 medium sized loaves (tin loaves) Dough : 250g rye starter (100%) 320g (+30g) lukewarm water 330g white bread flour 100g rye flour 50g roastedbarley malt 10g salt Seeds porridge : 100g sunflower seeds 50g linseeds 50g pumpkin seeds 50g dried fruit (raising, currants or cranberries) 100g warm water   Prepare the porridge : toast sunflower seeds and linseeds in a preheated oven (180C) for 6-8 minutes. Combine with the rest of the seeds and fruit and add water. Leave for an hour until the water is absorbed.   Dough : Mix all flours, including roasted barley malt, with starter and 320g of water. Mix well to make sure that all the water has been incorporated and all the flour is mixed in. Leave ...

Month three of my Bread-o-lution project, and to be perfectly honest I am finding it a bit hard to keep it up. Partly due to quite difficult breads I have chosen and partly due to, well, being a working mum. I have also started a parenting (read ranting) blog which is taking some of my time as well.  So, this month’s project is pumpernickel – this is not new new recipe for me, as I have tried it twice before, but just wasn’t happy with the results.   I made my very first pumpernickel following Nancy Silverton’s recipe – it turned out way too dry, and with very gummy feel to it – most of it ended up in a bin :(  The second attempt was made following Andrew Whitley recipe from “Bread Matters”, and even though the result was edible, it wasn’t quite what I was after – the bread was too light, not enough salt in it and it went all moldy only two days after I baked it.  This time I was determined to do it right and spent most of the month doing the research. ...

I need to get on with researching my February project for my Bread-o-lution, but that would require a bit of digging for the right kind of a recipe. Meanwhile I was running out of bread and stumbled upon a box of sesame seeds in my kitchen – literally, it fell out of a cupboard on top of me :) I am a bit fan of sesame seeds – who can resist a golden bun with tiny amber sesame drops on top? I always imagine sesame breads to be soft and fluffy, with slightly sweet taste. I was imagining it so much, I started drooling – before long I decided to create a recipe that combines all of my memories of a perfect sesame loaf.  Sesame  Sourdough Loaf  200g 100% white sourdough starter   400g white bread flour  100g wholemeal flour  290g mineral water  20g honey  20g sesame seeds  1 heaped tsp salt  20g unsalted butter, room temperature  Sesame seeds for sprinkling (optional)   My wonderful shiny Kitchen Aid has had...

Its that time of the year when we start making up plans for the future and write down New Year resolutions. I am pretty bad with sticking to any resolutions, and in fact I’ve given up even making any for a number of years. This year I’ve decided to share my New Year resolution with all you lovely people, so if I start straying from the path you can yank me back on the straight and narrow. So, the plan is to bake a new bread every month – something traditional – from as many countries as possible, something familiar and a bit unusual at the same time, something I haven’t baked before.< Here is the plan, but I reserve the right to change it as I please :) Please, join me in my baking – I would love to see your photos January - English Cottage Bread . This is a good old traditional recipe, and I really like the fun shape of it. A nice and easy recipe to start the year. February - Pain de Campagne . Again, a very traditional French bread – I’ve read a recipe for that pain de ch...

I have been a bit quite of late, due to a number of things, but mainly down to two small babies to run after and a lot of DIY work at home. I am blaming DIY for the murder of my starter – the number of times I have forgot to refresh it cause I fell asleep from physical exhaustion! Warm weather and a tired baker does not bode well, I tell you that! I still have some mother starter in the fridge, so not all is lost. However I decided to take a break from sourdough breads an started looking to a quick and easy every day loaf recipe that I can do in a couple of hours in-between looking after babies and house work. I came across “ John Whaite Bakes at Home ” book and I found loaf perfection!!   John is the winner of The Great British Bake Off a couple of years back and I have been following him and his recipes for a while. I was super happy when Mr Ranty bought me John’s book as a present – its a beautiful book to look at, nice layout and tempting photos, also John’s writing style i...

I had every intension to bake a Multigrain Bread, following Nancy Silverton’s recipe. Got a gook out, read all the ingredients, drafted a timeline to suit my weekend and the recipe and …. ended up baking two completely different loaves – all made up recipes too. What is it they say about best laid plans? When I did ask Mr Ranty what I should bake, he mentioned a sandwich he buys from EAT that uses some of brown malty bread with poppy seeds in it. That sounded like an interesting idea, so I decided to give that a go. Bake bread to match something I’ve never seen and never tasted – if that’s not a challenge, I don’t know what is Malty Poppy Seed Bread 118g white starter (100% hydration) 25g barley malt 25g molasses 90g milk 200g water 400g white flour 100g rye flour 1 ½ tsp salt 3 Tbsp poppy seeds Place starter, water and milk in a free-standing mixer. Add barley malt and molasses into the mixing bowl – you can probably just chuck all the ingredients together, but I w...

Another weekend, another day to try things out. I've made my fruity loaf last week, and it was gone, in like, four days. I ran out of bread in the house - had to buy some shop stuff - shock, horror!! Reminded me how much I hate the shop-bought stuff. To make sure that I don't have to do anything as awful as buying bread for a shop again, I've decided to make two loaves this morning. I was drinking my morning glass of OJ this mornings, and decided that would make a great inspiration for a loaf of bread, something sweet for a morning toast. I’ve ended up adding some whiskey to bread as well to make it a bit more interesting, but it wasn’t cause I was necking whiskey first thing in the morning, just thought orange and whiskey would go well together. Orange Whiskey Loaf 150g white starter (100% hydration) 100g orange juice 180g water 30g whiskey 400g white flour 50g wholemeal flour 90g rye flour 4 Tbsp orange jam or marmalade 50g unsalted butter, softened 1 ½ tsp salt We’ve tri...

My rye starter is looking nice and healthy, its time to test it out. Was only going to try making one rye bread, but looks like I’ve got a lot of starter – much more than the recipe requires, means that I can try out two different recipes – yay!! First one is “Seeded Rye” from “ Bread Matters ” by Andrew Whitley and second one is “ MiniOven favourite 100% rye ” from TheFreshLoaf website. First one, hmmmm, I think I’ve messed something up already. I’ve been feeding my rye starter 1:1 ration (by weight), keeping it at a 100% starter. The book’s sour rye is kept at 200%, with 2 parts water to 1 part flour. The recipe asks for 160 g of sour rye, so, I’ve figure, I could just use my starter and adjust the recipe to fit it. I meant to reduce the amount of flour, but somehow ended up reducing amount of water – muppet!! Tried mixing it all in my mixer, and got something that looks like a crumble topping instead of a dough. More water, hard to tell exactly how much, trying to achieve “a very s...