variables.

so; last week was missing a bread post. and the reason for that is because last week i spent the earlier half of the week either drunk or hungover, due to visiting ed in our country's fair capital (christened by me as Everything Everywhere in some vague conversational sarcastic moment when i was delineating the difference in our living situations, or something. don't ask). well, that and my previous efforts had exhausted 3kg of bread flour, and consequently i had to make a tactical decision on how to vary my endeavours; stick with technique perfection and vary the flour variety? or perhaps try a new technique? i decided, in the end, to stick with the basic technique i have been working with from the river cottage bread handbook, and change up the flour. the reason i went for this decision is because (and this blog is increasingly highlighting this for me, although it's a personality trait i've been somewhat aware of all my life), i do not feel yet that i have achieved a level of skill in the basics that is adequate for me to say i am good enough at it. now i'm just gonna throw the word perfectionist in there, and leave you all to draw your own conclusions. it may also shed light on why every university essay i ever wrote was on books i had already read repeatedly, and why i immediately gave up on things that caused me any great frustration during the learning process in my youth (we're talking guitar and violin lessons, maths homework, the usual suspects here). i have developed a technique of playing almost exclusively to my strengths that helps to shape the way people see me as a person, which isn't news to me, but the fact it's mirrored so strongly in my cooking? that really is.

so anyway, i decided, in keeping with my approach, to go as basic in my variation as to simply try my hand at brown bread, instead of white. there was only one change in the basic recipe suggested for this, and that is that the fat you use should be melted unsalted butter, not oil. it seems counterintuitive to use a gentler fat with a more robust grain on many levels, but brown flour has such a strong, malty character that you need something gentle to soften it.

as per my last batch i took process pictures. it's unfortunate that i don't have anybody else around during the day to help me, i would actually really like to get pictures of things like the shaping process as it's fairly technical and better described pictorially, but obviously my hands are busy, so i can only show you the passive stages of the process, when the yeasts and glutens need to be left to their own devices.

so here is my dough once kneaded. i found a couple of key differences with brown flour. one is that it needs more water than the ratio of 1kg flour = 600ml water to come together properly, but i expected that. i played it by eye so i couldn't tell you how much, but it was somewhere between 50-100ml. the other significant difference is that initially the dough is much more difficult to work with. not just on a resistance level, which, again, i expected, but in terms of the flour being rougher, making it more difficult to see the glutens forming and stretching. you have to work a lot more by feel until they get a bit more well-developed.

and this is my risen dough. i do exactly as the book tells me, popping a carrier bag over the bowl to provide an airtight environment for the bread to rise in, although i have also discovered something which i think gives the bread an extra kickstart, almost by accident. you can plainly see i am using the same bowl i mixed the dough in, right? the more awake among you might have spotted it gets used for almost everything i do; it was the bowl my mother and i used to use when she baked with me when i was little, the only real kitchen experience i had before university. i have a tendency to get attached to things that have absorbed stories, see for reference the fact that when my great grandmother died all i wanted were a few pieces of kitschy seventies china that had long since outlived the set they came in, that i remembered from when i was little. part of it is the literature student in me; i like to surround myself with narrative. anyway, ahem, i digress. obviously in the initial mixing process, the bowl gets all doughy and whatnot, so you have to wash it if you want to reuse it. and i might have mentioned that waitressing and handling glasswasher-fresh glassware have blessed me with asbestos hands? so i wash it in savagely hot water. the earthenware bowl then retains the heat, and gives that extra boost your rising process needs in a february kitchen. that's a lot of tangents for a tiny bit of accidental science i found, right? right.


proving loaf number one, relying purely on belief and a teatowel. what a little trooper. i did have some cotton proving cloths i sewed myself, but i'm not actually sure where i put them, so interdisciplinary bragging will have to wait for another day.

proving loaves number two and three, happy in the support of loaf tins and teatowels. they may have privilege, but i expect all the more from them for it when it comes to crunch time.


LOOK! i am so proud of this batch it's not even funny. again, insta-text to ed about it, who in an understatement of the century said i seem to have an 'affinity' with my bread. call it more like the heart-burning joy i used to get from getting firsts in essays, or acceptance letters, or whatever it was i used to burn myself out for months for. just without the soul destroying low the day after when i realized it wasn't enough. it's really that major a feeling, bringing these little babies out of the oven and thinking 'i did that from beginning to end'. i might sound crazy, but i get a lot of satisfaction from seeing something i have created entirely by myself turn out so beautifully. the little one in back is the freeform proved one, and the one in front is one from the proving baskets.

although, every family has to have its black sheep. this one was baked on the floor of my top oven, to try and get a stonebaked base going on. which totally worked, but as you can see it has tried to exit its' own skin via the slashes. it tasted perfect, and was the first one to get eaten, but it just didn't have the good looks and grace of the other two. i can only think that the heat on the base caused more oven spring in the initial rise so i should have slashed both more, and more horizontally.

still, overall i'm happy with the improvements i'm seeing, and every time i do this i learn more lessons about the process. the bread itself tasted incredible; i actually prefer brown bread anyway but this stuff was glorious, i used it, still warm to mop up the juices from a mixed mushroom pan fry i made out of laziness that was heavy on garlic and butter, and it was so good. fully cooled i've been eating it a lot with brie and honey, cos its flavour profile is a long the lines of oated things; it straddles the line between sweet and savoury, not piling its lot in with either, and therefore working majestically with both.