Cooking with Jonny69: baking bread.

You could also get some buttermilk and make soda bread - excellent made with half wholemeal and half white. Very versatile bread. This recipe is pretty much identical to mine and is delicious. Dead easy to make too :)

Stan's tip: The recipe says "Score the dough with a deep cross dividing it into quarters.". When it says deep, it means deep - almost all the way through, stop your cut about 1/2" from the bottom. Also, I do a double cross, i.e. divide into 8 but that's just personal preference.
 
Scam said:
Bump! I've been meaning to post in this thread for a while. I'm looking to try baking bread for the first time. Are there any decent recipes/guides out there (or in here!) for a simple wholemeal loaf to get me started?
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If you are just starting out, I'd highly recommend How to Bake by Paul Hollywood. I have it and it is very good at explaining what you need to do and why you need to do it. There are some really good recipes for bread, buns and pastries, and if you follow them through then you'll be making some lovely bread in no time at all.
I find that with so many different recipes on the Internet all with differing methods and ingredients, having this book with pretty much the same method running all the way through makes it is much easier understand what makes each bread different. It also means that if you make changes to the ingredients, you'll have a good idea on what those changes are going to do to the bread.
 
I've just gone to make a loaf, and i grabbed the self raising instead of bread flour. I didn't notice till i was going to make pizza bases, so the bread is sitting in a tin rising. Dose anyone know what is going to happen? is it going to be edible, or should i just chuck it and start from scratch?

Help me
 
cobrax said:
I've just gone to make a loaf, and i grabbed the self raising instead of bread flour. I didn't notice till i was going to make pizza bases, so the bread is sitting in a tin rising. Dose anyone know what is going to happen? is it going to be edible, or should i just chuck it and start from scratch?

Help me
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It will be fine for pizza base, it will collapse and not taste to great but will be edible!
 
cobrax said:
I've just gone to make a loaf, and i grabbed the self raising instead of bread flour. I didn't notice till i was going to make pizza bases, so the bread is sitting in a tin rising. Dose anyone know what is going to happen? is it going to be edible, or should i just chuck it and start from scratch?

Help me
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Was BigBoy right? I'm not much help but thought I'd add that I made pizza bases last night too. They may take a couple of hours but they are so much nicer than shop bought.

Also recently made some Brioche rolls. They were sweet and soft and full of buttery goodness :).
I've also branched out into pastry making now. Having made the Key Lime Pie from this years Great British Bake Off, this weekend it is chocolate and pecan pie, with homemade vanilla and butterscotch ice cream :).
 
Best thread (and bread) ever!

I've always assumed it was hard to make bread, but I read this thread the other day and was inspired. In 3 days I've made 5 loaves of white bread, 3 loaves of pide, 2 kind of french stick things. Every single one is AWESOME. Thank you all for the hints in this thread... I think I'm going to become a regular bread maker :-) It just tastes so good compared to the store bought stuff.

Someone should make this thread a sticky for sure.

Edit: I'm not using a breadmaker or mixer... doing it all by hand (it doesn't take long). Even though I'm a novice I think I'm starting to get a "feel" for how the dough should feel... kind of hard to explain, but I think this will help me improve.
 
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All right, a few loaves later, I have baked something that isn't a dense, doughy mess (though the crust is a little well-done).

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Used the ingredients from Jonny's OP, but this time I didn't do the second rise; just finished kneading, left it on the tray and let it rise there before popping it into the oven. This is much lighter and tasty than the previous ones I've done, which leads me to believe that I need to leave the loaf to prove for much longer before putting it into the oven when using the method posted.

The last time I baked a loaf, I left it for around 90 minutes in a warm, humid kitchen but it didn't rise much. Is this a time issue or the yeast I'm using? I've got a tin of the Allinsons Easy Bake Yeast.
 
I've currently got a sourdough starter on the go in a big jar. I cheated a bit and didn't wait for the natural yeast to find its way in; instead I used a splash of the dregs out my cider barrel so it's firing away on natural apple yeast. Have been feeding it with the odd tablespoon of flour and water. It's... lively :D
 
Jonny69 said:
I've currently got a sourdough starter on the go in a big jar. I cheated a bit and didn't wait for the natural yeast to find its way in; instead I used a splash of the dregs out my cider barrel so it's firing away on natural apple yeast. Have been feeding it with the odd tablespoon of flour and water. It's... lively :D
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Keep us updated. I'm definitely getting a sourdough starter going at some point this year, I keep putting it off but I've got to do it!
For last couple of months I've been baking baguettes for my lunch, but today I have ale and oat Rye bread for lunch :).
 
Well so far not so good :p

Working from home today. I got some dough proving over lunchtime and it's... well I don't really know what it's done. It was quite a dry dough when I started proving about an hour and a half ago, it hasn't really risen much but it's become very wet and sticky like chewing gum. Almost bordering on cake batter. Got that sour yeasty smell of the starter. It's like the yeast has broken down the structure of the dough :confused:

I've kneaded in a load more flour to dry it out and it's on for a second rise. It was a dough with 300g flour and it needed 3 handfuls of flour to bring it back to a bread dough consistency. Not expecting it to taste great now, but I can work on that next time.

Is this why sourdough loaves are typically proved in those wide proving baskets with a LOT of flour and tipped out to bake? I've tried to emulate something similar in my mixing bowl.
 
Not looking too promising at the moment, pre-bake :p

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^ nom nom
I love ciabatta so hard to get the big bubbles like the pros.
godinman said:
They're awesome, just use scissors to make the spines. Rolls came out very well, singed (I cannot spell that work) the hedgehogs slightly, the others I did fine however and the taste and texture is spot on. :)

Reckon I might start making my own bread a bit more regularly, what I want it a machine that will automatically mix, kneed and prove the bread and then let me cook it in my oven..
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get a bread maker then :P
they make dough as well, panasonic ones are best.

or get a mixer with dough hooks
 
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Just baked a sandwich loaf for the week, came out well.

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Comes out with a nice close crumb for sandwiches like the below from a previous loaf (although that was a baton that split - semi disaster :)):

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Recipe is 7g yeast, 500g flour, 10g salt, 330ml milk, 20g unsalted butter, 15g golden syrup. After the second rise, it also gets brushed with milk before going in the oven to keep the crust soft. I go for 250c pre-warm then bake for 5 mins before dropping to 210c for 25-30 mins (or internal temp being about 95c).

I've also been experimenting with my sourdough, had good results with a 70% hydration loaf but anything higher has caused me massive shaping issues and quite a flat loaf. Also the open texture of the bread makes it pretty difficult to consume for everything apart from dipping so think I'll keep doing what works.
 
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Jonny69 said:
I've currently got a sourdough starter on the go in a big jar. I cheated a bit and didn't wait for the natural yeast to find its way in; instead I used a splash of the dregs out my cider barrel so it's firing away on natural apple yeast. Have been feeding it with the odd tablespoon of flour and water. It's... lively :D
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I just mixed some pineapple juice and flour :D in a jar it goes. (the pineapple juice stops the bad bacteria trying to take hold before the yeast apparently)

I might try fermenting some fruit in a jar too as it sounds pretty cool for parties
 
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