Sourdough Baguette, Attempt No. 1

My first run of making a sourdough baguette with out a baguette pan. After kneading the dough, I lightly rolled out two rolls and placed them on a parchment lined 1/4 tray, topped with plastic wrap and left it to rise. Mel told me that this bread, because of its size, would be more like a filone. Either way, it came out soft enough to eat as a sandwich. I love having sandwiches on baguettes or rolls, however often times, a french roll is the only thing soft enough to eat comfortably. My goal: create a sourdough baguette for sandiches that doesn't leave your mouth feeling like it chewed through 3 feet of stale bread. Awesome.

Mixed White-Wheat Serano Sourdough

I baked these sexy loafs this morning. Man they are beautiful! These beautiful loaves are made with white starter and whole wheat flour. I also added roasted serano peppers. Two new things I did with these loaves are that I am trying out distilled vinegar and I am going to start writing my bread recipes and taking note of height, texture and taste.

A few days ago I looked up red velvet cake recipes and used one from the food network. I thought it was strange that it called for distilled vinegar, not because I didn't have any (actually I had just ran out), but because it was vinegar in a cake. Later after I made cupcakes, Mel asked me what I put into them and distilled vinegar came up. Mel told me that distilled vinegar actually helps make things rise.

Whenever I make wheat sourdoughs, I put in a little vinegar in the mix, as I noticed that it helped to cut the "wheaty" taste. So now I'm trying distilled vinegar in the hopes that I can kill to birds with one stone. I have to say that it seems to be working. Starting with these to loaves, I going to on and mixed white-wheat kick and try to find the perfect amount of each ingredient to make the best bread.

The picture to the left is a sandwich I made for a snack earlier today. Last night I made cilantro hummus. Today I went shopping for lettuce and ham. All day I've been craving a sandwich with cilantro hummus. So this is what I came up with. Ham and cheese with cilantro hummus and jalepeno celery mayo on wheat bread. Yum! The thing about always making your own bread is that you're always craving a sandwich. I suppose there could be worse things!

Oh My! This jam that my aunt made is Soooooo Good. I don't really care for store bought and produced strawberry jam because there is too much sugar in it. It is too sweet. No beuno! This jam, is perfect. Not only is it mild on the sweet, but it is actually a litte tart.

Flaxseed Oil Sourdough

Last nigth I went out with Mel to meet with some friends and have some drinks. While we were saying our good-byes to Stephanie and Arturo, Stephanie started going on and on about my sourdough, basically making everybody's mouth water. I had been planning on making a loaf earlier in the day for Arturo since he is leaving tonight for China and he won't be back for a year. However I never got around to doing it. And after Stephanie mentioned it, how could I not make a loaf for Art, especially since he mentioned that bread is his most favorite thing in the world, that he would marry bread if he could. So last night around 2am I made a couple of loafs. The loaf pictured here is the one that I kept for our house. The other loaf was equally as beautiful. This is a plain sourdough with flaxseed oil. Lots of healthy stuff, probiotics and flaxseed oil's omegas...

Mel's Birthday Breakfast

This morning I made eggs for Mel, like most mornings. What I was really stoked about was my Aunt Susan's Strawberry Jam. I got a small jar of it just this past x-mas. I was saving it for cooking, like baking cookies with jam filling. I just couldn't wait anymore, though. I would describe this dish, Zuchini Salsa Eggs with Strawberry Jam on Whole Wheat Sourdough Toast. Last weekend Mel picked up some Smart Balance butter, which is pretty good and I guess better for you than regular butter. Its okay with me, just means I can put more on my bread, right? The bread combined with the but butter and jam were pretty much heavenly.

Whole Wheat Sourdough

I was going to blog about the breakfast I made today (breakfast seems to be coming around 1pm these days), however none of my pictures made it look appetizing, so nix that. I will tell you that it was a piece of this Whole Wheat Sourdough with white wine scrambled eggs on top, covered with a spicy butter tomato sauce.

Back to the bread. In the scheme of things, this particular whole wheat starter that I've been working with as of late, is number 2. This loaf (pictured above) is #3. I used white wine vinegar to cut the wheat favor to a tolerable level. It came out really good, in fact I ate 2 slices right out of the gate. For the next loaf, I will be aiming at a wetter dough. I am trying to replicate the airy-ness of the whole wheat sourdough that Trader Joe's sells. I believe if I can replicate this airy-ness and spongy-ness, I will have a commercially viable bread.

The bread pictured to the left here are another batch of Balsamic Sourdough. I will hopefully be selling one of these loafs to one of my neighbors and the other two will be given out as gifts. I think I'm going to start giving out the first loaf free and charge for the second, starting at $3 a loaf. I will continue to give out loaves as presents as well.

In other news, I've been thinking about applying for a business license and using some of my tax return to pay for it. Mel and I want to get a business license together and move forward to getting a vending license. With the combination of these two, we could branch out into offering more than just bread, for example perhaps running a taco cart, etc. Also, I would like to start advertising my bread on craigslist, but I don't want to start until I'm legit. Let me know what you think, below in the comments section.

Cinnamon Raisin French Toast with Pear Compote

Late last night I baked two loaves of bread. One was a Sweet Cinnamon Raisin Sourdough (pictured here) and a Whole Wheat Sourdough. Mel suggested the sweet sourdough be used to make French Toast. Once again I was off and running.

The pear compote was reduced in orange zest, lemon juice and a splash of apple cider vinegar, as well as sugar and water. I should have reduced the pear down more, until they were really tender. Sometimes when you start cooking breakfast at 2:30 in the afternoon, things go haywire, cause your hungry and impatient, as was the case here. Next time I would ease up on the orange zest, use either the lemon or apple cider and reduce the pear until I had both a syrup and some tender chunks. Stay tuned for the next attempt. Oh yeah, even though I was impatient this breakfast dish was soooooo good, Mel and I thought we were having dessert for breakfast. Bad Monkeys!

The "M" Loaf

After taking a second look at my Aunt's Blog, I've decided that it was finally time to start my own blog, Sourdough Living. I baked this loaf last night, I call it the "M" Loaf. This morning I made sausage and egg sandwiches for Mel and her mom, with this bread. Just a few minutes ago I ate the heel with some chicken salad. Great!