A little bit of everything bread

jotimaz and I apologize for not posting in such a long while, but grad school and a little bit of travel has kept us busy.

The sandwich loaf for this week has a little bit of everything in it – bread flour, dark and light rye flour, wheat flour, cornmeal and sourdough. It’s dense and aromatic. All the other flours negate the crumbly nature of the cornmeal so it stays together quite nicely. Unfortunately, our sourdough had alot of liquid in it so the loaf didn’t rise as high as it could have. No worries though – we just have a little bit smaller sandwiches. =)

Sunflower whole wheat sourdough bread

The bread for last week’s sandwiches was superb! Whole wheat sourdough is always a winner in my book, but throwing in sunflower seeds really was a nice touch. The whole loaf was moist and nutty…perfect for turkey sandwiches!

Pane bigio (grey bread)

jotimaz entered a new bread realm – making and using a two-week biga. Biga is a classic Italian starter and is much like a sourdough starter, but it’s used in classic country breads. It’s just a mixture of flour, water and yeast that ferments in the fridge, but it provides such an amazing flavor. You just add a chunk of the biga along with your other ingredients and off you go! This particular bread is called “grey bread” because the whole wheat flour and bran supposedly give it a grey tinge.

Wow! I wish I could have captured the aroma in the house while these beautiful loaves were baking. I can’t even describe how wonderful the flavor of this bread was. It was just yeasty and natural and lovely. The crust was to die for – jotimaz let me have the ends just so I could enjoy the flavor of the crust in its entirety. =)

If you’re up for some awesome country bread, I would definitely look into starting a biga. Be aware that the whole process is extended for almost an hour more because of some additional rising and baking time. It’s well worth it though!

Whole wheat herb bread

This week’s sandwich bread is delectable! It’s filled with a couple of different kinds of herbs which means it smells and tastes amazing. Plus it’s soft and has kept well, which is always a plus in my book. If you want a little bit of exciting flavor in your sandwich, I would definitely recommend this herb bread. =)

Graham bread

Have you ever used graham flour before? Holy mackeral – it is so fine and silty. It’s technically a whole wheat flour but it’s milled finer. Man oh man does it make a wonderful tasting loaf. It’s sweeter compared to its other flour counterparts and it definitely stayed moist for the week. Plus, it bakes up so beautiful and golden brown. =)