On Monday night I made the sponge. Instead of 341 grams of flour, I used 300 gms of flour and 47.6 grams of a mixture of fine bran and wheat germ. I reduced the water slightly, to 355 gms instead of 405. The honey I used is low-grade quality, but it's all I have right now.
The blanket was 298 gms flour and 15 gms fine bran and wheat germ (instead of 311 gms flour). I had some extra yeast, so I put in an extra 0.3 gms.
In the morning I added the 15 gms salt and 128 gms of soft unsalted butter. I mixed it with the wooden spoon for a while, then finally with my hand. I kneaded the wet sticky mess for as long as I dared, a few minutes anyway (Rose says five minutes in the bowl), then dumped it out on the dusted bread board. I covered it with the inverted bowl and let it rest for 20 minutes.
Next I kneaded it very gently for just a few minutes. I then washed out the bowl and greased it. The dough went into the bowl, which I greased with soft butter. I patted a thin layer of oil on the top, as I patted it down flat. I covered it with saran wrap and put it in a plastic storage tub, so the cats wouldn't be tempted.
Without breakfast, I grabbed my bus pass and headed out to collect my ebike. I had brought it to the shop where I'd bought it, to get the headlamp working. He had sold it to me too quickly, hadn't quite finished all the repairs to it.
Yesterday, on the way to delivering the bike, I stopped at the restaurant equipment store behind the honeycomb swimming pool building, for another bread pan. I wound up buying a long loaf pan, and another 500 gm pan slightly shorter and longer. Both are Teflon. I was spooked by my recent experience of a stuck loaf. I looked for muffin pans, but they had only very shallow ones. I saw cute little tiny loaf pans, I thought I could use them for muffins. I bought 4 of them and one six-cup muffin tin. Spent 148 rmb altogether.
Did I mention the blender? I've been salivating for a blender. With that I could pick up odd grains at the supermarket and grind them, and add them to doughs. I also wanted to start experimenting with frozen yogurt smoothies, of which Blake has been raving. The cheapest ones I'd seen at the local appliance stores was just under 300 rmb, and seemed plasticky and cheaply done, though they had a lot of attachments. I went online to Taobao and found one for 128 rmb. It arrived. It has a large thick glass pitcher, the motor casing looks like it holds a powerful engine, and it also has the smaller cup and blade for grinding beans.
This time the first rise was almost a full two hours before the finger-press test was successful. I took it from the bowl and held it in the air. I let it ooze down, stretch itself out. I ever so gently pushed it to a square on the board. The texture was rough with all the bran; lovely. I was careful not to damage the air pockets. I folded each side in towards the center, then returned it to the bowl. The next rise took about 1 1/2 hours. I shaped it into a long loaf, and put it in the one long pan. It seemed to come up the side just about 1/4 of the way. I let it rise with the cover 3/4 closed, on the sunny ledge of the balcony. After an hour it had doubled. It looked ready, though I thought it looked small. I closed the lid and put it in the preheated oven at 190 degrees C. I forgot the ice cubes, at first; added them later. I had the solid pan set in the lowest slots, less than an inch from the bottom heating rods.
After 40 minutes of baking I removed the lid, turned off the top burner, and reduced the heat to 180 C. (the recommended baking temperature). Ten minutes later I removed it from the oven. It slipped out of the pan easily. I used the oven rack to cool it, as I haven't yet found cooling racks.
The bottom of brown, one little spot was dark brown but not quite burnt. The top looked quite lovely toast brown.
I had invited Lori over to celebrate the new loaf. The loaf had cooled over an hour, so I sliced up the whole loaf and divided into about six slices each group. Maybe two dozen slices altogether, maybe more. I set the end crust and few slices on a plate for when Lori arrived.
She called to say she was on the bus just then. I still had one more task to complete before my 'weekend' break was over. So I quickly shampooed my hair and set to with scissors, to trim off an inch on the top and sides.
By the time she arrived I had moussed and blown it dry.
Ah, the loaf. You want to know how it turned out. Lori brought a bottle of Cava pink bubbly. She said she felt like new beginnings were in the air and were to be celebrated.
We dove into the bread, slavering it with soft unsalted butter. The smell was fragrant with aromatics of almond and sweet healthy smells. The crumb was excellent. It was firm, yet airy. It was an explosion of tastes on the tongue. Realizing that we were eating bread and drinking wine on empty stomachs, I pulled out some cheese and olives. But by then our bread allotment was done! I still had some of Sundays bread, so I sliced and toasted the last of that. Yes, it was good, but it couldn't hold a candle to this lighter-than-air heavy whole grain bread.
My only regret is that I have to wait a whole week to do it again.
I sent Lori home with a packet of slices, to share with her colleagues, advertising this new product. I will bring a few slices to work today. I hope to get a packet to Oliver and Blake down at the CZU. The last packet I hope to send to my new Australian friend, Vicki, who lives a block away. Slowly building the business, one loaf at a time.
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