Wild Yeast

See this week’s yeast spottings …

The following open letter to Google may contain objectionable adult content. Reader discretion is advised.

Dear Google,

Thank you. You have lifted a veil from my eyes, and made me see what a truly loose woman I have apparently become.

When I discovered that not one, not two, but all of my photos are censored from Image Search with SafeSearch enabled, I admit I was baffled at first. All along I wanted this to be, and thought it was, a family blog. My mother reads it, and so do my kids. Now that I see, with your wise and perspicacious guidance, the lasciviousness I have so foolishly and publicly permitted myself to exhibit, I don’t know how I’ll be able to look them in the eye again. Never mind go to PTA meetings. And God help me if I ever decide to run for public office.

Like I said, I was baffled at first. But then, after a good night’s sleep (and I do mean sleep in the “not awake” sense, just to be clear), I sat down to take a look at my blog through fresh, objective eyes — through Google eyes, if you will — and I must say I was shocked at what I saw. The more I looked, the more lewdness I found. Oh, the shame!

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Meet my new mission in life: Horst Bandel’s Black Pumpernickel from Jeffrey Hamelman’s Bread. I made this for the first time over the weekend (yes, it took all weekend) and can verify reports that it is not a breeze. It wasn’t a disaster; I definitely have something edible, but it could be so much better. I’ve been bitten and I know it will keep after me until I get it right.

This is a heavy, dark, dense bread made from rye meal sourdough, soaked and cooked rye berries, cracked rye (which I substituted for unavailable rye chops), a small amount of high-gluten wheat flour, and an old bread soaker. It tastes fantastic. So what’s wrong with it? Two words: overhydrated and underbaked. Instead of being pleasantly moist like pumpernickel should be, mine could be called downright soggy.

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See this week’s yeast spottings …

Norwich Sourdough, which was My New Favorite Sourdough when I wrote about it last year, is still my number-one no-fail go-to bread. (In fact, I was thinking of renaming it Three-Compound-Adjective Sourdough.) It’s mildly sour and goes with just about everything.

For those times when a more assertive tang is the order of the day, this variation serves nicely. It’s essentially the Norwich sourdough formula but with 50% more rye flour and 33% more levain. Just as Norwich Sourdough is based on Jeffrey Hamelman’s Vermont Sourdough, this is adapted from Vermont Sourdough With Increased Whole Grain, both from the essential Bread: A Baker’s Book of Techniques and Recipes.

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Proofing bread in a basket gives support to an expanding loaf and helps it maintain its shape. When the basket is a brotform, it also imprints the crust with a beautiful spiral pattern that lends the finished loaf a rustic European flair.

A brotform (German for “bread mold” – see why we stick with the German name?) is a coiled cane basket that holds the shaped dough during its final proof. My brotforms (or brotformen, if you want to keep strictly to the German) are round and oval, but they also come in rectangular, square, triangular, and a variety of other shapes. A 7.5- or 8-inch diameter round brotform is a good size for up to a 1.5-pound loaf.

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