About
Welcome to my kitchen! If you love to bake bread or want to learn more about it, I hope you find something interesting or useful here, or have something to share with me.
What is Wild Yeast? One meaning is the yeast that makes sourdough, which I bake with often, but not exclusively. To me, though, baking with all kinds of of yeast, sourdough or not, is “wild:” outrageous, amazing, magical. Read more about why I bake.
I have been baking bread since I treated myself to a short artisan bread class on my birthday in 2006. (Why yes, that was my 29th birthday!) Since then I have been learning about baking from lots of sources: from classes at the wonderful San Francisco Baking Institute; from reading everything I can get my hands on, in print and online; from other home bakers at online communities such as The Fresh Loaf; and from my own trial and error.
I am currently a student in the professional bread and pastry program at SFBI.
When I’m not baking, I can be found working as a nurse practitioner in a community clinic, doing crossword puzzles, reading novels, and eagerly anticipating celebrating the next recent presidential election.
I live and bake in northern California.
Thank you for visiting Wild Yeast!
Susan
stumbled across the blog; currently in Japan visiting US Navy daughter and husband and their new-born daughter; will try to find Japanese bread, although we’re on an Air Force base in Misawa and thus surrounded by American things, Have been doing sourdough rye and ryeblends for a while, and while they’re tricky, they’re also rewarding.
cheers–
Alan
Alan, thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoy your time in Japan. A new granddaughter is just the best reason to be visiting — congratulations!
Yours is the best bread blog bar none.
I also avidly follow your posts on http://www.thefreshloaf.com
Subfuscpersona, I am honored, thank you.
Hi Susan,
Just stumbled upon your site. I think it’s nice that you have a blog dedicated to wild yeast. It’s the one that deserves the credit for giving the bread the rise and that special taste. Keep up the good work..from one fellow SFBI alumni to another SFBI alumni.
Doughman
Hi, Doughman! I’m glad you stumbled upon me and I hope you continue to enjoy my blog. Thanks for saying hello.
Interesting stuff, just was passing through while browsing and bookmarked your site waiting to see more bread!
Cheers
Jeremy
Jeremy, thanks for stopping by. I’m enjoying listening to the baker interviews on your site!
Hi, I found your signature on fresh loaf and you’ve done a great job!. I making semolina bread today as I volunteered to bake bread for six months for the winners of a silent auction to benefit homeless shelters. I want to commend you for putting on the book contest and encouraging people to donate to one of the worthy causes. Woods
hi, just found your site, it was wonderful to see someone who cares about the quality of the breads, as much as i do, i also went to sfbi, they are very good people there, i could tell by the way your breads looked, keep writing , i enjoy your site, thank you
Woods, what a generous donation!
Polly, thanks for the comment. I agree, SFBI is the best!
What a cool website! I just started to learn to bake bread this past fall after someone generously gave me a cup of sourdough starter, and I’ve really enjoyed it, but I have a lot to learn still. I might just add your blog to my regular reading list!
Hi Susan.
Thank you for your much needed info.
About a week ago or so, I stumbled in to your blog. I just read and read some more. I found myself came back again for seconds. In short I love the way you write.
But this weekend some thing wonderful happened.
I love to bake my usual authentic Ethiopian bread (Abesha dabo) with sourdough and a bit commercial yeast, of cours I use all barley flour and baked covered with banana leaves, that way I got the real abesha dabo falvour and down the memory lane.
So I started mixing things , and all of a sudden I started using some of the thechnics I read from your blog. It was not like I tried to remember it and applied it but it was in me and suddenly I knew what to do.
Was a really good feeling, of being confident in my baking experience.
Thanks again
Peace
Erin, I’m glad you stopped by and I’d love for you to become a regular reader. Good luck with your bread baking!
Watch, I’m really glad if I’ve been able to help. Thanks for sharing that with me.
Hi. I just moved to San Diego from Tokyo 2 months ago, and am already missing Japanese style pastry. I brought a bread machine which can make mochi. I will try your melon pan recipe! I am really impressed how they look. Yummy!! I will stop by again.
Hello Mayumi, welcome to California and to my blog! I will be interested to know what you think of the recipe.
Hi Susan, Great to finally see a face to match the superlative breads and outstanding formulas. I agree with subfuscpersona… best bread blog bar none. You’re the go-to girl when it comes to presentation, fermentation and inspiration!
Rock on,
David
Susan, thank you so much for your lovely comment on my blog. I am glad you left it because it traced me to yours, which I ABSOLUTELY LOVED! What a beautiful blog! Great recipes and pictures. I love baking bread, too (although only with a few recipes I know:) and I am sure I will turn to your blog a lot for inspiration and for great recipes! I am subscribing to your and adding you to my blogroll if you don’t mind!
Love your site and want to make your ciabatta recipe, wondering about conversions I am from US. Thanks.
Susan,
I love making my own bread, its become part of my rutine. I am so happy to found your website (through Astrid/lacerise).
Hi, Susan. Some people in Madrid, Spain, are starting a bread involved project (madridtienemiga.blogspot.com). Here we have no much tradition in home bread baking, so our information in spanish is a bit poor (like my english). I like your work, all your breads. I’ve traslated into spanish some of your recipes, and want to have your permission to use these translations on our blog, with my own photographs. Tk
Hi Susan,
Found your blog from foodgawker. I come from a place where bread is not a staple but merely a snack and most of the breads we eat are white, soft, and sweet or stuffed with something sweet. But I’ve been travelling to some places and found out about “other breads” and am amazed at how many bread varieties out there and there are people who are addicted to them. Well, I proclaim myself as bread addict since I found myself amazed by the sight of beautiful crusty and flour-y loaves (am I being too hyperbolic here?
) and loving the smell that comes out of them. And that’s for bakery or supermarket bread! I wonder how delicious and good-smelled they’d be if I made them myself. So I’ve been browsing through bread posts and very happy to find your blog. If I ever manage to overcome my fear of baking (since I’m not a skilled cook), I’ll try one of your recipes.
Meanwhile, keep the beautiful pictures coming!
I learned how to make natural or wild yeast and want to use it in my bread machine instead of using the active or instant yeast. Can it be done and how can we fine recipes for such. Perhaps there is a correlation from one packet of ADY (active dry yeast) to an amount of living natural yeast. Any help would be appreciated.
I love your website! I’ve been visiting for sometime now and I am NEVER disappointed. You are an inspiration. The building of the oven set me over the top; I haven’t been the same since.
I am happy to have found a site devoted to bread and specifically fermented or sour dough or wild yeasted breads. I have attempted numerous times to make bread in the old European way and have only had a hand full that were a success, I look forward to learning from you!
Susan, this is a beautiful site. I’ll be back! Thanks for stopping by my place. I’m honored.
why is your beautiful Roasted Garlic bread recipe with the parsley in terms this northern californian can’t read??? I have found looking up conversions has never been accurate??? Which conversion site do you use??? Having been born in SF it is a goal to re-create similar crispy crusts at my own table in my own kitchen…willing to try…
I am SO glad I found your website. I love to make bread, the old way, by hand. No breadmachine. I like to smell the yeast, form the dough, knead it, etc. It’s all so fabulously fun.
With my 2 sons gone to university now, I have to ‘give away’ my bread since my husband and I can’t eat it all.
Do you know how to make Calabrese bread? It’s here in our Italian grocery stores. I live in Northern Ontario, and my city, Sault Ste. Marie is about 60% Italian. No one will show me how!!
You have a great baking blog. I just read about you. Glad to hear that u’re doing Nursing. Can anyone can learn baking without joining baking institutes? I am not a good baker. You can visit my blog too. I love to learn more about baking.
Its a WOW
the best Baking Blog ever.
I learn something new every time I visit.
I wish you live close to me, or I am closer to you…
when you have the time pls visit the new blog I started around Christmas Time
http://www.phoeniciangourmet.blogspot.com
All the best . God bless your gifted hands.
Arlette
Dear Susan,
I am over the moon!I tried your sourdough starter recipe and at the end of the week my starter was doubling in ……3 and 1/2 hours!I’ve named her(er..my starter)’Malia’ in honour of the Obamas.I am a novice baker and I would like you to suggest a book which has simple whole grain recipes (especially sourdough ones) since I am totally confused by the plethora of bread baking books in the book store.Thanks a million.Your blog is simply awe inspiring!
Best Wishes,
Vimala
Hi Susan-
I really enjoy your recipies and your writing style!
After visiting the Epcot Center and enjoying some great veggie soup with a section of a cracker bread, which was used as a lid for the bowl, I decided that we needed to try duplicating it at home. I have tried a number of recipies and cooking methods downloaded from the net with a so-so result.
While your recipie may not match there’s, I can hardly wait to try it as it sounds and looks very yummie!
Hi all,
How do you steam in your wood burning oven. I really want to build one but would like to invent a steaming device, any advice?
I heard about ‘Yeastspotting’ from one of my blogger friends and today I have actually seen it. I am a novice bread baker and love to learn new ones. I am sure, I would find some different recipes here. Good work Susan.
Best,
Siri
Hi Susan,
Thanks for all your great blog entries! I’ve shared some of your recipes with bread-baker friends here at Stanford and hope your wood-fired oven is treating you well.
We’ve built our own wood-fired earth oven on a campus garden that you should stop by and see some time — I’ll try to drop you a line when next we bake in it!
~L
I spotted a link to this blog in the TimesOnline(UK)’s article listing “50 of the World’s Best Food Blogs” (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/food_and_drink/real_food/article5561425.ece). Congratulations to you for being recognized, and kudos to the editors for seeing the value of what you do here. I know I’ll be a regular visitor!
Susan,
I come to you seeking advice, I have tried the “batter” method of constructing a sourdough a a few times but have had zero success ( maybe I am not patient enough) … My father who baked french bread for 25 years advised me to make a starter from a small piece of dough ( water, flour, and crush grapes or rasins that have been heated in water) either way, I actually have been working on this method for about 4 days now, I am getting bubbles under neath the “skin” of the dough and it def smells sour! my question to you is how do you know when its ready for use? are you familiar with making a starter like this verses the batter type? any advice is much appreciate!
My dog always knows the really good bread! He’s a (now) 14-yr old Old English/Great Pyrenesse, with a nose for really good bread. I started baking sourdough bread when he was a 2yr old, and every time I bake a particularlly good loaf, he’s right there with his nose, wanting his share. Less than “really good bread”, he pretty much ignores. He’s a masterful judge of “really good bread”!
Love your blog, it’s gorgeous!
Great web site Susan I stumbled on this while looking at D Lepards site Jeremy had a link to this in the forum.
Thanks for the great recipes and you put them in grams not cups…Great stuff
I have some of thoe volcanic rocks so I will give the steam tray a go I’ve tried almost every thing else. Have been baking using a casserole dish with a lid works ok.
God bless and Happy baking
Normbake
Queensland
Australia
Great blog… I went looking for a hamburger bun recipe, found yours, read that you made them to go with your new meat csa… I am a Marin Sun Farms CSA member too! Perhaps I’ll see you at one of their CSA visit days… thanks for the great recipes
I am somewhat new at this and apologize for the perhaps stupid question, but could you please explain the use of grams for weight and liquid measurements? How do I make these measurements using conventional metric measurements? For example, liquids are usually given at milliliters. I am enjoying your blog very much.
Thank you.
I stumbled across your website and blog when searching for a recipe for fougasse. I not only found a wonderful recipe…I found inspiration! I have to admit, I love to bake but if a recipe called for yeast I would automatically reject it. After reading your blog and all the wonderful descriptions of the breads and rolls you bake I decided that I will no longer let yeast overwhelm me. I’m taking the next month off of work and will dedicate myself to learning to bake WITH yeast! Thank you for a great website celebrating my favorite food.
Hi Susan, I have been following your beautiful blog. You said you live in northern California. Might I ask what is the name of your town or city? I will be in San Francisco in August for two weeks attending Artisan I and II courses. I’d like to do a bit of exploring, visiting sourdough bakeries around the area. Would love to hear from you about your favourite places. Thank you very much. Shiao-Ping
Hi Susan
first of all great blog…your bread making is wonderful! Thanks for sharing with us! Then I’d like to ask you some advice. I’m going to come to Sf bay area in the next few days (I’ll stay 10 days in Mountain View and 5 in San Francisco). Any place “food related” to see/visit/eat in in your mind? I’ll be all alone all the day (my husband have staff meeting and a conference to attend) so…
thanks
Martina
Hi Susan,
I was wondering if you can recommend artisan bakeries around the world that have extremely long histories, such as the oldest living yeast and so on.
i would love to do something special with the information.
Thank you
Kris
Info about steam in a wood fired oven:
This is specifically for Gena Lora but anyone else who has a wood oven. I’ve been baking in wood ovens for about 15 years and the problem of getting steam into these ovens drove me nuts for a long time. At some point or other I even tried heat pans of rocks while the fire burned and then throwing water on them after I loaded the bread. Pretty dangerous. So…here’s the deal with wood ovens. If you are baking lean, fairly hydrated bread, (which is really where wood ovens shine) you really don’t need to put steam in the oven if…you load the oven full of bread. I don’t mean so that the loaves are touching. But enough so that the oven is full of bread to the door. My oven has a hearth that measures 36″X48″ and I try to load it with 14 loaves weighing about 650 g per loaf. There’s a lot of water in that amount of dough. The main trick is to get the bread into the oven as fast as you can and then put the door in. I usually drape a wet towel on the inside of the door, mostly so it fits tighter. If you load your oven with bread (whatever the size of your hearth) when you first check on it, maybe at about 25 minutes, you’ll be amazed at how much steam comes out of the oven. At this point the bread will already have started taking on that wonderful red brown color that you can normally only get with a steam injected deck oven. Of course, at this point you don’t need the steam any more and once you shuffle the loaves around and bake them longer, the crust will darken and become crisp.
The main thing to remember is that steam injected deck ovens were originally invented to try to duplicate what came out of brick ovens. Any kind of kitchen oven, either commercial or home, isn’t able to hold the steam for long so you need that big blast at the beginning of the bake. Wood ovens bake differently. You can bake in them at a lot higher temperature without burning the bread and the bread takes on a completely unique flavor. So…if you have a wood oven and your loaves are coming out with a dull, ceramic kind of finish…bake bigger batches! What could be better?
Tim Clark
I’m glad I found another bread site. I would love to start my adventure in the world of bread baking. I don’t feel though that I have the time, space, or adequate equipment to make quality bread. Then it would be finding someone to eat what I’ve made. What do you suggest for an apartment dweller as far as starting this trip? I also don’t have an oven that I think could handle steam as a way to create a great crust.
This is a wonderful site! Soon I will post photos and recipes of my gluten free, diary free, egg free, and commercial yeast free sourdough breads. Keep up the good work!
Was looking for a yeastless grissini recipe but while I didn’t find that I have found a fantastic blog with great recipes…first one to try will be the semolina-sesame flatbread!
Thanks and cheers from Cairo, Egypt
Well, like everyone else I think this is great. Using the recipe on this site I am attempting the wild yeast starter. I am about 3-4 days into this and it seems to be just a soft gooey glob. First time I added flour it looked great. went through a funny smell in the beginning but that was covered in the info. What could be the problem? Would not keeping it at 85 kill it? Most likely is in the mid 70’s temp. Hope I don’t have to throw this out. Any ideas? thank you for your help
love… love… love your blog! Thanks for shring with us… you are such an inspiratin for wanna be bakers like myself!
hi- I have been baking for many years- look forward to following your blog- saw it on SixApart listing today of best food blogs. I am a “nona” of 8 in Davis- would LOVE to go to SFBI!
I am probably close to you- let me know if you ever have a class at your home…
Yours is probably the most beautiful and well written baking blog I’ve yet encountered. It’s an inspiration to this retired baker.
I’m adding this to my Noteworthy Links roll.
Saludos,
Don Cuevas
Thanks for your great blog. Very inspiring…
I also have a question. Does somebody know if there is a webpage somewhere on the web where sourdough enthousiastics can offer or exchange their sourdough cultures as done within the kefir and kombucha communities?
Susan, your bread looks fantastic, I too love baking bread, mostly sourdough, I take pics of my breads too and can hardly resist slicing into a boule to see if it was proofed or baked just right. My starter is several years old and I truly enjoy the whole process of the natural yeast. A friend and I built a brick oven a few years ago thanks to Alan Scotts designs and we love baking in it. Good luck with your classes. I am a baking and pastry instructor and loving it. I love showing students websites like yours. Best of luck.
Jule
John, I would be interested in exchanging starters and my daughter in NY has a Kombuche I could ask her to share.
I am so delighted to find your website – I was looking up the term Poolish.
I started with Amish Friendship bread that my sister gave me but found it very sweet so I omitted the sugar and switched to water until my starter turned “sour.” I make bread every weekend as a stress reliever (I enjoy the kneading).
I store my recipes online and have a few that I’ve made under the tag “wild yeast” and will definitely be bookmarking your site! Thanks
This is an excellent blog. I teach standard and gluten free bread baking for the most part. Your blog has inspired me to pick up wild yeast starters again and get back to some olde world bread crafting. Thanks
Great meeting you this weekend Susan!
Hi- I have a question: why my bread is so heavy the next day. The day I do the bread is soft and delicious but the next day is kind of heavy and very hard to chew.
Please help!!!!!
WOW. THIS IS THE BLOG I WAS LOOKING FOR. BREAD,BREAD AND MORE BREAD. THANKS. I AM GOING TO TRY ALL YOUR RECIPES BUT ESPECIALLY THE CINNAMON ROLLS I WILL SHARE WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS FOR NEW YEARS SO THAT THEY MAY ALL START WITH A SWEEEET NEW 2010!!!! LOL
Susan,
This is a wonderful blog. Are you the same Susan who helped teach the recent baguette course at SFBI? It was a wonderful course and I am now becoming somewhat of a bread snob. Not really…just when you think you have it right, the next batch is not quite on the mark. Bread baking can be as humbling as it is fun. I am a nurse anesthetist and enjoyed studying the science of bread.
Keep up the great work.