u/Kamimitsu

This was a test run of making crumpets with sourdough discard. They're OK, but a bit denser than I'd have liked and not holey enough. I'll need to play around with the concept. Served them two ways: breakfast (ham and egg), and dinner (cheese hamburg with mushroom demiglace).

Recipe:

227g sourdough discard

1 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp salt

3/8 tsp baking soda

Mix all.

Pour 1/4 of mix in each ring mold.

Cook 6 mins one side

Remove mold and flip

Cook 3ish mins more.

After a rather aesthetically challenged last loaf, I went back to basics. This is an 80/15/5 (white, whole wheat, rye) loaf. Feeling somewhat vindicated.

Process:

Day 1 2:00am Make levain: 20g mature/fed starter, 20g water, 20g bread flour

Day 2 11:30am Make dough: Levain + 185g water + 255g bread flour (80% tomishou, 15% whole wheat for bread, 5% fine ground rye) + 5g salt; 12:00pm: Fermentolyse 1 hour

1:00 to 2:30pm Stretch and Folds every 30 mins, coil folds at end as dough strength increases

4:30 pm: Preshape 5:00 pm: Shape > Banneton > Cold retard

Day 3

11:30 Preheat Dutch Oven to 250C

12:15 Turn out loaf, score, place in D/O

Bake at 230C. 35 mins covered, 15 mins uncovered (50 total)

Whelp, this one got away from me, but I think I know why.

I found some jalapeños for sale at a local veg market, and figured I'd give sourdough with inclusions a go. It turned out comically flat, but still tasty and actually not that bad inside. It just rose laterally instead of vertically.

So, what went wrong? Well, first off, I think it was slightly underproofed. My suspicion is that the inclusions (which I added pre-fermentation) slowed things down more than I anticipated (might switch that up next time and add them during pre-shaping). Secondly, I think the cheese, which was perhaps cut a bit larger than it should have, "weighed down" the loaf during baking. Finally, and the biggest issue, was the shaping. It looks great in the picture (I mean, it looks like PERFECT, and it felt great!), but when transferring to the banneton, things went awry with some stickiness and whatnot, and the bottom basically completely opened up and no amount of stitching could rescue it. It probably doesn't help that my banneton is a bit on the large size for a loaf of that weight... I really should have used my smaller oval one, but I was afraid of over-spillage. Oh well.

Looks weird, but tastes great. I'll take it.

EDIT:

Process:

Day 1

• 2am - Make levain: 20g mature/fed starter, 20g water, 20g bread flour

Day 2

• 11:30am - Make dough: Levain + 185g very cold water + 255g bread flour + 5g salt; + inclusions 35g chopped fresh jalapeños, 70g diced red cheddar, 5g chopped fresh dill.
  • Fermentolyse 1 hour (dough kept in oven in steam proofing mode at 30C until cold retard)
• 12:30 to 2:30pm - 2 sets of stretch and foils, 2 sets of coil folds. All 30 mins apart.
• 2:30pm to 4:30pm - Bulk
• 4:30pm - Pre-shape > Shape > Banneton > Cold retard

Day 3

• 11:30am - Preheat Dutch Oven to 250C
• 12:15pm - Turn out loaf > score > place in D/O
• Bake at 230C. 35 mins covered, 15 mins uncovered (50 total)

I recently added Ina-ho to my list of saved searches on Mercari. Usually the prices are outrageous, though occasionally someone will sell it at a normal-ish price, probably not knowing or fully comprehending its rarity... or perhaps just not caring and being generous. In those cases it usually sells in a matter of minutes, before I ever have a chance. This time, I was quickest. 4500円 for the set, which includes the also discontinued Tsutsuji (though I already have a 15ml bottle if it from before it went bye-bye, so I'll likely hand out some samples to friends from this bottle). The Ina-ho is at like 80% full, so I'll take it as a win, as a 15ml bottle is usually 6000円 or more, so the other inks are just icing on the cake. As soon as a slot frees up in my lineup (I'm currently at maximum inked pens). I get to see what all the fuss is about.

It's been almost two weeks since my starter was ready for baking. I've made sourdough three times in that interval, but had about a cup of discard in the fridge. So, time to make crackers! This is the KAF recipe.

* 277g discard

* 113g flour (50/50 whole wheat and spelt)

* 57g melted butter

* 1/2 tsp salt

* 2 tbsp dried herbs

** EVOO and Maldon salt for topping

1. Mix all but topping

2. Divide in two, flatten discs.

3. Chill in fridge for 1 hour (the dough, not yourself)

4. Roll out to about 1.5 to 2 mm

5. Brush with oil

6. Dock with fork

7. Cut to size

8. Top with salt

9. Bake at 170 for 35m (recipe says 25, but my oven is stupid)

10. Cool and enjoy

It seems we're on a bit of a sourdough kick in the sub. Here's my second batch after getting back into it. My shaping still needs work, but hopefully will improve in time. I think I could get a little more height and ear once my shaping improves.

These guys stuck to the bannetons a little bit which caused minor issues, but all in all I was happy with the crumb (which was about perfect for me). I went a bit overboard with ice cubes, so they ended up a bit more waxy and blistery than I had anticipated, which is fine in its own right... just not what I had envisioned. I'll probably forgo adding cubes for steam next time and go with a dusting of flour.

Process:

Day 1

• 2am - Make levain: 20g mature/fed starter, 20g water, 20g bread flour

Day 2

• 11:30am - Make dough: Levain + 185g water + 255g bread flour + 5g salt; Fermentolyse 1 hour (dough kept in oven in steam proofing mode at 30C until shaping)
• 12:30 to 2:00pm - 2 sets of stretch and foils, 1 set of coil folds. All 30 mins apart.
• 2:00pm to 4:15pm - Ferment
• 4:15 - 4:45 - Divide > Pre-shape > Shape > Bannetons > Cold retard

Day 3

• 12:10pm - Preheat Dutch Oven to 250C
• 12:40pm - Turn out loaves > fiddle with banneton sticking > score > place in D/O with 4 ice cubes
• Bake at 230C. 27 mins covered, 13 mins uncovered (40 total)

After letting my starter starve and eventually die in the back of the fridge a year ago, I decided it was time to get back into sourdough and so I unsuccessfully tried to revive my starter from some frozen discard. I gave up on that after a couple of weeks and sent off for the 1847 Oregon Trail Starter from the fine folks at Carl's Friends.

After taking a couple of days to revive it, [Note to self: dehydrate some of this current starter to hedge against future starter neglect] I decided it was time to bake a loaf and here she is. I'm clearly out of practice as my shaping left something to be desired and I overproofed it slightly (hence the weird bulge and lopsidedness, and the large air pockets at the top), but hopefully I'll dial it in next time. It tastes amazing regardless. Process pics included for funsies.

Process:

Day 1

• 3am Make levain: 20g mature/fed starter, 20g water, 20g bread flour

Day 2

• 11am Make dough: Levain + 185g water + 255g bread flour + 5g salt; Fermentolyse 1 hour
• 12:30 to 2:00pm Stretch and Folds every 30 mins, coil folds at end as dough strength increases
• 5:15 Shape > Banneton > Cold retard

Day 3

• 11:30 Preheat Dutch Oven to 250C
• 12:15 Turn out loaf, score, place in D/O with 3 ice cubes
• Bake at 230C. 35 mins covered, 15 mins uncovered (50 total)

I used the steam proofing setting in my oven to keep things uniform at 30C for bulk ferment, and I probably went about 45 mins too far in retrospect.

After being inspired by u/NihilisticHobbit's take on the KAF Classic Sandwich Loaf, I decided to try it out and riff on it a bit.

It's basically the same recipe from KAF but with two small twists. I continued my trend of substituting the salt with miso (my miso is 12% salt, so that's 66g of miso paste) and I added 1.5 tablespoons of Za'atar spice mix (since I had it laying around and wanted some herbs). I used the proofing mode on my oven at 30C instead of just proofing on the countertop, so it took less time than the recipe called for: 1 hour for bulk and 30 mins for the final proof.

It came out nicely with a fantastic soft and silky texture, but it was a bit big for my loaf tin and overflowed the edges pretty seriously. I'll either need to use a deeper shokupan tin, or perhaps trim the recipe by 15-20%. I'll decide that next time.

And of course, when you make sandwich bread, you gotta make some sammiches.

Happy baking out there!

I got into the hobby a year ago, and have quickly amassed a bunch of stuff. I'm a sucker when I see a good price on Yahoo Auction or Mercari and the condition seems pretty good (I don't think anything pictured was over 10,000 yen ($65 USD) and most of the lenses were actually around 5000 yen ($32 USD). I hadn't really done a full inventory yet and carefully checked the lenses for dust, mold, sticky blades, etc. So I decided to do that today, as well as labelling any lenses whose designations are under the lens cap. Needless to say, I was kinda suprised about how much stuff I have. Figured I'd share it with the sub.

We often give the advice that, in general, more polishing yields cleaner and more subtle sake, but this guy bucks that convention completely. A junmai muroka nama genshu that is only polished 10% (it's called 90 because 90% of the rice grain is used).

It was fantastic. Light and refreshing. The aroma is unsurprisingly rice forward, not unlike a steaming bowl straight from the pot. The flavor is mild, but comes on quickly with fruit and a bit of sourness. It lingers for just a second then finishes very clean and crisp. It's marketed as a summer drink, and at 13% alcohol we all commented that it'd be a perfect bottle for a picnic. It went equally well alone or paired with food.

I recently switched launchers on my phone and reloaded the Yahoo weather widget... and it's different from before. I can't figure out what the dotted line means. My best guess is it's historical data of some kind. Any ideas?

I've had a wild hair for a week or so, thinking I wanted to do brownies or blondies. I settled on blondies with Black Thunder bits in them. Farking tasty, if slightly overbaked. My wife said they're perfect for her, but I usually like them a bit gooey-er, so I think I'll play around with less flour (and/or bread flour) next time. I'm still on my "sub miso for salt" kick, which I did with these as well.

Recipe/Process (adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction)

Ingredients:

• 150g AP flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 118g melted butter
• 2 tsp koji miso
• 150g brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 3/4 tsp vanilla ex
• 135g Black Thunder (chopped)

1. Whisk dry ingredients (flour and baking powder) in a large bowl
2. Mix wet ingredients (butter, sugar, miso, vanilla, egg) in a separate bowl
3. Add the wet to the dry and mix.
4. Fold in the candy bars or other mix-ins
5. Line a 18cm x 18cm square pan with parchment paper
6. Fill the pan and smooth the top
7. Preheat oven to 180C
8. Bake for 35m (will probably lower this by 3-5 mins next time)
9. Cool, in pan, for 1 hour
10. Slice and enjoy

I bought some new leatherette a few months ago and I finally got around to putting it on. It's only my second time installing leatherette. I didn't do a particularly clean job previously on my Pentax MX, but this went a little better on the Pentax ME-Super. Thankfully, the awesome gent at Aki-Asahi sent me an extra set (in dark brown) with a note "for practice", so if I royally screwed it up I had a backup. But I think I did OK. I guess I'll hold on to the extra in case I tire of this one or get it dirtied up.

We're looking fresh and snazzy for some summertime shooting!

I started with an MX, and after kinda learning the basics on that (about 5 or 6 rolls), I moved on to a Pentax ME-super (mostly for aperture priority, and so I could shoot a bit faster... my wife complained about how long it took me to get a shot with the MX). I plan to go with a two camera setup in the future. MX for B&W and ME-Super for color.

I'm currently trying to learn to more about depth of field, finding a good 'subject' for the center of the shot, and shooting wide-open (or nearly so)... which means I screw up focusing a bit since the error margin is razor thin.

Anyway, the pics above are a mix of lenses. The first few (cherry blossoms) are Fuji 400, shot with an SMC 55mm f1.8 and a Pentax-M Macro 50mm f4. The zoo shots are Fuji 200, with a Pentax 80-200mm Zoom. The museum diorama shots are Fuji 200, with a Pentax-M 50mm f1.7

Flowers really seem like a cheat to interesting pictures. I coulda posted like 10 more, but I think those were the best (I don't have much of an eye for composition, to be honest). None of the pics are cropped or edited in any way- just straight from the labs scans.