Seeded Sourdough Loaf from Homebaker's club and the art of breadbaking

 I've been practicing 'The Art of Breadmaking' for some time, in fact years, and there is always something for the home baker to learn.  For a few months now I have been a member of The Homebaker's club following all the detailed on line classes from my bread hero Jack Sturgess. Recently I attempted the Seeded Sourdough Loaf.

Without watching the class, without reading the recipe properly, without working the timings correctly and not putting the dough to rise overnight in the fridge, I hadn't grasped some of the finer points.  Let alone not having a Dutch oven to use, with the ratios mixed up giving a much higher amount of wholemeal flour, we still ended up enjoying a very good loaf. 

Take two: I watched the lesson from start to finish, and because of my having made the loaf albeit not understanding the finer points, the second attempt took account of all of these and most probably these have sunk into my mind and can also be transferred to other sourdough bread making sessions.

I learnt that by rising the dough overnight in the fridge, it makes it possible to bake good bread in the morning, and the Dutch Oven technique although rather good, I am satisfied with the good round shape from baking on a pre heated Silverwood baking tray.  I was not waiting up late to bake the bread, or having to leave the bread to cool overnight.  There was no tearing or any weak points, and the dough opened up nicely along the score lines.

The only thing I did differently was that I did not add the seeds to the outside, as with the poppy seed rye loaves I have made, I wanted to spare all the bits on the worktop and floor from the bits that fall off as the bread is cut.  There are of course plenty of delicious seeds in the dough.

Bread making tools came to my drawing class, again lots of lessons learnt during my first drawing class. As with bread making lots of practice and attempts will be required to get any better.

From my Garden - Six on Saturday - 26 October 2024

 Ending the week with some sunshine makes wandering round the garden even more delightful. Not all life is closing down for the winter just yet, even though the Amelanchiers have shed all their leaves.  As most plants start to prepare for the winter, others are coming to the fore and  I find little tasks, and make a note what I would like to do the following day as I put away my tools.

I am linking as usual with other SOSers over at Jim's, it is not at all an 'exclusive club', find out there the guidance for anyone wishing to contribute six items from their gardens.

Acer Wakaranai (Japanese for 'unknown') 

1. I've rearranged some of the potted plants in the garden and placed a couple on the small round table the better to be seen not only a reasonable height but also from the window's at the back of the house.

2.  Behind it is a small flowered Chrysanthemum which is of similar colour to the acer: Chrysanthemum Picasso is such a neat, tidy and well behaved supposedly hardy Chrysanthemum.  I was asking around at the HPS meeting last week about it, and some had lost it during the very wet winter.  Having lost mine, thankfully  Brenda, to whom I had passed one of my propagated plants in 2022, gave me one back.

Chrysanthemum Picasso

3. As I was admiring the small flowers, camera in hand,  I spied a Cricket.  I have seen grasshoppers in the garden before, and I was chuffed that this Dark Bush Cricket wasn't camera shy. 

Dark Bush Cricket

and as if one interesting insect was not enough a few flowers away was a shield bug

 Gorse Shieldbug, Piezodorus lituratus 

Identification is thanks to a request on the Entomology Group on Facebook. I seem to have a few different types, and found some tips online on identifying them.

4, Mahonia Soft Caress is having its best year.  I've had this plant nearly ten years found and bought at Cotswold Garden flowers when I went out on a January excursion to Cotswold Garden Flowers. 

5.  Fuchsias continue to look attractive and growing there around the perimeter of the garden and allowing them to grow tall keeping the stems from the previous year has worked nicely. Here the white flowered Fuchsia 'Hawkshead' has kept its leaves so far, as well as its flowers and has been in bloom for months.

6.  The small silver leafed Fuchsia microphylla ssp. hemsleyana ‘Silver Lining’ is another of those plants in garden with close association with friends, and was brought here in a pot from my previous garden. It has not needed to be moved, and in its ideal sheltered spot, it still has flowers, it is showing off its tiny pretty purple fruits.

In a Vase on Monday in October

I was going to write something about the changing clocks and how I become quite discombobulated days before and days afterwards, and how I wished they would not mess around with the clocks. However as it not actually pouring with rain today,  I have decided that I would instead ground myself in the lovely activity of picking flowers and arranging them for today's rendezvous chez Cathy for In a Vase on Monday.

This week  another studio pottery vase found  a few years ago, with its asymmetrical shape and a low centre of gravity makes a return to IAVOM with a few small stems.  It looks that there may be three elements here, however both those lovely leaves and the white flowers are from Persicaria Red Dragon.  The Chrysanthemum is Chrysanthemum 'Picasso'.

It is towards September and October that any Chrysanthemums come to the fore in the garden.  They need the shortening days to come into flower.  I was able to reintroduce Chrysanthemum Picasso which I first acquired under the HPS Plant preservation Scheme.  I lost it as it did not prove to be hardy, or was it that I had dug it up and potted it up to have some protection during the winter months. This year it is staying in the ground but with a good mulch.  I do hope it survives, as it is such a lovely plant just the right size for the garden here.

The Ginkgo has started to turn a lovely yellow, so a few leaves were picked up to nestle at the base of the arrangement.

Pumpkin gnocchi for lunch

 

It is pumpkin time again, and a large Turk's Turban was split and roasted on Wednesday in preparation for a big Mexican inspired soup when several friends from the WI came over for the book club.  Many of the pieces have been stored away in the freezer for future use, with some still in the fridge.  My sister asked if I knew of any pasta recipes and I set to to find some links for her.  This led to my making some pumpkin gnocchi for our lunch today.

To get to the base mix, I had to process the baked pumpkin.  I just have a small attachment to my hand held stick blender, but by diving up the mixture of around 300g baked pumpkin, it was possible.  The pumpkin baked up very firm by that I mean not at all watery, and the mixture was very dry, so I added two eggs.  Just around 200g of OO flour kneaded into the mixture gave just the right consistency.  The recipe I found on line was just a guide, and it didn't have salt, but I definitely would add salt next time, neither did it have any eggs, but since we were having this as a main course the extra protein was good.

We had half of these gnocchi for our lunch, and the other half are now being frozen down. Several of the recipes I looked up mentioned a dressing of butter and sage.  Here two pans are ready to start the cooking: the large frying pan of water was to boil the gnocchi, and the small one for preparing the butter and sage.

I treated myself and a friend to something from the Wells Food Festival just last week, and decided to try them for the first time.  I gently crushed the soft black salted Kampot pepper corns in a little olive oil and added a few fine strands of sage which I have gently heated in a little oi.  before melting the butter for the remainder of the gnocchi sauce.

At the same time as frying up the freshly picked sage from the garden I added in a good measure of roasted pumpkin seeds which I have ready to add to salads etc., and the whole was topped with some grated goat's cheese.

The dressing of sage and pepper infused olive oil was drizzled over the chopped tomatoes as a side salad and placed within the bowl....

Improvements for next time: salt the gnocchi and also the poaching liquid.

Use that dressing of sage, olive oil and bruised Kampot pepper corns to dress fresh sliced tomatoes served with anything else, it was delicious!

Possible food pairings: pumpkin gnocchi poached in a sweeten sauce and topped with toasted pecan nuts and maple syrup, alongside a dollop of yogurt?  

Years ago on holiday in  Austria in a traditional hill side hotel, we were served a simple dessert of dumplings with a vanilla sauce which was surprisingly good and obviously memorable..it was dressed with a scattering of toasted poppyseeds.  

From my garden , Six on Saturday - 19 October 2024

We have had rain: lots of it, a couple of days where for part there has been sunshine, but we have had no frosts.  How do I know for sure you may ask? The little nasturtium plants which sprouted up, once some top growth from early flowering perennials was cleared, are still standing well, turning their leaves as the sun travels from east to west.  I only mention this as I wonder whether there will be observations about the weather when I and several others link into Jim's post. There you will find how to join in yourself should you wish.

For now here are six random musings or observations this week, mainly chosen as some time during the week I ventured out and caught something on camera. As friends who came to lunch on Thursday observed: there is still a lovely amount of colour in the garden.

1. For the first time I have planted autumn flowering Crocus speciosus Oxonian.  It was rather a gamble as to where to plant the bulbs which I bought from Pottertons at the Rare Plant Fair in Wells only a few weeks ago.

  

Crocus speciosus Oxonian

There was a big clump of Origanum Bristol Cross which was getting rather congested, that got dug up to make way for the Crocus.  At the same time Squirrels are finding any softish piece of ground to burry their nuts, so the lovely twigs from a Magnolia that I had in the house as 'dried plant' material were retired into the garden to form a cage which also helped to keep the blackbirds off that area.  They have rather suffered in the pouring rain, but a couple of days of less rain and some sunshine drew me into the garden to admire them. 

2. One of my favourite areas in the garden is the gravel garden as it is there that I place plants apart and this doesn't look strange, in the sense that the current trend is to have full borders.  I used to volunteer at the Elizabethan gardens in Kenilworth, and learnt that back in those days, the 'exotic' plants were so precious that they were placed separately so that each precious plant could be admired.  My gravel garden functions as a place to appreciate the forms of plants.  This week the Allium thunbergii is probably the top star of the gravel garden.

Allium thunbergii Ozawa

3. And because I grew this Cyclamen myself from seed, this plant in the gravel area gives me even greater pleasure.  The pattern and richness of the leaf alone as it emerges and the relief I feel that it has survived another year, is exhilarating. There were two small tubers of Cyclamen graecum subs. candicum a little too close together, in the picture below it is to the left, a little out of focus, and yesterday I dug it up and moved it to a better position, which I hope will be successful. Looking at the root it was has the characteristic thickened long root. It is advisable to grow this one in a glass house, and since I don't have one but only a sheltered garden, I am delighted that it survives.

 4.  I just need to get close to this plant to look into the very small blooms to be amazed by the complexity of the petals.  It is a Knapweed, and in any case I love the wild ones too, but this plant is small and just the right size for the garden.

Serratula tinctoria var. seoanei

With bright light and a drop in the wind, a good close up was possible.   

5. By the conservatory, from where I can sit and look at the garden,  there are some rose bushes, and despite not having given them the care they ought to have had, they are giving a fine display. This is Rose Grace which I keep dead heading almost daily. I probably showed these a few weeks ago, but they have continued to give a lovely apricot warm glow even on the grey days.

6. New England aster, Symphyotrichum novae-angliae 'Purple Dome' is standing up to the rain and wind and I particularly like it as it does not require any staking.

Today I am off to attend the HPS meeting and am looking forward to hearing  Paul Cumbleton's talk ‘A Growing Addiction: Bulbs from the Winter Rainfall Area of South Africa’.