Bread baking

[Mercedes]

Thanks again guys, I take all your comments on board. I will jeep you informed how it goes. I may start myself a little diary in this section, to show my progress, if that's ok with Lord of the Lane

That sounds a good idea to keep us up to date, we could do with a "bread baking" section so we can all help each other.

I was going to do a course at one of the very few proper "real bread bakeries" here but it's £125 for an evening course which seems a lot of money!

Another thing that I have noticed when baking in general, which might just be me, but I no longer use the "fan" option as I find things bake better when just using a normal oven setting. I also think an oven thermometer is a good buy as a lot of ovens aren't accurate

There's a lot of info on the real bread campaign website about reducing all the rubbish in bread, salt being one of the things they say we should put less in. They even have a link to a site where you can calculate the percentage of salt you are putting in your bread, mine comes out at 1.33% which is too high, but apparently shop bought bread can have a much higher percentage

http://www.food.gov.uk/scotland/scotnut ... sl0oHn4XnY" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[davina112]

Thank for that, I'm not sure I can use my oven without the fan ??
But my hubby has an old range type thing in his garage and we do sometimes cook in it, I may try the bread in there.

[Mercedes]

Thank for that, I'm not sure I can use my oven without the fan ??
But my hubby has an old range type thing in his garage and we do sometimes cook in it, I may try the bread in there.

I'm sure a lot of people use a fan oven, I just find that with mine the temperature is all over the place but when I turn the fan off and just bake on the normal setting it stays constant. Might just be my oven, which is why I think a thermometer is always a good idea

[Stef]

If you can't turn your fan oven off the grill is usually a second oven, no fan.

Too me ages to remember that with ours

And I need an oven thermometer, all my cakes came out burned..... I have no idea why other than the temp is doing its own thing!

[Mercedes]

I have just put some dough to prove in my airing cupboard and out of curiosity I put a thermometer in there and even with the boiler on the temp is only 68f/20c which is not exactly warm.

I have dug out a couple of shower caps and will try them for the second proving, will be interesting to see if they rise more with those on!

Something else I find very useful for bread is one of those silicone baking mats for keading and also a dough scraper

[Bridgets Mum]

So, how did it go? Have you made some bread? I discovered sour dough bread last year and make that quite regularly but its not to everyone's taste.

[Mercedes]

So, how did it go? Have you made some bread? I discovered sour dough bread last year and make that quite regularly but its not to everyone's taste.

I've been wondering how it's going too!

Like you I also make sourdough bread now, in fact I make it all the time now in preference to ordinary bread with commercial yeast. The other day I made an apricot almond sourdough loaf which was nice, but I prefer the tang of just plain sourdough