#Wholemeal Sourdough

[martha-anne]

Highlights 🌞

Fig 1. Sketchbook page; drawn during an evening spent with friends

Fig 2. My first (ever!!!) completed knitting project; a hat for a baby.

Fig 3. Two wholemeal-spelt sourdough loaves ready for an overnight prove. One for me, and one to bring to a party.

Fig 4. A spoon carved with help from some extremely talented friends

Fig 5. Mustard greens from the garden - one of the only things growing abundantly at the moment.

[erikasandersonactor]

Baked Off!

Baked Off! @bakedoffpodcast - a gentle slice-of-life comedy drama with wholemeal wholesome characters - are crowdfunding for an editor!

Follow their progress here, chip in a few pennies and get early access to the episodes as well as other rewards and perks!

[ahockeywrites]

one

link to main masterlist pairing: lila rogers (ofc) x arber xhekaj warnings: none in this chapter authors note: chapter one is here! let me know how you guys are finding it :)

Lila didn’t speak French. Well, not much French. Not enough to hold a conversation with patrons so in the bakery, she was the one creating the baked goods. Bread, croissants, doughnuts, brownies. You name it, she made them with their traditional flavours following family recipes but each week there was a limited-edition delicacy that the shoppers loved. The role in the back of the store allowed Lila baking creativity and freedom that she had never had before.

The Montreal sun basked down on Lila as she made the short walk from Jessica’s house to their bakery. It was an early start for Lila, but she didn’t mind as her finish time was earlier than her aunt’s. A travel mug was a staple in her hand, and she sipped the coffee, savouring the hot liquid as it travelled down her throat.

Her morning routine was always the same. One: heat up all the ovens. Two: make a batch of sourdough, white, rye and wholemeal bread, shape them and leave them in the proving oven. Three: defrost the doughnut dough and start making the filling for them. Four: take out the pre-shaped croissants and other buttery items and put them in the oven to bake for the early morning visitors to the shop. Five: clean out the coffee machine and the front of house so that when her aunt arrived, they could open their doors immediately.

By the time Lila had wiped down the coffee machine and refilled the beans, Jessica arrived through the employee entrance at the back. It wasn’t really an employee entrance because only two of them worked there but that’s what a proper restaurant or bakery would call it so that’s what her and Jessie called it.

Jessica was only a few years older than Lila and were more like close cousins or friends than a traditional aunt and niece. They both shared their family’s blonde hair, green eyes, and shortness with neither of them being taller than five foot three. Lila just pipped Jessica by half an inch and the older woman refused to accept it, even though she knew.

The women worked in tandem until both of their alarms went off to signify that it was seven am and time to open the store. Jessica started welcoming in the early customers and making various types of coffees for the commuters who were on their way to their jobs on the centre of the island. Lila took the opportunity to hide in the back and begin preparing dough and batter for the following day.

The phone rang, probably someone requesting a custom cake or a supplier who wasn’t able to get something they usually requested, and Lila popped out to the front with a fresh tray of bread and doughnuts to restock up the counter. It was almost the lunchtime rush so Lila was pretty sure that it would be quiet as she sat on the stool in front of the cash machine. She made herself a cup of peppermint tea and sipped on it, hoping no customers turned up.

Her phone buzzed and she noticed that the latest post on the bakery’s Instagram had been posted on a travel account and now the following on that account had started going up by the minute. An idea popped into Lila’s head, and she quickly went through her photos to find one she took outside the store with the opening times on the outside. It was perfect because it would give all the new followers information of when the bakery would be open and should increase the profits.

The bell above the door rang and Lila jerked off the chair, almost dropping her phone onto the floor but very thankful that she didn’t as the bakery didn’t make enough for her to replace one just yet. She would need to save for at least another two months to be able to afford that.

“Bonjour,” Lila’s limited French was coming in handy, but she didn’t know how much more of the conversation she could hold up without changing to English.

“Anglais, merci,” the customer asked, and Lila sighed audibly. A chuckle escaped the man’s lips. Thank the heavens that this customer didn’t want to speak French or that they noticed how bad her Quebecois accent was, they felt bad and spoke English to her. One or the other, Lila didn’t mind, it calmed her anxiety down tenfold.

The customer was tall, had shaggy, dark hair paired with chestnut-coloured eyes. His chin and upper lip were dotted with a sparse coating of stubble but not enough to fully cover his light skin, but enough for him to go a few days without shaving before he needed to sort it out.

His face looked familiar to Lila, but she couldn’t place it. She welcomed the customer in English and took his order. Vanilla latte, two apple fritter doughnuts, two croissants and a loaf of sourdough. He didn’t look like a sourdough type of man, but who was Lila to judge.

She was thankful for the regulars who came in every other day for a bread restock, the couple who came in every weekend to get two americano’s with cream and two croissants before going on a walk in one of the local parks, the tourist who had found her Instagram account and wanted to try a speciality doughnut. Lila was thankful for every person who walked through the door and took a chance on a family bakery.

Lila packaged up the items for the customer and even gave him one of their branded tote bags for free. She hoped that by him carrying it, he might become a walking billboard and inadvertently advertise the small family bakery. He was attractive, so it wasn’t an impossibility, Lila thought.

Her body moved across to the cash register and started ringing up all his items as his large hands wrapped around his reusable coffee mug. That reminded her that she needed to put the one-dollar discount that they ran for not using a disposable cup. Save the environment and all that jazz.

“That’ll be twenty-two dollars,” Lila said, feeling more comfortable speaking English than French. The customer’s lips curled into a smile as he reached into his jacket pocket to collect his wallet and bringing out a credit card. He tapped it on the reader before wishing Lila well and waving before he went back outside into the Montreal weather.

That was one customer that Lila wouldn’t mind seeing again.

[oddman-the-oldman]

Rye Bread 2.0

Rye is a very low gluten grain, but it does have some. As the result pure Rye is challenging to get to raise and build a proper sponge. Most recipes call for Sourdough fermentation in an attempt to fix the problem. A local bakery uses the same process on a low gluten wheat to remove even more of the gluten from their breads. The knowledge has not been lost on me.

Most bakers in the USA add wheat to their Rye to build a sponge. Being allergic to wheat rules that out for me and I need a traditional northern European recipe to improve the problem. I've been reading some research on how people who depend on 100% over come the problem, Most of the recipes available to me leave out a critical step.

The scald the flower with +/- boiling water when they mix the dough.

Above is the loaf we made last night. Another Rye bread tradition is to allow it to rest for about a day or two after baking so it can dry just a little before you cut into it.

.

[bakedoffpodcast]

50/50 wholemeal sourdough loaf. Looking forward to cutting into this...

[bookwormscififan]

Hybrids and Humans, Chapter 1

Don't Forget to Lock the Doors

Read on AO3!

A/N: I may have been inadvertently convinced by @iamvegorott to start a fox Mad AU...

--

Everyone knew the stories. A genetics lab in a remote part of the country had a mishap with some experiments, flooding the surrounding town with a pungent grey mist that had some… strange effects on the citizens.

The policy against hats in schools was abolished when students began turning up with augmentations to their appearance, initially just animal ears among their hair, then devolving into tails and claws. Panic consumed the town, families breaking apart from differences in breed, and eventually a nation-wide quarantine was placed over the state to keep people away from these new hybrids.

That was over fifty years ago. The children affected had since grown up and had their own children, and slowly the segregation of the town fell through. The hybrids could live their lives, crossing state lines and being themselves, on the condition none of them ever experimented with genetic sciences again.

Mare whistled as he washed his hands, using the back of his wrist to nudge his glasses further up his nose. The afternoon sun shone through the kitchen window, casting everything in a soft orange glow, and Mare smiled as he thought about the fresh batch of bread he’d baked for himself and his brother.

Phantom enjoyed texture in his meals, preferring Mare’s poppyseed sourdough loaves over the traditional wholemeal bread, so Mare always made sure to bake him a loaf of sourdough. When Phantom got home from his outing, he’d probably make Mare some sweets as a token of gratitude, and the thought made Mare smile more.

Phantom wouldn’t be home for a few more days. He was out on a tour to find somewhere new for them to live, having grown tired of their small house at the edge of town facing the forest.

“Don’t forget to lock up,” Phantom had reminded Mare as he left, giving a pointed look at the back door, silently warning Mare of the hybrids that had been rumoured to live in the forest. The dangerous ones that people said were unafraid of letting their animal instincts take control.

Drying his hands, Mare calmly walked through the house to lock up, flicking the latch on the back door with a roll of his eyes. He was sure he could handle a rabid stranger showing up at his door, what with his certain “gifts”.

--

He was woken in the middle of the night by something scratching at the back door, the sound of nails against the wood making him sit upright. A cold chill had set in when night fell, causing Mare to stuff blankets and towels into every small gap in the walls and windows to keep the warmth inside, and curiosity got the better of him at the scratching on the door.

Climbing out of bed and tugging a blanket around his shoulders, Mare slowly crept down the stairs to the back door, peeping through the window to gauge what was there, but the dark covered everything. All he could see was a dark shape picking around the doorknob as if trying to dislodge it.

“It could just be a person,” Mare told himself as he wrapped his fingers around the doorknob, turning it and slowly opening the door.

A dark blur dashed past him before he’d gotten the door fully open, making a beeline for the smouldering fire and curling up close to it in attempts to get warm. After a couple blinks, Mare closed the door and turned around, gingerly heading toward the figure by the fire.

“Hello,” he ventured, making the shape out to seem human. Wrapped in a thick cloak, it was difficult to tell anything concrete, but the hands splayed out before the embers gave him a good clue. “It’s usually more polite to ask to be let inside before running in—”

“Sorry.” The voice was faint, weak, but certainly sounded human – not that Mare knew if the hybrids could speak – and the soft tone in the voice made Mare want to wrap his arms around this intruder and never let go.

“Well, I don’t really mind, honestly. I could rekindle this fire so you have more warmth, and you can stay the night,” Mare suggested, slowly moving to give his blanket to his guest. “My name is Mare, by the way. My twin isn’t here at the moment. He’s house hunting.”

The figure turned to look at Mare, hood falling from his head as he lifted it, and Mare started at the sight of two fuzzy fox ears sitting among the mop of brown hair. In the dim light of the dying fire, Mare could make out a pale face sprinkled with freckles and glossy eyes that seemed to reflect the orange of the embers.

“They call me Mad.”

Mare had never imagined coming face to face with one of the fabled hybrid humans before, but now he had a fox hybrid in his house, looking at him with grateful eyes, and he felt like his heart was going to pound out of his chest.

------------------------

@brokentimewatch @dungeon-dragons-dragons @rattyboyisemo

[german-sourdough-hk]

80% Wholemeal Spelt and Durum Wheat. Leavened by two preferments: Lievito Madre and rye sourdough. Cold proofing 🥶 for 18 hours.

A soaker of psyllium husks is not only healthy but provides moisture for the easy dry baking spelt.

[perlelas]

Baking of day

Hello ! For those who are interested, I made a Foccacia with sourdough and yeast (in my own way) today. And guess what ?

I share with you the process

Above all, I work with old wheat flour, and the flour I used today is wholemeal flour. (I can assure you that it works, prove 👇👇)

To get started, you will need the following ingredients : - Flour (500g) - Salt (9g) - Whole grain mustard (50g) - Yeast (preferably a quality fresh yeast) (25 g) - Fermented dough (prepared the day before) (100g) - Sourdough (refreshed the day before) (sourdough can also be an option) (100g) - Potato flakes (45g) - Rice flakes (60g) - Millet flakes (20g) - Olive oil (125g) - And of course water (500g)

here : potato flakes, rice flakes and millet flakes in the same container, sourdough and fresh yeast Step 1 : Pour your water first into the tank. Then the flour, then... other ingredients, except olive oil ! (Save the olive oil for later)

Then, start the kneading, (five minutes on the timer) Step 2 : Take a clean bin.

And spread olive oil with faond and on the edges

Practical advice : don’t forget to watch your mix. Because according to the temperature and humidity of the room, but also flour. You can also have small surprises, like me today :

You see ? The dough did not mix well. But it doesn’t matter, peel the dough with a horn (yes, that’s what we call it), and put it back in the mix. (if the five minutes have already passed, add three minutes)

Step 3 : Take your 125g of olive oil and pour it during kneading (do not put all at once, allow time for the dough to drink the oil)

P.A : If at the end of kneading, the dough seems too soft, almost liquid, add a little flour. Step 4 : Put your mixed dough in the oiled bin

Then, you will make flaps (so fold the dough on itself)

Well, there I show you the process with one hand (and I can assure you that it is not easy... 😬)

Step 5 : Protect the dough by covering it with a plasticized film. Like here👇

Then, let it rest for 30 minutes at room temperature. And what can you do in the meantime ? Well : dishes, friends ! Go, go, go ! After 30 minutes, if the dough seems too soft, redo a flap. Then let the dough rest for 60 minutes.

Step 6 : After all this waiting time, take a cooking hob, lay a sheet of baking paper, then... oil it (Not too much, otherwise it will no longer be a sheet of baking paper, but a sheet of wallpaper to stick to the wall.) (Don’t do that either.)

After, spread the dough on the cooking hob. Then, cover it with a plasticized film. After that, you’ll let it swell for an hour and a half. (It will not swell much, do not expect to see a pillow on the cooking hob)

Step 7 : (I hope you have not thrown away or put away the olive oil, because you will still need it.) Preheat your oven to 250 degrees. In a small container, pour a little olive oil, and dip your fingertips into it to make small holes in the dough, as you see here.

The filling can be according to your preferences, for my part, I put ratatouille, mozarella, eggs (because not enough mozarella), black olives and herbs (oregano and thyme).

Then put your foccacia in the oven, then lower the temperature to 240 degrees. Cooking time varies depending on the oven, but usually cooking is 17 to 20 minutes. And voilà !

Enjoy your meal !

[weirdnessxmagnet]

Honey Cakes and Wine

Antonia could have offered the finest cakes, made with the softest most refined flour, beaten to perfection in her stand-mixer and leavened with the best modern raising agents. She would offer these things later, but technical perfection was not the purpose of this first offering.

Intention. Attention. Creation as an act of worship.

The work.

The time.

Wholemeal flour ground via hand-mill. Coarsely chopped nuts and dates. A little milk, plenty of honey, and hand-beaten eggs. Leavened with a sourdough yeast she'd been working on almost as long as the structure itself. A recipe as ancient as her oldest memories, from a time when these offerings might be made at a household shrine, with a drink offering poured out to The Queen of Heaven.

Before the statues were toppled, and the name Asherah struck from the record.

(The wine was bought, because there was no way to age a red well in under a year without some kind of cheating, and if she had to cheat that would defeat the purpose regardless, but the cake could carry tradition in every crumb.)

In the new garden stood what might have been called an eccentric gazebo by someone who didn't know better. White marble pillars wound with vines, topped by a pediment depicting gilded snakes and stars. The entrance steps were flanked by a pair of marble lionesses detailed in gold, the inner boundary of the structure lined by a narrow pool dotted with water lilies.

(The goddess was going to force her to move past her unfair prejudice towards the flower...)

The canopy was a myrtle tree, full grown despite its newness and all bloomed with red flowers despite the season, roots reaching down beneath the temple itself. The trunk's base was ringed in two feet of marble, decorated with carvings of lionesses, serpents, fruit and trees. It could perhaps serve as a bench for those sheltering inside.

Or perhaps an alter.

"Lady Asherah, Queen of Heaven, turn your eyes upon this house that I have built for you and dedicate to you alone. Hear the prayers that are offered to you, and accept the gifts here left for you. As a burned forest may rise again, let your name rise and power rise once more."

The cakes were laid on a cloth upon the alter. The wine was poured not into any traditional vessel, but into a mug. A mug stamped with the words;

I love how we don't have to say out loud that I'm your favourite Daughter-in-Law.

[fourmsandasilentq]

Merry Christmas! I tried to make Christmas trees and a snowflake on the bread I baked on Christmas Eve. I'm pretty pleased with the results. (Wholemeal-rye yeast loaf, 76% hydration - I'm not on the sourdough bandwagon yet...)

Plus, my brother got me two banneton for Christmas that I just unwrapped, so future loaves will be even prettier :)

[metabolic-balance]

Sourdough Rye Bread

For all do-it-yourselfers among you … or if you like a challenge: our recipe for the 3-phase wholemeal rye bread with natural sourdough.Ingredients for one loaf (weighing 1kg) or 2 loaves (weighing 500g):400 g wholemeal rye flour400 g rye flourapprox. 500 ml lukewarm waterapprox. 2 tbsp. inoculated sourdough (available at the health food store)15 g sea salt1 tsp. agave syrup…

[books-bread-and-brigandage]

May as well start this with this

This year I decided to make an effort to do more things I like, and one of those was to get back into making sourdough with a more robust, better winter adapted, starter. So for any one who cares and the rest ofyou who might regret following me heres a 'how it started/how its going' of the Grain Area (aka Wheat F*cker) the culture I started on the morning of 1st Jan 2025, pictures taken imedately after a feed of 50g half white half wholemeal flour, and 12 hours later.

Unfortunately owing to the miserable cold so far all Ive been making is sourdough discard pancakes, and its had some surface mold Ive had to cull, but I am hoping if I stir more between feeds I might beable to avoid that. It is the first culture I have had that has actually doubled between feeds though, so I have high hopes when the weather warms up.

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

GLUTEN FREE BREAD THOUGHTS

hello fellow non gluten eaters! prompted by @ghostcrows 's complaints about how bad GF bread is, here are some of my thoughts on some of the ones I've tried (in a somewhat chronological order)! This is mostly stuff in Australia - others, especially in other countries, please feel free to contribute!

Brand: Country Life Availability: Used to be everywhere but has since disappeared - the recipes may now be under a different TipTop brand? Thoughts: This stuff was pretty garbage. It tasted like sweetened cardboard, and had a texture similar to that packing foam you'll see in hard cases for electronics. The loaf was also physically rather smaller than normal bread - sliced cheese/meats would always stick out the sides. I ate the one called something like "harvest seeds and grains" for quite a while because it was the best I could find - but it wasn't great. They dealt particularly badly with liquid - especially the plain white one! I discovered this on a school camp, where the beetroot on my burger caused the bread to rapidly disintegrate.

Brand: Helga's Availability: Pretty much always there Thoughts: They taste of SOMETHING, and it isn't cardboard or plastic; and they seem like they'd be very nutritious. Unfortunately, I've always found them to be VERY dense - and I'm not particularly a fan of the taste. I'll admit I haven't had their bread in a while - I still have it occasionally, but only if other brands are out of stock - and their recipes may have improved since then. I preferred Mixed Grain for sandwiches, but it's less good for toast.

Brand: Abbott's Bakery Availability: Most places, but not always in stock Thoughts: When I first tried their offerings around 2016, I went "OH MY GOOD ITS PROPERLY SQUISHY, how does this not have gluten?". They're also probably the closest in size/shape to your average glutenous bread that I've seen. My usual bread since then has been their Soy and Linseed, which I reckon is best texturally. Rustic White is a little too soft for me; but Farmhouse Wholemeal is better. Mixed Seeds is weird texturally - the centre of each slice is fine; but it's like the edges have gone ever-so-slightly stale or something - the Face of the Slice is a definite and identifiable texture; which makes for decent toast but WIERD sandwiches. Recently they've come out with a sourdough option as well; which TASTES LIKE SOURDOUGH if you're a toast person, but I still prefer soylin for sandwiches.

Brand: Deeks Health Foods Availability: Never seen it in-store, but a bunch of cafes/caterers etc use it Thoughts: Most of their offerings I've had taste pretty good (if a little sweet), but they're VEEERY crumbly on the texture front - the crust breaks off and then the rest starts to disintegrate. In addition, not all of their products are nut free - I think the only time I've seen "gluten free bread" with almond meal, it was theirs. I'm fairly lax about my nut allergies; because they've never got anywhere near anaphylaxis and it's mostly just peanuts and pine nuts I react to - but a reminder to the rest of y'all to ASK IF THE GF BREAD HAS NUTS! You may also need to prompt them to check for nut meal, not just whole nuts - and/or remind them that you're also asking about almonds; so they don't just scan the list for the word "nut".

Brand: Coles Free From Availability: Coles Thoughts: When I last tried their loaf it was garbage, but that was quite a while ago. However, their GF Ciabatta and Turkish (that you're supposed to warm in the oven for a few minutes) are both excellent - chewy and tasty!

Brand: Schär Availability: Some IGAs, ALDI. Overseas I've seen them at ALDI (aka HOFER), Billa, SPAR, and Conad. Thoughts: Their taste and texture are both excellent. However, they're often the most expensive option here in Aus, and the loaf is physically small (noticeable sliced cheese/meat overhangs). In addition, the ends of the loaf are usually at least 1.5x as thick as the other slices. I've most often seen them here with packaging in German, but also occasionally in Italian. Their "Classic" is a little sweet but definitely the best white bread I've had; their "Vital" is an EXCELLENT dark grainy sourdough sorta thing. I also tried their "Cereale" in Europe, which was good but I haven't seen in Australia; and both sorts of their Ciabatta (which were AMAZING.)

Brand: [Venerdi] Gluten Freedom Availability: Recently turned up in my IGA, quite a few cafes; and I think I've had one of their rolls on a plane out of Sydney? Thoughts: I'm not sure which one of their breads I tried, but I found it waay too sweet (though a good texture). However, their burger buns (I think I'm having their Sweet Potato Sourdough Buns?) are ABSOLUTELY BLOODY AMAZING. They Do taste of sourdough, they're not revoltingly sweet, they don't disintegrate with beetroot juice, and the texture is Perfect. The cafe closest to mum's work makes a bacon and egg roll using them that (as well as being delicious) sent me to Instant Texture Heaven - I like them dangerously much for how close that cafe is to uni!

Brand: Woolworths Free from Gluten Availability: Woolworths Thoughts: It's been a little while since I had any of their offerings, but I found their loaf comparable to Coles or Country Life (i.e. bad); and their rolls/buns/etc were both too sweet and too squishy for me. In their defense, however; the Woolworths GF biscuit range have the best texture I've tried. Their scotch fingers taste a little weird (chickpea flour, methinks), but they're SO much less crumbly that I actually prefer them to the Arnotts GF version (and I even think they're closer to the Arnotts non-GF ones!)

Brand: BFree Availability: Woolies and IGA but not Coles? Thoughts: I've only tried their bread once while visiting someone else - my impression was "not bad but not worth switching to". If I recall correctly, the one I tried had similar taste to Helga's Multigrain but with a squishier texture. I've also tried some of their wraps - they didn't taste that great (very buckwheat heavy? not sure - kinda how I'd imagine stone tastes) and they weren't noticeably more flexible than anything else I've had. I've heard their pita bread is good, though.

There are a few more I've had in cafes or that other people have bought me - but I either don't know the brands or can't remember the brands right now. Hope someone finds this useful!

[cookwithcheffrancis]

WHOLE WHEAT BREAD WITH WALNUTS|WHOLEMEAL BREAD|NO KNEAD BREAD|ARTISAN BR...

[german-sourdough-hk]

Flaxseed Sourdough made of SFB, sea salt, soaked flaxseed meal, SFB- Levito Madre preferment, wholemeal wheat- rye sourdough preferment and last but not least water.