Thursday, February 15, 2007

Baking Day....

I baked enough bread to freeze this time (I hope!). I have been experimenting with all the different grain mixtures to see which ones taste the best, which ones rise the best, and which ones hold up to slicing for sandwiches. These all have different ratios of Barley, Quinoa, Oatmeal, Millet, Wheat, Rye, Wheatberries, Spelt, and unbleached white flour. Some were soaked in buttermilk, some in yoghurt, and a couple are sourdough. My new little mill got a work out. And as they baked today, the smell was wonderful....very yeasty and grassy...

Photo-wise I was experimenting with LT exposures to show off all the textures.

The kids also took lots of pictures today. I will post them on Musings. Thursday seems to have officially become their unoffical photography day. :)

11 comments:

Colleen said...

Mmmm....I wanna come over and enjoy a slice of warm bread with you! I love the "rustic" look to this picture. What does LT mean, though?

Sandie said...

LT means long time exposure. If you click on the picture and make it bigger you can see almost every individual grain because the shutter was open long enough for the light to impart more details. I could explain it MUCH better if we were talking about actual film....I found out I had this option by playing with the menu button on my camera. I had the camera for almost 3 years, but just recently found the option.

Sandie said...

I also meant to say your welcome to come over anytime and I will have fresh warm bread waiting for you!

Dancingirl said...

There's not much I enjoy eating more than warm bread. What is the basket sitting on? It does look homey and rustic. Going to click on the photo to make it bigger

SUSAN said...

Oh my....those breads looks and sound delicious! Did you start baking at the crack of dawn? I'm impressed!!

The photo is lovely too....very homey!

Susan

Sandie said...

Becky, the basket is sitting on a trivet that is ringed with small twigs.

Susan, the buttermilk and yoghurt breads soak for 24 hours before the real bread making begins. So I started at dawn a couple days ago :) The sourdough took 7 days and I messed up my starter so I have to start that all over again. Emily and I started working on the breads about 9am and I took the last batch out of the oven at 5:30 pm. All total I ended up with two savory yoghurt herb rye loaves, two mostly quinoa sourdoughs rounds, four mult-grain buttermilk yeast rounds, 48 'sweet' spiced yogurt muffins, 48 oatmeal pecan raisin maple rolls, and two mostly whole wheat yeast loaves. What is in the basket is just a small sampling of what is in the kitchen waiting to be frozen.

Ampersand said...

Wow, in the larger view, the textures of the bread are just amazing.

Dalissa 365 said...

That's some nice looking bread... send some my way... or you could just email me a few recipes.

Colleen said...

Wow, Sandie! After I read your reply to me I did look at this, enlarged, and you weren't kidding; every grain really *is* visible! I'm not sure when it's appropriate to use long time exposure, but maybe between now and the end of this project I'll figure out that aspect of my own camera. Just maybe. ;-)

Anonymous said...

They are beautiful and they look yummy! Share recipes?

Jeff Reeder said...

I know I am a few days behind here, but LT exposure will let you have more detail because it allows your aperature to be smaller, thus giving you more in focus. The rules for film go for digital as well. Your camera just does it's best to let in the proper amount of light to give the best exposure. If the shutter speed is longer, the aperature can be smaller. If the shutter speed needs to be fast, to freeze action, the aperature has to be wide to let in more light, faster. This also creates a narrow depth of field. if you use LT, or bulb exposure settings you need to have your camera very still or on a tripod....depending on how much light you have to work with. Sorry, I felt like blabbing.Hopefully my babbleing is somewhat helpful.