Pumpernickel, Day 39-41

Well, I had a three day weekend after working Sunday, so I figured I would try baking the pumpernickel.  Success was mixed; I've determined that I need

• a wetter dough
• a stronger sourdough starter
• a warmer sourdough fermenting spot

That said, the crock-pot-baked loaf turned out... sort of.  The kind of weak sourdough starter left a bit to be desired on the flavor side.

For the oven, I got a large roasting pan to go under the loaf pan and hold the water.  It held enough for about 12 hours of baking at a time.

Oven set-up

The crock-pot setup was easier, since the pan could just sit in the water in the pot, and the crock-pot timer will

Crock-pot set-up

The oven loaf, despite the steam baking, dried out.  (Edited to add:  My husband is thrilled to have his very own loaf of Pratchett-style dwarf bread.)  I need a wetter dough and probably to lower the baking temperature more.  The crock-pot loaf stayed moist, but like I said before, with the relatively weak sourdough, the flavor isn't there yet.

Oven-baked vs. Crockpot-baked

 The texture wasn't terrible, though, and I got a decent color out of it.

I've been playing with the calculators over on Samartha's site, so hopefully between that and a better scale, round 2 will go better.  I may wait for warmer weather, though, when I can just grow the sourdough on the front porch and not have to worry about whether it's warm enough.

Oh, and my geranium is blooming again.  I got it in June 2009 at the SUNYLA conference, so it will be three years old sometime this year.  (I had pictures of it in the middle of all my pictures of the baking, so...)

The geranium I got at SUNYLA 2009.