My Cottage Bakery Diary

Dec 5, 2025 Probably the one thing I did right is to not try to make my Stollen yesterday at 4:30 pm. It would have run way into the evening and I didn’t have the energy to do it properly. Let’s see if we can make it perfect today!

Dec 4, 2025 The last 3 days have been challenging. The Rye Sourdough Sandwich didn’t rise as well as I liked, the Sourdough Sandwich didn’t rise well, and the crackers were less than stellar. The feelings of despondancy are tough to fight. My thinking is that you just have to go back to focus on one of the issues and study it. and try to isolate what it is that you are trying to do. Did the Country sourdough ferment too Fast in cold fermentation because my fridge wasn’t cold enough? Did I not have a good enough gluten structure? The sticky dough doesn’t do a window pane test very well. Does the cracker dough need more oil, to make it tender, more sesame seeds, , more salt?

Dec3, 2025 Snake in the Kitchen Yesterday was a wonderful day in that for the last few days I had a clogged kitchen sink that was very stubborn. I snaked it with a 6 foot snake, and no luck. Then I went to multiple vinegar, soda and boiling water, through the night, and the sink finally drained, but only a few quarts over several hours. That is a slow drain for sure. Then I got a 25 foot snake. 2 of them. I would keep one and if hte cheaper one worked I would take back the other. Cheaper one was missing a part so I went on the Habor Freight website and they told me to just get rid of it and they would return my money. The Kobalt snake is nice and worked really well but after 3 tries still no luck. I called Leo the next day wonering if he had any ideas and asking if the liquid Plumber route would be a good one. I hesitated to put any Sodium Hydroxide type chemical down the pipes as I read you can damage pipes and my garbage disposal also. So I had read on reddit over and over that the boiling water will soften the grease and then immediately after you pour that down, well give it a few minutes to soften the grease where the blockage is and then snake again. Surprised by Joy!!! Have you ever had that feeling like nothing is going to work? You are never going to solve an issue? The feeling of pouring water down that drain again for another bought of softening, and lo and behold! the water went all the way down. I didn’t believe it, so I tried it again and dang if it went down again. I once thought I had it but the boiling water just blew off the P neck and went into the bus tub underneath.

Nov 26, 2025
Bazaar Recap
A week has passed. The two Holiday Bazaars has Passed. Desert Casitas, was a hit and even got folks wanting to special order. Judy and Ollie did the Desert Green Bazaar and that went well also. The bakery goods pretty much sold out. Some of the take aways are; that I worried that nothing was moving and items were not getting any interest. The Rye Bread was concealed mostly in it’s nice packaging but you couldn’t see a loaf. I found that samples solved that issue. I sold out very quickly of the the Rye and Sandwich loaf. The cheese dip did wonders for selling the bread also.

The muffins through me for a loop because the apple spice muffins sold out quickly last time so I made extra. As Murphy ‘s Law would have it they sold the least. But with all the other’s gone they sold out as well. However they all sold eventually and didn’t get much push on the 2.00 price up from 1.50 on the last Bazaar.

Dec 1, 2025
Battling with a clogged drain. Sucks big time. I tried to snake it out and no luck. Made a better batch of crackers just needed salt.

Our Bazaar set up. The samples really helped sales. They loved th cheese dip.

Nov 15, 2025
I was so depsondent after baking some bricks of sourdough. I made some dough that almost broke my mixer, when I realized that my scale was broken. I could weigh things three times and never got the same reading.
I
I took a dough that was like taffy and added water and carefully hydrated it to a nice dough. I got some very nice loaves from it.
I have been battling over what I should bake the loaves in. I found a recipe online from “Little Spoon Farm” that used a pullman loaf pan and I really liked how it looked. I bout 2 online and I liked the result. I also cooked the Boule in my smaller Dutch Oven with great results.
Don’t give up when you screw up …You just may have created a winner.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nov 12, 2025

Great Luck with the German Sourdough Rye again
I am getting better at developing good gluten network through strain hardening, without breaking the gluten network like I was. I did a series of kneading on low on the KA mixer and then let it rest.

I mixed the dough with without the salt and oil till well mixed.
waited 10 minutes
Kneaded 5 minutes till gluten develops
Rested for 15 minutes
Kneaded again with salt and oil 5 min
Rest 15
Kneading again 5 min.
Rested 15
Shaped dough into a round loaf and placed in bratrform and let it rest overnight in fridge.
In the morning I let it rise 30-45 min. with light on in oven
Preheat to 475 on convection
Bake 30 min covered with a bowl of 12 ice thrown in
Bake for 30-40 min more at 375

Nov 15, 2025
Also I had great luck with the Sourdough crackers.
Just a bit of olive oil, a bit of dough and not too many sesame seeds on a thin layer spread way out, on a sheet pan.
Bake for 10 min at 350, score with a cookie roller or pasta roller and then bake another 15 min until they are brown and crispy.

Nov 10, 2025

Strain Hardening and not breaking the Gluten Development for the Rye Loaf

Had a wonderful discovery with strain hardening, which is developing strength in your gluten network to get a better rise on your loaf, and better oven spring.
I was overmixing the dough, more likely kneading the dough to rough on high in the mixer.
Here is a synopsis of Strain Hardening
“Strain Hardening in Bread Dough Development