tekobo

Hi, I've got the spit and I think it is probably more flexible for different sizes of joints and chicken than a cradle would be.

That sounds really good. Keen to see pix when you get the chance.

Wot @jonj said. I tried all sorts of chemicals to get the marks off my dark grout and, in the end, I followed advice from Dennis on another thread which said to reapply the grout. I just used the grout straight from the tube, rubbed it over with my finger, waited for it to dry and rubbed the dried grout off the tiles. Very easy and it gets rid of those unsightly white marks.

Thinking that I could lay out on a shelf in the greenhouse in the summer and see how dry the chips get. No hurry, could wait a year if necessary. It's just a fun side project.

Hey there @coolpapabill. What happened with the soapstone? Did I miss the unveiling? I am very interested to hear how this worked out.

It must be that time of year. We just trimmed our apple trees and bought a small wood chipper. @Basher turned me on to potentially using home grown wood for smoking but I think he intended that the wood be kept for a while to dry out before chipping. Our chipper is designed to work on green wood so I am planning to chip and then dry. The sample chips we have made so far look just like normal wood chips that you would buy for smoking so I am hopeful that we will get a good outcome. I plan to use them in my smoke pot for low and slow. Like the others I use Lumberjack pellets in the Dennis smoker.

Superb all round @Pequod

I was interested in this when I looked at your spreadsheet Syzygies. I too have a spreadsheet and, because I am not yet varying recipes, it primarily exists to give me some sense of what time things will be done and to adjust if that looks like being the middle of the night. Since I learned about leaving dough overnight in the cellar at the bulk fermentation stage I have not worried so much about timings and stopped using the spreadsheet. What is interesting about your approach is that your long "in cellar" stage is the autolyse stage. Helpful to know because I have been going max 4 hrs on autolyse when, sometimes, it might have been convenient (and better) to let the autolyse run for longer say if my levain isn't quite where it should be. Maybe one day I will get to the stage of tweaking to compensate for the hydration levels in the levain but for now I will simply steal your recipe and see how it works for me. Thanks.

Yo @Lance. That is fighting talk! You and your grill had better live up to it when you get together. Have you a delivery date yet?

Lovely looking loaf @Pequod, raisin and all!

Hey Bruce. Shame about not getting to sail away into the sunset but glad you had fun anyway.

I just stopped work for a little while and stood at my kitchen counter to eat something that sounds disgusting but was delicious. A slice of seeded rye with marmalade and a tinned sardine on top. Great combo. I used this combination of clear plastic container and sieve. Soaked the grain for 6 hours to start with, drained and then rehydrated for a minute or so twice a day, drained and tipped the drained grain into the plastic container. Left container on kitchen counter. Did this for three days and then made the bread. The maths was fun. Weight of dry grain was said to increase by 65% so I stood in kitchen trying to figure out what to ask Alexa to calculate. End weight divided by 1.65 was my solution and, on that basis, there wasn't much wasted at the end. I couldn't quite bring myself to use the remaining sprouted rye in salad, smelled just a little too funky for me Funny. I felt grown up, branching out from making standard boules to using a loaf "tin" instead. The silicone form couldn't quite cope with the bulk and bulged out at the side a little. I am planning on my next loaf, using buckwheat. The recipes are from the Tartine No 3 book and the rye loaf is called Rene's rye.

Finally! These rye loaves were made of equal proportions of flour and a mix of sprouted rye grain and seeds with a very small amount of malt extract and lots of water. Simply delicious.

What's the story with the Trimaran Bruce? Sounds like huge fun to get to build and go out in your own boat.

I was hoping this thread would encourage some other photographic contributions. Obviously I don't qualify as I wasn't old enough to have a date in the seventies. 😅

Jump in, the water's great! Seeded breads are great and yours looks better than many of my attempts. I am about to try a sprouted rye with a whole bunch of seeds in. Hoping it works out better than my last attempt at a heavy rye bread - it was inedible.

Yeah. The Husband calls Brussel sprouts "fart bombs" and refuses to eat them. I once scared a man in the supermarket by saying "my husband's away", while lovingly packing Brussel sprouts into a bag for my dinner. He thought I was making a pass at him and shot away, like a scalded cat. Thanks for your cabbage technique. Like you, no cabbage cook is quite the same and I wondered how you did yours. I have some fab cane and pepper vinegar that a friend brought back from the West Indies. Makes grilled cabbage very tasty indeed.

Awesome camping trip @ckreef. Did you sneak back home for a shower and other stuff? I love grilled cabbage. Care to share your recipe and process?

No guns here. Although my old dad just told me about the gun his American friend gave him when he visited him in Nigeria recently. Dad thinks I should be reassured by the fact that he practised on a firing range with a family friend. I reminded him that was over 55 years ago. Hmmm. What I have done is disobeyed @Pequod's advice about not chasing high hydration in my doughs. Step away from the water he said. Learn to handle your dough better. Well, I had this 60% kamut dough and the Tartine folk said that they push the hydration over 90%. So....I held my breath and dove in.

I have a Spanish friend who cooks great paella on his BGE. When this lockdown is over I am going to get a tutorial off him. A little less scary than wok cooking and I think the KK enclosed cooking environment should make v good paella.

Did lots of smoking yesterday. Lamb shoulder in one KK, pheasant breasts for the neighbour in the other followed by a pork "hand" which I marinaded in jerk spices and rum. Yum. Here is the lamb. Having been rude about air fryers, I bought one with some store vouchers that we had and am very impressed. I am also very happy to report that I have subverted the low fat premise of an air fryer. Here I give you brat kartoffeln with lots of butter. Yum

Loving your plants @Troble and your vegetable boxes are giving me ideas about what I can do in my home garden. Looks like you are going to have lots and lots of fun!

Run while you can, sweet child. I was once like you. I made jokes and mocked the Mockmillers. Bread came from the Czech couple down the road who have built up a fabulous bakery and business and our guest flours came in the form of einkorn loaves from our monthly farmer's market. And now? I am a bread obsessive, finding people to foist my bread onto so that I can make more, ever more, in the search for that elusive, perfect loaf. Run, run, run!

I use mine all the time as a heat deflector. I wrap the tray in foil and add water to reduce the smoke from drippings that might otherwise burn off. Were the holes to stop warping or to diffuse rather than deflect the heat? I have had no problems with warping, even when the dish was placed directly on the bars of the fire basket. Anyway, have fun with your new to you toy.

The look is sometimes disappointing but home made bread (almost) always tastes great. Einkorn loaf and mussels made for a simple, tasty lunch yesterday.