Organic beauty.

Meteil rye sourdough.  I constantly experiment with rye.  It’s such a satisfying and challenging medium!  During fermentation, it puts out an absolutely lovely, strong aroma of apples and honey.

Since there is no gluten in rye flour, to get sufficient volume, bakers combine it with variable percentages of strong wheat flour, making a méteil (sort of a mulatto).  Here I have 40% rye, and I like what I am seeing.

Pumpkin seed sourdough is one of our favorites.

Pumpkin seed bread

A fresh lot of baguettes tradition.  Now it’s time for breakfast.

The spectacular alvéolage is the mark of a superlative French baguette.  The big shiny holes distributed equally throughout the volume of the baguette owe a lot to the quality of the flour, to perfectly timed mixing, the high hydration (73-76), but also to the expert handling of the baker.  It’s a skill that requires months of practice.

With a sure hand and a pair of scissors, Guy makes the characteristic cuts of an épi baguette.

The hearty crust of country rye bread cracks open in beautiful patterns when the dough rises under the intense heat of the hearth.  Bakers probably understand Earth’s crust like no other.

<added Mar 15> It just occured to me that when I scheduled this photo for publication I had no clue that precisely on 03/11 Japan was going to be hit by the worst earthquake in recorded history.