For all interested in cheesemaking at home, I've found a very nice site:

http://www.foodsci.uoguelph.ca/dairyedu/cheese2.html


And they're offering a 5-day intro course in two weeks over at Guelph.... I'm thinking, I'm thinking...

Geo

For those still following this thread, here are the photos of the bagels.

First, here is my starter. I no longer use commerical yeast in any of my breads or pizzas. This particular starter is from a 150 year-old bakery outside of Paris. It has a great flavor with almost no sourness. I fed it about 3 hours before taking this shot:



The other ingredients:




Here is the dough being kneaded in my fork mixer. This is a VERY stiff dough - impossible to knead by hand and would probably burn out my KA stand mixer in a minute:



Bagels shaped and ready to go to sleep for a few days:



Bagels covered with plastic T-Shirt bags and placed in refrigerator"



Bagels are boiled for about 30-40 seconds before baking:



Bagels a few minutes after being placed in oven - note shine:



Close-up of finished bagel:



Open wide!



Bill/SFNM

Oh my!

What stand mixer do you use? Hobart? I vaguely recall a thread mentioning the KA ones (non professional line) came with plastic gears.

Do you keep your starter(s) fairly dormant by refrigeration?

Thanks!

sazerac wrote:What stand mixer do you use? Hobart? I vaguely recall a thread mentioning the KA ones (non professional line) came with plastic gears.

Do you keep your starter(s) fairly dormant by refrigeration?

sazerac,

I use a Santos fork mixer from France. Not only is it sturdy enough to stand up to the strongest dough, but the fork action which laminates layer over layer produces superior results for all kinds of bread. You will see fork mixers in bakeries all over France and in most Neapolitan pizzerias. I have a KA Artisan and use the whisk, beater, and meat grinding attachments frequently, but the bread hook doesn't provide the right action for many of my doughs. I believe that plastic gears were used for a few years and were discontinued due to numerous failures. Some of the newer KA models have a spiral dough hook instead of the older c-shaped hook.

I currently have 4 natural starters (soon to be 8) which I keep in the refrigerator. I rotate through them regularly and all seem ready to jump into action when needed. The oldest is about 10 years old.

Bill/SFNM