Dave and I are getting really excited about our new “grown-up” kitchen. The oven will even have a proofing mode – not that we need it too much here where the weather is always good for proofing dough, but still… Demolition begins on Nov. 26 and the work should be done within two weeks. From start (securing a loan) to finish we’ll have remodeled our kitchen in a month, for a lot less than the kitchen designers tell you it will cost. It’s as bad as the wedding industry. Another cabinet door fell off its hinges today, so we just took it off entirely. We’re kind-of celebrating how trashy it is right now because we know an end is finally in sight! Even Sammy is talking about “neewwwww cabinets.”

Today I decided to tackle the baguette once again. You really have to be in the mood for it. My starter seems to have recovered from my 6-week absence (Dave didn’t feed it) and dough is rising well again and regaining some taste. So it seemed a good time to craft the tricky little breads again. After a good rise and shaping, we had some trouble scoring the bread. Even Dave tried to help me. The lame wasn’t sharp enough. It just dragged the dough even though this time I put oil on the blade. In the past I’d retarded the bread overnight in the fridge and scored while it was still rather cool after proofing. This makes the bread more taught. In Washington, the kitchen was never more than 78 degrees as well and here it’s often 85, so the dough is bound to be more slack. Good for proofing, not so good for scoring. Oh well. It still had decent oven spring and certainly tasted good. The crust was crunchy, the crumb was chewy with nice irregular holes. Next time we’ll use a new razor blade and see if that helps.