Propolis honey from Trigona Stingless bees

Breakfast in  Bentong en-route to Raub - Coffee on brazier inside a quaint coffee shop

 Mao Shan Wang(Musang King) durian - So close and yet so far

 The durian plantation in Raub

 Young Musang King

 Trigona Stingless beehive

Sucking Propolis honey off the hive

Visit to Raub durian plantation

I came across these photos taken in May when I was in Kuala Lumpur to learn guitar making. This stirred up wonderful memories of the fantastic 2 weeks I spent up north. During a week end break, my host brought me to a durian plantation but unfortunately, the durians were still too young. They say that Musang King durians from Bentong/Raub area are the best in Malaysia. I was very, very disappointed that I was not able to feast on those beauties hanging from the branches. That is why I have been making up for lost opportunity now that the Musang King season is here now. It helps that I know a friendly durian seller near my work place. I was able to sate my insatiable appetite for the King of the King of Fruits.

We made a stop over in Bentong. I knew that this was a hot bed of CPM activities in the 50s/60s. I felt that I was transported into a time warp. The coffee shop still had coffee on a charcoal brazier. How rustic can it get.

When I was at the durian plantation, I learnt about tropical stingless Trigona bees and their miraculous Propolis honey. In the wild, they make their hives in hollow tree trunks. The enterprising bee-keepers cut the nest off the tree and placed boxes on the trunk. The bees will expand their hive in any hollow space. They seal the hive with bee resin called Propolis which has many medicinal properties. It is a natural antibiotic, antifungal agent. I had the opportunity to suck the Propolis honey off the hive.

Hybrid

Although the Tartine country loaf is a very nice bread, the only problem with it is that it requires the baker to be at home the whole day. The three hour bulk fermentation with stretch and folds every 30 minute and the final proof of 2-3 hours leaves you stranded at home.

To overcome this little problem especially for those who have to go out and make a living, I came up with a work-around so that I can still bake something similar when I get home from work.

This bread uses a ripe starter as flavoring agent but uses commercial yeast to boost leavening. Nothing original about this as many people do that(and get flamed by sourdough purists). In the morning before work, I feed the starter with 100g of flour and water. This will yield 200g of ripe starter when I return from work. I usually feed my culture with whole-wheat flour. This will form the 10% whole-wheat component called for in the Tartine recipe.

The main dough is just 900g of type 55 flour. As the starter is100% hydration, the amount of water to be added is 650g. This makes it a 75% hydration bread. The formula calls for 2 teaspoons of dry instant yeast and 3 teaspoons of sea salt. Oil is optional but recently I am starting to favor adding some oil into the dough. This helps to mitigate crust deterioration in the tropics where I live. Without the oil, the crunchy crust deteriorates into elephant hide. With the oil, the toughness is reduced. Of course all these problems can be eliminated with a bit of refreshing in the oven before consumption.

With the aid of the commercial yeast, the bulk fermentation is just 2 hours. The final proof is 1 hour. In this way, the bread can be completed in the evening when I am at home. The baking is done in a dutch oven for best results. The result is very similar to the Tartine country bread.

Finally looking like the Tartine Country Loaf

I decided to give the Tartine one more shot and it turned out very well. Not so for the 100% WW loaves which had to wait for their turn in the oven. They were slightly over-proofed by the time I loaded them in . I did the two loaves to see how the Tartine process work with 100%WW since I have plenty of the flour on hand. Having done them, I can see that with proper proofing times, they should turn out equally well. That's a project that I will do in the near future.

Since the cast iron pot worked well, I took out another, clay pot which I got from IKEA years ago to try. It worked equally well. I got beautifully opened ears this time round and my wife took out the Tartine book to compare after I told her about the results of the bake.

One loaf will be going to my favorite Durian seller who sold me 3 enormous Musang King Durians at an incredibly low price.

Starting to look like Tartine

The weekend is here. I was waiting for the weekend to come to try out the dutch oven method advocated in Chad Robertson's book. I took out the sourdough culture from the fridge to feed it on Thursday. On Friday evening, I fed it one more time. As I will be using 200g of the 100% hydration starter, I fed the culture in that proportion.

By Saturday morning, it had nicely more than doubled. The recipe called for 900g of White flour and 100g of Wholewheat flour. Chad's baker's percentage uses the European method. This has created a bit of controversy in The Fresh Loaf forum with people criticizing him for making such a fundamental 'mistake'.

The US method of baker's percentages is based strictly on the TOTAL amount of flour that will be used in the dough, including the starter. The European method computes the starter as a separate ingredient, the amount of which is stated as a percentage of the flour used in the main dough. It is simply a matter of definition and the difference is purely cultural.

After the 3 hour Stretch and Fold thing, the dough was doubled and bubbly. Since my cast iron pot is oval in shape, I shaped the loaf as a batard. The other was shaped as a boule and baked free-form. I got much better results today. My only regret was in over-flouring the cloth. The loaf from the pot had volume and a nice ear. The boule turned out not too badly also.

When I cut the bread, I was quite happy with the crumb. I buttered a small piece for my wife to try and she remarked that it had excellent flavor. What more can I ask for.

Tartine

My attempt at the Tartine loaf was not successful. Athough the bread was very delicious, it did not resemble the original Tartine bread in any way. The process was the same although the ambient temperature may be slightly different. I used a flour quite similar to T55 but as I had run out of WW flour, I make do with some Atta that I had on hand. This Atta had more of the bran sifted out so it looked almost like white flour. However, the main difference was the method of baking.

The method recommended by Chad was to bake the bread in a Dutch oven and perhaps I will try that in my next attempt. Meanwhile I console myself with my version of the ultimate Kaya Toast, made with homemade Tartine sourdough bread, homemade kaya, chunks of French Normandy butter and home-roasted Sulawesi Toroja coffee.

Kaya

Ingredients
Coconut milk 100%
Palm Sugar    33-50% depending on your sweet tooth. (Gula Melaka is fine but I find it too overpowering so less is more. A mix of Gula Melaka and plain sugar might work well)
Egg yolks       50 %
Pandan leaves to flavor
Dash of sea salt
Method.
1. Caramelise the palm sugar in a heavy bottom pot together with the Pandan leaves. This will infuse the sugar with the Pandan flavor.
2. Add the coconut milk and stir.
3. Stir until all the sugar has been dissolved.
4. Remove the Pandan leaves.
5. Spoon the coconut-sugar mixture into the eggs slowly and stir.
6. When half of the coconut milk-sugar has been added, add the Sugar-milk-eggs mixture back into the remaining coconut-sugar mixture.
7. Heat the Kaya mixture in a double boiler, stirring continuously.
8. Stop when the mixture has thicken.


Making Kaya is not difficult. However, some precautions must be taken to make it successfully. Kaya is a form of custard and to make a smooth custard, the eggs must be tempered. Otherwise, adding the eggs to the hot coconut milk-sugar mixture will scramble the eggs. Personally, I prefer some whites with the egg yolks as this will give the kaya some texture. With less whites, the kaya is too smooth and is more like a paste. The mixture is best cooked in a double boiler as excessive heat will transform the proteins into a tight ball. This is the classic sandy texture of Kaya Fail. Using a blender to rectify coarse Kaya texture is also Kaya Fail in my opinion.

For my bake this week, I tried out a new malt bought by my wife. The smell of the bread was good when it came out of the oven and I am looking forward to tea time for my kaya toast.