Breads of 2025

Happy New Year! Happy birthday week.

I’ve decided to start the year off by posting about bread rather than the other things happening that I will get to soon enough. It was an OK bread year but some great loaves were made.

The last loaf I made in 2025 was a repeated triumph over disaster adventure that I hope is the theme for 2026.

I mixed the dough on a Friday and put it in the fridge for a day long cold ferment. The next day (Saturday) I took if out to rise. It looks weird and continued to look weird throughout the day. Then I realized that I hadn’t put in the yeast. I wasn’t sure what to do. I ended up adding the yeast into the already mixed dough, kneading it some more and stuck it back in the fridge to see what happened.

The following day (Sunday) the bread still looked weird. I took it out to see if it would rise. It was out for several hours and there was no change in the dough. I put it back in the fridge for the yeast to continue its hydration (assuming that was the issue) and hoped for the best.

The day after that (Monday) the bread still looked weird (but less so) when I pulled it out of the fridge. It wasn’t looking great at first for the dough but then after some kneading and folding it came to life with the gluten forming and it started to rise.

It ended up being a pretty loaf. Not the prettiest load of the year (that was the late August loaf) but it was the tastiest by far. Those days of fermentation really made a difference.

May the triumph over disaster carry over through the year.

Here is a brief selection of some of the breads of the latter half of 2025. I haven’t included any of the focaccia made in 2025.