Alderpost Bakehouse

The standing list

Six loaves, and the reasons for each.

Weights are after the bake, so they are honest. Prices have not moved since the spring and will move when the grain price does, not before.

Country wheat

$9.00

The loaf we would be judged on. Hard red wheat milled Monday, sifted to about 85%, with enough whole rye to keep the fermentation lively. Open crumb, thick blistered crust, sour but not aggressively so.

  • 1.10 kg baked weight
  • 78% hydration
  • 24 h cold retard
  • Tue–Sat
  • Wheat, rye

Seeded spelt

$10.50

Whole spelt with flax and sunflower soaked overnight in the water they will bake in. Softer and nuttier than the country loaf; it goes stale a day sooner, which is the price of the oil in the seed.

  • 0.95 kg baked weight
  • 82% hydration
  • Seeds soaked 12 h
  • Wed, Sat
  • Spelt, flax, sunflower

Borodinsky rye

$11.00

Tin loaf, all whole rye, scalded with red malt and coriander. Dense, dark and faintly sweet. We do not sell it the day it is baked — it needs a full day to set, and cutting it warm ruins the slice.

  • 1.00 kg baked weight
  • 92% hydration
  • 90 min bake
  • Fri, Sat (baked Thursday)
  • Rye, coriander

Olive and fennel

$11.00

Country dough with durum for colour, folded through with brined Kalamata and fennel seed toasted that morning. The olives make the crumb wetter, so it is baked four minutes longer and comes out nearly black at the ears.

  • 1.00 kg baked weight
  • 76% hydration
  • Durum 15%
  • Fri, Sat
  • Wheat, durum

Milk bun, six

$8.00

The one enriched thing we make, for the sandwich shop two doors down and for anyone who asks. Scalded flour paste in the dough keeps them soft for three days without anything else being done to them.

  • 85 g each
  • Yudane method
  • Butter, milk, egg wash
  • Sat only
  • Wheat, milk, egg

Bakehouse half

$5.00

Half a country loaf, cut on the bench and wrapped. It exists because a full loaf is too much bread for one person and stale bread is a waste of a night's work.

  • 0.55 kg
  • Cut to order
  • From 11:00
  • Tue–Sat
  • Wheat, rye

Keeping it

Cut side down on a board, cloth over the top, out of the paper bag. Not in the refrigerator, which stales bread faster than the counter does. The country loaf is at its best on day two and good toasted until day five; the rye improves for three days and then holds for a week.

To freeze it, slice first and freeze the slices flat. A whole loaf thawed from frozen is a different and sadder object.

Bread that has gone past toasting is worth more as crumbs than as guilt. We take back any loaf from the same week for store credit and it goes into the crumb bin for the ice cream place on Vestry Street.